Aleksandar Djokic

Inserted 10 months ago

“I believe that the indolent response of the elite, when Putin needed their support the most, speaks volumes. Out of the 83 Russian regions, not more than 10 governors publicly spoke in support of Putin. The governor of Moscow, Sergey Sobyanin, and the prime minister of Russia, Mikhail Mishustin, were completely silent during the mutiny. We have seen oligarchs like Vladimir Potanin and Arkady Rotenberg, who is very close to Putin, immediately fly away from the country while the mutiny was taking place. We must understand that the rational, technocratic parts of Putin's elites aren't disillusioned by the lack of democracy and human rights violations in Russia or war crimes in Ukraine - they are afraid that they won't have a secure future alongside Putin anymore. Prigozhin's action could only have cemented this feeling.”

Aljazeera

Political Scientist