The writers’ group PEN America evidently didn’t stoop low enough in appeasing Kiev. For their annual week-long World Voices Festival for 2023, held in New York, they chose two Ukrainian writers who were also active-duty soldiers. In case that wasn’t enough of a message, they chose for their two “Russian” writers two anti-Putin writers who had left Russia. One might have thought they had properly covered their bases.
However, the two Ukrainians explained that they could face significant political, legal, and compliance repercussions and risks back home if the two Russian dissidents were at the same Festival. Of course, PEN America relieved the two Ukrainians of the threat from their own government by disinviting the two dissident Russian exiles.
