Director Chechnya Peace Forum, London 

The Kremlin, with Vladimir Putin in the driver’s seat, controls the Russian parliament, government, legislature, judiciary, judges, military, police, media, regional authorities, even its own political opposition – and, of course, the elections! As for those who dare to challenge this compelling manifestation of force and invincibility, the regime will clamp down hard. The Putin regime has absorbed the essence of George Orwell’s 1984 and is therefore the flag bearer of the Stalin and Brezhnev spirit of the Soviet era. In the West, and in most of Russia, this is called dictatorship or authoritarian rule. In the Kremlin it is called “Managed Democracy.” [Read more]