Munich, Feb. 19, (dpa/GNA) - Former world chess champion and harsh critic of the Russian government Garry Kasparov sees Russia’s military defeat in Ukraine as the only key to change.
A victory for Ukraine is the prerequisite for any change in Russia, Kasparov said on Saturday evening at the Munich Security Conference as exiled Russians discussed ways to achieve a democratic future for their country.
It must be made clear to the population in Russia that the war is lost, Kasparov said on Saturday evening. He considered the people there to be enormously capable of suffering as long as they thought victory was possible. The only way, he said, was to make it clear to the people that the war was being lost.
And to change the minds of Russians, he added, unfortunately, there is no other solution than to help the Ukrainians liberate Crimea. Crimea is the core of Putin’s mythology, Kasparov said.
The daughter of murdered Russian dissident Boris Nemtsov, Zhanna Nemtsova, attested that many people in Russia were unaware of the situation in Ukraine and also disinterested. Russians in exile need to talk to the Russians, she said.
There needs to be information about Russian crimes, she said. She said rational arguments alone would not work in this. The only thing that works is emotional arguments, she said.
Irina Shcherbakova, a founding member of Memorial, a human rights organization now banned in Russia, said the Russian dictatorship wanted people to believe that total chaos was imminent after its fall. This view is also catching on in the West, fears that the West must overcome, she said.
Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a prominent critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, once again traced Putin’s path to power, saying that everyone had underestimated him.
Khodorkovsky had already presented his proposals for a federalization of Russia before the official start of the conference in Munich.
The Russian leadership has not been invited for the first time in more than 20 years. Unlike in previous years, the Iranian leadership and politicians from the German far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party have also not received an invitation.
GNA