CURRENTTIME — broadcast
20260806 040000 UTC
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[00:00:20] Citizens of our country have the opportunity to vote for peace and freedom, for
[00:00:24] human lives. 10 parties for war,
[00:00:27] one against. At the Central Election Commission,
[00:00:30] a draw was held for sequential numbers in ballots.
[00:00:34] The real choice in the elections is either United Russia or Yabloko. Our number
[00:00:37] is two. Yabloko, by the way, was allowed to vote. You can
[00:00:40] vote for it. I urge you to become independent
[00:00:43] observers, to watch for
[00:00:46] falsifications, and to vote for
[00:00:49] the Yabloko party. Who and how supports
[00:00:53] Yabloko's anti-war slogans? You be quiet, don't
[00:00:56] interrupt.
[00:00:59] Shut up. Get him out of here, to hell
[00:01:02] with him! Who
[00:01:03] is against?
[00:01:16] even call Yabloko a party; it's no more than a cell,"
[00:01:20] Dmitry Peskov, the press secretary of the Russian president, said
[00:01:24] in a comment to the Washington Post. He is confident, I quote: "Pressure is
[00:01:27] exerted on those who violate the law, and those who
[00:01:30] do not violate it freely express their opinion." End
[00:01:33] of quote. The problem is that, for example, an anti-war statement
[00:01:37] in Russia, any statement, can be interpreted as illegal, or the publication
[00:01:40] of a photo of Alexei Navalny, or the publication of a link to a video
[00:01:44] that contains a publication of a photo of Alexei Navalny. But everything is
[00:01:47] in strict accordance with the law. As, for example, with
[00:01:51] politician Boris Nadezhdin. He was urgently deprived of passive
[00:01:54] suffrage, first being recognized as a foreign agent, then
[00:01:57] a protocol was drawn up about demonstrating
[00:02:00] symbols because of a link to that very video
[00:02:03] with a photo of Alexei left Russia, although he was going
[00:02:07] to run for the State Duma as an independent candidate.
[00:02:10] The Yabloko party has problems with nominating candidates for
[00:02:14] regional elections, for example, in St. Petersburg and Karelia. They
[00:02:17] found different pretexts; we won't go into detail about them now. The key thing is that
[00:02:21] there are strong politicians there who consistently made it into regional
[00:02:24] parliaments. Yabloko has been absent from the State Duma since 2003,
[00:02:28] and it's even more curious that now, against the background of a clear anti-war
[00:02:31] campaign, those who are quite likely to have never seen Yabloko live
[00:02:35] in the State Duma are campaigning for Yabloko. The federal list
[00:02:39] of parties for the State Duma elections was approved by the Central Election Commission. In the federal
[00:02:43] ballot, Yabloko got number two, right after United
[00:02:46] Russia. Independent analysts note that online,
[00:02:49] Yabloko confidently ranks among the top three in terms of subscribers on its
[00:02:52] social networks, while on TV, it is practically blocked. So, we will discuss
[00:02:56] both of these aspects today, both offline and online.
[00:03:07] Our country has reached it. Just a month ago, Yabloko's fate
[00:03:11] raised big questions: repression against party members,
[00:03:14] additional checks by the Central Election Commission. It seemed to have
[00:03:17] put an end to the Duma campaign. However, the party was allowed
[00:03:21] to participate in the elections after registering its federal list. This means
[00:03:25] that the only anti-war party has a chance. We are the only
[00:03:28] political force offering a real alternative to the government's
[00:03:32] course. We stand for peace. A week after
[00:03:36] the CEC's decision on registration, a post appeared in the party's Telegram
[00:03:39] channel. They overtook United Russia in subscribers.
[00:03:41] Yabloko became the second most popular on
[00:03:44] Telegram. New People held first place, but on August 5,
[00:03:48] Yabloko overtook them. Currently, over
[00:03:51] 90,000 people have subscribed to the party of Peace's Telegram
[00:03:55] channel. But every success is accompanied by setbacks. Recently, the party announced the start of collecting
[00:03:59] money for its campaign. Soon the website for collecting donations
[00:04:02] was subjected to a DDoS attack, and the increase in the number of subscribers was
[00:04:06] linked to bots. On the day we surpassed United
[00:04:09] Russia in Telegram subscribers, our channel was subjected
[00:04:12] to a massive bot attack. It is obvious that the goal of this attack
[00:04:16] is to discredit our result. Instead of honest political competition,
[00:04:20] someone prefers to use dirty technologies. But neither
[00:04:23] DDoS attacks nor bot fraud will change the main thing:
[00:04:27] people continue to come to us, support us, and stand for
[00:04:31] peace and freedom. Due to the lack of access to old media, the party conducts
[00:04:35] its main campaign online. On its social networks, they publish speeches
[00:04:38] by party chairman Nikolai Rybakov or conversations with other
[00:04:42] prominent members, for example, Kirill Goncharov. To truly
[00:04:46] change the situation in the country, to show political
[00:04:49] subjectivity, society will be able only by voting for Yabloko. On
[00:04:52] social media, Yabloko posts memes to trending music. You can't listen to it
[00:04:56] due to copyright, but we can show it. No. The special
[00:05:00] anthem of the campaign was a song by singer Yolka and the Iowa group,
[00:05:04] Yabloko. Here, listen
[00:05:43] Voting for the Yabloko party is
[00:05:46] incredibly important. It is the only
[00:05:49] party that stands against
[00:05:52] the war. Don't vote for Yabloko, it won't get 5%. Your
[00:05:56] vote will go nowhere.
[00:05:58] Why are you saying this, gentlemen bloggers, political,
[00:06:02] liberal, by the way, they were allowed to vote, you can
[00:06:05] vote for them, but the only problem, it seems to me, is that most of the people who
[00:06:09] really want to vote for Yabloko are underage and cannot vote.
[00:06:13] Online successes make rivals bite their elbows,
[00:06:16] or rather, apples. Here, for example, a creative from the New
[00:06:19] People party. On their social networks, they published a video in which
[00:06:22] State Duma Vice-Speaker Vladislav Davankov eats an apple.
[00:06:26] United Russia is not far behind either. The "Atlas of Elections" project summarizes
[00:06:30] that the ruling party is trying to increase its online presence through
[00:06:33] administrative resources. They write in regional and municipal official
[00:06:37] public pages, as well as subordinate
[00:06:59] the Yabloko party and asked if this online activity is
[00:07:02] a grassroots initiative or if it comes from the party
[00:07:05] itself. In these elections, only Yabloko stands
[00:07:09] for peace. Therefore, people who are tired of what is happening... want
[00:07:13] peace, they see it and sincerely support it. In essence, it is
[00:07:16] support not even for the party, but for this very demand. We
[00:07:20] regard these elections as a referendum. In this
[00:07:23] referendum, citizens will be able to express whether they want the continuation
[00:07:26] of what has been happening for five years, or if they want peace. For
[00:07:30] the continuation of what is happening, 10 parties stand. In the
[00:07:33] ballot, only Yabloko stands for peace. Therefore,
[00:07:37] campaigning for Yabloko on the Internet is
[00:07:39] a grassroots initiative. This is sincere support.
[00:08:42] So I wouldn't be flattered by these
[00:08:45] figures,
[00:08:47] and in general, in fact,
[00:08:51] you see, the Yabloko electorate,
[00:08:54] and indeed the Europeanized democratic electorate, which, by the
[00:08:57] way, is quite abundant in
[00:09:00] Russia, it is mainly found in large
[00:09:04] cities, represented mainly by educated people,
[00:09:07] mainly
[00:09:09] with average incomes, but not
[00:09:13] only, and it is measured in, well, tens
[00:09:17] of millions of people, 20-30
[00:09:20] million, but this electorate does not go to elections, it
[00:09:24] does not believe in the electoral process, in
[00:09:28] principle. In general, you can understand it,
[00:09:31] although, if it were rational, it would
[00:09:35] certainly take part in this
[00:09:38] procedure, but be that as it may,
[00:09:43] the broad masses of people, including advanced,
[00:09:47] educated ones, they,
[00:09:51] mostly and most often act irrationally.
[00:09:54] So, strictly speaking, even Yabloko's
[00:09:58] message for peace is also irrational. How
[00:10:02] will Yabloko ensure peace if
[00:10:05] it, say, gets into parliament?
[00:10:09] No way. What about these elections?
[00:10:12] What is being formed? Parliament is being formed, the State Duma,
[00:10:16] that very institution where the speaker
[00:10:19] chants five times
[00:10:23] "Russia, Putin." Excuse
[00:11:55] me for interrupting, but just so we don't lose
[00:12:04] this thought. You said that there are clearly people who will most likely come to
[00:12:08] the polling stations, and I assume you're hinting that they will spoil
[00:12:11] their ballots as a clear expression of protest. But our interviewee from
[00:12:15] the Yabloko party today emphasized that they see this as an anti-war referendum. Well,
[00:12:19] it turns out, from their perspective, in some sense, it can be assumed that United
[00:12:23] Russia, and Putin in particular, also perceive these elections as a kind
[00:12:26] of referendum, well, from his perspective, as approval of the war, among other things.
[00:12:29] Therefore, he spoke, for example, at the United Russia congress in person, which
[00:12:33] hasn't happened for a long time. That's the first thing. Second, 5 years is a huge
[00:12:37] electoral cycle for the State Duma. Possibly, at least
[00:12:40] half a generation has grown up that, firstly, was still underage at the beginning of
[00:12:44] the great war, and secondly, now has the right to vote. So,
[00:12:47] here's a double question: will this referendum succeed, especially considering that spoiling
[00:12:51] ballots is also an expression of a position, and has that very
[00:12:55] Yabloko electorate you mentioned at the beginning become younger? Well, point
[00:12:58] one: first of all, I would not now call for spoiling
[00:13:02] ballots. If these were presidential elections, then it
[00:13:05] would make sense. Now, no, because
[00:13:08] those ballots that will be spoiled, they
[00:13:11] are taken into account when counting. They will be distributed among the parties
[00:13:15] that passed, since the majority will be United Russia,
[00:13:18] the larger part of invalid ballots will go
[00:13:22] to United Russia. Therefore... you
[00:13:25] simplified my
[00:13:27] position a little.
[00:13:29] I want to say that in this situation, elections
[00:13:32] are not a meaningless
[00:13:35] procedure, because it is meaningless in the European sense
[00:13:39] of the word, in the sense that voters in no way can influence
[00:13:42] the actions of the authorities in the future through the composition of the State Duma.
[00:13:46] But these elections make sense in at least
[00:13:49] three dimensions. This is the first for the authorities, the most
[00:13:53] important thing is the ritual. Elections
[00:15:30] are important for this government, and for the voter,
[00:15:34] it is a way of demonstration and nothing more. For
[00:15:37] such a critically minded, European-minded
[00:15:41] voter, a way of demonstration. You can demonstrate that
[00:15:45] you don't care when you don't go to elections, all
[00:15:48] together. You lump everyone from
[00:15:51] Zyuganov to Yavlinsky
[00:15:55] together. You can come and spoil your ballot, in this situation, this is not the best
[00:15:58] option. You can come and vote for Yabloko, even
[00:16:02] though some of the votes will be stolen and so on and so
[00:16:05] forth. Yes, in this situation, I think it would be more correct to vote for
[00:16:09] Yabloko. But as a person with
[00:16:12] extensive experience observing elections, I think
[00:16:16] that point one: a huge part of the potential Yabloko
[00:16:19] electorate will proudly and foolishly ignore the elections. Well, that's
[00:16:22] how our public opinion is structured. Second,
[00:16:26] второе,
[00:16:29] when counting votes, people controlled by Mr.
[00:16:32] Kiriyenko, if Yabloko unexpectedly gets too many,
[00:16:36] they will politely correct Yabloko, and
[00:16:39] you won't be able to do anything about it. No courts will
[00:16:42] save you. And
[00:16:46] third, it is
[00:16:48] that in fact,
[00:16:51] as sad as it may be,
[00:16:54] Yabloko is also a member of this
[00:16:57] team. Otherwise, it would not exist in
[00:17:01] Russia. It was very
[00:17:04] carefully trimmed, painted like...
[00:17:38] Yabloko at a distance, well, it's painfully difficult
[00:17:41] to force yourself to vote for such
[00:17:44] a fighter for peace, but there are no other options left for
[00:17:47] Russia. But again, I want to say,
[00:17:51] rationally, of course, yes. As far as I know
[00:17:54] the character of the highly respected
[00:17:57] Russian voter, well, he won't go. He
[00:18:01] is ready to vote for a strong leader, whether
[00:18:05] it's Yeltsin, whether it's Navalny, whether it's
[00:18:08] someone else. He is not yet
[00:18:11] ready to vote for abstract
[00:18:15] values. So, I would wholeheartedly suggest
[00:18:17] voting for Yabloko, but I know that it won't happen. And if
[00:18:21] it does happen, then of course, it won't be allowed to get
[00:18:25] more than 3%. I'll remember that prediction, but that's what
[00:18:29] you call it at the federal level. I also want to mention that besides the elections
[00:18:32] to the federal parliament, there are also regional elections. It was
[00:18:36] precisely at the federal level that Yabloko encountered much more problems. In
[00:18:40] your opinion, why do regional politicians from Yabloko cause so much more concern
[00:18:43] for the Russian authorities? You mentioned some regions, I'll add
[00:18:47] St. Petersburg, yes. Of course,
[00:18:50] well, again, Pskov could also be mentioned,
[00:18:54] where, this is Kiriyenko, this is
[00:18:57] a methodologist, he
[00:19:00] is a dry, functional,
[00:19:04] calculating person. He understands that
[00:19:08] in Pskov, Shlosberg is there, and he
[00:19:11] can, so Shlosberg must be imprisoned, Pskov neutralized.
[00:19:15] He understands that in
[00:19:18] Karelia,
[00:19:20] it's the same thing. He understands that Moscow and St. Petersburg are two more
[00:19:24] potentially dangerous regions. Strictly speaking,
[00:19:27] that's all, already everything. There are almost no more.
[00:19:31] You can try to catch something in Novosibirsk, somewhere else, but unlikely.
[00:19:34] That is, he...
[00:21:20] predictable. During the war in the Russian parliament, laws are usually
[00:21:24] adopted unanimously or with the passive participation of non-voting
[00:21:27] deputies. Many Russians are not interested in the September elections
[00:21:31] from the point of view of new faces in parliament; few doubt the victory
[00:21:35] of the ruling party in connection with rumors of possible
[00:21:38] mobilization after the vote. However, at the end
[00:21:41] of July, the CEC unexpectedly registered Yabloko, a party that is going to
[00:21:45] the elections with the slogan "for peace and freedom," advocates for a ceasefire
[00:21:49] agreement, and opposes political repression. The peaceful
[00:21:52] agenda did not appeal to all current deputies
[00:21:56] and political parties. We would
[00:21:59] prefer to fight not on the political field,
[00:22:02] but on the battlefield. You see,
[00:22:05] what are your ceasefires?
[00:22:08] Not once has any of you been to Donbas.
[00:22:12] Yabloko's registration increases interest in the elections, the participation
[00:22:15] of anti-war Russians. However, on television, everything is stable.
[00:22:19] Yabloko... and other small parties, despite legislative requirements,
[00:22:23] are given very little airtime compared to United Russia and
[00:22:26] other parliamentary factions, notes the "Atlas
[00:22:30] of Elections" project. On Wednesday, Yabloko received the second number on the ballot
[00:22:33] as a result of the CEC lottery, which was shown on PTV. "Why did you decide
[00:22:37] not to rotate the Altatron?" "Because all the numbers that remained suit
[00:22:41] me."
[00:22:44] Moreover, I pulled out what we wanted, because the real choice in the elections is either
[00:22:48] United Russia or Yabloko. Number two,
[00:22:51] oh, number two.
[00:22:55] Now we know that citizens of our country have the opportunity
[00:22:58] to vote for peace and freedom, for the lives of people. This is the first case during
[00:23:02] the current campaign when Yabloko's anti-war agenda was able to be aired.
[00:23:06] Over the past week, federal channels have generally
[00:23:09] reduced their coverage of the election race. On Channel One, the share of such
[00:23:13] reports was only 2.5%, falling
[00:23:16] more than 10 times compared to the previous week, the "Atlas
[00:23:20] of Elections" reported. Yabloko managed to increase the number of mentions on
[00:23:23] federal channels, surpassing other small parties, but
[00:23:26] again, without focusing on the anti-war program. As part
[00:23:30] of state support for families of SVO participants,
[00:23:33] 36 regional support measures are in effect. The governor
[00:23:36] said they try to implement them proactively. Last
[00:23:40] week, TV channels tried to create among viewers a sense of consolidation
[00:23:44] around supporting Russia's war foreign policy, notes the Atlas
[00:23:47] of Elections. One of the main indicators
[00:23:50] of the evenness of covering party work over the past weeks, reports about
[00:23:54] their pre-election congresses, for example, the United Russia congress
[00:23:57] was given more airtime than all other
[00:24:00] parties combined.
[00:24:03] Well, is it worth recalling Mr. Zhuravlyov's famous epic about Danish
[00:24:06] turtles in supposedly public houses for zoophiles? An old meme, if
[00:24:10] you like, you can research it online yourself. Let's recall
[00:24:13] another episode, a recent, fresher one. A month ago, Zhuravlyov was asked
[00:24:17] why so few deputies or their children generally...
[00:24:50] since '14, when none of you bastards were there, none of you at all. I
[00:24:54] was the only one at Zakharchenko's inauguration. And you're
[00:24:57] telling me, where's your document? I don't
[00:25:01] need it, because you didn't understand that all deputies
[00:25:05] are forbidden to participate there, only with
[00:25:07] permission. But Milonov participated, the Order
[00:25:11] of Courage hero. That's fine, I don't know where he
[00:25:14] participated, I know where I participated. I have
[00:25:17] fallen comrades, and I didn't die because I hid
[00:25:21] behind their backs. And I don't
[00:25:23] give a damn. You picked the wrong person to tell
[00:25:27] me where I should be and where I shouldn't be sitting in Moscow. Why
[00:25:30] do I need you here recording an interview? Go to
[00:25:33] hell. Go there yourself.
[00:25:37] But our interlocutor in the Yabloko party is generally
[00:25:40] optimistic about this TV disposition. He claims that
[00:25:43] there is still free airtime mandated by law, plus
[00:25:46] TV debates, and there, too, it will be possible to articulate Yabloko's position
[00:25:57] about these outbursts by Mironov, he actually wrote this in his Telegram channel,
[00:26:01] and Zhuravlyov.
[00:26:14] Such an army of fleas that bite, the hysteria is
[00:26:18] very characteristic, indicative. But in
[00:26:21] the Kremlin, there are less hysterical and more rational people, so they
[00:26:25] understand what they are doing. They
[00:26:28] understand that, yes, now they will release a pack of these...
[00:27:02] realized that Nadezhdin represents some systemic,
[00:27:05] poorly controlled threat, so it's better to
[00:27:08] close it. They don't consider Yabloko such
[00:27:11] a threat. I think they view it as
[00:27:15] , on the contrary,
[00:27:18] a convenient tool for suppressing
[00:27:21] anti-war sentiments. They
[00:27:24] will count as many figures, as many percentages as
[00:27:27] they deem necessary, and then they will say: "Here you go." They
[00:27:31] will forget that they were not allowed, removed,
[00:27:35] imprisoned,
[00:27:37] their hands and feet tied. They will tell all their
[00:27:40] voters, who are the majority in Russia, and tell
[00:27:44] them, "Here, Yabloko advocated for peace propaganda.
[00:27:48] How much did they get? 1.7%,
[00:27:52] 2.3%, 2.9%." Well,
[00:27:55] something like that. "Here is your
[00:27:58] Europeanized," the Russian will say...
[00:28:32] there is nothing to hope for
[00:28:35] and nowhere to
[00:28:38] retreat. Therefore,
[00:28:41] we must be calm, courageous, not offended,
[00:28:45] do what needs to be done
[00:30:48] Crimea, there is movement, for the first time in
[00:30:52] history, we are doing
[00:30:56] this without a land operation, we are creating a...