By liquidating the international historical and educational society Memorial, and just a day later, the human rights centre of the same name, Vladimir Putin's regime has put an end to any discussion about where the country is heading. Well, that is exactly where it is heading!
Towards that 'wonderful past', the true image of which was gathered and revealed in all its detail by historians, human rights defenders, and ordinary, concerned citizens, who were by no means all descendants of the repressed. They painstakingly collected testimonies of the crimes of Soviet, communist power, so that these crimes would never be repeated. The authorities, which have long since ceased to be either Soviet or communist, replied unequivocally: 'We can repeat it.'
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Undoubtedly, Memorial irritated Putin just by its existence. By reminding him again and again of the role that the agency in which he was formed had in the country's history, and where he started his climb to the pinnacle of power. By the way, not thanks to the agency. The current Russian president, who laments the collapse of the 'great power', has completely forgotten that the probability of such a career flight in that country would not only have been nowhere near possible for him, but would have been close to zero. Being merely an assistant to a pro-rector, even at the second most important university in the country, and remaining a staff member of the KGB, it is quite likely that he would have retired from that position to grow cucumbers in a vegetable patch. Perhaps – his age allowed for it – he would have climbed a couple more rungs, but no higher. And his pension would have been the most ordinary one, intended for a retired lieutenant colonel. Not a personal one, nor even one of republican significance.
By the way, this is not about Putin. Any former Chekist, although they are never truly 'former', would have acted in exactly the same way in his place. Though the justification for destroying Memorial does provoke thought. 'Why, instead of pride for a country that freed the world from fascism, are we offered the chance to regret our own, as it turns out, dark past?' the prosecutor's representative asked pathetically in court, and answered it himself: 'Because someone is paying for it.' Paying, of course, from abroad.
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