Russian police on Saturday arrested dozens of opposition politicians and municipal deputies at a conference in Moscow, organizers and participants said. Participants from more than 50 of Russia’s regions had gathered to discuss parliamentary and local elections in September at a forum organized by a project backed by prominent Kremlin critic Mikhail Khodorkovsky. Forty minutes…
Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine has sown division among former Eastern Bloc countries, analysts say, with some seeing it as a godsend and others as a Kremlin propaganda tool. Countries in the region have been particularly hard hit by the virus and find themselves torn between a readily available jab from their old ally and European…
It has been an unprecedentedly long, unrelentingly cold, and oppressively dark winter. And while spring may still be a ways away, this week I caught subtle hints of its eventual arrival: an unexpected shaft of amber afternoon light; optimistic early morning birdsong; and a slight softening of the air on my face, as if I’d…
The World Economic Forum has dropped St. Olga of Kiev from its list of influential women after Ukraine’s ex-president criticized the organization for calling her the founder of Russia. Before being taken down, St. Olga’s profile on the WEF web page dedicated to International Women’s Month described her as “the progenitor to modern-day Russia” and…
Dozens of countries took Russia to task at the UN on Friday over its imprisonment of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny, and slammed numerous “arbitrary arrests” of his supporters. In a historic joint statement delivered to the United Nations Human Rights Council, 45 countries voiced alarm at “the deteriorating situation of human rights and fundamental freedoms”…
Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny has been moved to an unknown location from a detention center outside Moscow where he had been quarantined, his Twitter account said Friday. Navalny was similarly transferred from a Moscow jail last month, turning up at a Vladimir region detention center where he was under quarantine a week later. He was sentenced…
Russia’s arms sales last year were not affected by the economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic, a senior official said Friday, making it one of the country’s only industries to come out unscathed. “Our order book remained at a level of $50-55 billion,” said Dmitry Shugayev, who heads the Federal Service for Military-Technical Cooperation. “We…
Over 6,300 surveillance cameras in Russia are not secure, making them vulnerable to cybercriminals, experts told the Kommersant business daily Friday. Dark web users can easily access footage and private data from the CCTV cameras installed at places like industrial plants, businesses and smart home systems as they have public IP addresses, Kommersant cited experts…
On Tuesday Russia’s best-selling novelist Guzel Yakhina presented her third novel, “Train to Samarkand” (Eshelon na Samarkand), in an online press conference. Yakhina took Russia’s literary world by storm in 2015 with the publication of her first novel “Zuleikha Opens Her Eyes.” It won the Yasnaya Polyana and Big Book awards, was translated into over…
Five Chechen men went on trial in Austria for outing and harassing female compatriots for exhibiting “Western behavior,” Austrian media reported Thursday. The defendants were accused of running an online chat where they threatened, intimidated and occasionally abused Chechen women for allegedly not adhering to strict Islamic rules, according to the Die Presse daily. “The…
Russian prosecutors on Friday charged three men over the 2009 murder of one of the country’s most notorious gangsters and drug traffickers who had served time in both Russian and U.S. prisons. Vyacheslav Ivankov, alias Yaponchik or The Little Japanese, was shot in the abdomen in July 2009 by sniper fire as he left a…
Slovakia’s health minister has announced his resignation after coming under pressure from the country’s four-party ruling coalition for ordering Russia’s Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine, Reuters reported Thursday. Slovakia became the second EU country after Hungary to purchase Sputnik V for national use, bypassing EU authorization of the jab. Prime Minister Igor Matovic ignited backlash from…
The mutating H5N8 strain of avian flu has a high risk of human-to-human transmission, Russian authorities warned Friday. Anna Popova, who heads Russia’s health watchdog Rospotrebnadzor, made the prediction nearly a month after scientists detected the first case of H5N8 transmission to humans at a southern Russia poultry farm. “There’s a fairly high degree of…
Russians’ life expectancy plummeted in 2020 as the coronavirus pandemic disrupted President Vladimir Putin’s goal to increase lifespans, according to state figures cited by the RBC news website Thursday. Annual life expectancy dropped for the first time in 17 years from a record of 73.3 years in 2019 to 71.1 years last year, according to…
Lyubov, a 59-year-old pensioner doing her weekly shop, doesn’t know why her Russian state pension isn’t going as far as it used to, but is sure the government needs to do something about it. “All the prices for food are going up,” she told The Moscow Times on her way out of a branch of…
On March 10, Head of the North European Interregional Department for Supervision over Nuclear and Radiation Safety of Rostechnadzor Sergey Perevoshchikov delivered the statement of conformance of Unit 6 to requirements of technical regulations and project documentation to Director of Leningrad NPP Vladimir Pereguda. The day before, the final 15-day integrated tests of the new…
A Ukrainian soldier has been killed in clashes with Russian-backed separatists in Ukraine’s war-torn east, its military said Thursday, raising fears over a fresh outbreak of heavy fighting. Clashes have broken out in the east over the past month, testing a ceasefire brokered last year that had raised hopes for an end to the conflict…
Russian movie distributors have self-censored a gay sex scene from “Supernova,” a British love story starring Stanley Tucci and Colin Firth that was released in Russia on Thursday, media reported. Citing viewers who had also watched the original edit, the DTF culture and tech platform said “at least one scene where the characters try to have sex…
Russia said Thursday it had killed a suspected militant planning a terror attack in the North Caucasus republic of Dagestan. The National Anti-Terrorism Committee (NAK) in a statement announced that an operation to “prevent the preparation of a terrorist attack” was carried out Thursday. “A bandit who put up armed resistance was neutralized,” it said,…
Russia’s telecommunications watchdog said Thursday that Twitter had still not deleted more than 3,000 posts containing illegal content after Moscow began disrupting Twitter’s services in the country. On Wednesday, Roskomnadzor said it began slowing down the US social media giant’s work in Russia, saying Twitter failed to comply with its requests to delete content related to…
Russia’s decision to label one of its leading women’s aid groups a “foreign agent” after a year when domestic violence spiked signals a widening crackdown on organizations seeking to tackle the problem, activists told The Moscow Times. The country’s Justice Ministry added Nasiliu.net — Russian for “No to Violence” — to the register formed by…
Support for Russia’s pro-Kremlin ruling party has dropped to an eight-year low ahead of legislative elections where it seeks to retain a supermajority this fall, independent poll results said Thursday. United Russia, which enjoys a two-thirds majority in the country’s lower house of parliament, would receive 27% of the vote if it was held this…
Russia plans to display state-of-the-art Armata T-14 tanks at its World War II victory parade on Red Square this spring, its manufacturer announced Thursday. The T-14’s developers tout its next-level firepower, maneuvering and remote-control capabilities, as well as its unmanned turret and improved design for better survival prospects for its three-person crew. The 14-wheel main…
March 11, 2021, 11:55 Flight made along the proposed route of the Soyuz Vostok gas pipeline. Action plan of the Joint Working Group for 2021–2022 signed. A Gazprom delegation headed by Vitaly Markelov, Deputy Chairman of the Company’s Management Committee, paid a working visit to Mongolia. The visit involved a flight along the proposed route of the Soyuz Vostok gas pipeline, which will become…
Polish officials have accused a deported Russian diplomat of endangering others by failing to self-isolate when he got infected with coronavirus earlier this year, Polish media reported Wednesday. Poznan consul Igor Oshchepkov was among the Russian diplomats that Poland, Germany and Sweden expelled in February in retaliation to Moscow’s identical steps for the European diplomats’…
British authorities plan to sell the home of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia three years after their near-fatal poisoning with a Soviet-developed nerve agent, the BBC reported Wednesday. Officers found a high concentration of Novichok smeared on the door handle of the Skripals’ home in Salisbury after they were discovered collapsed…
Bashneft, a subsidiary of Rosneft Oil Company, has completed the upgrading of a gas pipeline to send associated petroleum gas (APG) from the Urshakskoye field to the Shkapovskoye gas processing plant in Bashkiria
Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan vowed Wednesday to improve cooperation as they launched the construction of a new reactor at Turkey’s first nuclear power plant. The two leaders each pressed a button on their office desks in Moscow and Ankara in a video link ceremony unveiling the third phase of Akkuyu…
10 March, 2021, Büyükeceli (Mersin Province, Turkey) – A ceremony commemorating the start of Unit 3 construction was held at the site of the first Turkish nuclear power plant Akkuyu. Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan joined the ceremony via videoconference. Energy and Natural Resources Minister Fatih Dönmez, ROSATOM Director General…
Russia’s Ambassador to Egypt Georgy Borisenko made a visit to the construction site of the El-Dabaa NPP together with the Chairman of the Board of Directors of Egypt’s Nuclear Power Plants Authority (NPPA) Dr. Amged El-Wakeel and supervisors of the El-Dabaa NPP construction project from ROSATOM and NPPA. Russia’s Ambassador to Egypt Georgy Borisenko said:…
Russia’s National Guard will train journalism students to safely cover mass protests, a senior lawmaker said Wednesday. The lessons will be organized after the detentions of and use of force against dozens of journalists at mass nationwide rallies in support of jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny earlier this year. Moscow’s police chief earlier Wednesday defended…
Russia has confirmed 4,351,553 cases of coronavirus and 90,275 deaths. March 10: What you need to know today Russia on Wednesday confirmed 9,079 new coronavirus cases and 466 deaths. Morocco and Kenya have authorized Russia’s Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine, The Russian Direct Investment Fund announced Wednesday. Tunisia on Tuesday received a shipment of 30,000 doses of Russia’s Sputnik…
Russia’s intelligence service has claimed that the United States is dissatisfied with the ruling party in Georgia for not carrying out Washington’s orders and that Washington is preparing to crack down and force Tbilisi into a more obedient position. “In Washington, dissatisfaction is growing with the actions of the ruling Georgian Dream party, which is…
At the end of 2020 just before all museums were closed in Moscow to contain the second wave of the coronavirus, the Museum of Moscow opened “100 Years Old: VKHUTEMAS, School of the Avant-Garde.” Lauded as one of the most important cultural events in the capital, it immediately had to close until a few weeks…
Russia blamed “equipment failure” at the state internet provider for mass government website outages after authorities said they will slow down Twitter for Russian users Wednesday. The websites of the Kremlin and Russian government as well as both chambers of parliament briefly went down after Russia announced it will slow Twitter’s loading speed within the country…
Eurasia’s highest active volcano, Kluchevskaya Sopka, erupted in Russia’s Kamchatka peninsula earlier this month. Luckily for those who are not able (or too scared) to witness the equally dangerous and spectacular natural phenomenon with their own eyes, the continuous explosive activity is being documented on camera and widely shared on social media. Kluchevskaya Sopka was…
Moscow’s decision to defy a second wave of the coronavirus and keep its economy firing helped the country’s largest companies book a strong end to the year and cement their recovery from the early blows of the coronavirus pandemic, analysis of company results shows. Over the full year, corporate profits at Russia’s large and medium-sized…
09 March 2021, Moscow – Akkuyu Nuclear JSC (ROSATOM’s subsidiary) receives two loans of up to $200 million and $100 million respectively for a period of 7 years from Sovcombank to finance the construction of the Akkuyu NPP in Turkey. The loan agreements were signed by Sovcombank and Akkuyu Nuclear JSC. The loans are being…
Russia’s media watchdog announced Wednesday that it will disrupt Twitter’s loading speeds within the country for failing to remove banned content, a move that experts say represents a new crackdown on foreign social media. “Starting March 10, 2021, centralized response measures have been taken against Twitter to protect Russian citizens and force the internet service to…
Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed legislation Wednesday allowing phone companies to jam communication in prisons in order to prevent scams. The legislation’s authors say that convicts use contraband cellphones to commit fraud and witness intimidation as well as control the actions of fugitive members of criminal organizations. Under the newly signed amendments to Russia’s criminal…
Russia and China unveiled plans Tuesday for a joint lunar space station, as Moscow seeks to recapture the glory of its space pioneering days of Soviet times, and Beijing gears up its own extraterrestrial ambitions. Though Moscow was once at the forefront of space travel — it sent the first man into space — its cosmic…
A Turkish court on Tuesday sentenced five suspects to life in jail over the 2016 murder of Russian ambassador Andrei Karlov in Ankara, state news agency Anadolu reported. The suspects were accused of links to the 22-year-old gunman, Mevlut Mert Altintas, who was killed by Turkish special forces shortly after he shot dead Karlov at…
Russia and China agreed Tuesday to build a lunar space station, as Moscow seeks to modernize its extraterrestrial might and catch up with the United States in the space race. Russia, which sent the first man into space during the Soviet Union, has been lagging behind Washington and Beijing in the exploration of the Moon…
Russian gas pipelines emitted more methane, a potent greenhouse gas, in 2020 than the previous year despite a coronavirus-related slump in demand, the European Space Agency has said. Citing analysis of its satellite images by the data firm Kayrros, the ESA said Thursday that methane emissions increased by 40% despite a 14% drop in Russian…
Moscow said Tuesday that claims it was spearheading a disinformation campaign against U.S.-made coronavirus vaccines to boost its own homegrown jab were “absurd and groundless.” The comments come a day after Washington said Russian intelligence was behind four websites involved in a campaign to undermine U.S.-made vaccines, accusing Russia of putting lives at risk. Russian…
Russia and the United States will work together to tackle climate change-related issues in a rare moment of cooperation between the two powers with increasingly frayed ties, President Vladimir Putin’s representative on climate issues said Tuesday. Ruslan Edelgeriyev identified protection of the rapidly warming Arctic, forest sector projects and nuclear energy as key priorities in Russian-U.S.…
A Kyrgyz ballet troupe’s refusal to perform in a show featuring stars from Russia is shining light on the woeful condition of state-funded culture. On March 6, local performers who had been due to support Russian leads in a production of Swan Lake took to the stage of the State Opera and Ballet Theater in Bishkek…
One of Galina Yanchikova’s earliest memories is playing with her grandfather’s feet as a three year old the last time she saw him before he left exile in Kazakhstan to try to return to Moscow. Prominent Marxist activist and academic Friedrich Bauermeister had left Germany with his family for Stalin’s U.S.S.R. in 1934, and been…
Russia has secured an agreement to produce its Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine in Italy, marking the first such deal for producing the vaccine in Europe, Bloomberg reported Tuesday. Similar talks are underway in France and Germany despite the vaccine not yet being approved for use within the 27-member bloc. The EU’s medicines regulator, the European…
RN-Yuganskneftegaz, Rosneft’s largest production asset, has remediated over a thousand land plots with a total area of over 230 hectares in 2020 as part of its long-term environmental protection and restoration programme
Verkhnechonskneftegaz, an enterprise of Rosneft Oil Company’s oil and gas production complex, has pumped 2.5 bcm of associated petroleum gas (APG) into an underground gas storage facility since the start of its rational use programme
Russians are most likely to see rising prices as the main issue facing the country, according to an independent survey from the Levada Center polling agency published Tuesday. Several months of inflation have driven prices for basic commodities like sugar, sunflower oil and pasta, prompting President Vladimir Putin to call for emergency measures to cap…
The Russian Federal Security Service (FSB)’s internal estimates for recent marches in support of jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny placed the protester count at much higher numbers than officially acknowledged, the Meduza news website reported Tuesday. The data is reportedly part of the highly secretive FSB military counterintelligence unit’s first known comprehensive review of public…
Russia exported a record amount of food supplies in 2020, becoming a net seller of agricultural products for the first time since the collapse of the Soviet Union. The country sold $30.7 billion worth of agricultural goods abroad last year, news site RBC reported Tuesday, citing a report by AgroExport, a division of Russia’s agricultural…
Russia has selected Manizha to represent it in this year’s Eurovision song contest with her song “Russian Woman.” The Tajikistan-born singer-songwriter will replace punk-rave group Little Big, who were chosen to represent Russia in the 2020 sing-off which was ultimately canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic. Manizha said her song, written a year ago on…
Russia is demanding a public apology from the European Union’s medicines regulator for comparing its Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine to “Russian roulette.” Christa Wirthumer-Hoche, management board chairwoman of the Amsterdam-based European Medicines Agency (EMA), made the errant remark Monday while advising EU members against emergency use authorization of Sputnik V. “Such comments are inappropriate and…
On March 7, the specialists initiated loading dummy fuel assemblies (DFA) into the reactor of power unit No.2 of Belarus NPP (the General Designer and the General Contractor – Engineering Division of ROSATOM). This process is a prerequisite and a kind of a dry run of the fuel load into the reactor, and includes, inter…
The head of the management board at the EU’s medicines regulator warned late Sunday against emergency national authorizations of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine, comparing the idea to “Russian roulette”. Last week the Amsterdam-based European Medicines Agency (EMA) launched a rolling review of the Sputnik V vaccine, a key step towards being approved as the first…
Russian women in cities nationwide held a strike for equal rights ahead of International Women’s Day. In cities like Moscow, Kazan and Ulyanocsk, protesters called on the authorities to abolish all “repressive, sexist and homophobic laws,” to pass anti-domestic violence legislation and to institute laws against sexual harassment in the workplace. “We planned the strike…
International Women’s Day remains one of Russia’s most beloved holidays, even though its popular meaning has evolved over the years. In the Soviet era, the holiday celebrated the revolutionary struggle for equality, a far cry from today’s flowery celebration of womanhood and femininity. Though the holiday’s critics blame it for re-enforcing harmful gender stereotypes, March…