Sputnik, a Russian state-owned, English-language news agency, ran a story today claiming that the German foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, had, in part, blamed protesters and pro-democracy activists for the Syrian civil war. Steinmeier is regarded in some quarters as being somewhat friendlier to the Kremlin than his French and British counterparts, or his Chancellor, Angela […]
Russia’s well-regarded Ekho Moskvy radio station, which has long attempted to maintain political independence despite the increasingly hypoxic climate for dissenting media and pressure from shareholders (the station is owned by Gazprom-Media), has today, facing an acute crisis since last month when the station received a warning from Roskomnadzor (the Russian media regulator) and an intervention […]
The following is a translation of a harrowing account in Gazeta.ru from a French journalist and her cameramen who were taken captive in Slavyansk right at the time Italian journalist Andrea Rocchelli and his translator Andrei Mironov were killed in shelling by the roadside. While the account, edited by Elizaveta Antonova, is dated 26 May, […]
Lenta.ru, one of Russia’s most prominent independent news outlets, has had their editor removed after they published an interview with the leader of Ukraine’s ultra-nationalist Right Sector, Dmytro Yarosh. Lenta was first warned by the Russian regulatory commission that they could face penalties, and then their editor was fired. Slon, another independent media outlet, has […]
After their editor-in-chief was forced out for having published an interview with a controversial Ukrainian political leader, the editors and staff of Lenta.ru published this statement. — Ed. Dear readers! Today, the 12th of March, the owner of the Afisha-Rambler-SUP company, Aleksandr Mamut sacked the editor-in-chief of Lenta.ru, Galina Timchenko. Alexei Goreslavskiy, the deputy director-general […]
Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina, along with several other performers, activists and journalists, have been attacked by Cossack paramilitary police while attempting a protest performance in Sochi this afternoon (RT has removed their video so we have replaced it with video from the Associated Press). The group attempted once again, having been detained yesterday, to […]
The prosecutor’s office of St. Petersburg has launched a probe of TV Rain over a poll dedicated to the 70th anniversary of the lifting of the Leningrad Blockade, the prosecutor’s website reported. The probe was initiated in response to complaints from survivors of the Blockade, outraged at TV Rain’s question: “Should Leningrad have surrendered, in […]
Let’s start with the weather. Recently an exotic-looking gentleman has become a permanent fixture on the “Russia‑24” public TV channel: a catchy checkered blazer, an acid-pink shirt, and a saucy scarf. His outfit, his nervous manners, and picaresque tone, recalls Bulgakov’s Korovyev, rather than a leading specialist of the “Phobos” weather center. Up until now […]
Russian government regulators are threatening to shut down TV Rain because of fallout from an “blasphemous” poll, run by the channel this past Sunday. TV Rain is Russia’s only independent TV station, and many are skeptical that a TV station may be shut down entirely because of a single segment of one show. –Ed. Pripachkin […]
The Microsoft Corporation (which owns the internet telephone service Skype) is prepared to store information on conversations and correspondence for six months, in order to provide it, along with user data from within the Russian Federation, to Russian law enforcement agencies, according to a response from Microsoft’s press service to a request from ITAR-TASS. “Microsoft […]
