His voice is steady, despite fear and anger. It’s a rare word: a Russian diplomat publicly denounces the war in Ukraine. In a letter made public at the end of May, published on the professional social network LinkedIn, Boris Bondarev expresses his shame at the war waged by Vladimir Putin since February 24, which is, he says, a war against the Ukrainian people but also against the Russian people. So many reasons which pushed him to leave with a bang the Russian Permanent Representation to the United Nations Office at Geneva (Switzerland).
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After putting his family in safety with him in Switzerland, he agreed to confide in franceinfo, denouncing the drift of Russian diplomacy since the arrival of Vladimir Putin in power. “It’s no longer about diplomacy“, he summarizes in his letter made public, but “warmongering, lies and hatred (…) JI just can’t take part in this bloody, stupid and utterly unnecessary ignominy anymore.“
War in Ukraine: the rare testimony of Boris Bondarev at the microphone of Marie-Pierre Vérot and Denis Kataev
to listen
“In the early 2000s, we had fairly good relations with Western countries, explains Boris Bondarev to franceinfo. We had made cooperation with the United States and Europe a priority. But in 2007, he has that famous Munich speech in which Putin thunders against the whole world and says that he has been deceived, that the West has not lived up to our expectations. He then decided to pursue a policy of containment of the West, and diplomacy had to espouse this line, it is an unfriendly or even hostile policy.”
BREAKING: Russia’s Counselor to the United Nations in Geneva has resigned.
Boris Bondarev: “Never have I been so ashamed of my country.”
UN Watch is now calling on all other Russian diplomats at the United Nations—and worldwide—to follow his moral example and resign.
— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) May 23, 2022
And Boris Bondarev to warn, Vladimir Putin is not in a process of negotiation as one imagines in the West, but he has an obsession: “Russia is always right and we must pursue our interests without making concessions, because only the weak yield. And that a great power must fully respect its vital interests.“
Boris Bondarev is the only diplomat to have, for the moment, publicly expressed such violent disagreement with Moscow. He says he’s not the only one to think this:I have colleagues who share similar feelings, friends who have the same point of view. We talk about that, of course, but our opinion is not shared by many people, it is not the dominant point of view.
Propaganda and fear have done their work. Boris Bondarev knows what he is risking. He now lives like his family under protection in Switzerland where he has requested political asylum. A specialist in disarmament and non-proliferation issues, he is looking for a new job and has a definite asset: his intimate knowledge of the workings of Putin’s diplomacy.