Appease Putin No Longer

Liberal democracy in Russia has been spiralling downward for some time. With present threats to aim missiles at the West, as in the days of the Cold War, Canada and the rest of the Western world better start taking this threat seriously. Here is a good open letter to the G8 by one Yelena Tregubova:

Yelena Tregubova is a former member of the Kremlin press corps. Her book, Tales of a Kremlin Digger, published in 2003, accused Vladimir Putin of stifling political and press freedoms in Russia. As a result, she lost her job and was blacklisted from the Russian media. In February 2004, a bomb exploded outside her apartment, moments before she opened the door. Tregubova, 34, has now applied for asylum in Britain.

She writes:

There has been no single example in history of a dictator who, sooner or later, did not become a danger to both his close and distant neighbours.

The goal is not the “revival of Russia” or the “revival of the national pride of the Russians”, as Putin and the Kremlin’s propaganda are trying to present it. It is a full-scale revenge by the secret services and the authoritarian regime with all their old methods and tricks.

Putin has shut all independent TV channels, introduced harsh censorship, blocked access to the press for the democratic opposition, accused Russian human rights activists and NGOs of being Western spies, and split up the country’s biggest oil company, Yukos, among his friends from the special services.

Encouraged by your non-resistance, Putin’s regime has become so strong and impudent that is now directly threatening its close neighbours, Poland and the Czech Republic, former colonies of the Soviet Union, trying to speak to them as if they were its vassals. In recent months, three ambassadors - Estonian, Swedish, and British - have been affected by the actions of extremist organisations controlled by the Kremlin.

And now events have taken a logical new turn: the Kremlin is threatening the West, by missile-rattling. The critical difference between this and the Soviet era lies in the fact that then you knew exactly which side of the barricades you stood on, when you provided moral support to the opponents of dictatorship. But nowadays due to the favourable situation in oil and gas markets, Putin has the resources to buy your indulgence and silence.

Say what you will about Prime Minister Harper not being as conservative as he should be, but at least foreign policy wise he has been courageous; be it no more buttering up to China; be it deploring terrorism against Israel. Now, hopefully, he will show courage and say what needs to be said to Russia. The non-appeasers of the world should take heart that Canada has Harper in charge; leadership with a conscience and a backbone. It used to be that some foreign despot could flash a few petro-dollars in front of Chretien (and dare I say, Maurice Strong’s padewan, Paul Martin Jr.) and he was more than obliging to stick to pleasantries.