Alexei Navalny’s killer Vladimir Putin is no misunderstood or “demonized” despot as Bruce Currie alleges. Putin has a lengthy history of having his political opponents eliminated through extrajudicial executions. On March 17, 2023, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Putin and his commissioner for children’s rights Maria Lvova-Belova for kidnapping thousands of Ukrainian children and sending them to Russia, a war crime. Putin’s military is committing thousands of atrocities and war crimes in Ukraine particularly its targeting of civilians. Navalny opposed Putin’s war in Ukraine as have thousands of Russians who’ve been arrested, beaten and tortured in the Russian dictator’s prisons.

However, Navalny’s spirit lives on in the Russian soul. He’s an enduring hero that possesses unparalleled courage and integrity who successfully exposed the corruption of Putin and his cronies. “The Spy War, How the CIA Secretly Helps Ukraine Fight Putin,” from the NYT’s is revealing but not as Currie imagines. “Putin,” it reports, “had regularly interfered in Ukraine’s political system, handpicking leaders he believed would keep Ukraine within Russia’s orbit, yet each time it backfired driving protesters into the streets.” Ukraine, a sovereign nation since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, doesn’t want Putin manipulating its political system. Ukrainians know their country’s prosperity depends upon democracy, freedom and membership in the European Union not being subservient as part of Putin’s version of a totalitarian state.

John Stuart Hancock

Concord