War in Ukraine: Mali breaks diplomatic ties, death in prison of a pianist opposed to the conflict… an update on the situation

Pianist Opposed to Ukraine Conflict Dies in Prison

A Russian pianist who was imprisoned after criticizing the attack on Ukraine has died in custody, his relatives said, amid a crackdown on dissent in Russia.

Pavel Kushnir, 39, died in a remand center in Birobidzhan, a town in a remote region of the Far East bordering the China.

His mother, Irina Levina, 79, confirmed to the Russian website Mediazona on Monday that she had been notified of her son's death in prison following a hunger strike. “I was informed of this by an FSB investigator in Birobidzhan. It was on July 28.” From a hunger strike”, she said.

According to her, investigators said that the authorities had tried to help her son: “They say they gave him IVs, they tried to support him, but it clearly wasn't enough.” His death has not been officially announced. Contacted by AFP on Monday, the local prison administration did not wish to comment.

On Monday, the team of the late opposition figure Alexei Navalny, who himself died in prison in Russia in February 2024 after having endured increasingly harsh detention conditions, shared on X an appeal for donations to repatriate the pianist's body to his hometown of Tambov.

In May 2024, a Telegram channel covering news from the Birobidzhan region announced his arrest, claiming that he was accused of “calling for terrorism”, a crime punishable by a heavy sentence in Russia. His arrest had not been officially announced.

According to the media Vot Tak, the pianist had published four videos on a YouTube channel followed by a few dozen people since November 2022, in which he criticized the Kremlin and the invasion of Ukraine.

In one of these videos, consulted by AFP, he declared, standing facing the camera, “Down with the war in Ukraine”, “Down with Putin's fascist regime”, “Freedom for political prisoners”, and denounced the massacre in Buchha, near Kiev, blamed on the Russian army.

“Life is what will never exist under fascism. Freedom, creation, sincerity, truth, the beauty of a human face”, he said in this video published in early January.

A graduate of the Tchaikovsky Conservatory in Moscow, considered one of the best music schools in the country, he has been the soloist of the Birobidzhan Philharmonic since 2023.

In an interview in January 2023 with a local media outlet, he looked back on his career: “Art is very closely linked to the values ​​that I have chosen for myself and to which I wish to dedicate my life.”

Kiev regrets a “hasty” decision by Bamako

Ukraine on Monday regretted the “hasty” decision Mali to sever diplomatic relations with kyiv, accused of being involved in a heavy defeat of the Malian army and the Russian paramilitary group Wagner in late July against separatists and jihadists.

“The decision of the transitional government of the Republic of Mali to sever diplomatic relations with Ukraine is short-sighted and hasty”, the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs castigated in a statement.

After this defeat at the end of July, in which dozens of fighters from the Wagner group and Malian soldiers were killed according to the separatists and jihadists, a Ukrainian military intelligence official, Andriy Yusov, had implied that Kiev had provided information to the rebels so that they could carry out their attack.

The Malian authorities accused Mr. Yusov of having thus "admitted Ukraine's involvement in a cowardly, treacherous and barbaric attack", accusing Kiev of "supporting international terrorism".

Ukrainian diplomacy assured on Monday that Ukraine “unconditionally adheres to the norms of international law” and “firmly rejects the accusations of the transitional government of Mali”.

“It is regrettable that the transitional government of the Republic of Mali has decided to sever diplomatic relations with Ukraine without conducting a thorough examination of the facts and circumstances of the incident that occurred in northern Malii”, she said.

Ukraine “reserves the right to take all necessary political and diplomatic measures in response to the unfriendly actions” of the Malian authorities, she added.

In a statement on Monday evening, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), which Mali left in January, expressed “its strong disapproval and condemnation of any foreign interference in the region that could constitute a threat to peace and security in West Africa, as well as any attempt to drag the region into the current geopolitical confrontations“.

She said she was following “with concern the developments in the security situation in Mali” and “reiterate its constant availability for any initiative aimed at working for peace, security and stability in the sub-region”.

The junta in Mali has since 2022 broken the old alliance with France and its European partners, to turn militarily and politically towards Russia.