'Putin is a murderer': Russian opposition figure Vladimir Kara-Murza
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In an interview with FRANCE 24, Russian opposition figure Vladimir Kara-Murza, who survived two suspected poisoning attempts and spent two and a half years in jail before being released in a 2024 prisoner swap, said Russian President Vladimir Putin was "not only a dictator" but "also a murderer in a very direct and literal sense of this term". He accused Putin of ordering the assassinations of fellow opposition leaders Boris Nemtsov and Alexei Navalny.
Kara-Murza was freed in August 2024 in the largest prisoner exchange between Russia and the West since the Cold War. He spent a year in total solitary confinement in Siberia, conditions he described as torture.
"Prolonged solitary confinement is officially equated to torture," he explained. "You start going crazy, you start forgetting names, you start forgetting even the simplest words." The Kremlin critic said he was "absolutely certain" he would die in prison before the prisoner exchange, which he called "a miracle".
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Asked about current US policy on Ukraine, Kara-Murza was scathing. "The policy of the current US administration towards Putin is shameful," he said, accusing President Donald Trump of "pushing Ukraine into a capitulation to Putin". Kara-Murza dismissed Trump's peace plan for Ukraine as "Vladimir Putin's Christmas wish list" and condemned the deportation of Russian dissidents from the US.
"The only language aggressors, dictators understand is the language of strength and principle. And if America in its current form is not willing to lead on this, then Europe must," he concluded.
