Staunton, April 3 – In the wake of Crimea, Moscow is likely to increase pressure on Belarus to cooperate, but experts say there is little chance that the two countries will unite any time soon. Instead, Putin’s Crimean Anschluss is likely to make Belarus and other former Soviet republics even more leery than they already […]
Staunton, April 2 – Vladimir Putin is driven less by the “imperial syndrome” some are pointing to than by his own sense of the weakness as a result of his continuing reliance on the export of natural resources and his opposition to “the internal West” which wants Russia to modernize, according to Kirill Rogov. As […]
Staunton, March 19 – In the past, “every country had its own map, each of which was more or less different,” a Georgian writer says, but with Marco Polo and Google, most came to accept a similar map of the world, one in which borders are clear and fixed. But Russians remain an exception. According […]
Staunton, March 19 – Arguing that “after the Crimean events, the world will not be what it was” because key element of the previous international system – the inviolability of national borders – has been finally and irrevocably violated, four Moscow analysts say that this opens the door to five possible “new world orders” in […]
Crimea has gone to the polls today to decide, nominally at least, between joining the Russian Federation or reverting to the 1992 Crimean consitution (a declaration of independence from Ukraine in all but name). The referendum has been condemned by both the Ukrainian government and almost all foreign states bar Venezuela, Syria and North Korea. […]
The war of words between Russia and the EU and USA is intensifying. While the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, is attending meetings in Paris to persuade France, an arms supplier to Russia, to oppose sanctions, Russian state media have released potentially damaging phone recordings between EU diplomats. Yesterday’s liveblog can be found here. For […]
A pro-Kremlin Russian media outlet, Kommersant, has held a question and answer session with the EU’s ambassador to Russia, Vygaudas Ušackas, in which they discuss relations between Moscow and Brussels. This is thesecond part of the interview. The first can be found here. – Ed. Why is the EU completely dependent on the US and […]
All the factions of the State Duma endorsed the statement on the situation in Ukraine. In this statement the legislators express dissatisfaction with the actions of the opposition, including riots and destruction of monuments, as well as with meddling by western politicians in Ukraine’s affairs. In its statement the State Duma warns that “unauthorized rallies, […]
Every Wednesday, The Interpreter’s managing editor James Miller will be speaking with Dr. Matt Sienkiewicz, a professor at Boston College, about the major headlines of the week. If you have questions you’d like Matt to address in future episodes, feel free to tweet to him: @mediastudied. If you have feedback on the content feel free to tweet to James: @MillerMENA. […]
The Interpreter’s Elena Sevettaz, a Russian-French journalist, has published a book about Sergei Magnitsky, whose death in prison, and post-mortem trial and conviction, sparked protests around the world, eventually leading to the Obama administration passing sanctions against Russian officials involved in the case. The Russian government responded by blocking American adoptions of Russian children. The new […]
