Meanwhile, as the government continues to harass and intimidate the “fifth column” and to pit the pro-Putin majority against this non-violent, politically impotent, semi-suffocated “enemy”, a real danger to the Russian state and society is rapidly rising. Analysts in Moscow are warning about the “privatisation of violence”. Russia is turning into a “confederation of mafias”, prominent Moscow analyst Dmitry Oreshkin said in an interview. “It’s not clear who’s killing in each particular case, whether it’s Kadyrov’s people, or [state security] people, or whether somebody else has come out with a private initiative,” he added. “The state as a system of institutions has disappeared. It has been privatised by certain groups who have executed violence at their own discretion.”
