From Vladivostok to Kaliningrad, protests over the imprisonment of Alexei Navalny are stirring Russia • The Kremlin reacts with extraordinary violence, fueling a pre-revolutionary atmosphere, even if there is no revolution on the horizon
Protest suppression is expected to escalate in the coming weeks.
A parade of demonstrators in central Moscow, this week
Photography:
Photo: AFP
Only a few minutes passed from the moment the reading of the sentence in the case of Alexei Navalny in the Moscow court ended, and thousands of angry people took to the cold city streets.
They shouted "Putin - thief!", Called for the release of the opposition and responded with the sirens of thousands of drivers who were still filling the boulevards of the Russian capital in the evening.
"I do not even have words in Russian to describe how I feel," said one of the protesters on a live channel of the independent channel Dodge. I was also very scared when I went out, but when I saw the crowds, I realized that there was a chance. "
St. Petersburg also spontaneously went out to protest against the opposition's sentence, but even there the masses were dispersed by the riot police, who used batons and electric weapons against anyone who happened to be in their way.
Someone gave the order to clean the city centers - and the mission was completed "successfully", with more than 1,000 detainees and detainees.
But the battle in Russia, which until recently seemed so stable to the Israeli spectator, is just beginning.
The man who has become a symbol
for almost three weeks, since Nabalani returned to Russia from rehabilitation in Germany and was arrested at the Sheremetyevo airport, Russia takes to the streets.
Poisoning through Nobitz'ok, Russian Shin Bet agents apply on August underpants, shocked even those who were not his supporters survival and restoration amazed many others; and shirking responsibility and spreading the Kremlin lies the harpist took tranquility anyone with a little honesty.
But when he decided to return For Russia, though it was clear to him what awaited him, Navalny became an iconic figure, a living symbol.A man who survived death is willing to throw up a glove in front of a regime with unlimited means? The permissible threshold, after all, is a character who should have had almost mythical dimensions. Navalny managed to get into these shoes.
Why did he return to Russia at all?
I found myself in Germany, because I was transferred to her in the resuscitation box after they tried to kill me ... Russia is my country, and Moscow is my city, and I miss them. " If he stays in Germany, he will slowly become another commentator on Russian affairs. And in any case, if they still want to get rid of him, there is no reason to assume that they will not reach him outside Russia as well.
"Vladimir
Pants Poison" The Kremlin, who could not admit to the assassination and certainly did not accept responsibility, arrested him in order to keep him out of the public arena. (And Russia even paid him compensation for that.) Nabalani was required to report for registration until 2019, but the probationary period was extended by another year to maintain the pressure lever. On probation.
"The main point of this proceeding is not how it will end - if they are imprisoned a
And if not;
The main thing - to frighten masses of people, "Navalny said before the sentencing," Now everyone knows that Putin is simply a clerk, who happened to be promoted to the presidency ... and his only way (to deal with political opponents) is assassinations.
No matter how much he tries to describe himself as some great statesman, he will go down in history as poisonous.
"Alexander was the liberator, there was the wise Jaroslav - and Vladimir would be the underwear poisoner."
Nabalani in court, this week // Photo: Reuters
Now the question is what will happen with the protest. There is no room for far-reaching announcements, but it is also impossible to miss that something deep is moving from its place in Russia. Over the past two weekends, hundreds of thousands of civilians have marched from Vladivostok in the Far East to Kaliningrad on the shores of the Baltic Sea. Demonstrations in favor of Navalny also took place outside Russia, including in front of the embassy in Tel Aviv.
Another important issue in the Nabalani protest is the intergenerational issue. According to anthropologist Alexandra Archipova and her scientific team, about 40 percent of protesters in Moscow and St. Petersburg are 25-35 years old. These are young people who on the one hand have not lived under any other leader except Putin, and on the other hand are also the most Western generation that has been in Russia; The USSR - whose disintegration was a disaster for Putin - is not even a vague memory for them. They know it is possible to live differently, and freedom is a value worth fighting for. The
government incites and exterminates
this one of the reasons . another reason is that his trial revealed many of which country they live - like Kafka's stories, they all basically Cbr-morsaim potential. all that remains is to sew a bag and initiate the procedure only resemble a fair trial, to keep the deceptive facade of legality for supporters of the regime.
at the same time The Kremlin gambled on immediate repression, escalating from demonstration to demonstration, while carrying out wholesale restraining orders and incessant propaganda on television and social media. It
is doubtful whether the regime can do otherwise, "Siloviki", the security authorities - is the source of his weakness. When the management of the incident was shifted from the political-administrative field to the security authorities, the road to violence was paved. Another reason is constant paranoia about foreign moles and interventions in Russia In the laws echo Reconciliations obtained two months ago, according to which any civilian body - if not a proxy of the Kremlin - is in fact a foreign agent. In these figures, anyone with power in his hands is trying to prove loyalty.
What does all this mean? Demonstrations in favor of Nabalani will likely continue in the coming weeks, with the extremes of repression. This means that a pre-revolutionary atmosphere is emerging in Russia, even if there is no revolution on the horizon. On the other hand, stability in Russia is often also a matter of optics. "Everything was forever, until it was no more," he crowned his book on the fall of the Soviet-Russian anthropologist Prof. Alexei Yurchek. It is not inconceivable that this will also be the script this time.
