COURAGE! Part 2
Tessa Szyszkowitz in conversation with Evgenia Kara-Murza
HOW TO FIGHT PUTIN
Two years ago, on February 24, 2022, Russia’s president Vladimir Putin started a full-fledged war against neighboring Ukraine. Since then, Russia has occupied 11% of Ukrainian territory, killed or severely wounded 130.000 Ukrainian soldiers and - all according to Harvard Kennedy School Belfer Centre - about 10.000 Ukrainian civilians have died in the war. Putin’s regime is also responsible for the death or severe injury of 200.000 Russian soldiers in that war. While the war rages on, Russian opposition politicians and critical journalists are not allowed to call it a war or to criticize it in any way. Who does gets sentenced to long prison sentences in a penal colony.
Like Vladimir Kara-Murza. The Russian-British activist was arrested in April 2022 for denouncing the Russian invasion of Ukraine. In April 2023 he was sentenced to 25 years in jail for “high treason”. His wife Evgenia Kara-Murza is leading a campaign for his release. In her talk she will explain under which inhuman conditions her husband is held. The treatment of political prisoners in Russia - next to Kara-Murza also Alexej Navalny, Ilya Yashin and many others - is deteriorating in the runup to the Russian presidential elections on March 15-17 are coming: “These elections are not legitimate”, says Evgenia Kara-Murza.
Evgenia Kara-Murza is a Russian-American Human Rights Activist and wife of political prisoner Vladimir Kara-Murza. She is also a translator and the Advocacy Director at Free Russia Foundation.
Tessa Szyszkowitz, is an Austrian journalist and author. She writes for Austrian and German publications such as Falter & Tagesspiegel, she is also a Distinguished Fellow of the Royal United Services Institute in London.
Recorded at Kreisky Forum February 20, 2024
Technical production: Milan Loewy