In the last few weeks Russia vetoed a UN resolution commemorating the anniversary of the 1995 Srebrenica massacre as an act of genocide and strongly hinted that it would veto a UN inquiry into the downing of the Malaysian Flight MH17 by pro-Moscow forces in Ukraine a year ago. Even for Moscow this is quite […]
Staunton, February 20 – Moscow has been outraged whenever the people of its former imperial domains have taken down statues of Lenin erected in Soviet times, but now it is possible that those same statues may be taken down in the Russian Federation and in the only way the Kremlin would approve of: by state […]
Staunton, February 5 — Some in the West and even in Ukraine are urging Kyiv to accept Vladimir Putin’s Anschluss of Crimea and its formation of “peoples republics” in the Donbas in order to resolve the crisis, but such calls are dangerously wrong because if Kyiv agrees to Moscow’s demands, Moscow will only make more, […]
Staunton, November 20 – Russian civic identity “does not contradict” ethnic identities either of ethnic Russians or non-Russians, Leokadiya Drobizheva says, as long as economic and social conditions are good. But when they are deteriorating as now, ever more people in Russia connect that development with ethnic factors and the two identities begin to split […]
Staunton, November 10 – The primitivism in the thinking of Vladimir Putin and his entourage reflects the fact that he and they are members of the generation that was “the most Soviet of all those who arose after 1917,” cut off from those who could remember pre-1917 conditions and fully socialized in the communist system, […]
Staunton, September 29 – The demolition of the statue of Lenin in the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv has attracted international attention, with some seeing this as a provocation by one or another side in the war in Ukraine and others viewing it as an indication of the maturation of the Ukrainian revolution and a sign […]
Yesterday’s liveblog can be found here. An archive of our liveblogs can be found here. For an overview and analysis of this developing story see our latest podcast. Please help The Interpreter to continue providing this valuable information service by making a donation towards our costs. View Ukraine: April, 2014 in a larger map For […]
Staunton, July 27 – In a Facebook post that has been picked up by various Armenian outlets, Tigran Khemalyan, a noted filmmaker, sharply criticizes those ethnic Armenians who have become more Russian than the patriarch and who are promoting Russian great power attitudes of hostility and suspicion to everything non-Russian. Among these “’prophets’ of Russism,” […]
Yesterday’s liveblog can be found here. For an overview and analysis of this developing story see our latest podcast. Please help The Interpreter to continue providing this valuable information service by making a donation towards our costs. View Ukraine: April, 2014 in a larger map For links to individual updates click on the timestamps. Below […]
Updated Daily. Kremlin propagandists have targeted the State Department’s spokesperson for ridicule in a social media campaign, but it’s not clear if it has genuine resonance. Surveillance of Internet users and particularly bloggers will increase under new Russian laws, although Putin claims he is just “thinking of the children.” Russian independent media has tracked the […]
