President Volodymyr Zelensky said Thursday that Ukrainian forces were “holding our ground” in Avdiivka, after Moscow said it had improved its position in the frontline eastern town. The Donbas town is symbolically and strategically important to Kyiv and near the Russian-controlled city of Donetsk, seized by separatist forces in 2014. “Avdiivka. We are holding our…
Russian President Vladimir Putin arrived in Kyrgyzstan early Thursday, marking his first trip abroad since the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued a warrant for his arrest. Putin has seldom traveled abroad since invading Ukraine in February 2022 and has until now remained inside the country since the March 2023 ICC warrant. Though Kyrgyzstan is a…
Journalist Khaybar Akifi was severely wounded in a drone attack that also killed his four-year-old daughter and his wife’s parents in Russia’s border region of Belgorod, several media officials said. “Right now (Akifi) is in a coma after a Ukrainian drone strike that killed his daughter and his wife’s parents,” the head of the state…
Iraq’s prime minister on Wednesday called for Russian President Vladimir Putin to help reach a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas militants. “Mr. President, I appeal to you as a president of a permanent UN Security Council member to come forward with an initiative on a real ceasefire and search for a real solution to…
Russia on Wednesday said its forces had strengthened their position on the frontline near Avdiivka, a day after Ukraine warned Moscow was stepping up strikes to encircle the eastern town. Avdiivka is symbolically and strategically important to Kyiv, lying just north of the Moscow-controlled city of Donetsk which was seized by separatist forces in 2014.…
Kyrgyzstan’s parliament on Wednesday ratified an agreement for a common air defense system with Russia, just a day before a planned visit by Russian President Vladimir Putin to the Central Asian country. The agreement states that a land plot of five hectares at the Kant Russian military base in Kyrgyzstan will be used for the…
RN-Vankor Company (an oil-producing subsidiary enterprise of Rosneft Oil Company) opened a recruitment centre for Vostok Oil project in Krasnoyarsk.
At least one Russian soldier was killed and five others wounded in shelling near the border with Ukraine, media reported Wednesday, citing anonymous sources. Five soldiers were hospitalized in the Bryansk region after a Tuesday afternoon attack on the village of Gudovka, according to Astra, an independent news channel on the Telegram messaging app. Gudovka…
Ukraine’s security service on Wednesday said it had identified two suspected informers who allegedly helped Russia strike at a wake last week, killing over 50 people. The SBU named two local men now living in Russia, saying they were suspected of giving information that led to a missile attack on the village of Hroza in…
A Russian court on Wednesday fined veteran rights campaigner Oleg Orlov 150,000 rubles ($1,500) for “discrediting” the Russian Armed Forces. Orlov, who serves as co-chair of the Memorial human rights group, was found guilty of repeatedly “discrediting” Russia’s military over his public opposition to the war in Ukraine. Under wartime censorship laws, the charges can carry…
The My Denunciation app did its job almost too well. The satirical app, created by an anonymous exiled Russian IT specialist, aimed to trick the public into submitting denunciations through its system. In doing so, the app would ostensibly prevent these reports from reaching law enforcement — and highlight the growing problem of denunciations in…
Updated with new injury count. A train operator and at least four other people were injured when two metro cars collided in southeastern Moscow early Wednesday, according to local authorities and state media. “A train without passengers was being transferred to the depot when it rolled into a train waiting at the Pechatniki metro station,”…
Russia’s economy is set to grow by 1.1% in 2024, slower than previously predicted, the International Monetary Fund said Tuesday in its latest World Economic Outlook report. The updated forecast placed Russia at the bottom of the IMF’s list of major emerging markets and developing economies, where average growth for this year and next was predicted…
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday voiced concern over the “catastrophic increase” in the number of civilians killed since fighting between Israel and the Hamas militant group erupted over the weekend. During a telephone call with his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan, “emphasis was placed on the sharply worsening situation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict zone,” the…
The UN General Assembly on Tuesday rejected a bid by Russia to regain a seat on the Human Rights Council, from which it was ousted after invading Ukraine. Russia, which was competing with Bulgaria and Albania for two open spots allocated to the Eastern Europe regional group, nonetheless received 83 votes in its favor from…
Armenian leader Nikol Pashinyan will skip a summit that Russian President Vladimir Putin is expected to attend, host country Kyrgyzstan said Tuesday, amid a growing rift between Yerevan and Moscow. Pashinyan’s snubbing the meeting of a Moscow-led regional grouping is a further blow to ties between Yerevan and Moscow, which have soured in recent weeks.…
The Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) has ruled to keep Russia’s Under-17 team banned from international competitions following backlash from some of the organization’s members, The Associated Press reported Tuesday. UEFA and the world football authority FIFA banned Russian clubs and national teams from competitions days after Russia invaded Ukraine last year. Last month, UEFA…
Two people were killed in Ukrainian shelling of Russia’s western Belgorod region, its Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said Tuesday. An elderly man was killed instantly when an artillery shell hit a home in the village of Popovka, which is located some 50 kilometers from the border with Ukraine. His wife sustained severe shrapnel wounds and died hours…
A pro-Russia Japanese lawmaker left his opposition party Tuesday after facing criticism for making a surprise visit to Moscow and declaring his support for Russia in its war against Ukraine. Muneo Suzuki, a former parliamentary vice-minister of foreign affairs, submitted a letter of resignation to the center-right opposition Japan Innovation Party, the party’s secretary-general Fumitake…
Russian forces were Tuesday trying to encircle the eastern frontline Ukrainian town of Avdiivka, an official said, adding it was being heavily bombed. Kyiv’s forces have managed to cling on to Avdiivka despite repeated Russian strikes. The town lies just north of the Russian-controlled city of Donetsk, which was captured by separatist forces in 2014. “For…
Russian forces closed in on the frontline town of Avdiivka in east Ukraine on Tuesday, as Kyiv warned Moscow was stepping up strikes in an attempt to encircle it completely. The Russian attacks come after months of a slower-than-expected Ukrainian counteroffensive, launched this summer to claw back territory lost during Moscow’s invasion. Avdiivka is an…
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday issued his first public statement about the war between Israel and the Hamas militant group, accusing Washington of pursuing a pro-Israel policy against the interests of Palestine. “I think many will agree with me that this is a clear example of the failure of U.S. policy in the Middle East,”…
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday issued his first public statement about the war between Israel and the Hamas militant group, accusing Washington of pursuing a pro-Israel policy against the interests of Palestine. “I think many will agree with me that this is a clear example of the failure of U.S. policy in the Middle East,”…
RN-Vankor, an enterprise of Rosneft oil and gas production complex, obtained a patent on developing a new environmentally friendly technology for recycling drill cuttings into soil concrete construction material at the Vostok Oil project.
A Moscow court has rejected Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich’s appeal against the extension of his pre-trial detention on widely criticized spying charges, Interfax reported Tuesday. Gershkovich, 32, a U.S. citizen and former Moscow Times journalist, was in August ordered to stay in pre-trial detention until Nov. 30. He challenged that ruling, having lost two…
Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov late Monday voiced support for Palestine and offered to send his soldiers to mediate the conflict between Israel and the Hamas militant group. “I address the leaders of Muslim nations — create a coalition and reach out to those who you call friends, Europe and the whole West, so that they don’t bomb…
Updated with the latest death toll and number of people missing. Four Russian citizens have been killed and at least six others remain missing following the Hamas militant group’s surprise attack on Israel over the weekend, Russia’s Embassy in Tel Aviv told state media Tuesday. The latest updated toll comes after Russian Ambassador Anatoly Viktorov said on…
Russians’ interest in the deadly Hamas attack on Israel was significantly higher than interest in the war in Ukraine over the weekend, according to an analysis of Google Trends data by the independent media outlet Vyorstka. Observers have called the attack, which the Palestinian militant group launched on the Russian president’s birthday, “Hamas’ gift to…
Russia on Tuesday will seek to return to the UN Human Rights Council, a test of what Moscow believes is quiet support for its membership despite fierce criticism from the West over the invasion of Ukraine. Russia, which was booted from the Geneva-based body after it invaded Ukraine last year, will be considered in a…
The Russian segment of the International Space Station (ISS) sprung its third coolant leak in under a year Monday, raising new questions about the reliability of the country’s space program even as officials said crew members weren’t in danger. Flakes of frozen coolant spraying into space were seen in an official live feed of the…
Updated to add details from the Financial Times’ report. Russian billionaire Mikhail Fridman has left Britain and intends to move to Israel, the RBC news website reported Monday, citing an unidentified source familiar with the matter. Alfa Group, the investment conglomerate which Fridman co-founded, confirmed this information to RBC. “The businessman is currently in Moscow…
Reports circulated last week that Russia had withdrawn much of its Black Sea Fleet from Sevastopol in annexed Crimea. This followed a wave of attacks from Ukraine attacking warships, submarines, and infrastructure in the strategic naval base. Though the news was met with celebration among Ukraine’s allies, with the British Armed Forces Minister calling it…
A rocket fired by Hamas militants hit a mosque near Jerusalem dedicated to Akhmat Kadyrov, a Chechen separatist fighter in the 1990s who later switched sides and pledged allegiance to Russia, Israel’s foreign ministry reported Monday. According to the ministry, a Hamas rocket “directly hit the Akhmat Kadyrov mosque,” the second-largest mosque in Israel. No injuries…
Russia’s government is set to spend four times more on “patriotic education” in 2024 than in 2022, the RBC news website reported Monday, citing a draft budget proposal. A total of 45.85 billion rubles ($450 million) will be allocated toward various youth movements, school officials engaged in “patriotic” education, state insignia, and monitoring of youth online.…
At least four Russian citizens are missing following the Hamas Islamist group’s surprise weekend attack on Israel, Russia’s Embassy in Tel Aviv said Monday. The embassy said there was still no word on whether Russians were among the 800 people who died during the ground, air and sea attacks that caught Israel by surprise on…
Updated to include death toll. One Russian citizen has been killed and at least four others were missing following the Hamas Islamist group’s surprise weekend attack on Israel, the state-run RIA Novosti news agency reported Monday, citing the Russian Embassy in Tel Aviv. At least 800 people have died during the ground, air and sea…
Israel on Sunday formally declared war against the Hamas militant group after its fighters launched an unprecedented surprise attack against the country, which by Monday had already resulted in the deaths of more than 1,100 people in both Israel and Gaza. Russian officials and media figures have not signaled explicit support for either of the…
The number of luxury cars in Russia surged last year despite Western sanctions in retaliation to Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, the RBC news website reported Monday, citing an analysis of federal tax audit data. The number of cars with a sticker price of 10 million rubles ($98,500) or more increased by 22% from 2021-2022, reaching an…
The United Nations on Monday voiced concern over Moscow’s “mass conferral” of Russian passports in Ukrainian territory it controls, saying that those who refuse the documents are “ensnared in a web of exclusion.” The UN human rights office OHCHR said residents who do not take up Russian citizenship were being denied access to essential public…
Moscow and the Arab League will work to “stop the bloodshed” in Israel and Gaza, Russia’s Foreign Minister said Monday as he met the group’s chief Ahmed Aboul Gheit. Aboul Gheit was in Moscow for talks following Saturday’s unprecedented attack on Israel by the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas. “I am sure that Russia and the…
Russia has charged prominent Russian lawyer Ilya Novikov in absentia for joining the Ukrainian military, the Federal Security Service (FSB) said Monday. Novikov left Russia after the February 2022 invasion of Ukraine and joined the Ukrainian territorial defense forces, according to the FSB’s statement. It said that Novikov “underwent military training, participates in combat operations and is engaged in…
Russia, which was ousted from the UN Human Rights Council after its forces invaded Ukraine, will attempt a return to the body on Tuesday — an uncertain move that will provide a gauge of its international support. The UN General Assembly will vote that day to elect 15 new members to the Geneva-based UN body,…
Russian Vladimir Putin on Saturday announced the start of gas supplies to Uzbekistan via Kazakhstan, a boost for Russia’s industry hit by a flurry of Western sanctions over the offensive in Ukraine. Despite being home to a wealth of natural resources including gas, the Central Asian country of Uzbekistan has faced energy shortages. Moscow meanwhile…
Russia’s Defense minister Sergei Shoigu inspected a military factory producing the Sarmat intercontinental missile, saying it would soon be ready for use, his ministry posted on Telegram Saturday. The Sarmat is capable of carrying multiple nuclear warheads and is among Russia’s next-generation missiles which Putin has described as “invincible.” The Russian Defense Ministry posted footage…
Russia’s Foreign Ministry on Saturday called for Israeli and Palestinian forces to stop armed hostilities after attacks launched by Palestinian militant group Hamas on Israel. “We call on the Palestinian and Israeli sides to immediately ceasefire, renounce violence, show the necessary restraint,” Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said. Zakharova called the parties to set…
Ukrainian shelling on the Russian border region of Belgorod killed one person on Saturday morning, local authorities said. “This morning, the Armed Forces of Ukraine hit the village of Urazovo in the Valuysky district with Grad missiles,” Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov wrote on Telegram. “One person died — a man who was on the street at…
Washington’s decision to expel two Russian diplomats in retaliation for a similar expulsion of US diplomats is “banal revenge,” Russian ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov said Saturday. In a statement on Telegram he said that at a meeting with the US side, “I asked my interlocutors to explain what exactly our comrades were…
Kazakhstan announced on Friday new efforts to increase the share of the Kazakh language over Russian in its media landscape, amid growing skepticism over Moscow’s influence since the invasion of Ukraine. Kazakh is the official language of the former Soviet republic in Central Asia, but Russian is recognized too and is still widely spoken among…
“It was hard for me there, I wanted to come back all the time,” Alexander Pipkin, his eyes downcast, said in an interview on Belarusian state television at the end of August. In the interview, Pipkin is presented as a repenting doctor, formerly part of the Belarusian opposition in exile, who decided to return to…
A Russian court in annexed Crimea has sentenced a Ukrainian activist who was abducted last year to 13 years in prison for “espionage,” Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) said Friday. Serhiy Tsygipa, an activist and citizen journalist from southern Ukraine’s Kherson region, went missing in March 2022 while attempting to bring medicine to his mother-in-law,…
The Russian government has lowered the payout offered in the restructuring of tech giant Yandex following anti-war statements made by the company’s co-founder, Russian media reported Friday. Sanctions over Russia’s war in Ukraine have forced Yandex, once the crown jewel of Russia’s tech sector, to split into two new companies, with one overseeing its operations…
The ruble fell further against the dollar on Friday, a day after Russian President Vladimir Putin said the sanctions-hit country’s economic situation was “stable.” The Russian currency fell by as much as 101.46 rubles to the dollar in morning exchanges before paring down some losses. The ruble crossed the psychological threshold of 100 to the…
Russia’s western enclave of Kaliningrad on Friday received its first cargo ship via the Northern Sea Route, long touted by Moscow as an alternative shipping lane to the Suez Canal. The vessel made a stop in the port town of Baltiysk while en route to St. Petersburg from Shanghai, Kaliningrad region Governor Anton Alikhanov said on…
Senior Russian legislators will consider revoking the ratification of a global nuclear test ban treaty after President Vladimir Putin suggested resuming nuclear weapons tests, the parliament’s speaker said Friday. Putin said Thursday it was “theoretically possible” to de-ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) since the United States had signed but not ratified it. Vyacheslav Volodin,…
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu on Friday called for more Su-34 fighter jets to be produced, as Moscow pursues its offensive in Ukraine. The Kremlin has announced a massive spending hike to accommodate its military needs in Ukraine as its large-scale offensive approaches its second year. “These planes are real workhorses. They can make four…
A powerful storm flooded and knocked out power in households in Far East Russia’s Sakhalin region, authorities said Friday. Video shared on social media showed heavy rains and flooding in the region’s largest city of Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk. More than 5,000 residents were left without electricity after emergency crews restored power for 13,500 people, according to the Sakhalin…
A 10-year-old and his grandmother were killed on Friday when Russian missiles smashed into Kharkiv in eastern Ukraine, just hours after another attack left dozens dead at a wake in a nearby village. Rescue workers in Kharkiv were extinguishing fires next to charred vehicles, and twisted missile fragments lay in a deep crater in the…
Russian President Vladimir Putin said Thursday that Russia’s mission is to “build a new world” as he blamed a Western “military and financial pyramid scheme” for Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. “We are, in fact, faced with the task of building a new world,” Putin said in a grievance-filled speech at the annual Valdai Discussion Club. He…
President Vladimir Putin last week introduced a bill greenlighting Russia’s exit from the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities (FCNM), the world’s most comprehensive legally binding treaty devoted to safeguarding the rights of minority groups. Russia is home to representatives of as many as 193 ethnic groups who speak at least 270 languages…
Russia’s top shaman has given his blessing to the Kremlin’s military offensive in Ukraine, praising troops and denouncing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as an “enemy,” state media reported Thursday. Shamanism, a religious practice that involves connecting with the spirit world, is prevalent across the indigenous peoples of Siberia and resurged in popularity after being heavily…