As my anxiety deepened, I kept asking my acquaintances in government: will there be a war? Everyone answered no: a war would not be beneficial to anyone. When Putin sent troops, these people were initially shocked and bewildered. Many of them now believe his claim that war was inevitable and threaten to avenge the cursed West for its sanctions. When the war broke out, my partner and I handed over our return tickets to Moscow and found ourselves in the middle of South Asia, not knowing what to do next. Six months ago, I decided to take a break. I needed some time to think about leaving journalism, which I dreamed of working for as a child. In Russia, Covid-19 was a convenient pretext for the state to completely detach itself from society and shut down what was left of the independent media. Authorities replaced them with a system of call centers in the regions to handle questions and comments from the population. They gave them a ridiculous name (Regional Control Centers) and, just as ridiculously, spent billions of rubles on them. For the past 18 months, one friend after another has been branded an enemy of the people, a “foreign agent.” Authorities began restricting their activities under the threat of criminal prosecution, a de facto ban on the entire journalism profession. It was awful to realize that half my life had collapsed, that my painstaking efforts to build my reputation from the beginning were in vain. As the dangers for journalists increased day by day, freedom of speech withered and people obeyed the endlessly pounded message that citizens should not participate in the country’s political life, but take care of their own affairs. I could not see the point in continuing. This decision was very difficult. I felt like a part of me was dying. What can I do? How can I help personally? These questions have been on my mind since Putin announced on the fourth day of the war that he was preparing Russian nuclear weapons, and it became clear that this would certainly not end quickly and things would get worse. In the first week of the war, Russian society was not yet cut off from the rest of the world, locked up voluntarily-compulsorily in the largest cage on earth. Because Putin presented the war as a “special operation” and did not warn the public or even those close to him of what he was going to do, the state propaganda machine remained unannounced. Two journalists from the independent Russian TV channel Rain Rain say goodbye to a friend last month before leaving for Georgia © New York Times / Redux / eyevine The country’s most popular artists expressed shock and horror at the war and condemned it. The anti-war reports immediately garnered hundreds of thousands of signatures, huge numbers of people from different professions signed open letters and the most courageous came out to protest in the streets. they were few, but they were there. It seemed that at least half of Russian society did not support the war and could still influence the other half. This gave real, albeit limited, hope. But I have lived my whole adult life under Putin – I turned 30 this year – so I knew the authorities would put an end to it all very quickly, by silencing and punishing those who spoke openly. I knew that in a few days the independent media would be abolished, my friends (at best) would be out of work and society would leave only propaganda. Almost on their own, my hands started writing the first article for my newsletter. I thought I could use my sources and knowledge to explain what is really going on in Russia, at a time when it is becoming less and less known. Did I ever imagine that I would start making my own tools, even on a small scale, in a moldy hotel room 6,500 km from home? But what else can I do, how else can I help here and now? Did I ever imagine that I would start making my own tools, even on a small scale, in a moldy hotel room 6,500 km from home? The Putin regime is doing nothing as effective as destroying what others have built, leading its people to places the regime has given them. After the first week of the war, what was left of the free Russian media was blocked, closed, forced to leave the country. Foreign journalists have been threatened with imprisonment for spreading “false news” about the actions of the Russian army. The same recently passed law silenced dissenting artists, celebrities, ordinary citizens – everyone. The cell is closed and all that remains is a deafening silence, which broke only a few forms that have been moved entirely abroad. Within days, my friends and colleagues flew in panic in all directions, as if ants were running from a crumbling anthill. When will I see it all later, I wondered? And then, immediately, other thoughts. When will the people who left Ukraine return to their homes? When will they see their loved ones and friends? Will they see them? I control every experience I have based on what I imagine people who have been attacked by Putin’s military feel. My colleagues and friends from Ukraine are hiding in bomb shelters, leaving their homes, heading for the unknown. I burst into tears for the first time when a close friend living in Kyiv told me at the beginning of the war that she could not bear to look at her house as she left it, all the objects she had lovingly decorated. me, not knowing if he would ever live there again. I’m away from home now, but I do not really know if this house still exists. I remember the last two years in Russia: how a rustling in the hallway or a knock on the door while I was not waiting for anyone made me shudder. Paranoia increased, especially when my colleague Ivan Safronov was imprisoned. He was accused of treason for his work as a military journalist. From today’s point of view, his persecution, like many other absurd events of the last two years, seems strangely logical. On the other hand, I do not think I can ever feel safe anywhere. My situation is very specific. I am Azerbaijani by nationality, not Russian, but I was born and raised in Moscow. My childhood and adolescence were in the 1990s and 2000s and all these years I was bullied because of my nationality. The Russian language has some very bad words for people from the Caucasian democracies. What could a child do? I tried to adapt, to make my peers accept me and through this trauma I gained a tremendous wealth of experiences and skills. I respected the world of educated people, in which I managed to escape with study and hard work, a world in which there was no room for separation by skin color and nose shape. Now, I am in a paradoxical situation: for most of my life I had to fight xenophobia and prove that I too belong to Russian society. But today, when I speak Russian on the street, I think: what if a passerby can say I’m from Russia and assume I’m supporting the war? How can I convince them that I am one of the normal people who are against Putin’s actions, someone who could be their friend? Maybe I’m fatal to be a stranger everywhere. But maybe my difference is also my strength. The identity that was stifled and discriminated against by the Russian state pulled me out of the mud. I have been writing articles for a month now. Despite the fact that it destroyed my profession in my homeland, the Russian state did not manage to take it from me. Work helps me deal with stress and not lose myself completely. Seeing the shots from Bucha I shudder in horror, but I’m not surprised: after Chechnya, Beslan and the Nord-Ost, after Kursk, the assassination of Anna Politkovskaya, the downing of the Boeing MH17, the poisoning of Alexei Navalny, I they know that the Russian security forces and the army are capable of anything. However, without the freelance journalists from all over the world now working in Ukraine, we would not have learned the truth about Bucha. I am overwhelmed with horror, disgust and anger about what is happening. At the same time, I am glad for my colleagues, who told the world the truth. Farida Rustamova is a journalist who has worked for BBC News Russian, Meduza and TV Rain. Her Faridaily newsletter is available at Substack Learn about our latest stories first – follow @ftweekend on Twitter
