Yuri Luzhkov running from Moscow
“In Russia, you must live long — and it will become interesting.” This saying, attributed to poet Korney Chukovsky, has been validated once again. Yuri Luzhkov, until four months ago the powerful mayor of Moscow and cochairman of Vladimir Putin’s United Russia party, who faithfully delivered the capital’s votes to the Kremlin and sent his police to break up pro-democracy rallies, has applied for a residence permit in the Republic of Latvia. According to press reports, Mr. Luzhkov deposited 200,000 Lats (US$378,000) in subordinated capital at Rietumu Banka — an investment that, under Latvian immigration laws, qualifies him for permanent residence. The former mayor explained that Latvian (and thus EU) residency will allow him “freedom of movement.”
Few things are more ironic than a senior Putin regime official asking for help from a Baltic country. Especially if the official is Yuri Luzhkov, who once compared Latvia to “Pol Pot’s Cambodia,” accused it of “genocide” of its Russian-speaking minority, and proposed boycotting Latvian products over the country’s refusal to grant Russian language official status. Bureaucrats and legislators in Moscow frequently refer to Latvia and neighboring Estonia — both of them EU and NATO members — as “fascist regimes.” “Everything changes,” observed Latvian journalist Vladimirs Zemnieks: “Evidently, [Latvia] does not appear as bad in reality as it did from a high-ranking position in Moscow.”
Mr. Luzhkov’s request was denied. After news of his application broke, Interior Minister Linda Mūrniece added the ex-mayor to the Latvian visa blacklist. Mr. Luzhkov vowed to fight on and get residence documents “in some other European country.” The former cochairman of United Russia seems to have little confidence in the system he helped build and sustain. Mr. Luzhkov is just the first of many. As the regime in Moscow begins to crumble, dozens of officials, unwilling to risk charges of corruption and abuse of power, will head for the West, hoping that their fortunes will buy them a quiet retirement somewhere on Sardinia or the Canary Islands.
They should not get their hopes too high. The second conviction of Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Platon Lebedev and the recent arrests of opposition leaders have, it appears, finally strengthened Western resolve to stand up to Moscow’s repression. The proposed EU visa blacklist, currently discussed in the European Parliament, is no longer limited to midranking officials. It begins with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, the mastermind of Russia’s authoritarianism and corruption. The signal from Brussels could not be clearer: the perpetrators of today’s abuses will, sooner or later, be held accountable.
Vladimir Kara-Murza, worldaffairsjournal.org
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