-Caveat Lector- <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/"> </A> -Cui Bono?- KGB stirs in the shadow of Putin Mark Franchetti Moscow A FORMER KGB officer renowned for the zeal with which he persecuted dissidents and intellectuals in Soviet times is being tipped to take over the FSB, the domestic branch of the Russian security service. The expected appointment of Viktor Cherkesov, 49, at present the FSB's deputy director, has added to concern that President Vladimir Putin will steer Russia towards a new era of authoritarian rule following his election last Sunday. Cherkesov would replace Nikolai Patrushev, the director, who is likely to become the interior minister or to head the powerful security council. The rise of Cherkesov, a shadowy figure who rarely appears in public, has appalled liberals, who accuse him of playing a leading role during the 1980s in the arrest and imprisonment of 20 dissidents in Leningrad, as St Petersburg was then known. Described by critics as being a hawkish reactionary, Cherkesov headed the investigative department of the KGB's hated fifth directorate, which was responsible for surveillance of the media, church, schools and trade unions. It specialised in persecuting dissidents. © The KGB was reformed in 1991 and the statue of its founder, Felix Dzerzhinsky, was toppled Photograph: Alexander Zemlianichenko Such was Cherkesov's success that in 1992 he was promoted to director of the agency's St Petersburg branch. Then, 18 months ago, he was called to Moscow by Putin, who had just been appointed head of the FSB. The Russian leader, who served in the KGB for 16 years, has known Cherkesov since the early 1980s. Cherkesov was also a member of his presidential election campaign team. "God forbid that a man like Cherkesov should have even more power than he already has," said Vyacheslav Dolinin, a former dissident arrested and questioned by Cherkesov dozens of times in St Petersburg. Dolinin spent nine months in prison and four years in labour camps in the far east of the Soviet Union for writing and smuggling to the West articles predicting the collapse of the Soviet economy. He was pardoned in 1987. "I'll never forget Cherkesov's office - that's where his true nature came out," said Dolinin. "It was number 13 and had been converted from an old public lavatory. Cherkesov sat behind a large desk under a portrait of Lenin. I was always made to sit on a chair in front of a small table. Both were nailed to the floor. A heavy metal grate was fixed to the window. "He questioned me for days, trying to make me squeal on friends and other dissidents. He never showed any sympathy. He was no monster, but this was an ambitious, small-minded man. His threats were always subtle." Cherkesov is also remembered in St Petersburg as the last KGB officer to open a case under a notorious clause in the Soviet criminal code - known as article 70 - which dealt with political crimes. The target was Yuli Rybakov, a former artist who is now a liberal member of parliament. Initiated in 1988, when Gorbachev's reforms were already well advanced, the case was closed by Moscow a few months later. "Cherkesov is the man who appeared on television, presenting my fax machine as clear evidence of my alleged spying and propaganda activities," Rybakov said. "That tells you quite a bit about his mentality." In one of his last actions before leaving for Moscow, Cherkesov also helped to open the case against Alexander Nikitin, a naval captain turned environmentalist who was arrested in 1996 and charged with treason after accusing the Russian navy of dumping nuclear waste. Far from regretting his fervour in tormenting intellectuals, Cherkesov, an early advocate of schemes to monitor private e-mails and other internet traffic, has repeatedly defended his methods, arguing that he never broke Soviet laws. Apprehension about how Cherkesov would lead the FSB coincides with uncertainty over Putin's plans for Russia. Although the president has promised to enforce a "dictatorship of the law", little is known of his policies. A blueprint for a five-year economic programme is not expected until May. Putin has repeatedly refused to say when he will form a government. Mikhail Kasyanov, a technocratic deputy prime minister respected in the West for his negotiations with the International Monetary Fund, is widely tipped as prime minister. For Yelena Bonner, widow of the late Andrei Sakharov, one of the Soviet Union's most celebrated dissidents, Putin's apparent intention to promote Cherkesov is indicative enough of the likely direction of events. "If in 1991 someone had said that the KGB would return to power nine years later, I would have thought him mad," she said. "How can this be happening?" oRussian soldiers found the bodies of more than 30 members of an elite commando unit ambushed by Chechen rebels in the mountains south of Grozny, the capital of the breakaway republic. It was the second such deadly ambush in a month. <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance—not soap-boxing! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, misdirections and outright frauds—is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRL gives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. 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