In Yet Another Return to Stalinist Principles, Kursk Officials Now Persecuting Even Those Loyal to the Kremlin who Back Putin’s War in Ukraine

Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 11 – One of the distinctive features of Stalinist totalitarianism was that no one was safe from persecution and arrest. Even those who were the most supportive were suspected of opposition because it was assumed that these “wreckers” were trying to rise further up the ladder of power and thus be in a position to wreck more.

            Now, something similar is happening in Kursk Oblast where officials are so worried about street protests that they have begun to attack even those “who are loyal to the authorities and supportive of the war.” Tragically, this federal subject which was occupied by Ukrainian forces is likely to prove a bellwether for the Russian Federation as a whole.

            That is suggested by a report in the media internet portal Reaspect.info which details the ways in which Kursk officials have sought to repress even ostensible supporters of the Kremlin and themselves, yet another sign that in Putin’s Russia, like Stalin’s Soviet Union, no one is safe (https://regaspect.info/2025/06/11/novye-politicheskie/).

            The numbers of people involved are still relatively small, but the decision of the authorities to turn on even their supporters is a very large move and deserves to be followed with extreme care. The 2500-word Regaspect.info report provides a baseline of this kind of political abuse that needs to be kept in mind if officials elsewhere in Russia take similar steps.