Russia's New Threats to Exiles: Seized Assets and Forced Returns

In Bangkok this week, members of an anti-war Russian rock group fought against deportation to Russia. They were held in what supporters described as a cramped, hot, 80-person immigration cell.

On Wednesday, the lower house of parliament in Moscow passed a law that allows the Russian government to seize the property of Russians living abroad who, in the words of the chairman of the legislature, “stain our country .”

Although the two developments were thousands of miles apart, they reflected the Kremlin's same grim analysis: Using new legislation and apparent diplomatic pressure on other countries, it is turning the screw on Russia's vast anti-war diaspora.

“Historic Russia has risen,” President Vladimir V. Putin said Wednesday at a meeting with supporters of his presidential campaign, repeating his claim that the time has come to cleanse Russian society of pro-Western elements. “All this scum that is always present in any society is slowly being washed away.”

Under the law, any Russians, even those living in exile, who are involved in “crimes against national security” – including criticizing the invasion of Ukraine – can have their assets confiscated. Putin is expected to sign the law, although it is not yet clear how broadly or aggressively the Kremlin plans to use it.

But the swift passage of the law – which passed the State Duma unanimously – is another signal that the Kremlin, having stamped out dissent at home, is increasingly turning its attention to criticism from abroad. Hundreds of thousands of Russians fled after the start of the war, including many celebrities who can still reach their fans through platforms like YouTube, which remains accessible within Russia.

Among the first to feel this increasing pressure are popular artists who have attracted large audiences in places popular with Russian émigrés, such as Dubai and Southeast Asia. In recent weeks, Russian anti-war celebrities have accused Thailand and Indonesia of bowing to Russian pressure to cancel their shows, while an anti-war rapper was banned from re-entering the United Arab Emirates, his adopted home country.

The most dramatic case occurred after members of the rock group Bi-2, originally from Belarus and one of Russia's most popular bands, were arrested in Thailand last week for an immigration violation. Their supporters said Russian officials had pressured Thailand for days to deport some of them to Russia, where the musicians could have been prosecuted for criticizing the war.

By Wednesday, the rockers had escaped that fate thanks to the intervention of Israeli and Australian diplomats, who arranged for all seven band members to be deported to Israel, according to the group's lawyer, who requested anonymity for security reasons. (Four are citizens of Israel and one of Australia.)

The extent of the Kremlin's efforts to have the rockers sent to Russia was not clear, but on Tuesday the group said in a statement that Thai authorities had canceled an earlier plan to deport some of them to Israel after Russian diplomats had visited the immigration center. where they were held.

Analysts and human rights advocates see the case as a clear demonstration of the Kremlin's increasingly aggressive efforts to punish Russians who speak out against Putin abroad — especially if they do so in non-Western countries interested in maintaining good relations with Moscow.

“This is a special operation,” said Dmitry Gudkov, an exiled Russian opposition politician close to Bi-2, referring to what he described as Russian efforts to send the band members to Russia. “Their job is to make someone big outside the country, to show that they can get anyone, anywhere.”

The one from the rock group sultry hits are part of the soundtrack of the early Putin era, and in later years the group stood alongside Russia's elite at major events – for example, at Putin's annual economic conference in St. Petersburg. in 2019. But last year Bi-2's singer Igor Bortnik was to write that Putin's Russia evoked “only disgust and prudishness.”

The Russian Foreign Ministry denied interfering in the Bi-2 case in Thailand, but called the band members “sponsors of terrorism” shortly after their detention. A Russian lawmaker, Andrei Lugovoi, said the country awaited Bi-2's deportation “with open arms” and predicted: “Soon they will be playing and singing on spoons and metal plates, tap dancing for their cellmates.”

(Mr. Lugovoi is no stranger to Russian intervention abroad, having been accused by Britain in 2007 of poisoning a Putin critic in London.)

Thailand, which maintains a largely neutral position on the war in Ukraine and is a major destination for Russian tourists, said it was following established procedure. Asked by a reporter on Wednesday about the possible deportation to Russia of members of the Bi-2 band, the country's Foreign Minister Parnpree Bahiddha-Nukara said that if they are found to have committed “illegal acts”, Thailand “must follow the rules”. process.”

The band released a statement from the concert organiser, VPI Event, acknowledging its failure to obtain the correct visas for the band's January 24 show on the Thai island of Phuket. But VPI claimed that the Thai authorities' decision to arrest the performers – rather than punish the concert organizers – was unusually harsh.

“We are doing everything we can to free the artists, but we are facing unprecedented pressure at every stage,” the company statement said while the musicians were still behind bars, adding that shows in Thailand by two other Russian anti war artists had been canceled recently. to soften. “The campaign to cancel concerts under pressure from the Russian consulate began in December.”

Some pro-Kremlin figures have begun to praise Russia's Foreign Ministry for becoming more aggressive in pressuring anti-war Russians abroad.

“The MFA has really started working in this regard,” Sergei Markov, a pro-Kremlin political analyst who regularly appears on Russian state television, said in a telephone interview. Russian diplomats, he added, have “actively informed” foreign governments in recent months about Russians who have “sided with the enemy.”

Alisher Morgenshtern, a rapper who had criticized the war and moved to Dubai, said last Friday that the United Arab Emirates had banned him from re-entering the country. Ruslan Bely, an anti-war comedian, had two shows canceled in Thailand in January.

Another anti-war Russian comedian, Maksim Galkin, announced a show in Bali, Indonesia, last week, days after Russian state media reported that his two planned shows in Thailand had been canceled.

But last weekend Mr Galkin told his 9 million Instagram followers that the Bali show had also been cancelled. Indonesian authorities, he wrote, had turned him away at the border, telling him they were doing so at the request of the Russian government.

“It's funny,” Mr. Galkin said wrotethat the Russian state devoted so much effort to 'the maniacal persecution of deviant artists abroad'.

The head of the Bali regional office of the Indonesian Ministry of Law and Human Rights, Romi Yudianto, said he was not familiar with Mr Galkin's case but that Indonesia “has its own sovereignty” and has the right to ban unwanted visitors to refuse.

But Mr. Markov, the pro-Kremlin analyst, described the pressure on anti-war artists, as well as the new law allowing the confiscation of the property of Russians who criticize the war, as part of the same government effort.

“This is a message to those who are against Putin,” but they do not know how loudly to voice their disapproval, Mr. Markov said. It's a reminder to them, he said, that if they speak out, even outside Russia, “don't think you're doing well.”

Reporting was contributed by Sui-Lee Wee, Hasya Nindita, Muktita Suhartono And Oleg Matsnev.