Veteran human rights lawyer freed in exchange says Russia is sliding back to Stalinist times
BERLIN: A human rights activist in the 1980s, Oleg Orlov believed that Russia had turned a corner when the Soviet Union collapsed and a democratically elected president became the leader.
But then Vladimir Putin came to power, crushing dissent and launching a full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Eventually, 71-year-old Orlov was thrown into prison himself for opposing the war. Released last week in the largest East-West prisoner swap since the Cold War, he was forced into exile – just like the Soviet dissidents of his youth.
In an interview with The Associated Press in Berlin on Thursday, Orlov condemned the scale and severity of the crackdown under Putin, with people jailed for merely criticizing the authorities, something not seen since the days of dictator Josef Stalin.
And he promises to continue his work to free Russia's many political prisoners and keep their names in the spotlight.
“We're slipping somewhere into the Stalin days,” said Orlov, who at times showed signs of fatigue from a hectic schedule of media interviews in the week since his release.
He was sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison in February for writing an article against the war. When he was unexpectedly moved last month from a prison in central Russia in what ultimately led to the Aug. 1 prisoner swap, he was waiting to be transferred to a penal colony after losing his appeal.
The move was a complete surprise, he told the AP.
First, he was told to write a petition for clemency to Putin – something he said he flatly refused. A few days later, he was loaded into a van and driven, to his astonishment, to an airport in Samara and flown to Moscow.
“To find yourself on a plane, among free people, straight from a prison – a very strange feeling,” said Orlov.
Three more days followed in Moscow's notorious Lefortovo prison, isolated in his cell, where he wrote a complaint that he was denied access to his lawyer. Then, he was shown a document that said he was forgiven. He was put on a plane again, this time from Russia, along with other freed dissidents, and was met in Germany by Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
He broke into a smile when he remembered seeing familiar faces on the bus to the airport – artist and musician Sasha Skochilenko, jailed for a small protest against the war, opposition politician Andrei Pivovarov and others.
“So when a state security guard announced (on the bus) that it was a change, I already understood perfectly well,” he said.
While detained in Lefortovo, Orlov suspected that another criminal case was being prepared against him. As for what charges authorities might bring, he said, “They'd find (one) no problem.”
“The repressive machine… has been set in motion and is running on its own,” the veteran human rights lawyer said. “The machine works to support itself and can only intensify the repression, make it harder.”
Memorial, the Nobel Peace Prize-winning rights group co-founded by Orlov, says more than 760 political prisoners remain imprisoned in Russia. Another prominent human rights group, OVD-Info, says more than 1,300 are currently imprisoned in politically motivated cases.
Some of them face isolation, without access to lawyers or doctors, often at the behest of the authorities, Orlov said.
Opposition politicians such as the late Alexei Navalny or recently replaced Vladimir Kara-Murza were kept in such isolated conditions in remote penal colonies and their health deteriorated.
“My experience was much easier than many others',” Orlov said. Prison officials “never exercised outright iniquity against me,” he added, “I was not singled out from the crowd.”
Still, it's important to support the growing number of those persecuted on political grounds, he said, from keeping their plight in the headlines to sending letters and care packages and helping their families.
In prison, “there's always this sense of concern for your family. Knowing that your family is going to be okay really helps you feel at peace. And in prison it is the most important thing – not to despair and feel at peace,” said Orlov.
In the turbulent early days of his life in exile, which he never sought, Orlov had little time to process his new freedom and was still not reunited with his wife.
But he is determined to continue his work with Memorial and says there are things lawyers can still do outside Russia, such as maintaining a database of political prisoners and coordinating assistance for those behind bars.
The total cessation of repression will only happen, however, when Putin's “repressive, terrorist regime” ceases to exist, he says.
