The Final Statement
‘I am prepared for whatever decision the court may make. To me, it is not a punishment. It is an opportunity to grow, because punishing me for someone else’s actions is simply absurd.’
…to express my opinion regarding the prosecution’s evidence.
I would also like to thank the officers of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the FSB, who, in their zeal to uphold the law – even though they repeatedly violated it in my case – freed me from false friends. They had appeared to care about me, but when confronted with the prosecution’s nationalist fabrications, they accepted them at face value and erased me from their lives. Moreover, my wife has most likely become my former wife. It saddens me that my younger daughter is growing up without my love.
During my imprisonment, I was finally able to rest from the relentless race of everyday life, where even twenty-four hours in a day never seemed enough. By the time I was arrested, the constant pressure and its consequences had exhausted me so completely that I sometimes lacked the strength even to breathe. I felt like a creature entirely covered with stalactites formed from accumulated problems, illnesses, insecurities, and emotional wounds stretching back to childhood. The violent arrest, the torture, and the psychological destruction were like crashing headfirst into a wall at full speed, shattering all those growths into pieces. It awakened in me the understanding that one should live not despite life, but to create something new. Meeting extraordinary people and finally having the opportunity to read books, I found answers to many of the questions I had been asking since childhood.
Imprisonment gave me the opportunity to reflect. The purifying silence of solitary confinement, in particular, helped me understand who I am and why I am on this earth. I adopted a raw-food diet. By overcoming the predatory instinct associated with eating meat, eliminating cooked food, dairy products, and all animal-derived foods, both my body and my mind were transformed. Such a transformation is almost worth going through an ordeal like mine. I doubt I could have reached this level of awareness while free – it might have taken decades. Yet imprisonment gave me that unexpected gift. Our attachments to food, possessions, rituals, and beliefs weigh us down, leading us in circles and preventing the mind from becoming free. Awareness is a luxury that not everyone is capable of attaining. I am sincerely grateful to have gained such a treasure, one in which sadness, longing, insecurities, and overpowering desires no longer dominate me.
In place of emotion came tranquility and the realization that we live in a perfect world. Every person does everything they can to make this world a better place. Everyone strives to the best of their ability, and the result is the best version of reality we are presently capable of creating. At this moment, it simply cannot be any better because we are not yet capable of making it so. We should be grateful for what we have and thankful to everyone for it. For it is through every event – even those that seem horrific – that we arrive at this very point and gain precisely the experience we need.
I will refrain from declaring myself either guilty or innocent. Instead, I call upon the court and the prosecution to evaluate the evidence without prejudice. And an impartial evaluation of the evidence means a thorough assessment guided by fairness and the rule of law.
The trend of our time points to the impunity of certain people in positions of power who are able to decide the fate of others. Driven by fanatical ideology compounded by cognitive dissonance, they are capable of fabricating evidence. In the past, there was the European Court of Human Rights; in the future, perhaps there will be a BRICS court or something similar. Professional incompetence will eventually be judged accordingly. If an employee at any company allowed such chaos in official documentation as exists in my case file, they would be dismissed without hesitation. Yet here, at such a high level, we are confronted with such disgraceful nonsense. Frankly, it embarrasses even me. And the supervisory authorities allow it to happen. If only that were the end of it. But because of such misconduct, people suffer and the law itself is disregarded.
I am prepared for whatever decision the court may make. To me, it is not a punishment. It is an opportunity to grow, because punishing me for someone else’s actions is simply absurd. And I am ready for that absurdity. In any case, I will live to see my release – or rather, the release of my body. My mind has not been, and never will be, imprisoned. I live with gratitude for everything. I wish the same for everyone else.