Question: Estonian journalist Svetlana Burtseva is being prosecuted in Tallinn, on charges of treason and violation of international sanctions. How would you comment on this?

Maria Zakharova: Estonia, as well as other “advanced democracies” in the Baltic region, continues to systematically resort to reprisals as a routine method of dealing with dissent. They have in fact honed this practice of eliminating any sources of alternative thinking to perfection. This new fabricated criminal case against Estonian journalist Svetlana Burtseva has flagrantly exposed the flawed and irreconcilable policy pursued by Tallinn, which is ready to commit any crime to settle scores with its opponents and intimidate all doubters.

The serious charges brought against Svetlana Burtseva pursue only one goal – to severely punish her for her professional activities, for not wanting to obediently integrate into the local mainstream and expressing a different view, which the authorities find objectionable. Being an independent journalist, or just a sensible person is associated with very real risks to life in Estonia.

This kind of reprisals against dissenters, reminiscent of the medieval Inquisition, have taken root in Estonia and other Baltic countries largely due to the lack of reaction from the relevant international organisations. For many years, they have been deliberately looking right past the egregious violations of human rights in those states, including the right to free access to information and pluralistic media, becoming de facto complicit in these atrocities. In this case, however, this isn’t about some abstract categories; their inaction endangers a person’s life, which the Estonian authorities are ready to cripple for the sake of their purely opportunistic interests. And again, there have been no outcry from the relevant human rights groups, since it is normal for them to overlook violations of the rights of Russian and Russian-language media and journalists.

The situation involving Svetlana Burtseva and the fabricated case against her are clear manifestations of the deep crisis and decline of Western-style democracy, which has morphed into a neoliberal dictatorship.