Boris Nemtsov had spent the better part of his adult life fighting the system. He had always been an ardent critic of Vladimir Putin, and was determined to convince his countrymen that liberalism and democracy were the only ways to prevent Russia from becoming a ‘pariah country.’
Last night, Nemtsov was leaving a restaurant in Moscow, while accompanied by Ukrainian model Anna Duritskaya, when a passing car opened fire on him, leaving him dead in the street.
His body isn’t even cold, and theories abound as to who is responsible for the killing. For some, the most obvious culprit would be Putin. Russia has a long history eliminating those who oppose the prevailing regime, and Putin’s time in power has seen the deaths and detention of numerous journalists, defectors, and dissidents. However, it’s hard to say if the death of Nemtsov was really in Putin’s best interest.
Putin has enjoyed the overwhelming support of most Russians in recent years (most polls place this support at around 80 percent), and it doesn’t appear that Nemtsov was really a threat to his rule. In the Russian political scene, being liberal or democratic is synonymous with being pro-US or even CIA run. These movements are marginal at best, and have even less support than the modern version of the Communist Party. Nemtsov was a fly on the back of Putin’s Russia, and killing him would only bolster a movement that was no threat to him.
This post was published at The Daily Sheeple on February 28th, 2015.
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