Dmitry Gudkov
Facebook
January 9, 2021
I understand that Russians there is no problem more important than Trump’s showdown with Twitter. The precedent of blocking a social network account is not a very good one, of course, but the folks in the US will cope without us. I would venture to throw out a different topic for discussion.
On Monday, January 11, the verdict in the case of Azat Miftakhov will be read out in the Golovinsky District Court in Moscow. Trump was banned on Twitter, but Azat, a graduate student in mathematics from Moscow State University, has been locked up in for allegedly breaking a window at United Russia party office. He has been in a pretrial detention center for two years, although there is no evidence of his guilt.
If you’re worried about freedom of speech, Azat’s case is also cause for worry. At the last court hearing in the case, people who came to support Azat were not only not allowed into the court building. They were simply locked up in the courtyard of the building. A paddy wagon was brought in and shipped them out of there. The detainees included two journalists, with press cards, but that means nothing to our authorities.
If the Miftakhov case were given at least 1% of the attention that has been spent on Trump in Russia, the case would not have happened. And we’re not taking about a ban on Twitter here, but arrest, torture, and a [possible] imprisonment in a penal colony.
Boris Vishnevsky
Facebook
January 9, 2021
In our country, Roskomnadzor can block any media outlet or website that tells truths that the authorities find unpleasant.
But this does not cause popular outrage.
In our country, people are put in jail for reposting things on the internet.
But this does not cause popular outrage.
In our country, hundreds of political prisoners are being held on falsified charges, starting with Yuri Dmitriev and ending with the defendants in the Ingush protest movement trial.
But this does not cause popular outrage, and rallies and pickets in support of these people attract almost no attention.
In our country, anyone who disagrees with the authorities can be declared a foreign agent.
But this does not cause popular outrage.
In our country, the president has been given lifelong immunity from prosecution for any and all crimes, and he does not even need to pardon himself in advance.
But this does not cause popular outrage.
But what an explosion of indignation there has been over the blocking of Trump’s Twitter account. It has been the main topic of discussion in Russia!
As long as this is the case, the Kremlin can rest easy.
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Sergey Abashin
Facebook
January 9, 2021
It’s stunning. Russia has hundreds of political prisoners, political assassinations and political persecution, two ongoing wars involving tens of thousands of dead and the occupation of territory in several [foreign] countries, a personal dictatorship that has been de facto and legally established, and laws that permit total censorship in the mainstream media. And yet Russian intellectuals are hotly debating whether it is right or wrong to block the American president’s Twitter account two weeks before the end of his official term.
Translated by the Russian Reader
The Russian Reader 
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