Khodorkovsky: With the incursion in Kursk, Kiev aims to show the West that "red lines do not exist"

2024-09-03 07:52:00, Kosova & Bota CNA

Khodorkovsky: With the incursion in Kursk, Kiev aims to show the West that

Mikhail Khodorkovsky

The surprise incursion that the Ukrainian military launched about three weeks ago in Russia's western Kursk region remains an "important element of the war," says prominent Russian opposition figure Mikhail Khodorkovsky in an interview with Current Time.

The operation on Russian territory, after years of fighting only in Ukraine, has boosted Ukraine's morale and dealt a blow to domestic support for Russian President Vladimir Putin, Khodorkovsky said on the sidelines of the Globsec international security conference in Prague on September 1.

"The aid that the [Russian] state is giving to the people caught up in the war is not adequate," Khodorkovsky said, adding that most of Russian society does not see the incursion as a military operation, but rather as a kind of "disaster natural".

"Putin's ten thousand rubles [$110] is an insult to the people. And that's how the people see this help," he said.

This reaction makes the political risk even greater for the Russian government to call for a new mobilization of troops for the war against Ukraine, Khodorkovsky argued.

"Turning the war into a national effort is a decision that [Putin] has been shy to take," according to him.

Putin's government has used the media to prevent the onset of "war fatigue", convincing the general public that "there is no war".

"Once he creates the feeling that there is a war, time will start to run out," Khodorkovsky said, adding that "we just don't know how much time is left, as the special military operation has been going on for some time."

For Ukraine, the incursion is part of Kiev's efforts to convince its Western partners that it makes no sense to establish "red lines" regarding offensives against Russia.

"It is clear that bureaucracies in all countries - especially the United States - are very cowardly," argued Khodorkovsky.

"They have to prove that red lines do not exist, or at least they are not here. This step has greatly angered the [Western] bureaucracies, although they have not shown it yet. Like it or not, they have been shown that the red lines are not where these bureaucracies pretend they are. That makes [the incursion] very important," he said.

Khodorkovsky, 61, has been one of Russia's richest men.

He was arrested in 2003, allegedly on fraud charges that his supporters say were designed to punish him for his political activity and facilitate the seizure of his business assets by figures close to Putin. .

In 2005, he was sentenced to nine years in prison. However, Putin pardoned him in December 2013 and expelled him from the country.

Since then, Khodorkovsky, based in London, has funded a number of Russian opposition initiatives. In May 2022, the Government of Russia declared him a "foreign agent".

In April 2023, Khodorkovsky was among a large group of prominent Russian opposition figures in exile who signed the Declaration of the Democratic Forces of Russia, which declared Putin's government "illegal and criminal" and demanded the withdrawal of Russian troops. from "all occupied territories" in Ukraine./ Rel