IMATRA, Finland — At the edge of Imatra, a medium-sized Finnish town on the border with Russia, high snow drifts ensconce a shopping outlet that sits barren apart from a large “for sale” sign. Another sign on the building reads “Добро пожаловать!” — Russian for “welcome” — a reminder that just a few years ago,…
Дежурство: on call, on stand-by, duty In my post-Russian life, I’m trying to learn a new language. I can sometimes conjugate a few essential verbs and occasionally even get case endings right, but I can’t really talk to people. I realized that I don’t have that basic set of 50 or 100 standard phrases that…
Exiled Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya said Friday she has not heard from her jailed husband for a year, describing the lack of communication as a form of torture. She called on UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to intervene, saying that other Belarusian political prisoners had also been cut off from the outside world. “It’s been…
A Ukrainian drone attack on the Russian border region of Belgorod killed two people on Friday, its governor said. He said three Ukrainian “kamikaze drones” hit the village of Rozhdestvenska, close to the border with Ukraine, in a region that has come under frequent artillery, rocket and drone attacks throughout the two-year conflict. “As a…
Updated with additional travel alerts from other countries. Latvia’s Foreign Ministry on Friday urged its citizens to leave Russia as soon as possible and to avoid mass gatherings in Moscow amid reports of possible “terrorist acts” in the coming days. “We urge Latvian citizens in Russia to be cautious and avoid mass gatherings… due to…
Russia has celebrated International Women’s Day since the Soviet era. But the holiday — which celebrates women’s contributions to society — has inevitably been influenced by the war in Ukraine like much of Russian society. The result has been images of Russian soldiers and masked security officers handing women flowers to mark the holiday:
Women’s Day has been a national holiday in Russia since 1966, but was celebrated for decades before that. It is a festival where Russians pay tribute to all the women in their lives, from mothers and sisters to teachers and colleagues. While the United Nations uses International Women’s Day to celebrate gender equality and highlight…
President Vladimir Putin met with billionaire Roman Abramovich to discuss swapping the late opposition activist Alexei Navalny for Russians jailed in the West just hours before he died in an Arctic prison last month, the investigative outlet Agentstvo reported Friday, citing four sources familiar with the matter. According to two of Agentstvo’s sources, Putin and…
Russian President Vladimir Putin hailed motherhood as “an amazing purpose for a woman” in his International Women’s Day message aired Friday. “You, dear women, are able to transform the world thanks to your beauty, wisdom and generous hearts, but, most importantly, thanks to the greatest gift that nature has given you — childbirth,” Putin said in…
Indian authorities said they have detained members of a “trafficking” network sending citizens of the country to fight for the Russian army in Ukraine after raiding several travel agents. At least two Indian citizens fighting as soldiers in Russia’s armed forces have been killed in the war, with several recruits telling AFP they were shipped…
A late-night Russian strike on the northeastern Ukrainian region of Kharkiv killed two people, the region’s governor said Friday, as both Moscow and Kyiv reported a wave of overnight aerial attacks. Kharkiv region Governor Oleh Syniehubov said Russia launched a “series of shelling” attacks on the town of Kupyansk, close to the front lines, late…