On Feb. 24, 2022, people across Ukraine awoke to the sound of Russian missiles as President Vladimir Putin declared what he called a “special military operation.” Two years later, millions of Ukrainians have been displaced, tens of thousands of civilians and combatants have been killed and a number of cities and towns have been destroyed…
The United Kingdom is offering British passports to Russian officials in exchange for intelligence information, the British newspaper i reported Friday, citing three anonymous U.K. intelligence sources and one former Russian informant. The report comes just over half a year after the head of Britain’s MI6 spy service, Richard Moore, urged Russians appalled by the…
Boris Nadezhdin says he will not rally his supporters to protest against his exclusion from next month’s presidential election — because, he says, he has learned from “Alexei Navalny’s mistakes.” “It would mean exposing my supporters to the police and Rosgvardia’s batons,” Nadezhdin told The Moscow Times, referring to the inevitable crackdown awaiting unauthorized protests…
U.S. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer arrived Friday in Ukraine in a bid to put pressure on his Republican opponents in Congress to unlock crucial aid for Kyiv as Russia’s invasion enters its third year. “We are here to show the Ukrainian people that America stands with them and will [continue] fighting to get the…
Russia’s appeal against its suspension by the International Olympic Committee was dismissed by the Court of Arbitration for Sport on Friday with Moscow lambasting its banishment from this summer’s Paris Games as “discrimination.” The IOC suspended the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) in October last year for violating the territorial integrity of the membership of Ukraine…
Russian investigators have told the mother of Alexei Navalny that she must agree to hold a secret funeral for her son or they will bury him at the prison where he died last week, the late activist’s spokeswoman said Friday. “An investigator called Alexei’s mother an hour ago and gave her an ultimatum: either she…
Russia has blocked the websites of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s (RFE/RL) five Central Asian bureaus, the independent internet freedom monitor Roskomsvoboda said Friday. An “unspecified state body” ruled to block the websites more than a year ago, in January 2023, but their domains were restricted inside Russia only on Thursday. RFE/RL operates in 27 languages in 23 countries,…
U.S. President Joe Biden on Friday announced sanctions against Russia on over 500 targets to mark the second anniversary of its invasion of Ukraine, vowing sustained pressure to stop President Vladimir Putin’s “war machine.” The sanctions, described as the largest single tranche since the start of the war, also seek to impose a cost for…
Russia’s Foreign Ministry announced Friday that it has “significantly” expanded an entry ban for European officials in response to the EU’s “illegal and unfriendly” sanctions on the eve of the second anniversary of the war in Ukraine. The EU’s 13th round of sanctions, adopted on Wednesday, targets 200 officials and entities mainly from Russia involved…
Dozens of Russian cultural figures and activists have called on authorities to release the body of opposition activist Alexei Navalny, who died in an Arctic penal colony last Friday. After days of being denied access, Navalny’s mother Lyudmila said Thursday she had finally been allowed to see her dead son’s body, but added that authorities refuse…
Moscow-installed authorities in annexed Crimea have charged Crimean Tatar activist and citizen journalist Lutfiye Zudiyeva with “misue of freedom of mass media,” the advocacy group Crimean Solidarity said Thursday. Several masked agents were filmed escorting Zudiyeva from her home in Dzhankoi, a town located in the north of the Crimean penninsula. “In a few days,…
Armenia has suspended its participation in a Russia-led security bloc, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said in an interview published on Friday, Yerevan’s latest step in distancing itself from Moscow. Russia and Armenia have traditionally been allies but relations soured last year when Russian peacekeepers failed to intervene when Azerbaijan took control of the disputed enclave…
Putin has also been bolstered at home, ahead of an election certain to extend his long rule: a massive crackdown has all but crushed dissent and the Russian leader’s main opponent — Alexei Navalny — is dead. Ukraine, meanwhile, has been weakened by the blocking of U.S. aid, its failed counter-offensive and worsening ammunition shortages.…
The United States on Thursday charged Russian banking tycoon Andrei Kostin and two U.S.-based associates for violating sanctions by paying for the maintenance of his luxury property. Kostin, chairman of Russia’s second-largest state-owned bank VTB, was accused of participating in a scheme to evade sanctions and launder funds to support his two superyachts, the Justice Department…
In the two years since the Kremlin invaded Ukraine, Russia has experienced a backsliding in several key areas connected to environmental protection and the fight against climate change. This not only poses risks to public health but could also undermine global efforts to address the climate crisis. While many of Russia’s environmental policies and related…
A video ad released this week urges Russians to go out and vote in the upcoming presidential election or face the consequences of a dystopian future in which traditional family values have been outlawed. The 6-minute video, published on YouTube Wednesday, employs a number of homophobic tropes to paint a hypothetical Russia of the year 2036, one…
Russian authorities have prosecuted more than 116,000 activists during President Vladimir Putin’s latest term in office, the investigative news outlet Proekt reported, surpassing levels of political repression seen during the rule of Soviet leaders Nikita Khrushchev and Leonid Brezhnev. Between 2018 and 2023, Russian courts fined 105,000 people for making public statements or attending protests. Another…
Ukraine said Friday it had shot down an A-50U Russian spy plane over the Sea of Azov, and shared a map appearing to show it had crashed over southern Russia. Moscow made no official comment, but authorities in Russia’s southern Krasnodar region said fire crews were at the scene of an air crash, without elaborating.…