“It’s not just that I don’t regret any of it – I’m proud of it,” read a written statement sent out via a Russian journalist.
Kara-Murza faces 25 years in prison, with several criminal charges based primarily on his criticism of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The verdict will be handed down next Monday.
“I only blame myself for one thing,” announces the 41-year-old.
“That I failed to convince enough of my countrymen and politicians in democratic countries about the danger that the current regime in the Kremlin poses to Russia and the world.”
The trial against the regime critic is one of many similar in Russia, where the authorities have clamped down on freedom of expression since the outbreak of the full-scale Ukrainian war. However, Vladimir Kara-Murza says he believes in a different future:
“When the war will be called a war . . . and when it is those who pushed and started this war who will be called criminals, instead of those who tried to stop it.”