Arkady Babchenko Is Alive, the Chelyabinsk Criminal Case, and Rising Gasoline Prices

[music]

Good evening, dear viewers of the channel

Navalny Live on YouTube, from our studio.

Today it’s not Navalny, as you’ve probably

already guessed, but Lyubov Sobol and Georgy Alburov.

Alburov, and today we’re here together.

You probably want to know what this

minute of silence for Arkady Babchenko was about.

The script is already outdated, and of course

that changes what kind of silence we’re observing, but about

Arkady Babchenko, we of course wanted

to say a few words. Well, first of all,

what happened was, of course, astonishing,

unexpected, and of course it took us a long time

to recover—first from what

happened on the 29th, and we still hadn’t fully come

to our senses before what

happened on the 30th, when Arkady

Babchenko came back to life—I don’t know how else

to put it.

I’ll explain for those who may have been out of touch

for the past two days and haven’t opened

social media or the news, because it seemed to me

that everyone was talking about it. It seemed impossible

to hide from this news—they

completely flooded the information space. If

your dugout has no internet, radio, or

television, then for your benefit we’ll now

tell you what actually happened.

On May 29, media reports appeared saying that

Russian journalist Arkady Babchenko

had been killed by three shots to the back in his home.

Supposedly, his wife found his body when he

—and the words “killed by three shots to the back” don’t

sound cheerful at all—supposedly his body

was found by his wife, and then all of this was written by his

colleague from Crimean Tatar television

on Facebook, and this

naturally

caused a huge reaction. Everyone

began expressing sympathy,

condolences, and trying to learn

the details of what had happened. There were

reports that Arkady was still alive

when he was found, but then his condition worsened and he

died on the way to the hospital. All of this

naturally shocked and stunned everyone

who was familiar with his work,

read his posts, and followed his life.

Arkady Babchenko is a fairly well-known

figure now in the political and

public life of our country,

and in Ukraine’s as well, actually. And then the

next day there was a press

conference at which Arkady Babchenko

walked out alive. People had already rushed to Kyiv,

written obituaries; many had already managed

to order Babchenko’s books so they could

read them; some had already downloaded and

read them. I even read that one woman

went to a psychotherapist and paid for an appointment

that very day because she was so

upset. She was later very annoyed that the money

had been spent for nothing, because he then

appeared alive at that press conference and

said that this had been an operation—

an operation by Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU)—and that it was

necessary in order to truly

save his life, because there had been a contract

out on him from people who needed

to be found, identified, and proven to be the ones

planning this crime. So,

as I understand it now, evidence is being gathered

against the people who

planned to carry out Arkady’s murder, and

there is footage of the arrest of

the organizer of this murder. I hope

that a pretrial measure will be imposed on the organizer today.

As I understand it, the main

person who exposed this murder plot

was the would-be hitman himself,

who had served in eastern Ukraine,

the man who was assigned to carry out this

killing. He went to the SBU first,

they eventually believed him, and he helped play the role of

the killer and expose this whole chain. And in

fact, some fairly strong

statements are being made by the Ukrainian SBU, and

some evidence has been released. There is

video of a man counting money,

sitting in a car and recounting cash; there is

video of the arrest. I very much hope that

there is much more evidence than this,

and that for now they’re keeping it

up their sleeve so that later,

at the right moment, it can be published. But

for now, all of this really does look like

a murder was prevented, and we are all very

glad that Arkady Babchenko is alive—

that he stayed alive. I’m being told we have

a short clip of the joyful

moment when Babchenko was invited into the hall

at the press conference. Let’s

watch it.

And Arkady Babchenko...

I will... your work... and she... better package...

...spilled... you... ruby... all that lovey-dovey stuff...

...you’ll find out... sitting... and I’ll shoot...

...and now they are bringing in Arkady Babchenko.

(inaudible)

Happy third birthday.

Marganets.

[music]

And now Ukrainian President Petro

Poroshenko has assigned security to Arkady

Babchenko, so I hope that his life

and health now,

and the safety of his family, are no longer under threat. According

to the SBU, Russian special services hired

a man to kill Babchenko for $40,000.

According to Ukrainian media, the SBU

has brought terrorism charges

against the alleged organizer. Yes, today

a man is suspected of organizing and

acting as an intermediary in this murder plot—a man

with the surname German. He is a Ukrainian citizen.

He works somewhere in the defense industry, and according

to the SBU, he was recruited by the Russian

the special services, and they organized it together

the assassination attempt on Babchenko

let's move on to the next topic

because I think we also shouldn't

forget the other people who are still alive and

of course, I wanted to talk on this broadcast

about Oleg Sentsov, who since May 14 has been on

a hunger strike—yes, it's already been more than two

weeks since Oleg Sentsov

began his hunger strike, and that is of course very

impressive. It is a courageous, brave

act. To go on hunger strike in prison is terribly

difficult, utterly unbearable, because

read any memoirs by

Soviet dissidents who describe how

a hunger strike in prison unfolds, how

it happens

and, even worse, forced

feeding—forced feeding through

the nose. All of this is real torture, and if

a person goes that far, it means that he

is truly prepared to part with his

life for his convictions, for his

innocence. And of course Sentsov should

be immediately exchanged by Ukraine for

Russian servicemen, or for other

people who are also currently being held in

Ukraine as prisoners. In fact, it's absurd

—absurd, sad, and tragic—that

as for Oleg Sentsov, personally I would never

have known

I read about his case and watched his

statement, and it seems to me there are no

grounds to accuse a person of

terrorism. That is, the case that we

have seen, which has been publicly and convincingly

laid out online—you can

look at what this

criminal case against Oleg Sentsov was stitched together from

—there is simply no solid evidence

or basis

These are fake pieces of evidence, trumped-up

charges, and all of it existed only

so that they could apparently report that

there were terrorists, that we prevented

a terrorist threat against

Russia, and, you know,

under the quota-driven system, file some kind of reports to Putin

and

and all of this—I've gone too far afield now

it seems to me that now it is already necessary

to stop and make the sensible decision

to have Oleg Sentsov released

along with the other people who are

clearly suffering because of the political

ambitions of Vladimir Putin. Yes, once again,

a hunger strike in prison is as serious as it gets

If a person goes on hunger strike

in prison, it means he is ready to put

his life at risk, it means he is ready

to die for his convictions, and that

of course commands the utmost respect

Let's move on to Russian criminal cases in

Chelyabinsk

A criminal case has been opened against the organizers of the May 5 rally

under the article on

hooliganism

No, they did not overturn cars or burn

police vans

and whatever else people supposedly do when committing hooliganism—they did not

fire guns while drunk in a hotel, either

They didn't do that either, unlike

some former senators, by the way

What is unfolding now in Chelyabinsk is

completely awful

Again, on the one hand it's almost funny, because

it is so absurd that it is very

hard even to believe that this is really

happening right now before our very eyes

that somewhere in our country right now, people

really could be sent away for seven years

to a real, actual prison

for this. On the other hand, it is

truly tragic, and we started with not

the most cheerful news, but we cannot

not talk about this, because in fact

it seems to me this once again shows that

any one of us, any one of you who can

watch this broadcast right now, could tomorrow

be imprisoned under the very same article. Right now

a case has been opened simply because people

on May 5 held a very successful and

excellent rally in Chelyabinsk—here it is

right before your eyes: people are walking down

the central street, chanting, as you can see

in an entirely peaceful manner

as calmly as possible, with absolutely no

violations of public order—look, whole cars with

all their windows intact are standing nearby, no one is

firing pistols into the air while drunk

drunk, naked, or whatever else it is that

people engaged in hooliganism are supposed to do. They are waving

Russian flags—how

patriotic that is, first of all; and how wonderful these people are

Just look at their faces, how

inspired they are, how strongly they feel

their unity, and in a noble impulse to fight for

their country, for their future and the future

of their children, they came out onto the streets of their city

And now, because people were shouting

the chant 'Dubrovsky, resign!' and

'One, two, three—Putin, leave!' I don't know of any more

peaceful chants at a rally. Girls were chanting, 'One,

two, three, four; one, two, three—Putin, leave!' Right now

show us a little more, it seems to me

and now these people are facing

a prison term of up to seven years because

the case was reclassified under the most

serious part of the article: that this group of people, by

prior conspiracy, carried out

hooligan acts

Hooligan acts, meaning that they were chanting

'One, two, three—Putin

leave!' Not 'one, two, three'

—since when is 'Putin' obscene language? This is absurd

Since when did 'Putin' become a swear word? They

were chanting this completely lawful

chant—what have we come to, that we are even discussing this?

The legality of chanting in the streets—what a horror.

And it is an absolutely proper chant.

Putin really is a thief, and this needs to be

said out loud in the streets; there is therefore nothing

criminal about it. But in Chelyabinsk,

the Chelyabinsk authorities and police found it absolutely

appalling. The Chelyabinsk governor really did not like it,

he disliked it intensely, and they moved to

open a criminal case against these

wonderful guys, so that, apparently, they would

walk the streets without chanting, or

better yet, not walk the streets at all,

but sit at home and write, "we're laying down"

messages in blocked Telegram for business and

other purposes. In fact, there is a wonderful

report that they posted—a report on the

interrogation, a scan of a police interrogation record.

No, actually, Volkov, our colleague, posted it

on his Twitter; you can

take a look and read this absolutely

masterful

document in this case. It described, if I am not

mistaken, that this gathering of people was supposed to proceed

in a

good-natured and patriotic manner, which

is something else entirely. I have never seen more good-natured and

patriotic gatherings of people than

the rallies organized by our

team, where people are so

good-natured, so patriotic,

so wonderful, that this colonel

or lieutenant colonel—someone can correct me on the rank—

this police officer ought to go there himself,

come out to these rallies, and enjoy

the universal good nature and the atmosphere of kindness

and patriotism. But as of now, our

coordinator Boris Zolotarevsky has been

arrested for 25 days, and now these

investigative actions are continuing, along with

unprecedented pressure on him. At the same time, he

was taken in for questioning immediately upon leaving

the special detention center. You are now seeing two

episodes: first that, and then a search.

At the exit from the detention center, and I saw

photos of how the police

entered the house, and they looked like—well, imagine

the Victory Day parade, you know, where there are

snipers sitting somewhere up in the towers—

all in uniform, with some hellishly

huge rifles. So people in that kind of

gear came rushing in, storming the

place of a man whose entire guilt,

from the police's point of view, basically consists

of chanting, "One, two, three—Putin, resign!"

So the full force

of the Chelyabinsk police came crashing down on

his head. Moreover, in Chelyabinsk, the headquarters was

as far as I know, stripped of all its equipment—

literally robbed. So the point is that

the staff are continuing to work now

through the headquarters, and of course it will

keep working despite any

unprecedented pressure that

is being exerted against our

regional colleagues. But probably, by the way, speaking

of robbery, we should move on to

a promotional segment about our store. I wanted

to tell you about it, and now we have

a minute for the store segment on the couch.

At the moment, you practically cannot

buy anything from me—well, actually, you can buy,

but not by phone; instead, go to our

website. A banner with the address should appear now. So,

what should we start with? Or rather, don't ask me

what class it is.

This phone case—with little jokes on it—how do you even describe it properly?

This is probably the right way to present it.

The case with the jokes on it—I do not remember how much

I was supposed to call it so that I could

advertise it successfully. They gave it to me, and since

I have been using it, I can honestly say

I do not know how good I am at describing products,

but I will try: it is a very good case.

Unlike cheap AliExpress cases, the edges are sturdy,

so if the phone falls

somewhere, it will not get scratched, and most

likely it will remain intact, because

there is cushioning here to absorb the impact.

I really, really like it.

I have been using it for I do not know how long now,

several weeks, and I am extremely happy with it.

I

would cross out from my résumé

the line saying I can work as a remote salesperson.

That seems to have failed. We also have in our store

this little calendar here. This calendar was

drawn by Alexei Navalny, by the way.

He is due to be released at the end of June, and I

think we will definitely go to meet

him, and we will all be calling on people to do so. Here

here we have

riot police officers (OMON, Russia's special police units) drawn here, and also Mother Rus'

depicted in barbed wire,

a prison-camp watchtower, and 9 more

drawings.

There are 12 in total—one for each month.

So yes, if you buy it, you will get

that, and besides there are many other things in

the store. The hoodies are great too; I

also really like them, and I have had mine for

a very long time, and after washing it still looks great.

Nothing happens to it; all the printed text

from May 2018 is still in place. I really

like it. I really do use the things

that we sell in our fundraising

store, and I am genuinely pleased with them.

I am being told that the calendar costs 666 rubles (about US$10 at the time),

and if you buy it right now, it will still be 666 rubles, and these

little cases too—well, these cases

are wonderful, genuinely very high-quality,

and they cost 800 rubles (about US$12 at the time). By the way, I will explain

I

before you ask why they are so

expensive. First, why are we selling this? Well,

first of all, why is it so expensive? The money goes toward

the work of the Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK, founded by Alexei Navalny).

All of this is quite transparent; all of it

will of course appear in the financial reporting.

It’s half a purchase, half a

donation, really — that is,

when you buy these items, you’re effectively

getting some merchandise from us in return.

From the Anti-Corruption Foundation and Alexei

Navalny’s campaign headquarters.

And so that in some way it would feel

nice for you — so that you’re not just donating

money, but also getting something in return from

us. Of course, it’s without Alexei’s signature, without

anything special, but still, roughly

speaking, you’re not leaving empty-handed. But in fact,

all of this money goes in full

to fund the work

of the Anti-Corruption Foundation and the headquarters

of Alexei Navalny, to continue our

work, so that we can work even

better and on a larger scale.

Yes, Artyom Salikhov writes: it seems to me that Oleg

Navalny, on leaving prison,

will be locked up for another 30 days

for some pretext. Honestly, I wouldn’t be surprised

by anything at this point.

But the main thing is that we all must

understand perfectly well:

Oleg Navalny is not guilty. Oleg Navalny

is not guilty even under the verdict itself.

And according to the ruling of the European Court of Human

Rights, the case against Oleg Navalny isn’t worth

a damn. This case is politically

motivated, and he must

be released immediately. And all these

years

that he has been in prison, he

has been there unlawfully, against common

sense, against the law, and for all of this,

of course, the people who did this,

the organizers of these trials, will bear

responsibility. There is no

doubt about that.

Oleg Navalny is now

a political prisoner, because Putin’s people

really like hostages — they really like

putting pressure on family members. And this case with

Alexei Navalny, when they simply

jailed his brother precisely so that

Alexei would stop

carrying out his political

activity,

would stop defending his rights and

freedoms, and helping other

people living in our country do the same. But as

we can see, that didn’t work, so

Oleg remains in prison, but we

hope that in the very near future he will

be released.

In any case, we will not stop doing what we do.

Hello to Ufa as well — and in the comments they’re also

sending greetings. And people are writing: Navalny,

how many more episodes of the 2017 show will there be without

Alexei Navalny? How many more — two?

I think no, there will be one more

episode, because he gets out — we’ll tell you.

He gets out on the morning of June 14 from the special detention center.

As for the detention diaries, I visited him today.

I’ll pass along all your greetings to him.

He listens to Echo of Moscow radio and gets some

bits of news, and he was also very surprised

by the case involving Arkady Babchenko.

But of course, not all of the information

reaches him in full.

But he’s upbeat and cheerful, and he’s learning Python — yes, learning

Python. I visited him several times, and all those

times our conversations mostly revolved

around Python. I brought him four

books — I bought them especially for him — on

Python, and he’s been reading them avidly, and

it seems to be going well. He’s very

engaged in it. It’s great that a person is ready

to discover some new skills, new knowledge

for himself. From one of the books he even

seems likely, once he gets out, he’ll be able to

write his own blog on the internet.

Can you imagine — he wanted to learn programming.

Well, since I’m also into Python,

you understand that something has to be done, and that

you should bring Alexei something so he can understand it

better. So you teach him, basically. Well, I just

comment and answer his questions, and

even the last time — or rather, the time before last —

I came to see him and brought

some Python exercises that had been prepared for him,

and

when I came back, he took the sheet

of paper with the problems on it,

solved them, and even wrote a program. It seems to me

that this piece of paper will someday

have some value in the future.

He scored 52 points or something like that — I haven’t checked yet.

Bags.

A viewer writes:

It’s a shame that once again Alexei will spend his birthday

locked up.

Indeed, June 4 is Alexei

Navalny’s birthday, and he will spend

it locked up, unfortunately. Our colleague Nikolai

Lyaskin recently had his birthday

as well, and he too spent it locked up.

And

he was in the same special detention center, by the way,

as Alexei Navalny. Unfortunately, they can’t see each other

because they’re in different cells. As

political prisoners, they are kept

separately. But today, with Kolya, in my view,

something close to a legal miracle happened:

today, on appeal, his term

of administrative arrest was reduced to ten days.

He had been given fifteen days; now it’s

ten. That means he will be released

very soon, literally in the next few days,

not in five. I think he’ll be free on June 2.

As I recall, he had originally been supposed to get out

on June 7.

We’ll see how things go with

Nikolai Lyaskin. I think he’ll come up with

something to tell you, and it will make a wonderful

special detention center story. Today there were also appeals

for Kira Yarmysh and Ruslan as well.

the court left his sentence unchanged

things didn’t go that way, and it was left without

changes

Ruslan is serving 30 days; 25 days is

first of all illegal, and second, awful

terribly hard. I myself have never been held

in a special detention center, which is why from time to time

you get offended and people look at me sideways

my colleagues do, but nevertheless I

understand perfectly well that there, first of all,

it’s boring, and second, in the summer the unsanitary conditions

are made worse by the hot water being turned off

even a fork or instant noodles like Doshirak (a popular Russian instant ramen brand) can become a problem for you

the conditions really are very bad

25 or 30 days is very, very bad

really uncomfortable, I mean

you’re allowed one hour of walking a day

but the rest of the time you’re lying there crammed in with

a large number of other people. I know that

there were 10 people in Ruslan’s cell

and all those who were locked up with

Ruslan were people who had already

served time before in a penal colony, that is, people

who had been caught either for drunk driving

so they already had a certain kind of experience

and baggage

or people who are required to report regularly

people who aren’t in prison but are supposed to

check in at their place of residence and if they don’t

they can also be jailed for a number of days, so

it’s, let’s say, a specific kind of company, but at the same time

as Ruslan said, everyone respects political prisoners

because when I wrote

that phrase, that everyone respects political prisoners

someone replied to me on Twitter

and even retweeted it, because he wrote

to me that back in 1991

he thought the very concept of political prisoners in our

country would disappear, but he was mistaken. Never

say never

and indeed, now we do have them; we are living

in Russia, where there are political

prisoners under criminal charges and under

administrative charges as well

according to Ruslan, on the contrary, everyone

keeps asking about politics; he’s already tired

of talking about the Anti-Corruption Foundation’s investigations

to his cellmates, and by the way, we have

video greetings from him and from Nikolai as well

let’s watch what Ruslan

had to tell us in the middle of all this

for our program

Hello everyone, we’re at the Moscow City Court

today, where Kira and others are having their appeals heard

we’re here together with our

colleagues

the hearing would not have taken place if we

hadn’t come, but they left everything

unchanged, so basically

that’s it

no

we got five days, and everything was left

unchanged. Keep working. And do you want

a funny thing about this video?

Araslanov recorded it before they

announced the ruling, and in it he says

that they left these jail days unchanged

because in fact the whole case is sewn

with white thread, meaning it’s completely obvious and fabricated

it was completely obvious. I went to court today

I was at Kira’s hearing today

and at the hearings for Ruslan and Nikolai as well

and I wasn’t skipping work

the judge was just unbelievable, and I went there because

they were discussing the rally of May 5 in Moscow

and whether that rally had been authorized, and I could

show the court, as a witness, that

the rally was approved, because when we

received the official document

confirming the authorization of the rally, that happened

only on May 10, so

at that time the rally was not

unauthorized and was not

unapproved. But the judge didn’t even

hear me out. I spent all that time

sitting in the hallway, and the judge simply did not

bother to hear my testimony

nor did he bother at all

to grant any motions

from the defense side; they repeatedly filed

motions to call a witness, motions regarding

the inclusion of documents, and so on, and

all of those motions were denied, and

more than that, the judges there were so

how should I put it

on our broadcast, but they were so

unfair that they even

threw journalists out of there

in batches just because they picked up

their phones. It was really hardcore there

at the hearing

the session was held in office number 6

I wrote that it seems to me

that maybe every office in this court should

be renamed after that room number

because justice is certainly nowhere to be found there

yes, of course. I was at

Alexei Navalny’s appeal, and there

really, if you have the chance to go to court

to attend a trial involving

a political case, if they’re considering

someone’s arrest over a rally, someone’s arrest over

some repost or something like that, go

without fail. Just set aside one day

and you will understand that this

lawlessness, this crime

of the authorities that is happening right now

is much closer than you think

it’s a very sobering experience. If you have

some acquaintance who thinks

that, well, not everything is bad, that there are

some reasonable judges there, that there are

some officials who maybe are

decent people

please, just take them to one

such trial or appeal hearing, and they will

guaranteed

be in for a real roller coaster

the impression, because at first he comes in

so when I came in, although I perfectly well

understand what is happening there, still

it is quite interesting at first

so, the judge speaks with Navalny and says

well yes, yes, right, show the video

let's see what happened there, yes, yes, well

you can hear, right, that you seem to be chanting something

and then they just grab you and detain you

wow, well, that really is something

what a horror, just look at what they are doing

they beat you, grab you, and the judge, it seems,

seems good-natured and loyal, even

at first starts discussing things quite reasonably

the video, asking Alexei about what happened there

then leaves to make a decision and after

half an hour comes back with the ruling and says

leave it unchanged, there are no grounds not to

trust the police officers, and even if

someone might have gotten the impression

that this judge is reasonable, that this judge

would somehow follow the law and

act according to conscience and honor, all of that

all of that collapses, and definitely bring

your friends, and come to these court hearings yourselves

it is very engaging and enlightening

your rose-colored glasses disappear immediately, and all this

this whole façade

falls away before your eyes. And let's also look at

the video Nikolai Lyaskin recorded for us, this is

you managed to record it after they pulled you away from the bailiffs

you literally recorded this video address

they were recording me without my... Hello everyone

sending you my greetings and all kinds of rays

of joy and indignation from the Moscow City Court

the appeal is underway right now, the judge has not yet

issued a decision, but I think everything here is

obvious: they will leave it unchanged

leave it unchanged, strange... what outraged me most

of course was those 25 days

in detention, and also this tweet that we

made without any other

interaction with the mayor's office, but this is

an outrage, judicial lawlessness, and therefore

of course judicial reform is one of the

first things that must happen in the Beautiful

Russia of the Future

many people ask how I am doing

everything is bearable, everything is fine, the staff

treat me normally, nothing terrible

the really bad thing is that I am isolated from you

but I am reading books, and I always urge you not

to get used to the lawlessness that

is going on. We should not, over a tweet, and people should not

be subjected to administrative arrest or any

other punishment at all. In my case there is

forgery involving two police reports with the signatures

of witnesses, which were written up without me present

for that, for falsifying documents

of course responsibility should be borne

by the police officers and the people whom they

call on

to sign falsified documents

but in any case, huge greetings to all of you

the viewers and everyone watching, I will never get tired of

saying it

leave likes, share clips from the broadcast

subscribe to the channel and also to

the Navalny Live app, you are all doing great

well done, it somehow really

... 2018 ... Anyway, now for some good news

good news from Yekaterinburg

where, unexpectedly, a volunteer won his case and received

16 rubles in compensation for unlawful

detention while handing out leaflets. He should not have been detained at all

but the fact that he

won in a Russian court and even received

compensation is, of course, astonishing; I cannot recall

anything like it. Moscow is a separate story, of course

all the courts there have been completely purged, and in

Moscow, yes, not only in political

cases, and in general, justice

is probably hard to achieve. If the case is about

some property division in a divorce, then

perhaps a judge can still somehow

make a fair decision there

calculate it correctly, I hope, using

a calculator

but if you are up against the state

then in Moscow the case is doomed in advance, and

it is not even worth wasting time and nerves, and

if possible, you should litigate at least

in commercial court, because there the judges are still

more or less professional

some decisions can still get through. In

Moscow courts it is completely

useless. And just recently my mother-in-law

told me about a case where she was litigating over

a land plot

and she said that they did not just indirectly but directly

told her, basically, let's settle it

... he said that when I come in

I was told outright in response that

do not list it in the register, because we have an

unofficial instruction that all these decisions

will simply be denied for sure; at most, indicate

him at least as a third party there so that he

appears somewhere, because he has no direct relation

to the case, so there is no need to list him as a defendant. And of course

many thanks to the judge for his honesty

well, that is how Russian

justice works. The honest part is that they

said what kind of decision they would issue

an honest decision... I mean

what I am saying is that right now, unfortunately

our Russian judicial

system is not something you should rely on, even if you

do not take part in rallies

still, unfortunately, you are unlikely

to achieve even some semblance of justice

some statistics for May 5: detained

and subjected to arrest, that is, given

various jail terms, were 22

people; 11 staff members received fines

that is only for the headquarters: twenty-

two staff members were arrested, and 11 were fined

and overall during the May 5 protest there were

1,351 people detained in total, just imagine

this crowd, and how much time

the police wasted pointlessly on

detaining all of them, processing the paperwork,

and drawing up reports.

Then there were all those court hearings,

to take stock of the real heroes,

to count the honest people in our country

who suffer for the truth, for their

views, for their political beliefs.

But again, we and our colleagues from the

Anti-Corruption Foundation

naturally help everyone who was detained. We

file complaints, we go to court, we

continue to fight for justice, and we will

keep doing so all the way to the ECHR (European Court of Human Rights), if necessary.

All complaints about all unlawful detentions

will, of course, be vindicated by the European

Court of Human Rights once the cases make it there.

After appeals in the Russian courts, we will

seek justice, compensation, and

protection for our people. And here someone writes:

tell us about the news

in quotes: “Russia has been ordered to pay €2

billion for human rights violations.” I

take it this is the total amount for all

the years during which Russia has been subject to rulings.

Those €2 billion are for the entire

period Russia has paid citizens who

suffered from actions by the authorities

that were unlawful. This could include torture,

and kidnappings in Chechnya, it could be torture

in police custody, it could also be unlawful

detentions—in other words, this is the

overall sum for all human rights

violations that made it to the court. And by the way,

my colleagues are reminding me that we are

still collecting donations for

paying fines,

and we even have a banner for it—we’ll probably

see it on screen in a moment. You can also

take part, and of course this

money goes only toward paying the unlawful

fines people received for

coming out to the squares of their cities on May 5.

Please send in your questions; we

will try to answer them and discuss whatever

interests you. Your feedback is very

important to us. I also wanted to discuss a news story

that I was told we absolutely had to cover

on today’s broadcast. And who would have thought

the answer would come from the court bailiffs?

Today they literally stopped me there,

grabbed me by the button, and said: when

we were just talking in the courthouse corridor about how

I’d be hosting the broadcast today together with

Georgy, and that today we’d be discussing

various news stories,

they said, “Do you know what you need to talk about?”

I said, “What?” They said:

“Gasoline.”

“Have you seen how much gasoline costs? Yesterday I

filled up for one amount, and

today it’s the same amount for much less, and they’ve

completely lost it”—and then came the profanity,

which we won’t repeat on our broadcast.

But the bailiffs, too, have quite an opinion of our

president and government, who

have raised gasoline prices. In fact,

right now I really think that everyone

connected in some way with

transportation—

freight or passenger transport—as well as people who

simply own cars, could not have failed to

notice the price increase, the sharp increase

in gasoline prices. The average price of AI-95 gasoline

in Russia has risen to 43 rubles 60 kopecks

per liter

whereas in June of last year, according to

Rosstat (Russia’s federal statistics agency), it was still

39.9 rubles. So

that is, a clearly noticeable increase.

Naturally, this cannot help but

affect not only people who

own cars. Even if you’re a pedestrian,

you will still notice this rise in

gasoline prices, because

you buy food in stores—and how do

those goods get delivered there? They’re transported

by vehicle.

And vehicles use gasoline, and gasoline

has become more expensive. You can trace this through

many things, of course.

And this gasoline price hike, it seems to us,

is hitting literally everyone. And just now I

even saw online—we probably won’t show it here,

but you can google it yourselves—a whole lot,

just a huge number of flash-mob videos

where men

well, in male voices, apparently, film

videos at gas pumps and

say everything they think about

the price hike, the president, corruption

in the country, and so on. Because really,

all of this, of course, comes down to corruption.

Right now, after the May decrees (major presidential policy directives), there is a new

task: by any means possible

to squeeze money out of the population, and so

now the screws are really being tightened. You’ve

probably heard about the VAT increase, about rising prices,

about the proposed increase in the retirement

age, and now this gasoline issue.

Of course, there will be more sad news like this,

news that will hit our

fellow citizens in the wallet.

More of it, yes. And you’re talking about the population

that is suffering. But there are people who

are suffering more than others—for example, Roman

Abramovich,

Oleg Deripaska. Oleg Deripaska is suffering so much

that he has called for electricity prices to be raised

so that, despite the sanctions, he would still

be left with as much money as he had before

the sanctions. It’s astonishing arrogance, of course. I

didn’t think people could be that brazen.

And we also wanted to discuss Roman Abramovich.

If we have time, we definitely will.

After we listen to comments from

Mikhail, an expert in the oil and gas sector.

They got through to Krutikhin there and

asked him: how long can this go on, where is it headed,

why is it getting more expensive, how much more will it rise, and

who is to blame for all this. Predicting it is

very difficult. This is about how, for a moment,

that is, quite significantly affects the price

of gasoline, since taxes and levies account for

the cost of gasoline. It comes to roughly six

and a half to seven rubles per liter,

or, of course, in the total price

it makes up about 65 percent overall.

The rest is made up of the producer’s costs,

as well as transport and refining costs, and some

minimal margin. If taxes continue

to rise,

then prices will inevitably go up too. But since

the government

is still firmly determined

to collect more for its own coffers

and is increasing the burden, I believe, this year,

they planned two increases

in gasoline excise taxes, and those measures

did have an effect — they pushed gasoline prices upward

already after the first increase in January, and

they kept rising after that. Now, in government circles,

they say they are considering

possibly making some reduction

in the excise tax, but apparently that has not

helped oil producers or refiners

much.

Prices will almost certainly keep rising, and we

can see that overall — I’m losing my train of thought here —

a component of this is

oil refining.

In other words, the refining margin right now

is already negative. If large

companies can somehow

offset losses from refining with

profits from exporting crude oil, for example,

then small companies, which are forced

to buy gasoline and diesel fuel either on the exchange or

directly from refineries,

do not have that luxury, and apparently

they are the ones who will be raising prices.

All right then, and now let’s move on to

Abramovich, because Zhora

will never forgive us if, on this

broadcast, we don’t discuss what is happening with him right now.

You’ve probably seen it in the news —

some truly remarkable things are going on

right now.

He did not get a UK visa, where he

naturally lives and where he

has been moving all his assets.

He also did not get a visa to Switzerland; he was

refused citizenship there, so

he went to Israel and obtained citizenship.

Strangely enough, for some reason he did not

go to Russia.

Even though, of course, he has a great deal

connecting him to Russia. As for Abramovich,

no matter how much Abramovich tries to present himself as an honest

businessman independent of the authorities,

he is absolutely nothing of the sort.

Abramovich is flesh of the flesh of the current

regime; it raised him, and even now he

simply pays off people

who are in power. This has been

proven many times over; there are many stories

about Abramovich simply handing over

yachts, millions of dollars, and in return

naturally he was able to keep accumulating

his wealth.

But among the most outrageous

cases, one can recall, for example,

something more recent — remember Shuvalov’s house

that is surrounded by houses without windows, you know,

the one where windowless buildings were constructed so that

there would be no view? Abramovich — or rather, his company —

was involved in building that project. There is also

a wonderful story involving Shuvalov

and Abramovich. Anyone who has long followed

the investigations of the Anti-Corruption Foundation (founded by Alexei Navalny)

or has simply followed Shuvalov or

Abramovich knows it perfectly well.

Not recently exactly, but a number of

years ago, a huge sum of money

suddenly appeared in Shuvalov’s asset declaration —

an enormous amount.

Tens of millions of dollars. He was

asked, “Shuvalov, where on earth did you get

that kind of money?” And Shuvalov replied, you know,

“Well, back when I was not yet in

government service and was working as a lawyer, I helped

Abramovich privatize Sibneft, if I remember correctly,

and for that Abramovich gave me

an option for half a percent of Sibneft.

So I exercised that option and

what do you think? No, those $50 million

that he received from

that option — he did not put them in a bank, but

loaned them out.

And according to Shuvalov, do you know to whom

he loaned them? To Alisher Usmanov — because that is

exactly the kind of person who so desperately needs

loans from Shuvalov. It may have turned out to be

quite a successful deal, because

he lent Usmanov $50

million and got back $118

million literally in

a very short

period of time. And you certainly will never

manage to put money in a bank or lend

it to someone at an interest rate like that.

And those $118 million,

which came from some very

murky loan that itself came from a very

murky Sibneft option — according to

Shuvalov, that is precisely what allowed him to buy

that legendary castle in Austria,

that legendary apartment in London, and in general

to live like some completely deranged

Arab prince — I don’t know what else

to call him.

Abramovich is also the man who

gave the yacht *Olympia* to Vladimir Putin. About this

wrote people who were directly

witnesses to that process.

They moved this yacht to Sochi, where it

remains to this day, and Putin

periodically uses this yacht there at sea.

Everything is simply blocked off by FSO officers (Russia’s Federal Protective Service), and

Putin sails on it to his residence

in Praskoveyevka. What else can be said about Abramovich?

What is really there, in fact?

There are too many details to go into.

I mean, just so you understand: if

Abramovich is being stripped of his British visa, that

does not mean that all Russian

businesspeople

are being denied British visas. No, this is an excellent

signal to all the people who pay bribes,

to the authorities who feed off this

power, who live off the favors

that this government grants them.

It says: guys, your money is not welcome here, and

that is absolutely right. I mean, listen,

if thieves broke into your apartment,

if people came in and made

a complete mess of it, and then people showed up with

money that they had stolen from

someone else—sure, of course they

paid you, but still, why would you want in

your country money that

was obtained through corruption? Why would you want

these criminals in your country? They are of no use

to anyone, and it is great that Abramovich

has run into this—I can only support it.

So, now

let’s move on to Georgy Reutov, because I can see

that, honestly, I do not even really want to talk

about it at length, because it seems to me that everyone

can already see that the oligarchy is now

tearing our country apart piece by piece and

dragging it abroad. This is not being done by

the opposition, and it is not being done by journalists. It is

being done by very specific people—people

who are fed by the authorities and are close

to Vladimir Putin. And now it is perfectly

clear that Abramovich went to

Russia, where his

business is, where he earns

money, while he went to Israel in order

to live in warmth and comfort.

Just so you understand: for both the oligarchs and

the authorities, Russia is a way

to make money, while the place to spend that money

and build a life for themselves

is not here. For them, Europe

and the United Kingdom are the places where they

plan to live someday, where they plan

for their children to live—and their children are already

living there now. And when this castle of theirs,

which has now turned out to be a house of cards,

starts collapsing literally

from the slightest breeze, for them it is, of course,

a shock, because they invested millions and

millions of dollars. They hoped to spend

a significant part of their

lives there. They hoped they could buy everyone off

and that with their money

they would get investor visas and everything

would be smoothed over across Europe with cash, while those

European politicians would be

so cynical that they would not

ask questions or sniff around

about where that money came from. But now, as far as I

understand, a process has been launched in the United Kingdom

after the poisoning of Skripal

to review these

investor visas and to begin

asking questions

of the people investing money: what

kind of money is it, and how was it

obtained? Right now, as far as I

understand, there is a review of the investor

visa of Abramovich.

And that is why he has run into difficulties. In

fact, Abramovich makes

his money in Russia, and yes, it really does smell bad.

He has construction

and development projects in Russia, and his

metallurgical company Evraz has a great many

interests there. When we did an investigation

in

2015 into Moscow’s garbage—where it

was being taken, and which companies were handling it—

Abramovich’s trail showed up there too.

So, even back in 2015, he

had a great many business interests in Russia. And of course,

he does not connect his life with Russia

at all. What the United Kingdom is doing

to stop the flow

of dirty money into the country

deserves enormous respect. They have now

done several very impressive things

that I wish Russia would do as well.

For example, there is a register

company beneficial owners.

What is a beneficial owner? A company’s beneficial owner may

be a shareholder, but that shareholder may well

be just a nominal figurehead who simply

signs documents.

If you go to a bank or

to a government office,

they ask you:

who is the company’s beneficial owner, who is the real

owner of the company? And the United Kingdom maintains

an open register

of the beneficial owners of companies

registered in the UK. That means

that even now you can literally go to the website

of the British registry, called Companies

House, and download the full dataset on

company beneficial owners.

They went even further: they published a complete

register, a full list of commercial and

residential real estate owned

by offshore entities and legal persons. In other words,

roughly speaking, if one of those

Russian crooks—or not crooks, just

ordinary people—has some company

in the UK that owns

real estate in the UK, then you can simply

match up the two databases,

both of them open and published by the British authorities.

The government says you will be able to search

for property this way, and they want to go

even further: they want to publish not just

a list of foreign companies, mostly

various offshore firms that own

property in the UK, but they

also want to publish a list of the beneficial owners

of those companies. Then, of course, that will be the end for everyone,

and all the crooks who

hid behind these companies in order to

buy British property — all of them

will float to the surface like fish...

You know what the reason is?

Compare that.

Well, I don't even know anymore. Georgy, that was excellent.

Simply the best. But since we're talking

about Abramovich, and airtime is running short,

we should probably also talk

about Usmanov.

Because Usmanov has essentially now

taken all of Russian sport into his own hands.

Including esports — even esports,

where some people will tell you that

esports isn't really sport, but

sport really has now ended up

effectively under Usmanov's control,

because he has placed his own people

in key positions. For those who don't know,

Alisher Usmanov

in addition to everything else, is also

the president of the International Fencing Federation.

The current sports minister is

Pavel Anatolyevich Kolobkov,

an Olympic champion and an Honored Master of Sport in fencing.

And just recently, a new lineup was formed

for the new composition

of the Russian Olympic Committee. Previously,

it was headed by Zhukov, the same man who

we could probably talk about at length as well,

but now that position has been taken by

Pozdnyakov, a four-time Olympic

champion in fencing, 44 years old,

who is also connected with the same

federation headed by Alisher

Usmanov. They say that it was he who was

the lobbyist — Alisher Usmanov

who pushed Pozdnyakov into this post. And in effect,

to put it briefly, the Olympic Committee

of Russia

is more involved in a kind of diplomatic

function, while the Sports Ministry handles

its own budget and the allocation of funds

for sport. And these two key positions

are now occupied by Usmanov's people.

So in effect, he is the

ultimate beneficiary, the owner, of this whole

sports story in Russia — of an entire country.

Yes, and why did you back off there?

Usmanov owns the famous estate in

Znamenskoye on Rublyovka (an elite residential area outside Moscow), in the Moscow

region. And by the way, Usmanov's wife

is Irina Viner, who is also very close to

the world of sport, to put it mildly.

He really is taking it under his control — he is taking under

his control, and moreover not only that.

He is taking control with the obvious

approval of Vladimir Putin, because there are also

other notable

members of the new Russian Olympic Committee,

including oligarch Gennady Timchenko,

who, I don't know whether he has ever been involved in sport

personally or professionally,

Roger, you probably know.

Timchenko? Gennady Timchenko — how close

is he to sport? No, I can't recall

any athletic achievements of his. Yes, he didn't

do judo together with Arkady and

Putin; he knew him through a different

channel. And Vladimir Kozhin, the former

head of the presidential administration's affairs office,

now an adviser to the president,

on military-technical

cooperation, is also a person who, judging

by appearances, to be honest, doesn't exactly look like

someone very close to sport, yet he too has joined

the Russian Olympic Committee. Clearly these are people

who are very good friends from the inner

circle of Vladimir Putin, who

have now been placed in the Olympic

Committee, apparently in order to

control the situation regarding the admission of

the national team to the next Olympics, the doping

scandal, to keep everything under control and

report directly to the boss.

Right, so what else do we still need to discuss today?

Baklanova, the main news, the biggest

headline: the 150th anniversary

Gazelle van has crashed into the bridge

In St. Petersburg there is a bridge that says

"A Gazelle won't fit through." In other words, this is

a special bridge — I follow this

story, and it gives me incredible joy.

The number of views — or whatever you call it

on your internet. For those who

don't know, Kolya, by the way, didn't know about this

bridge. There are masses of videos about it. It's been

famous for about five years already.

So yes, and among them

a huge number of times there have been

incidents recorded there.

In St. Petersburg there is a bridge that says

"A Gazelle won't fit through," and it's not just

written there for nothing — every time a Gazelle tries

to go through, and with remarkable

regularity, news appears

that yet another Gazelle has had its roof sliced off

under this bridge. And just the other day, it was the 150th

Gazelle. There was even a photo online

of a person who brought a cake to the site

with a candle marked 150

and celebrated the occasion. Yes, if you have

any other good news, be sure

to send it in. I have another excellent piece of news:

Russian Railways plans by 2025

to phase out gravity toilets.

These gravity toilets —

it feels like such an innovation, with

nanotechnology and all that, something absolutely remarkable.

A truly unique thing from *Interstellar*, aaa, actually.

It’s actually a vacuum toilet, and these are ordinary

toilets, and, excuse me, it’s basically just a hole

that can take quite a beating... you dug through the ice there.

These are old-school, the most old-school kind.

That’s what toilets in Russian trains are like, and that’s it.

Gravity, sure — but only in 2025.

When even the thousandth Gazelle van won’t make it across those

bridges, Russian Railways will refuse — there’s nothing left to protect in the floors.

At least somewhere, someone is writing something good.

A good comment in the chat. And as for Mish (possibly a person’s nickname), let him

just stay over there and mind his own business, and not

stick his nose into Russia anymore.

Why does he keep meddling in Russia, and where are

we supposed to earn money so we can spend it

on ourselves? He learned to push in, and he’ll keep

interfering in Russia, taking our

wealth and dragging it off in different

directions, the old way, to different countries and

by different means, as long as Vladimir

Putin is in power.

Unfortunately, nothing will change. What do you

think about the new program for tracking down

holding-company networks by *Novaya Gazeta* (an independent Russian newspaper), if anyone

hasn’t seen it — they put out something that looks

absolutely amazing. I saw it,

I’d seen them write about it a little before, but this

is an insanely powerful piece of work. They took

data on state procurement by state-owned

companies, they used the register of legal

entities,

they used the shareholder register of joint-stock

companies, and they built the following map:

they took these state contracts and traced from them

the links to companies, and it turned out that

a fairly large number of state contracts —

worth hundreds of billions of rubles (billions of U.S. dollars) for

each of the state companies, for Russian Railways, Gazprom, and

so on — hundreds of billions were going

to people connected to one another,

who shared common companies.

Roughly speaking, there were 10 to 20 people

linked to one another,

sharing companies that were not really independent,

with the same phone number, located at the same

address — and they were getting contracts worth hundreds

of billions of rubles. And now this

fairly large body of data, so far,

I think covering around 20 such holdings, *Novaya Gazeta*

has published as a huge resource for

investigation. It seems to me many people simply

weren’t ready to grasp the scale

of what had happened, because literally in

a single publication, *Novaya Gazeta* wrote

about how trillions of rubles

are flowing to people connected to one another.

There are separate groups that supply

Gazprom, separate groups that supply Russian Railways, and all

of these groups were outlined quite clearly,

like distinct clusters. All these people

were identified, and that’s already a substantial achievement.

I hope they release it publicly, but for now

you can read it on the *Novaya Gazeta* website — it’s

excellent material, an excellent techno-

logical, high-tech investigation.

We can take questions from the chat now, and in the meantime

I’ll talk about what investigations like this usually

lead to.

As someone who investigates cartels, I

can say that this really is

a major piece of work, a major achievement

by the journalists at *Novaya Gazeta*, but unfortunately

I’m overcome by very pessimistic

feelings when I think about how

all this will end, what it will lead to.

Most likely, the companies will remain untouched.

I mean, what will it lead to? Contractors

who collude with one another and

form a cartel — will they be convicted, will they go to prison?

Maybe, but I don’t know. I don’t know a single

case in Russia — or rather, it’s not just that I don’t know one,

I know there hasn’t been a single case in Russia

opened under Article 178 of the Criminal Code

of the Russian Federation, which states

that restricting

competition illegally, excluding participants

from tenders, and so on, is not permitted. In other words,

the article is about restricting competition, and it

says that for restricting or eliminating

competition, there is a possible prison

sentence — and yet there hasn’t been a single

case under that article. I don’t know of any.

No matter how much I looked through law-enforcement

statistics, however much I tried to find one, I

didn’t find a single case like that, and

that’s why I think that unfortunately

these cases will come to nothing. But

of course, transparency and public information

do make life harder for some people.

What *Novaya Gazeta* is doing is vitally important; we’re doing it too,

we’ll keep doing it, and we’ll keep pushing for

accountability, of course. Unfortunately, even

lately the antimonopoly service seems to have

gone down the wrong path, in the opposite direction.

There used to be at least some sense of justice, but it has gone

a bit the other way, because if

earlier I had

little hope in the police,

still the courts at least

would sometimes side with the service and impose at least

minimal administrative fines

for violations, whereas now very often

things have started breaking down and the service just

seems to let people off everywhere,

people involved in these huge cartels

worth billions of rubles. But listen, if we’ve started talking

about state procurement, state companies, and so

on, let me mention something remarkable.

I was talking about a closed report, but there are

excerpts in the media, and the general contents have been described there.

It’s a report by Alexander K., who was

recognized as Russia’s best investment

analyst in 2016. The report

by this man, who is now, after

this report, being fired from Sberbank (Russia’s largest state-owned bank),

said the following:

They’re pushing him out, and more than that, his

supervisor too — in short, this person had better...

A Russian investment analyst wrote

the following: that the real

beneficiaries

of Gazprom are neither the Russian

government nor the Russian state budget,

but Gazprom’s contractors, who receive

huge, completely unjustified,

meaningless and unnecessary contracts from

Gazprom.

Gazprom, for example, orders pipes for

hundreds of billions of rubles

for things that, first, are not needed and, second, cost far

more than market rates. Instead of this money

going to the budget in the form of dividends, it

is siphoned off as overpayment.

It goes to the people who work as contractors for

Gazprom. And who are Gazprom’s contractors in our country?

Well,

those working for Gazprom are friends

of Putin, and Viktor

— Putin’s friends and people close to him.

Among Putin’s friends and associates,

I simply don’t think there are such

naive people left who are still prepared to

wonder who that might be. Yes, it is

the Rotenbergs and Timchenko, old friends

of Putin, who own companies

engaged in construction and

various other kinds of work,

carrying out these contracts for Gazprom. These people

are in fact, as it was

written in the Sberbank report, people who

are effectively the beneficiaries

of Gazprom. That is the essence of it.

But listen, this is no secret, and

it had long been obvious to everyone already. The fact that it

was finally put down on paper is great, and the person

was not afraid to write it. And this

was the professional opinion of an excellent

analyst. It was his job to write

things like that, because he is paid

to give shareholders a sound

assessment, a sober and objective analysis

of what is happening in the company. Because of this,

he has now been fired. Before that, he had published

a report on Gazprom, and before that

he had published a report on Rosneft, and

the situation in both cases is actually dire.

In fact, both Gazprom and Rosneft are

companies of enormous importance to Russia. These are

not just some private companies

built from scratch; they are tied to the welfare of

all the residents of our country. We,

as citizens, have the right to know these

results. But in the end, reports like these

do not even lead to any scrutiny of the Rotenbergs

and Timchenko. But unfortunately, now we do not have that

right, and they also want to deprive us of the right

even to learn about it officially, which

of course

means that those who actually do

their job duties

are being fired. I very much hope, I

wish him the soonest possible new employment.

To Alexander and to his superior, Kudrin

(Alexei Kudrin), because for

your work—yes, specialists like that

are worth their weight in gold. By the way, I remember that

Alexander Fek actually

was recognized as Russia’s best

investment analyst in 2016.

I’ll say right away: the best people are simply

punished for their professional

qualities. It is just negative selection,

negative selection, and probably now

the people remaining at Sberbank are those who

will be ready to write whatever is required and whatever

is demanded. There was real value in

the product that was being made

by Sberbank; judging by everything,

if this is how it ended, then it was

fairly objective material

that was very useful for people

who invest in Russian

companies. Now the quality of that product

after this scandal, in the eyes

of shareholders and subscribers to this

product, has fallen. Because if before

they were receiving

what turned out to be fairly good and

objective material,

then after this they will be receiving

censored material. It is one thing when

you simply buy a newspaper and see

censorship there—well, that is kind of obvious to you.

Yes, there is censorship in newspapers; that surprises no one.

But if you are paying for a product on which

your financial well-being, your

investment portfolio, depends,

on which it depends whether you make money

this year or not,

and when you see that this product has become

worse simply because Putin’s friends did not like it,

then of course you will

refuse it; naturally, it will no longer be

of interest to you, and it will no longer serve your needs.

In this sense, of course, Sberbank itself

—this Sberbank division—has

lost a great deal of its value.

We could go on down the list for a long time

of state companies and oligarchs about whom

Georgy has something to say, but our time

has come to an end. Just one final

comment from one of our listeners:

“It’s a stupid bridge. They need to put up a proper sign

and a height-restriction bar before the bridge,

as they should. I’m sure

the person who wrote that the bridge is stupid was one of the drivers

of some

Gazelle van.”

Number 103. Unfortunately, the good jokes

have run out, and the bad ones have too, and our airtime

has come to an end along with them. We

will try to tell you about the main news

of this week, standing in for the irreplaceable

Alexei Navalny, who is currently

serving time in a special detention facility

under administrative arrest.

together with Ruslan, wider than the united one, at Kira Yar

mice by Nikolai Baskov

and and our other colleagues, others

with allies and volunteers, they are now

being illegally subjected to political

repression. Sending big greetings to the Anti-Corruption Foundation

and the headquarters to continue

their work as always. Watch the channel

Navalny Live and subscribe to our channel

turn on notifications; they tell the truth here

see you all at some

next fillet, bye, meeting

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