They opposed the war for months. They protested: sometimes publicly, often privately. By the thousands they were imprisoned. And now they are massively fleeing their country. Since the call for mobilization launched by President Putin on September 21, some 700,000 Russians of fighting age have left the land of the tsars. The duty spoke with some of them. First portrait of a series of four.
“Everything happened very, very quickly,” says Pavel Zakharov. When President Putin took the floor on September 21 to decree the mobilization of 300,000 reservists, the 30-year-old Russian was at his office in Krasnodar, in the south-west of the country. “I left my job immediately,” he says through his computer screen. I called my girlfriend to prepare my luggage. And the same evening, I was on a bus. »
A journey into the unknown which took him through the Caucasian republics of Kabardino-Balkaria and North Ossetia-Alania, to make him reach, nearly a thousand kilometers further, Tbilisi, the capital of the Georgia, from where he spoke this week with The duty. A stopover in his exile which will lead him, he hopes, to the United States in the coming days.
“I can’t believe all this is really happening,” he says, detailing his journey, made by bus, car and on foot, fear in his stomach and adrenaline in the carpet. “You always have to keep moving forward. You don’t know what to do or what’s going to happen. The situation may change at any time. And no one knows what is going on,” he adds to explain the disarray he experienced.
To run away
The decision to flee Russia was taken in a hurry, but it had been matured for a long time, says Pavel, who underwent military training at the university, which makes him eligible for the mobilization decreed by Putin. “It was clear to me that I would not fight in this war which is against my values, he underlines. I have opposed this war from the start. »
On the day of his departure, Pavel had managed to buy a bus ticket to Yerevan, Armenia. But the pitfalls, intrinsic to emergency situations, have multiplied along the way. In the checkpoints between each region, tension was mounting: passports were photographed, luggage searched. “When agents asked me questions, I said that I was going on vacation,” he explains.
Then, the traffic became increasingly dense, to the point where traffic jams stretching for several hours formed. ” The police [à la frontière de l’Ossétie] came to tell us that we would not cross, that all those who are old enough to be mobilized would not be authorized to continue, ”he reports. After defying the order and continuing on his way for a while, the bus driver decided to turn back.
Pavel and others then decided to continue on foot. Then, in turn, local residents agreed to put them in their car in exchange for amounts ranging from a few hundred to several thousand rubles. Cash the anti-war activist had on him. “I had taken all my money out of the bank on the first day of the war,” he explains. I was afraid of no longer having access to it afterwards. »
The last driver who picked up Pavel sped off in the opposite lane to bypass the traffic jam and drop him off directly at the border crossing at the Georgia border. The young man was then able to see the chaos that reigned there. ” It was crazy. There were so many people. People were crossing the border on bicycles or scooters with large suitcases, ”he says, adding that it is forbidden, at this place, to walk to reach Georgia.
Another good Samaritan then agreed to take Pavel in his car to cross the border post. The moment of truth — both long awaited and dreaded — then arrived. The customs officer asked him the usual questions. “I told him that I was going on vacation to Istanbul for two weeks and that I had a hotel reservation,” reports Pavel. Quite simply, the customs officer stamped his passport and let him pass. “I was so relieved! says the 30-something, laughing. If he had left Krasnodar later, Pavel says he is convinced that he would not have managed to cross the border. “And now I’m like a refugee,” he says, still incredulous.
Continue the road
After spending a night in a hotel upon his arrival in Tbilisi, Pavel has since been hosted by residents. But he still doesn’t feel welcome. “There’s a lot of graffiti that shows phrases like ‘Russians, leave our country’ or ‘Go home.’ There were also demonstrations against the Russians. Recall that Russia militarily invaded Georgia in 2008.
Soon, the young man will board a plane bound for Mexico. “I will then cross the American border on foot to Tijuana to request political asylum,” he explains. A path that many Russians could take, after the White House said last week that the United States was open to welcoming Russian dissidents as refugees.
As the final step in his plan, Pavel plans to get married over Zoom to his Russian girlfriend in the state of Utah, which allows for such a virtual ceremony. “That way she can come and join me,” he hopes.
The young man — who is sorry to see Russian culture being “cancelled” around the world (“look at the number of people who oppose this war”) — already aspires to return one day to the Russia he cherishes . “But not before the regime becomes a democracy,” he says. Right now it is extremely dangerous to be in Russia for anyone who does not support this war or opposes the government. »
With Vlada Nebo