the nyt article provided a link to the video you mentioned in your post. to think that this medieval barbarity could still be going on in a country that is at least by dint of geography is european, is mind-boggling. i’m kazakh, and i guess by extension muslim too – although i’ve never seen the inside of a mosque in my life – and for the life of me i would never understand why some people are so hell-bent on the literal interpretation of the scripture, be it the bible, the torah, or in this case, the quran. criminalization of adultery could be justified only by the most slavishly undeviating reading of the quran, and if one takes literally this passage, then slavery is ok, too, then every grown child who doesn’t take care of his parents should be stoned to death, and on and on, which would decimate half the population in some countries. to say nothing of the fact that the torture the poor women endured is not a canonical form of the shari’a punishment. public beheadings are sanctioned by the shari’a law, and so is stoning to death, but head and brow shaving and cross-marking are definitely not. so if somebody wants to play the islamic purist, the least they could do is to bone up on the subject. either way, that human dignity could be se easily trampled upon with absolute impunity in the 21st century, is shuddering.

it is also interesting to note that czar vladimir is falling back on the hallowed by time russian tradition of governing by proxy in the regions. the czars appointed governors and gave them a free reign to plunder and pillage as long as the taxes were collected and the frontiers defended. if that’s not in the same vein, i don’t know what is.