I first heard this slogan, «Conspiracy of Hope,» from Tamara Chikunova, whose only son, Dmitry, was arrested during the «Third Wave» of mass repressions in Uzbekistan, and a criminal case was fabricated against him.
After horrific torture and threats of violence against his mother, he was forced to confess to a crime he did not commit, thereby signing his own death warrant and was executed by firing squad on 10 July 2000, in the basement of the Tashkent city prison.
I met Tamara on the day she was informed of her son’s execution, and after that, she became one of the most prominent voices against the death penalty in Uzbekistan. Unfortunately, she was not heard by those who should have been helping her. During this time, several thousand people were executed in the country. As it turned out later, more than half of the prisoners were executed unlawfully, a third were only witnesses to the crime, but they were forced to confess under torture, and a quarter had nothing to do with the charges at all.
Such are the depressing statistics of Uzbekistan, where torture and concentration camps have become everyday occurrences, but the world continues to be deaf, blind, and stupid to the pleas for help of victims of torture or those facing execution, which is why the «Conspiracy of Hope» is all that remains for us today.
Hope dies last, when there’s no Faith, no Love, no Compassion, no Mercy left. But what does a person think about when they stand at the firing squad wall, raising their eyes to the sky? Has anyone ever wondered? I’ve been there, and I can tell you there’s little that’s pleasant about it, but these impressions will last me a lifetime, which is what I try to share in my books, political theater, and other projects.
In the summer of 1997, I spent a month and a half in that damned place, the basement of the Tashkent city prison. To say it was a kind of hell on earth would be an understatement, and from there I escorted four fellow inmates to the next world. Then, I was subjected to a mock execution by firing squad, after which I suffered my first heart attack at the age of 29. Yes, that was a pastime the executioners had in those days in Uzbekistan: to make people perceive death as a release from suffering after all the horrors.
I wrote my first book about this, «For Those Who Love Freedom,» and then my second book, «Independence of a Strict Regime,» and now you have my third book in your hands.
The hell I went through and survived was without cauldrons of hot tar and devils with pitchforks, there were people there who were more like demons, and now I am faced with something similar, because I cannot get the support of “humanists» because I do not fit into certain “standards» tolerant paranoia, namely, I am an immigrant, but I am white, I am not a Muslim and I am not gay, and besides, I am “Russian”, which is why I feel like a subhuman against the backdrop of the demonstrative licking of the asses of dubious persons.
Let them lick it, there’s no accounting for taste, but when I enter «human rights» organizations, I hear the hissing of snakes behind my back, and the employees of these organizations are more like a gathering of harpies who, when they meet me, show their poisonous fangs, and the foam of rage runs down their lips. Instead of protecting human rights and promoting democracy, they do anything but what is needed, and most importantly, they do not allow any outsiders to this humanitarian trough, because corruption and spy mania, clumsiness and unprofessionalism are the main tools in their hands.
As far as I understand, these organizations receive substantial financial support, but ultimately, we see neither the money nor human rights. Therefore, I came to the conclusion: «Who Helps Dictators» is the title of my fourth book, and this has become «A Grave Loss» for me—this will be the title of my fifth book. After all, human rights and everything related to them are essentially «Business on Fools”—this is the title of my sixth book. These books are ready and published in the original Russian in the USA and Germany, but, unfortunately, there is no funding yet for their translation into other languages.
No one helps me with this, all my applications for funding are rejected, so I am forced to “steal» money from my family’s budget, including for the publication of this book.
Tamara Chikunova died on 31 March 2021, but she went down in history as one of Uzbekistan’s most renowned human rights defenders, dedicating her life to the fight against the death penalty and torture. It is to her that I dedicate this book.