They accuse him of justifying terrorism

“The Court issued the precautionary measure against Kasparov of arrest in absentia for two months from the moment of his arrest in Russia or his extradition to Russian territory,” the judge ruled.

The former world champion was accused of “publicly justifying terrorism on telecommunications networks, including the Internet”, a crime that could cost Kasparov a prison sentence. between five and seven years in prisonreported the Russian agency TASS.

Kasparov, included on the Russian list of foreign agents in May 2022, has lived outside Russia for more than a decade.

Last October, the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) opened a criminal case for “organizing a terrorist community” and “attempted usurpation of power” against tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky and other prominent Russian opponents in exile, founders of the Russian Anti-War Committee (CAR), including Kasparov.

According to the FSB, Khodorkovsky and the other founders of the CAR “finance Ukrainian militarized formations declared terrorists in Russia and carry out recruitment work for these formations, and subsequently use them in plans to seize power in Russia by force.”

The CAR was founded on February 27, 2022, three days after Russia launched its military campaign in Ukraine, with the stated objective of combating the “aggressive dictatorship” of Russian President Vladimir Putin, in power for a quarter of a century.

In 2022, Kasparov was designated a “foreign agent”, a label used against opponents, generally journalists and activists, and subject to tedious administrative procedures in Russia.

In March 2024, Kasparov was included on the list of “terrorists and extremists,” according to a note from the Russian financial surveillance service, in another advance against the former world chess champion.

Kasparov, born in 1963 in Azebaijan (then part of the Soviet Union), is a harsh critic of Putin’s regime. He questions it on social networks and also speaks out in interviews and statements by the opposition.

In 2023 he even stated that “Putin is the murderer of (Alexei) Navalny”, the Russian opponent who died in prison.

Last November, meanwhile, he participated in the Berlin Freedom Conference and redoubled his criticism of Putin for the invasion and war in Ukraine.

“This is not a chess game” in which “you can shake hands” and the parties say “okay, good, it’s a diplomatic solution, we can go home,” he said in an interview with the EFE agency.

He also singled out Putin for his collaboration with Venezuela, China, Iran, North Korea and Cuba, to which Russia “returns favors” for its support.

“Putin sits on North Korea, Iran, the Iranian ayatollahs, the Maduro regime. They are all working together,” he said in the midst of escalating tension between the United States and Venezuela.

“It is not surprising that, just as there are North Korean and Cuban soldiers in Ukraine fighting on Putin’s side, China is financing Putin’s war and Iran is sending drones,” the Russian opponent deepened.