Month: February 2021

Russian women activists have received hundreds of death threats after their Valentine’s Day “chain of solidarity” for female victims of political repression, the Mediazona news website reported Tuesday. Around 300 participants formed human chains in central Moscow and St. Petersburg on Sunday following weeks of harsh police crackdowns at pro-Navalny protests. The event’s organizer, activist…

Russian academics are warning that lawmakers seek to curb their freedoms with a new law that would require state permission for public outreach, the weekly journal Nature reported Monday. Amendments to Russia’s education law advancing through the lower house of parliament, the State Duma, seek to stamp out “anti-Russian” influence in educational activities outside formal settings.…

France’s national cyber security agency said Monday it had discovered a hack of several organizations that bore similarities to other attacks by a group linked to Russian intelligence. It said the hackers had taken advantage of a vulnerability in monitoring software sold by French group Centreon, which lists blue-chip French companies as clients, such as…

The annual march in honor of slain Russian opposition politician Boris Nemtsov will not take place this year due to the coronavirus pandemic, one of its organizers announced on Monday.  Supporters have held memorial marches for Nemtsov every Feb. 27 near the site on a bridge steps away from the Kremlin where he was shot…

Courtyard protests across Russia in support of jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny were a success despite lacking the massive crowds of previous rallies, his team said Monday. The Valentine’s Day demonstrations saw Navalny supporters hold up flashlights and candles in residential courtyards rather than stage traditional street protests. Photos from the event flooded social media…

Russian billionaire Oleg Tinkov, arrested in London on tax fraud charges, said he plans to dedicate himself to charity work including fighting leukemia, with which he was diagnosed in 2019. “To be honest, I no longer have the motivation to do business. I’m done; I’m retired,” Tinkov, who founded the online bank Tinkoff, was quoted…

A Moscow coronavirus hospital medic said he has been fired for joining a flashlight protest in support of jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny while wearing his protective gear. Saidanvar Sulaimonov was among the tens of thousands to share photos of themselves holding up phone flashlights Sunday in a show of muted solidarity after weeks of…

Indonesian police are on the hunt in Bali for a Russian fugitive wanted by Interpol after he escaped from custody while waiting to be deported from the resort island, authorities said Monday. CCTV footage released by the authorities showed Andrei Kovalenko sneaking out of the immigration office in Denpasar detention center on Thursday while officials…

A Russian court is creating a “dangerous precedent” for press freedom by fining the Ura.ru news website 15 million rubles ($205,000) for defaming a Chechen official, the outlet said Monday. The Chechen Supreme Court is scheduled to hear Ura.ru’s appeal this Friday against a lower court ruling that found the Yekaterinburg-based outlet guilty of falsely…

People across Russia gathered in residential courtyards and public squares late on Sunday, lighting their phone flashlights in a show of support for jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny. The new tactics were an effort to avoid the harsh police crackdown seen at previous protests in Navalny’s support over the past month and resembled similar neighborhood…

Russia has launched a postponed cargo spacecraft carrying food and supplies to cosmonauts at the International Space Station who had been forced to rely on American colleagues for supplies. The Progress MS-16 freighter was due to send 2.5 tons of food, fuel and adhesives for air leak repairs to the ISS in December but was…

Russia has confirmed 4,086,090 cases of coronavirus and 80,520 deaths. Feb. 15: What you need to know today Russia confirmed 14,207 new coronavirus cases and 394 deaths. Health workers in Bosnia received the first dose of Russia’s Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine, Reuters reported Friday.  Montenegro, St. Vincent and the Grenadines and Kazakhstan have authorized Russia’s Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine,…

SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk on Sunday invited President Vladimir Putin to a “conversation” on the popular invitation-only audio chat app Clubhouse. “Would you like to join me for a conversation on Clubhouse?” Musk tweeted at Putin’s official Twitter account. In a Russian-language follow-up, Musk said “it would be a great honor to speak…

Hundreds of women formed a “chain of solidarity” in central Moscow Sunday to support jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny’s wife Yulia and female victims of political repression. The Valentine’s Day demonstration follows weeks of harsh police crackdowns at pro-Navalny protests and was inspired by last summer’s protests in neighboring Belarus, where women formed human chains…

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday accused the West of using jailed opposition figure Alexei Navalny to try to “contain” Russia. “Our opponents or our potential opponents… have always relied on — and used — ambitious, power-hungry people,” Putin said in an interview with Russian media conducted on Wednesday but only broadcast on Sunday by…

Russia has given preliminary approval for its Covid-19 Sputnik V vaccine to be manufactured in Serbia, a minister said on Friday. “The first phase of the production of Russia’s vaccine Sputnik V on Serbia’s territory has been preliminarily approved,” Serbia’s minister for innovations Nenad Popovic said in a statement. The announcement was made after a…

Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad-Bager Galibaf paid a visit to Russia this week, marking his first foreign trip since assuming the post in May of last year.  Though the visit is unlikely to bring an immediate breakthrough despite Iran’s plans for fast-track membership in the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU), it will certainly make a long-term imprint…

A Russian-born socialite has been released from U.S. prison after completing a nearly four-year sentence for theft and larceny, the Insider reported Thursday. A New York City court in 2019 sentenced Anna Sorokin to at least four years in prison for posing as a German heiress named Anna Delvey and scamming banks and friends into…

The conflict was at the center of diplomatic spat the UN Thursday when Western countries claimed Russia was blocking efforts to bring about an end to the fighting. Kiev has repeatedly accused Moscow and the separatists of undermining a ceasefire that brought relative calm when it took effect in July last year. Ukraine’s defense ministry reported that…

Russia is ready to cut ties with the European Union if it imposes further sanctions on the Russian economy, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Thursday. The heated rhetoric comes 10 days before top EU diplomats are scheduled to discuss new travel bans and asset freezes on President Vladimir Putin’s allies in response to the jailing…

Russia’s main Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny was back in court Friday for allegedly defaming a World War II veteran, after being ordered to prison in another case that sparked global outrage and mass protests in his country. The hearing came a little over one week after the 44-year-old opposition leader, a persistent thorn in President…

When Nikolai Bondarenko stepped outside his apartment building in the Volga River city of Saratov on the morning of Feb. 8, the police were waiting for him. The city council communist deputy and video blogger was arrested and fined 20,000 rubles ($270) for attending an unsanctioned protest in support of jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny.…

President Vladimir Putin has floated the possibility of getting vaccinated against the coronavirus later in 2021, the Kommersant business daily reported Thursday, citing his closed-door meeting with journalists. Putin, 68, has held off on receiving Russia’s domestically manufactured Covid-19 vaccine despite touting it as the world’s “best” jab and boasting of its first-in-the-world approval. His…

Russia has agreed to pay jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny damages for his 2012 detention during mass anti-government demonstrations that Europe’s human rights court ruled degrading, Interfax reported Thursday. Russia’s Justice Ministry said it will not appeal the European Court of Human Rights’ (ECHR) November ruling because the ruling did not hold that Navalny’s rights…

Russia said Thursday it would respond in kind if the EU imposes sanctions on Moscow over the jailing of opposition leader Alexei Navalny and a crackdown on protests by his supporters. EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell earlier this week said he would propose the bloc impose new sanctions on Russia, as he blasted the…

Vladimir Kara-Murza, a prominent Kremlin critic who survived two suspected poisonings, was likely tailed by the same chemical weapons squad that allegedly poisoned Alexei Navalny, the Bellingcat investigative outlet reported in a joint investigation with The Insider and Der Spiegel.  Bellingcat analyzed travel data which showed that in both cases, in 2015 and 2017, Kara-Murza…

Law enforcement authorities warned Russians Thursday not to take part in Valentine’s Day courtyard protests in support of jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny. Navalny’s team has called on supporters to hold up their cellphone flashlights in their residential courtyards for short intervals to avoid the kind of crackdown that followed a wave of mass nationwide…

As the value of Bitcoin soared this year, bringing cryptocurrencies back into the global spotlight, Russia’s opposition leader Alexei Navalny saw his team’s crypto wallet fatten.   Public blockchain data shows that a Bitcoin address tied to Navalny received 3.5 Bitcoin ($120,000) at the end of January as supporters rushed to donate to the Kremlin critic…

Ukraine has banned coronavirus vaccines produced in bitter rival Russia despite struggles to launch its vaccination campaign. A resolution passed by the government on Feb. 8 and posted on its website Wednesday banned the registration of vaccines from “aggressor states,” a designation Ukraine has applied to Russia since 2015. Ukraine’s pro-Western leadership has repeatedly rejected…

Two Russian regions’ move to lift their face mask mandates is premature, a leading health expert told The Moscow Times on Thursday.  Officials in the republic of Chechnya and the republic of Udmurtia on Wednesday announced that residents would no longer be required to wear face masks in public, becoming the first two regions of…

A senior Russian university administrator has resigned after tricking students into filming a flashmob in support of President Vladimir Putin following mass nationwide protests that criticized his rule, local media reported Wednesday. The students were shocked to learn that their participation in a coordinated hand- and flag-waving performance for a state holiday had been repackaged…

France had allegedly rejected Russia’s offer to examine its scientists’ findings that opposition leader Alexei Navalny was poisoned, President Vladimir Putin was reported to have said at a closed meeting Wednesday. Putin told chief editors of Russian news outlets that he had promised French President Emmanuel Macron that Moscow would “immediately” open a criminal investigation…

Protests sparked by the jailing of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny have spread beyond the traditional Russian activist hubs of Moscow and St. Petersburg as discontent with the authorities and frustration over low standards of living rise. Tens of thousands took to the streets in over 120 cities after the opposition leader was arrested on his…

The time in prison has done little to quench Ruslan Krasnikov’s thirst for change at the helm of Russian government — and to fight for it through street protests.  “The protests will continue. People have suffered injustice,” he said Wednesday outside a detention center where he had just spent 10 days in Russia’s second-largest city…

Jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny’s wife Yulia Navalnaya has left Russia for Germany, Russian state-run news agency Interfax and German newspaper Der Spiegel reported Wednesday, both citing unnamed sources. Navalnaya flew to Frankfurt from Moscow’s Domodedovo Airport, Interfax cited its source as saying. Lawyers for both Navalny and Navalnaya told the state-run TASS news agency that they…

Russia’s media watchdog said Wednesday it had fined the Russian-language service of U.S.-funded Radio Liberty/Radio Free Europe nearly $150,000 over non-compliance with its controversial “foreign agent” law, in a penalty that could increase. Groups or individuals identified as “foreign agents” in Russia must disclose their sources of funding and label publications with the relevant tag…

An independent Russian news website has shut down four months after its editor died from setting herself on fire outside the city of Nizhny Novgorod’s police headquarters. Irina Slavina, editor-in-chief of Koza Press, died on Oct. 2, the day after security forces raided her home in search of evidence of her ties to the opposition.…

A Russian court on Wednesday ordered a psychological examination of former U.S. Marine Trevor Reed, who was convicted of assaulting a police officer in a case condemned by President Joe Biden’s administration. Reed, 29, was found guilty and sentenced to nine years behind bars in July last year for allegedly hitting a Moscow law enforcement…

A major winter storm is expected to descend on Moscow this week with massive snowdrifts and unusually cold air temperatures even by the Russian capital’s standards, forecasters said Wednesday. Snow is expected to blanket Moscow beginning Thursday afternoon and lasting into the weekend, Russian weather service chief Roman Vilfand told the state-run TASS news agency.…

Visitors to Armenian-controlled Nagorno-Karabakh now have to get Russian permission ahead of time. The territory’s de facto ministry of foreign affairs announced new entry regulations for foreigners on Feb. 8, and one of the provisions was that Russian peacekeeping forces will examine applications “for security purposes” before they are approved. It’s not clear what prompted the new…

Russia said Wednesday it was looking to simplify entry requirements for migrant workers, to aid industries like construction and agriculture that are facing labor shortages due to the pandemic. Moscow announced border closures in spring last year to curb the spread of the coronavirus, prompting thousands of migrant workers, mostly from ex-Soviet countries in Central…

Russia’s surge in deaths last year is the “harsh reality” of the global coronavirus pandemic, the Kremlin said Wednesday after official data showed a much higher Covid-19 death toll than initially reported. The state statistics service on Monday attributed 162,429 of deaths in 2020 to the coronavirus, three times more than the 57,555 deaths first…

Around 2.2 million Russians have been partially vaccinated against the coronavirus so far — or 1.5% of the country’s population —  the lead scientist behind the development of Russia’s homemade Sputnik V vaccine said Wednesday. The progress update was announced by Denis Logunov, deputy director of research at the state-run Gamaleya Institute, at a meeting…

But Russia has come under fire for its official virus statistics and the government’s stated death toll of 78,134 in particular has been undermined by recent mortality data. Figures published by statistics agency Rosstat on Monday showed more than 162,000 virus-related deaths last year, more than double the number reported by the government’s task force so far.…

Russian activists have announced a “Chain of Solidarity and Love” in central Moscow on Valentine’s Day in support of jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny’s wife Yulia as well as Russian women prosecuted for political reasons.  The event was inspired by last summer’s women-led actions in neighboring Belarus, where people formed long human chains to protest police…

Two coronavirus patients hospitalized outside Moscow have died following an oxygen outage in at least the fourth such incident in recent months, regional health officials confirmed to Russian media Wednesday. A malfunction is believed to have caused the oxygen supply interruption at the coronavirus wing of the hospital in the western Moscow region district of Odintsovo, emergency…

Security forces detained several Moscow-based Jehovah’s Witnesses during raids in connection with a new extremism investigation into the religious group’s members, authorities announced Wednesday. Russia’s Investigative Committee, which probes major crimes, said Federal Security Service (FSB) agents, National Guardsmen and police officers assisted in the raids at 16 addresses in and around Moscow. The investigative…

Russia has issued an interstate arrest warrant for Leonid Volkov, the regional network coordinator for jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny, Interfax reported on Wednesday, citing the court press service.  Volkov, who is currently based in Lithuania, faces criminal charges in Russia for allegedly inciting minors online to participate in unsanctioned protests last month. Several of…