Is
Modernisation in Russia Possible? Interview
with Grigory Yavlinsky and Boris Titov by Yury Pronko,
"The Real Time" programme, Radio Finam, May
12, 2010
On 19 February, the Yabloko Party University hosted a lecture “Dynamics of Changes in Public Opinion”. The lecturer was Denis Volkov, sociologist and Director of the Levada Centre. The participants, using materials from sociological surveys, examined how the attitude of Russian society towards the “special operation” was changing in two years, what determines public sentiment today, how opinions are distributed among different segments of the population, and whether it is worth listening to critics of public opinion polls.
On Saturday at the 21st Conference of the Chelyabinsk branch of Yabloko elected new leadership of the regional branch for the next two years. Delegates from Chelyabinsk, Kopeisk, Zlatoust, Miass and Troitsk participated in the conference.
The discussion will be held by the Gender Faction of the Yabloko party on 27 February. Everyone is invited to participate.
What are the “traditional family values” that the Russian government is promoting? Taking care of the family hearth, serving husband and children while giving up professional growth? How to deal with domestic violence? How can single-parent families be based on traditional values? How to combine the role of a “working mother” with these traditions?
Picture: Francisco de Goya “Los caprichos”. The sleep of reason produces monsters. 1799. Prado Museum, Madrid
We invite everyone to join our open discussion “Why didn’t books help?”, timed to coincide with the second anniversary of the start of the “special military operation” on the territory of Ukraine. Several invited guests will take part in the discussion: a teacher, a journalist, an actor, a writer and a sociologist.
Photo: The Tipografia culture centre / Photo from open sources
The Tula regional branch of the Yabloko party issued an open appeal to the regional Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Public Prosecutor’s Office with a demand to check the actions of police who stormed into the Tipografia culture centre past weekend.
On the night of 17-18 February, police and masked men burst into the Tipografia culture centre in Tula, where a night party was taking place. Video footage of ill-treatment of event participants emerged online. According to OVD-Info independent human rights project, the police forced the party participants to lie face down on the floor. Those present at the event were photographed, beaten, and threatened with being forcefully sent to the “special military operation”. Several people were forced to do squats, one was forced to sing the Tula anthem. The police detained several people and took them to the police station. One of the detainees told OVD-Info that protocols were drawn up against him and other participants in the event for “LGBT propaganda”.
The death of Alexei Navalny is a great tragedy. Whatever its immediate cause, Alexei became a victim of political repression. Navalny was an opponent of the regime and ended up in the penal colony mainly for his political activities. The conditions of his detention, numerous imprisonments in the punitive isolation cell were nothing more than torture, a limitless physical and moral torture, hypocritically and cruelly committed by the authorities, which stop at nothing to suppress their opponents.
Statement by the Yabloko party on the death of Alexei Navalny
16.02.2024
The Yabloko party expresses condolences to the family and friends of Alexei Navalny.
Responsibility for Alexei Navalny’s death lies with the authorities of our country.
His death occurred in penal colony conditions that were essentially torture. The death of Alexei Navalny must be thoroughly investigated, as well as his poisoning in 2020. Society must know all those responsible for his death, and those responsible must be punished.
Yaroslav Shcherbakov, Chairman of the Chelyabinsk regional branch of the Yabloko party, appealed to the Governor of the region with a request to solve the problem with the doctors of an infectious disease department and the construction of a children’s hospital in the city of Miass.
On the day of memory of the Russian scientist, statesman, political and military figure Alexander Kolchak, a public lecture “Admiral Kolchak as a Russian George Washington. Assessment of the image of the Supreme Ruler in Russia and abroad (1918-1920)” was held in the Omsk regional branch of the Yabloko party. The lecturer was Vladimir Kalekin, Master of History, Associate Professor, and Candidate of Sciences.
Photo: Zulfiya Sitdikova / Photo from social media
UPDATE: 13 February, 19:50 Moscow time. Fundraising for Zulfiya Sitdikova is closed! We thank everyone who helped the Yabloko activist.
Yabloko activist Zulfiya Sitdikova from Kazan, Tatarstan, is accused of “rehabilitating Nazism” (Article 354.1, Part 3 of the Criminal Code) and “discrediting the army” (Article 280.3, Part 1 of the Criminal Code) for the posters calling for peace. Previously, the activist was fined under an administrative article for “discrediting the army” and served five days of arrest for “disobeying the demands of a police officer”. The Tatarstan Yabloko is helping Sitdikova raise money to pay for a lawyer.
In July 2021, Vladimir Putin published an article in which he made it absolutely clear to the whole world that Russia could start a military conflict with Ukraine at any moment. The article essentially denied Ukraine’s right to statehood and sovereignty and, correspondingly, made territorial claims. Such claims, expressed by the president of a nuclear power, substantiated Russia’s historical right to military action. “Moreover, this is not a war with a neighbour with whom the country has some differences, even if territorial, but instead a war with a powerful external aggressor, in other words, with the West where Ukraine is merely the battlefield for the confrontation,” I wrote in my response article “On the Historical Future of Russia and Ukraine” published on 19 July, 2021.
Photo: Viktor Kogan-Yasny / Photo by the Yabloko Press Service
My job is to occasionally write about things that relate to limiting bloodshed now and eliminating it strategically in the future. I have to write in a dry language because it’s “work”. Political leaders, military leaders and military commanders say in dry language how many they have killed and how many more they should kill, and they do not know other ways to achieve their goals.
Photo: Sergei Piskunov holding a placard “No More Than 2 Terms”/ Photo from social media
UPDATE: 12 February, 11:45 Moscow time. Sergei Piskunov was detained in the Altai Territory. He is suspected of “creating an extremist community” (Article 282.1 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). Now he is being taken to the Rubtsovsky City Court which will choose a preventive measure.
Sergei Piskunov, candidate member of Yabloko and electoral expert in Kuzbass, was arrested. This became known on 12 February. Earlier, on 10 February, his home was searched in connection with the case of “organising an extremist community”, after which the civil activist was taken for questioning, but then released.
Photo: Akademgorodok (the “Academic Town”) in Novosibirsk /Photo from open sources
On the Day of Russian Science and in honour of the 300th anniversary of the formation of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Novosibirsk regional branch of the Yabloko party sent congratulatory letters to the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the trade union of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, as well as to Yevgeniy Kraus, the Acting Director of the Institute of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics and Doctor of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, and Anatoly Popkov, Chairman of the Trade Union Committee of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences. In letters signed by the Chair of the Novosibirsk Yabloko, Natalia Chubykina, the party not only congratulates the scientific community on their professional holiday, but also notes that the shadow of repression, reminiscent of Stalin’s times, is once again looming over science. The staff and management of trade union of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences had to face persecution of scientists.
On 23 and 25 December, charity Christmas parties were held at the central office of the Yabloko party for the children of Ukrainian refugees – wards of the Civic Assistance Committee and Lighthouse Charity Foundation. We are summing up the results of the charitable New Year parties.
Photo: Lev Shlosberg / Photo by the Pskov regional branch of Yabloko
On 5 February, the Pskov City Court fined Lev Shlosberg, Deputy Chairman of the Yabloko party, three times for distributing materials without a “foreign agency” tag ( Article 19.34, Part 4, of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation) and mentioning without a special reference an organisation recognised by the state as extremist (Article 13.15, Part 2, of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation). The three fines totaled 62,000 roubles. Lev Shlosberg says that he is going to appeal these fines.
Photo: MP Gurulyov, a screenshot of the programme “Sunday Evening with Vladimir Solovyov”
On 5 February, the Izmailovsky Court of Moscow refused to recognise as illegal the inaction of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, which did not find extremism in the calls of State Duma deputy, General Andrei Gurulyov about the “rotten” 20 per cent of population who disagree with Putin and, therefore, must be destroyed. The appeal to the Ministry of Internal Affairs was sent by Boris Vishnevsky, a deputy of the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg and Deputy Chair of the Yabloko party. The court’s decision will be appealed.
Today, on 6 February, the Tomsk City Duma discussed at a closed meeting depriving Yevgeny Kaverzin, a deputy from Yabloko and a technologist at the Clean City waste recycling company, of his mandate. Such a measure against Kaverzin was proposed by the executive authorities.
On 19 February, the Yabloko Party University will host a lecture “Dynamics of Changes in Public Opinion.” The lecturer is Denis Volkov, sociologist, Director of the Levada Centre. Participants in the lecture, using materials from sociological surveys, will consider how the attitude of Russian society towards the “special operation” has changed over the two years, what determines public sentiment today, how opinions are distributed in different segments of the population, and whether it is worth listening to critics of public opinion polls.
Yevgeny Kaverzin, a deputy from Yabloko in the Tomsk City Duma, may be deprived of his mandate. The formal reason is some inaccuracies in his income declarations for 2020 and 2021, but the real reason for deprivation of his mandate is his protection of the interests of citizens that are infringed by the regional waste management operator. The meeting of the City Duma, at which a decision on depriving Yevgeny Kaverzin of his mandate will be held on 6 February.
