“No to Putin! No to war! Freedom for political prisoners!’

With this triple slogan, Russian citizens opposed to the regime of Vladimir Putin plan to demonstrate on Sunday, November 17, in Berlin. The march is scheduled to move towards the Russian embassy near the Brandenburg Gate. The initiative has been taken by prominent opposition politicians Ilya Yashin and Vladimir Karamurza, who were released in August following a prisoner swap between Russia and the West. They will be joined by Yulia Navalny, widow of the Kremlin’s best-known critic and opposition leader, Alexei Navalny, who died in Russian custody in February. After her husband’s death, Navalnaya follows in his footsteps, increasingly seeking the limelight.

In Russia itself, protesters against the war in Ukraine risk facing heavy prison sentences. Such demonstrations took place only after the Russian invasion in 2022 – since then the measures against such demonstrations have been draconian. Of course, this does not concern Russian citizens abroad, who are nevertheless accused of remaining almost invisible: Ukrainian activists in particular, demonstrating in Europe and Germany are wondering: Where are the Russian citizens who disagree with the war in Ukraine?

The controversy over the Russian flag

However, another issue was raised on social networks long before Sunday’s demonstration: Can the Russian tricolor flag be used in the Berlin march? An informational poster for the march shows images from a demonstration against the annexation of Crimea in Moscow in 2014, showing Russian and Ukrainian flags. However, some believe that the Russian flag has now, with the war in Ukraine, become discredited. “War criminals and their accomplices march under these flags,” argues Russian journalist Ksenia Larina, who left Russia before the invasion of Ukraine.

Political scientist Alexander Kinev disagrees – he believes these “additional terms” reduce participation, contributing to “divisions”. In each case part of the Russian opposition uses a different flag, white-blue-white, to separate its position from the Putin regime. Ilia Yassin, one of the organizers of the demonstration in Berlin, told DW that there are no regulations: “We left this issue out, it’s not important.” Putin, however, Yashin adds, “has no rights to the Russian tricolor flag.”

The Russian opposition abroad is divided into two camps

The flag issue is just one example of the conflicts that characterize Russia’s exiled opposition. A section of it supports Yulia Navalnaya and the Foundation Against Corruption (FBK), the best-known legacy of Alexei Navalny. Others support Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a former oil tycoon and well-known Kremlin critic who spent 10 years in a forced labor camp. The two groups compete for leadership and organize separate events.

Will the mobilization in Berlin manage to stay united? Yasin hopes so. “The situation in the opposition is not easy” he observes, pointing out that there are problems. “There are many conflicts and the competition is not always fair,” admits the opposition politician.

Edited by: Chrysa Vachtsevanu