Year: 2020

Cossacks have begun patrolling a predominantly Chinese neighborhood in Russia’s fourth-largest city of Yekaterinburg in search of signs of the coronavirus, the Znak.com news website reported Wednesday. Russia temporarily banned entry to Chinese nationals starting Thursday in an attempt to prevent the spread of the disease, which has killed more than 2,000 people in mainland…

Russia’s exports to China dropped by almost a third in the first six weeks of the year as the spread of coronavirus sapped demand in the world’s second-biggest economy. Exports dropped 21% to 620,000 tons year-on-year in January and halved to 118,000 tons in the first 10 days of February, the Izvestia newspaper reported Wednesday,…

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Wednesday a military operation by his forces to push back a Syrian government offensive against rebels in northwest Syria was now “a matter of time” after talks with Russia failed to halt the assault. Turkish troops have already massed inside the Idlib region and more were heading to the border area,…

Chinese diplomats were at a loss after Russia barred entry to Chinese citizens as a coronavirus prevention measure, the Kommersant business daily reported Wednesday.  Russia announced the temporary entry ban for Chinese tourists, workers, students and private travelers starting Thursday. The suspension does not affect non-Chinese nationals traveling from China, and Chinese transit passengers will…

State media in Russia is reveling in the scandal of an exiled Russian activist in France who shared a sexually explicit video that punctured the political career of one of Emmanuel Macron’s top allies. Petr Pavlensky and his partner, the woman who reportedly received the explicit messages from Benjamin Griveaux that were released last week,…

On a chilly April morning in 2019, four North Korean men arrived unannounced at the Verona stud farm in Moscow’s elite suburb of Rublyovka in search of a perfect white Welsh pony for the son of their Supreme Leader Kim Jong-Un.  They settled on Sansa, an exceptional three-year-old that had won awards across Russia. “One…

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…

U.S. authorities in Miami arrested a Mexican citizen who had been recruited by a Russian government official to locate and obtain the license plate number of the car of a “U.S. government source,” the U.S. Justice Department said on Tuesday. Hector Alejandro Cabrera Fuentes, a resident of Singapore, was arrested on Sunday after he arrived…

Ukraine’s film authority has banned the distribution of several movies over national security concerns, including a Russian-Ukrainian romantic comedy featuring Ukraine’s current president, it said Tuesday. The Ukrainian state film agency said it banned a total of five movies in 2019, three of which were banned to comply with a request by Ukraine’s security service. …

Russian artist Pyotr Pavlensky was put under formal investigation on Tuesday after the publication of an online sexual chat that caused one of French President Emmanuel Macron’s closest lieutenants to pull out of the race to become mayor of Paris. The Paris prosecutor’s office said Pavlensky had been released from a police station on Tuesday…

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…

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday dismissed a veteran, once close adviser who until recently managed Moscow’s relations with war-torn Ukraine. Putin fired Vladislav Surkov, seen as a hardliner by many in Kiev, in a terse two-line statement on the Kremlin website. His sacking, which coincided with a flare-up in fighting in eastern Ukraine, had…

Russia will suspend entry of Chinese citizens to its territory starting from Feb. 20, Russian authorities in charge of coronavirus prevention said on Tuesday. Travel restrictions of some form to prevent the spread of the disease, which has now killed more than 1,800 people, have been imposed by many countries to ease the risks of…

The United States on Tuesday tightened financial restrictions on Venezuela, blacklisting a subsidiary of Russian oil firm Rosneft that President Donald Trump’s administration has said provides a lifeline to President Nicolas Maduro’s government. The sanctions announced by the U.S. Treasury Department increase the pressure on Russia, which the United States sees as the main backer of Maduro’s…

Suicides and fatal road accidents make up a high share of deaths in Russia’s military despite declining overall figures, according to Defense Ministry data cited by lawmakers Tuesday. Overall deaths in the Russian Armed Forces have decreased by 29% between 2015-2019, State Duma deputy Valery Rashkin told Interfax without providing figures for each cause of…

A second Russian citizen from the quarantined cruise ship Diamond Princess has been hospitalized with suspected coronavirus infection, Russia’s Embassy in Japan said Tuesday. The embassy said that a Russian woman earlier said to have been diagnosed with coronavirus on the cruise ship docked in Japan does not have the virus, but that her husband, who…

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…