Judging history through the courts…

Yevgeny Dzhugashvili, proud grandson of former dictator Joseph Stalin, brought a libel claim for 9.5 million roubles ($299,000) from the Novaya Gazeta newspaper and 500,000 roubles from the author of an article published last April which claimed Stalin personally signed politburo death orders.

Fortunately the court saw sense (and presumably reviewed a couple of history books) before rejecting the claim. The AP reports that a ruling against the newspaper would have been seen as an exoneration one of the 20th century ’s most notorious autocrats. And it would have dealt a blow to beleaguered Russian liberals who accuse the Kremlin of whitewashing history.

Spurious indeed.