Welcome to our column, Russia Update, where we will be closely following day-to-day developments in Russia, including the Russian government’s foreign and domestic policies. The previous issue is here. President Vladimir Putin finally appeared today at a news conference in St. Petersburg with Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambayev, but he said little and did not explain […]
Welcome to our column, Russia Update, where we will be closely following day-to-day developments in Russia, including the Russian government’s foreign and domestic policies. The previous issue is here. The Kremlin has published a new picture of President Vladimir Putin reportedly meeting with the head of the Supreme Court today, but as throughout the week, […]
Staunton, March 13 — The Putin regime has lost two things on which any state depends: a monopoly on the legitimate use of force on its own territory and a balance among its own force structures. And those twin losses help to explain why that country’s force structures may be emerging as the most powerful […]
Staunton, March 12 — Andrey Illarionov, an economist who earlier served as an advisor to Vladimir Putin, says that future historians may describe what is happening in Moscow now as “a conspiracy of the generals” — or more precisely as a behind-the-scenes battle between a former lieutenant colonel (Putin) and three senior generals. As the […]
Welcome to our column, Russia Update, where we will be closely following day-to-day developments in Russia, including the Russian government’s foreign and domestic policies. The previous issue is here. The human rights monitors who took testimony from the Chechen suspects jailed for the murder of opposition leader Boris Nemtsov have now themselves been threatened with […]
Staunton, March 11 -Even though Vladimir Putin is extremely successful in managing the news about the big issues in Russian life, such as what he calls “the investigation” rather than the cover-up of the murder of Boris Nemtsov, he cannot control the flow of news items which directly or indirectly show the way in which […]
Staunton, March 11 — Ramzan Kadyrov has said he is prepared to give his life for Vladimir Putin, but the larger and more immediate question now, Oleg Kashin argues, is ‘where is the guarantee that Kadyrov’s men will not kill” the Russian president or others in his entourage so that the ambitious Chechen leader can […]
Welcome to our column, Russia Update, where we will be closely following day-to-day developments in Russia, including the Russian government’s foreign and domestic policies. The previous issue is here. Vladimir Putin has awarded medals to Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov even after his praise of a suspect in the murder of Boris Nemtsov, and has also […]
Staunton, March 9 – In the increasingly Orwellian world that is Vladimir Putin’s Russia, one in which the lie is the truth, it is important to remember that “with rare exceptions,” the murders of those the authorities don’t like are “not solved. Sometimes, those who carried the out are found, but those who ordered them […]
Staunton, March 9 – Vladimir Putin’s acknowledgement that he personally decided upon and conducted a special operation to seize Crimea “opens a unique and limited-time window of opportunities” for the West to bring real pressure on him, divide his regime and force Moscow to change course, according to Slava Rabinovich. The Russian economist and blogger […]
