Oleg Orlov

Shortly after the May 7 presidential inauguration of Vladimir Putin, the Russian parliament passed four major bills in record time–all of them meant to counter the protests that first erupted in the country in December 2011.

At the end of our recent mission to Moscow, our delegation squeezed in one final official meeting. Vyacheslav M. Lebedev, the chief justice of Russia’s Supreme Court, had sent word only the night before that he would receive us. The meeting had been brokered by Aleksei Venediktov, the legendary founder of the radio station Ekho…