A Moscow court sentenced Russian ornithologist Sofya Rozenfeld to 3.5 years in a penal colony on October 7 over two donations to the Anti-Corruption Foundation, Science reported, citing the independent Russian outlet Mediazona.
The payments totaled 2,000 rubles, about $27 at 2021 exchange rates. They were made in August and September 2021, after a Russian court had designated the foundation extremist. Rozenfeld told the court that recurring automatic payments continued while she was out of contact on a scientific expedition and that she canceled them after learning of the designation. She acknowledged making the transfers but denied intending to finance extremism, according to Current Time's account of Mediazona's court reporting.
A specialized Arctic research program
Rozenfeld is a senior researcher at the Russian Academy of Sciences' A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution and one of the country's leading specialists on Arctic waterfowl and their migration routes. Her work combines field observation, seaplane surveys and aerial photography to estimate bird populations and identify important stopover sites.
Didier Vangeluwe, an ornithologist at Belgium's Institute of Natural Sciences and Rozenfeld's longtime collaborator, told Science that their complementary skills supported a decade of joint expeditions. His expertise is in capturing and tagging birds, while hers is in field observation across the Russian High Arctic.
Their research has followed Bewick's swans that left from the same Arctic location but wintered as far apart as Greece and China. Science also reported that Rozenfeld helped establish collaborations with Chinese researchers to protect migratory birds, work that depends on understanding an animal's full route rather than studying it within a single country's borders.
Work interrupted by the sentence
Vangeluwe said he had been working with Rozenfeld as recently as the week before Science's October 13 report. They were finalizing a paper and a presentation for a November symposium in Germany. The study combines field observations with GPS tracking to identify where migrating waterfowl encounter spring hunting grounds, with the aim of informing hunting schedules that reduce risks to vulnerable birds.
University College Cork ornithologist John Quinn, who joined Rozenfeld on a 1996 expedition to Siberia's Taymyr Peninsula, described her to Science as one of the "go-to experts on the ecology of Arctic bird species." Vangeluwe said her geographic perspective and field methods are unusual within Russia.
Science reported that Rozenfeld's lawyers intend to appeal the sentence. She also holds Israeli citizenship, and her family has sought help from Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The ministry told the Israeli outlet Ynet that it was in contact with the family and Russian authorities about consular services.
