In Russia, criticism of the ‘special military operation’ in Ukraine has been systematically suppressed. Demonstrations soon became one-man actions or covert expressions of protest on walls and in porches. Can local and regional elections on September 11 change that?
Stumbling and extremely tense, Ella Pamfilova sat opposite Vladimir Putin last Friday. In his residence in Sochi, the chairman of Russia’s Central Election Commission reported to the president on the progress of the campaign for the local and regional elections scheduled for September 11. On her lapel a small brooch in the shape of the letter Z.
“I would like to tell you the most important thing about our parties,” Pamfilova said visibly emotionally. “That despite their political and ideological differences, they all stand in solidarity in their support for the special military operation, well, with perhaps one insignificant exception. Everyone understands that unity is now more important than ever, that we must stand together.’
Putin, meanwhile, peered intently at the file Pamfilova had handed him. The conversation did not mention the “referenda” that Russia might have planned on that date in occupied parts of Ukraine.
Principles squandered
With that ‘minor exception’, Pamfilova was apparently referring to the left-liberal opposition party Jabloko, which is running with 170 candidates in Moscow’s district council elections on September 11 and, six months after the start of hostilities, continues to be the only one to criticize military action against Ukraine. There is not the slightest doubt about this within the party.
‘Pamfilova talked about an ‘insignificant’ party. I would like to dispute that.’ These are the words of 20-year-old Yaroslav Kruchinin. The political science student is a candidate for councilor in the Moscow district of Izmajlovo. “I am proud to belong to Jabloko, and I would like to say to Pamfilova: we have not squandered our principles for a high position.”
In his reply, Kruchinin refers to Pamfilova’s past as a politician, when she still belonged to the democratic camp. “Everything has changed after February 24,” says Kruchinin. ‘In other circumstances I would tell everyone how unlimited trees are being cut down in Izmajlovo, how parks and boulevards are being destroyed in our green district, but that is impossible now.’ The only question that still matters, he says, is what Moscow voters think of the struggle in neighboring Ukraine.
Gloomy but combative
Kruchinin and dozens of other candidate councilors have gathered in the upstairs room of the Yabloko headquarters in Moscow, to get to know each other and report on their experiences. The mood is gloomy but also combative. ‘We are conducting this campaign under enormous pressure’, concludes Krochinin. “But this campaign is decisive in many ways. Either we succumb to that pressure, or we go through to the end.’ So he says it’s up or down.
Sergei Melnikov (53), candidate councilor in the Mitino suburb, agrees. “I decided to run after the events of February 24, because I understood that I could no longer remain silent. As candidates, we understand that we are being watched closely by the authorities and the police, that we could be fined or arrested, that we could lose our jobs.”
In recent months, all forms of criticism of the campaign against Ukraine in Russia have been systematically suppressed. Protest demonstrations with sometimes hundreds, sometimes several thousand participants, only took place in the first days and weeks. The police cracked down and made more than 16,000 arrests. Since then, the street protests have been limited to one-man actions that last a few minutes at most. Sporadically there are covert expressions of protest on walls and in porches.
Draconian Punishments
Politicians who dared to publicly criticize, for example, calling Russia’s ‘special military operation’ a war, have also been prosecuted for ‘discrediting’ the Russian army or spreading ‘fake news’, and have been fined or jailed. Moscow district councilor Alexei Gorinov has been sentenced to seven years in a penal colony for expressing criticism during a council meeting. Others, such as politicians Vladimir Kara-Moerza and Ilya Yashin, are still in custody and may also face similar draconian sentences.
Several critics, media and NGOs have been branded as ‘foreign agent’ or ‘unwanted organization’ and many have left the country. Numerous sites have also been blocked. The results of some polls suggest that a majority of Russians support the “operation” against Ukraine, although there are doubts about that too, as many people are hesitant to speak out.
Remarkably, however, from time to time doubt or criticism seeps through, even in the mainstream media, which can still appear in Russia. These expressions are often quickly suppressed or ignored. But they are indications that there is more going on beneath the surface than Pamfilova’s jaunty words about ‘union’ and a collective ‘fist’ suggest.
No discussion possible
At the beginning of March, the well-known film director Karen Shakhnazarov noted in one of the talk shows on Russian state television, reluctantly and with some surprise that the Ukrainians ‘are not surrendering en masse’, that the Ukrainian army is ‘providing fierce resistance’ against expectations. “We have to recognize the reality. In thirty years, the Ukrainians have formed a nation,” said Shakhnazarov, who soon after this broadcast fell back on the well-known rhetoric and did not speak a cross word after that.
It was the same with Colonel Mikhail Chodarjonok, another regular on many state television talk shows. During the broadcast in May, he warned that the morale of the Ukrainian armed forces was high and that the country could mobilize a million troops without much difficulty if necessary. “The greatest shortcoming of our military-political situation,” he continued, “is that we are geopolitically isolated. And that, as much as we’d like to deny it, practically the whole world is against us.”
The same Chodarjonok made a voluminous article in the newspaper at the beginning of February Nezavisimaja Gazeta looking forward to the optimistic ‘forecasts of bloodthirsty political scientists’. “There will be no Ukrainian blitzkrieg,” the officer concluded. “An armed conflict with Ukraine is absolutely not in Russia’s national interest at the moment.” The article went virtually unnoticed.
This also applied to an article in the same newspaper by the 80-year-old philosopher Aleksandr Tsipko in June. ‘I have overcome my fear and talk about that which is not allowed to be talked about today. If I wasn’t already in my ninth decade, I probably wouldn’t have done that.’ Tsipko was born in Odesa, where his family still lives. In Soviet times he was an advisor to the Central Committee of the Communist Party, later an advocate of Gorbachev’s perestroika. At that time, discussions at the top were still possible, but not anymore, he notes bitterly.
Common sense
Tsipko has previously written a lot about the relationship between Russia and Ukraine, including the misunderstanding that exists in Russia with regard to the neighboring country. “I am concerned about the ability of the current rulers to adequately assess the situation and the possibilities of the country,” Tsipko wrote in the statement. Nezavisimaja Gazeta. “I am still shocked that the authorities expected Ukraine to welcome the Russian troops with flowers.”
According to Tsipko, the people who formulate policy towards Ukraine in Russia have “not the slightest idea about its history and problems.” And, contrary to expectations in Moscow, the Russian invasion did not divide the neighboring country, but rather welded together the Ukrainian and Russian-speaking parts of the population.
But the consequences of the Russian action go much further. Tsipko sees the current conflict with Ukraine and the entire Western world as a watershed in Russian history, with far-reaching and tragic consequences for his country. It is a great tragedy that Russia – which through no fault of its own has not known a Renaissance or Enlightenment and has wasted seventy years on a senseless communist experiment – instead of overcoming that cultural backwardness tries to convince itself that the removal of Europe and the modern institutions of culture and science will save the country.’ February 24 has, according to Tsipko, “turned Russian history upside down.” If Russia does not call in common sense in time, ‘then that means our end and that is our own fault’.
Diplomatic ripple
There was another notable ripple in diplomatic circles, albeit outside Russia. Russian ex-diplomat Boris Bondarev resigned this spring after 20 years of diplomatic service in protest at the Russian UN mission, for which he was stationed in Geneva. “The beginning of the war was a shock to many employees of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,” he told the Russian television channel Dozhd last week. “Probably for all, because few believed such a scenario was real.”
Bondarev had hoped that others would follow his example, sending a signal and “showing that there are adequate people working in the Foreign Office”, but that did not happen. Not openly, at least, quietly. “There are people who have left the ministry in protest, and quite a few.” And that is also a telling observation.
In the upcoming September 11 elections, Jabloko — long marginalized nationally, but locally successful — hopes to give those quiet critics of Russia’s actions in Ukraine a voice. “It is the only legal possibility to do this,” Maksim Kroeglov, leader of the Moscow city council, told the candidate councilors. Demonstrations are prohibited, Facebook has been declared an extremist organization, as has Instagram. Expressing your opinion uncompromisingly is prohibited, all attempts to do so are punishable under the new legislation. But I assure you that there are many people in Moscow who are protesting against what is happening.’
The question remains how many people will actually make use of that option. A recent poll shows that so far only one third of Muscovites know they can go to the polls on September 11.