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In his first interview since being released in a prisoner swap between Russia and Ukraine, key MH17 witness Vladimir Tsemakh said Dutch and Australian officials offered him Dutch citizenship and a house in the Netherlands during interrogations. Tsemakh, a Ukrainian citizen, was kidnapped in the Donbass by Ukranian security services on June 27. He had […]

Four Russians have been rescued after being stranded in below-freezing temperatures in a remote Arctic region, The Siberian Times newspaper reported Friday. Three men and one woman had been traveling a 270-kilometer distance from the village of Berezovka to the town of Srednekolymsk in the republic of Sakha when their two snowmobiles broke down in […]

A Russian plane was forced to make an emergency landing when its engine failed shortly after takeoff from the Siberian city of Tyumen, the state-run TASS news agency reported Friday. There were 80 passengers and six crew members on board the flight, Interfax reported. The Sukhoi Superjet 100 operated by Yamal Airlines was flying from […]

Russia’s Supreme Court has disbanded veteran activist Lev Ponomaryov’s civil rights group months after authorities labeled it a “foreign agent,” Interfax reported Friday. Russia’s Justice Ministry blacklisted For Human Rights as a foreign agent alongside two of Ponomaryov’s other NGOs in February after an inspection into its political activity while receiving funding from abroad. Ponomaryov, […]

A Moscow court has ordered catering magnate Yevgeny Prigozhin’s company to compensate the parents of schoolchildren who suffered food poisoning last year, Interfax reported Friday. The parents sued Prigozhin’s business alongside other companies, schools and officials this spring for the December 2018 dysentery outbreak in several state-run daycare centers and kindergartens. Officials confirmed 127 overall […]

Hundreds of millions of dollars in cash has been shipped from Russia to Venezuela, providing a lifeline to the South American country as U.S. sanctions limit its access to the global financial system. A total of $315 million of U.S. dollar and euro notes were sent in six separate shipments from Moscow to Caracas from […]

A fresh roster of forecasts and data on the Russian economy suggests slow growth and low inflation coupled with robust corporate performance will mark the final two months of the year. Meanwhile, economy-watchers remain fixed on a crucial Central Bank meeting in December and are divided over whether Bank of Russia governor Elvira Nabiullina will […]

Israel has suspended the extradition to the U.S. of a Russian hacker after Russia proposed to swap him for an Israeli woman jailed in Russia over airport marijuana possession, The Jerusalem Post reported Thursday.  In mid-October, Russia asked Israel to swap Alexei Burkov, who is wanted in the U.S. on charges of credit card fraud, […]

Russian investigators have opened a genocide case on the murder of more than 200 disabled children in southern Russia by Nazi Germany during World War II based on newly declassified documents. German death squads on Oct. 9-10, 1942, killed 214 disabled foster children who had fled Crimea for the coastal town of Yeysk, according to […]

The first business owner who returned to Russia after appearing on the so-called ‘Titov list’ has been sentenced to three years in a penal colony for fraud, Russian media reported Friday. Andrey Kokovin, who returned to Russia from the U.K. last year, was found guilty of stealing 10 million rubles from his Rostov-based company in […]

The U.S. State Department warned on Thursday that it had seen indications of Russian “influence” on recent unrest in Chile, where two weeks of protests and riots have rocked the administration of President Sebastian Pinera. A senior State Department official said there were “clear indications” people were taking advantage of the unrest in Chile — […]

Turkey has handed over 18 men believed to be Syrian government soldiers who were seized in northeast Syria near the Turkish border earlier this week, the Turkish Defense Ministry said late on Thursday. The ministry did not say who they were handed over to, but said it came about “as a result of the coordination […]

When the chairman of Russia’s Committee on Informational Policy, Leonid Levin, stepped on stage in Moscow’s Lomonosov building on Oct. 28  to give a speech during the second All-Russian Digital Forum he couldn’t have chosen a better place. The venue is not just the home of Russia’s fastest supercomputer, it’s also overshadowed by the iconic […]

Starting this month, a slew of new laws and rules has entered into effect in Russia that will change different aspects of life in the country, including regulations of the internet, the ability to top up e-wallets and make religious pilgrimages. Here’s a look at three major laws that came into effect Nov. 1: Sovereign […]

Russia and Serbia have carried out successive joint military exercises in the past week, including Russia’s first use of its advanced S-400 missile defense system abroad. Analysts argue that Serbia pursues close ties with fellow Orthodox Christian and majority-Slavic Russia to gain leverage for maneuvering with the West. Serbia is negotiating entry into the European […]

Russian activists from the Consortium of Women’s Non-Governmental Organizations launched a Halloween social media flashmob — #LawOrDeath — to push for a 2017 law that largely decriminalized domestic violence to be overturned. “This day has become an occasion for those who like to rattle other people’s nerves,” said Tatiana Belova, the originator of the idea […]

Seven Russian Wagner Group mercenaries have been killed in two separate shooting incidents involving Islamic State-linked insurgents in Mozambique’s northern Cabo Delgado province this month, two Mozambique army sources told The Moscow Times. In a previously unreported attack that took place on Oct. 10 in Cabo Delgado’s Macomia district, two Russian Wagner soldiers were shot […]

Estonia is more than 2,000 miles from the Levant, yet ripples from President Donald Trump’s recent actions in Syria are reaching all the way to the Baltic Sea. Trump’s Oct. 6 decision to withdraw troops from parts of Northern Syria was made in a phone call with Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan that caught other […]

Russian President Vladimir Putin paid a one-day visit to Hungary, where he mourned the plight of Christians in the Middle East and analyzed his Ukrainian counterpart’s ideologies. The Moscow Times picked out three remarks Putin made alongside his right-wing conservative counterpart Viktor Orban and other officials Wednesday: On Christianity: “Although the Middle East is the […]

Turkey is in talks with Russia to hand over 18 people believed to be members of the Syrian government forces, who were captured near the northern Syrian town of Ras Al Ain, Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said on Thursday. Turkey’s Defense Ministry said on Tuesday that 18 people, had been captured near Ras al Ain, […]

A Russian conscript killed eight fellow soldiers in the country’s Far East last Friday in a mass shooting the Defense Ministry quickly attributed to the shooter’s nervous breakdown. The conscript has been detained at military unit 54160 in Russia’s Zabaikalsky region, where he and the victims served, and charged with murder. The Defense Ministry did […]

CHERNOBYL, Ukraine — On a gray, overcast fall morning, a hound mix with copper-and-white fur sidles up to a group of foreign tourists taking photographs in front of the old Soviet sign welcoming visitors to Chernobyl. “Dude, don’t touch it, you’ll start throwing up,” a brash college-age American says to his friend, laughing. “We just […]

Russia’s mammoth infrastructure spending spree over the next few years will do little to boost the slow pace of growth in the Russian economy, economists have warned. A new study from consultants at Oxford Economics has found that the country’s $400 billion six-year National Projects program will result in an increase in annual GDP growth […]

Russian schoolchildren are largely unwilling to participate in political protests but are concerned about the environment and tolerant of LGBT people, according to a newly published sociological study on the views of youngsters in the country. The report follows the involvement of thousands of young activists in anti-government protests that gripped Moscow this summer. Russian […]

President Vladimir Putin’s KGB profile is now being showcased at an exhibit of declassified documents at St. Petersburg’s central state archive. Putin, who served in the Soviet spy agency between 1975 and 1991, had credited his KGB past for preparing him for the presidency. He assumed the presidency in 2000 after a stint at the […]

Facebook said on Wednesday it had suspended three networks of Russian accounts that attempted to interfere in the domestic politics of eight African countries, and were tied to a Russian businessman accused of meddling in past U.S. elections. The campaigns targeted people in Madagascar, Central African Republic, Mozambique, Democratic Republic of Congo, Cote d’Ivoire, Cameroon, Sudan and […]

Russians fear arbitrary exercises of power more than death, according to an independent Levada Center poll that the Kremlin dismissed as superficial. Fear of arbitrary authorities and lawlessness placed third in the pollster’s hierarchy of fears for the second year in a row in 2019. The return of mass repressions and a tighter political regime […]

Denmark has granted permission for Gazprom’s Nord Stream 2 pipeline to be built through Danish waters. After months of delays, the Danish Energy Agency today announced it is finally giving its approval for the natural gas pipeline project that will transport Russian gas directly to Germany. Denmark was the final country on the planned route […]

At least eight Russian nuclear-powered submarines sailed out from their homeports on the Kola Peninsula last week, Norwegian military intelligence told the country’s National Public Broadcasting Organization (NRK). The aim of the massive operation is to get as far out to the North Atlantic as possible without being discovered by NATO, the intelligence service said. Such […]

Emails claiming to show how to improve Russia’s bid to host the FIFA World Cup by bribing world football’s decision-makers have leaked, the investigative news website The Insider has reported. Russia won hosting rights for the 2018 FIFA World Cup in a 2010 vote, beating out fellow contenders England, Spain-Portugal and Belgium-Netherlands. Former FIFA boss […]

The U.S. House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly on Tuesday to recognize the mass killings of Armenians a century ago as a genocide, a symbolic but historic vote instantly denounced by Turkey. The Democratic-controlled House voted 405-11 in favor of a resolution asserting that it is U.S. policy to commemorate as genocide the killing of 1.5 […]

Russia is preparing to conduct at least five tests next year of its new ballistic missile that has been called the largest missile in history, the Vedomosti newspaper reported Wednesday. President Vladimir Putin unveiled the Sarmat missile, also called Satan-2, at an annual address last year that reportedly riled U.S. President Donald Trump. Russia went […]

Russian President Vladimir Putin is facing an unwelcome new financial challenge in Syria after the U.S. pullback enabled his ally Bashar al-Assad to reclaim the biggest chunk of territory in the country still outside his control. The U.S. decision to keep forces in northeastern Syria to guard oil fields denies Assad access to desperately needed funds to […]

Russia’s newest nuclear-powered submarine has for the first time test-fired an intercontinental ballistic missile ahead of the vessel’s delivery into service this year, the Defense Ministry announced Wednesday. The Knyaz Vladimir, which is expected to join the Russian Navy’s Northern Fleet in December 2019, was floated out in 2017 and embarked on its first sea […]

A group of Russian scientists has revealed the first pictures of a massive fountain of methane gas bubbling from the sea floor in the eastern Siberian Sea. During the 35-day expedition that started Sept. 21, the scientific expedition expedition organized by Tomsk Polytechnic University (TPU)  noticed a spot of emerald-colored water which turned out to […]

Five Russian mercenaries are believed to have been killed alongside 20 Mozambique servicemen during an ambush in the southeastern African nation, the independent Carta de Moçambique news outlet reported Tuesday. The unconfirmed report comes a month after the reported arrival of 200 Russian mercenaries and three helicopters to help Mozambique’s government forces fight jihadists amid Moscow’s wider […]

Russia’s state nuclear firm Rosatom has declassified the personal files of German scientists involved in the Soviet nuclear program after World War II. The Soviet Union tested its first atomic bomb ahead of schedule in 1949, an achievement largely attributed to German experts and Soviet espionage on the U.S. Manhattan Project. Stalin had awarded prestigious state […]

Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the Soviet Union, on Monday published a new book titled “What is at stake: The future of the global world.” The 88-year-old Nobel Peace Prize laureate’s new book touches on a wide range of topics, including his thoughts on Russia’s bruised relations with the West, the rise of global […]

Ukraine’s military said the withdrawal of government and Russian-backed rebel troops started at 12:00 p.m. local time on Tuesday in Zolote, a town in the eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk. Ukrainian forces have fought rebels in the Donbass region in a conflict that has killed more than 13,000 people. Both sides have agreed to modest troop […]

A parallel central bank in eastern Libya stepped up deliveries of new banknotes from Russia this year, before and after eastern-based commander Khalifa Haftar launched a military offensive to capture Tripoli, Russian customs data show. The data obtained by Reuters shows nearly 4.5 billion Libyan dinars ($3.22 billion) were dispatched in four shipments from February to June. Haftar launched his campaign […]

The black labor market in Russia is shrinking as fewer people try to keep their work off the books and their wages away from the taxman. So said a recent survey by the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), which found one in three Russians are currently engaged in the so-called […]

A Russian aluminum plant closed as a result of U.S. sanctions is set to be transformed into a bitcoin mining hub. The Nadvoitsy Aluminum Plant in Russia’s northern Karelia region, owned by Russian metals giant Rusal, stopped production last summer after it lost access to American customers following the introduction of U.S. sanctions against Rusal […]

Sberbank, Russia’s largest bank, is to purchase a $170 million stake in tech giant Mail.Ru. The deal will see Sberbank buy into a company called MF Technologies, which owns a majority of Mail.Ru’s voting rights, from Gazprombank — another state-owned Russian financial outfit. Sberbank’s 35% stake in MF Technologies would give it control of one-fifth […]

President Vladimir Putin has granted Russian citizenship to eight leaders of Old Believer communities in the United States and Brazil who are planning to move back to their motherland, authorities have said. Thousands of Old Believers — members of a traditionalist Christian denomination at odds with the Orthodox Church — fled Russia in the 19th […]

Officials from Russia, Ukraine and the European Union met again on 28 October in Brussels to discuss terms for the transit of Russian gas via Ukraine next year, with still no breakthrough in negotiations in sight. Ukraine is the largest single transit route for Russian gas entering Europe, handling 86.8 billion cubic meters (bcm) of […]

Russia’s counter-sanctions against western food imports cost its citizens $70 per person every year through higher prices. New research into the impact of Russia’s counter-sanctions and its import substitution policies found that the costs to Russian shoppers through higher prices for food, including fish, meat, cheese and vegetables far outweigh any of the program’s benefits. […]

A Russian history magazine featuring a 1939 caricature of Stalin in a wedding gown holding hands with Hitler on its cover has sparked a backlash that led at least one Moscow bookstore to pull the issue from its shelves. The latest edition of the Diletant monthly featured a colorized U.S. cartoon criticizing the Soviet Union’s […]

An Indian citizen has been held in Russia for more than three months after being caught in a Moscow airport transit zone with half a gram of marijuana while traveling, the Mediazona news website has reported. Aashish Bhadurya’s detention comes less than a month after the sentencing of a U.S.-Israeli citizen to 7.5 years in […]