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Welcome to HARDtalk. I am Sarah Montague. Ilya Ponomarev was only | :00:10. | :00:20. | |
one of 446 deputies who voted against the Russian parliament's | :00:21. | :00:21. | |
vote on President Putin's annexation of Crimea. Within months he was | :00:22. | :00:24. | |
accused of fraud and his bank accounts were frozen. He now lives | :00:25. | :00:26. | |
in the United States and says "the best talent we need for a future | :00:27. | :00:29. | |
Russian government" is there. So can Russians in exile really make a | :00:30. | :00:31. | |
difference when the man they want to overthrow is so popular at home? | :00:32. | :00:53. | |
THEME SONG PLAYS. Ilya Ponomarev, welcome to HARDtalk. Thank you for | :00:54. | :01:06. | |
having me. Why did you vote against the annexation of Crimea? I think | :01:07. | :01:14. | |
the answer for that question is obvious. Are you was against the | :01:15. | :01:18. | |
bloodshed. Ukraine, the closest neighbour and Allied, is now our | :01:19. | :01:25. | |
enemy. -- ally. That is an appropriate. Did you expect to be | :01:26. | :01:31. | |
the only one of all the deputies voting that way? Unfortunately, yes. | :01:32. | :01:36. | |
I spoke to all of them who could have voted another way and | :01:37. | :01:39. | |
unfortunately none of them wanted to join me. There is obviously a | :01:40. | :01:45. | |
history of people in Russia speaking out against the government having a | :01:46. | :01:49. | |
difficult time. What did you expect to happen as a result of your boat? | :01:50. | :01:54. | |
In general, many people speak against the government. This | :01:55. | :02:00. | |
particular case was pretty much important for the president | :02:01. | :02:05. | |
personally. That is why I expected consequences. I was just thinking | :02:06. | :02:08. | |
they would be consequences inside the country and they would try to | :02:09. | :02:13. | |
create a criminal case when I am inside the country and they would | :02:14. | :02:16. | |
try to put me in jail. But they learnt their lesson and didn't want | :02:17. | :02:20. | |
any more martyrs like they had previously with other people. What | :02:21. | :02:26. | |
did happen? When did you first realise there was a problem? Umm, | :02:27. | :02:31. | |
you know, I got messages straightaway. Straightaway I was | :02:32. | :02:38. | |
called a national traitor, the fifth column, the agent of the CIA. But, | :02:39. | :02:46. | |
that is a usual accusation that Russian opposition here is. In July, | :02:47. | :02:51. | |
when I was on the business trip, they decided to close the borders | :02:52. | :02:56. | |
amid. They said I could not cross the Russian border any more. You | :02:57. | :03:02. | |
went to the US? Your accounts were frozen? Yeah. I was lucky I was in | :03:03. | :03:09. | |
the United States and not in some other location. They actually froze | :03:10. | :03:13. | |
my bank accounts and shut down my credit card. I was left penniless in | :03:14. | :03:24. | |
another country. I had to start a real new life. Being in the United | :03:25. | :03:27. | |
States, I had many friends to help me. Your family, your children, they | :03:28. | :03:34. | |
are still in Russia, aren't they? No, actually. I brought them out. It | :03:35. | :03:40. | |
was a lengthy and not a very easy process. My son is now in Germany. | :03:41. | :03:46. | |
My daughter is now with her mother in Bulgaria. They are safe, at | :03:47. | :03:51. | |
least. As far as you are concerned, your family, as you say, are now | :03:52. | :03:59. | |
separated. You have been charged with embezzlement. They accuse you | :04:00. | :04:03. | |
of having embezzled $400,000 from a foundation. What do you say to those | :04:04. | :04:10. | |
charges and why do you not go back to defend yourself? They are | :04:11. | :04:17. | |
charging every single opposition leader with some case. They invent | :04:18. | :04:22. | |
something for every single person. It is just that the articles of the | :04:23. | :04:25. | |
criminal court are slightly different. The most popular one is | :04:26. | :04:28. | |
exactly this, embezzlement or stealing money from the state | :04:29. | :04:36. | |
budget. This is a case for any people, including Sergei, who voted | :04:37. | :04:43. | |
in favour of Georgia, and for those who voted for international | :04:44. | :04:51. | |
terrorism. This is to show Russian people that Russian authorities may | :04:52. | :04:57. | |
not be ideal. Many know they are involved in corruption. But the | :04:58. | :04:59. | |
opposition is no better. That is what they are saying. Why don't you | :05:00. | :05:03. | |
go back home and fight and defend yourself against those charges? You | :05:04. | :05:08. | |
know, there are no courts right now to debate this in Russia. It is like | :05:09. | :05:14. | |
you are playing a soccer game when there is just one set of goals and | :05:15. | :05:20. | |
all the judges are on one side and you really cannot confront them is | :05:21. | :05:29. | |
API tried to do that. -- them. I debated those charges in the civil | :05:30. | :05:32. | |
case but no one listened. My situation is similar. Let them go to | :05:33. | :05:38. | |
Interpol. Let them dry and international prosecution and let | :05:39. | :05:42. | |
the international court see all 30 arguments and let them decide. -- | :05:43. | :05:48. | |
the. -- all the arguments. I am always checking in on Facebook where | :05:49. | :05:53. | |
I am right now. So far, no Interpol. Only threats. It is just the courts. | :05:54. | :06:05. | |
Your own party, A Just Russia, has also turned against you. You have | :06:06. | :06:09. | |
been threatened with impeachment. You have been removed. Only a few | :06:10. | :06:15. | |
other in your party of 60 plus voted with you. That is absolutely right. | :06:16. | :06:24. | |
My party, when it was carrying white ribbons on their suits, later, they | :06:25. | :06:30. | |
took them off, and started to show their loyalty to President Putin. | :06:31. | :06:37. | |
That is a very sad case. Unfortunately, they are a member of | :06:38. | :06:42. | |
a different national alliance. None of my partners actually questions | :06:43. | :06:46. | |
this kind of behaviour. They totally flipped on their political position. | :06:47. | :06:50. | |
I am standing on the position when we were running for the elections. I | :06:51. | :06:54. | |
am standing exactly on the position I was promising to my constituents. | :06:55. | :07:00. | |
Unfortunately, the party has changed all that. OK, so, for what you are | :07:01. | :07:06. | |
saying, they are all wrong, everyone bringing a case against you, and you | :07:07. | :07:12. | |
are right? No, I am not saying that. I can saying that people are weak. | :07:13. | :07:17. | |
They always say that politics is the art of the impossible. There are | :07:18. | :07:22. | |
real people inside my party that remain there. But they are trying to | :07:23. | :07:26. | |
fight against different economic measures of the government, | :07:27. | :07:30. | |
different social initiatives, and they justified by this that they | :07:31. | :07:35. | |
still continue fighting against this new liberal measure that they are | :07:36. | :07:39. | |
still in the Parliament and have to be loyal to be president because | :07:40. | :07:44. | |
otherwise they will be impeached in the same fashion I was. OK, but in | :07:45. | :07:48. | |
terms of what this meant that you outside the country, I know you were | :07:49. | :07:52. | |
suddenly told by a friend that there was a billboard on a 10-storey | :07:53. | :07:55. | |
building across from the Kremlin with your face on it and the words, | :07:56. | :08:00. | |
national traitor. Now, that was some time after you left. And you said | :08:01. | :08:06. | |
that you were fearful of staying in the same place for more than a | :08:07. | :08:09. | |
couple of nights. Is that still the case? Do you still fear? Fear for | :08:10. | :08:16. | |
what may happen to you? Look, I don't fear. What will happen will | :08:17. | :08:22. | |
happen, I thought. I and doing what I need to. Some people in the | :08:23. | :08:28. | |
opposition like to talk about this, how they have been prosecuted. I | :08:29. | :08:32. | |
don't like to talk about that. Yes, in modern Russia, we have the same | :08:33. | :08:38. | |
set of events that were happening in Germany in 1930. Unfortunately. And | :08:39. | :08:44. | |
the country is going in exactly the same direction, with | :08:45. | :08:48. | |
authoritarianism, the same tricks of state propaganda, and, that really | :08:49. | :08:55. | |
makes me sorry for my country. What makes me sorry is our neighbours, it | :08:56. | :09:02. | |
is dangerous for then. But what am I supposed to do? I am a Russian | :09:03. | :09:07. | |
Patriot. I need to fight against them. You are seriously comparing | :09:08. | :09:17. | |
Russia with German? I use an President Putin is Hitler? I | :09:18. | :09:26. | |
wouldn't say this. But his public speeches used the same terminology. | :09:27. | :09:31. | |
They have the same word. For President Putin, it would be too | :09:32. | :09:34. | |
high of a comparison. He is more like one of Hitler's aides, like | :09:35. | :09:42. | |
Herbels, because he does not have grand vision and objectives. He | :09:43. | :09:49. | |
doesn't want to kill people either. -- Goebells. He just wants to be | :09:50. | :09:55. | |
rich. Why do you say you are fearful for Russia's neighbours? My country, | :09:56. | :09:59. | |
unfortunately, is a country with a great culture, a great tradition, | :10:00. | :10:06. | |
the great system of education, and people at the end of today, they | :10:07. | :10:10. | |
aren't this, they are threatening neighbours, they are trying to force | :10:11. | :10:13. | |
them, instead of with soft power, they are using hard power. That | :10:14. | :10:19. | |
makes me sorry for my people and it makes me really sorry for all of our | :10:20. | :10:25. | |
neighbours. Like here, we are standing in Ukraine, and I am | :10:26. | :10:28. | |
talking to Ukrainians. They are always friendly to ordinary | :10:29. | :10:32. | |
Russians. They don't understand why we, like relatives right now, are | :10:33. | :10:38. | |
fighting. It is not the Guild of Ukrainians, it is the guilt of | :10:39. | :10:42. | |
Russia. -- macro. What about the Baltic states? Is Nato, the West, | :10:43. | :10:50. | |
are they fearful Russia could scare up trouble in the Baltic states? | :10:51. | :11:02. | |
Vladimir Putin cannot stop confrontation. He pulled out of | :11:03. | :11:09. | |
confrontation. The Baltic states have the obvious target of Russia | :11:10. | :11:13. | |
and Vladimir Putin going further. I think that, of course, the military | :11:14. | :11:19. | |
of those states have to be reinforced. Bite you are talking | :11:20. | :11:25. | |
about somebody who has approval ratings in Russia consistently of | :11:26. | :11:36. | |
more than 80%. -- but. This is from independent Western polls as well as | :11:37. | :11:38. | |
Russian ones. He is unbelievably popular and what the Russians want. | :11:39. | :11:45. | |
I think that he is genuinely popular. Of course, I don't think it | :11:46. | :11:49. | |
is above 80%. People can sometimes not be sincere in an authoritarian | :11:50. | :11:56. | |
state. To expect to give those answers for psychological bolsters | :11:57. | :12:01. | |
is kind of, you know, you have not lived in this kind of society. -- | :12:02. | :12:06. | |
pollsters. But of course he is popular. He is popular because | :12:07. | :12:10. | |
people think we are protecting the minorities outside Russian borders. | :12:11. | :12:15. | |
They really think that it is an American invasion, it is a Western | :12:16. | :12:22. | |
invasion in the Ukraine, and we are the good guys. We are protecting | :12:23. | :12:24. | |
then. Your society can feel the same invading Iraq. You also feel you are | :12:25. | :12:30. | |
the good guys despite not always being right. But there are plenty of | :12:31. | :12:34. | |
people in the West, plenty of British people, who would say that | :12:35. | :12:37. | |
actually the problems of Ukraine started when the West moved into | :12:38. | :12:45. | |
Russia's backyard. That is the words of a professor at Chicago | :12:46. | :12:50. | |
university. He wrote a book about the Ukraine crisis being the fault | :12:51. | :12:54. | |
of the West, saying that what the West did was provocative. You know, | :12:55. | :13:00. | |
you can justify whatever you want to justified. We can go to the approach | :13:01. | :13:07. | |
of two millenniums backwards, World War Two, but we are living in the | :13:08. | :13:13. | |
21st century. Ukraine is an independent country. Also, I don't | :13:14. | :13:19. | |
like the fact, and I feel sorry, that Ukrainians decided to go the | :13:20. | :13:22. | |
wrong way 25 years ago. But it was their choice. We have to respect | :13:23. | :13:28. | |
that choice. They voted for it in any legal public referendum. Russia | :13:29. | :13:31. | |
should take it and recognise it as an independent state. There is no | :13:32. | :13:38. | |
fear of influence. The good will of the Ukrainian and Russian people and | :13:39. | :13:41. | |
the good will of the European Union and the European people. You are now | :13:42. | :13:45. | |
in a situation where you have said the Baltic states need to be more | :13:46. | :13:49. | |
heavily defended. You have called for the West to arm the Ukraine | :13:50. | :13:51. | |
against your own country. I call to compensate the military | :13:52. | :14:03. | |
between Ukraine and Russia. Because Ukraine was for a very long time | :14:04. | :14:09. | |
relying on so-called Budapest Memorandum where western states | :14:10. | :14:12. | |
including Great Britain by the way made guarantees to Ukraine on its | :14:13. | :14:20. | |
territorial integrity. You didn't honour your own obligations | :14:21. | :14:23. | |
according to that memorandum. And now Ukraine has to restore its | :14:24. | :14:28. | |
military power. And if you are not honouring your obligations towards | :14:29. | :14:31. | |
Ukraine at least compensate and help them create military and stop | :14:32. | :14:37. | |
bloodshed at the end of the day. I have no doubt Ukraine will not | :14:38. | :14:40. | |
invade Russia but Ukraine should be able to defend itself. OK but Mr | :14:41. | :14:45. | |
Ilya Ponomarev you are trying to convince your fellow Russians that | :14:46. | :14:48. | |
they need change and here you are calling for Russia's neighbours to | :14:49. | :14:54. | |
be armed. You have also suggested that economic sanctions against | :14:55. | :14:58. | |
Russians should be expanded to all government workers and their | :14:59. | :15:00. | |
families. I mean these are ordinary Russians. Is it any wonder that they | :15:01. | :15:08. | |
are calling you a national traitor? You see my position is that what you | :15:09. | :15:13. | |
have done with sanctions by imposing economic sanctions on the whole of | :15:14. | :15:18. | |
the nation was a mistake because you yourself gave to turn all the | :15:19. | :15:24. | |
necessary tools to show that the west is the necessary enemy -- | :15:25. | :15:28. | |
Putin. That affects ordinary people and it doesn't affect the elites. | :15:29. | :15:33. | |
What I am saying is that you should change this position. You should | :15:34. | :15:36. | |
fight against the elites, those who are making those decisions, though | :15:37. | :15:41. | |
are giving orders in Ukraine to kill ordinary Ukrainians. Those who are | :15:42. | :15:46. | |
the foundation of this regime. But you're not doing this because you | :15:47. | :15:50. | |
are benefiting from those guys to do their money laundering in the west | :15:51. | :15:54. | |
by moving their capital in the western countries, including Great | :15:55. | :15:58. | |
Britain once again. You have made it very clear that the west should | :15:59. | :16:02. | |
effectively keep out of Russia because they just make a mess of it | :16:03. | :16:10. | |
but your solution is that exiles, exiles like you can be a political | :16:11. | :16:14. | |
force and from the outside, what, forced a revolution in Russia? Look, | :16:15. | :16:22. | |
my personal strategy is not from the outside trying to create a | :16:23. | :16:25. | |
revolution in Russia. Firstly I don't believe that revolutions are | :16:26. | :16:29. | |
being created. Moreover that they can be created from the outside of | :16:30. | :16:33. | |
the country, from the outside of the national borders. The guy who is | :16:34. | :16:38. | |
creating the revolution in Russia, his name is Vladimir Putin right | :16:39. | :16:42. | |
now. With what he is doing. What we are supposed to do is to showcase | :16:43. | :16:47. | |
the alternative. And right now by being here in Ukraine I am trying to | :16:48. | :16:52. | |
help Ukranian economy by showing to ordinary Russians that by creating a | :16:53. | :16:57. | |
revolution you can actually prosper, you can actually benefit, that your | :16:58. | :17:01. | |
nation can start to develop. And this is not happening right now in | :17:02. | :17:05. | |
Ukraine because the country doesn't have a clear strategy of where to | :17:06. | :17:10. | |
develop and I hope to help with this thing. Secondly, I want to help to | :17:11. | :17:18. | |
organise Russian buyouts -- Ponomarev, because Russia has had a | :17:19. | :17:23. | |
brain drain with more than a million living in the last two years and | :17:24. | :17:27. | |
these are the most capital people, the most entrepreneurial, the most | :17:28. | :17:32. | |
bright and capable scientific brains. And by getting them united, | :17:33. | :17:36. | |
getting them to create his alternative for the country I think | :17:37. | :17:40. | |
they can later returned to the country and create a new nation. It | :17:41. | :17:43. | |
sounds like a government in exile. You said the best we need for this | :17:44. | :17:47. | |
government is in the US. You are talking about what? It is not the | :17:48. | :17:52. | |
government in exile. Government is Anna Lieuwe -- is an elitist | :17:53. | :17:59. | |
approach. I am talking about common initiative. So how would it work? So | :18:00. | :18:04. | |
you have the people you are marshalling from the bottom up. What | :18:05. | :18:09. | |
changes, what changes in Russia as a result of that? It is a new vision | :18:10. | :18:16. | |
for the country. Right now the only person who can say that he has the | :18:17. | :18:20. | |
vision is Vladimir Putin. And when you are asking me about the surveys | :18:21. | :18:27. | |
that show he is popular, he is popular because there is no | :18:28. | :18:30. | |
alternative. And when you are selecting somebody from nobody, of | :18:31. | :18:34. | |
course he will get the high numbers. As soon as people would see that | :18:35. | :18:38. | |
there is an alternative, and this alternative is not about | :18:39. | :18:44. | |
personalities, is not about anything but the way the country is supposed | :18:45. | :18:51. | |
to go, then his numbers will start to decrease. This vision you are | :18:52. | :18:54. | |
painting is from outside Russia. What is changing inside Russia? | :18:55. | :19:00. | |
Right now think that our changing inside Russia, these are changing | :19:01. | :19:04. | |
for worse, and that will continue for a while in the same direction -- | :19:05. | :19:08. | |
are. Of course, there are certain forces who are participating in the | :19:09. | :19:10. | |
parliamentary elections which are coming this September, and I have my | :19:11. | :19:15. | |
personal preference whom I am supporting during these elections, | :19:16. | :19:20. | |
and I am trying to influence my constituents to come to the polling | :19:21. | :19:24. | |
stations and vote, and vote consciously, but nothing will change | :19:25. | :19:28. | |
through the elections. It is a process, it is not about a result. | :19:29. | :19:32. | |
Anatoly Goulburn in the Russian Times said whenever the opposition | :19:33. | :19:39. | |
has to tackle fundamental problems it disintegrates into little | :19:40. | :19:45. | |
splinters. Is he right? The main problem of political opposition in | :19:46. | :19:49. | |
Russia that has been associated with 1990s and nothing is worse for | :19:50. | :19:54. | |
Russian person to go back in 1990s, and that's one of the main problems | :19:55. | :20:00. | |
of the Liberal opposition, because Sony people were in the government | :20:01. | :20:04. | |
at that time. And when people are choosing between then and Vladimir | :20:05. | :20:07. | |
Putin they always choose Vladimir Putin because it was a time of | :20:08. | :20:11. | |
relative prosperity for the common Russians -- so many people. So to go | :20:12. | :20:14. | |
further the opposition has to present a vision. OK but since 2012 | :20:15. | :20:18. | |
you said I think this regime will not survive another two years, it | :20:19. | :20:23. | |
might not even survive a year. UKIP predicting that President Putin will | :20:24. | :20:26. | |
be out of power in two or three years and yet you say it is not | :20:27. | :20:29. | |
going to happen via elections. How is it going to happen? I think it | :20:30. | :20:37. | |
can happen actually every given day. Because the elites in Russia right | :20:38. | :20:40. | |
now, they are totally unhappy with what's going on. And if they in | :20:41. | :20:48. | |
their anteroom are silently pressuring President Putin to do | :20:49. | :20:52. | |
some changes. They are not happy with the economy, they are not happy | :20:53. | :20:55. | |
with relations with the west, but what Vladimir Putin is saying is | :20:56. | :21:01. | |
hush, sit tight, sanctions will be lifted, we will be victorious, you | :21:02. | :21:05. | |
know, nothing would change, we will get back to the business as usual. | :21:06. | :21:08. | |
And right now they are sitting and waiting. If they would see that | :21:09. | :21:12. | |
there is no business as usual things would start to change. If they would | :21:13. | :21:18. | |
see that Weston community is backing up and is not doing what it was | :21:19. | :21:24. | |
doing, doing what it was saying in public, then of course things will | :21:25. | :21:27. | |
continue like this for another six or seven years at least -- western. | :21:28. | :21:31. | |
But you have said elites cannot be changed gradually as newcomers will | :21:32. | :21:35. | |
be corrupted either bad practices and approaches of the past. The | :21:36. | :21:39. | |
future needs to be built from scratch. And it sounds like | :21:40. | :21:44. | |
somebody... I know you admire Lenin. It sounds like something he would | :21:45. | :21:51. | |
say. Again, I think that the changes, they will come in two | :21:52. | :21:55. | |
stages. All changes in Russia, they started from the top. There was no | :21:56. | :22:00. | |
time in Russian history when the initial change was not initiated | :22:01. | :22:05. | |
from the top. And I think that the situation is moving in the | :22:06. | :22:10. | |
direction, the situation will start to change from the top. But then the | :22:11. | :22:14. | |
common people should pick it up and it should be a mass protest. It | :22:15. | :22:20. | |
shouldn't be an elitist approach. And this is something that I am | :22:21. | :22:23. | |
trying to work on right now. OK, so use a change will come because | :22:24. | :22:27. | |
someone near, someone at the top near President Putin, will make a | :22:28. | :22:32. | |
move against him? It is not necessarily that it will be a move | :22:33. | :22:39. | |
against him. You know, it can be relatively friendly move. Let's | :22:40. | :22:42. | |
start to change something. Let's play another game like it was played | :22:43. | :22:49. | |
between Vladimir Putin and. Let's change another face, but it's no | :22:50. | :22:54. | |
longer 2008, and as soon as they start any kind of serious changes I | :22:55. | :22:57. | |
think the situation will actually below. The situation would blow | :22:58. | :23:01. | |
because what, the people would insist on change? -- blow. Yes, | :23:02. | :23:06. | |
because people no longer want to wait. They want those changes. And | :23:07. | :23:12. | |
right now they see a person in charge, they see the only person who | :23:13. | :23:16. | |
is powerful and who is seen as more powerful than western leaders. As | :23:17. | :23:21. | |
soon as they would see that this person is not so powerful any longer | :23:22. | :23:28. | |
than the changes would start. Ilya Ponomarev, thank you for coming on | :23:29. | :23:30. | |
HARDtalk. Thank you very much. After a couple of really hot days it | :23:31. | :24:06. | |
all went bang somewhat on Wednesday. Certainly for some there was a whole | :24:07. | :24:09. | |
host of thunderstorms across Scotland, clearing out | :24:10. | :24:12. | |
into the North Sea now, a rash of them across eastern | :24:13. | :24:14. | |
England disappearing | :24:15. | :24:17. |