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Mikhail Khodorkovsky Profile picture
@khodorkovsky_en
Sep 12 • 10 tweets • 3 min read • Read on X
There are thousands of Russians in U.S. immigration detention

Several hundred anti-war activists among them face grave danger if deported to Russia.

🧵 We're ready to help identify those most at risk
Among the approximately 100,000 Russians seeking asylum or humanitarian visas in the U.S., around 5,000 are being held in immigration detention facilities. Within this group, several hundred individuals face genuine political persecution in Russia due to their anti-war and pro-democracy stances.
There are hundreds of dissidents who, if deported back to Russia, will face immediate imprisonment and even torture. There are already examples of individuals being deported and imprisoned for acts such as protesting against Putin and the war, or for being deserters.
Leonid Melekhin, for example, protested the war and fled to the U.S. across the Mexican border in August 2024. He was detained for months and deported back to Russia in July this year.

newyorker.com/news/the-lede/…
Upon his arrival, he was immediately arrested and charged with "public justification of terrorism," which could result in a five-year prison sentence. He awaits his trial in detention.
Artem Vovchenko, 27, deserted the Russian military in the fall of 2022 because he didn't want to fight against Ukrainians. He fled a military base in Armenia where he was stationed and was subsequently wanted in Russia.
After fleeing, Vovchenko sought political asylum in the United States, but he was deported to Russia in August 2025 and was immediately detained, questioned, and remains in custody. reason.com/volokh/2025/09…
We still don't know the fates of dozens of others.
If the U.S. authorities are willing, Russian activists at stand ready to assist in identifying those most at risk.

Contact form can be found here: antiwarcommittee.info/en/committee/#…

The decision to offer protection to these individuals or allow them to seek refuge elsewhere is a test of the U.S.'s commitment to being a leader in the democratic world and an ally to those fighting against oppression.
· Despite all the noise and the challenges of politics, it is my hope that the U.S. leadership will navigate this terrain with moral clarity. At the end of the day, it’s lives of humans that are at stake.

You can learn more about this story here: thetimes.com/us/news-today/…

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More from @khodorkovsky_en

Mikhail Khodorkovsky Profile picture
Sep 7
The diplomatic chaos around Ukraine is what happens when all sides realize their positions have become unsustainable.

Every major actor has hit their limit.

🧵Here’s why I believe a path to Peace in Ukraine is real: Image
Image
Let me be blunt about Trump's position as I see it: He doesn't care about Ukrainian sovereignty or Russian security concerns.

He cares about one thing only – reporting back to his voters and getting his Nobel Prize.
His entire strategy revolves around forcing both sides into a room and making them cut a deal, any deal. He wants to pivot to China, and Ukraine and Russia are just obstacles along the way—a fact China understands well and, on the contrary, wants this situation to drag on.

So does Europe, but for a different reason: As long as Russia is bogged down in Ukraine, Europe is in relative safety.
Read 14 tweets
Mikhail Khodorkovsky Profile picture
Sep 5
7 years after Putin unveiled 5 'invincible' superweapons, only 1 has seen combat.

Now he's betting the Burevestnik missile—which killed 5 people in testing—will end the war on favorable terms.

🧵 The Update on all of Putin’s 2018 WeaponsImage
At the end of August, in a highly symbolic act, Putin visited Sarov, the birthplace of the Soviet nuclear program. Alongside him was his Chief of the General Staff, Gerasimov. Image
The official purpose of the visit was to review the status of the nuclear-powered and nuclear-armed Burevestnik cruise missile. It coincided with a logistical build-up at the Pankovo nuclear test site in the Arctic. reuters.com/world/europe/p…
Read 16 tweets
Mikhail Khodorkovsky Profile picture
Sep 3
When Russian model Guzel Ganieva threatened Epstein's network in 2015, he turned to an unusual source: Sergei Belyakov, the FSB-trained official running Putin's St. Petersburg Economic Forum.

🧵Here's how Epstein worked with Putin's regime: Image
Belyakov wasn't some rank and file official. He graduated from the FSB Academy in 1998 and embedded himself in Russia's economic elite.
By 35, he was Deputy Minister. His real job, however, didn't change - he was FSB, placed to run influence operations from inside the government.
Read 12 tweets
Mikhail Khodorkovsky Profile picture
Sep 3
Putin's "Christianity" at full display: a 63-year-old pastor sentenced for preaching peace.

Nikolai Romanyuk called war a sin and urged believers to refuse the draft.

🧵For this, a Russian court sentenced him to 4 years under laws against "threats to state security." Image
The court convicted Romanyuk under Article 280.4 of Russia’s Criminal Code for public calls against state security. The conviction rested on a sermon he delivered in September 2022 and was published on the church's YouTube channel.
Romanyuk is a senior pastor of the Evangelical Church of the Holy Trinity.

Officers, carrying automatic rifles, detained him during a raid on October 18, 2024, at his home.
Read 14 tweets
Mikhail Khodorkovsky Profile picture
Sep 1
The United States is now Putin's deportation partner.

Russian political refugees who sought safety in the U.S. are being returned on charter flights. Upon return, they face hours-long interrogations by security services.

🧵Here's what is known about the latest flight: Image
On August 27, at least 30 Russian citizens were deported from the United States back to Russia. According to Dmitry Valuyev, president of Russian America for Democracy in Russia, most were asylum seekers who had fled political persecution. theins.ru/en/news/284453
The actual number may be higher—Anna Shumova from Russian Seattle for Freedom reports 60-65 people on that charter flight alone.

echofm.online/stories/deport…
Read 15 tweets
Mikhail Khodorkovsky Profile picture
Aug 29
I spent 10 years in Putin's prisons for the crime of political participation. Now he's counseling Trump about "rigged" elections.

🧵It's not my business to tell Americans how to conduct elections, but taking Putin's advice here is like taking fire safety tips from an arsonist Image
When Putin came to power, Russia had real elections. They were imperfect, but they were real. Independent TV covered opposition candidates and challenged the official narrative. Political donations didn’t get anyone in trouble. Governors answered to voters of their respective regions, not Moscow.

That was the democracy I believed in and invested in. Then the full-scale destruction began: Putin seized NTV, then TV-6, then Izvestia. I watched it happen and thought markets would resist. They didn't. wapo.st/3JxlBzv

Without truly independent media, the opposition became invisible. You can't win elections when voters can’t hear your message. Putin understood this perfectly.
Then came my turn. At the time, I was a successful businessman and gave money to different opposition parties and did so openly. I didn’t agree with some of the candidates and parties I gave money to, but did it nonetheless because I saw it was a way of ensuring political competition. I called for it openly and pointed to instances of state corruption. One of the corrupt officials turned out to be Putin himself.

Putin's response to this was swift: he arrested me, claiming I stole more oil from my company than it could’ve ever produced. Then there was a show trial followed by ten years in prisons in Siberia. My company, YUKOS, was destroyed, its assets were stolen. Every other businessman got the message: touch politics and you're next. cnn.com/2003/WORLD/eur…

Under arrest, I witnessed Putin use the Beslan school terrorist siege to cancel gubernatorial elections entirely. Hundreds of children were killed, and he used their deaths as an excuse to start appointing every regional leader himself (‘otherwise terrorists may get the power’). Federalism cannot survive without regional democracy. This is when Russia de facto stopped being a federation. rferl.org/a/1056377.html
Read 11 tweets

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