Tag: Kommersant

Reports of precise numbers and accounts of tracking Islamist fighters as they leave Russia and return open up the question of how much the FSB controls these fighters, not only to gather intelligence but to perform missions.

Russian businessman Aleksandr Grigoryev has been detained on suspicions of money-laundering $1.6 million from banks that lost their licenses, and could be involved in as much as $46 billion, Moscow Times reported, citing Kommersant. Welcome to our column, Russia Update, where we will be closely following day-to-day developments in Russia, including the Russian government’s foreign […]

Staunton, June 23 – Anti-Americanism has become part of the discourse of ordinary Russians over the last year, but senior government officials have generally been restrained in their use of such phobias. But that has now changed, Nezavisimaya gazeta says, and “anti-American phobias have acquired the status of the official picture of the world in […]

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. UPDATES BELOW Anna Duritskaya, the Ukrainian companion of slain opposition leader Boris Nemtsov who was with him on the night of his murder is not being […]

Staunton, September 18 – The Russian government is about to introduce a bill that would allow jailers to use more force, including lethal force in some cases, against prisoners and to avoid being held accountable by the courts, an action that led Russian ombudsman Ella Pamfilova to appeal to Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev to kill […]

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 […]

The Kremlin is planning to set up its own publishing company with a conservative-leaning news angle, Kommersant has reported, citing Dmitry Badovsky, Director of the Institute of Socio-Economic and Political Studies Foundation (ISEPI), and formerly Deputy Chief of the Internal Policy Department in the President’s Administration. The founder of the new entity will be ISEPI. […]

[Summary: Acting Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin, a member of the Superior Council of United Russia, is expected to run for the mayoral elections on 8 September as an Independent. United Russia has explained this by the fact that “40 parties” “might want” to support him. The main potential rival to the acting mayor, Civic Platform […]