Month: February 2020

A hospital in Russia’s Urals region has refused to treat an HIV-positive patient after a staff physician shouted that he would “infect us all here,” the local 59.ru news outlet reported Monday. More than 1 million people in Russia live with HIV and a record 37,000 people died from HIV-related illnesses there in 2019. Violating…

Russia plans to commemorate the football World Cup it hosted two years ago with a monument installed at a popular gathering spot for fans in central Moscow, its architect has said.  Nikolskaya Ulitsa, a quiet street steps away from Red Square, quickly turned into party central for tens of thousands of visitors from around the…

Russian presidents could be made immune from criminal prosecution once they leave office under proposed constitutional reforms, a senior lawmaker said on Tuesday. The proposal, made by a parliamentary working group, comes after President Vladimir Putin last month announced sweeping reforms to the political system that would shift some powers away from the presidency. Putin’s…

A Dutch appeals court Tuesday ordered that the Russian government pay $50 billion to former shareholders in the defunct Russian oil giant Yukos. The decision overturned a previous ruling from a lower court. Immediately after the ruling, Russian officials said they would appeal the decision, lining up a final showdown over the multi-billion dollar dispute…

A Ukrainian solder was killed and four others injured on Tuesday when heavy fighting erupted in eastern Ukraine, the country’s military said, as it and Russian-backed separatists blamed each other for the flare-up. The violence was some of the worst since a Paris summit in December tried to narrow positions between Kiev and the separatists on…

Turkish forces have resumed joint patrols of northeastern Syria with Russia following a two-week pause in which Moscow and Ankara traded barbs over a Russian-backed assault in Syria’s last rebel stronghold. Turkish servicemen stopped showing up for joint patrols on Feb. 3, the Russian military had said. Tensions flared up between Russia and Turkey after…

The Sevmorput, the world’s only nuclear-powered cargo ship, is currently preparing for a voyage to Antarctica to supply Russia’s Vostok research station.  The cargo ship will transport construction materials to the station located 1,200 kilometers from the South Pole, Rosatom, Russia’s state nuclear corporation, said in a Facebook post.  The ship is set to deliver…

Almost 80% of Russians believe that Russia and the West should become friends and partners, according to the results of an independent Levada Center poll published Tuesday. Only 3% of Russian respondents said they see the West as Russia’s enemy, Levada said. Another 16% said they view the West as a rival. Two-thirds of Levada’s…

Ireland’s police believes Russia has dispatched agents there to inspect undersea cables, raising concerns that they could tap or damage the cables at their weak points and thwart global communications, Britain’s The Times newspaper reported Sunday. Britain and the United States have warned that the Russian Navy could disrupt over $10 trillion in daily transactions…

Russia‘s FSB security service planned and organised the murder of a Georgian man in Berlin last summer, a killing that triggered diplomatic expulsions from Germany and Moscow, the investigative website Bellingcat has said. Citing mobile phone metadata and a months-long investigation conducted with Der Spiegel and The Insider, Bellingcat published information it said showed the…

Tourist arrivals to Russia have surged by 20.5% in 2019, according to official figures cited by the Association of Tour Operators of Russia (ATOR) on Monday.  More than 5 million tourists visited Russia in January-December 2019, according to ATOR’s breakdown of Federal Security Service (FSB) border service data, up from 4.2 million tourists the previous…

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that Russia was managing the conflict in Libya “at the highest level,” Turkey’s NTV broadcaster reported Saturday. Erdogan, whose country backs Libya’s internationally recognized government, has publicly accused the Kremlin-linked Wagner mercenary group of supporting Libya’s rival faction headed by eastern commander Khalifa Haftar. Russia has repeatedly denied its…

Key law enforcement authorities of Russia’s Arctic region joined forces in anti-terrorism exercises onboard two retired nuclear-powered icebreakers docked in the Kola Bay. It has been several years since the Sovetsky Soyuz and Sibir icebreaking vessels were last in the icy waters of the Arctic. The two nuclear-engine vessels were taken out of service in 2010…

A Russian Constitutional Court judge has said that modern Russia should renounce its status as a successor state to the Soviet Union, the Kommersant business daily reported Monday. Judge Konstantin Aranovsky expressed his opinion as an addition to a December ruling that awarded restitution to the children of the victims of Stalin’s repressions. While he agreed…

Having the Russian word for “cock” carved on his forehead with a razor blade as punishment for smoking an illicit cigarette in his barracks toilet was the last straw for Private Artyom Pakhotin.  Two weeks later, on April 19, 2018, he shot himself dead with an AK-74 during his platoon’s drill training session in the…

A Russian passenger onboard the quarantined Diamond Princess ship has been diagnosed with the new coronavirus, marking the first infection of a Russian citizen, Russia’s Embassy in Japan said Monday. The Diamond Princess cruise ship, owned by Carnival, has been quarantined since arriving in Yokohama, Japan on Feb. 3, after a man who disembarked in…

A Russian court has ordered Alla Ilyina to be placed back into coronavirus quarantine days after she escaped from a hospital in St. Petersburg. Ilyina, 32, was placed under a 14-day quarantine in St. Petersburg’s Botkinskaya clinic earlier this month after returning from China’s Hainan resort island with symptoms of a possible coronavirus infection. She…

Russian scientists, teachers and other groups of professionals have signed open letters in support of seven young men who were jailed last week on what they call fabricated charges of terrorism. A court in the central Russian city of Penza last Monday sentenced the seven members of an anti-fascist group called Set to prison terms between…

An outspoken Russian priest has sparked public ire for comparing common-law wives to “prostitutes.” Archpriest Dmitry Smirnov, who has raised eyebrows in the past for calling abortions “worse than the Holocaust” and comparing today’s young men to “scrawny chickens,” said recently that Russian women “don’t know what marriage is.” “They don’t want to say ‘I’m a…

As the new coronavirus that has killed more than 1,700 people continues to spread around the world, Russia has stepped up measures to tackle the health risk, including closing most entry points along its 4,200-kilometer border and suspending e-visas and work visas for Chinese nationals.  Russia reported its first two cases of coronavirus and said…

A Russian dissident artist who published screenshots of sexual images that forced President Emmanuel Macron’s candidate for Paris City Hall to pull out of the race was arrested in the French capital on Saturday, the prosecutor’s office said. Benjamin Griveaux, one of Macron’s closest lieutenants, abandoned his bid to become mayor of Paris on Friday after…

Turkey has fulfilled its responsibilities in the northwestern Syrian region of Idlib in line with its de-escalation agreements with Russia and Iran, Vice President Fuat Oktay said on Saturday, after violence spiked in recent weeks. Turkey and Russia, which back opposing sides in the conflict, agreed in 2018 to set up a de-escalation zone in…

When Russia evacuated its citizens from the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak this month, it flew more than 140 people from China to a quarantine clinic in the Siberian city of Tyumen.  Isolated from the rest of the world until they’re confirmed to be infection-free, these people have taken to social media to stay connected…

Russia said on Friday it had asked Canada to hand over case files on a 95-year-old former Nazi death squad member living in Canada to help Moscow with an investigation into the mass murder of children at a Soviet orphanage in 1942. Helmut Oberlander, who was born in Ukraine and became a German citizen during…

A Jehovah’s Witness from the Siberian city of Chita has claimed he was tortured by local police on Monday during a mass crackdown on believers in the region, Russian investigative news site The Insider reported Friday.  Lawyer Artur Ganin told the outlet his client Vadim Kutsenko was taken to a local forest by police, where…

A close ally of French President Emmanuel Macron on Friday pulled out of next month’s race to become mayor of Paris after a Russian dissident artist said the candidate had sent sexual images to a woman who was not his wife. Artist Pyotr Pavlensky published screenshots of an online chat between Benjamin Griveaux and the…

Some 41% of men in Russia consider the fact that they retire five years later than women to be discrimination, while only 28% of female respondents share this opinion, according to a Superjob.ru survey. Russia’s pension reform, which started in 2019, is gradually increasing the retirement age and indexing pensions. Last year, Russian women could…

The United States believes that sanctioned Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska laundered money for President Vladimir Putin, The Financial Times reported Friday, citing a U.S. Treasury letter to Deripaska’s lawyers explaining the sanctions. The Trump administration imposed sanctions on Deripaska and two dozen other tycoons and officials in April 2018 in retaliation for what it called…

The number of Russians who believe Russia was responsible for the downing of the MH17 has increased five-fold to 10% from 2% in 2015, according to a new study from the independent Levada Center pollster.  The poll, conducted together with the Dutch University of Leiden, also showed that 60% of Russians believe Ukraine was behind…

Police in Russia are investigating news outlets BBC Russian, Radio Liberty and Meduza after lawmakers accused them of promoting drug use, Interfax reported Thursday. Ten foreign NGOs allegedly recruit activists to promote the decriminalization of drugs and the three outlets “actively cover” their rallies, State Duma deputy Vasily Piskaryov said at a session on foreign…

Russian and Ukrainian attitudes toward each other have worsened in less than half a year, a joint study by the independent Levada Center pollster and the Kiev International Institute of Sociology (KIIS) said Thursday. The latest survey showed 42% of Russians having a “good” or “very good” opinion of Ukraine; while 49% of Ukrainians had…

Russia’s Ambassador to Turkey, Alexei Yerkhov, faces threats over the Moscow-backed military campaign in Syria, the envoy said in an interview Thursday, four years after his predecessor’s assassination. Yerkhov’s predecessor Andrei Karlov was shot dead by an off-duty policeman at the opening of an Ankara exhibition in December 2016. Russia and Turkey support opposing sides…

President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday Russia would not legalize gay marriage as long as he was in the Kremlin. He made clear he would not allow the traditional notion of mother and father to be subverted by what he called “parent number 1” and “parent number 2”. “As far as ‘parent number 1’ and ‘parent number…

Protesters in Russia are twice as likely to receive real prison time for violence against law enforcement authorities than those tried for the same crime under different circumstances, the independent Novaya Gazeta newspaper reported Thursday. Novaya Gazeta compared nearly 12,000 assault sentences in 2016-2019 with the 57 sentences handed down to protesters over their role…

A court in southern Russia has sentenced a scientist to seven and a half years in prison for treason, the state-run TASS news agency reported Thursday. Alexei Temirev, a Doctor of Technical Sciences from the city of Novocherkassk, was detained in July 2018 and his case files were classified. Investigators accused him of sending state…

As the only remaining independent, English-language news source reporting from Russia, The Moscow Times plays a critical role in connecting Russia to the world. Editorial decisions are made entirely by journalists in our newsroom, who adhere to the highest ethical standards. We fearlessly cover issues that are often considered off-limits or taboo in Russia, from…

As the only remaining independent, English-language news source reporting from Russia, The Moscow Times plays a critical role in connecting Russia to the world. Editorial decisions are made entirely by journalists in our newsroom, who adhere to the highest ethical standards. We fearlessly cover issues that are often considered off-limits or taboo in Russia, from…

As the only remaining independent, English-language news source reporting from Russia, The Moscow Times plays a critical role in connecting Russia to the world. Editorial decisions are made entirely by journalists in our newsroom, who adhere to the highest ethical standards. We fearlessly cover issues that are often considered off-limits or taboo in Russia, from…

As the coronavirus epidemic continues its rapid spread worldwide, Russian pranksters have been staging coronavirus scares in public places, pretending to have virus-induced seizures and even dressing up in hazmat suits to detain ‘sick’ people. One man caused panic on the Moscow metro on Feb. 2 when he collapsed on the floor of a metro…

As the only remaining independent, English-language news source reporting from Russia, The Moscow Times plays a critical role in connecting Russia to the world. Editorial decisions are made entirely by journalists in our newsroom, who adhere to the highest ethical standards. We fearlessly cover issues that are often considered off-limits or taboo in Russia, from…

As Russia prepares to mark the 75th anniversary of the World War II victory, President Vladimir Putin is stepping up his defense of Josef Stalin and digging in against calls to open up secret archives on the Soviet state’s killing of millions of its own citizens. People in places such as Butovo where more than…

Russia on Wednesday accused Turkey of flouting agreements it had made with Moscow on Syria and of aggravating the situation in Idlib where Syrian forces have made gains in their campaign to eliminate the last insurgent bastion in a nine-year war. That offensive has fueled violence in Idlib, in northwest Syria and bordering Turkey, forcing…

Russian forces have mediated an armed conflict between pro-regime and U.S. troops in northeastern Syria, the Russian military said Wednesday following a deadly incident. U.S. soldiers killed one person in Syria’s Hasakah region after their vehicles were stopped at a checkpoint, according to Syrian and Turkish media. The shooting was reportedly followed by U.S. airstrikes…

The Netherlands refused a request by Moscow to consider allowing Russia to prosecute three Russian nationals identified as suspects in the 2014 downing of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17, the Dutch justice minister revealed on Wednesday. The first court hearing in the Dutch case against the three Russian suspects and one Ukrainian is scheduled for March 9. If the case…

A Russian court on Wednesday released three men who were taken into custody last year in an embezzlement case against the Baring Vostok private equity group, placing them under house arrest instead, the RIA news agency reported. The men, including two Baring Vostok executives, were detained a year ago along with their colleagues, U.S. investor…

A swimming pool in southern Russia that banned women has been ordered to reverse its decision, the Kommersant business daily reported Wednesday. The prosecutor’s office in the majority Muslim republic of Dagestan ruled that the Anzhi Arena’s actions were illegal and a violation of human rights, although it stopped short of calling the ban discrimination.…