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About James Brown

James Brown is a PhD candidate in history at Northumbria University. His focus is on Soviet dissidents and their use in the politics and international relations of the Cold War. He previously studied at Glasgow University, doing a Master’s in East European, Russian, and Eurasian studies. During this time he studied Russian and wrote his thesis, ‘Returning to Machiavelli: Giving Belarus-Russia relations the Original Realist Treatment’, which received the prize for best dissertation from the Centre for East European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies at Glasgow.

James is a Staff Writer at Strife.

James Brown

Russia’s 2021 State Duma Elections: A sham vote but with signs pointing to possible future change

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Russia’s recent elections were the most repressive of the past twenty-one years, marred by ballot stuffing (©Gwydion M. Williams, 2011; CC BY 2.0 license).

National elections to the State Duma of the Russian Federation, the lower chamber of Russia’s bicameral parliamentary system, were recently held across a three-day voting period from the 17th to the 19th of September. The result was entirely predictable: an apparently resounding victory for Vladimir Putin’s party United Russia (Edinaya Rossiya).

The final count recorded that United Russia took 49.8% of the vote. The nearest rival was the Communist Party which attained a 19% share of the ballots. Following them were the confusingly named ultra-nationalist ‘Liberal Democratic Party of Russia’ (LDPR) on 7.5%, ‘A Just Russia’ on 7.4%, and ‘New People’ on 5.3%, a new party taking part in the elections for the first time.

The Communists, LDPR, and ‘A Just Russia’ are generally considered to be pro-Putin and part of the ‘systemic opposition’ in Russia that allows the simulation of pluralism in the country. New People, meanwhile, advocate the liberal reforms popular among supporters of the jailed opposition leader and Putin-critic Alexei Navalny but without directly attacking Putin, suggesting they are potentially a ‘synthetic party’ convened by Putin’s lackeys to take votes away from the genuine, ‘non-systemic’ opposition.

Such efforts to secure Putin’s dominance show how Russia’s elections have become increasingly uncompetitive over the 21st century, with allegations of vote-rigging and voter coercion always common. However, in 2021, measures to supress the opposition reached new heights both before and during the voting period.

In the build-up to the elections, civil society came under a renewed and vicious assault from the authorities. This included both targeted and mass arrests of protestors following Navalny’s imprisonment in January and many genuine opposition candidates being barred from standing. The rationale behind this new wave of oppression rested on the simple fact that United Russia has become increasingly unpopular in recent times, particularly following the government’s poor performance during the pandemic and allegations of corruption against key party figures, seeing it reach levels as low as 30% in opinion polls.

Opposition leader Alexei Navalny, pictured here in 2017, observed the elections from a prison cell following his arrest earlier this year by the security services upon his return to Russia. Navalny was flying home from Germany, where he had been receiving treatment for a near-fatal poisoning which the Russia state is highly suspected of having perpetrated (Evgeny Feldman, 2017; CC BY-SA 4.0 license).

The elections themselves, meanwhile, were marred by ballot stuffing and an absence of foreign observers. A new online voting system was introduced this year, partially in response to covid, which enabled the security services to monitor voting behaviour and intimidate reluctant state employees to cast their ballot for United Russia. Meanwhile, team Navalny’s tactical or ‘smart’-voting initiative, an app that recommended to voters the most viable non-United Russia candidate in their district to vote for, was blocked by the authorities; Apple and Google both removed the app from their online stores leading to criticism from Navalny’s allies. Yet despite Putin maintaining his two-thirds supermajority in the State Duma, which is required to make constitutional changes such as to limits on presidential terms, there are signs that we may see change in Russia one day.

Though United Russia won, the political capital expended by Putin to win the election, necessitated by the party’s sheer unpopularity, has cost the ruling regime in terms of legitimacy. Meanwhile, even with the use of exceptionally repressive measures, the political technologists of United Russia could not prevent a 4.4% drop in its share of the vote. Furthermore, while the path to extending Putin’s rule beyond 2024 has been secured, as senior RFE/RL correspondent Robert Coalson has said, it is difficult to see how the Kremlin can hold another similar vote, such as in the upcoming 2024 presidential election, having now so thoroughly discredited any remaining democratic credentials it had. While in the last presidential vote of 2018 selected Kremlin-approved liberal opposition candidates were allowed to run, in order to create the impression of a competitive election, no liberal opposition candidate will be willing to stand in such blatantly fraudulent elections. And without the ability to simulate democracy, Putin’s legitimacy and position is at the very least made slightly more uncertain.

There are also signs that the once pliant systemic opposition may be willing to challenge the regime. The Communists, who were long considered a fairly toothless pro-Putin party, have on the back of gaining fifteen seats and increasing their vote share by 6%, been emboldened. Their leader, Gennady Zyuganov has accused the Kremlin of perpetrating a litany of electoral violations, among them ballot stuffing. Some Communists have since come out onto the streets to protest the election results, claiming they were cheated of victory by state interference with the online voting system.

The Kremlin of course denies these allegations, calling the elections a ‘free and fair’ vote. The regime has even sought to deflect these accusations, with former president and Security Council deputy chief Dmitri Medvedev suggesting it may launch a ‘probe’ into supposed US interference in Russia’s political system.

Nevertheless, despite such bluster, the Kremlin must now be aware that through its actions during 2021’s vote it has limited its options via which to claim legitimacy, a development that further down the line could have serious consequences to Putin’s grip on power. Certainly, it cannot be denied that political apathy does remain high in Russia which suits the regime. However, if in 2024 Putin does try to remain in power, as many expect him to do, there are reasons to tentatively predict a political re-awakening in Russia. As Vladimir Kara-Murza says, the continued claim to legitimacy via rigged votes by the ever-present president may prove to be an insult too far to the dignity of Russian voters and 2024 has the potential to become another decisive moment of revolutionary political change in modern Russian history alongside 1917 and 1991.

Belarus: Rogue State

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A squadron of heavily equipped riot police face an anti-government protestor holding the red-and-white flag of the opposition in the Belarusian capital Minsk (©Jana Shnipelson, 2020, used with permission).

In recent times, the Republic of Belarus has captured the world’s attention for its transformation, into what many now describe as a fully-fledged ‘rogue state’. In the last two years Belarus has morphed from a once largely stable, albeit authoritarian, state, to one of the most pressing threats to peace and order in Europe. The Belarusian government, led since 1994 by the dictatorial Aleksandr Lukashenka, has become increasingly violent and repressive in response to the opposition protest movement that emerged following Lukashenka’s victory in rigged-elections in August 2020 – which many consider to have truly been won by the exiled leader of the Belarusian opposition, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya.

Since August 2020, the Belarusian security services have exacted a brutal crackdown on protestors and freedom of expression; 35,000 are thought to have been arrested while 150,000 have fled to neighbouring Ukraine, as the Lukashenka government tries to cling to power. In 2021, Belarus’ piratical behaviour has escalated to new heights. Lukashenka’s government has run up the score in disturbingly reckless and vicious offences against its own citizens, targeting them both at home and, increasingly, abroad. Already accused of torturing imprisoned protestors, the security services of Belarus, still ominously known as the KGB, stunned the world when in May they redirected and grounded a Ryanair flight flying from Greece to Lithuania in order to arrest the opposition journalist Raman Pratasevich, who was travelling on-board with his girlfriend, Sofia Sapega; she was also detained. Then, at the start of August, a litany of fresh acts of brutality transpired.

The Belarusian Olympic sprinter, Krystsina Tsimanouskaya, after making non-political criticisms of the Belarusian team’s coaching staff at the 2020 Tokyo games, was ordered home by Belarusian team officials. Fearing for her safety in her home country, Tsimanouskaya sought refuge at the Tokyo Polish Embassy and fled via Vienna to Warsaw. The sprinter’s grandmother had warned her that she would not be safe upon returning to Belarus and the Olympian has since been joined in Poland by her husband. Yet even being abroad does not seem to promise guaranteed sanctuary to at-risk Belarusians.

Vitaly Shyshov, who led Belarusian House, an organisation assisting Belarusians who have fled to Ukraine, was found dead hanging from a tree with a broken nose in a Kiev park on August 3rd. While a Ukrainian police investigation is ongoing, many of Shyshov’s colleagues at Belarusian House and fellow dissidents strongly suspect the involvement of the Belarusian security services. Shyshov had previously reported being followed by strangers and Belarusian House released a statement, saying: ‘There is no doubt that this was a planned operation by security operatives to liquidate a Belarusian dangerous for the regime.’ Responding to Shyshov’s death, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who herself was forced to leave her home country, called it ‘worrying that those who flee Belarus still can’t be safe.’

Belarus’ authoritarian president Aleksandr Lukashenka who has been in power since 1994 (©Okras, 2014: under CC BY-SA 4.0 license).

Meanwhile, the Belarusian government has been involved with arranging clandestine flights from Iraq, smuggling refugees over and directing them across its borders into Poland and Lithuania in order to create a local migration crisis; Warsaw accuses Minsk of weaponizing migration like this in retaliation to Poland’s granting of asylum to the sprinter Tsimanouskaya. Such brazen acts, committed with complete disregard for human life, to achieve cynical political goals leave analysts at a loss as to how to understand the Belarusian government. Belarus expert Andrew Wilson has put forward the ‘madman theory’ of foreign policy, ‘according to which unpredictability and rash behaviour are actually an asset, unsettling opponents and even allies’, to rationalise the strategies employed by Aleksandr Lukashenka.

By making Belarus impossible to predict, Lukashenka intends to catch his opponents off-guard. The package of economic sanctions brought against Belarus by the EU in June were designed to force Lukashenka to relax his aggression. Yet Belarus has only escalated its maniacal behaviours, suddenly exiting the Eastern Partnership with the EU which had been in place since 2009 in June.

Belarus’ spiralling behaviour poses a serious challenge to the West. Sanctions have as yet failed to achieve the desired results. Wilson posits that Belarus’ leaders may in the future resort to aggressive economic takeovers of national financial assets in order to bankroll the regime. Meanwhile, the City of London must come under greater scrutiny, with the Belarusian opposition calling for investigations as to whether the Belarusian state is already benefitting from bonds and money raised in UK markets.

The picture remains unclear as to how long Lukashenka’s regime can last. However, so far it has succeeded in hanging on to power by whatever means it deems necessary, and so long as Russia’s problems with civil unrest persist, Moscow will look to back its ally in Minsk. The threat that Belarus might escalate its behaviour further needs to be taken seriously by Western leaders, from whom Tsikhanouskaya is currently seeking support, and they must take further coordinated actions to end Lukashenka’s increasingly international reign of terror.

Russia’s battle with COVID: One Step Forwards, Three Steps Back

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Russia continues to struggle against the Covid-19 pandemic as cases and deaths increase each day (by focusonmore.com; licensed under CC BY 2.0)

Russia was the first country to approve a vaccine to treat the SARS-CoV-2 virus, its Sputnik V jab, which has since been complemented by the development of two other homegrown vaccines, CoviVac and EpiVacCorona. Moscow also directs a national vaccination program which is free and accessible to all Russian citizens who wish to receive a shot. Russia ought to be well on its way to achieving a high-level of immunity in its population, with the government repeatedly claiming ‘victory’ over the deadly coronavirus.

Yet any claims of victory are false. The country’s Covid defence is in a poor position relative to other large nations. As of July 21 Russia has a paltry 14.38% of its population fully vaccinated; 54.3% are fully vaccinated in the UK by contrast. Meanwhile, cases and deaths multiply at alarming rates each day, with 24,098 infections and 711 fatalities recorded on 20 July. Though democracies are also still struggling to defeat the virus, especially the highly transmissible Delta variant, responsibility for Russia’s poor performance in managing the pandemic largely falls at the feet of Vladimir Putin and his authoritarianism.

Rather than properly getting to grips with the pandemic, the severity of which the Kremlin has sought to downplay, the government has instead often prioritised its shady political objectives, carrying out a comprehensive crackdown against civil society following Alexei Navalny’s imprisonment and preparing for the upcoming elections to the State Duma, Russia’s parliament, scheduled to happen this year on 19 September. Meanwhile a combination of a historic lack of trust in the state among Russians, government disinformation about vaccines produced outside Russia, and lack of adherence to proper development standards in the production of Russia’s vaccines has seen the Russian population largely shun vaccination and remain vulnerable to the third wave of Covid. The authorities, when they do try to mitigate the virus’ effects, are increasingly being forced to impose restrictions which are widely unpopular with the public, including the enforcement of mandatory vaccinations and infringements on everyday life such as requiring proof of vaccination status to visit cafés and restaurants, which has led to a thriving black market in fake QR codes and vaccination certificates.

Putin has repeatedly expressed confidence about beating the virus but his government continues to lag behind in terms of its response (World Economic Forum; licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Russia’s continued covid-crisis has three main causes: vaccine hesitancy and mismanagement, disinformation, and an undemocratic political system. Firstly, vaccine hestitancy is widespread among the Russian population. While this is also an issue in many other countries, including democracies, it is a problem which is particularly pronounced in Russia. Data collected by a poll conducted by the Levada Centre, Russia’s largest polling agency, revealed that 54% of respondents were unwilling to be vaccinated, 25% were willing, and 19% reported that they had already received the vaccine; 69.4%, 68.6%, and 48.9% of the UK’s, the US’, and France’s populations respectively have accepted at least one shot of a vaccine.

Second, Russians’ vaccine hesitancy is compounded and made more likely by the behaviour of the government. Not only was Russia’s flagship vaccine, Sputnik V, developed and administered before the completion of routine mass trials to assess its efficacy (it is considered safe by experts now), the government has mismanaged its promotion. President Vladimir Putin’s own vaccination was shrouded in secrecy as he refused to be pictured during it and initially he did not reveal which shot he had received (in the end it transpired to be Sputnik V), forfeiting a PR opportunity taken by many other world leaders to demonstrate to the public the safety of Covid vaccines. There have additionally been reports that Russians were given a different vaccine to the one they were informed they were receiving, while lockdowns have generally been ‘eschewed’ by the government. The Kremlin has also taken a highly nationalist approach to the utilisation of its vaccine. Sputnik V has become a tool in the Russian government’s foreign policy, offering it to African countries to boost Moscow’s standing. Meanwhile, the Kremlin has simultaneously promoted conspiracy theories regarding vaccines developed in other countries in order to lift the profile of its own. The combined effect has been to worsen public confidence in the best line of defence against the increasingly rampant virus.

Yet third, and most fundamental of all, is that the above factors are symptoms of the longer-term illness which undermines the effectiveness of Russia’s governance: the poor health of its democracy and civil society. It is not so much that Russians do not trust vaccine itself. Rather, they do not have faith in the government that provides the vaccine. The Russian state already interferes in the daily lives of citizens to sometimes intolerable degrees, which provokes cynicism towards any government scheme. Despite the vaccine’s necessity, it is seen as just another untrustworthy authoritarian measure that the state is trying to enforce on the population.

Russia’s Covid crisis is a lesson in the ills of autocracy. Having long lost the trust of millions of Russians, the state cannot not rely on voluntary uptake of the vaccine, meaning further unpopular mandatory measures may be necessary, regardless of the fact Putin said he hoped there would be no need for a new lockdown at 2021’s Direct Line session, a public relations event where the Russian President fields questions from ostensibly ‘typical’ Russians over videocall. The regime also plans to use the elections as an opportunity to ‘refresh its legitimacy’ and Covid will take careful management in order to avoid any upsets for the ruling but increasingly unpopular United Russia party. For now, though, the Russian government remains on the back foot.

The sky is no limit to Lukashenka’s brazen brutality: How will the West respond?

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Belarus cuts an increasingly unwelcoming and isolationist stance in world politics as the incumbent authoritarian regime of Aleksandr Lukashenka violently clamps down on dissent (Reiseuhu/Unsplash, 2019).

Commercial airline flights passing over Eastern Europe and Russia have previously found themselves caught up in the power games between East and West, both during the Cold War and after. Notoriously, in 1983 the Soviet military shot down Korean Air Lines Flight 007 after it traversed into Soviet airspace, killing all 269 crew and passengers. In 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 was shot out of the sky by rockets fired from a field controlled by pro-Russian separatists during the early stages of the ongoing war in Ukraine and all 283 people on-board were killed. During the 1970s and 1980s, meanwhile, Soviet citizens occasionally hijacked international flights in attempts to reach the West. Yet something new took place on May 23rd when Ryanair Flight FR4978, travelling from Greece to Lithuania, was unexpectedly rerouted to land in Minsk whilst flying over Belarusian airspace.

The cause for landing was no mechanical failing. Instead, a national government, that of Belarus; led since 1994 by its authoritarian President Aleksandr Lukashenka; illegally but successfully authorised the hijacking of the commercial passenger flight and the detention of two of its 126 passengers, sending a fabricated bomb threat and a MiG-29 fighter to shadow the cockpit to intimidate the pilots. The target was Raman Pratasevich, 26, the former editor of the Belarusian opposition social media channel Nexta (pronounced nekh-ta meaning ‘somebody’), who was accompanied by his girlfriend Sofia Sapega, 23. Both were both arrested and imprisoned by the Belarusian KGB upon the grounding of their flight. Pratasevich has apparently since been tortured and he and Sapega were forced into making video-confessions to fraudulent charges of conspiring against the state. Pratasevich may face the death penalty.

This violation committed by the Belarusian authorities is a truly shocking move for a national government, even by the standards of the frequently brutal Lukashenka regime. The blatant disregard for international laws and norms exhibited by the decision to authorise the hijacking reflects the increasingly intense process of retrenchment taking place within the Belarusian state, as it attempts to re-stamp its authority on the country after experiencing massive anti-Lukashenka protests which erupted in 2020 following a rigged election. Many other key opposition figures have already been arrested or exiled, notably the main independent candidate in the rigged poll, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, leader of the all-female opposition troika completed by Veronika Tsepkalo and Maria Kolesnikova.

Anti-Lukashenka protestors with a banner reading ‘We Are Belarus’ march through the Belarusian capital Minsk following the rigged national election in August 2020. The Red and White flag is used by the opposition and recalls the flag of the Belarusian National Republic, which briefly existed as an independent state in 1918, and used by Belarus following its independence from the Soviet Union and before Lukashenka took power in 1994 (Andrew Keymaster/Unsplash, 2020)

As the dust settles following the hijacking, international observers’ eyes have turned to the West to see how it will respond. Since Belarus gained independence in 1991, the US and EU have long attempted to draw the small-state of 10 million people away from Russia, which has significant economic, political, and military ties with Minsk and essentially props up Lukashenka’s government. Lukashenka, however, has sought to strike a balancing act between East and West, and insisted only he can preserve Belarus’ autonomy, a claim used as one of his main campaign messages in Belarus’ unfree elections. The West now, however, must be seen to act towards forcing change in Belarus. The question remains as to whether sanctions or promises of financial aid provide the best avenue to producing more democratic outcomes in Belarus.

Some initial steps have already been taken. The UK and EU have banned commercial airliners from taking flight paths that traverse Belarusian airspace, with the bloc also enacting asset freezes on leading Belarusian officials. On the other hand, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has offered £2.6 billion in financial aid should Belarus take major steps towards democratic reform, emulating a classic ‘carrot and stick’ approach to international relations. Washington, meanwhile, announced that it would work with Brussels to design a more comprehensive set of sanctions.

Exiled Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya speaks at the European Parliament in 2020 (“20-09-21 AFET with Svetlana Tikhanovskaya-52” by EPP Group in the European Parliament (Official) is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, however, has said Western responses must go much further than they have before, asking the EU to be ‘braver’. Acting from Lithuania, she will try to use her status as leader of the Belarusian opposition-in-exile to meet with world leaders and attempt to persuade them that decisive action is required. The opposition hope for targeted economic sanctions, including a boycott on Belarusian petrochemicals, as well as potash, which are the main stays of national export products. The leader of the Belarusian opposition hopes to travel to Washington once Covid-related restrictions are relaxed.

Meanwhile, there are more specific, but no less important questions facing Western governments. In particular, the UK, now outside the EU, is under pressure to end the flow of dirty Belarusian money which passes through the City of London, as Estonia’s President Kersti Kaljulaid has called for. British firms must also act with regard to their ties to the Belarusian government.

The West’s response has to be comprehensive and decisive, lest Lukashenka be allowed to continue his brutal reign and stifle all dissent. Western governments must also consider how to combat the influence of Russia, with President Vladimir Putin recently ‘hailing’ closer ties between his country and Belarus. All eyes will thus be on whether the G7 leaders make good on their promises ‘to support civil society, independent media, and human rights in Belarus’, made at the recent Cornwall Summit. Meanwhile, the EU seems close to finalising its sanctions package, which initially meets many of the opposition’s hopes, though uncertainty still remains as to what the bloc will approve and enact. At stake is the liberty of thousands of political prisoners and the futures of millions of Belarusians.

Andrei Sakharov at 100: Nobel Laureate, Dissident, and Human Rights Champion

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Andrei Sakharov, born 21st May, 1921 in Moscow (Credit: Vladimir Fedorenko/License: CC BY-SA 3.0 license)

The 21st of May 2021 marked one hundred years since the birth of Andrei Sakharov. A Nobel Laureate, scientist, weapons designer, dissident, and human rights campaigner, the numerous labels one can use to describe him pay testament to the size of the legacy Sakharov left behind upon his death in 1989. Many events celebrating Sakharov have been held in his honour, with one hosted and recorded by the Davis Centre for Russian and Eurasian Studies at Harvard University.

In Moscow, however, Sakharov’s place of birth, a planned exhibition celebrating the dissident’s life and achievements, organised by the Sakharov Centre, was disrupted by the state authorities. Though the official reasons cited were conflicts in the provision of necessary equipment with commemorations of the Second World War (usually referred to as the Great Patriotic War in Russia) taking place at the same time, representatives of the Sakharov Centre say they were informed by officials that it was the content of the planned exhibition which meant it could not be permitted to go ahead.

The Russian state would naturally be anxious about allowing a dissident to be celebrated when it is still trying to side-line Alexei Navalny, a contemporary Russian dissident and one of the President Vladimir Putin’s fiercest critics. Though there are differences between their views, like Navalny, Sakharov was a perennial thorn in the side of the Kremlin and the Nobel Laureate’s message on the primacy of human rights is as equally resonant today as it was in the 1960s and 1970s, when Sakharov rose to prominence.

Sakharov’s path to becoming a dissident and human rights champion was in some senses an unlikely one. A member of the Soviet scientific elite and one of the chief architects of the hydrogen bomb, Sakharov could have enjoyed a life of privilege and comfort had he opted to remain uncritical of the Soviet government’s abuses, as did so many of his colleagues. This is the only aspect of Sakharov’s biography, that is his achievements in nuclear physics, that the Russian state is prepared to honour, with Putin issuing a statement celebrating the scientist’s contribution to ‘defence capability and national security’ through the hydrogen bomb’s creation. Not once, however, did the Russian President mention Sakharov’s human rights activism. Though it may be obliged to acknowledge Sakharov’s importance, the Russian state will not encourage celebrating dissidence.

Sakharov’s ideas are actively dangerous to the Putin regime, most famously articulated in a 1968 pamphlet Thoughts on Progress, Peaceful Coexistence, and Intellectual Freedom in which the dissident offered a compelling and original vision of global cooperation. Sakharov turned against the arms race his own work had helped accelerate and argued that respect for the individual’s views and rights by governments provided the sole basis for any chance of a peaceful and progressive future that averted the threat of war. Notably, Sakharov called for internationally binding laws that guaranteed freedom of speech, the protection of the environment, and the rationalisation of international relations through the introduction of scientific methods. Most of all, for Sakharov, respect for human rights had to form the basis of the social contract between the citizen and their government. His pamphlet sold millions and turned him into a figurehead of human rights and opposition to the Soviet state’s abuses.

The Soviet leadership, of course, took a dim view of Sakharov’s activities and gradually intensified their persecution of the scientist until 1980, at which point, following comments critical of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the increasingly reactionary Kremlin decided to place the dissident in internal exile in the closed Soviet city of Gorky. Deprived of all but the most modest means of communication, the Soviet state hoped that the dissident and his wife, Elena Bonner, could be isolated. Bonner was an equally key figure of Soviet dissent and campaigned for freedom in the Soviet Union and beyond. She passed away in 2011 and continues to be celebrated as a champion of human rights.

Despite his persecution, Sakharov’s ideas had a resonance which the Soviet state could not contain. Having already received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1975, Sakharov, even while in exile, continued to resist the Kremlin’s attempts to suppress freedom of speech, and the dissident served as a symbol of hope for those seeking reform in the USSR.

Sakharov’s ideas on freedom were in part taken up by Mikhail Gorbachev, who would attempt to reform the Soviet Union and turn it towards some measure of democracy. Gorbachev brought Sakharov out of exile in 1986 and the dissident became a crucial figure in the efforts towards democratic reform, taking up a seat in a new national legislative body. Gorbachev struggled to enact his reforms effectively and political chaos began to grip the USSR in the 1980s. There were few figures who could equal Gorbachev for stature and political standing, yet Sakharov might have been a stabilising figure for the USSR’s nascent democracy as Gorbachev’s reforms and the Soviet Union itself fell apart during 1990-91. Alas, Sakharov sadly died in 1989, having long suffered with poor health, and the Soviet Union lost one of its leading lights.

Mourners gather at Sakharov’s grave in 1990 (Credit: GeorgeLouis/License: CC BY-SA 3.0 license)

Though his argument on the importance of human rights may not seem as revolutionary as it did during the Cold War, it is partly the veracity of Sakharov, Bonner, and other campaigners that we have to thank for the wide circulation of these concepts today. His ideas also continue to have relevance. With wilting democracy across different parts of the world and growing threats to freedom of speech, Sakharov’s message on intellectual freedom ought to be remembered. Further, Sakharov rose concerns about climate change at a time when the issue was not on many politicians’ agendas. The academician called on governments to take action to reverse the effects of environmental destruction for the benefit of all humankind and his joint messages of respect for human rights, intellectual freedom, and the environment remain compelling to this day.

Sakharov’s legacy lives on the form of a prize in his name, presented by the European Union to cotemporary champions of human rights. In 2020, the prize was received by the democratic opposition in Belarus led by Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, whose ongoing struggle highlights the lingering presence of the type of authoritarianism which Sakharov himself resisted. Remembering him and his ideas this year draws attention to the need to defend those fundamental rights for which he fought, and many others fight for today.