which is straight after this programme. welcome to hardtalk. i'm stephen sackur. in this new year, vladimir putin has plenty to worry about. donald trump is about to bring a new level of unpredictability into us foreign policy. that could be good for russia, but maybe not. putin's forces are slowly advancing in ukraine, but at a staggering cost. the economic strain of war and sanctions is beginning to bite. my guest is vladimir kara—murza, the anti—putin activist, poisoned, thenjailed before being freed in a prisoner swap last year. putin can seemingly rely on the quiescence of the russian people. but for how long?

vladimir kara—murza, in washington dc, welcome to hardtalk. hello, stephen. it's very good to be on your programme. it is great to see you there in washington. you, of course, have had pretty much six months now to get used to being a free man. are you used to it? well, frankly, it's still feels

a little bit surreal because, you know, up untiljust a few months ago i was pretty certain that i was going to die in that siberian prison. and the prisoner exchange that happened on the 1st of august was a miracle — this is the only way i can express it. but it was in so many ways a human—made miracle because it was made possible by the relentless advocacy, by the relentless efforts of so many people of goodwill in the democratic world who never stopped speaking up for the political prisoners who are languishing injails in putin's russia. and, while the 16 of us have been saved from that hell, from the hell of putin's modern day gulag, let's not forget that so many hundreds and hundreds and hundreds remain. according to self—admittedly incomplete counts by human rights organisations, today's russia holds more than 1,300 political prisoners.

mm. this is more than the whole of the soviet union — so that's 15 countries put together — had in the mid—1980s. and of course the fastest growing category on russia's political prisoner list are those russian citizens who have publicly spoken out against putin's war of aggression in ukraine. i can only imagine, not having been through it, but i can only imagine both the physical and the mental hardships that you have been through. which is proving sort of harder to deal with and to repair within yourself, the physical side or the mental side? 0h, of course, the psychological is much, much more difficult. i was never tortured physically while i was in prison because, you know, with high profile political prisoners they don't do that. they find other ways to... but, just to interject, you had been poisoned twice before, which you believe was the direct work of the russian state, and that had damaged your body to a point where you were particularly vulnerable as you were held in solitary confinement in siberia. oh, this is all absolutely true, and of course,

thanks to the brilliant media investigations led by bellingcat, we know the names of the fsb officers who are part of this death squad within putin's regime. these are the people who organised the poisoning of alexei navalny back in 2020. these are the people who followed and surveilled boris nemtsov, the russian opposition leader, in the weeks leading up to his assassination in 2015. these are the people who poisoned me on two occasions, in 2015 and 2016 - ah, 2017. excuse me. so, yes, of course there were there were some physical aspects to it but the psychological was much, much more difficult. and this is what the regime and the kremlin has been doing since the soviet times. one thing they do, for example, is that the regime always makes a point of fighting and punishing notjust its own political opponents, but also the families. this is a very soviet, very old tradition going back almost a century. you know, for example, i was not allowed to telephone my wife. i was not allowed to telephone my kids. and this is the case with so many other political prisoners as well.

and of course, according to united nations rules, solitary confinement for more than 15 days is officially considered to be a form of torture. i spent 11 straight months out of the two and a bit years that i was in prison in solitary confinement, at a maximum security prison in siberia. and i have to say, in my previous pre—prison life, i did a lot of advocacy on behalf of prisoners of conscience, and i of course knew about this un rule about 15 days or more in solitary confinement being equated to torture. but i have to be honest — i never understood it. and it's not really easy to understand it until you've experienced it, because, well, after a while, your mind really starts playing tricks on you when you sit in solitary confinement. so, essentially, you're all the time sitting in a small cubical—sized cell, you know, two metres by three, just four walls and a small window with metal bars on the top. your bunk gets attached to the wall at five o'clock in the morning with the wake—up call, and then you cannot take it down again until the lights out at 9pm. and the whole day, essentially, you just, you know, you just walk around in a small circle inside the cell, or you can try to sit in this really uncomfortable stool sticking out of the wall, but you can't sit on it for long. there is nothing to do.

there is nowhere to go. there is no—one to speak to. i was only allowed to write for an hour and a half every day, 90 minutes. they give you a pen and paper and then they take it away again. and after a while, in conditions like this, your mind really starts playing tricks on you. mm. i mean, you start forgetting names, you start forgetting words, you start shouting at walls, and you have to really make an effort to maintain your sanity. and let's not forget that this also has been an old soviet tradition in russia. if we go back to the soviet dissidents in the 1960s and �*70s and �*80s, people like vladimir bukovsky and natan sharansky and yuri 0rlov and others, they were also held in isolation, in solitary confinement. and this is happening today. this is how alexei navalny... right. and now, of course... ..was kept in prison. ..you are free. but i just wonder whether there is a little part of you that feels a sense of deep disappointment. despite the joy of being reunited with family and being in the united states,

you had always made it plain that you felt your future had to be in russia. you, a little bit like alexei navalny, always said that to be a credible opponent, a viable opponent, of vladimir putin and what he is doing to your country, russia, you had to be inside that country. and of course you're no longer able to be inside russia. does that bring its own sense of deep disappointment? well, it has always been a question of principle for me. you're absolutely right that, you know, a russian politician has to be in russia. i've always felt that i would not have any moral right to call on my fellow russian citizens to stand up and oppose putin's dictatorship if i wasn't prepared to do this myself. i think being a politician, being a public figure, presupposes a level of responsibility that transcends, you know, any considerations of personal safety or personal comfort.

this was why i did not leave russia after the two poisonings in 2015 and 2017. this is why i did not leave russia after the launch of putin's full—scale aggression on ukraine in 2022. you know, when we were expelled in that prisoner exchange back in august of last year, i couldn't help but remember the words of vladimir bukovsky, whom i already mentioned, a legendary soviet era dissident and writer who spent many, many years in the soviet gulag and then was thrown out of the country in the first prisoner exchange of this kind back in 1976. and he wrote in his memoirs, recalling that exchange, that, "we have a really funny country where they can neither "arrest you according to the law nor release you "according to the law." and this is exactly what happened with us. i mean, needless to say, we were all arrested, in contravention of the law, because, you know, my �*crimes�* consisted in public speeches against putin's regime, against putin's war of aggression in aggression in ukraine, against the political repression in russia and so on. i had five public speeches in my indictment and my sentence, and this is why i received my 25—year prison sentence.

when i was being escorted down the steps of moscow city court on the day of my sentencing in 2023, the commanding officer of the police convoy turned to me and said, "did you reallyjust get 25 years in prison for "five public speeches? " mm. isaid, "yeah, i suppose i did." and he said, "well, i hope they were good." but, you know, this is the same situation as bukovsky faced back in �*76, because the way we were expelled on the 1st of august, nobody asked our consent at any moment in time. i refused to sign a petition for pardon addressed to putin, yet i was still pardoned, as were the others. the russian constitution in article 61 very clearly, very explicitly prohibits the forced deportation of russian citizens from russia. i mean, it sort of makes sense. you cannot expel a citizen of the country out of the country without his or her consent. but this is exactly what happened with us. look, this is the old soviet style tradition that continues today. sure. but i have absolutely no doubt... 0n the nature — if i may, vladimir — on the nature of your deportation, your forcible exit from the country, it was part of a deal. and it's a morally complex deal because, in return for the release of 16 individuals from russian detention, russia, the kremlin, got something very important in return — that is eight

russians were returned to russia, and they were all employees of the state. one of them, at least, was a convicted murderer who had been convicted of a brutal murder in germany of a chechen former militant. you always defended the deal. you said, "we shouldn't see it as a prisoner swap. "we should see it fundamentally as saving lives." and you have also, since then, said that you believe more swaps should take place. isn't. .. absolutely. isn't that simply encouraging vladimir putin to take more �*political hostages�*? well, first of all, let's be absolutely clear about this. vladimir putin, just as other authoritarian dictators, are going to arrest their opponents, regardless of any swaps or the absence of any swaps. they do this because this

is the nature of authoritarian regimes where free speech, where opposition to the government, is equated to treason, equated to criminal offences. so that has nothing to do with it. as far as such exchanges and swaps presenting a moral dilemma, this is absolutely right. and this exchange on the 1st of august last year was of course unequal because on the one side of the exchange, as you've pointed out, there were innocent people whose only �*crime�* consisted in speaking up their mind and opposing the brutal dictatorship led by vladimir putin. and on the other side were actual criminals — spies, hackers, and this convicted assassin who was serving time in germany. so i do understand the moral dilemma, and i do understand that this was a very difficult decision, in particularfor the government of germany that had to release the assassin. but to me, democracies are about difficult decisions. you know, in dictatorships everything is easy, everything is decided, you know, on the whim of one individual. democracies come with difficult decisions. but to me, the biggest difference between a dictatorship and a democracy is that there is nothing more important, there's nothing more valuable in a democracy than human life.

and with this exchange in august of 2024, 16 human lives were saved from the hell of vladimir putin's gulag. and so i believe absolutely that, yes, we should have more such swaps. we should have more such exchanges. there is an old tradition going back to the 1970s with east—west prisoner exchanges that liberated soviet and then russian political prisoners. and i do believe that the free world, that the democratic world, has not only illegal, but a moral responsibility before those people, those people in russia, those people and other authoritarian regimes, who have the courage, who have the tenacity, to stand up and say that, "no," that this is wrong. and, you know, when i say that these are life—saving operations, this is not just a metaphor. this is notjust a figure of speech. among the many, many, many political prisoners in russia, there are people for whom this is literally a life or death situation.

for people like alexei gorinov, a moscow municipal councillor who was convicted for speaking out against putin's aggression in ukraine. for maria ponomarenko, a journalist from siberia who also is serving time in prison because she opposed this war. for them, it's a question of life or death. and, yes, i do believe the free world has a moral right to stand, a moral responsibility... all right. ..to stand up for those people who share the values of democracy, freedom and the rule of law. you've just pointed to some russian prisoners who are still incarcerated because they were brave enough, in the russian context, to speak out against putin's all—out invasion of ukraine. within hours of your liberty, you stepped into a major controversy. newly freed, you chose to say that you believed some of the sanctions being imposed on russia as a result of putin's ukraine war were "unfair". and you deeply upset many ukrainians who felt that

you were failing to understand the gravity of what putin and russia have done to ukraine and the need for the gravest of consequences, and at the very least, very serious sanctions to be placed upon the country. do you regret what you said? well, first of all, let's make it absolutely clear. i've spent many years working to impose sanctions on the kremlin. the two poisonings that you've mentioned were in response to my work on advocating for the magnitsky legislation that imposed targeted personal sanctions on those people in and around the kremlin who are personally complicit in human rights abuses, who are personally complicit in violations of the rule of law, who are personally complicit in corruption. and i'm proud of that work. this is the most important work i've done in my life. and, you know, having been out

now for a few months, out of prison, sort of catching up on two and a half years worth of information vacuum, i'm astonished, frankly, to see how many glaring holes there are in the sanctions mechanisms imposed by western countries on the putin regime in response to the aggression in ukraine. i'll give you just one example. according to a recent report by a london think tank, up to 30% of all the military technologies and military equipment used by putin's army in ukraine still comes from western or western allied countries. this is unacceptable. the missile that hit the children's hospital in kyiv on the 8th ofjuly contained several western—produced microchips. this is unacceptable. to me, this speaks of the glaring holes in the sanctions mechanism. and another such area where there should be much more compliance and a much more firm response from western countries are the targeted sanctions because we still see, astonishingly, people from, you know, kremlin or kremlin—connected oligarchs freely travelling around countries of western europe, and one example is putin's grand—niece, who is the daughter of his niece, who actually serves as a deputy

defence minister of russia, while the war is going on, she is still free to travel around the countries of the european union, and this is unacceptable. sure. but if i may... so this should be strengthened... if i may, vladimir, what i think... i'm coming to responding to your question. what i think some ukrainians felt was that you were, in essence, signalling that you believe the problem in russia today is a putin problem rather than a much deeper mindset problem with all of russia, and that in a sense you're giving a pass to the russian people, the russian nation, which has a fundamental problem with an imperialist mindset, with a notion that it has a right to re—establish a greater russia in and around the former borders of the expanded soviet union. are you ready today to say, "you know what, there is "a russia problem. it's notjust a putin problem"? i think it is absolutely unacceptable in the 21st century to talk in stereotypes, to label an entire nation

of 140 million people as being, i don't know, imperialistic, or that there's something wrong with it. i mean, look, this is sort of a blatantly obvious thing to say, but every country has different people. sure. every society has different viewpoints, and it is totally wrong, insulting, and unacceptable to label an entire nation as, you know, whatever people are, whatever the views that you're referring to are holding. there are so many people in russia who are against putin's regime, who are against... well, to put it bluntly, one ukrainian mp, after hearing what you said about some of the sanctions at the time you felt being unfair, she responded — this is iryna gerashchenko — by saying, "frankly, i can no longer believe in any good russians." you know, that that is sort of where we are as a result of two and a half years of terrible conflict between a russian invading force and ukraine. well, i'm sorry, but such views are simply racist. when people start, again, defining people by their nationality, what is this? to talk about sanctions,

just to finish answering your previous question about sanctions, the sanctions that i called counterproductive and wrong — and i'm still calling them that today — are sanctions that are blanket, that are indiscriminate, that are directed against anybody who holds a russian passport. sanctions should target putin's war machine. putin's war economy. the goal of the sanctions should be to make it more difficult, and ideally impossible, for putin's regime to continue conducting this criminal war... so you're saying that the baltic states and poland, which have made it virtually impossible for a russian to enter their territory, you're saying that that's fundamentally misguided, are you? yes, i am, because this doesn't affect putin, this doesn't affect lavrov. i don't think they were planning to drive in the baltic states with a russian number plate on the car. but you know who it affects? it affects independent journalists. it affects human rights activists. it affects lawyers who are helping political prisoners in russia because they cannot

enter these countries because they hold russian passports. you know, the last i've looked at the european convention on human rights, article 1a expressly prohibited discrimination based, among otherfactors, on nationality. so this is unacceptable to me, in the 21st century, to be labelling entire nations of peoples as that there's something wrong with them. look, hannah arendt, one of the most prominent historians who studied the third reich, expressly rejected the notion of so—called collective guilt. she said, "that's a very convenient way out for people "who actually are responsible," because, she said, "if everybody is supposedly guilty then no—one really is." there are people who actually are responsible for the war crimes being committed by the russian army in ukraine. there are people who actually are responsible for this war... so when... ..of aggression that has been waged for almost three years... so when the levada opinion polling organisation... ..and they should be held responsible.

hang on, vladimir. when the levada opinion polling organisation in russia, which admittedly works in very difficult circumstances when it comes to polling, but when it finds repeatedly that a very clear majority of russians support putin's ukraine policy, you're telling me that's nonsensical and meaningless, are you? stephen, i understand that it's yourjob to ask questions like this, but i'm sorry — this is an absolutely senseless question. how can we talk about opinion polls in a repressive dictatorship, when people go to prison for expressing views that differ from the views of the government? i'll give you just one example. a few months ago, a man in moscow named yuri kokhovets received a five—year prison sentence for responding to an opinion poll question saying that he's against the war in ukraine. they've tracked him down, they've arrested him, they've put him on trial and they sent him to prison for five years, for responding to an opinion poll... now, i know those stories as well as you, vladimir, but is the only conclusion we can draw, then, that

all dissent, all attempts to oppose putin, whether it be in his ukraine policy or his domestic, deeply repressive policies, is impossible? is that the conclusion you've drawn now that you sit outside russia? no. the conclusion is that these so—called opinion poll results are no more meaningful than so—called election results in the soviet union that showed 99.9% support for the communist party. and then the soviet regime fell apart in three days in august 1991. it's not possible to judge the true state of public opinion in a country that imprisons you for expressing it. and, frankly, i'm puzzled, really, really puzzled as to why serious analysts and journalists in western countries continue to refer to these so—called fake opinion polls. people who do this are doing the job of putin's propaganda because that's what the putin propaganda machine wants the whole world to think, that most russians support the regime, most russians support the war. this is not the case. when i was in prison i was receiving thousands, thousands of letters from all over the country, every month, from people i've never met, from cities and towns i've never been to, people expressing support, people expressing solidarity, people writing to me that they feel the same about this war as i do.

and this time last year, january or february 2024, in the midst of a so—called presidential election campaign, when there was putin and a couple of hand—picked clowns running alongside him, there was this one candidate, a lawyer, a former member of parliament, called boris nadezhdin, who announced that he was running for president of russia on an anti—war platform. and the public response wasjust unimaginable. suddenly, all over the country, in large cities and small towns, there were hours—long lines of people who formed at his campaign headquarters, at his campaign headquarters, of people who wanted to sign of people who wanted to sign the nomination papers the nomination papers to get this anti—war to get this anti—war candidate on the ballot. candidate on the ballot. of course he was denied of course he was denied access to the ballot as, access to the ballot as, opposition candidates... opposition candidates... of course. of course. he was struck off the he was struck off the ballot straight away. occupying it. ballot straight away. ..invariably are. ..invariably are. listen, we're short of time. listen, we're short of time. i just... i just... absolutely, but... absolutely, but... i just want to i want to ask i just want to i want to ask you a very basic question, you a very basic question, and i'm mindful that you're and i'm mindful that you're sitting in front of a screen sitting in front of a screen where the white house is very where the white house is very obvious and donald trump obvious and donald trump is soon going to be is soon going to be

occupying it. isn't the truth that the political winds, maybe the winds of the military situation as well, are blowing in putin's favour, and that donald trump's inauguration is going to emphasise that, and that, frankly, your belief, expressed many times since you were released, that there will be a time when you can go back to russia,

i have absolutely no doubt that russia will be a democratic country. i have absolutely no doubt that i will be back in my homeland, and i think it's going to be much quicker than many people today could expect. vladimir kara—murza, i wish we had more time, but we don't. thank you very much indeed forjoining me from washington. thank you so much for having me. hello. 0ur weather may well be turning a bit murkier right now, but it was a pretty stunning end to the day on tuesday with lovely sunsets here in highlands, scotland, we have a number of these sunset pictures sent to us from our weather watchers. we had a significant jump in temperatures over the last 24 hours. fylingdales in north yorkshire was monday's coldest spot at just 3 degrees, but we had temperatures jump up

here by 7 degrees celsius from monday into tuesday. tuesday itself was a day of variable cloud and a bit of sunshine at times. now, high pressure is dominating our weather picture for the next few days, bringing a quiet spell of weather and often feeding up some pretty mild air too. however, mild weather at this time of the year doesn't necessarily equate to sunny weather, and right now, what we're seeing is extensive low cloud. we've got some mist and fog around, and the low cloud is also bringing a few patches of drizzle with it too, particularly across parts of wales and western areas of england. so, although it's a frost free start to your day on wednesday morning, it's going to be pretty murky with mist and fog for wales, western areas of england and quite murky conditions through the vale of york. a few fog patches in the midlands too. some of these fog patches may well linger all day, but i think for most areas, you'll see a bit of sunshine coming through, the best of that for scotland, the far north of england. may well stay rather

cloudy for east anglia and south east england, some of that cloud could stay quite low, with occasional mist patches still around into the afternoon. temperatures for most of us into double figures, so we're on the mild side for the time of year. and with this area of high pressure staying with us wednesday, thursday into friday as well, not going to be great changes in our weather pattern day by day. so thursday morning, again, a few mist and fog patches around initially, perhaps a little bit more in the way of sunshine extending across scotland into northern england, the north midlands and wales. but, again, we'll probably have some low cloud and mist hanging on across parts of east anglia and southern counties of england. temperatures generally around 7—10 degrees, so we're running a little bit above average for the time of year, and quite mild there for west scotland and northern ireland. friday the high pressure is still with us, but into the weekend, this weak weather front is going to move in off the atlantic. the front weakens as it runs into our area of high pressure. and so saturday, a dry day, sunday, we'll see the clouds thicken with outbreaks of light rain spreading in. there'll be a few showers around next week, but for the time being, the weather staying mostly on the mild side.

live from washington. this is bbc news. hopes rise for a ceasefire in gaza. the us secretary of state says israel and hamas are on the brink of a deal. south korean investigators are trying once more to arrest

impeached president yoon suk yeol following a failed attempt earlier this month. winds of up to 70 miles an hour are forecast in the los angeles area, raising concern that wildfires could spread again. negotiators in qatar have raised hopes that israel and hamas are on the verge of a ceasefire and hostage release deal. qatar's foreign ministry said key issues have now been addressed, but israel has cautioned that the deal is not there yet. us presidentjoe biden and egyptian president abdel fattah el—sisi are calling on both sides to show flexibility to achieve a truce. a palestinian official told the bbc that the first stage of the deal will likely include the release of 34 israeli hostages, including women, children, the wounded, and the sick.