Politics             The First Thousand Days of War     19 November 2024


   For a thousand days now, Putin and his band of bloody henchmen have
   been waging war against Ukraine.  I deliberately avoid saying that
   Russia is at war with Ukraine, because a country is, first and
   foremost, its people, and many Russian citizens do not support their
   leadership's actions.  It's particularly important to note that the
   country's leadership has been usurped and does not represent the
   interests of Russian citizens, but rather only those of a small group
   close to Putin.

   Both before and after the war began, I did everything in my power to
   - I want to say prevent it - but no, at least to avoid participating
   in this crime: I exposed election fraud and took dishonest electoral
   commissions to court, I held anti-war pickets in my hometown and in
   Moscow, and I worked as a human rights defender in courts to protect
   people whose only "crime" was speaking out against Putin and against
   the war.

   I no longer pay a single rouble in taxes to the Russian treasury,
   I've evacuated my family from Russia, I've hidden from the police in
   a remote Russian village, I've endured hunger and cold, and I've lost
   my home in Ozyory.  Some might say I've lost almost everything, but I
   disagree: I haven't lost my freedom, which the Russian state so
   zealously tried to take from me, and just as importantly, I've
   preserved the freedom of my family members.  I don't regret choosing
   this path for a single moment.

   The war continues.  The people who have betrayed my country continue
   to attack Ukraine, including raping and killing civilians.  By
   conservative estimates, at least twelve thousand Ukrainian civilians
   have died since the war began.  Twelve thousand!  And how many more
   will die?  How long can the gears of this bloody war machine continue
   to grind innocent people?  Neither I nor anyone else knows the answer
   right now.  But I refuse to give up.  And I'm certain we'll soon see
   Putin's face in a war crimes tribunal.





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