As the Putin regime continues its crackdown on the growing opposition movement, a former KGB comrade of the president is now in trouble, with his family business “all but ruined by a blizzard of state inspections,” writes Fred Weir in the Christian Science Monitor.
Gennady Gudkov, a businessman and member of the “loyal opposition” in the Duma has been speaking at recent protests in the capital, hoping, as Weir reports, “to steer the protesters toward peaceful and constructive engagement with the authorities.”
But the Kremlin doesn’t see it that way. Russian bureaucrats have targeted his security firm, which has recently been visited by the police, fire department and the Moscow architectural control committee, leading to the suspension of its license for employees to carry guns and forcing him to sell his company at a loss.
“I took the path of Khodorkovsky,” Gudkov said, “and now I am really afraid.”
