Russia

A week of diplomatic manoeuvring, ultimatums and psychological gambits has ended with a sadly predictable result: Vladimir Putin will not be coming to the negotiating table in Istanbul. Nor will he be sending a single cabinet-level negotiator. Instead the Russian delegation will be headed by former culture minister Vladimir Medinsky – the same low-level minion that Putin sent to the last round of talks in Istanbul in March-April 2022. Instead of a breakthrough, the great diplomatic effort led by Zelensky and the combined leaders of Europe have elicited nothing beyond a calculated insult from a defiant Kremlin.  This latest cycle of hope and failure in the endgame to the Ukraine

Once again, the ruler of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, is making headlines. And once again, he has announced his intention to step down from his position. But is it for real this time? Kadyrov has hinted at resigning on at least five separate occasions. Each time, the official explanation as to why he hasn’t stepped down has been that President Vladimir Putin refused to accept his resignation. As Kadyrov, who likes to call himself Putin’s loyal infantryman, dutifully points out, he is always willing to serve his patron – and so he remains in power. These announcements are often accompanied by choreographed public outcries from Chechnya, where citizens, as reported by

It was almost like old times, but also a sign of the new. Vladimir Putin’s Victory Day parade passed off without a hitch, rumbling and squeaking with armour, untroubled by Ukrainian drones, and watched over by foreign leaders there in a sign of support. Yet the efforts made to ensure the parade ran smoothly, the nature of the guest list, and Putin’s rhetoric all highlighted the new times. The most recent iterations of the parade had been distinctly reduced affairs, a single Second World War vintage T-34 tank substituting for the usual phalanx of tanks, and the guests largely confined to Putin’s clients. For the 80th anniversary of the end

Boris Berezovsky, the Russian oligarch, was found hanged in his Sunningdale home in March 2013. Born to Ashkenazi Jewish parents, Berezovsky converted to Russian Orthodoxy in 1994. His leap of faith, I suspected, was more political than spiritual. ‘So why,’ I asked him at dinner one evening, ‘do you buy Russian Icons?’ Berezovsky told me that he tried to bribe Vladimir Putin with motor cars, but he refused them. He was more successful with gifts of Russian Icons, which Putin passed on to churches and monasteries. Throughout his political career, the Russian president has taken care to look after the Russian Orthodox Church. Does this reflect a genuine religious belief?

Sergei Naryshkin, director of Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), is in many ways an uncomfortable and ephemeral spy chief, but an enthusiastic information warrior. In recent talks with the Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko, he accused Nato of threatening Moscow and Minsk by increasing the size and activity of its forces on the border – or rather, certain nations within the alliance: We feel and see that European countries, especially France, Britain and Germany, are increasing the level of escalation around the Ukrainian conflict, so we need to act pre-emptively. We are ready for this. Playing up a supposed ‘threat’ to Belarus is a way of threatening Poland and the Baltic

Ever since Donald Trump’s now-infamous phone conversation with Vladimir Putin last month, Russia has been buzzing with speculation that Western companies which left the country after the 2022 invasion, especially US ones, will be returning. For some, this is a dream, for others a nightmare. Either way, it seems to be an overblown prospect fuelled by a refusal to accept just how toxic the Russian market will be for the foreseeable future. Under the headline ‘Now Hello Again? How American Companies Will Return to Russia,’ the popular tabloid Moskovsky Komsomolets yesterday confidently asserted that ‘American business wants to return to Russia, but now the game will be played by Russian rules’.

Just hours after the US announced last week that it had reached an agreement between Russia and Ukraine to stop the conflict in the Black Sea, Moscow presented its conditions for this partial truce. Moscow said it would comply with the truce only when these stipulations are met. This list of demands Russia presented to the US is a classic example of the delay tactics the Kremlin likes to use. But it also provides a helpful glimpse at Russian decision-making and Putin’s world view. The agreement, as hashed out between the US and Russia, is pretty hollow. America insisted Russia agreed to ensure safe navigation in the Black Sea, eliminate

Vladivostok, the ‘ruler of the East’, is preparing to celebrate the 165th anniversary of its founding. City Day, as they call it in the capital of Russia’s Far East, will see week-long celebrations, including sailing regattas, street performances and an enormous firework display. The naval base, home to Russia’s Pacific Fleet, usually gets in on the act too, commemorating the arrival on 2 July 1860 of the first military vessel to seize control from its Chinese inhabitants. Many of those inhabitants stayed in the Far East, at least at first, though mass deportations to China increased after the Soviets seized power in 1917 – an egregious example of ethnic cleansing,