WASHINGTON: Washington on Tuesday condemned the closure by Russia's Supreme Court of the prominent rights group Memorial International, calling it an "affront" to human rights.

"The persecution of International Memorial and Memorial Human Rights Center is an affront to their noble missions and to the cause of human rights everywhere," US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement, referring to the group's sister organization that also risks closure.

The decision, he added, "follows a year of rapidly shrinking space for independent civil society, media, and pro-democracy activists in Russia."