“It is no longer a country… where the government tries to pretend it is playing by the letter and spirit of the law.”
These words were uttered by former World Chess Champion Garry Kasparov about Russia. Kasparov retired from chess to take on Russian President Vladimir Putin. He is the leader of the United Civil Front, a group that seeks to publicise and challenge Putin’s attempts (successful!) to turn Russia away from democracy.
Kasparov was arrested last Saturday for demonstrating with like-minded Russians; Kasparov was dragged away by some of the thousands of police Putin ordered onto the streets of Moscow.
Putin may have fooled Bush, but Kasparov is a canny customer who will prove a worthy adversary. One can only hope he will be receiving the backing of pro-democracy movements/countries around the world.
Two pieces of advice for the Grandmaster – get a food taster quickly and avoid British Airways.
Libertas01 
April 18, 2007 at 8:37 am |
Garry Kasparov was in the UK 2 weeks ago doing a series of radio / TV slots. One of the things he said (and in all seriousness) is that he doesn’t eat the food or drink on Aeroflot flights, and that he only uses the airline for short distance internal journeys.
April 18, 2007 at 8:11 pm |
Putin is very worrisome these days. He seems to have changed over the last several years. I wonder what happened?
April 25, 2007 at 2:33 am |
He was always very closely tied to the KGB. Russia is becoming more of a police state with capitalism than a full democracy. It’s what they’re used to though. Thousands of years of repression, make this in their blood. They are better off than they were in Soviet time, and while they are a rival, at least they aren’t an enemy as they were.