Putin and Merkel clash over Pussy Riot

MOSCOW - The Associated Press

Chancellor Merkel (L) meets Russia’s Putin in Moscow. EPA photo

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Nov. 16 shot back at visiting German Chancellor Angela Merkel for raising questions about the imprisonment of the Pussy Riot punk provocateurs, suggesting she was poorly informed about the group’s true nature.

The exchange at a Russian-German business forum in Moscow, Merkel raised cautious criticism of the two-year prison sentences imposed on two members of the band Pussy Riot for a guerrilla performance in Moscow’s main cathedral of a so-called “punk prayer” entreating the Virgin Mary to save Russia from Putin. “Whether it was necessary to send two girls to (prison) camp, I don’t know,” Merkel said.

But Putin asked whether Merkel knew that one of the women had previously taken part in a performance-art demonstration where several dolls representing migrant workers and homosexuals, one of them also identified as Jewish, were hung from nooses. “We cannot support, with you, people who take an anti-Semitic position,” Putin said.

Forum came in the wake of growing German criticism of Russia’s human rights record and its moves to crack down on dissent. “It’s not meddling in domestic affairs, it’s a sign of closeness,” she said through an interpreter. “The better we know each other, the more openly we talk.”