Staunton, August 19 – An increasing number of Russians, horrified by what Vladimir Putin is doing and convinced that reforming his regime is impossible, are beginning to think about what will happen “after Putin.” In many cases these reflections are disturbing in the short term but provide a source of optimism over the longer haul. […]
Pavel Kanygin, special correspondent for the independent Russian online newspaper Novaya Gazeta has been interviewing a number of the pro-Russian separatists and other political figures in Ukraine for some time. [See our translation of his interview with former Yanukovych Aide Anna German—The Interpreter). Kanygin himself was once kidnapped by the Russian-backed separatists and freed on […]
In December, Russian President Vladimir Putin gave a very long press conference. However, many organizations were not allowed to attend, and the kind of hard-hitting questions we’d expect if there were freedom of the press in Russia were not asked. Three days before the event, The New Times published this brave piece of journalism – […]
A foreign journalist was briefly detained by the Federal Security Services (FSB) in Sochi yesterday, her audio recorder was temporarily confiscated, and her passport information was scanned by authorities. This is hardly the first time that press freedom in Sochi has been challenged, raising concerns that journalists will continue to be the target of Russia […]
Several employees of Kommersant, an organization with deep Kremlin ties, have been fired for publicizing unauthorized quotes from Putin’s Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov. The offending quote suggested that Vladimir Putin was afraid to even mention opposition leader Alexei Navalny’s name in case it gave him free publicity. Putin has repeatedly spoken about Navalny without mentioning […]
Many of Russia’s newspapers have shut their pictures off today, replacing them with black or grey squares, or red Xs, in order to protest against the imprisonment of a distinguished photojournalist, Denis Sinyakov. Sinyakov was photographing a protest by Greenpeace activists when he and the activists were arrested. Despite the fact that Sinyakov was only […]
