Anthony McIntyre ✒ I wish I had as much courage in my whole body as Maria Ovsyannikova, who went on to the prime time Russian TV news show today with this anti-war poster, must have in her little finger - Simon Pirani.


Marina Ovsyannikova is not the first prominent Russian journalist to have challenged Putin’s wars.  Anna Politkovskaya did likewise during the Second Chechen War and was 
ultimately murdered in her Moscow apartment in 2006. 

Ms Ovsyannikova had to have been aware of the risk she was taking before she stepped in front of the rolling television cameras immediately to the rear of the live news anchor on Channel One. Still, the mother of two young children and a Channel One writer and editor for more than twenty years did not balk. In her message on the country's most watched news broadcast, she urged viewers not to believe the propaganda and that the society was being lied to by its leaders. Stop the war. Don't believe the propaganda. They're lying to you here. That is what authentic journalists and writers should be doing in all wars, where the by now clichified first casualty is truth.

Her placard, so courageously brandished, may now become a target on her back. The international coverage coupled with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's 
public expression of gratitude to Ms Ovsyannikova can only have infuriated Putin who already seems light years behind the Ukrainian in the propaganda war.  A new batch of Novichok nerve agent might be considered an appropriate corrective response by the Kremlin.

Prior to taking protest action Ms Ovsyannikova uploaded a video onto social media in which she said:

Unfortunately, in recent years I have been working on Channel One, creating Kremlin propaganda and I am now very ashamed of it. I’m embarrassed for letting them tell lies from the TV screen. I'm ashamed that I allowed them to zombify Russian people. We were silent in 2014, when all this was starting. We didn't go out to rallies and protests when the Kremlin poisoned Navalny. We just silently observed this anti-human regime. And now the whole world has turned its back on us. And ten more generations of our descendants will not be able to wash away the shame of this fratricidal war. We are the Russian people. We are thoughtful and smart, it is only in our power to stop this madness. Come out to protest, don't be afraid of anything, they can't arrest every one of us.

While it is easy to sit here in Drogheda hammering a keyboard for Ukraine, what was witnessed in Channel One was fearless speech.

Grilled for 14 hours and subsequently fined 30,000 rubles in court for a separate act of dissent from the war, she steadfastly refused to row back from her actions or views, pointing out that for her the ordeal does not end with the fine  "because I have not yet been fined or prosecuted for my appearance on the TV news broadcast. So I think there may be further prosecutions coming."

These further prosecutions could result in a 15 year prison sentence. Putin, intent on suppressing alternative perspectives, has banned Russians from describing his war as an invasion, war or assault. He also prohibits people discrediting the military by circulating fake news. It seems the main offender in this category is the Russian leadership which has done little but lie about the Russian military since it launched its invasion-war-assault.

Ms Ovsyannikova  has been offered political asylum in France where she will be safe from arrest so long as she does not wear a burkini on a beach, an offer she politely declined:

Unfortunately, I won't be able to accept this kind offer because I am a patriot, I want to stay and live in my own country with my family, all my friends are here, and I want to stay in Russia.

Today as Mariupol began to look ominously like Gaza with its bomb shattered buildings and homes, while Russian society looks like it is heading to “mass repression and concentration camps,” acts of defiance like that displayed by Marina Ovsyannikova are vitally important. She has chosen to forsake a comfortable career for the sake of others who are voiceless in a society where the police have arrested an estimated 13,500 people. Some of those arrested have been tortured. Those opposed to the war are excoriated by Putin as scum, traitors, gnats. In the midst of this darkness Marina Ovsyannikova is a candle whose flame burns the reams of propaganda churned out by the war criminals of the Kremlin. with words like these: 

What’s happening in Ukraine right now is a true crime . . .  And Russia is the aggressor. And the responsibility for this crime lies only on the conscience of one person, and that person is Vladimir Putin.

⏩ Follow on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre.

War-Assault-Invasion

Anthony McIntyre ✒ I wish I had as much courage in my whole body as Maria Ovsyannikova, who went on to the prime time Russian TV news show today with this anti-war poster, must have in her little finger - Simon Pirani.


Marina Ovsyannikova is not the first prominent Russian journalist to have challenged Putin’s wars.  Anna Politkovskaya did likewise during the Second Chechen War and was 
ultimately murdered in her Moscow apartment in 2006. 

Ms Ovsyannikova had to have been aware of the risk she was taking before she stepped in front of the rolling television cameras immediately to the rear of the live news anchor on Channel One. Still, the mother of two young children and a Channel One writer and editor for more than twenty years did not balk. In her message on the country's most watched news broadcast, she urged viewers not to believe the propaganda and that the society was being lied to by its leaders. Stop the war. Don't believe the propaganda. They're lying to you here. That is what authentic journalists and writers should be doing in all wars, where the by now clichified first casualty is truth.

Her placard, so courageously brandished, may now become a target on her back. The international coverage coupled with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's 
public expression of gratitude to Ms Ovsyannikova can only have infuriated Putin who already seems light years behind the Ukrainian in the propaganda war.  A new batch of Novichok nerve agent might be considered an appropriate corrective response by the Kremlin.

Prior to taking protest action Ms Ovsyannikova uploaded a video onto social media in which she said:

Unfortunately, in recent years I have been working on Channel One, creating Kremlin propaganda and I am now very ashamed of it. I’m embarrassed for letting them tell lies from the TV screen. I'm ashamed that I allowed them to zombify Russian people. We were silent in 2014, when all this was starting. We didn't go out to rallies and protests when the Kremlin poisoned Navalny. We just silently observed this anti-human regime. And now the whole world has turned its back on us. And ten more generations of our descendants will not be able to wash away the shame of this fratricidal war. We are the Russian people. We are thoughtful and smart, it is only in our power to stop this madness. Come out to protest, don't be afraid of anything, they can't arrest every one of us.

While it is easy to sit here in Drogheda hammering a keyboard for Ukraine, what was witnessed in Channel One was fearless speech.

Grilled for 14 hours and subsequently fined 30,000 rubles in court for a separate act of dissent from the war, she steadfastly refused to row back from her actions or views, pointing out that for her the ordeal does not end with the fine  "because I have not yet been fined or prosecuted for my appearance on the TV news broadcast. So I think there may be further prosecutions coming."

These further prosecutions could result in a 15 year prison sentence. Putin, intent on suppressing alternative perspectives, has banned Russians from describing his war as an invasion, war or assault. He also prohibits people discrediting the military by circulating fake news. It seems the main offender in this category is the Russian leadership which has done little but lie about the Russian military since it launched its invasion-war-assault.

Ms Ovsyannikova  has been offered political asylum in France where she will be safe from arrest so long as she does not wear a burkini on a beach, an offer she politely declined:

Unfortunately, I won't be able to accept this kind offer because I am a patriot, I want to stay and live in my own country with my family, all my friends are here, and I want to stay in Russia.

Today as Mariupol began to look ominously like Gaza with its bomb shattered buildings and homes, while Russian society looks like it is heading to “mass repression and concentration camps,” acts of defiance like that displayed by Marina Ovsyannikova are vitally important. She has chosen to forsake a comfortable career for the sake of others who are voiceless in a society where the police have arrested an estimated 13,500 people. Some of those arrested have been tortured. Those opposed to the war are excoriated by Putin as scum, traitors, gnats. In the midst of this darkness Marina Ovsyannikova is a candle whose flame burns the reams of propaganda churned out by the war criminals of the Kremlin. with words like these: 

What’s happening in Ukraine right now is a true crime . . .  And Russia is the aggressor. And the responsibility for this crime lies only on the conscience of one person, and that person is Vladimir Putin.

⏩ Follow on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre.

9 comments:

  1. The last comment did not make it through. TPQ does not publish comments from "Unknown". It leads to too much confusion when there are multiple users posting as "Unknown". If your comment is for publication sign off on it.

    ReplyDelete
  2. The Putin rally in Moscow was so reminiscent of Trump. It's all about "me, me, me." You are either a patriot or a traitor, us verses them. The US must not let Trump anywhere near power again.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. And hopefully the Russians get rid of Putin and never allow him near power again either.
      The similarities jumped out at me also.

      Delete
    2. Peter

      A bit off topic but I am sure you are outraged at this bromance. I would be if LUFC owner hugged such a murderous scumbag.

      https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/man-city-boss-sparks-fury-26510064

      Delete
    3. Barry

      Of course, wouldn't it be great if all clubs were owned by the fans?

      Delete
    4. Peter / Barry - I think it gets to the point that these things become virtue signalling. I am not sure a demand for him not to own football clubs because he hugged a tyrant is going to get far. Israel commits “barbarous, sustained murder" so I wonder if Chris Bryant would oppose anybody hugging Netanyahu from owning clubs. These things are invariably fraught with contradictions. It never makes us feel easy but what are the practical measures we can take to be effective rather than merely waxing ethical? I feel the Saudis and Israelis should be subjected to the type of sanctions Russia is undergoing today but how feasible is it?

      Delete
  3. A very brave woman that cannot be denied, pity nobody in Britain did something similar about Blairs illegal war in Iraq, to stay well in with Bush, I wonder what would happen if anybody did? However, the expected death sentence has not happened, yet, much to my pleasant surprise.

    On the subject of Novichok the Britsh produce it as well, at Porton Down, Salsbury!!!

    Caoimhin O'Muraile

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Katherine Gunn blew the whistle on it, lost her civil service job and went on trial as I remember. Good film about it.

      Delete
    2. Catherine Gunn was a GCHQ employee who, as I recall, blew the whistle on the provenance of the "dodgy dossier" on Iraq' supposed WMD capability.

      Delete