WASHINGTON: Kremlin critic and chess legend Garry Kasparov on Tuesday called for a stronger Western response to Moscow’s aggression in Ukraine and said Russian dissident voices must be included in efforts to stand up to Vladimir Putin.
In an interview with AFP, the former world chess champion who last week was put on Russia’s list of “extremists,” called for more military aid to Kyiv against a “terrorist regime that only understands force.”
Kasparov, 60, blamed the Kremlin for the death in prison last month of opposition leader Alexei Navalny and said it marked a new low in Putin’s crackdown on dissent.
“Navalny’s murder...is a new milestone,” Kasparov said. “We are dealing with an enemy who wants to win this war, because Putin is waging war not only against Ukraine, NATO and the EU, but also against the liberal world order.”
Navalny, the Russian president’s main opponent, died suddenly at the age of 47 in an Arctic prison in mid-February of what officials said were “natural causes.” Navalny’s team and Western leaders blame the Kremlin, which denies responsibility.
Navalny was buried in Moscow earlier this month, with tens of thousands of Russians queuing to lay flowers despite the threat of arrest in a striking display of dissent. His widow Yuliya Navalnaya pledged to continue his work.
Kasparov, widely viewed as one of the world’s greatest chess players, retired from chess in 2005 to focus on political activism and has lived in exile in New York for the past decade.
In the interview, Kasparov urged the West to include Russian opposition voices in efforts to oppose Putin’s aggression.
“In order to defeat Putinism and all the forces of evil that it represents, there needs to be a coalition that would include this Russian component, like (Charles) de Gaulle’s Free French,” Kasparov said referring to the French resistance movement during World War II, which de Gaulle headed from London.
“The people who are ready to say: ‘The regime is illegitimate, the war is criminal, Crimea is Ukrainian’ must become a part of this fight.” Russia annexed Crimea in 2014.
Kasparov said he and other dissidents are working on formulating a path forward for the Russian opposition. “We need to create a matrix of a free Russia outside of Russia today, what we call half-jokingly a virtual Taiwan.”
The Russian opposition, however, is notoriously fragmented and Navalny’s team has in the past clashed with Kasparov.
Fresh disagreements emerged among Kremlin critics in recent weeks over how to register protest in this weekend’s presidential election, which Putin is sure to win without any real opponents allowed on the ballot and election officials under his thumb.
Kasparov urged Western countries to welcome anti-war Russians, including programmers and engineers involved in the making of drones and other weapons.
“Give them a chance to leave, give them a chance to switch to the other side,” Kasparov said. “I think this would sharply undermine Putin’s ability to wage war.”
Kasparov expressed frustration with the West’s reluctance to fully back Ukraine’s war against the Russian invasion, now in its third year. Kyiv has been struggling on the battlefield with crucial aid military delayed in the US Congress.
Kasparov said Western sanctions imposed on Russia have achieved little and called on more funding for Ukraine, including from confiscated Russian assets, and long-range missiles.
President Joe Biden “promised devastating consequences. And where are those devastating consequences?” Kasparov asked.
“Unfortunately, the West is lagging behind, and any weakness demonstrated by the West is an invitation to Putin for more aggression.”
Kasparov spoke to AFP on the sidelines of a gathering in Washington of the World Liberty Congress, a coalition of pro-democracy activists from 60 countries.
“We believe that from Russia to Venezuela, to China to Africa, all the authoritarian regimes and dictators are working together... voting for each other at the United Nations,” said US-based Iranian dissident Masih Alinejad.
“The bad guys are united,” Alinejad, who heads the organization, said at a joint press conference. “The time has come for the good people from authoritarian regimes to be united as well to expand our ideology, which is democracy, dignity, and freedom.”
Formed last year, the World Liberty Congress espouses non-violent protest, provides support to grassroots activists in home countries as well as political prisoners and their families.
Putin ‘only understands force:’ Russian chess legend
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Putin ‘only understands force:’ Russian chess legend
- Garry Kasparov, 60, blamed the Kremlin for the death in prison last month of opposition leader Alexei Navalny and said it marked a new low in Putin’s crackdown on dissent
- Kasparov, widely viewed as one of the world’s greatest chess players, retired from chess in 2005 to focus on political activism and has lived in exile in New York for the past decade
France asks Indonesia to transfer national on death row
- Indonesia has in recent weeks released half a dozen high-profile detainees
- French diplomats have acknowledged that talks were underway for the transfer of Serge Atlaoui
Indonesia has in recent weeks released half a dozen high-profile detainees, including a Filipino mum on death row and the last five members of the so-called “Bali Nine” drug ring.
French diplomats have acknowledged that talks were underway for the transfer of Serge Atlaoui, a 61-year-old Frenchman arrested in 2005 at a drugs factory outside the capital Jakarta.
The Indonesian government has now confirmed it received the official transfer request, which will be discussed in early January.
“We have received a formal letter requesting the transfer of Serge Atlaoui,” senior law and human rights minister Yusril Ihza Mahendra said.
The French embassy in Jakarta declined AFP’s request for comment.
Father-of-four Atlaoui has maintained his innocence, claiming that he was installing machinery in what he thought was an acrylics plant.
He was initially sentenced to life in prison, but the Supreme Court in 2007 increased the sentence to death on appeal.
Atlaoui was held on the island of Nusakambangan in Central Java, known as Indonesia’s “Alcatraz,” following the death sentence, but he was transferred to the city of Tangerang, west of Jakarta, in 2015 ahead of his appeal.
That year, he was due to be executed alongside eight other drug offenders but won a temporary reprieve after Paris stepped up pressure, with Indonesian authorities agreeing to let an outstanding appeal run its course.
In the appeal, Atlaoui’s lawyers argued that then-president Joko Widodo did not properly consider his case as he rejected Atlaoui’s plea for clemency — typically a death row convict’s last chance to avoid the firing squad.
The court, however, upheld its previous decision that it did not have the jurisdiction to hear a challenge over the clemency plea.
Atlaoui’s lawyer, Richard Sedillot, said last month that there was still “considerable hope” for a transfer.
Together Against the Death Penalty (ECPM) said the official request is the “penultimate step in a long fight” for those at the Paris-based organization who have campaigned for years to prevent Atlaoui’s execution.
“We are now waiting for this transfer to become a reality,” ECPM director Raphael Chenuil-Hazan said.
Earlier this month, Filipino inmate Mary Jane Veloso tearfully reunited with her family after nearly 15 years on Indonesia’s death row. She was transferred to a women’s prison in Manila where she awaits a hoped-for pardon for her drugs conviction.
Indonesia has some of the world’s toughest drug laws and has executed foreigners in the past.
At least 530 people were on death row in the Southeast Asian nation, mostly for drug-related crimes, according to data from rights group KontraS, citing official figures.
According to Indonesia’s Immigration and Corrections Ministry, more than 90 foreigners were on death row, all on drug charges, as of early November.
Despite ongoing negotiations for prisoner transfers, the Indonesian government recently signaled that it would resume executions — on hiatus since 2016 — of drug convicts on death row.
India’s former PM Manmohan Singh cremated with state honors
- Singh’s body, draped in Indian flag, was carried through the capital on a flower-decked carriage pulled by a ceremonial army truck
- Modi, who called Singh one of the nation’s ‘most distinguished leaders,’ attended the funeral, along with President Droupadi Murmu
NEW DELHI: The body of Manmohan Singh, the former Indian prime minister whose death has spark outpourings of grief at home and accolades from abroad, was cremated on Sunday on the banks of the Yamuna River in New Delhi with full state honors.
The funeral was conducted in the Sikh tradition as priests chanted hymns, after Singh’s body, draped in the Indian flag, was carried through the capital on a flower-decked carriage pulled by a ceremonial army truck.
The flag was removed and the body covered with a saffron cloth before it was placed on the pyre.
Since Singh died on Thursday at 92, many have taken up his comment near the end of his 10-year rule that “history will be kinder to me than the contemporary media.”
He was referring to a perception of weak leadership as he headed a coalition government facing numerous charges of corruption, which was thrown out of office in the 2014 election won by his successor Narendra Modi.
Modi, who called Singh one of the nation’s “most distinguished leaders” after his death, attended the funeral, along with President Droupadi Murmu and representatives of various countries. Modi’s government has decided to allocate land for Singh’s memorial.
Singh, considered the architect of India’s economic liberalization, had criticized Modi’s economic policies such as demonetization and introducing a goods and services tax.
Singh is survived by his wife and three daughters.
Congress Leader Rahul Gandhi accompanied Singh’s family on the truck to the Nigambodh Ghat cremation site after the procession from party headquarters in New Delhi, where people joined Congress party leaders and members to pay their last respects.
The leaders of the US, Canada, France, Sri Lanka, China and Pakistan were among those expressing grief at Singh’s death and highlighting his international contributions.
Regular flights between Ashgabat and Moscow suspended for a month from Dec. 30, says TASS
MOSCOW: Regular flights between Ashgabat and Moscow are to be suspended for a month from Dec. 30 after an Azerbaijan Airlines jet crashed in Kazakhstan, the state-run TASS news agency reported on Saturday citing Turkmenistan's national air carrier.
A passenger jet operated by Azerbaijan Airlines crashed near the city of Aktau in Kazakhstan on Wednesday, after diverting from an area of southern Russia where Moscow has repeatedly used air defence systems against Ukrainian attack drones.
Turkiye’s pro-Kurd party to meet jailed PKK leader Saturday
ISTANBUL: A delegation from Turkiye’s main pro-Kurdish DEM party is due on Saturday to visit jailed PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan, who is serving life on a prison island off Istanbul, a party source said.
“The delegation left in the morning,” the source told AFP, without elaborating how they would travel to the island for security reasons.
The visit would be the party’s first in almost 10 years.
DEM’s predecessor, the HDP party, last met Ocalan in April 2015.
On Friday, the government approved DEM’s request to visit Ocalan, who founded the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) nearly half a century ago and has languished in solitary confinement since 1999.
The PKK is regarded as a “terror” organization by Turkiye and most of its Western allies, including the United States and European Union.
Detained 25 years ago in a Hollywood-style operation by Turkish security forces in Kenya after years on the run, Ocalan was sentenced to death.
He escaped the gallows when Turkiye abolished capital punishment in 2004 and is spending his remaining years in an isolation cell on the Imrali prison island south of Istanbul.
Saturday’s rare visit became possible after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s nationalist ally, MHP party leader Devlet Bahceli, invited Ocalan to come to parliament to renounce “terror,” and to disband the militant group.
Erdogan backed the appeal as a “historic window of opportunity.”
Afghan Taliban forces target ‘several points’ in Pakistan in retaliation for airstrikes – Afghan defense ministry
KABUL: Afghan Taliban forces targeted “several points” in neighboring Pakistan, Afghanistan’s defense ministry said on Saturday, days after Pakistani aircraft carried out aerial bombardment inside Afghanistan.
The statement from the Defense Ministry did not specify Pakistan but said the strikes were conducted “beyond the ‘hypothetical line’” – an expression used by Afghan authorities to refer to a border with Pakistan that they have long disputed.
“Several points beyond the hypothetical line, serving as centers and hideouts for malicious elements and their supporters who organized and coordinated attacks in Afghanistan, were targeted in retaliation from the southeastern direction of the country,” the ministry said.
Asked whether the statement referred to Pakistan, ministry spokesman Enayatullah Khowarazmi said: “We do not consider it to be the territory of Pakistan, therefore, we cannot confirm the territory, but it was on the other side of the hypothetical line.”
Afghanistan has for decades rejected the border, known as the Durand Line, drawn by British colonial authorities in the 19th century through the mountainous and often lawless tribal belt between what is now Afghanistan and Pakistan.
No details of casualties or specific areas targeted were provided. The Pakistani military’s public relations wing and a spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Afghan authorities warned on Wednesday they would retaliate after the Pakistani bombardment, which they said had killed civilians. Islamabad said it had targeted hideouts of Islamist militants along the border.
The neighbors have a strained relationship, with Pakistan saying that several militant attacks that have occurred in its country have been launched from Afghan soil – a charge the Afghan Taliban denies.
