Will Putin Be Next?

A face da inocência?

Will Putin Be Next? By Alexei Bayer Tuesday, December 05, 2006 The mysterious recent murders of journalist Anna Politkovskaya and ex-KGB colonel Alexander Litvinenko — Putin critics both — have caused many observers to wonder whether Russia is reliving its Soviet past.

As Alexei Bayer argues, present-day Russia is so dysfunctional that the next victim could be President Putin himself .

When Vladimir Putin became Russia’s president, he surrounded himself with former uniformed officers from the extensive Soviet security apparatus — the so-called “siloviki.”

As implausible as it sounds, some in the West believe it could be Putin himself who stands behind some of the more prominent murders of his critics.

The drift and lawlessness of the early post-communist era are over, he proclaimed. Russia will now have a new, solid political apparatus — and state power will be strengthened.

Under former president Boris Yeltsin, bankers, entrepreneurs, politicians and bureaucrats had been murdered by professional hit men with alarming regularity. [...]

• Post dedicado à memória de todos aqueles que já foram bárbaramente assassinados às mãos de algum carrasco - ou grupo deles que, concertadamente, se uniu para impôr o gatekeeper da informação e preservar um certo status quo na Rússia de Putin. Aos que morreram e aos que estão vivos e vão agora descobrir a verdade.