Paul
Goble
Staunton, March 31 – A man who
posted on line a call to conduct a popular referendum on the formation of an
independent Astrakhan Republic has been convicted of seeking to violate the
territorial integrity of the Russian Federation and given a suspended sentence
of 18 months behind bars and a further year during which he cannot be employed
by government agencies.
Aleksandr Lychagin, the prosecutor
for Astrakhan oblast, said some may view this “’initiative’” as a bad joke, but
“some may take it seriously.” As a
result of vigilance by the FSB, the man was arrested, charged, and convicted,
in what Lychagin suggests is a warning to other thinking about anything similar
(kaspyinfo.ru/nezavisimoj-astrahanskoj-respubliki-ne-budet/).
During 2018, he continues, seven
cases of extremist posts were referred to the courts, which returned five
convictions. So far this year, however,
he has not referred any to the courts, either because people have become
convinced that they will be caught and punished or because of changes in
popular attitudes.
Two aspects of this particular case
are worth nothing. First, it calls attention to the fact that even portions of the
Russian Federation apparently completely integrated include at least some
residents who view secession as the only possible way to defend their rights given
Moscow’s increasing repression of the regions.
And second, because Moscow is not
willing to consider giving the regions more rights, activists in such places are
apparently concluded that the only way out is a way out, namely, the pursuit of
independence, the unintended product of Russian policies rather than of any conspiracy,
regardless of what some in the center are certain to believe.
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