The bureaucracy has grown such powerful roots in Russia, and corruption is so widespread, that people from opposition have no interest in changing an….

I ask myself whether Russia is moving in the direction of democracy. I don't believe it is! Bit by bit, Russia is slipping back into an authoritarian….

As a storyteller I was influenced by the Moscow underground, where it was common to be apolitical..

Germans, Frenchmen and Englishmen can say of themselves: "I am the state." I cannot say that. In Russia only the people in the Kremlin can say that. ….

As a child I perceived violence as a sort of natural law. In the totalitarian Soviet Union, oppression held everything together. It was the sinister ….

When I turn on the TV in Russia I see a general calmly claiming that our missiles are ahead of the latest American models by three five-year plans. I….

The West should be even more vocal in insisting that the Russians respect human rights..

The Russian writer Vladimir Nabokov once said: In a Democracy, portraits of a nation's leader should never exceed the size of a postage stamp. That w….

The word "people" is unpleasant to me. The phrase "Soviet people" was drummed into us from childhood on. I love concrete people, enlightened people w….

Everyone in Russia must awaken the citizen within himself..

In Russia there are special people who are permitted to do anything. They are the sacrificial priests of power. Anyone who is not a member of this gr….

Orthodox churches, autocracy and national traditions are supposed to form a new national ideology in Russia. This would mean that Russia would be ove….

In Russia no one is surprised when an official accepts a bribe while at the same time portraying the state as some sacred entity to which the bourgeo….

My television teaches me that everything was wonderful in the Soviet Union. According to the programs I watch, the KGB and apparatchiks were angels, ….

The worst thing that can happen to Russia is indifference in the West - that is, if it were interested in nothing but oil and gas..

The citizen lives in each of us. In the days of Brezhnev, Andropov, Gorbachev and Yeltsin, I was constantly trying to suppress the responsible citize….

The Khodorkovsky case is typical of the "oprichnina" - the system of oppression..

Putin likes to quote a sentence from Czar Alexander III, who said that Russian has only two allies - the army and the navy. As a citizen, this makes ….

In Russia whenever you encounter a minor official, he lets you know that he is above you and that you depend on him. It is reflected in the superpowe….

In Russia one can be as pure as can be and still lose everything in a flash and end up in prison..

In Russia only those who are loyal to the people in power can become wealthy..