Russia’s online community has been abuzz over the past week with praise for popular YouTuber Yury Dud’s documentary about life in the land of the gulag labor camps. It’s a departure for the 32-year-old sports editor, whose 5.1 million subscribers tune in to watch him interview personalities from all walks of life about their personal…
Europe’s human rights court has awarded opposition leader Alexei Navalny’s aide and an activist $17,000 each for violations of their rights and freedoms by the Russian government. Elvira Dmitriyeva, Navalny’s coordinator in the city of Kazan, was fined in 2017 for organizing and campaigning for participation in an unauthorized public event. Grigory Kablis’ social media…
The Stone Flower fountain is one of the more famous attractions in Moscow’s VDNKh exhibition park. The fountain, which was built in 1954, recently underwent renovations. But do Moscow’s residents know how much it really cost? According to a government tender, the restoration of the fountain cost 1.2 billion rubles ($18.6 million). For comparison, the…
Each year on May 9, Russia and a handful of former Soviet countries celebrate Victory Day, which marks the day after Nazi Germany surrendered and Soviet forces took control of Berlin. The end of the Great Patriotic War, as World War II is known in Russia, is still celebrated as the country’s most important public…
Russian lawmakers have asked the foreign minister to draw up a list of officials involved in the prosecution of admitted Russian agent Maria Butina, the pro-Kremlin Izvestia newspaper reported Tuesday. Butina was sentenced to 18 months after she pleaded guilty in December to conspiring with a Russian official to infiltrate a gun rights group and…
Infrastructure development was the top issue when Russian President Vladimir Putin arrived in Beijing on April 25 to attend Chinese President Xi Jinping’s top-level meeting on the Belt and Road initiative. The meeting was the second of its kind and Putin was the prime guest. Russia is a country of key importance for the Belt…
The United States obstructs Russia’s work in the United Nations by selectively issuing visas to Russian nationals, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Monday. Russia’s chemical weapons expert Dmitry Poklonsky was denied a U.S. visa to attend a UN Security Council session last Thursday, Russia’s Foreign Ministry said in a press statement. He was due…
Moscow does not expect any foreign leaders to attend its Victory Day celebrations, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told the state-run RIA Novosti news outlet on Monday. Every year on May 9, Russia celebrates Victory Day to commemorate the Soviet victory in World War II. In Moscow, the day is marked with a massive parade through…
Russia has opened its first center aimed at issuing Russian passports to residents of separatist-controlled eastern Ukraine, Interfax reported on Monday. Last week, President Vladimir Putin signed an order to simplify the procedure for obtaining a Russian passport for residents of separatist-controlled eastern Ukraine, prompting calls from Kiev for more international sanctions. “Today, the center…
Around 200 prisoners in 2018 were so badly injured during questioning by investigators in Moscow region pre-detention facilities that they required hospitalization, a senior Federal Prison Service (FSIN) official has claimed. Russia’s federal penitentiary system was rocked by a scandal last year after bodycam footage showed guards violently beating prisoners in a notorious prison outside…
Belarus said on Monday that clean Russian oil had yet to reach its borders via a major pipeline supplying Europe after tainted crude running through the system prompted several importers to halt flows last week. State-run oil firm Belneftekhim said Belarusian refineries were still running at reduced capacity, after Moscow had said it would start pumping…
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Monday that Russians and Ukrainians would only benefit from sharing common citizenship, the Interfax news agency reported. Putin said on Saturday Moscow was considering offering all Ukrainian citizens fast-tracked Russian passports, a move that angered some politicians in Ukraine which has been at war with pro-Russian separatists since 2014.…
The Kremlin considers it premature to discuss any details about expanding Russia’s fast-tracked passport offer to all Ukrainian citizens, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Monday. President Vladimir Putin on Saturday said Moscow was considering offering all Ukrainian citizens fast-tracked Russian passports. Putin made the statement days after signing an order to simplify the procedure…
Marine specialists in Norway have said a harnessed whale that was discovered off its coast may have been trained by the Russian Navy as part of a program to use underwater mammals for service operations. Norwegian media reported Saturday that local fisherman Joar Hesten removed a harness from a beluga whale in northern Norway after…
More than half of Russians believe the internet in Russia should continue to develop as a network “uniting the whole world,” according to a study conducted by the state-funded VTsIOM pollster. The study comes two weeks after Russia’s lower house of parliament approved the third reading of a draft law that aims to increase Moscow’s…
Russia has fallen out of the top five defense spending countries for the first time since 2006 after its spending decreased by 3.5 percent from 2017 to 2018, according to a new report published by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). Russia has expanded its military presence abroad in recent years, with its 2014…
Orthodox Easter, called Paskha in Russian, celebrates the resurrection of Jesus Christ and is one of Russia’s most widely celebrated religious holidays. Because it follows the Orthodox Calendar, it is usually celebrated later than Catholic Easter. People prepare for the celebration by coloring eggs, baking the traditional kulich cake and making paskha, a cottage cheese…
President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday Moscow was considering offering all Ukrainian citizens fast-tracked Russian passports, a move likely to anger some politicians in Ukraine which has been at war with pro-Russian separatists since 2014. Putin made the statement days after signing an order to simplify the procedure for obtaining a Russian passport for residents…
A full-scale assault against militants in Syria’s Idlib province “is not expedient now” and civilians’ security needs to be taken into account, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday. Speaking in Beijing, Putin said Russia would work with the Syrian opposition to finalise the make-up of a constitutional committee, part of efforts to secure a…
U.S. President Donald Trump’s proposals on nuclear arms disarmament is “not serious,” a Kremlin spokesman said on Saturday. Trump has ordered his administration to prepare a push for a new arms-control agreements with Russia and China citing the cost of the 21st-century nuclear arms race, The Washington Post reported on Thursday citing administration officials. “It…
Every Friday, 24-year-old student Arshak Makichyan stands alone in Moscow’s Pushkin Square with a poster warning locals about the dangers of climate change. He started his protest in mid-March, inspired by the #Climatestrike movement led by young activists around the world. Back then, Makichyan and around two dozen other Muscovites gathered in Sokolniki Park in…
A federal judge on Friday sentenced Russian agent Maria Butina to 18 months in prison after Butina pleaded guilty in December to conspiring with a Russian official to infiltrate a gun rights group and influence U.S. conservative activists and Republicans. U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan said the 18 months will include the approximately nine months Butina…
The Syrian government and armed opposition groups, together with both sides’ backers, could agree on the makeup of a constitutional committee in coming months, Russian negotiator Alexander Lavrentyev said on Friday. Forming a constitutional committee is key to political reforms and new elections meant to unify Syria and end an eight-year war which has killed…
A Russian-born socialite has been found guilty of theft of services and grand larceny in New York, facing up to 15 years in prison and deportation to Germany, the Associated Press reported Friday. Anna Sorokin, 28, assumed the name of Anna Delvey when she tricked her friends and banks into financing her lavish $275,000 lifestyle…
Yevgeny Prigozhin, a catering magnate with ties to Vladimir Putin, has paid out compensation to the parents of dozens of children who were reportedly poisoned after eating food provided by his catering company. Officials confirmed some 130 cases of food poisoning among kindergarteners in southeastern Moscow in December, leading parents to file a class-action lawsuit…
Half of Russia’s Orthodox Christians do not know the origins of Easter, according to a state-run poll published on Friday. Christians celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ on Easter Day after his death on the cross. Orthodox Easter falls on Sunday, April 28, ending seven weeks of fasting and kickstarting the traditions of spring cleaning…
Admitted Russian agent Maria Butina will be sentenced on Friday by a federal judge after pleading guilty in December to conspiring with a Russian official to infiltrate a gun rights group and influence U.S. conservative activists and Republicans. Butina, a former graduate student at American University in Washington who publicly advocated for gun rights, faces…
At the first Belt and Road summit in Beijing two years ago, Vladimir Putin offered little more than platitudes for Xi Jinping’s global infrastructure initiative, essentially calling China’s “project of the century” a welcome new plank in Russia’s own strategy for ending American hegemony. Since then, deep-pocketed Chinese companies have intensified their march across Asia, Africa…
Russia will hold talks with Poland, Belarus and Ukraine on Friday about how to solve a problem of polluted Russian oil being pumped through a major pipeline serving Europe and which supplies refineries as far west as Germany. Poland, Germany, Ukraine and Slovakia have suspended imports of Russian oil via the Druzhba pipeline over quality…
Thousands died of hunger and cold as they laid rails across the desolate areas of North Siberia. Now Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu hints he is ready to give the Transpolar Mainline project a new shot. It was one of the many monstrous projects started by Josef Stalin. The railway line was to be built…
The head of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) highly secretive branch has been detained on suspicion of large-scale bribery, the Kommersant business daily reported on Friday. Colonel Kirill Cherkalin headed the FSB economic security department’s financial counterintelligence support unit. The department played key roles in investigations surrounding former economy minister Alexei Ulyukayev, deputy prime minister…
April 26 marks the anniversary of the world’s worst nuclear disaster to date at the Chernobyl power plant in northern Ukraine. Following the 1986 explosion at Chernobyl’s reactor number four, radioactive material spread across much of the Northern Hemisphere. Thirty-three years on, the power plant is surrounded by both a hushed desolation and a buzz…
Two people are reportedly dead following a shooting at a Moscow metro station, the state-run TASS news agency reported on Thursday. A man opened fire and killed one person at the entrance of Noviye Cheryomushki station before committing suicide, TASS cited a law enforcement source as saying. Russian media, citing the Baza Telegram channel, have…
The wildfires tearing through southeastern Siberia claimed their first human victim on Thursday as damages almost doubled to nearly 1 billion rubles ($15.4 million), authorities said. At least 36 people were injured and nearly 650 left homeless in Zabaikalsky region, while almost 12,000 pets and livestock animals were killed in the flames. The Emergency Situations…
Lawmakers in Kiev approved a bill boosting the use of Ukrainian across state administration and media, in a move that risks complicating relations with Russia and the West at the same time. While Ukrainian has been the sole official language since 2014 when Kremlin-backed Viktor Yanukovych was toppled from the presidency in deadly street protests,…
Outgoing Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko’s policy has suffered a “total failure” which manifested in his election loss, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in first remarks on the Ukrainian vote. Poroshenko garnered 24 percent of the vote in the Sunday runoffs, behind television comedian and political novice Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s 73 percent. His defeat was seen as…
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday a decision to give residents of Ukrainian rebel regions fast-track access to Russian passports was no different from what some European Union states were already doing. Speaking to reporters at the end of a summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, Putin said that Poland, Romania and Hungary…
Russia is considering banning certain meat and dairy products, including parmesan and jamon, over health concerns tied to infectious diseases, the Vedomosti business daily reported. Wholesale imports of fresh EU food products were banned in 2014 in retaliation to Western states imposing sanctions over Russia’s annexation of Crimea and support for separatists in eastern Ukraine.…
Poland and Germany have suspended imports of Russian oil via a major pipeline, citing poor quality and triggering a rare crisis over supply from the world’s second-largest crude exporter. Halting imports from the Druzhba pipeline could trigger legal claims by Western buyers against Russian suppliers, who would in turn seek compensation from Russian pipeline monopoly Transneft, three traders…
President Vladimir Putin’s order simplifying the procedure for residents of separatist-controlled eastern Ukraine to obtain a Russian passport prompted condemnations from Kiev and the United States. Putin’s decree on Wednesday eases the path to Russian citizenship for an estimated 3.7 million people living in the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk republics after five years of war…
The United States is capable of attacking Russia from space, a senior Russian general said Wednesday. U.S. President Donald Trump unveiled a plan in January calling for the development of space-based sensors to shoot down missiles before they can threaten U.S. soil, among other capabilities. Moscow warned the new U.S. missile defense strategy would unleash…
Russian President Vladimir Putin said after holding talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un on Thursday that he thought U.S. security guarantees would probably not be enough to persuade Pyongyang to shut its nuclear program. Putin and Kim held a day of talks on an island off the Russian Pacific city of Vladivostok two months…
A high-ranking aide to Libyan commander Khalifa Haftar was in Moscow on Wednesday, a sign of Haftar’s closeness to Russia at a time when forces loyal to him are fighting the internationally recognized government for control of Tripoli. Kheiri Al Tamimi, the head of Haftar’s office, showed up at the high-profile Moscow Conference on International…
President Vladimir Putin has signed a decree making it easier for residents of separatist-controlled eastern Ukraine to obtain Russian passports and citizenship, the Kremlin said on Wednesday. In 2017, Putin signed an executive order recognizing the passports from the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk republics as valid in Russia. The move was widely regarded as the…
Wildfires tore through nearly 20 towns in the grasslands of southeastern Siberia between April 19-22. The fires injured at least 34 people, four of them critically, and left at least 645 people homeless in Zabaikalsky region. Some 11,800 pets and livestock animals were also killed, The Siberian Times reported. Regional authorities estimate the blaze, which…
Reuters has corrected a story it published on April 18 saying Venezuela is funneling cash flow from oil sales through Russian state energy giant Rosneft to evade U.S. sanctions after Rosneft threatened to ban the international news agency from operating in Russia. The story, datelined Mexico City, said Reuters had uncovered a scheme whereby Venezuelan…
U.S. Ambassador to Russia Jon Huntsman has boarded one of two U.S. Navy aircraft carriers that arrived in the Mediterranean on Tuesday to caution Moscow against its activities in Syria and around the world. The U.S. and other Western countries have accused Russia of a range of bad behavior, including aggression in Ukraine, involvement in…
Kim Jong Un, like Vladimir Putin, has enjoyed flourishes of bonhomie with Donald Trump only to see the relationship fray over sanctions. Now, the North Korean leader is turning to the Russian president for help. Kim left North Korea by train and crossed into Russia on Wednesday, the Interfax newswire reported, citing an unidentified official.…
President Vladimir Putin may look beyond Russia for a mechanism to keep power after his current term ends. That’s making Moscow’s closest ally nervous amid spiraling tensions over Kremlin threats to slash economic subsidies. After years of spending billions of dollars to support Belarus’s state-dominated economy, Russia is intensifying pressure on President Alexander Lukashenko to…
Sounds of explosion rocked through the borderlands as 1,000 forces and more than 340 military vehicles, tanks and aircraft engaged in military training. There was no silent Easter in the border areas between Russia and Norway. As locals on the Norwegian side relaxed in their cabins on Easter Monday, the nearby military units based in…
Russian authorities have issued the first guilty verdict under a new law criminalizing “blatant disrespect” toward the authorities for online posts calling President Vladimir Putin an expletive. A Novgorod region court 570 kilometers northwest of Moscow found a local resident guilty and fined him 30,000 rubles ($470) Monday for posts calling Putin “a fantastic f——”…
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un crossed the border into Russia on Wednesday by train, Russian media reported, for his first trip there aimed at galvanizing support from President Vladimir Putin while nuclear talks with Washington are in limbo. Kim is expected to project himself as a serious world player with his first meeting with the Russian leader and…
Vladimir Putin’s poll ratings are down after a tax hike squeezed cash-strapped consumers. But the Kremlin has opened the coffers to give as much as $8 billion this year to another key constituency: oil companies awash in record profits. The handouts are part of a complex arrangement under which oil companies agree to freeze fuel…
President Vladimir Putin has unveiled a submarine capable of carrying six thermonuclear warheads on Tuesday ahead of its deployment in 2020-2021. Russia’s naval submarine called “Belgorod” will be the world’s longest submarine ever built, measuring 184 meters, The Barents Observer has estimated. The Belgorod will be able to carry six underwater “Poseidon” drones, the state-run…
VSEVOLOZHSK, Leningrad region — When Ivan first learned he would be losing his job at the Ford factory he was floored. For more than a decade, the 50-year-old welder has been producing the frames of Focus and Mondeo cars at the U.S. automaker’s plant in Vsevolozhsk, an industrial town 30 kilometers east of St. Petersburg.…
Russian authorities raided the meeting spaces of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Siberia and the country’s Far East late last week, detaining five worshippers and holding two in pre-trial detention. Russia added the group to its registry of extremist organizations in 2017, exposing Russia’s estimated 175,000 Jehovah’s Witnesses to mass raids and forcing at least 5,000 to…
Russia’s public finance watchdog has uncovered 772.7 billion rubles ($12.12 billion) in government spending violations last year. The volume of total violations has decreased substantially from 1.87 trillion rubles in 2017 as detections increased by 43 percent, the RBC news website reported Tuesday. Procurement accounted for the highest share of budget violations at 294.6 billion…
Belarus has suspended exports of light oil products, gasoline and diesel fuel to Ukraine, Poland and the Baltic countries due to the low quality of Russian oil, the country’s exporter announced Tuesday. Russia’s pipeline monopoly Transneft and its Energy Ministry said last week there were problems with the quality of Russian oil going through the…
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un will visit Russia’s Far East capital of Vladivostok for his first summit with President Vladimir Putin on April 25, the Kremlin confirmed on Tuesday. The leaders will discuss political and diplomatic efforts to settle the nuclear issue on the Korean peninsula, and Kim’s visit is key in this process, Kremlin…
An outspoken Russian lawmaker has turned heads for arguing that civil rights are restrictive, while bans are a form of freedom. Yelena Mizulina, who successfully lobbied for Russia’s 2012 “gay propaganda” law and spearheaded efforts to decriminalize domestic violence, made the statement in defense of recent internet restriction laws. On Monday, Russian senators backed tighter…