It’s been a pretty slow news week in Russia, and my suspicion that this involves something more than just the approach of the Jan. 7 Orthodox Christmas. We’ve had relatively few events of any major importance in the political environment (at least that we know of), no major moves against companies or individuals, and the economic and currency reports feel like a broken record – the same announcements of another devaluation seemingly seem not to change from day to day.

However for those of us involved in highly public legal cases in Russia, we long ago became accustomed to this condition of “suspended animation.” Whenever I attempt to explain to colleagues what it is like to fight a truly political case, I often say that the first thing to understand is that this genre often resides completely outside of the law. For so many of these cases, every “legal” outcome is in fact a decision handed down from the highest levels of the Russian Federation.