Author critical of Putin sentenced to eight years in prison

Last year, OÖN met him for an interview when his volume “Stories from Home” was published in Frankfurt. Now writer Dmitry Glukhovsky has been sentenced in absentia by a Moscow court to eight years in prison for “spreading false news about the Russian armed forces”.

Glukhovsky was born in Moscow in 1979. The three volumes of his “Metro” science fiction series are set in the Moscow subway after a nuclear war and have become bestsellers. The trilogy was the basis of the computer game of the same name. His novel “Outpost – Der Posten” was published in German in autumn 2021. In it, Glukhovsky uses motifs from Russian history and culture to show how Russian propaganda manipulates and creates an illusory world. In 2022, he co-signed an appeal to “address all Russian-speaking people in Russia to spread the truth about the war in Ukraine”. He described Putin as a “hypocritical old man,” and since then Glukhovsky has been on the wanted list.

The author, who speaks brilliant German, has been living in Central Europe for a long time. Exactly where is to remain a secret. He doesn’t expect an attack of the kind that has often taken place on Russian dissidents, but the mood towards critics in Russia could become even worse. The verdict does not change anything about his acute situation. He was previously unable to travel to Russia or a number of other countries such as China because they would extradite him to Russia. Glukhovsky sees the possibility of an end to Russian aggression only in a regime change and an opening to the West. Otherwise the collapse of Russia threatens.

A Russian-Ukrainian team is currently working on one of his plays in London. On Sunday, awaiting the verdict, Glukhovsky posted on social media: “A Russian is more willing to accept daily dangers than boredom.”