Ua long chain of measures against women: Putin’s Russia is making headlines for too many repressive measures that undermine their freedom and dignity. From impunity for rapists and perpetrators of feminicide if they go to fight in Ukraine to new rules to influence their reproductive life.
Impunity for rapists if soldiers go to Putin’s Russia
Among the criminals who became “heroes of the homeland” is Sergei Khadzhikurbanov, who seventeen years ago took part in the murder of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya. Sentenced to 20 years in prison, he received a pardon from President Vladimir Putin after fighting for six months in Ukraine.
Equally incredible was the confirmation of the release of Vladislav Kanyus, born in 1996, guilty of having brutally killed his ex-girlfriend Vera Pekhteleva. She had inflicted 111 stab wounds, raped her and finally strangled her with a wire. He was sentenced to 17 years in prison in 2022, I was released by decree of the President.
And the girl’s family, the activist said on Telegram Alena Popova, discovered that Kanyus was free from the web. In fact, his mother saw photos online of him wearing a camouflage suit and holding a weapon during a barbecue.
And how he was pardoned Nikolai Ogolobyakfound guilty of killing three girls and a boy aged between 15 and 16 and released 5 years early.
Such is the situation that even the worst Russian serial killer, Mikhail Popkov, 59 years old and serving two life sentences for killing a total of 86 women, can hope for release. He ran for Putin’s army in Ukraine at the beginning of the year.
From criminals to war heroes, passing through Putin’s pardon
How is it possible? He explains it the independent Russian site Meduza. On June 24, 2023, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a law on exemption from criminal responsibility for participants in the war against Ukraine. The criminals then have a further “criminal shield” which allows them, while serving their country in the army, to commit further crimes until the end of the conflict. As long as they don’t desert. The specific enlistment of rapists is not contemplated but is evidently a reality. And, as Ilya Politkovsky, son of Anna Politkovskaya, explained, the families obviously cannot contest the pardon in any way. In fact, they are not even aware of it.
«They shed their blood on the battlefield to atone for their crimes. They redeem themselves by shedding blood in the assault brigades, under the fire of bullets and bombings,” said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, explaining the pardon mechanism for aspiring war heroes.
Domestic violence in Russia
He described how much the condition of women, and the level of abuse against them, have worsened in an article on Barent Observer journalist Olesia Krivtsova. Men returning from war increasingly engage in domestic violence in their familiesin a climate of general impunity.
Sasha Scochilenko, sentenced to 7 years in prison for a hoax
One of the symbols of Putin’s anti-women policies is Aleksandra “Sasha” Skochilenko33 years old, sentenced a few days ago to 7 years in prison. I had replaced some price tags in a supermarket with leaflets containing messages against the war in Ukraine. On the tickets were written things like: «The Russian army bombed an art school in Mariupol where about 400 people were taking refuge from the bombing» and «Russian conscripts are sent to Ukraine: the lives of our children are the price of this war.” The of him is one of the cases of repression of freedom of expression to have attracted more attention in Russia in recent months.
«It just so happens that I you represent everything that Putin’s regime is so intolerant of: creativity, pacifism, LGBT, feminism, humanism and love for everything bright, ambiguous, unusual,” he wrote in a letter from the detention center. “I survived and grew despite and in spite of everything that was forced upon us here. Sooner or later what happened should have happened. But I believe that this is not the end, that I can do it, I will get out of this, I will survive, no matter how many years they put me in prison.”
Limitation of abortion
Another eloquent measure regarding respect for women’s rights in Russia, the limitation of access to abortion, a right acquired since 1920 (apart from the Stalinist regime). Among the measures on the table, the reduction of access to abortive drugs, the pressure on clinics to give up their license to proceed with the termination of pregnancies, the exclusion of abortions from compulsory medical insurance. The campaign is formally motivated by an attempt to address the demographic crisis and in which the Russian Orthodox Church, which has close ties to the Kremlin, plays a key role. Having “children, not a career” is the destiny of women. Pregnancy, explained Minister Mikhail Murashko, would be their “responsibility”.
At a time when over 100 thousand Russians were sent to die in war, the topic of abortion as corrective to the demographic crisis It seems quite specious. A way to distract public opinion from important things. There is a joke on the Russian Internet, linking the increase in anti-abortion rhetoric to the Kremlin’s desire to have more soldiers.
The Russian feminist movement against the war in Ukraine
On the other hand, since Russia launched the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, women have been at the forefront of Russian pacifist movement to break the “information blockade”. The poet is also among the leaders of the Feminist Anti-War Resistance (FAR) group Daria Serenko, included by the Russian Ministry of Justice on the list of “foreign agents”. And from the BBC in that of the most influential women of 2023. But, naturally, the media are also part of the ranks Pussy Riot.
But the women, mothers and wives of men at the front, took to the streets against President Vladimir Putin also to protest against the “illegal orders” given to their men.
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