The New York Times has published a great profile article of the 82-year-old human rights leader Lyudmila Alexeyeva, who was most recently arrested on New Year’s Eve.  She shares one thing in common with the ultra-nationalists and Stalinist cult:  she too misses the days of the Soviet Union, because at least then there were a few rules constraining prosecutors from building false cases.

New fears have replaced the old ones, though. Ms. Alexeyeva has received death threats, and last year she buried two friends who were killed. Legal risks are unpredictable, too. While Soviet dissidents could strategize to protect themselves — knowing, for example, that prosecutors needed at least two witnesses — their tricks are of no use in a post-Soviet justice system, where cases can be wholly fabricated, she said.

“Now they do what they want,” she said. “There were rules then. They were idiotic rules, but there were rules, and if you knew them you could defend yourself.”