Dissidents speak out from Lithuania after fleeing Putin’s Russia

This is an up to date model of a narrative first printed on March 17, 2024. The unique video might be considered here. 

71-year-old Vladimir Putin has now led Russia for twenty-four years.  If he serves out the presidential term he won this 12 months, he shall be in energy so long as Soviet dictator Josef Stalin. Putin’s challengers typically meet premature ends; one, after an explosion on a airplane and, Alexey Navalny, Putin’s main rival, who died in February in an Arctic jail camp. Putin has additionally killed almost all inside opposition to his unprovoked war in Ukraine. And but, many brave Russians proceed the battle outdoors the nation. As we first reported in March, we met a few of them in a metropolis that you just would possibly consider because the capital of free Russia. 

It’s 500 miles west of Moscow, the town of Vilnius, in Lithuania the place there isn’t a love misplaced for Russia. 

Lithuania is a democracy of about 3 million folks and a NATO ally. Vilnius, the capital, is clothed within the colours of Ukraine. The metropolis modified the Russian embassy’s deal with to “Heroes of Ukraine Street.” And Putin is reminded the worldwide court docket within the Hague is ready along with his arrest warrant. Since Putin’s 2022 invasion, Lithuania has welcomed greater than 2,500 Russian exiles.

Mantas Adomenas: It is our coverage to offer shelter to all freedom fighters.

Mantas Adomenas served as Lithuania’s deputy overseas minister from 2020 till final August. 

Scott Pelley: I have not seen so many Ukrainian flags since I used to be in Kyiv. Why do your folks really feel so strongly about this?

Mantas Adomenas: Our freedom, our independence, our kind of safety is being defended within the battlefields in Ukraine. Ukrainians are dying in order that we might be protected.

Scott Pelley: There are many extra Russian dissidents who wish to come to Lithuania. Can you settle for any extra?

Mantas Adomenas: Yes, I feel we are able to settle for. Of course—  we are going to accommodate as many as wanted and to offer them with risk to work for the liberty and democracy in Russia.

One of the Russian exiles, in Lithuania, working for freedom and democracy is a crusading mother. Two years in the past, Anastasia Shevchenko fled Putin’s regime. 

Anastasia Shevchenko: This is a terrorist regime. They are threatening different international locations with oil, gasoline, nuclear weapon, and grain. They are threatening us with our kids, with our mother and father, with our lives, and so forth.

More than something, it was her daughter, Alina, severely disabled at delivery, that made Shevchenko an activist in opposition to Putin. Back then, the household was in southern Russia and Alina was in a Russian authorities nursing house.

Scott Pelley: Alina couldn’t speak, couldn’t talk?

Anastasia Shevchenko: No. She was like a one-week youngster, like a child. She was 17, however even, , to feed her, it was an entire science, as a result of she wanted blended meals. You want to carry her in a particular place.

Shevchenko cared for Alina a lot of the time as a result of the Russian nursing facility was brief on employees and provides. 

Anastasia Shevchenko: I used to be struggling to get medicine for my daughter, begging within the pharmacy that she wanted it. It was crucial for her well being. They stated, “No, we just don’t have it, because the ministry forgot to order it this month and you need to wait.” I made a decision, I’m not going to maintain silence. I’m going to face out and to speak out.

She spoke out by way of a Russian democracy group referred to as Open Russia. It was tolerated 10 years in the past and Shevchenko organized protests in her hometown. But in 2019, the Kremlin cracked down. Shevchenko was arrested and her lawyer warned her she can be shocked by what the police had already completed.

Anastasia Shevchenko: He confirmed me the screenshots of me– in my mattress. And I noticed that that they had put in the video digicam into the air con unit above my mattress. and so they have been watching me for six months in my bed room.

A Russian court docket ordered Shevchenko into home arrest. She could not go to or look after Alina. It wasn’t lengthy earlier than her daughter developed pneumonia. By the time a choose granted Shevchenko a cross to the hospital, Alina was unconscious. 

Anastasia Shevchenko: I spent– possibly ten minutes, holding her hand, as a result of that is what I do when my kids are unwell. When you maintain their hand, they really feel higher. But this time, she was chilly. She did not really feel me. And she died in an hour. 

In 2021, Shevchenko was given a four-year suspended sentence. But when Putin invaded Ukraine, the following 12 months, she determined to flee Russia. From her southern metropolis, she took her two surviving kids on an 1,100 mile drive. A U.S.-based democracy group organized Lithuanian visas. 

Scott Pelley: What does this inform us about Russia at this time?

Anastasia Shevchenko: It’s sufficient to put in writing one thing on social media. Just one sentence, and you’ll be imprisoned for years. They are listening to your cellphone calls. They’re watching you in your bed room. They are controlling you. 

Breaking that management is why Sergei Davidis additionally left Russia for Lithuania in 2022. 

Scott Pelley: You can be in a Russian jail only for doing this interview.

Sergei Davidis: Oh, for positive, for positive

In Moscow, Davidis helped lead one in all Russia’s largest human rights teams referred to as Memorial. It gained the Nobel Peace Prize two years in the past however now it is banned. He advised us…

Sergei Davidis (translation): Almost day by day there are increasingly more arrests. We hear information about new political arrests. And aside from the authorized aspect of it, extra typically than earlier than, there’s violence and torture.

Davidis heads Memorial’s mission to assist political prisoners. He advised us he has confirmed 680 in jail at this time however he believes the precise quantity is multiples of that. Since 2022, Russians might be sentenced to fifteen years only for criticizing the war– on the road or within the media.

Sergei Davidis (translation): One of the implications of the struggle was an entire wipe out of unbiased mass media, a prohibition of any opinion that is not beneath management of the federal government.

Independent newsrooms in Russia have been pressured to shut. Government-controlled newscasts report solely the absurd lie that the struggle is self-defense in opposition to Nazis. This host says, “we are on the side of good against the forces of absolute evil, embodied by the Ukrainian Nazi battalions.”  

Tatyana Felgenhauer: People are scared. So they really feel lonely. They really feel terribly lonely.

Tatyana Felgenhauer and Aleksandr Plyuschev have been discuss radio hosts on a outstanding Moscow station. They have been allowed to speak their minds till the day Putin launched his struggle.

Aleksandr Plyuschev: It was my morning present. I stated, “It’s half past 6:00. Good morning. War began.”

“War began” and inside two weeks, their station was pressured to shut. 

Now, Plyuschev and Felgenhauer are in Vilnius, streaming, every day, into Russia on YouTube. Putin silenced Facebook, “X” and Instagram however YouTube could also be too well-liked for the Kremlin to dam, thus far. 

Tatyana Felgenhauer: This is the one probability to speak in regards to the struggle actually as a result of the propaganda tries to create this sense that you’re utterly alone in case you are in opposition to the struggle. 

Scott Pelley: Why does this imply a lot to you?

Tatyana Felgenhauer: Really, I might hate myself if I’m silent or pretending that the whole lot is OK.

If Russian radio and TV stations are allowed solely Kremlin speaking factors… 

…we noticed a Lithuanian station telling the reality, not on a channel, however on platform quantity 5—to a captive Russian viewers.

Because a part of Russia, Kaliningrad, on the left, is separate, like Alaska from the decrease 48, the Moscow-Kaliningrad prepare should journey by way of Lithuania.  

The vehicles are sealed for the transit however at a cease in Vilnius, Russian passengers have been confronted by posters of atrocities. Each learn, “Putin is killing civilians in Ukraine. Do you agree with this?” The gallery testified because the prepare waited half an hour. There’s no solution to understand how a lot fact climbed aboard. And nobody is allowed off the prepare, partially, as a result of Lithuania worries about Russian brokers. 

Scott Pelley: Putin is notorious for trying to assault his enemies in overseas international locations. And I ponder if the Russian dissidents are protected right here in Lithuania.

Mantas Adomenas: Of course, it’s a main concern for us. And we spend considerable– effort in– in ensuring that– dissidents are protected right here and– safer than they’d be, in reality, in– in lots of different international locations. 

Scott Pelley: Have there been makes an attempt?

Mantas Adomenas: Well, I’m afraid I can not launch that data in additional element. But– let’s put it this way– that– that Russia is continually probing and continually attempting.

And this previous March, Russia might have gotten by way of. Leonid Volkov was attacked with a hammer outdoors Vilnius. Volkov, on the proper, was a prime aide to Putin’s late rival Alexey Navalny. Volkov’s arm was damaged. The attacker fled.  

Vladimir Putin’s re-election this 12 months introduced him to his fifth time period, which can cowl the following six years. He enjoys assist from nationalists who wish to consider that at this time’s Russia is an distinctive nation. But Putin additionally has weaknesses. It’s estimated he is misplaced 300,000 troops killed and wounded and Russia has a inhabitants lower than half that of the United States and an economic system in regards to the measurement of Italy’s.

Anastasia Shevchenko: My hope is– a rustic the place a authorities takes care about residents.

Anastasia Shevchenko is free in Vilnius however she’s needed in Russia for breaking her probation. These days she’s streaming her personal YouTube present and sends drugs, meals and letters to political prisoners. She’s turn out to be one other voice to the remoted and the lonely and people, like her daughter, who won’t ever escape the brand new iron curtain. 

Anastasia Shevchenko: She was alone, nobody subsequent to her. I actually really feel very responsible about it. But I would not change something in my life, I feel.

Scott Pelley: Why not?

Anastasia Shevchenko: You know, the society in Russia relies on fakes. We have faux democracy, by structure it’s a democracy, faux information, faux elections And I wish to be the alternative. I wish to be open. I need Russia to be open. 

Three males have been arrested in neighboring Poland for the assault on Leonid Volkov. The Polish prime minister referred to as it an tried assassination and stated the person who organized it labored for the Russians.

Produced by Henry Schuster. Associate producer, Sarah Turcotte. Broadcast affiliate, Michelle Karim. Edited by Michael Mongulla.

Scott Pelley

Scott Pelley, one of the vital skilled and awarded journalists at this time, has been reporting tales for 60 Minutes since 2004. The 2023-24 season is his twentieth on the printed. Scott has gained half of all main awards earned by 60 Minutes throughout his tenure on the venerable CBS newsmagazine.