16th February 2024. Mourning.

What a black day for Russia, and its people, always suffering. And for us.

Is this violent death a victory for its power-mad leader, or a sign of his fear?

What a man, Navalny. What belief, what ideas drove him back to Russia, into the hands of his killers, after German doctors had cured him from Russian poison?

Why does it all remind me of Avdi Kallistratov, the hero of the novel “The Place of the Scull” by the great Kyrgyz (and Soviet) writer Aitmatov? The book was written 37 years ago.

From Chinghiz Aitmatov: The Place of the Scull, 1987

[Grishan to Avdi Kalistratov]

“… I will strangle you to death as an enemy of the people, scoundrel, and people will thank me because you are an agent of imperialism, scum! Do you think now that Stalin is dead, you will be spared?”

“It was quite clear, Grishan was a master of his trade. He killed Awdi Kalistratov with the hands of others. And if, on the next day, the dead Kalistratov was found or if there were doubts about him having fallen from the car or having jumped from it by himself, he, Grishan, would have a clean slate – he had not touched him. He could say: The guys have got into a fight, and in the scuffle, Avdi, unfortunately, fell.”

“But there is one thing that [Avdi] had not thought about, back then: What if there was a principle, a law; according to which the world punishes its sons for their most noble ideas and mental impulses? What if that is the form and the way to victory of these ideas, the price of victory?”