Premium from the FT – Gillian Tett shares her déjà vu: The revolution will now be TikToked

Premium from the FT – Gillian Tett shares her déjà vu: The revolution will now be TikToked

What on earth is happening in Russia? It isn’t merely ordinary observers who were confused by last week’s “coup that wasn’t”, undertaken by the Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin.
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By Gillian Tett of The Financial Times

What on earth is happening in Russia? It isn't merely ordinary observers who were confused by last week's "coup that wasn't", undertaken by the Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin. I've spent the week talking to western diplomats and foreign policy officials, and almost no one has been able to explain with confidence exactly what occurred, much less dared to predict what might happen next.

My perspective involves a strong element of déjà vu. In 1991, I was in Vilnius, Lithuania, when an abortive Soviet coup hastened the dissolution of the USSR. The following year, I was in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, when protests in the former Soviet republic led to the president being overthrown. Then in 1993, I was in Moscow as parliamentarians attempted unsuccessfully to oust Russian president Boris Yeltsin. Each event was intense. I will never forget being swept into the presidential palace amid bullets as a Tajik crowd seized control, or finding a still-warm teapot on the desk of an official who had presumably just fled.

___STEADY_PAYWALL___

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