Russian Parliament Expels Anti-Putin Deputy

The Russian parliament expelled an opponent of President Vladimir Putin on Friday in a vote which he said intensified a Kremlin crackdown on dissent and likened to a Stalinist show trial. A vote in the lower house, the State Duma, deprived opposition deputy Gennady Gudkov of his parliamentary immunity over allegations he denied of operating a business while in the assembly, a charge that carries a two-year jail sentence (but no trial took place as yet). Opposition leaders said his expulsion, one day before a protest rally in Moscow sent a clear signal that Putin was determined to smother dissent in his new-six year term. "It is a political vendetta and extrajudicial punishment," Gudkov, 56, told the Duma before it voted 291-150 to oust him. Three deputies abstained. "I received my mandate from the people, from hundreds of thousands of voters who voted for me, and only they can judge what kind of deputy I am," Gudkov said.

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2012/09/14/world/europe/14reuters-russia-gudkov.html?partner=rss&emc=rss