PUTIN BETS ON REPRESSION.

• Author: Handley, John
• Position: Vladimir Putin

PUTIN BETS ON REPRESSION

By David Sentor, Senior Fellow Foreign Policy Research Institute

http://www.fpri.org/articles/2012/09/putin-bets-repression

Russian analyst David Setter has written two recent books on Russia: It Was a Long Time Ago and It never Happened Anyway: Russia and the Communist Past and Age of Delirium, which he is now turning into a documentary film about the fall of the Soviet Union. His theme in this article is that Vladimir Putin, four months into his third term as Russia's president, has made clear his intention to use repression, such as that listed below, to silence his opponents.

1 Putin has ensured the passage of legislation limiting the opposition by increasing from 2,000 to 300,000 rubles the fines for participating in unsanctioned rallies.

2 Another new law imposes fines of up to a million rubles and four years in prison for officials of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) receiving foreign grants and failing to register as foreign agents.

3 The new law on slander, likely aimed at independent journalists and politicians, now makes that a criminal offense subject to fines of up to 5 million rubles.

Recent court cases reveal how Putin intends to use his new authority.

4 On 31 July, Alexei Navalny, an anti-corruption blogger, was indicted for organizing the misappropriation of $500,000 from a state-owned timber firm. He had accused the head of the Investigative Committee, Alexander Bastrykin, a close Putin ally, of concealing the fact that Bastrykin owns property in the Czech Republic and has the right to live there.

5 Also in July, Taisia Osipova received a prison term of eight years on drug charges. The drugs, according to witnesses, were planted. In all probability, this 28 year-old mother with a 5 year-old daughter was convicted because she refused to testify against her husband, Sergi Fomchenkov, an activist with the Other Russia opposition movement.

6 On 14 September, the Duma for the first time in history expelled a politician for running a business while serving in the...