Day: March 4, 2019
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All the Pancakes and Parties of Maslenitsa in Moscow
Russia’s believers reflect while its vegetarians rejoice as we get ready for special Lenten menus in meat-loving Moscow in the six weeks of Lent that precede Orthodox Easter. The week that announces the transition to Lent is Maslenitsa — seven days full of pancake (or in Russian, blini) eating and merriment. Running from March 4…
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Putin Signs Decree Suspending INF Nuclear Pact
President Vladimir Putin has signed a decree suspending Russia‘s participation in the Cold War-era Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty with the United States, the Kremlin said on Monday. Russia announced last month it was suspending the treaty after the United States said it would withdraw because of violations by Moscow. Russia denies flouting the accord and has accused Washington of…
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A Look Back at the Skripal Poisoning, One Year Later
On March 4, 2018, former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia were found unconscious on a park bench in southern England. After an investigation, British authorities said the two had been exposed to a military-grade nerve agent in an attempted murder carried out by agents of Russia’s GRU military intelligence agency — a…
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Russian Telecoms Are Selling Users’ Location Data to Authorities
Russia’s top telecom operators are selling the location data of their clients for millions of dollars to Moscow’s City Hall, the Vedomosti business daily has reported. The Russian capital already fields one of the world’s largest facial-recognition systems, with 174,000 surveillance cameras expected to enter into operation this year. Meanwhile, new anti-terror legislation that entered…