Boris Nemtsov RIP

Boris Nemtsov was a charismatic Russian reformer who had served in Boris Yeltsin's government. He had a reputation for scrupulous honesty, but had been labelled a "national traitor" for criticising the present Russian government.

Just before Midnight last Thursday, Mr Nemtsov, in the words of The Economist,

"was assassinated on a bridge just steps away from the Kremlin. Mr Nemtsov was shot with four bullets fired from a passing car. The area is infested with video cameras, police, security services and secret agents charged with protecting Russian president Vladimir Putin.

Given the level of security in the vicinity of the Kremlin, it is hard to imagine why Mr Nemtsov's killers would have picked that spot for the shooting, unless they had reason to believe they would be able to escape. The assassins did not try to cover their traces; they did not shoot the woman who was walking with Mr Nemtsov. It is by far the most significant political assassination in recent Russian history."

(The article from which this quote is taken can be read online at
 http://www.economist.com/news/europe/21645432-russias-rising-political-hatred-claims-victim-scrupulously-honest-reformist-leader-liberal-martyr?fsrc=nlw%7Cnewe%7C2-03-2015%7C)

It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that Mr Nemtsov was the latest victim of a wave of hatred which he himself described ten months ago as follows:
"I can't remember such a level of general hatred as the one in Moscow today ... Not in 1991, during the August coup, not even in 1993 [during Yeltsin’s stand off with parliament]. Aggression and cruelty are stoked by the television while the key definitions are coming from the slightly possessed Kremlin master. "National traitors", "fifth column", "fascist junta"—all these terms are coming from the same Kremlin office…The Kremlin is cultivating and rewarding the lowest instincts in people, provoking hatred and fighting. People are set off against each other. This hell can not end peacefully."
The kind of hostility which Nemtsov described and which has now claimed his life cannot be good for Russia or for her neighbours.

There are people in the West who have been making excuses for the recent behaviour of Vladimir Putin's government - generally people who hate the USA and cannot resist the temptation to believe Putin's anti-US propaganda as a stick to beat America, or people who hate the EU and cannot resist the temptation to believe Putin's anti EU propaganda as an opportunity for more Europe-bashing.

Goodness only knows there are plenty of excellent reasons to criticise the European Union, but I honestly do not believe that there is any justification whatsoever for regarding the recent chain of events in Ukraine and Russia as one of them.

And anyone who thinks otherwise might usefully study what happened to Boris Nemtsov.

He was no traitor to Russia and his country will be much poorer without him.

Rest in Peace.

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