# Closing Statement by Samutsevich

Екатерина Станиславовна Самуцевич

Closing Statement at the Pussy Riot Trial by Yekaterina Samutsevich 2012.08.08

Самуцевич Екатерина Станиславовна

Closing Statement by Samutsevich

Origin: http://samlib.ru/k/kuznecow_d_j/lastsamutseviche.shtml

Создан: 11/08/2012, изменен: 11/08/2012, 8k

Поэма: Политика

Series: @Исторические документы

Closing Statement at the Pussy Riot Trial by Yekaterina Samutsevich 2012.08.08

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During the closing statement, the defendant is expected to repent or express regret for her deeds, or to enumerate attenuating circumstances. In my case, as in the case of my colleagues in the group, this is completely unnecessary. Instead, I want to express my views about the causes of what has happened with us.

The fact that Christ the Savior Cathedral had become a significant symbol in the political strategy of our powers that be was already clear to many thinking people when Vladimir Putin's former [KGB] colleague Kirill Gundyaev took over as head of the Russian Orthodox Church. After this happened, Christ the Savior Cathedral began to be used openly as a flashy setting for the politics of the security services, which are the main source of power [in Russia].

Why did Putin feel the need to exploit the Orthodox religion and its aesthetics? After all, he could have employed his own, far more secular tools of power-for example, national corporations, or his menacing police system, or his own obedient judiciary system. It may be that the tough, failed policies of Putin's government, the incident with the submarine Kursk, the bombings of civilians in broad daylight, and other unpleasant moments in his political career forced him to ponder the fact that it was high time to resign; otherwise, the citizens of Russia would help him do this. Apparently, it was then that he felt the need for more convincing, transcendental guarantees of his long tenure at the helm. It was here that the need arose to make use of the aesthetics of the Orthodox religion, historically associated with the heyday of Imperial Russia, where power came not from earthly manifestations such as democratic elections and civil society, but from God Himself.

How did he succeed in doing this? After all, we still have a secular state, and shouldn't any intersection of the religious and political spheres be dealt with severely by our vigilant and critically minded society? Here, apparently, the authorities took advantage of a certain deficit of Orthodox aesthetics in Soviet times, when the Orthodox religion had the aura of a lost history, of something crushed and damaged by the Soviet totalitarian regime, and was thus an opposition culture. The authorities decided to appropriate this historical effect of loss and present their new political project to restore Russia's lost spiritual values, a project which has little to do with a genuine concern for preservation of Russian Orthodoxy's history and culture.

It was also fairly logical that the Russian Orthodox Church, which has long had a mystical connection with power, emerged as this project's principal executor in the media. Moreover, it was also agreed that the Russian Orthodox Church, unlike the Soviet era, when the church opposed, above all, the crudeness of the authorities towards history itself, should also confront all baleful manifestations of contemporary mass culture, with its concept of diversity and tolerance.

Implementing this thoroughly interesting political project has required considerable quantities of professional lighting and video equipment, air time on national TV channels for hours-long live broadcasts, and numerous background shoots for morally and ethically edifying news stories, where in fact the Patriarch's well-constructed speeches would be pronounced, helping the faithful make the right political choice during the election campaign, a difficult time for Putin. Moreover, all shooting has to take place continuously; the necessary images must sink into the memory and be constantly updated, to create the impression of something natural, constant and compulsory. ...

I now have mixed feelings about this trial. On the one hand, we now expect a guilty verdict. Compared to the judicial machine, we are nobodies, and we have lost. On the other hand, we have won. Now the whole world sees that the criminal case against us has been fabricated. The system cannot conceal the repressive nature of this trial. Once again, Russia looks different in the eyes of the world from the way Putin tries to present it at daily international meetings. All the steps toward a state governed by the rule of law that he promised have obviously not been made. And his statement that the court in our case will be objective and make a fair decision is another deception of the entire country and the international community. That is all. Thank you.

References

http://nplusonemag.com/pussy-riot-closing-statements 13 AUGUST 2012. MARIA ALYOKHINA, NADEZHDA TOLOKONNIKOVA, YEKATERINA SAMUTSEVICH Pussy Riot Closing Statements. 13 AUGUST 2012. - Translations edited by Liora Halperin, Katharine Holt, Vera Koshkina, Ainsley Morse, Rebecca Pyatkevich, Sasha Senderovich, and Bela Shayevich.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhOeSTjDTr8Yekaterina Samutsevich Closing Statement at the Pussy Riot Trial. Yekaterina Samutsevich. Aug 11, 2012 by PussyRiotEng http://eng-pussy-riot.livejournal.com Online broadcasting from a court hearing the case of #PussyRiot in Moscow. English version - https://twitter.com/Eng_Pussy_Riot motildanopacaran@gmail.com

http://eng-pussy-riot.livejournal.com Free Pussy Riot. English site about Pussy Riot.

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