As Russian President Vladimir Putin is waging a deadly assault against his own people who are protesting against the war, experts believe Russia is inching closer to being a society like North Korea.
The already troubled freedom of speech in Russia is in a nosedive.
Russia is the New North Korea
Since the war started, many Russians have flooded the roads, protesting against the aggressiveness of Putin.
Not only this, but a Russian journalist also protested against Putin during live telecasts. However, the journalist was arrested and interrogated right after the incident.
Putin has been assertive in jailing everyone speaking against his policies. This is the reason why he banned social media platforms in the country and passed a bill to curb so-called disinformation.
According to an independent project which studies political persecution in Russia, OVD-Info, more than 15,000 protesters in the country have been arrested so far for daring to speak against Putin.
A former intelligence officer, Rebekah Koffler, specifically mentioned the March 17 speech of Putin, noting that Russian society is getting similar to North Korea.
And there it is. Putin has shut down all free press. Russia is now totalitarian like North Korea.
— Outspoken™️ (@Out5p0ken) March 14, 2022
On Friday, Putin held a pro-war rally and parroted his belligerent talk. Koffler noted that thousands of people present in this rally were not present of their own will, but they were forced to come.
According to Koffler, employers, schools, and other facilities bound their people to go to Putin’s rallies just like North Korea, where supporting the dictator has become a compulsion.
She further stated that not going to demonstrations is never an option for Russian people, as most of them are informed they will become traitors if they do not go to demonstrations.
Crackdown Against Russians Pushing Them Into Chaos
Russia’s Putin is even doing a crackdown against declared activists.
Last week, a human rights activist, Marina Litvinovich, was arrested just because she called for anti-war protests in the country while posting a Facebook video.
Litvinovich revealed that Russian people are anti-war and Putin’s ambitions do not depict the sentiments of Russian people.
Most Russians are even unaware of the ground realities, as Putin’s disinformation campaign censored all the media outlets.
Recently, the New York Times reported the relatives of Ukrainians in Russia do not even believe the war is happening.
Koffler also believes Russia will continue censoring the western version of information, as the media is one of the few weapons left to Putin.
Russia is just terrible version of North Korea now
— Free Syria Media Hub (@Free_Media_Hub) March 22, 2022
Thus, Russia is inching closer to becoming a “pariah” to the global community, Koffler added. This is not the first time the Russian president is being compared to his North Korean counterpart.
Both of them have striking similarities, as their personalities resemble one another greatly, not to mention their policy vision also depicts many of the same goals.
Not only this, but the media in both countries is controlled by the state.
The only way Russia was better than North Korea was due to the fact that civil liberties there were relatively more than those of North Korea. However, this difference is also fading away with time.
