「沈黙は賛成と同じ」 ロシアで声を上げる７６歳の反戦画家

【ＡＦＰ＝時事】ロシアが第２次世界大戦の対ドイツ戦勝記念日を迎えた９日、画家のエレーナ・オシポワさん（７６）はほとんど寝ずに、ウクライナ侵攻に抗議するプラカードを仕上げた。（写真はオシポワさん。サンクトペテルブルクの自宅で）
　しかし、ロシア第２の都市サンクトペテルブルクにある自宅を出た途端、見知らぬ男性２人にプラカードを奪われ、持ち去られた。
　「明らかに組織的な妨害でしょう」。それでもオシポワさんは、めげることなく代わりのポスターをつかむと、再びデモへ向かった。
　大学で芸術を教えていた元教授でもあるオシポワさんは、２０００年にウラジーミル・プーチン氏が政権の座に就くと、その２年後から２０年間、街頭デモを行ってきた。地元では「サンクトペテルブルクの良心」として知られる存在だ。オシポワさんが機動隊にたびたび拘束される映像は、ソーシャルメディアで広く拡散されている。
　「今、大事なのは、禁じられていようとも『戦争反対』の声を上げることです」
　ロシア政府が「特別軍事作戦」と称するウクライナ侵攻を開始して以降、各地の抗議デモは容赦なく弾圧され、侵攻を批判すると１５年の実刑に処される可能性がある。
　オシポワさんは、２０１４年にはロシアによるウクライナ南部クリミア半島の併合や、ウクライナ東部での武力衝突に抗議した。今は、ウクライナ侵攻を批判している。

■「国を愛するなら、責任は自分に」

　「こんなことを国民として受け入れてしまうとしたら、自分の子どもたちの未来を考えるのをやめることになります」
　アパートの部屋にある自作のプラカードには、反戦と反政権を掲げるメッセージがあふれている。「私たちは子どもたちにどんな世界を残していくのか──それがプラカードに込める思いです」
　他にも「使い捨ての兵士にされるのはごめんだ」、「妻よ、母よ、戦争を止めよう」、「私たちは帝国主義による挑発的な政治の犠牲者だ」といった言葉が書かれたポスターが並ぶ。
　「私は声を上げ続けてきました。沈黙は、自分の国で起きていることに賛成するのと同じだからです」とオシポワさんは言う。「だから、私は抗議に行くのです」
　何度も拘束されたせいで警察にすっかり顔を覚えられ、最近では連行されずにまっすぐ家に帰されることもあるという。
　「とうの昔に怖くなくなりました」とオシポワさん。「自分の国で恐れてはいけません。自分の国を愛するなら、その国の責任は自分にあると思うべきです」 【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2022/05/25-12:56）

Yelena Osipova barely slept ahead of Russia's pomp-filled Victory Day celebrations on May 9.
The 76-year-old artist was up late, making placards to protest about the conflict in Ukraine.
But the moment she stepped out of her home in Saint Petersburg on her way to demonstrate, two unknown men snatched the work from her and ran off.
It was upsetting. I'd worked half the night and really liked those placards, the white-haired painter told AFP.
It's obvious that it was an organised attack.
Indefatigable as ever, within an hour, the tiny, stooped woman, who moves with difficulty, already had a new poster and was heading out again to protest.
Osipova is well-known in her home town.
She has been called the conscience of Saint Petersburg, Russia's second city, after two decades spent publicly opposing the rule of President Vladimir Putin.
Since the Kremlin's forces rolled into Ukraine, she has also become a symbol of Russians standing up against the conflict.
Footage of her frequent detentions by riot police has been widely circulated on social media.
The main thing is that people should say these forbidden words today: 'No to war', said the former art professor.
But in Russia that is a risky prospect.
Protests have been ruthlessly stamped out and those criticising the campaign -- a special military operation in official parlance -- risk a 15-year jail term.
- 'Silence means agreement' -
Osipova first started taking to the streets two years after former KGB agent Putin took power in 2000.
She has been demonstrating ever since against what she says are the crimes committed by the Russian authorities.
She protested in 2014 when Moscow seized the Crimean peninsula from Ukraine and against the fighting sparked in the east of the country.
Now she is focused on Putin's full-fledged offensive against Russia's pro-Western neighbour.
If people accept all this, then it means they are not thinking about their children, she said as she showed AFP her work in her flat.
I'm dedicating my placards to this idea: what world are we leaving to our children?
She shows off one poster with the face of a young girl shouting No to war on a yellow and blue background, the colours of the Ukrainian flag.
Another of a child has the slogan What world are we leaving behind us?
Since 2002 I haven't been able to stay silent, because silence means agreement with what is happening in my country, she said.
That's why I go to protest.
Her flat with its decrepit vaulted ceilings is in the heart of Russia's former imperial capital and has been home to her family for three generations.
Its two rooms are cluttered with pictures and posters with pacifist and anti-Kremlin messages.
I don't want to serve as cannon fodder, reads one poster of a soldier. Wives and mothers, stop the war, says another.
A third proclaims: We are all hostages of the provocative politics of imperial power.
On one wall hangs a large photo of a young man: her only son, Ivan, who died of tuberculosis in 2009 at the age of just 28.
Osipova has been frequently detained by the police, but they now know her so well that they sometimes just take her straight home rather than to the station.
I've long ago stopped being scared for myself, she said defiantly.
In your own homeland you should not be afraid, but if you love it you should feel that you are the one in charge.