The Russian authorities included this Monday Boris Akunin, one of the most read contemporary Russian writers, in the official list of “extremists and terrorists”, whose registry is kept by Rosfinmonitoring, the federal financial supervision service.
Last Friday the Russian publishing house AST announced that it was stopping publishing the books of Akunin, 67, living abroad, critical of the war in Ukraine and the policies of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“The recent statements of the writers (Akunin and the poet Dmitri Bikov), which had a great impact in the media, require a legal assessment, said the general director of AST, Pavel Gribkov, when announcing the publisher’s decision.
That same day, the digital book sales service Litres suspended the distribution of Akunin’s works and a popular bookstore chain removed them from its shelves.
Following the inclusion of Akunin on the list of “extremists and terrorists”, the Russian authorities on Monday opened a criminal case against him for “discrediting the Russian Armed Forces”, according to a source from the Committee on Russian instruction.
Akunin, pseudonym of Grigori Chjartishvili, living abroad, rose to fame with a series of novels set in the second half of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th, starring Erast Fandorin, a unique fictional detective, who became into an endearing character for readers.
His first novel, “Azazel”, was published in 1998 and that same year three other books with Fandorin’s adventures went on sale.
On the eve of the war in Ukraine, Akunin accused Putin, in an interview with Eefe, of being a “dictator” with post-imperialist ambitions who has led his country to a state of “semi-disintegration.”
“Moscow considers Ukraine and the other former Soviet republics part of its ‘zone of influence’ and does not want it to be reduced. The entire Ukrainian crisis, from the seizure of Crimea to the financing of the revolt in Donbas, is a punishment to Ukraine because in 2014 the new Government decided to turn from East to West,” he said.