Long overdue, but today I resign from civil service. Enough is enough.

For twenty years of my diplomatic career I have seen different turns of our foreign policy, but never have I been so ashamed of my country as on February 24 of this year. The aggressive war unleashed by Putin against Ukraine, and in fact against the entire Western world, is not only a crime against the Ukrainian people, but also, perhaps, the most serious crime against the people of Russia, with a bold letter Z crossing out all hopes and prospects for a prosperous free society in our country.

Those who conceived this war want only one thing - to remain in power forever, live in pompous tasteless palaces, sail on yachts comparable in tonnage and cost to the entire Russian Navy, enjoying unlimited power and complete impunity. To achieve that they are willing to sacrifice as many lives as it takes. Thousands of Russians and Ukrainians have already died just for this.

I regret to admit that over all these twenty years the level of lies and unprofessionalism in the work of the Foreign Ministry has been increasing all the time. However, in most recent years, this has become simply catastrophic. Instead of unbiased information, impartial analysis and sober forecasting, there are propaganda clichés in the spirit of Soviet newspapers of the 1930s. A system has been built that deceives itself.

Minister Lavrov is a good illustration of the degradation of this system. In 18 years, he went from a professional and educated intellectual, whom many my colleagues held in such high esteem, to a person who constantly broadcasts conflicting statements and threatens the world (that is, Russia too) with nuclear weapons!
Today, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is not about diplomacy. It is all about warmongering, lies and hatred. It serves interests of few, the very few people thus contributing to further isolation and degradation of my country. Russia no longer has allies, and there is no one to blame but its reckless and ill-conceived policy.

I studied to be a diplomat and have been a diplomat for twenty years. The Ministry has become my home and family. But I simply cannot any longer share in this bloody, witless and absolutely needless ignominy.


Job offers are welcome...

Russian far-right groups and neo-Nazis have joined forces fighting in Ukraine, rendering President Putin’s claim that he is denazifying the country “absurd”, German foreign intelligence agents have said.

The Russian Imperial Legion, the paramilitary arm of the extremist Russian Imperial Movement, had already taken part in the fighting, the BND said in a seven-page document sent to German ministries this month and seen by Der Spiegel.
...
One of the two Rusich founders had been considered a sadist “since he killed a puppy in a social media post”, the report to ministers said.

To prove the right-wing extremist background of the organisation, the BND analysts added pictures of the Rusich founders it named only as Alexei M and Jan P. The report showed M with a swastika flag and P making the Hitler salute in front of a campfire.

The BND added that a right-wing extremist, named only as Alexander M, from Donetsk had tried to recruit volunteers for the war via Telegram, saying that a decision had been taken to form a battalion to support Russian and pro-Russian forces.

The BND said that M himself had fought on the Russian side in Donbas in the past. He is known to a wider audience in Russia as a military correspondent for the Russian state television channel Pervyy Kanal.