Alexei Navalny, probably the most prominent Russian opposition figure, has died in a Russian prison. This news spread around the world on 16th February. How he died is not clear. Many suspect foul play. Putin does certainly not mind seeing him dead.
Just like everyone else, I also don’t know exactly what happened. The incentives are such that I would guess he died because of a medical condition. I simply cannot see what Putin gains from murdering him at this point. He is no real danger to him. Putin enjoys some genuine popularity in Russia at the moment and Tucker Carlson just gave him some positive press in the West. Therefore, if anything, the death of Navalny is hurting Putin rather than helping him.
The people who are profiting from this the most are probably the neocons, who hate Russia and would like the Putin regime to disappear. Still, do these people have the power to kill someone locked up in a Russian prison? That would be a serious intelligence breach on the side of the Russians. I highly doubt the US would be able to do that.
That leads me to conclude that he probably died from a medical condition. That is not to whitewash the Putin regime from any guild. Being locked up in a rough Russian prison certainly does not increase the chances of survival if one has medical problems. There can be no doubt that the main reason he was imprisoned is because he got too dangerous for Putin.
I do share the outrage of his death. It does show how foolish it is to see Putin as one of the good guys, an alternative media theme that I have criticised in previous articles. However, a lot of the people who are screaming the loudest about his death, which is to say western governments, really are nothing but pathetic hypocrites.
These are the same people who either say nothing about or actively support the prosecution of Julian Assange, who is currently tortured to death without any real charges in a UK prison. These are also the same people who actively support the horrible dictatorship of Zelensky in the Urkaine and pretend that he is fighting for the values of liberal democracy. What a joke.
In the Ukriane, critics of the Zelensky regime are dealt with in a brutal manner. When the US journalist Gonzalo Lira died a few weeks ago in a Ukrainian prison, most likely from torture, the western defenders of democracy did not say a beep.
And let us not start talking about the US government throwing peaceful protesters into jail after framing them for insurrection following a perfectly legitimate protest on January 6th 2021. In addition, Edward Snowden is still hiding in Moscow for exposing criminal activities of the US government. Similar stuff is happening in most countries of the so called liberal West.
It is not that Putin is not bad – he definitely is – it is that western democracies cannot claim to be much better any more. Of course, these western liberal democracies were never perfect, but they once really had a claim of being better. During the cold war the Soviet Union truly was an evil empire, opposed by a relatively free West which had a somewhat working rule of law. Not any more unfortunately.
But I have to say, the neocons are not the only hypocrites when it comes to commenting on Navalny’s death. Many in the alternative media also have lost it. There are people who are perfectly correct to support Assange or Snowden, but who somehow think that Putin had no choice but to imprison the “terrorist” and “criminal” Navalny.
What did Navalny do to deserve this? Yes, he was an open critic of Putin and worked to exchange his government. But isn’t that totally legitimate in a free country? Why would it be illegal to oppose Putin if one really is aiming for a liberal society? Organising protests and propagating a different government should be totally legitimate in a free society.
Oh, but I hear some people say that Navalny is a criminal because he was asking for Western support to do this. So what? The things he was planning to do were still totally legitimate. He is just a lobbyist for a cause, something that is totally legal in western democracies, at least it used to be. It definitely should be.
If Putin’s Russia was such a great place, Navalny would have been able to freely express himself in Russia and organise support for his cause. But he could not do that because Putin’s Russia is a form of dictatorship.
Criticising western governments for locking up people like Assange, because they were trying to change the regime in Washington, but then call Navalny a criminal because he wanted to do the same in Russia is just deeply hypocritical. It goes to show that there are not just bad people in western government, but also bad people in the alternative media space.
Everyone should have a right to express their opinion and organise politically. That is particularly true for people aiming to make governments less powerful. Governments who suppress this should not be seen as legitimate by any decent person. Those who correctly point out the downfall of western liberties should also be consistent in not supporting tyrants abroad.
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