Murdered Putin rival Nemtsov was tailed by FSB agent
Boris Nemtsov, a former opposition leader and critic of Vladimir Putin, was followed by an FSB agent linked to an assassination squad for almost a year before he was shot… Read more »
Category: Russia
How Putin provokes – and complicates – the struggle against autocracy
Just as the West overlooked abuses by anti-communist allies during the cold war, it will make ugly compromises now to counter Vladimir Putin’s revanchist Russia, The Economist suggests. Doing so… Read more »
After Ukraine – democracy is the next identity politics
The war in Ukraine is prompting considerable speculation about the onset of a new Cold War. The cold-war strategy of “containment” is being studied for the current age. Truman’s America… Read more »
Russian activists’ open letter calling for end to war in Ukraine
Disturbing – UN documented at least 37 forced disappearances or arbitrary detentions of Ukrainian officials, journalists & civil society activists, incl 15 disappeared in or around Kyiv, Kherson, Luhansk &… Read more »
Democratic Resilience Initiative launched amid Kremlin inner circle dissent
The United States plans to sanction approximately 400 Russian individuals and entities, including more than 300 legislators from the Duma, the Russian parliament’s lower house, a senior Biden administration official… Read more »
Global initiative to free political prisoners launched as Navalny convicted – again
A Russian court on Tuesday convicted top opposition leader Alexei Navalny of fraud and contempt of court, sentencing him to nine more years in prison in a move that was… Read more »
Could kleptocrats’ Londonograd change from sanctuary to snare?
The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project has uncovered over $17.5 billion in assets tied to Russia’s ruling oligarchs. The group used its Russian Asset Tracker to look for land,… Read more »
Zelenskyy: The Man Who Took On Putin
“I don’t need a ride, I need ammunition.” Russia’s Vladimir Putin must have thought it was Christmas when Volodymyr Zelenskyy, a comedian with no experience of statecraft became Ukraine’s President,… Read more »
‘United for Ukraine’: Baltics and Belarus invoke spirit of Kalinowski
Belarus is experiencing a de facto occupation by Russia but the country’s people are supporting the Ukrainians in their war with Moscow, according to Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya. “Should… Read more »
Putin falls into the dictator trap
Vladimir Putin personifies despotism’s dilemma, Princeton historian and Stalin biographer Stephen Kotkin told The New Yorker’s David Remnick this week. ‘The information gets worse. The sycophants get greater in number…. Read more »