Staunton, August 25 – The war that Vladimir Putin has unleashed in Ukraine is “only part of his global war” against modern civilization and as such is a challenge, however much unrecognized as yet, “no less dangerous than those made by Hitler” in the last century, according to Moscow commentator Aleksandr Skobov. In a Grani.ru […]
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 […]
Staunton, July 29 – The Russian government should reduce the attention it is paying to ethnic Russians and Russian speakers in the former Soviet republics – a group he calls “Russian World-II” – and expand its attention to ethnic Russians and those who feel an attachment to Russia elsewhere, a group he calls “Russian World-I,” […]
Staunton, July 24 – The central Russian narrative on the emergence of the three modern nations of Russians, Ukrainians and Belarusians, a narrative on which Vladimir Putin relies, is that there was a single Russian nation a millennium ago and that Ukrainians and Belarusians were byproducts of Russian ethnogenesis, the result of outside interference. That […]
Staunton, July 21 – “Many ethnic Russians both in Ukraine and in Russia itself are ready to declare themselves Ukrainians” or indeed anything else “if only to break out of ‘the Russian world’ and ‘cursed Sovietism’ and gain access to Western civilization and the benefits they believe it offers, according to a Russian Marxist. In […]
Staunton, July 17 – Vladimir Putin’s intervention in Ukraine appears to have united most Russians, but it has introduced or at least highlighted a deep split among Russian nationalists, some of whom support his actions and others very much oppose, to the point that people calling themselves “Russian nationalists” are now on both sides of […]
Staunton, July 16 – Because Vladimir Putin has chosen to turn toward the past rather than the future as shown most recently by his “having unleashed a war in Ukraine,” the Kremlin leader has become “the last soldier of the Empire, who will shoot his last bullet even as the Empire draws its last breath,” […]
Staunton, July 15 – Andrey Neronsky, the director of the Moscow Center of Russian Culture in Latvia, says that a Ukrainian scenario is completely possible in that Baltic country and that as few as 500 pro-Russian militants like those in Donetsk and Luhansk could end Latvia’s existence as a unified state. In comments to Newsbalt.ru […]
Staunton, July 10 – Russian public opinion “is being prepared for a change in Kremlin policy” toward Ukraine, Moscow commentators say, with central government media now downplaying the need for and utility of force and playing up the ways in which Vladimir Putin can serve as “peacemaker.” But this shift in tone, which reflects increasing […]
Staunton, July 9 – Recent events in Ukraine and especially the Kremlin’s decision not to intervene overtly in support of pro-Russian groups there has cost Vladimir Putin support among Russians, but Moscow commentators disagree about how much he has been hurt and how long the impact of this shift will last. Aleksandr Dugin, the Eurasianist […]
