Staunton, January 19 – Over the past year, Ukrainians have torn down more than 500 memorials to Vladimir Lenin, actions that reflect their revulsion at the Soviet past but ones that have had the unintended consequence of transforming Lenin into a conservative figure for many Russians and making the destruction of Lenin statues in their […]
Staunton, January 19 – Twenty-five years ago today, on Mikhail Gorbachev’s order, Soviet troops invaded the Azerbaijani capital of Baku by land, sea and air, killing hundreds and enflaming ethnic hatreds, in an action the Soviet president five years after the events acknowledged was “the greatest mistake” of his political career. That event, known to […]
Staunton, January 15 – Federica Mogherini, the EU’s foreign policy chief, commenting on Russia’s annexation of Crimea, says that “we will never accept the change of borders by force. Neither now nor in this century nor in this millennium.” But she adds that there should not be any limitson political dialogue with Moscow concerning the […]
Staunton, January 12 – Both the tsarist and Soviet armies had at various points units consisting of Muslim soldiers, and these units fought well. But if Moscow allows Central Asians to serve in the Russian army and even forms “Muslim battalions,” it is far from clear whether these units would be willing to fight for […]
Staunton, December 24 – A proposal by Valentina Matviyenko, the Chairman of Russia’s Federation Council, to declare the Soviet government’s 1954 transfer of Crimea from the RSFSR to the Ukrainian SSR “illegal” could “lead to war not only between Ukraine and Russia but practically along the entire perimeter of the present-day Russian Federation,” according to […]
Staunton, December 13 – Four Russian analysts suggest that the six causes they identify as being behind the collapse of the USSR are again to varying degrees present in Russia today, but what is perhaps more interesting than the causes they do identify is the one that they don’t: the ways in which the six […]
Yesterday’s live coverage of the Ukraine conflict can be found here. An archive of our liveblogs can be found here. For an overview and analysis of this developing story see our latest podcast. Please help The Interpreter to continue providing this valuable information service by making a donation towards our costs. View Ukraine: April, 2014 […]
Staunton, December 5 – Even as evidence mounts that the Russian Federation may be more fragile than other post-Soviet states and that its aggression in Ukraine may accelerate its disintegration along ethnic or regional lines, Vitaly Tretyakov says that “Russia was and will continue to remain an empire.” Tretyakov, dean of the television faculty at […]
Staunton, November 28 – Russian aggression in Ukraine has opened a new divide in the West between those who take freedom for granted and those who know that it must be defended or it can be lost, according to Vladimir Vyatrovich, the director of the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory. Many in the West have […]
Staunton, November 25 – The unwillingness of Russians to make a sharp break with the Soviet past and accept that Russia today is “a new independent state” and the efforts of Vladimir Putin and his regime to present Russia as a country with a single unbroken history has left Russia without a present or a […]
