Putin’s War in Ukraine Outgrowth of His Violations of Rights at Home, Activists Say

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Mar. 25 – Vladimir Putin’s unleashing of war in the center of Europe is the direct result of the Kremlin’s longstanding refusal to defend the rights and freedoms of all its citizens and as such calls attention to a lesson of World War II that the world has still not fully learned, leading Russian human rights activists say.

            That lesson is simple: any “state which crudely and massively violates human rights within its borders sooner or later will become a threat to peace and international security,” especially if the international community fails to react to those violations in a timely and serious way, they say (mhg.ru/news/gumanitarnyy-manifest-rossiyskih-pravozashchitnikov).

            Numerous Russian rights activists have made this declaration in announcing the formation of a new Council of Russian Rights Activists to replace the Human Rights Council of Russia that existed until last year. Eleven signed their names but others have signed but asked that their names not be listed out of consideration for their personal security.

            That so many have asked to have their names withheld from the public declaration and that all of them have felt compelled to use the Kremlin term “special military operation” rather than the accurate one “war” in describing what Putin is doing in Ukraine highlights the tenuousness of such people and their ideas in Russia today.

            The authors also note that when such a state begins a war abroad, there is an inevitable deterioration in the state of human rights in that state itself: “Since the beginning of ‘the special military operation,’ the situation in Russia has become worse, with mass persecution of citizens of their anti-war positions and for any public expression of disagreement with the powers.”

            “Russians have been deprived of access to non-governmental sources of information,” they continue. “Independent means of mass information and social networks have been closed or are being blocked. Government television channels feature aggressive propaganda full of hatred.”

            And “laws have been adopted allowing the incarceration for lengthy periods anyone who expresses opinions” at variance with the Kremlin. Still worse, “at the highest level of the state” – that is Putin – there have been calls “to ‘cleanse’ the country from ‘national traitors,’” calls that suggest the situation will only get worse.

            “Our common responsibility,” the authors say, “is to stop the war and defend the lives, rights and freedoms of all people, both Ukrainians and Russians.”