A German tourist has been arrested in St. Petersburg on drug smuggling charges after he brought gummy bear edibles on a flight to Russia, the Federal Customs Service (FTS) said Tuesday. The man was detained at St. Petersburg’s Pulkovo airport after a customs inspector noticed inside of his backpack “a rigid plastic bag with the…
A court in Finland has jailed a Russian nationalist fighter Yan Petrovsky for violating EU sanctions by entering the country under an alias, the Finnish broadcaster Yle reported Tuesday. Petrovsky was detained in July on separate charges of committing terrorism in Ukraine. Yle reports that he was able to cross the border into Finland in…
Authorities in the Russian city of Vologda announced Tuesday that a local movie theater will screen U.S. conservative pundit Tucker Carlson’s interview with President Vladimir Putin. “This [interview] took place last week but it’s still being discussed all over the world,” Vologda Mayor Sergei Voropanov wrote on the messaging app Telegram. “But not every Vologda…
A Moscow court on Tuesday sentenced a 65-year-old American man to 21 years in prison for sexually abusing his sons when they lived in the United States. “The Savyolovsky court of Moscow sentenced 65-year-old U.S. citizen David Thomas Barnes to 21 years in a penal colony, finding him guilty of sexually abusing his own children,”…
Russian strikes killed five people across Ukraine on Tuesday, Ukrainian officials said. The governor of northeastern Ukraine’s Kharkiv region, Oleh Syniehubov, said three people were killed in his region, which borders Russia and has seen increased attacks in recent months. Syniehubov said a 61-year-old woman was killed when Russian forces shelled the city of Vovchansk,…
Pop star Filipp Kirkorov traveled to occupied Ukraine to perform for Russian soldiers two months after his attendance at a scandalous “nearly naked” party put a dent in his career, media reported Tuesday. Independent news outlets speculated that Kirkorov made the rare trip as an act of repentance days after his name appeared on a list of…
The Kremlin confirmed Tuesday that President Vladimir Putin will not take the stage to debate his rivals in Russia’s March presidential election. “Everyone can see Putin’s statements on all aspects of Russians’ lives on a virtually daily basis,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. He added that Putin “fundamentally differs” from all other candidates because…
Two trains collided in Russia’s Chelyabinsk region late Monday, with law enforcement officials saying one of the drivers involved in the crash was likely intoxicated. “A medical screening showed the locomotive driver had alcohol in his bloodstream,” the transportation unit of Russia’s Investigative Committee, which probes major crimes, said in a statement. The law enforcement…
Updated to include Peskov’s, Zakharova’s remarks. Russia has issued an arrest warrant for Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, the independent news website Mediazona reported Tuesday, marking the country’s first-ever criminal case against an acting head of a foreign government. Kallas appeared on Russia’s wanted list after she spoke in favor of dismantling a Soviet-era monument in…
A Russian court of appeals has sentenced prominent anti-war sociologist and Marxist theorist Boris Kagarlitsky to five years in prison, his lawyer told reporters on Tuesday. In December, Kagarlitsky was ordered by a Moscow military court to pay 600,000 rubles ($6,600) for “justifying terrorism,” charges which he denied. Prosecutors appealed the lower court’s decision to fine…