Russians are racing to try and obtain European visas as some countries impose travel restrictions and fears grow that the European Union could ban Russian tourists from the bloc in response to Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. The number of applications for Schengen visas — which give access to most EU countries — submitted by Russians…
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A robotic dog equipped with an anti-tank rocket launcher mounted on its back quickly went viral after it was unveiled at Russia’s annual Army-2022 international arms expo Monday. Just as quickly, investigative outlets found the futuristic device to bear a striking resemblance to a consumer-grade robotic dog available on Chinese online marketplaces. Dubbed “M-81 complex,”…
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Estonia on Tuesday removed a Soviet-era World War II memorial from Narva — a city with a large Russian-speaking minority — accusing Russia of using such monuments to stir up tensions. Prime Minister Kaja Kallas said in a statement that the move was a response to “increasing tensions and confusion around memorials in Narva.” “We…
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A court in Russia’s republic of Bashkortostan on Tuesday fined a veteran rock star over an anti-war speech he made onstage at a concert earlier this year. Yury Shevchuk, the legendary frontman of rock band DDT, spoke out against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine during the band’s concert in his native city of Ufa in May. …
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Russia said Tuesday that massive explosions at a military facility on the Kremlin-controlled Crimean peninsula in Ukraine that also damaged electrical power infrastructure were the result of “sabotage.” Russian President Vladimir Putin meanwhile said the United States was trying to drag out the conflict, accusing Washington of putting Ukrainians in the firing line and supplying…
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Russia has no military need to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said Tuesday. “From a military point of view, there is no need to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine to achieve the set goals,” Shoigu said at an international security conference in Moscow. He slammed media speculation that Russia could potentially…
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Russian President Vladimir Putin has revived the Soviet-era award of “Mother Heroine” as the country grapples with a demographic crisis fueled by plunging birth rates. Putin signed a decree Monday reviving the honorary title “Mother Heroine,” which Soviet leader Josef Stalin first established in 1944 in the wake of massive population losses during World War…
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Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday accused the West of seeking to prolong the war in Ukraine and impose a unipolar world order that prevents nations from “choosing their own path.” “More and more states and nations choose [to pursue] their own path of free, sovereign development…These processes are opposed by Western globalist elites [that]…
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Five Europeans captured in eastern Ukraine went on trial Monday in a court administered by Kremlin-backed separatists in the city of Donetsk, Russian media reported. The five — Mathias Gustafsson of Sweden, Vjekoslav Prebeg of Croatia, and Britons John Harding, Andrew Hill and Dylan Healy — all pleaded not guilty to charges of being mercenaries,…
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Jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny said Monday he had been placed in a punishment cell following his efforts to create a labor union in jail. Navalny is serving a nine-year prison sentence in a strict regime penal colony near the Russian town of Vladimir on embezzlement charges that he and his allies say are politically…
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President Vladimir Putin on Monday promoted Russian weapons to his foreign allies, saying they had all been tested on the field of battle. “We are ready to offer allies and partners the most modern types of weapons — from small arms to armored vehicles and artillery, combat aircraft and unmanned aerial vehicles,” Putin said in…
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Russian investigative news outlet iStories has published an apparent war crimes confession from a soldier stationed on the outskirts of Kyiv during the early weeks of the Kremlin’s invasion of Ukraine. iStories’ reporters identified four Russian servicemen suspected of robberies, looting and murder of civilians in the village of Andriivka by using photos the soldiers…
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Military activity near the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in southeastern Ukraine has caused increasing concern in recent days as cases of shelling rise and experts warn that the risks of a serious nuclear incident are very real. “Any attack to nuclear plants is… suicidal,” United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said last week, as he called…
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Ukrainian forces struck one of Russian mercenary group Wagner’s bases in eastern Ukraine’s Luhansk region, regional authorities said Monday. “The Armed Forces of Ukraine again successfully struck the enemy’s headquarters…this time in Popasna, where a base of the Wagner PMC was destroyed yesterday. The number of those killed is being clarified,” Luhansk regional head Serhiy…
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Russian aluminum magnate Oleg Deripaska has sued bank founder Oleg Tinkov, seeking 2 billion rubles in damages ($32.5 million) for alleged defamation, media reported Monday. Both Deripaska and Tinkov are among the few influential Russian business owners to have spoken candidly about the negative impacts of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Deripaska filed civil lawsuits against…
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While millions of Ukrainian children have fled their homes since Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, more than 3 million children remain in the country as of July 26, according to UNICEF. As Russia’s war against Ukraine drags on, children continue to live in wartime conditions, surrounded by bombed buildings, destroyed cars and anti-tank equipment.
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U.S. basketball star Brittney Griner, who was found guilty of drug possession and trafficking in Russia, has appealed her nine-year jail sentence, her lawyers said Monday. The two-time Olympic basketball gold medalist and Women’s NBA champion was arrested at a Moscow airport in February for possessing vape cartridges with a small amount of cannabis oil. “Brittney…
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A Russian journalist said he was barred entry to Estonia over the weekend after the Baltic country decided to stop allowing in Russian nationals on tourist visas. The incident came days before Estonia’s tourist-visa entry ban is set to take effect this Thursday, a measure imposed amid a wider European debate over shutting out Russian…
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Dmitry Vrubel, the Russian painter who shot to fame with a work on the Berlin Wall depicting Soviet and East German communist leaders kissing, has died in the German capital at age 62. One of the best known Berlin Wall graffiti pieces, Vrubel’s 1990 work titled “My God, Help Me to Survive This Deadly Love”…
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Russian oil production fell in the first weeks of August, ending several months of recovery from Western sanctions imposed over Russia’s war in Ukraine, the Kommersant business daily reported Monday. Average daily production so far this month has fallen by 3% compared to July, totaling 1.428 million tons, the publication said, citing unnamed sources familiar…
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Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un exchanged letters indicating stronger bilateral relations amid Moscow’s international isolation over its war in Ukraine, North Korean state media reported Monday. The letters follow Pyongyang’s recognition of two Moscow-backed separatist regions in eastern Ukraine and the country’s reported readiness to send workers to the…
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An explosion that set off a fire at a market in the Armenian capital Yerevan on Sunday killed three people and injured dozens of others, officials announced. The fire ripped through the market at Surmalu, said the first reports. “After preliminary data, an explosion happened which set off a fire,” said the emergency situations ministry…
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Forest fires so massive they dwarf European countries. Oil spills that turn Arctic rivers red. Snow that turns black from coal soot. Russia, the world’s fourth-largest emitter of greenhouse gasses and a country whose territory is warming 2.5 times faster than the planet as a whole, is already acutely feeling the impacts of climate change.…
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Hungary said Saturday that Russia has started delivering additional gas to the EU member following a July visit to Moscow by its foreign minister. Hungary’s Foreign Ministry said trade negotiations with Moscow “led to an agreement”, resulting in Russia’s Gazprom starting to deliver “above the already contracted quantities” on Friday. “It is the duty of…
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The U.S. and Russia are discussing a prisoner exchange that would involve trading a notorious Russian arms trafficker for an American basketball star, a Russian diplomat said Saturday. It marked the first time that Russia has said the talks concerned exchanging Viktor Bout, known as the “Merchant of Death,” for two-time Olympian Brittney Griner. “The…
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Karl Nesselrode (1780-1862) was a staunch conservative and monarchist. In the mid-19th century, he had successfuly transformed Russia into what would later be called “the gendarme of Europe.” And thanks to popular support for the “Russian world” in the Balkans at the time, he achieved the predictable result of Russia’s complete diplomatic isolation on the…
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Russia’s economy will return to growth in 2024, the country’s Central Bank said in its policy outlook for the next three years published Friday. According to the bank’s baseline scenario, Russian gross domestic product (GDP) will record an annual fall of up to 6% this year. But, in the fourth quarter of 2023, the economy…
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European leaders should be wary of “possible incidents” at nuclear power plants in their countries, Russia’s former President Dmitry Medvedev said Friday. Russia’s ex-leader, who has become increasingly hawkish since the invasion of Ukraine, made the threat in a post on messaging app Telegram about the shelling of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant in Russian-controlled southern…
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An analysis of archive footage from polling stations in Russia recorded during parliamentary elections last year suggests over 17 million ballots were cast fraudulently, independent media outlet Meduza reported Friday. At the time of the September elections, Russia’s Central Elections Commission said it lacked money to provide online video streaming from all polling stations. But…
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More than 5,000 Russian soldiers have been killed in Ukraine since the start of the invasion, according to a tally of confirmed deaths updated this week by independent Russian media outlet iStories. The figure is over three times higher than the official death toll of 1,351 which was last updated by the Russian Defense Ministry in…
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All along the road connecting Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia, there are billboards erected by the Russian peacekeeping mission there: “Where there are Russians, there is peace.” “The Russian peacekeeping contingent is guarding the peace.” But after recent escalations in tensions here, many Karabakh Armenians are doubting those promises. An outbreak of violence in early August saw two Armenian…
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A Russian court on Thursday placed former state TV journalist Marina Ovsyannikova, who denounced President Vladimir Putin’s attack on Ukraine live on air, under house arrest until October. On Wednesday, investigators detained Ovsyannikova, 44, and charged her with spreading information about the Russian armed forces deemed false by the government. The mother of two faces…
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Russia and Ukraine accused each other on Thursday of shelling the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant in Russian-controlled southern Ukraine ahead of an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council to address global concerns over the facility. Ukrainian forces “once again struck the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant,” Vladimir Rogov, a member of the Moscow-installed regional administration, said…
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Latvian MPs on Thursday declared Russia a “state sponsor of terrorism” whose actions in Ukraine constitute “targeted genocide against the Ukrainian people”. The statement MPs adopted said the parliament “recognizes Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism, and calls on other like-minded countries to express the same view”. Voting by 67 in favor and none…
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Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February plunged many liberal-minded Russians into a state of shock and apathy. But for Anna Rivina, the country’s leading expert on domestic and gender-based violence, the path forward amid wartime chaos was clear. “When the entire world seems to be falling apart, it is difficult to decide what to do,…
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Jailed Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny has filed a lawsuit against the penal colony where he is currently serving a nine-year prison service. Navalny said the IK-6 prison in the Vladimir region hadn’t disclosed information about the purchaser of the products that he manufactures in the colony. The regional court press service claimed the purchaser…
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Moscow’s ally Belarus on Thursday played down reports of overnight explosions at a military airbase near the border with Ukraine that is said to be used by Russian troops. “On Aug. 10, at around 23:00 (20:00 GMT), during a test run, a piece of equipment that had its engine replaced caught fire,” the Belarusian defense…
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The agency that processes immigration of Jews to Israel has started making preparations for its possible closure in Russia, The Jerusalem Post reported Wednesday. In a move that drew swift blowback from Israel, Russia’s Justice Ministry last month requested the “dissolution” of the Jewish Agency, citing unspecified legal violations. “The Jewish Agency will operate all…
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Ukraine on Wednesday accused Russia of carrying out rocket strikes that killed 14 civilians in areas near a nuclear power plant, as the G7 warned that Russian control of the facility “endangers the region.” Overnight strikes in the Dnipropetrovsk region in central Ukraine killed 13 people and injured 11, with five reported to be in…
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An apparent Ukrainian attack on a military air base in Russia-controlled Crimea sent people running for cover from a series of powerful blasts, causing shock among locals and tourists at the height of the holiday season. Towering plumes of black smoke were seen rising from the Saki air base in western Crimea on Tuesday afternoon,…
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Russian scientists and human rights activists have called on President Vladimir Putin to extend Russia’s moratorium on the death penalty to the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR). A DNR court in June sentenced British citizens Aiden Aslin and Shaun Pinner and Moroccan national Saadun Brahim — who fought alongside Kyiv’s forces — to death on…
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Russian police have detained and raided the house of Marina Ovsyannikova, the former state television producer who protested the war in Ukraine in a live news broadcast, her lawyer said Wednesday. Ovsyannikova, who has two young children, faces 10 years in prison on charges spreading “fakes” about the Russian army and will remain in custody until Thursday,…
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Ukraine on Wednesday accused Russia of rocket strikes that killed 13 civilians in areas near a Russian-held power plant, where renewed fighting has raised fears of a nuclear disaster. The overnight strikes in the Dnipropetrovsk region in central Ukraine also injured 11 people, with five reported to be in a serious condition. “It was a terrible night,…
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Steven Seagal, a Hollywood actor turned vocal Kremlin supporter, is visiting eastern Ukraine to film a documentary aimed at “changing the perception” of the war there, the leader of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) announced Tuesday. “Steven said that 98% of people who are talking about the conflict in media have never been here [in…
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Multiple explosions near a Russian naval air base on the western coast of annexed Crimea killed one person and injured several more Tuesday, according to eyewitness accounts and local pro-Kremlin officials. Videos filmed by eyewitnesses show a huge plume of black smoke rising from the direction of the Russian Black Sea Fleet’s Saki air base…
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Since Russia invaded Ukraine at the end of February, it has seized tens of thousands of square kilometers of Ukrainian territory including major cities like Kherson, Melitopol and Mariupol. While many civilians have fled, those who remain in Russian occupied territory are trying to continue with their lives despite the ongoing conflict. The Kremlin appears…
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France said Tuesday that a ban on Russian nationals entering military installations had been applied too rigidly when two Russian visitors were turned away at the Chateau de Vincennes, a medieval fortress and tourist attraction on the edge of Paris. Once the residence of French kings and among Europe’s best-preserved monuments of its kind, the…
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Last month, Vsevolod Osipov was unmasked as an informant for Russia’s security services. He had been sent to Tbilisi to monitor the many Russian dissidents who have flooded the Georgian capital recently. But he says his new notoriety hasn’t much affected his life here, and done little to scare away patrons – primarily Russians themselves…
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Russia has slammed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s proposal to ban all Russian travelers from going to the West, saying the measure would be unfeasible and counterproductive. In a Washington Post interview published Monday, Zelensky called on Western countries to shut their borders to all Russian nationals — regardless of their stance on their country’s invasion of Ukraine…
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Russia’s flagship airline Aeroflot has started stripping its passenger aircraft for parts after Western sanctions over Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine it off from foreign equipment and servicing it heavily relies on, Reuters reported Tuesday, citing four unnamed aviation industry sources. Russia’s 2030 aviation industry strategy envisions the “partial dismantling” of a portion of foreign-made aircraft…
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An Iranian satellite launched by Russia blasted off from Kazakhstan early Tuesday and went into orbit amid controversy that Moscow might use it to improve its surveillance of military targets in Ukraine. A live feed from Russian space agency Roscosmos showed the launch of the Soyuz-2.1b rocket carrying the Khayyam satellite from the Russia-controlled Baikonur…
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Russia said Monday it was suspending U.S. on-site inspections under a strategic arms reduction treaty with Washington, pointing to Western sanctions and coronavirus infections. The Russian foreign ministry said facilities that are subject to inspections under the New START treaty will be “temporarily” exempt from such inspections. The announcement comes as ties between Russia and…
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The Kremlin accused Ukrainian forces Monday of firing on Europe’s largest nuclear power plant in occupied Ukraine and warned the alleged attacks could have “catastrophic consequences.” Kyiv said Moscow was responsible and called for the area to be demilitarized, adding that two employees had been wounded in recent attacks. Fighting continued meanwhile along battle lines…
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Russian authorities have blocked or deleted some 138,000 websites since Moscow launched its invasion of neighboring Ukraine in February, the country’s prosecutor general said Monday. Following over 300 requests from prosecutors, Russia’s communications watchdog Roskomnadzor has censored thousands of websites in a bid to combat “fake news,” according to prosecutor general Igor Krasnov. “After the…
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The Kremlin’s war against Ukraine is one many Russians don’t want to fight. And some are so vehemently opposed that they are apparently prepared to take up arms against their country and fight alongside the Ukrainian army. The Freedom of Russia Legion claims it was formed in March, when over 100 Russian soldiers gave themselves up to…
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At least two dozen Russian regions have formed 40 volunteer units made up of thousands of their residents in efforts to ease Moscow’s manpower shortage in Ukraine, the Kommersant business daily reported Monday. The Kremlin’s recruitment drive aims to generate a battalion of about 400 contract soldiers in each of Russia’s 85 regions for a…
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Ukrainian forces bombed a strategic bridge over the Dnipro river overnight in the Russian-held city of Kherson, the army announced Monday. “What a night for the occupiers in the Kherson region. Strikes in the area of the Antonovskiy bridge,” regional deputy Sergei Khlan wrote on Facebook. Southern army command spokeswoman Natalia Gumeniuk confirmed the attack.…
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Four more ships loaded with grain set off from Ukrainian ports on Sunday, as Moscow and Kyiv blamed each other for a new strike at a Russian-occupied nuclear plant. Amnesty International, meanwhile, said it deeply regretted the “distress and anger” caused after it alleged Ukrainian forces were flouting international law by exposing civilians to Russian…
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The reelection of a Russian former deputy premier as head of the international chess federation was a “victory” for Moscow, the Kremlin said on Sunday. The reelection of Arkady Dvorkovich as FIDE president was “clearly very good news and a very significant victory,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov was quoted by the TASS news agency as…
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Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky on Saturday accused Russia of using the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant “for terror” after the operator of the facility reported major damage at the site. Energoatom, the operator of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in the south of the country, said Saturday that parts of the facility had been “seriously damaged” by military…
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