2023-07-21 20:00:00
MOSCOW.- The Russian Justice opened a case for “extremism” once morest an influential nationalist blogger and former separatist leader of eastern Ukraine Igor the Greek, arrested this Friday and who recently vehemently criticized the president Vladimir Putin.
Girkin, also known by his alias Igor Strelkov, supports the current offensive in Ukraine, but disapproved of the management carried out by the Kremlin and the Russian military leadership, through his Telegram account, where he has some 875,000 followers.
“The country will not survive another six years of cowardly mediocrity in power”came to write in one of his latest publications.
Members of the Wagner group detain a man in the city of Rostov-on-Don on June 24, 2023. STRINGER – AFP
With the opening of this case, the Russian authorities send a message of firmness regarding criticism of powerfour weeks following the brief uprising led by the Wagner paramilitary group.
“This is one of the consequences of the Prigozhin mutiny”said Tatiana Stanovaya, a researcher at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, following Girkin’s arrest was announced.
“The Army gained more political opportunities to repress its opponents in the public space”, he added, although he qualified: “I would not expect it to become something massive. The most radical can be persecuted so that the rest are more careful.
In a message on social networks, his wife, Miroslava Reginskaya, had announced that he was arrested for “extremism”, which was later confirmed by the Justice.
“Today, at approximately 11:30 a.m., representatives of the Investigative Committee came to our house. I was not there at the time. Soon, according to the doorman, they took my husband out holding his arms and took him in an unknown direction, ”he assured.
Igor Girkin and his wife, Miroslava Reginskaya
A veteran of the Russian Army and former intelligence officer, Girkin, 52, helped illegally annex Crimea in 2014 and later led pro-Russian separatist militias in eastern Ukraine. With his ruthless discipline, he earned a reputation as a determined commander.
In May 2014, he was named Minister of Defense of the Donetsk People’s Republica breakaway entity that claimed territory in the Donetsk region in Ukraine, though it was ousted a few months later.
In 2022, it was one of three people sentenced in absentia to life in prison by a Dutch court, by his role in the downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 when flying over Ukraine in 2014.
Since 2014, Girkin had been gradually marginalized for his messianic visions, considered too extreme. He rose to prominence with Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine last year, becoming one of the most popular commentators on the war.
“The men who run law enforcement and power ministries in Russia have wanted to arrest Girkin for a long time,” Stanovaya said.
Strelkov [Girkin] had crossed all conceivable boundaries long ago”, he added.
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