MOSCOW, December 20. /TASS/. The Russian Justice Ministry has asked the Moscow City Court to shut down the rights organization called the Moscow Helsinki Group, the court told TASS on Tuesday.

"The court has registered a lawsuit from the Russian Justice Ministry regarding liquidation of nongovernmental organizations. The defendant is the Moscow Helsinki Group. The date for the hearing hasn’t been set yet," the court representative said.

The human rights organization the Moscow Helsinki Group was established on May 12, 1976. Lyudmila Alexeyeva took helm of the organization in May 1996. She passed away on December 8, 2018. Following her demise, the group started to be run by three co-chairpersons instead of one. In January 2019 the following people were elected to these positions: Valery Borshchev, Vyacheslav Bakhmin and Dmitry Makarov.