Kudrin Resigns

High drama at the Kremlin today – long-serving Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin has resigned his post.  Having taken up the position over 11 years ago, his resignation comes today at the behest of a furious President Dmitry Medvedev following a blistering row over disagreements in ‘policy‘ (in other words, Kudrin has no desire to aid the efforts of a dictatorship).  Medvedev subsequently ordered him to leave, calling him an ‘irresponsible chatterbox‘; but Kudrin has long stated that he would not serve in the government if Prime Minister Vladimir Putin decides to take up the Presidency next year, as he is now certain to do.  Kudrin was quoted yesterday as saying that he did not see himself in the new government.

With Kudrin’s departure, the Kremlin rids itself of one of its last liberal bastions.  This is Putinocracy at its most unabashed.