Khodorkovsky: alleged lack of confidence in govt the source of Russia's economic decline
MOSCOW. Dec 20 (Interfax) - Former Russian oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky has argued it is alleged lack of public confidence in Russia's leaders that is the ultimate cause of its economic woes.
"For the past ten years our country has given up freedom, supposedly in favor of wellbeing. Under the slogans that no one needs freedom, that there is no true freedom anywhere, that ordinary people are not ready for it. Freedom has been swapped for a strong hand in the hope that that strong hand would feed and not strangle," Khodorkovsky, who lives abroad, said in a statement in connection with the 10th anniversary of his release from prison.
The Russian government "wants to decide who its citizens must do business with, from whom they can get money for public activities, and whom they must consider a friend and whom an enemy," he said in his statement, posted on his website.
"But there is a practical aspect to freedom. Only through free interaction between people can wealth be created and wellbeing achieved. It is people and their free interaction that is the source of wealth, even in Russia. It is not natural resources, territory, or, least of all, the state," Khodorkovsky said.
"By the start of 2014, the current state had begun to realize that it had led the country into an impasse" and opted for war as the solution, he said.
"We will have a high price to pay for this in all respects. We are already paying it. We are sustaining huge losses - lives, money, confidence, ties that have been built, opportunities," Khodorkovsky said.
"Yes, oil prices are falling. But this is not why living standards in Russia are falling catastrophically," he said.
"The cause lies somewhere else. No one trusts this government any more. Neither within the country nor outside," Khodorkovsky said.
Even those who verbally support it "are rushing to bureaux de change before the dollar goes up further," he said.
"People are losing money. But that is not the most terrible thing. The 'Russia surrounded by enemies' theory means that we are being deprived of access to knowledge and technology, deprived of cooperation with the most advanced of countries," Khodorkovsky said.
"It is freedom that has always been the main enemy of today's government because freedom always leads to the change of government," he said.
"Anyone, even the best person in the world, will cross the line sooner or later if they are vested with unlimited power," Khodorkovsky said. "So Russia needs a system that precludes the concentration of power in the same pair of hands. I won't get tired of speaking about a constitutional reform as the first and necessary step toward national freedom and wellbeing."
"It is not only the president who can wield unlimited power but also a governor, a prosecutor, and even a police officer at any [police station] no matter how remote. It is our objective that everyone should feel that they will always be defended by a law-based state," Khodorkovsky said.