Category: putinism

Twenty-Five Years

25 years ago, on March 26, 2000, Vladimir Putin won the Russian presidential election, making him the official successor of Boris Yeltsin, who had resigned three months earlier. Putin, who was prime minister at the time and had served as acting president after Yeltsin’s resignation, won 53.4 percent of the vote in what is widely considered the last truly competitive presidential election in Russia to date. Over the next 25 years, Putin would only tighten his grip on power. To comply with the constitutional limit of two consecutive terms, he switched to the role of prime minister in 2008 while his ally Dmitry Medvedev occupied the presidency. After amending the constitution to extend presidential terms from four to six years starting in 2012, Medvedev made way for Putin to run in the 2012 presidential election. Putin won 63.6 percent of the vote, securing a third term in Russia’s highest office.

After winning re-election again in March 2018, Putin once again faced hitting the constitutional term limit in 2024. To address what became widely known as “the 2024 problem”, Putin proposed wide-ranging amendmen[t]s to the constitution in January 2020, which included a change to presidential term limits. While making the rules stricter on paper by limiting Russian citizens to two presidential terms in their lifetime — disallowing the shuffling between positions that Putin had employed in 2008 and 2012 — the amendmen[t] was designed to disregard past or current terms, effectively erasing Putin’s first four terms. The new rule paved the way for Putin to run again in 2024 and to seek re-election in 2028 if he so chooses, which could keep him in power until 2036.

If Putin remains in power beyond 2030, he would become Russia’s longest-serving leader, surpassing Joseph Stalin, who led the Soviet Union for 29 years between 1922 and his death in 1953.

Source: Felix Richter, “Putin’s Grip on Power,” Statista, 25 March 2025

Tequilajazzz frontman Evgeny Fedorov explains to Konstantin Eggert, the presenter of DW’s #Trendy, why Putin is a genuinely grassroots president, what Fedorov’s wealthy fans asked him to play at company parties, and how Russian chanson masqueraded as Russian rock.

Konstantin Eggert: You and I are speaking in Vilnius, where your manager had to look for quite a long while for a venue for your gig because many people turned him down. Does this bother you?

Evgeny Fedorov: Of course it makes me sad. We realize that, in our case, it is unfair. There are artists playing both sides of the fence who are traveling around the world to make money. We are vocal opponents of the war and everything that has been happening in Russia. So it’s a little bit offensive to us, but we realize that this is the price the times make us pay and nothing can be done about it.

— How easy is it for an artist in exile to survive?

— It’s gotten harder. I can’t say that we were a big box-office band. Our music is specific: we’ve always had a fairly modest audience, and we’re used to it. Business wise, we are now cut off from the Russian market and can’t tour Siberia and the Far East. It’s not a big deal, because on 25 February 2022 I personally announced on social media that we would stop doing concerts in the Russian Federation. It was a deliberate (not hysterical) step on our part. We have been coping with these difficulties. We have a small but very loyal, attentive, smart fan base. As it turned out, a significant number of them left the country with us, and so I see in the audience the same people who used to come out for our concerts in St. Petersburg and Moscow.

— In one interview, you spoke about the muteness that overcame you when the full-scale invasion began. Is that muteness completely gone now?

— No, it’s not gone. It has become obvious that I have to reinvent myself, to devise a new language, both creatively and literally. It’s just inappropriate even to remember now some of the things I wrote songs about. I have to change a lot, and this applies to all areas of my life.

Konstantin Eggert interviews musician Evgeny Fedorov, Deutsche Welle Russian Service, 26 March 2025 (in Russian)

— What do you mean that you have to change? You once said that writing protest songs wasn’t your thing.

— I’m not good at it. I tried to voice my rage and grief, all the emotions that were overwhelming me, but it sounded stupid and unnatural. Despite the fact that they were my emotions, I couldn’t express them adequately in songs. We wrote only one [protest] song, “A Machine Full of Evil.” These were the first lines I wrote down in a notebook after the war started. I was watching a war newsreel from Ukraine, and this line came to my mind: “A machine full of evil was crawling.” It’s the only song on the subject where it’s quite obvious to everyone what it’s about. We don’t use any Aesopian language in it.

— Do you think that most people in Russia are just running this “evil machine”?

— No, of course not. I see a huge number of people who were not able to leave [Russia] for various reasons. Some of them deliberately stayed behind to try and destroy the system and to help each other survive. But I’m still horrified to see what a humungous number of people wholeheartedly support this crap.

Tequilajazzz, “A Machine Full of Evil” (2023)

— Among them are people with whom you have collaborated — [Vyacheslav] Butusov, [Konstantin] Kinchev, and a considerable portion of today’s Z-patriots from the cultural realm. Did you already feel at that time that this could happen? Or are those people just interested in the money?

— Almost none of them was a surprise to me. They had obviously been drifting in that direction. You could see that they were going over to that side, they had got their own personal confessors. […] The guys were fusing with the regime, it was out in the open for everyone to see, and nobody surprised me. You know, I had a dream a couple of times that Putin and I were in an office. He says, “Zhenka, sit down, I’m going to take care of business and then we’ll go fishing.” Something like that. I remember the nasty delight I felt in the dream. How cool, I’m hanging out with Putin himself! That courtier’s joy of being near power. I woke up, horrified to discover that I had it in me too, that no one was immune.

The more popular an artist is, the more often they are in the regime’s domain. I have friends who played at ex-President Medvedev’s dacha. I realize that if my music had suddenly appealed to Putin and I had been invited, I cannot rule out that a metamorphosis would have happened to me, and that I would suddenly have been possessed by this despicable joy of being around powerful people. I thank God and our firmness, which we have maintained all these years, and our aesthetic commitments and our ethical commitments, too, that we escaped the danger.

We played company parties three times in our lives. Each time it was a former fan of ours who, as a university student, used to pogo at our gigs, but then had struck it very rich, and so for his birthday or for his company’s birthday he had engaged our band and asked us to play our most hardcore alternative songs. It was always quite funny, because it was obviously the wrong music for a company party. It was just that the guy had bought himself the kind of hardcore show which he couldn’t permit himself to attend now, because he was a “big man,” surrounded by security guards, and so on. But God spared us from all those parties organized by the presidential administration and all those people who were trying to craft the new imperialist mindset.

— Is Putin a people’s president?

— I wish I could joke about it, but I look at people, how they relate to him, and everything that is happening now, and it seems that he is in fact a people’s president, because this type of president did not “go viral” for nothing and enjoys such popularity. It means that he resonates with the people, so that means he is a people’s president.

— What resonates?

— The jokes, the quips, the anecdotes. The man thinks in memes from Soviet movies. He knows how to speak this language and this appeals to people. I remember that my normal, sane friends, when Putin started making all those jokes, squealed with delight: “What a great joke he made!” I said, Guys, what’s wrong with you, it’s a purely cop joke, filled with contempt for people and the belief that no one is without sin, that “everyone shits somewhere,” that everyone is dirty, and if they aren’t, they should be made dirty. I think his practice is based on that.

— And even the war, all the Cargo 200s coming home, doesn’t change that?

— Those people are certain they are fighting for a just cause, they have been convinced of it. We all grew up completely convinced we were the kindest and most generous [people in the world], that we couldn’t be wrong. It’s a very cozy room from which it’s hard to escape and realize that we [do not do] the most magnanimous things. And when we save nations, we are just saving a lane for business.

— In January 2000, when Radio Liberty journalist Andrei Babitsky was abducted in Chechnya, I realized the new regime were the enemies of the media, and therefore the enemies of everything else that was decent. Did you have a moment when you realized that this was a catastrophe?

— September 1999, the apartment building bombings. It was quite obvious this was regime change, that [the bombings] had been necessary to bring that person to power. I lived with that horror for twenty years, trying to resist, not allowing myself to flirt with Russian chanson, with underworld things, with what Russian rock later turned into — this fusion of the guitars, the image, and the courtyard songs of Russian chanson with all the paraphernalia of chthonic values — with vodka, herring, the banya, and so on.

— You once said that the need for protest songs ended in the 90s and the bourgeois era of just being creative dawned. Was it a good time for you?

— It’s generally normal for people to do creative work and sing love songs. The need to write protest songs is not normal. We liked the fact that rock and roll was no longer a genre persecuted by the KGB and that it was safe to play. We sang about ugly things, often without delving into lofty matters. Our music is about different aspects of human life, both lofty and absolutely ordinary, even shameful. That’s normal. What is happening now is not normal.

— If you look at the last thirty years, what Russian music, literature or cinema has stuck with you?

— A few Boris Grebenshchikov albums for sure. Now I’m just cut off. I can’t listen to anything that I liked three years ago. I turn on my favorite album and realize I can’t listen to it because it takes me back to a life which no longer exists. I’ve become an “anti-old fart.” Because old farts listen to the music of their youth and choose to stay in their time bubble. My bubble has burst. I’m listening to the stuff teenagers and young adults listen to, to weird experimental stuff that doesn’t sound like what I used to enjoy.

I’m reading a lot of hundred-year-old émigré prose right now, which has suddenly become timely. It’s interesting to compare [my experiences with] the experiences of people who left [Russia] between 1918 and 1920. There is this sense of horror at the darkness that surfaced and deluged everything, the mundane details, the executions, the horror at this outbreak of self-righteous darkness, spewing saliva, blood, and shit… The horror is quite comparable.

— Let’s imagine that tomorrow Putin falls, we make peace with Ukraine and give them back the occupied territories, and the political prisoners are released. Would you be willing to go home?

— I don’t want to see those mugs. Where will all these cops, FSO officers, and the people who are in league with them go? A huge number of my friends in Russia are in a terrible situation. What is it like for those people who are on our side, but who are [in Russia]? How do they survive? How do they each struggle in their own way, often just on an aesthetic level? I have a quite pessimistic view of the future. I don’t believe that any of this will change quickly, if it didn’t change in the few years of freedom that Russia had, which people didn’t savor, but decided to go back to the Brezhnev-era twilight.

Source: Konstantin Eggert, “Fedorov: People in the Russian Federation have been convinced they are fighting for a just cause,” Deutsche Welle Russian Service, 26 March 2025

Tequilajazz, One Hundred Fifty Billion Steps (LP, 1999)

Evgeny Fedorov is a Russian musician, composer, and producer. Having played and composed music from a young age, he is a well-known and highly regarded figure in the Russian alternative rock scene. Since late August 2024, he has been in ICORN residence in Stockholm after openly criticising Russia’s war in Ukraine.

Evgeny Fedorov joined his first band Объект Насмешек (‘Object of Ridicule’) in 1986 and became very popular in the final years of communism, touring and performing across the USSR until the band broke up in 1991.

In 1993, Fedorov formed another band Tequilajazzz for which he continues to be the lead singer and bass player. The band has recorded and released numerous critically acclaimed albums and has toured all over the world.

In addition to Tequilajazzz, Fedorov has been involved in several other music projects, including Optimystica Orchestra and Zorge, and has composed music for Russian films and TV series.

After openly criticising Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Fedorov was harassed and threatened with legal action by the Russian government. He was publicly condemned on state-controlled Russian television.

At the end of August 2024, Evgeny Fedorov began an ICORN residency in Stockholm. He continues his work from Kulturhuset Stadsteatern.

Stockholm ICORN City of Refuge

Stockholm has hosted writers and artists at risk since 1998 and has been an ICORN City of Refuge since the network was established in 2006. Since 2012, Kulturhuset Stadsteatern has been managing Stockholm’s ICORN programme, so far hosting 12 ICORN residents, including Faraj Bayrakdar, Arya Aramnejad, and Zahra Hussaini.

Currently, Stockholm offers three ICORN residences simultaneously. Alongside Evgeny Fedorov, music artist Mun Mun from Myanmar and poet and short story writer Raafat Hekmat from Syria are also continuing their work from Stockholm and Kulturhuset Stadsteatern.

Source: “Musician Evgeny Fedorov in ICORN residence in Stockholm,” International Cities of Refuge Network, 17 March 2025

Russia ranks poorly in transparency, corruption, and democracy in many international indexes. Researchers at The Economist ranked it 150th out of 167 countries in its Democracy Index last year, highlighting the country’s lack of political diversity and frequent election manipulation. Russia also received a worrying score for corruption in NGO Transparency International’s most recent annual report, where it ranked 154th out of 180.

The Kremlin regime’s repression and journalistic censorship are also reflected in a ranking on global press freedom, with Reporters Without Borders placing the country 183rd out of 208 last year—a score that is hardly surprising, considering that Russia still regularly imprisons journalists, including on the grounds of “espionage.” The government also restricts access to the internet and critical content online.

Source: Anna Fleck, “Freedom, Corruption, Democracy: Russia’s Poor Record,” Statista, 26 March 2025

Alexander Skobov: “We Are Witnessing a Disgusting Attempt at a Purely Imperialist Collusion Between Two Predators”

Alexander Skobov. Photo: Mediazona

Today, the 1st Western District Military Court sentenced 67-year-old dissident Alexander Skobov to 16 years in prison and fined him 300,000 rubles (just over $3,500). Skobov, who first faced criminal prosecution in the USSR, was convicted under charges of “participation in the activities of a terrorist community” (for his involvement with the Free Russia Forum, a Russian opposition conference abroad) and “justification of terrorism” (for his social media posts and articles). Mediazona publishes Skobov’s closing statement from today’s trial—a passionate speech in which he continues to openly support Ukraine, defies persecution and denounces judges as accomplices of Putin’s war crimes.

I will not dwell on the fact that the investigation has branded the organisation I have the honour of belonging to, the Free Russia Forum, as a terrorist community. There has been no official ruling from any government body recognising the Free Russia Forum as such. For now, it is merely an “undesirable organization.”

But I have little interest in all this petty mumbling. I prefer to speak about what truly matters. What matters here is the platform of the Free Russia Forum, a platform I was directly involved in shaping, and one that distinguishes the Free Russia Forum from most other opposition organisations.

Let me remind you that this platform is built on three principles. First: we stand for the unconditional return to Ukraine of all its internationally recognised territories occupied by Russia, including Crimea. Yes, Крим це Україна. [Crimea is (part of) Ukraine — TRR.]

Second. We support all those who are fighting to achieve these goals—including citizens of the Russian Federation who have voluntarily joined the Armed Forces of Ukraine. 

And third. We recognise any form of war against Putin’s tyranny inside Russia, including armed resistance. Of course, we are deeply disgusted by the methods of ISIS, when innocent people are targeted, as was the case in Crocus City.

But are the Kremlin’s war propagandists a legitimate target? The Free Russia Forum has not formally debated this issue or adopted any resolutions on it, so what I say next reflects my personal position alone.

I believe that propagandists such as TV host Vladimir Solovyov deserve the same fate as Hitler’s chief propagandist Julius Streicher, who was hanged by the Nuremberg Tribunal. Until these outcasts of the human race are brought before a new Nuremberg Tribunal—and as long as this war continues—they remain legitimate military targets. 

For me, the comparison between Putin’s and Hitler’s propagandists is not mere rhetoric. Much of my public writings has been devoted to proving the inherently Nazi nature of Putin’s regime—a regime with which peaceful coexistence is fundamentally impossible. 

I appeal now, as I have before, first and foremost to Europe, which should remember the origins of the current European system. Since 1945, Europe has been building a world in which predators no longer prevailed, a world based on the principles of law, justice, freedom, and humanity. Europe had achieved much on this path and seemed to have rid itself of massacres and territorial redistributions forever.

Europe once believed that this safe and prosperous world was securely protected by a great powerful ally across the ocean. Today, this world is being torn to splinters by two scoundrels on both sides: the Kremlin and Washington. People with pro-fascist values have come to power in the United States. 

We are witnessing a disgusting attempt at a purely imperialist collusion between two predators. An even more despicable collusion than the Munich Betrayal of 1938. If Putin’s annexations are legalised, it will spell disaster for civilization. Europe, you have been betrayed. Wake up and go fight for your world!

Death to the Russian fascist invaders! Death to Putin, the new Hitler, murderer and scoundrel! Glory to Ukraine! Glory to the heroes!

I usually end my speeches with these words. But today I will be further asked whether I plead guilty.

Well, I am the accuser here.

I accuse Putin’s corpse-stinking clique of planning, unleashing, and waging an aggressive war. Of committing war crimes in Ukraine. Of orchestrating political terror in Russia. Of corrupting my people.

And now, I ask the servants of Putin’s regime present here, mere cogs in the repressive machine: do you find yourselves guilty of complicity in Putin’s crimes? Do you repent?

And with that, I’ve said all I needed to say.

Source: “‘I am the accuser here—I accuse Putin’s corpse‑stinking clique’: Closing statement of dissident Alexander Skobov, sentenced to 16 years in prison,” Mediazona, 21 March 2025

A Russian military court sentenced Soviet-era dissident Alexander Skobov to 16 years in prison on charges of justifying terrorism and being a member of a terrorist organization, the exiled news outlet Mediazona reported Friday.

Skobov, 67, was arrested in April on allegations that he justified an attack on the Russian-built Crimea Bridge in an online post and was a member of the Lithuania-based liberal opposition platform Free Russia Forum, which Russian authorities have outlawed as “undesirable.”

A military court in St. Petersburg convicted Skobov on both charges and sentenced him to serve his time in a maximum-security prison.

Prosecutors had requested an 18-year sentence for Skobov, whose health had deteriorated significantly during pre-trial detention.news

In a defiant last statement in court, Skobov condemned both Russian and U.S. leaders as “predators” engaged in an “imperialist conspiracy” in Ukraine.

“Death to the Russian fascist invaders! Death to Putin, the new Hitler, the murderer and scoundrel! Glory to Ukraine!” Mediazona quoted Skobov as saying.

“I’m the one blaming you here. I accuse Putin’s ruling clique, which stinks of corpses, of preparing, unleashing and waging an aggressive war,” Skobov added.

Russia’s Justice Ministry designated Skobov as a “foreign agent” in March 2024. He is among the few outspoken critics of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine to remain inside the country despite the risk of facing criminal charges under wartime censorship laws.

A dissident since the late 1970s, Skobov was convicted twice and subjected to punitive psychiatric treatment for “anti-Soviet propaganda.”

Source: “Military Court Jails Soviet-Era Dissident Skobov 16 Years for ‘Justifying Terrorism,’” Moscow Times, 21 March 2025

Alexander Skobov: What It Means to Be Anti-War and Anti-Fascist

The complete text of Alexander Skobov’s speech during closing arguments at his trial today (18 March 2025). Video: SOTAvision

Those who have been following my trial will certainly have noticed that the position of my lawyers and my position are not quite the same. We have emphasized different things, and we have slightly different objectives. My lawyers have sought to draw attention to a problem that is identified in the reports of international organizations as the abuse of anti-terrorist legislation to restrict the freedom of expression, the freedom of speech.

This problem does exist, and in some quite decent countries, particularly the European countries. The European approach to this problem has differed from the American one. The United States of America has the First Amendment of the Constitution, which expressly prohibits any limitations on freedom of speech. In the wake of the severe trauma wrought by the Second World War, the European countries took a somewhat different path. They introduced measures to restrict the dissemination of ethnic hatred, ethnic superiority, and ethnic inferiority — all the ideas associated with Nazism. A whole system of restricting freedom of speech has arisen out of this. Europe has sought a reasonable balance between freedom of speech and its restriction.

I do not regard this experiment as successful. Freedom of speech either exists or it doesn’t exist. Any restrictions on it will always lead to abuse, no matter how well intentioned. The very idea of prohibiting people from condoning anything or anyone is flawed in principle. It means forbidding people from thinking and feeling. Lawyers have the inalienable right to seek to condone their client any way they can, but so does any human being.

Only this whole story has nothing to do with us. There is no abuse of anti-terrorist legislation in Putin’s Nazi Russia. There is legislation explicitly aimed at quashing all expression of disagreement with the authorities. Under this legislation, a theatrical production about the horrible fate of women who were tricked by ISIS fighters into joining their war as their wives is deemed “condoning terrorism.” Those complicit in the guilty verdict against Yevgenia Berkovich and Svetlana Petriichuk have no souls, they are undead, but the law itself is worded in such a way that it can be interpreted this way. Can we speak the language of law with a state which has adopted a law like this and deploys it in this way? Of course we cannot.

My case is fundamentally different from the case against Berkovich and Petriichuk, as well as from the numerous cases against people who limited themselves to voicing moral condemnation of Russia’s aggression against Ukraine. My case is not about freedom of speech, its limitations, and the abuses of these limitations. My case is about the right of a citizen in a country waging an unjust war of aggression to utterly and completely take the side of the victims of the aggression. It is about the right and duty of a citizen in a country waging such a war.

This right is covered by the category of natural law because it cannot, in principle, be regulated by legal norms. All warring states regard going over to the side of their armed enemy as treason. And the aggressor never recognizes himself as the aggressor and calls the robbery and plunder in which they engage “self-defense.” Can we prove legally to the aggressor that they are the aggressor? Of course not.

But Putin’s Nazi dictatorship is an aggressor of a special kind. Having legislatively declared a war a “non-war,” it regards all armed opposition to its aggression as “terrorism.” It does not recognize the existence of a legitimate armed opponent at all. The obligatory reports of the Russian high command persistently refer to the Ukrainian army as “militants.” Does this have anything to do with law? Of course not. But war, in principle, is not compatible with law. By its very nature, the law is a constraint on violence, while war is violence without restraint. When the guns talk, the law is silent.

My case has to do with my involvement in the armed resistance to Russian aggression, even if only as a propagandist. The goal of all my public statements has been to achieve a radical expansion of military assistance to Ukraine, up to and including the direct involvement of the armed forces of NATO countries in combat operations against the Russian army. For the sake of this goal I refused to emigrate and deliberately went to prison. What I say carries more weight and resounds more loudly when I say it here.

Borrowing the wording of the so-called Criminal Code of the so-called Russian Federation, all these actions constitute assistance to a unfriendly foreign power in generating threats to the national security of the Russian Federation, as described in the current Criminal Code’s article on high treason. Why was I not charged with violating this article, nor with violating the many other political articles in the current Criminal Code, charges which should have been brought against me for my publications? The most important of my publications were never included in the indictment, although I had the opportunity to make sure that the investigation was acquainted with them. In addition, the investigation was aware that I had made personal donations to purchase lethal weapons for the Ukrainian army and publicly encouraged others to follow my example. This is the kind of thing for which the authorities now automatically charge people with high treason.

Why didn’t they do it? I think that they didn’t do it not only due to the overloaded repressive apparatus, human laziness, and the typical aversion of Russian authorities to legal norms in general, including their own legal norms. They are our legal norms, they would say. We do what we want with them, we enforce them when and if we want to enforce them. We call the shots.

But there is another reason. Even among the people who have morally condemned the Russian aggression and risked going to prison for it, there are not many who have dared to take the side of the victims of the aggression. The dictatorship is afraid that there will be more such people, and it is afraid of “bad” examples. So it has had a stake in not amplifying my voice too much and not mentioning the specifics of my case, which I have just mentioned. I have tried to focus the public’s attention on these selfsame peculiarities.

Unlike my lawyers, I really have not tried to prove to the aggressor that they are an aggressor who has violated all internationally recognized legal norms. It makes as much sense as discussing human rights with Hitler’s regime or with Stalin’s similar regime. By the way, maybe the judge can recall which article of the Criminal Code criminalizes equating Stalin’s regime with Hitler’s.

But my lawyers and I are unanimous that my case cannot be considered outside the context of the ongoing war. It is a part of this war. And my lawyers’ attempts to speak the language of law with the aggressor’s authorities only illustrate once more that when the guns do the talking, the law is silent.

Free speech is not the issue in my case. In this war, speech is also a weapon that also kills. The Ukrainians write my name on the shells annihilating Putin’s lowlife who have invaded their land. Death to the Russian fascist invaders, death to Putin, the new Hitler, a murderer and scoundrel! Glory to Ukraine, glory to the heroes! I rest my case.

Source: Darya Kostromina (Facebook), 18 March 2025. Translated by the Russian Reader

Alexander Skobov

Prosecutors have requested an 18-year prison sentence for Russian dissident Alexander Skobov, whose trial on charges of justifying terrorism over a social media post he wrote about the Ukrainian bombing of the Crimean Bridge is coming to an end in St. Petersburg, independent news outlet Bumaga reported on Tuesday.

Requesting Skobov be given a six-year sentence for justifying terrorism, as well as a 12-year sentence for “involvement with a terrorist community”, prosecutors also asked the court to ban Skobov from administering websites or Telegram channels for four years and to fine him 400,000 rubles (€4,500). Having openly criticised the regime of Vladimir Putin and opposed both Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea and its 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Skobov was arrested in April over a social media post he wrote about the Ukrainian bombing of the Crimean Bridge, which connects Russia to the annexed peninsula.

Skobov had previously said that the destruction of the bridge was “extremely important from a military-political standpoint” and called a failed Ukrainian attempt to destroy it a “shame”. He had also been fined for his links to the pro-democracy Free Russia Forum, an organisation deemed “undesirable” and thus effectively outlawed in Russia. The Free Russia Forum condemned his detention, calling it “arbitrary”, and demanding his immediate release.

Now 68, Skobov is a well known Soviet-era dissident who was part of the New Leftists opposition movement in the late 1970s. He was forced to spend two three-year stints in a psychiatric hospital, a common fate for political dissidents at the time, for publishing the anti-government magazine Perspectives and for participating in protest actions.

Having been deemed a “foreign agent” by the authorities, Skobov nevertheless refused to leave Russia, despite pleas from his family to leave. While in pretrial detention, Skobov’s health in general, and eyesight in particular, have deteriorated rapidly.

Source: “Prosecutors request 18-year prison sentence for Russian dissident’s social media post,” Novaya Gazeta Europe, 18 March 2018

Claude Malhuret: A French Lesson

Brut America, “French Senator criticizes Trump,” YouTube, 7 March 2025

French politician Claude Malhuret critiqued the United States’ shifting stance on Ukraine and targeted President Donald Trump in his remarks during a general session of the French Senate on Tuesday.

Source: YouTube. Thanks to Olga Klymenko and Nancy Ries for the heads-up.

Monsieur le Président,

Monsieur le Premier ministre,

Mesdames et Messieurs les Ministres,

Mes chers Collègues,

L’Europe est à un tournant critique de son histoire. Le bouclier américain se dérobe, l’Ukraine risque d’être abandonnée, la Russie renforcée.

Washington est devenu la cour de Néron, un empereur incendiaire, des courtisans soumis et un bouffon sous kétamine chargé de l’épuration de la fonction publique.

C’est un drame pour le monde libre, mais c’est d’abord un drame pour les États-Unis. Le message de Trump est que rien ne sert d’être son allié puisqu’il ne vous défendra pas, qu’il vous imposera plus de droits de douane qu’à ses ennemis et vous menacera de s’emparer de vos territoires tout en soutenant les dictatures qui vous envahissent.

Le roi du deal est en train de montrer ce qu’est l’art du deal à plat ventre. Il pense qu’il va intimider la Chine en se couchant devant Poutine, mais Xi Jinping, devant un tel naufrage, est sans doute en train d’accélérer les préparatifs de l’invasion de Taïwan.

Jamais dans l’histoire un président des États-Unis n’a capitulé devant l’ennemi. Jamais aucun n’a soutenu un agresseur contre un allié. Jamais aucun n’a piétiné la Constitution américaine, pris autant de décrets illégaux, révoqué les juges qui pourraient l’en empêcher, limogé d’un coup l’état-major militaire, affaibli tous les contre-pouvoirs et pris le contrôle des réseaux sociaux.

Ce n’est pas une dérive illibérale, c’est un début de confiscation de la démocratie. Rappelons-nous qu’il n’a fallu qu’un mois, trois semaines et deux jours pour mettre à bas la République de Weimar et sa Constitution.

J’ai confiance dans la solidité de la démocratie américaine et le pays proteste déjà. Mais en un mois, Trump a fait plus de mal à l’Amérique qu’en quatre ans de sa dernière présidence. Nous étions en guerre contre un dictateur, nous nous battons désormais contre un dictateur soutenu par un traître.

Continue reading “Claude Malhuret: A French Lesson” →

Ilya Yashin: The Basics

Ilya Yashin

Our strange post-truth era turns everything upside down and paints black as white. It is vital that we remember the basics and not lose our bearings to avoid going crazy.

So I just want to remind you that:

  1. Vladimir Putin is a dictator, murderer, and war criminal.
  2. It is immoral and outrageous to work on Putin’s behalf and aid him.
  3. The Russian army’s invasion of Ukraine is unlawful and unwarranted.
  4. Ukraine is the victim of aggression.
  5. Russia is a police state: it stifles dissent and persecutes its citizens for dissenting.
  6. Any individual who resists Putin’s regime deserves our encouragement.
  7. Alexei Navalny and Boris Nemtsov are Russian heroes.
  8. There should be a regular transition of power in all countries.
  9. Human rights are universal.
  10. Human life is priceless.

Source: Ilya Yashin (Facebook), 6 March 2025. Translated by the Russian Reader

Armogedon Dasha

“Armogedon Dasha,” Kronstadt, Russia, summer 2006. Photo by the Russian Reader

If one starts from the premise that the United States was engaged in a peace process, then what we saw Americans do yesterday makes no sense. The same goes if we begin from the assumption that present American leadership is concerned about peace generally, or cares about American interests as such. But it is not hard to see another logic in which yesterday’s outrages do come into focus.

It would go like this: It has been the policy of Musk-Trump from the beginning to build an alliance with Russia. The notion that there should be a peace process regarding Ukraine was simply a pretext to begin relations with Russia. That would be consistent with all of the publicly available facts. Blaming Ukraine for the failure of a process that never existed then becomes the pretext to extend the American relationship with Russia. The Trump administration, in other words, ukrainewashed a rapprochement with Russia that was always its main goal. It climbed over the backs of a bloodied but hopeful people to reach the man that ordered their suffering. Yelling at the Ukrainian president was most likely the theatrical climax to a Putinist maneuver that was in the works all along.

This, of course, might also seem illogical, and at an even higher level. The current American alliance system is based upon eighty years of trust and a network of reliable relationships, including friendships. Supporting Russia against Ukraine is an element of trading those alliances for an alliance with Russia. The main way that Russia engages the United States is through constant attempts to destabilize American society, for example through unceasing cyberwar. (It is telling that yesterday the news also broke that the United States has lowered its guard against Russian cyber attacks.) Russian television is full of fantasies of the destruction of the United States. Why would one turn friends into rivals and pretend that a rival is a friend? The economies of American’s present allies are at least twenty times larger than the Russian economy. And Russian trade was never very important to the United States. Why would one fight trade wars with the prosperous friends in exchange for access to an essentially irrelevant market? The answer might be that the alliance with Russia is preferred for reasons that have nothing to do with American interests.

In the White House yesterday, those who wished to be seen as strong tried to intimidate those they regarded as weak. Human courage in defense of freedom was demeaned in the service of a Russian fascist regime. American state power was shifted from the defense of the victim to the support of the aggressor. All of this took place in a climate of unreason, in which actual people and their experiences were cast aside, in favor of a world in which he who attacks is always right. Knowledge of war was replaced by internet tropes, internalized to the point that they feel like knowledge, a feeling that has to be reinforced by yelling at those who have actually lived a life beyond social media. A friendship between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, a masculine bond of insecurity arising from things that never happened, became more important than the lives of Ukrainians or the stature of America.

There was a logic to what happened yesterday, but it was the logic of throwing away all reason, yielding to all impulse, betraying all decency, and embracing the worst in oneself on order to bring out the worst in the world. Perhaps Musk, Trump, and Vance will personally feel better amidst American decline, Russian violence, and global chaos. Perhaps they will find it profitable. This is not much consolation for the rest of us.

Excerpted from: Timothy Snyder, “The War Trump Chooses,” Thinking about…, 1 March 2025

⚡️ Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova’s comment on Zelensky’s voyage to Washington, D.C. (March 1, 2025)

💬 Leader of the neo-Nazi regime Zelensky’s visit to Washington D.C. on February 28 is an epic political and diplomatic failure of the Kiev regime.

The Russian Side has repeatedly made it clear at all levels that Zelensky is a corrupt individual who lost his grip on reality and is unable to reach and honour agreements.

❗️ The Kiev regime refused to continue talks on a political and diplomatic settlement in the spring of 2022, using lies and fake claims to justify continued hostilities and keep receiving Western military and financial aid.

With his outrageously rude behaviour during his stay in Washington, Zelensky re-affirmed his status of the most dangerous threat to the international community as an irresponsible figure that can stir up a big war. It must be clear to everyone that this kind of attacks coming from a terrorist leader are quite unambiguous.

This cynical individual will stoop to anything in pursuit of his goals and is obsessed with preserving the power he has usurped. That is why he:

🔻 has destroyed the opposition,

🔻 built a totalitarian state,

🔻 ruthlessly sending millions of his fellow citizens to death.

Under the increasingly deteriorating political situation, this figure is unable to show a sense of responsibility and is therefore obsessed with continuing the war and rejects peace, which means death to him.

Unprecedented in history of international politics and diplomacy, a dressing down given to Zelensky by the US president in the White House is also indicative of the political weakness and extreme moral degradation of the European leaders who continue to support the maniac head of the Nazi regime who has lost touch with reality.

As before, we continue to operate on the premise that a truly just and durable peace is not possible unless the root causes of the Ukraine crisis are completely eliminated.

The main ones among them include:

🔻 the West breaking its promises not to expand NATO and the alliance’s absorption of Europe’s entire geopolitical space all the way up to Russia’s borders,

🔻 the Kiev regime’s systematic elimination of everything about Russia, including language, culture, and church, just like the German Nazis did in the past.

The demilitarisation and denazification of Ukraine, as well as recognition of existing realities on the ground remain Russia’s unchanged objectives.

☝️ The sooner Kiev and the European capitals come to realise this, the closer to a peaceful settlement of the Ukraine crisis we will be.

Source: Russian Foreign Ministry (Facebook), 1 March 2025

Rick Wilson: “And I truly believe that Donald Trump will very soon offer military aid to Russia. I believe this in my heart of hearts. I want every single one of you people who think, ‘Oh, this was such a brave moment of diplomacy,’ when Donald Trump starts offering Russia intelligence, and weapons, and support, and protection, I want you to tell me if you think you still live in the America you voted for.”

Source: The Lincoln Project, “Trump and Vance ATTACK Zelenskyy in Oval Office and Align U.S. with PUTIN,” YouTube, 28 February 2025. Thanks to Mark Teeter for encouraging me to re-watch this video and note its stark conclusion.

Defenders of the Fatherland Day

Source: Russian Foreign Ministry (Facebook), 23 February 2025

Up to nearly a half of Russian casualties in the war against Ukraine could be men who had few or tenuous links to Russia, or were living on the margins of society, according to new research by the BBC. Their deaths are largely ‘unseen’ by ordinary Russians.

Alongside the independent media outlet Mediazona, and with the help of a network of volunteers, BBC Russian uses open source data to chart the names of Russian soldiers killed in the war. To date, we have confirmed the names of more than 95,000 of them – implying a true death toll of up to 235,000.

This figure doesn’t include those who were killed serving in the militia of the self-proclaimed Donbass republics which we estimate to be between 21,000 and 23,500 fighters.

BBC Russian, independent media group Mediazona and volunteers have been counting deaths since February 2022.

Continue reading “Defenders of the Fatherland Day” →

Ukraine (The Betrayal)

Source: “The World in Brief,” The Economist, 15 February 2025

Today, there was one happy man in the Kremlin. Vladimir Putin banked his legacy on an all-out war that, at one point, looked all but lost for him. But he waited long enough to see the tides change in his favor.

Three years in and hundreds of thousands of deaths after, the U.S. president is calling Putin, offering peace talks on Russia’s terms.

Hi, my name is Oleksiy Sorokin, I’m the deputy chief editor of the Kyiv Independent, and this is the latest issue of our Russia-themed newsletter.

Today we will talk about how Russia is about to win the war.

It’s a topic of debate when authoritarian Russia began morphing into a totalitarian state, but Feb. 24, 2022, is a point that finalized this transformation. A point of no return.

The all-out war was supposed to be quick. It was supposed to be a victory of a new world order and of a new Russia, once again a force that would decide the fate of the world, a force that people would fear.

Taking Kyiv, installing a new Russian-controlled government, and forcing Ukraine to recognize Crimea, Donetsk, and Luhansk as Russian was to be achieved within months, if not days.

The country Putin attempted to subjugate, however, was fiercely resisting. Something that Russian political and military leadership didn’t expect and didn’t prepare for.

Yet, over and over, Russian President Putin was bailed out by the West.

In 2022, Russia was making fortunes on selling off its energy resources to the West. When Russian troops were murdering civilians of Mariupol and nearing Kyiv, Moscow’s war chest was being replenished by Europeans.

The slow phasing out of Russian energy resources in the West allowed Russia to iron out its pivot to the East, building a formidable shadow fleet to transport its energy resources to anyone willing to buy.

When Russia began to lose ground and prepare for a Ukrainian counteroffensive, the U.S. was slowing down military shipments, giving Moscow further breathing room.

Seeing that the West was unwilling to support Ukraine to the fullest and was willing to allow Russia to continue, Russia, well, continued.

Russian leadership doubled down, increasing attacks on Ukraine, making committing war crimes a state policy, and simultaneously choking all forms of dissent at home.

Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war were tortured and often murdered, and children from occupied territories were abducted.

Domestically, Russia outlawed speaking against the war, with people receiving hefty prison terms for criticising the invasion.

For the majority, however, the state made sure their economic well-being and daily routines remained unchanged, allowing ignorance to flourish. The Russian economy was doing fine.

All this made Putin confident. He knew that time played in his favor. The U.S. would surrender, and Europe would be in no position to object. He was right.

While on the campaign trail, Donald Trump had made it clear that he has little interest in continuing to support Ukraine’s fight against Russia.

His comments of ending the war in “24 hours” were a figure of speech, but it was clear that some sort of peace plan would be presented by the incoming administration.

Russia listed its demands, Ukraine listed theirs. Both waited. The fighting went on along the front line.

Russia was in a better position to negotiate. The West’s unwillingness to truly stop Russia, especially if it meant causing any sort of inconvenience at home, allowed it to regroup and begin a major offensive, ongoing to this day.

What came next was too good to be true… for Russia.

On Feb. 11, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth began his European tour. Off the bat, he made public the U.S. position concerning the upcoming peace talks.

Hegseth said, “Returning to Ukraine’s pre-2014 borders is an unrealistic objective,” and that NATO membership for Ukraine is not an option, effectively agreeing with Russia’s demands.

Then, Trump called Putin.

“We both reflected on the great history of our nations and the fact that we fought so successfully together in World War II, remembering that Russia lost tens of millions of people,” said Trump following the call, parroting the Kremlin’s favorite line of the huge sacrifice Russia undertook in a war that ended 80 years ago, and how it is for whatever reason relevant today.

“As we both agreed, we want to stop the millions of deaths taking place in the war with Russia/Ukraine. President Putin even used my very strong campaign motto of ‘common sense’,” Trump added.

“We agreed to work together, very closely, including visiting each other’s nations. We have also agreed to have our respective teams start negotiations immediately, and we will begin by calling President Zelensky of Ukraine, to inform him of the conversation,” he went on.

The next day, Trump proposed to return Russia to G7, the intergovernmental political forum of the most developed democratic countries from which Moscow was kicked out following the start of its war in 2014.

Russian officials and pro-war public figures were openly excited about Trump’s moves.

“The movement that has begun is the result of the heroic work of our fighters and the principled position of Vladimir Putin, who speaks of openness to negotiations but firmly defends Russia’s national interests,” said lawmaker Evgeniy Revenko, deputy head of Putin’s United Russia party.

“Zelensky’s days are numbered, and Trump’s arrival at the Victory Parade in Moscow no longer seems like a fantasy,” he added.

“The phone call between Putin and Trump will go down in the history of world politics and diplomacy. It is not a breakthrough yet, but perhaps the first step towards one. I am sure that in Kyiv, Brussels, Paris, and London, they read Trump’s lengthy commentary on his conversation with Putin with horror and cannot believe their eyes,” said Russian Senator Aleksey Pushkov.

I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I agree with Mr. Pushkov.

Following the call, the Kremlin said, “We, of course, understand that our main counterpart in this process is Washington.”

And here we are today. It took three years, but Russia is where it wanted to be from the start — at a table with the U.S. deciding the fate of the world without the world’s consent.

Putin will push for more, seeking to squeeze the most out of Washington, and give nothing in return.

Russia would demand to keep the territories it controls, and most likely try to take the ones it doesn’t. According to Russia’s new constitution, Russia sees Ukrainian Crimea, and four oblasts — Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson — as its own. Russia doesn’t have full control of any of the four.

With NATO off the table, other demands might be thrown at Trump, reducing Kyiv’s army or legalizing Russian language and influence in Ukraine.

Whether the U.S. will agree, and most importantly, whether Kyiv and the EU will go by the agreements that Moscow and Washington are set to achieve behind their backs, remains to be seen. There’s a strong chance that they won’t.

But overall, the sun is now much brighter for Putin than it was just a few days ago.

Eleven years of fighting against Ukraine, three years of all-out war and thousands of war crimes committed, Putin isn’t a pariah anymore. His worldview is on track to become mainstream, and it’s the leader of the free world who is leading him back to the table.

Source: Oleksiy Sorokin, “WTF is wrong with Russia” (newsletter), Kyiv Independent, 13 February 2025

In this week’s bulletin: Russia used US banks to dodge sanctions/ Private military companies at war/ Crimean 2024 human rights report/ Further evidence of Russian torture, execution of prisoners, fabrication of evidence and withholding of medical aid in occupied areas/ New wave of detentions in Crimea/ 

News from the territories occupied by Russia:  

Young people who have quit the occupied areas: “It’s like being freed from a horrible stench” (Ukrainska Pravda, 9 February)

Stadiums under occupation: sports facilities in Donbas today (Ukrainska Pravda, 7 February)

Russia uses medical torture to fabricate its ‘trial’ of disabled 74-year-old Volodymyr Ananiev (Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, February 7th)

Russians refuse to sell insulin and other vital medicines to Ukrainians without Russian passports, reports Ukrainian intelligence (Ukrainska Pravda, February 7th)

How can Ukraine solve the problem of documents from the occupied territories? Human rights defenders share their vision with international partners (Zmina, February 7th)

A janitor, a cook, an informer — who is being tried for collaborating with the enemy? (Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, February 6th)

Russian FSB carry out new terror raids and arrests by quota in occupied Crimea (Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, February 6th)

Human rights and humanitarian legal norms: 2024 review (Crimea Human Rights Group, 5 February)

Viktor Dzytsiuk was almost tortured to death in occupied Donbas. Now Russia is continuing his torment (Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, February 5th)

ZMINA took part in a discussion on the cultural decolonisation of Crimea (Zmina, February 4th)

Russian FSB uses shoddily faked video to charge 63-year-old woman abducted from occupied Ukraine with ‘terrorism’ (Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, February 3rd)

First prosecution in Crimea for “childfree propaganda” (Crimea Human Rights Group, 2 February)

The situation at the front:

Russian forces advance on Pokrovsk (Meduza, 5 February)

News from Ukraine – general:  

Support for war victims: human rights defenders presented new roadmap of draft laws (Zmina, February 5th)

Defying Odds In Ukraine  (They Said So, February 4th)

Ukrainian Holocaust survivor: Hitler wanted to kill me as a Jew. Putin is trying to kill me because I’m Ukrainian (Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, February 3rd)

How Ukraine lost faith in the Red Cross and UN (Kyiv Independent, January 22nd)

Ukraine: Bikis, our feminist year (Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières, January 20th)

Ukraine: And yet he remained a human  (Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières, January 4th)

War-related news from Russia:

Draft exemptions as Russians know them are ending (Meduza, 6 February)

Rebranding private military companies for the war in Ukraine (Posle.media, 5 February)

Support fundraisers for Solidarity Zone’s recipients in court (Solidarity Zone, 5 February)

Russia used US banks to send billions to Turkey, dodging sanctions (Kyiv Independent, February 3rd)

The Russian far right: “an affinity for violence brings them together” (Posle.media, 29 January)

Analysis and comment:

US Aid, Russia and Ukraine (The Russian Reader, 4 February)

A girl from the burnt village: the story of Maria Nevmerzhytska (Commons.com.ua, 3 February) 

Statement by human rights organisations: another wave of searches and detentions of Crimean Tatars (Crimean Human Rights Group, 2 February) 

Research of human rights abuses:

Prison medicine: ways to humanize it (Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, February 7th)

UN monitors report sharp increase in executions of Ukrainian POWs, and point to Russian officials’ effective incitement to kill (Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group, February 7th)

The Centre for Civil Liberties Participated in the First World Congress on Enforced Disappearances  (Centre for Civil Liberties, February 6th)

“I Urge You to Make Every Effort to Release Ukrainian Prisoners of War And Unlawfully Detained Civilians ” Maksym Butkevych at the UN Security Council (Centre for Civil Liberties, February 6th)

“Crimes Against Peaceful Civilians Warrant Your Action” The Center for Civil Liberties Appealed to PACE Members  (Centre for Civil Liberties, February 6th)

Upcoming events:

Saturday 15 February, 11.0 am — 4.0 pm, Conference: End the Russian invasion and occupation. National Education Union, Mabledon Place, London, WC1H 9BD. Register here.

Saturday 15 February, 11.0 am – Palestine solidarity demo. To join the Ukraine-Palestine solidarity contingent, with our banner, “From Ukraine to Palestine – Occupation is a crime”, meet outside Banqueting Hall, corner of Whitehall and Horseguard Avenue, London SW1A

Saturday 22 February, 12.00 , Demonstrate at the Russian embassy. Assemble 12 noon – St Volodymyr statue, W11 3QY Rally 1pm – Russian embassy, W8 4QP. Flyers are available for distribution – email info@ukrainesolidaritycampaign.org and ask for them.

==

This bulletin is put together by labour movement activists in solidarity with Ukrainian resistance. To receive it by email each Monday, email us at 2022ukrainesolidarity@gmail.com. To stop the bulletin, reply with the word “STOP” in the subject field. More information at https://ukraine-solidarity.org/. We are also on twitter, Bluesky, Facebook and Substack, and the bulletin is stored online here. 

Source: News from Ukraine Bulletin 133 (10 February 2025)

Europeans still like cheap Russian LNG

France, Spain and Belgium are the biggest buyers

Source: FT

Source: Adam Tooze, “Why Europe and India are still buying Russian energy. Friedman and Schwartz disaggregated. Cuba in Africa and the decline of the all-nighter,” Chartbook, 15 February 2025

Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 prompted a refugee crisis in Europe. News footage showed people piling onto trains and into cars, desperate to escape the threat of bombs and Russian occupation. In Kharkiv, a taxi driver named Sergii told me how in those chaotic early days of war, he had helped evacuate people as Russian missiles turned his bustling neighbourhood of Saltivka into a ghost town.

“I survived by praying to God,” Sergii said, pointing to the icon of the Virgin Mary dangling from his cab’s rearview mirror. “I helped people with no money get out of Saltivka, because people with money had already left.” He narrowly avoided death himself, he added, explaining a rocket had destroyed his apartment as he went out to his cab to retrieve the mobile phone he’d left on the front seat.

Nearly seven million people have now fled Ukraine. The majority have settled in European countries, many of which responded to the war by waiving visa requirements for Ukrainian refugees. Around 250,000 came to the UK, which decided not to fully lift restrictions but to instead introduce two emergency visas: the Ukraine Family Scheme and the Homes for Ukraine scheme.

At their outset, both visas granted Ukrainian nations the right to live, work and study in the UK for up to three years. Now, as the third anniversary of Russia’s invasion rolls around, anybody who arrived in the early days of the war is about to see their right to remain expire.

Yet this week, many Ukrainians faced the prospect that they may never be able to return to their homes. US President Trump announced he had spoken to his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, to begin peace negotiations that risk handing over occupied regions of Ukraine to Russian control.

Residents of Ukrainian towns and cities previously liberated from Russian control, such as Bucha and Izium, have spoken about the reign of terror and cruelty they endured under occupation, including torture, rape, summary executions and false imprisonment. Should the peace deal go ahead on Putin’s terms, Ukrainian refugees in the UK face an increasingly uncertain future, with those whose homes are in the occupied territories potentially unable to return.

But even before the announcements from the White House and the Kremlin, the UK’s visa schemes have long presented problems for the vulnerable Ukrainians they are supposed to support.

“Before the full-scale invasion, I had a normal life,” Nastya*, aged 24, told openDemocracy “I worked in a supermarket and a fabric factory. Everything was absolutely good. And then on 22 February 2022, the war started.”

At the time, Nastya lived in Uzhorod, a city near the Slovakian border. As missiles battered the country’s major cities and the Russian forces occupied cities such as Izium and Mariupol, committing war crimes in Bucha and Irpin, she decided to flee with her husband.

“It was a stressful time,” she admitted. “I did not know what the future would be and my family were scattered around the world, some in England, some in Germany and some in Ukraine.”

Nastya and her then-husband travelled to Germany, where her mother was living, before coming to the UK on the Ukraine Family Scheme in August 2022. “It was hard to get a job in Germany, especially as I don’t speak German,” she explained. “I didn’t want to live on benefits, I wanted to support myself and live independently. I had heard in the UK there were opportunities for work, so I relocated.”

Nastya and her husband’s visas took only a few days to be approved, and the pair moved in with her sister-in-law in Leeds, where Nastya found a job in a local factory. “The work was hard and physical with lots of heavy lifting but I was earning some money which is good,” she said.

After three months in the UK, Nastya discovered she was pregnant with her first child. It was happy news, but it came as her marriage was falling apart. “It was quite difficult,” she said. ‘My husband was very sad and there were a lot of horrible moments. I decided to separate from him and go to Germany to be with my mother to have the baby.”

Nastya gave birth to a beautiful baby girl, who shares her bright brown eyes and dark hair. While she had wanted to be with her own mother during the birth, as a newly single mum Nastya was keen to return to the UK, where her father and grandmother were living, to get a job, support her daughter, and start a new life.

She had assumed that as she had the right to live and work in the UK, her daughter would be able to join her on the same family visa scheme.

But what Nastya did not realise is that while she was caring for her newborn in Germany, the Conservative government had been quietly restricting Ukrainians’ right to enter the UK. The family visa scheme had been closed and Ukrainians were no longer allowed to sponsor fellow refugees to arrive on the Homes for Ukraine visa.

Now, if Nastya wanted to come to the UK, she would have to leave her daughter behind.

War in Europe

When the Homes for Ukraine scheme was launched in 2022, members of the British public could open their homes to Ukrainian refugees in exchange for an initial monthly payment of £350 from their local council, while Ukrainians who successfully applied for the scheme were granted the right to live, study and work in the UK for three years.

But in February 2024, the then-Tory government brought in a series of changes. It halved the length of time a new Ukrainian applicant would be able to stay in the UK to 18 months, and amended the rules so that only people with British citizenship can sign up to become hosts. At the same time, it cancelled the family visa scheme, meaning Ukrainian nationals living in the UK can no longer sponsor family members to join them.

These changes have effectively made it impossible for Ukrainian nationals in the UK to help loved ones to settle here to escape the war. Now, Ukrainians wanting to come to the UK are reliant on there being an available British citizen who will take them in. But this, too, has suffered changes that have made it a less appealing prospect for many hosts.

In November, the Labour government announced all British citizens signed up to the Homes for Ukraine scheme will be paid £350 a month, regardless of how long they have been hosting. Households who have been hosting for more than a year are currently paid £500 a month.

Even before this announcement, the number of hosts was in decline, according to openDemocracy’s analysis of government data. In the third quarter of 2023, 100,061 households in England received the monthly ‘thank you’ payment, but by the third quarter of Q3 2024, this had fallen to 48,533 households, the lowest number since the full-scale war began.

This decrease in hosts was also apparent in our review of Homes for Ukraine Facebook pages. While at the start of the war, posts from Ukrainians looking for sponsors received multiple comments from potential hosts, these days they often garner no responses or are met with ‘jokes’, with one commenter saying: “I’d rather be in Mykolaiv than London”. Others respond telling those who wish to relocate to the UK from another European country, like Nastya, that the scheme is not for them: “People in the UK would prefer to sponsor people who are in Ukraine and need to be saved from war.”

“Instead of putting more and more administrative barriers in front of people fleeing war, the UK government must show it can match the solidarity and empathy shown by the people of the UK,” said Alena Ivanova, committee member of the Ukraine Solidarity Campaign, which is organising a march to the Russian embassy in London to mark the third anniversary of the full-scale invasion.

“We know that the vast majority of Ukrainians in the UK are vulnerable women, small children and elderly people who carry significant trauma as a result of Russia’s brutal war. The least we as a country can do is not put them further at risk and increase their anxiety but help them settle and rebuild their lives,” Ivanova added.

Those who arrived in the UK through either the Homes for Ukraine or Ukraine Family Visa scheme in the early days of the war are about to see their right to remain expire. But with the conflict ongoing, they can extend their visas via the Ukraine Permission Extension Scheme.

While this extension is undoubtedly needed, the process for obtaining it is fraught – and may put vulnerable people at risk of falling out of the system.

People needing an extension can apply only when they have 28 days or less left on their right to remain, which may impact their ability to work or be housed, with landlords and employers nervous about accepting Ukrainians who may not have the legal right to be in the country. Those who miss the extension window are at risk of becoming undocumented and therefore will be considered to be in the UK illegally. Although the war means it is unlikely these people will be deported, they would be unable to work or access housing, and are at risk of being removed in the future.

And applications for extensions can only be made from within the UK – a problem for women like Nastya in Germany, or for anyone visiting family in Ukraine.

Polling by the Office for National Statistics found that while the majority of Ukrainians are aware of the visa changes and the need to apply for an extension, a small minority of mainly vulnerable refugees, such as the elderly or young, are not.

Uncertainty is also built into the extension scheme. People will be able to extend their right to stay in the UK by only 18 months, half the three years they were initially granted. If they stay for the full term, a Ukrainian refugee’s total residency in the UK will have been four and a half years – six months short of the five years that a person must have continuously lived here to be eligible for the right to settle permanently.

There is also uncertainty for those British nationals hosting Ukrainians. If their guest is granted an extension, their host will need to reapply for thank you payments.

openDemocracy asked the UK government how it plans to deal with the temporary nature of the visas should the conflict continue for another 18 months. We also asked what plans they have in place should a peace deal cede Ukrainian territory to Russia, with those fleeing the occupied regions unable to return home. They did not respond.

‘I feel loneliness’

Nastya had always planned to return from Germany to the UK with her daughter. Here, she could work and have her own home where she, her daughter and her new partner, who is also Ukrainian, could live as a family.

Now, the changes to the visa schemes have cut her and her daughter off, leaving her living in limbo. She and her daughter face a choice: living in Germany where she struggles to find work and faces eviction from her refugee accommodation in the coming year, or returning to Ukraine which endures daily bombardment by Russian bombs and drones.

“In Germany, I face going into a refugee camp, which is no place to raise a child,” Nastya warned. “My mother lives in a separate city and so we cannot see each other regularly.”

Worse, the heartbreak of being separated from her father and grandmother has been devastating.

“They have never had the chance to meet their granddaughter and great-granddaughter,” she said, the pain of separation clear in her voice. “I have not been in touch with them face to face, and they would really like to meet. I want to see my father and grandmother and it is impossible.”

The changes to the visa schemes have left women like Nastya experiencing a double displacement. First, the full-scale invasion forced them from their homes in Ukraine. Now, changing government policy has separated them from family members in the UK.

“I have cried a lot,” said Nastya. “I feel loneliness, it is so hard that I can’t put it into words. I am crying a lot but I don’t want to blame anyone. If I would receive a visa for my daughter it would be really nice and I would be able to meet my family.”

Nastya has some hope. Last month, the Labour government partially reversed the changes made by the previous administration, allowing Ukrainians to bring their children to join them in the UK, a change described as a “welcome step in the right direction,” by Mubeen Bhutta, British Red Cross director of policy, research and advocacy. The charity has supported Nastya and her family.

“Our teams have supported people who had been unable to reunite with young children,” she said. “We’ve seen their pain and suffering and know this will mean a lot to families who have been torn apart. However, even with these changes many family members will remain separated.

“It is still very difficult for displaced Ukrainians to help elderly parents or partners find safety in the UK. It is vital that the government addresses these obstacles and helps more Ukrainians reunite with their loved ones.”

Nastya, who has a legal right to be in the UK, can now apply for an extension and for her daughter to join her. Her partner, however, must find a British national to sponsor him.

“It is really hard to be a refugee,” she said. “It is impossible to see a future for Ukraine. It would be really nice to go to the UK to work, to rent a flat, to pay taxes. This is what I need, simple things to be satisfied. I want my daughter to be happy, to have a good education.”

*Names have been changed to protect identity

Source: Sian Norris, “Harsh UK visa schemes leave Ukrainian families in limbo and torn apart,” openDemocracy, 14 February 2025

Alexander Skobov: Closing Statement at Trial

Alexander Skobov’s closing statement at trial:

I was brought up in the Soviet Union to believe that when a malicious, cruel aggressor attacks civilians, you have to take up arms and go do battle with him, and that if you cannot bear arms, you help the people who are doing battle and call on others to do the same.

All my work as a political commentator has been about calling on people to go do battle with the aggressor which has attacked Ukraine, to assist Ukraine with weapons and ammunition.

No one had attacked or threatened Russia.

It was Putin’s Nazi regime which attacked Ukraine, only because of the megalomania of the regime’s ringleaders, because of their inhuman thirst for power over all they survey.

Murdering hundreds of thousands of people is their way of bolstering their self-esteem. They are degenerates, scum, and Nazi riffraff.

The guilt of Putin’s Nazi dictatorship in plotting, unleashing, and waging a war of aggression is obvious and does not need to be proven. We also do not need to prove our right to offer armed resistance to this aggression on the battlefield and in the aggressor’s rear. It would be laughable to expect this right to be acknowledged by a regime which tosses people in prison for morally condemning its aggression out loud. All legal means of protesting Putinist Russia’s aggression have been eliminated.

My calls to resist the aggressor’s regime with armed force have caused me to be charged with terrorism.* I won’t deign to argue with the aggressor’s officials even if they claim my actions constitute pedophilia. Russia’s courts have long ago shown themselves to be appendages of the Nazi tyranny and seeking justice from them is pointless. I will never stand up before these people, who are the lackeys of murderers and scoundrels.

I see no point in arguing with puppets of the dictatorship about how conscientiously they execute their own laws. In any case, these laws are the laws of a totalitarian state and their aim is to stifle dissent. I do not recognize these laws and I will not obey them.

I also have no intention of appealing any rulings made by or actions taken by representatives of the Nazi regime.

The Putinist dictatorship may murder me, but it cannot force me to stop fighting against it. Wherever I find myself, I will keep calling on honest Russians to join the Ukrainian Armed Forces. I will keep calling for airstrikes on military facilities deep in Russian territory. I will keep calling on the civilized world to inflict a strategic defeat on Nazi Russia. I will keep trying to prove that the new Hitler’s regime must be routed militarily.

Putin is the new Hitler, a vampire driven insane by impunity and drunk on blood. I shall never grow tired of saying, “Crush the viper!”

Death to the murder, tyrant and scoundrel Putin!

Death to the Russian fascist invaders!

Glory to Ukraine!

[Grani.Ru:] Thanks to Alexander Valeryevich’s dedicated wife Olga Shcheglova (pictured above). Thanks to SotaVision for filming at the Petersburg military court (Skobov is participating in the trial via video link from Syktyvkar). Thanks to those who didn’t unsubscribe from Grani.Ru after it closed. It’s as if Skobov timed his brave deed to coincide with the final moral collapse of numerous media brands. And yet he will be heard by a handful of his contemporaries. But he has already gone down in history.

* Skobov has been charged with “publicly calling for terrorism,” “publicly condoning terrorism or promoting terrorism using the mass media, including the internet” and “organizing a terrorist community and participating in it.” If Skobov is convicted on these charges, he faces a maximum penalty of ten to fifteen years in prison and fines of up to one million rubles (approx. 9,500 euros) — TRR.

Source: Grani.Ru (Facebook), 15 January 2025. Translated by Thomas Campbell (aka the Russian Reader)

Thе New Year Spirit

“Bring back the New Year spirit”: Igor Stomakhin, Moscow, 2024

Faithful to its avant-garde nature, Noise Cabaret premieres the immersive series Dialogues, based on the philosophical works of Plato, on December 25. Alexander Khudyakov turns ancient Greek philosophy into a lively, witty and provocative dialogue with the audience.

Along with his partner Ivan Wahlberg, Khudyakov, who not only acts in the project but directs it, will guide the audience through the labyrinths of Plato’s thought. What is justice? Where is the line between existence and non-existence? What is the true nature of love? These and many other fundamental philosophical questions will serve as starting points for reflection and debate.

Dialogues is a series of interactive performances in which each viewer is involved in a philosophical discussion consisting of adapted texts by Plato and actorly improvisation, meaning that the way the performance goes depends on the audience’s involvement. Each new performance is a separate chapter dealing with a specific philosophical problem, so you can join the series at any stage. The first episode deals with the concept of justice.

Noise Cabaret plans to invite Petersburg celebrities to enrich the conversation with the audience with their own opinions and views.

Khudyakov shared the idea behind the project.

“We wanted to do a story related to people talking in a bar. But just people talking to each other is not interesting. There has to be a big focus. When I studied Plato, I was interested in several aspects of his philosophy. It would have been wrong to limit ourselves to a single topic. So the idea to make a series arose: take Plato, read him, and discuss the themes he raises in the Socratic dialogues.

“We plan to produce a new episode every two or three months. There’s no pretense here that we’re serious scholars of Plato’s philosophy: it’s more of an excuse to talk to people about difficult topics, to air the Dialogues and reflect on them. And a bar is a place where you can talk about all sorts of things, including philosophy.”

Source: Fontanka.ru, 23 December 2024. Translated by the Russian Reader

Russians spent almost 6 billion rubles on Ozempic generics in 2024

Semaglutide-based drugs are commonly used for weight loss

In the first ten months of 2024, Russians spent 5.9 billion rubles [approx. 52 billion euros] on over one million packs of generic versions of the drug Ozempic (semaglutide), according to DSM Group, as reported by Vedomosti.

Among the most popular generics are Geropharm’s Semavic and Promomed’s Quincenta. The original drug Ozempic stopped [sic] official supplies to Russia in December 2023, opening the market to domestic analogues.

2024 was a record year for drugs in this category. By comparison, in 2023, Russians spent only 297 million rubles on Ozempic, buying 20 thousand packs. In 2022, they spent 1.9 billion rubles (256 thousand packs); in 2021, 758 million rubles; and in 2020, 76 million rubles.

Semaglutide-based drugs are used to treat diabetes but have recently been gaining popularity as weight loss drugs, which has also contributed to their sales growth in Russia.

Source: ASTV.ru, 21 December 2024. Translated by the Russian Reader

St. Petersburg will open a new metro station this week, Governor Alexander Beglov announced Thursday, marking the former Tsarist capital’s first new metro station in five years.

The Gorny Institute metro station, located on Vasilievsky Island, will extend the fourth (or “orange”) line westward. It will begin operations at 9:00 a.m. on Friday, with its vestibule open for both entry and exit, Beglov said.

“The opening of Gorny Institute is a milestone,” the governor wrote on Telegram, noting that the city had overcome “significant challenges” during the station’s construction.

Beglov thanked President Vladimir Putin, metro builders, engineers and residents of St. Petersburg for their patience and support, calling the station’s completion the “first results” of sustained efforts to advance the city’s metro system.

The station’s opening comes after years of delays. Initially scheduled for completion in 2015, its opening was postponed to 2018 and later to 2022. Construction efforts were further overshadowed by a fatal scaffolding collapse in June 2020 that killed one worker and injured another.

Gorny Institute is the first station to open since 2019, when three others — Prospect Slavy, Dunayskaya, and Shushary — were inaugurated.

St. Petersburg’s metro is currently made up of five lines and 72 stations. However, it has expanded slowly over the years, in stark contrast to Moscow’s burgeoning metro system, which this year opened eight new stations.

Source: Moscow Times, 26 December 2024

[…]

In trying to grasp the tonality of the film [Anora], I am reminded of a line from Francis Bacon: “You can be optimistic and totally without hope.” The situation the characters find themselves in, being at the mercy of the rich, is totally without hope. The “hopeful” version of the script would be one in which Vanya does stand up to his parents and runs off with Ani, even at the price of losing his wealth—this is the film’s narrative lure. Or maybe another where the ruthless capitalist mother gains a grudging respect for her tough daughter-in-law, like in the last season of Fargo. But despite its grim closure, the impression the film gives is far from dreary or pessimistic. The hopeless optimism of Baker’s cinema lies in the sheer life that seems to almost burst out of the filmic frame, and, especially, his deep care for his characters, even Vanya.

Source: Aaron Schuster, “The Ethical Dignity of Anora,” e-flux Notes, 20 November 2024

In the fall of 2023, with the goal of understanding what is really happening with Russian society during wartime, the Public Sociology Laboratory team went on ethnographic research trips to three Russian regions—Sverdlovsk, Krasnodar and Buryatia. Over the course of a month, PS Lab researchers observed how people talk about the war and how it affects daily life in cities and villages. In addition, they recorded sociological interviews with local residents. PS Lab has compiled three detailed ethnographic observation diaries (more than 100,000 words apiece) and conducted 75 in-depth interviews. Overall, it has managed to collect truly unique data that provides an idea of what people say and think about the war in everyday situations, and not only when answering researchers’ questions.

The full text of the report is book-length and written in a book-style format: it consists of seven chapters, introduces many characters, and allows readers to be fully immersed in contemporary wartime Russia. The following summary, meanwhile, highlights the main analytical conclusions.

  • Russian society remains politically demobilized and deideologized. Despite the prevailing opinion that it is strictly militarized, we see that the war has become routine and therefore a disregarded part of reality. For example, compared to the first years of the war, the amount of prowar symbolism in public spaces has decreased in all three regions. The war has neither become a source of new ideas in the cultural life of cities or villages nor been integrated into familiar and already-established cultural formats. The war is not discussed in public places, including, with rare exceptions, local online communities.
  • In spontaneous conversations, Russians rarely discuss the overall goals and causes, criminality, or justifications of the war. They are concerned with the impact of the war on their everyday lives. When they talk about the war, they mostly talk about the same things they discussed before the war, for example, everyday difficulties, money, or ethics. Men more often discuss topics that are considered “masculine” in society, such as the technical side of the war, and women usually talk about “feminine” topics, such as how war destroys families.
  • Participation in various types of prowar volunteering and organized assistance for the military, which are often cited as an example of the mobilization and militarization of Russian society, is rarely motivated by people’s firm support for the “special operation.” It is usually associated with pressure from the administration, community moral norms (concerning mutual assistance), and/ora desire to help loved ones, rather than a wish to make victory for Russia more likely. Observation of volunteers’ activities show that while working, they do not discuss the war or politics, rather choosing topics that are personable and relatable to them: prices, pensions, families, and/or stories related to the volunteer centers.
  • Despite all these similarities, the war is perceived slightly differently in different regions. The peculiarities of each region’s view owe to factors like the number of military units and penal colonies from which prisoners are recruited, proximity to the combat zone, the prosperity of the region and the availability of decent jobs, the density of social ties, the circulation of news transmitted by friends on the front lines, etc. In other words, the differences in perceptions of the war are attributable mainly to the peculiarities of life in the regions before the invasion of Ukraine.
  • The conflict between opponents and supporters of the war is gradually subsiding, while the rift between those who stayed in Russia and those who left is growing. This is happening both because the shared experience of living through a difficult situation within the country is becoming more important for many Russians than any differences in viewpoint, and also because people are discussing the war less.
  • At the same time, the waning conflict between opponents and supporters of the war does not always mean more social cohesion. Since people are trying to live as if the war is nonexistent and the government does not talk about any losses or problems associated with the war, all negative consequences of the war are either normalized or pushed into the realm of “personal problems” that are not discussed with anyone and that everyone must deal with on their own.
  • Overall, many people do not feel able to influence political decisions. Therefore, they are increasingly distancing themselves from the war. They understand that they cannot change government policy, but they retain at least some control over their private lives—and therefore they are immersed in them. Over time, not only apolitical Russians but even sure opponents of the invasion experience this powerlessness and, as a result, some of them accept the new reality while continuing to condemn the war internally.
  • Consequently, many Russians are increasingly distrustful of political news from a broad range of sources. Instead, they put their trust in local media. Local problems and news seem much more important and relevant to them. Moreover, they feel that, unlike the war, local issues are at least sometimes within their ability to influence.
  • At the same time, the war is weighing people’s emotional state. Many of our interlocutors admit that they experience anxiety, tension, uncertainty, fear, even if these things are not usually spoken about openly. The departure of sons and husbands to war makes women “scream at the top of their lungs.” However, people rarely share such emotions with others, and if they do, they do so in groups with close friends.
  • Many Russians who are not interested in politics may justify or condemn the war depending on the communicative context.
  1. They tend to non-emotionally justify the war through normalization (“there are always wars”) or rationalization (“it was necessary”) when asked about it directly in more formalized settings, such as research interviews.
  2. They are more likely to criticize the war when prompted to think about how it negatively affects them as ordinary Russians. This criticism differs from that of war opponents. For opponents, the war is a moral crime against Ukraine, whereas for apolitical Russians, the war is seen as something that destroys Russian society and harms ordinary people. However, this criticism does not lead apolitical Russians to question the war’s necessity or inevitability, nor does it extend to criticizing the Russian government.
  3. They tend to emotionally justify the war when confronted with traditional anti-war narratives. When Russia is accused of committing moral crimes against the Ukrainian people, they often take such accusations personally and attempt to defend their own dignity.
  • Some people have experienced a strengthened sense of national identity, and sometimes a demand for greater solidarity arises. It’s important to note that this increased sense of national identity does not lead Russians to adopt the official imperial brand of nationalism. Unlike the Kremlin, ordinary people live in a world of nation states, not in a world of imperial fantasies (according to which Ukraine is not a real state and Ukrainians are an inferior people).
  • A feeling of uncertainty is what truly unites Russians today. Despite the fact that people choose various strategies to cope with this feeling, it still significantly complicates the ability to plan one’s life and plunges Russians into pessimism.

Thus, on the one hand, the formerly extraordinary nature of the war is giving way to normalization: the war is gradually becoming something ordinary, another unremarkable part of the surrounding world. In a sense, many Russians resist both the Kremlin’s attempts to turn ordinary citizens into ideological supporters and the attempts of the anti-war liberal opposition to force society to actively experience guilt and fight. On the other hand, the war constantly reminds us of its existence, creating new threats, new anxieties, and new reasons for discontent in Russians.

Source: Public Sociology Laboratory (The Russia Program), December 2024

Dear readers!
Times are tough, and the key in this case is holding on in every sense.
No one says it’s easy.
But it’s not so hard either.
The other day I asked Vladimir Putin whether he expected anything more from himself in the outgoing year.
But I want to ask you: do you expect anything more from yourself in the coming year?
We need to expect things. We need to want things. It’s a way of holding on to ourselves. Of looking after ourselves. Of not losing ourselves. And even of finding ourselves.
A hard sign (“Ъ”) will never be a soft sign (“Ь”)!
Happy incoming New Year!
Let’s not be on the defensive!

Andrei Kolesnikov, Special Correspondent, Kommersant Publishing House

Source: Email from Kommersant, 31 December 2024. Translated by the Russian Reader. The so-called hard sign, which the Bolsheviks dropped from the Russian Cyrillic alphabet in 1918, has been the logo of Kommersant since the newspaper’s relaunch in January 1990. Andrei Kolesnikov has been the newspaper’s special Kremlin correspondent — that is, its chief Putinversteher — for many years. Of course he’ll deny it all when push comes to shove and Putin goes, and he’ll point of course to the cynical, jocular (but ultimately loyal) way he’s written about the Russian dictator and war criminal all these years.