Russia Records 20,000 Political Detentions in 2022 – Watchdog

Russia detained at least 20,467 people for political reasons in 2022, according to end-of-year statistics published last week by OVD-Info, one of Russia’s leading independent human rights watchdogs.  At least 19,478 of those were detained for speaking out against Russia’s invasion of neighboring Ukraine. Other detentions occured at ecological and workers’ rights protests and protests…

Russia’s Media Regulator Granted Powers to Block all LGBT Sites

The Russian government has granted its media regulator the authority to block websites containing “LGBT propaganda” without a court order, according to a decree published on Monday. “Information propagating non-traditional sexual relations and (or) preferences” now serves as grounds for blacklisting any website in Russia, alongside those containing child pornography, information about suicide methods, and…

Kremlin Places Bellingcat’s Christo Grozev on Wanted List

Russia’s Interior Ministry placed Christo Grozev, the lead Russia journalist with the open-source investigative journalism group Bellingcat, on its wanted list on Monday. In keeping with previous wanted lists, the ministry did not specify which criminal offense Grozev was suspected of. The Interior Ministry only provided the Bulgarian national’s birthplace, date of birth, gender, and…

U.S. Asks Putin to Keep ‘Acknowledging Reality’ After ‘War’ Reference

The United States on Friday derisively called on Russian President Vladimir Putin to acknowledge reality and pull troops from Ukraine after he finally called the conflict a “war.” Since Putin ordered the invasion in February, Russia has officially spoken of a “special military operation” and imposed a law that criminalizes what authorities call misleading terminology.…

Russia’s Tatarstan to Rename Regional Presidency

The head of Russia’s republic of Tatarstan will lose the title of “president,” the last remaining symbol of Russian federalism following the Kremlin’s decades-long centralization of power. Tatarstan’s president will instead hold the title “Rais,” an Arabic term meaning “leader,” according to the publication. Lawmakers in the majority Muslim region introduced a new bill to…

Russia Jails Man for 3 Years Over Ukraine Remarks

A Russian court on Thursday jailed a man for three years over spreading “false information” about Russia’s offensive in Ukraine on a pirate radio station, as Moscow steps up its crackdown on critics. The court found Vladimir Rumyantsev, a 61-year-old worker in Vologda city in northwest Russia, guilty of broadcasting “false information” that was “full of hatred”…

Armenia PM Blames Russian Peacekeepers for Karabakh Blockade

Armenian Prime Minister Nikolai Pashinyan accused Russian peacekeepers Thursday of failing in its mission to unblock a key road that links Armenia to the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region. Pashinyan last week accused Armenia’s neighboring arch-nemesis Azerbaijan of blocking the Lachin corridor, Yerevan’s sole road link to the Armenian-populated separatist enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh, and cutting off residents…

‘Empty Words’: Russian Officials Unswayed By Zelensky’s U.S. Visit

Russian officials and other prominent figures have dismissed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s first wartime trip to the United States as an empty gesture that would not advance Russian-Ukrainian peace talks. More hawkish voices, meanwhile, called for Ukraine to be “destroyed” altogether following Zelensky’s meeting with U.S. President Joe Biden and widely praised address to Congress.…

Zelensky Says U.S. Aid Not ‘Charity’ on Triumphant U.S. Visit

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday directly appealed for long-term U.S. support on his first foreign trip since Russia’s invasion, saying aid was not “charity” and had helped keep his country “alive and kicking.” Three hundred days after Russian leader Vladimir Putin attacked Ukraine with hopes of swift conquest, Zelensky enjoyed a hero’s welcome on a…

Medvedev Discusses Strategic Partnership, Ukraine War With China’s Xi

Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev met Chinese leader Xi Jinping on Wednesday in an unannounced visit to Beijing, where he passed on President Vladimir Putin’s message hailing “unprecedented” cooperation. “The talks were quite useful,” Medvedev, who is now deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council, said in a video posted on his Telegram messaging app channel.…

Putin Forms Mobilization Task Force Featuring Military Bloggers

President Vladimir Putin established a task force Tuesday to coordinate work between the government and pro-war military bloggers on Russia’s chaotic mobilization campaign. The move fueled questions over possible plans to launch a second round of mobilization, despite Putin declaring its end in late October, as Moscow faces mounting losses in Ukraine. The Kremlin has denied that…

Russia’s Justice Ministry Seeks Dissolution of Moscow Helsinki Group 

Russia’s Justice Ministry has filed for a court order to shut down one of the country’s most prominent and respected human rights organizations, the state-run RIA Novosti news agency reported on Tuesday. In its legal filing, the Justice Ministry claimed that the Moscow Helsinki Group had violated unspecified “legal requirements” while carrying out its activities, a…

Putin Orders Intensified Hunt for ‘Traitors, Spies, Saboteurs’

President Vladimir Putin ordered Russia’s counterintelligence services on Monday to step up their hunt for “traitors, spies and saboteurs” and prevent threats from abroad. Speaking on Security Agency Worker’s Day, a professional holiday in Russia, Putin laid out “high demands” on Russia’s security agencies to respond to “new threats and challenges.” “You must put a firm…