BERLIN (TIP): All Russian opposition politician Ilya Yashin had with him when he was released from his penal colony in a swap was his toothbrush, a tube of toothpaste, his expired passport and the prison garb he was wearing.
But he has hit the ground running.
Within days of arriving in Germany, Yashin not only bought new clothes, set up a smartphone and reunited with his parents, but also held a news conference, fielded questions from his supporters live on YouTube and held a rally in a Berlin park — even if it meant he didn’t have time to catch up on sleep.
The 41-year-old dissident, released last week in the historic East-West prisoner exchange, admits he doesn’t quite know how to be a politician in exile, a role that was forced upon him against his wishes.
But in an interview on August 9 in Berlin with The Associated Press, he said he wanted to continue campaigning against Russia‘s war in Ukraine, trying to free more political prisoners and advance projects to unite the country’s fragmented opposition.
“There is a lot of work,” said Yashin, visibly tired from his tight schedule.
A vocal and outspoken critic of President Vladimir Putin, Yashin was convicted of spreading false information about the Russian military after he made remarks on YouTube about hundreds of corpses found in the Kyiv suburb of Bucha after Russian forces withdrew from the area in March 2022, some bound and shot at close range.
He was serving 8 1/2 years in prison when on Aug. 1, Russian authorities put him on a plane to Turkey in the exchange.
It wasn’t something he wanted or sought, Yashin stressed at a news conference after arriving to Germany along with other Russian dissidents. In fact, he had said at one point that he would never accept such a deal — and reiterated it last week, describing his release as a “forced deportation.”
Unlike many Kremlin critics, Yashin had long refused to leave Russia despite mounting pressure from the authorities, arguing that his voice would sound weaker from abroad. He stayed even after the invasion in 2022 and hastily adopted laws criminalizing any public criticism of it.
He told AP that his newfound freedom has left him feeling conflicted. On one hand, there’s “a massive surge of enthusiasm, massive inspiration and a lot of joy,” Yashin said.
“For the first time in over two years … I don’t need to wake up at 5 a.m. after being ordered to wake up, I don’t need to walk with my hands behind my back, there are no bars, fences and barbed wire around, I can breathe in fresh air, eat what I want, call whoever and whenever I want,” Yashin said. “This feeling of freedom, it’s inebriating.” (AP)