DAR AL HARB - RUSSIA: PUTIN & THE NEO-SOVIET KREMLIN CRACK DOWN ON OPPOSITION PARTY

Kremlin Cracks DownOn Party of Putin Critic
By ALAN CULLISON

MOSCOW -- When Russia's parliament widened the definition of illegal extremist activity last year, critics of President Vladimir Putin feared they would be targets.

That fear appears to be justified. Prosecutors in the southern city of Krasnodar have warned that a local branch of a prominent opposition party, Yabloko, will be shut down if it doesn't stop distributing the books of one of its leaders, a columnist who has assailed Mr. Putin.

Andrei Piontkovsky said he received a letter from prosecutors this week summoning him "to give an explanation" of his books, which have been available for more than two years and which officials have now determined fall under Russia's new definition of extremist.

Under a law passed last year, extremism includes acts such as "the abasement of national dignity" and the "public slander of a state official." Mr. Piontkovsky said he is accused of inciting social and ethnic unrest.

Mr. Piontkovsky, who is in Washington as a visiting scholar at the Hudson Institute, said he will speak to prosecutors when he returns to Russia in July. "I expect them to charge me with extremism," Mr. Piontkovsky said in a telephone interview. "This is a charge they will use against every critic of the Putin regime."

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Pertinent Links:

1) Kremlin Cracks DownOn Party of Putin Critic