Paul Goble
Staunton, Aug. 25 – The last of the 136 Dagestanis charged for their roles in the Makhachkala airport protests in October 2023 against the arrival of people from Israel have resulted in sentences of up to 15 years in prison, an extraordinary figure for public protests even in Putin’s Russia.
According to Magdi Kamalov, founder of the independent Chernovik portal, the republic government has imposed such sentences in order to prevent any repetition of mass actions in that restive republic (kavkaz-uzel.eu/articles/414112). That suggests that many in the republic government and in Moscow fear that equally large and violent protests may be ahead there.
Indeed, the length of sentences the authorities hand out elsewhere in response to protests may be a useful measure of just how fearful the powers that be are about more demonstrations in the future and how much they are counting on draconian sentences to prevent more people from going into the streets.
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