Russian State-Funded Sputnik News Pulls Out of Britain

Russia’s state-run Sputnik news organization will shut down its British operations five years after opening a bureau in Scotland, the news agency described as a Kremlin propaganda tool announced Friday.  Sputnik began broadcasting from its Edinburgh studio in August 2016, the same year that U.S. intelligence agencies accused it and the RT news channel of…

ROSATOM experience will be used in industrial and civil construction in Nizhny Novgorod Region

JSC Atomenergoproekt (company of the Engineering Division of ROSATOM) and the Ministry of Construction and Development of Agglomeration of Nizhny Novgorod Region have concluded an agreement on cooperation in development and promotion of information model technologies in the field of industrial and civil construction in the region. In accordance with the agreements, the Engineering Division…

Rights Groups Urge Russians to Wake Up to Syria Abuses

Rights groups in Moscow urged Russians to take responsibility for abuses in Syria as they released a damning report Friday on the country’s role in the decade-old conflict. Published to coincide with the 10-year anniversary of the Syrian war, the report is the first into the conflict by Russian campaigners and seeks to shed light…

Armenian PM Self-Isolates Ahead of Putin Meeting

Armenia’s prime minister has gone into self-isolation as a preventative measure against coronavirus ahead of a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow, officials said on Friday.  It is common for anybody meeting in person with 68-year-old Putin to isolate beforehand to protect him from the contagion. Nikol Pashinyan, who faces backlash at home…

Sculptures Sing Opera at St. Petersburg’s Manege

An exhibition called “Stillness. Russian Classical Sculpture From Shubin To Matveev” opened at the Manege in St. Petersburg, throwing a virtual bridge across centuries, artists and art forms. The spacious halls of the Manege have been transformed into theater spaces, complete with a foyer, dressing rooms, an orchestra pit, audience seats and stages where different…

Ukraine Says Russia Massing Troops on Border, U.S. Warns Moscow

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Thursday accused Moscow of building up troops on his country’s border as the United States warned Russia against “intimidating” Ukraine. Kiev has been locked in a conflict with Russian-backed separatists since 2014, and this week Ukrainian officials reported Russian troop movement in annexed Crimea and on the border, near territories…

Russia Warns of Anti-White ‘Aggression’ in U.S.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Thursday warned that anti-white racism might be building in the United States and said that political correctness “taken to the extreme” would have lamentable consequences. In an interview with political scientists broadcast on national television, Moscow’s top diplomat said Russia had long supported a worldwide trend that “everyone wants to get…

Navalny Says State Broadcaster RT Filmed Prison Conditions

A television crew from the Kremlin-backed broadcaster RT has filmed a segment at Alexei Navalny’s prison colony, the jailed Kremlin critic’s Telegram channel said Thursday. The crew arrived at the prison colony, known as one of Russia’s harshest, a day after Navalny announced the start of his hunger strike to demand proper medical care for…

Hunger Strikes as Russian and Soviet Protest Tools

Jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny announced Wednesday that he is going on hunger strike to demand medical treatment and an end to “torturous” sleep deprivation in one of Russia’s most notorious prison colonies. Hunger strikes as a tool of protest date back to the Soviet era, when solo dissidents or even entire groups of prisoners…

More Russian Doctors Trust Coronavirus Vaccine – Poll

Russian doctors are more likely to trust the homegrown Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine than they were last year and trust their country’s jab significantly more than they do foreign vaccines, according to an independent survey published Thursday. Out of the nearly 2,000 Russian doctors surveyed by Levada and the professional community of medics Vrachi.rf, 69%…

Russian ‘Anti-Apple’ Law Requiring Local Apps Takes Effect

Smartphones, tablets and computers sold in Russia must now come with pre-installed domestic software and apps from Thursday in a new law seen by critics as another attempt to curb online freedom. The initiative was introduced in an effort to promote the country’s tech companies but critics say it is another bid to tighten state control of Russia’s…

Timeline: Navalny’s Tumultuous Return to Russia

Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny on Wednesday announced he is launching a hunger strike from the prison colony where he is serving a 2.5-year sentence to demand proper medical treatment. The Kremlin critic was sent to one of Russia’s most notorious penal colonies on returning to Russia from Germany, where he spent months recovering from…

U.S. Slashes Visa Services at Consulates in Russia

U.S. visas and services for American citizens will only be available in Moscow after the U.S. slashed operations at its remaining Russian consulates, U.S. Ambassador to Russia John Sullivan announced Thursday. High tensions and Russia’s 2017 personnel cap on the U.S. diplomatic mission previously prompted the State Department to consider closing the two remaining U.S.…

Russian Diplomats in North Korea Facing ‘Acute Shortages’ of Food, Essentials as Frustration Builds

Russian diplomats in North Korea are growing increasingly frustrated with the “severe conditions” in which they have found themselves as anti-coronavirus measures cut off the secretive country from the rest of the world. In a Thursday statement, Russia’s Embassy in Pyongyang said diplomats in the country are facing an acute shortage of essential goods sparked…

Russian Journalist’s Georgia Visit Sparks Protests

Protests broke out in Georgia’s capital of Tbilisi over Russian journalist Vladimir Pozner’s visit to celebrate his birthday, Georgian media reported late Wednesday. Footage showed crowds chanting outside a central Tbilisi hotel where the media personality and state-run television talk show host was said to have been gathering with dozens of guests on the eve…