Professor who fled Putin's war says Kremlin is playing Russian roulette with lives

Since Russia invaded Ukraine in early 2022, Vladimir Putin has faced persistent opposition not only in Western capitals but also inside his own country.

- ARPAN RAI

For Russians, though, criticising the president comes at a cost – one Salavat Abylkalikov knows all too well.

Abylkalikov, 38, a former professor at one of Russia’s most prestigious universities, says he was compelled to flee Moscow last year to escape being conscripted to fight in the Ukraine war, and protect his wife and daughter from harm and separation. The war, which started nearly three years ago, has resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians and Russians and made an estimated 6 million people refugees.

Russia has suffered the biggest brain drain since the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, says Abylkalikov, who now lives in exile in the UK. Abylkalikov is one of 400 academics from Russia, Belarus and Ukraine who, since the start of the war, have fled or sought help to leave from the Council for AtRisk Academics (Cara), a British charity that assists foreign scholars looking to escape dangerous places or situations.

Nearly 300 of the academics are from Ukraine – the highest number of requests for support from scholars in a European country since the 1930s.

Speaking to