Separatism and harassment

Against the ex-Prime Minister of Scotland and the host of RT, Alex Salmonda, charges of harassment are charged

In recent months, the British media are actively monitoring the scandal that unfolded around the former first minister of Scotland, Alex Salmond. The fact is that Salmond is a sign figure for Scotland: a few years ago he was a real leader of the Scottish people with an enviable electoral rating and, with the support of voters, managed to initiate a referendum on independence from the UK. Now he is accused of 14 episodes of sexual harassment and rape attempts. The politician himself claims that he is innocent, and suits the Scottish government, believing that in this way his former colleagues want to reduce political scores with him. Another interesting detail to the portrait of Salmond is for more than a year now he has been leading his own political talk show on the Russia Today (RT) television channel, which in the West is considered the rubble of the Kremlin propaganda.

From the Scottish leader to leading on Russian television channel

64-year-old Alex Salmond is hard to call a key player in modern British politics, but some a couple of years ago he was a big figure for the whole of Scotland. Since 2007, he was the head of the local government ( first minister. - Ed. ) And for almost 20 years he headed the separatist Scottish National Party (SNP), turning it into the second largest in the UK and still having the majority in the Scottish parliament.

“The basis of modern Scottish politics is the idea of ​​equality between the authorities and the people and the aspiration for the national state. Alex Salmond stood on the forefront in defense of these values, ”explains the expert in the field of social policy, teacher of the University of Western Scotland (UWS) Evan Gibbs. - The party has established itself as a defender of public services from the government, headed by Tori in London. But this radical position has always been balanced by strong relations with business and support for both the European Union and NATO. ”

Scottish nationalists have long advocated for the country's independence from the UK, and in this area Salmond did a lot: having defeated the Labor in the elections in 2011, SNP announced that it would be fulfilled by the main election promise - it would initiate a nationwide referendum on the issue of the United Kingdom. However, the voting results did not play into the hands of Scottish nationalists:

55% of the inhabitants voted against independence, after which Salmond was forced to resign from the post of the first minister and leader of SNP.

“After the loss and subsequent resignation of Salmond, the party encountered a dilemma: whether to promote the idea of ​​a re -referendum, as the new members of the party wanted, or maintain caution, as the experience of the party leaders prompted,” explains Evan Gibbs. Soon after the defeat at the referendum, the post of head of the Scottish government was occupied by Nicolas Rodzhen - former deputy Salmond. With its help, the former first minister still tried to hold a new campaign for the independence of Scotland-the upcoming Brexit referendum was just facilitated by this. But the Scots again decided differently - 62% of the inhabitants of the region opposed the exit of Great Britain from the EU. As a result, in the early elections to the British Parliament in 2017, SNP lost more than a third of the places in the House of Commons, and one of them belonged to Salmond itself.

After the defeat, Salmond discovered the talent of the TV presenter: already in November 2017, he launched his own political talk show on the Russia Today (RT) television channel. On the alex Salmond Show, the ex-head of the Scottish government with the guests ( one of whom was the former head of Catalonia Carlos Puchdemon. - Ed. ) Discussed British and European politics. Former colleagues expectedly criticized the new place of work of Salmond: once his like-minded person, and now the first Minister of Scotland, Nikola Nerdes, said that she would advise him to choose another television channel for transmission, emphasizing that

SNP "will never evade criticism of the Russian authorities if they deserve it."

The ministers of the Scottish government and the speakers of the House of Commons, one after another, refused to come to the Salmond show, calling RT "Posmrevsky" and "propaganda" television channel. Even more questions for RT appeared after the poisoning of the Skripals - in the light of what position the media occupied in relation to the UK, who accused Russia of using chemical weapons in Europe. Salmond, in turn, stated that he makes the program on his own, and the RT management does not interfere in his work.

However, the British authorities also expressed very specific claims to the program: in July 2018, according to the investigation, the British OFCOM regulator stated that “Twets and Letters of viewers”, which Salmond read on the air, could be written by RT employees, and some of these messages appeared on Twitter, after the program of the program.

The output is offom: the show “misleads” and undermines the trust of the audience. In RT, all charges of the British regulator are stably denied.

Accusations of harassment and crowdfunding to defend honor

The investigation against Salmond began in January last year. Soon after the Scottish government, against the backdrop of sexual scandals around the world, decided to reconsider its policy regarding such crimes; Two employees of the apparatus filed official complaints about Salmond: they claimed that since 2013 their former boss had repeatedly gone to them. The general public about the accusations became known only in August-the details appeared in one of the media, after which Salmond accused the authorities of the intentional drainage of the confidential investigation data to reporters and gathered a press conference at which he said that he was not guilty.

Despite the statements of the first minister Nikolai Rodzhen that the Scottish National Party has no reason to exclude Salmond, he left the party after his own free will, promising that he would return when he restores his good name in court. At the same time, Salmond said that he intended to sue the Scottish government, and launched a crowdfunding campaign to raise money for the lawsuit: in just a few days he managed to collect more than 50 thousand pounds of donations.

Already in early January, the Supreme Civil Court in Edinburgh admitted that the internal investigation of the Scottish government against Salmond was conducted with some procedural violations. But on January 24, the politician still appeared in court in Edinburgh,

He was charged with 14 points: among others, he was charged with two attempts to rape, an attack of an obscene nature and a violation of public order.

However, the politician escaped the arrest: Salmond was interrogated as part of the case and released on bail. Details of the accusations are still unknown, but he himself did not disclose the details of the case "out of respect for the court."

The RT channel was expected to defend Salmond. The editor -in -chief Margarita Simonyan unexpectedly connected the accusations against the politician with his work on the Russian television channel. “Alex Salmond has long been angry with the entire British and Scottish establishment. And in the show on RT, he says those things that BBC, for example, could say, ”said Simonyan, recalling that the founder of the WikiLeaks project, Julian Assange, was also charged with sexual crimes. “It is dangerous to be the leading RT,” she summed up.

However, in Britain, such a version is practically not discussed. The media believe that if there is a political background in this matter, then it is probably associated with a possible hardware struggle within the Scottish National Party, which all this time had the image of one of the most disciplined and united parties in the United Kingdom. Now the British society is trying not to hit the extremes and racks his head more on the ethical issue: how to ensure the right of every citizen to the presumption of innocence along to give every woman who has undergone harassment, the opportunity to defend his rights - regardless of how influential her offender is?