Marc Bennetts
@marcbennetts1
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The Times foreign correspondent. Writing a book for Bloomsbury on Russia's spiral into madness under Putin. Any views/opinions expressed here are my own.
Joined September 2013
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Local newspaper in Moscow. "NOTHING IS HAPPENING. Walk on by. A special operation is underway. No one is growing poor. The economy is growing."
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Last burgers in Moscow’s flagship McDonald's. Asked one man as he was leaving for his thoughts and he said "I only ever use the toilets."
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Not only did Georgia play some of the best football of the Euros so far (despite losing), their fans also chanted "Putin is a fucking dickhead," (Путин хуйло) and it got shown live on air all over Russia.
как же это ахуенно! я солидарен с грузинскими фанатами!! самое крутое, что это крутили по федеральному российскому каналу Матч тв!
ПУТИН ХУЙЛО
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A Russian propaganda newspaper that was handed out in the Kherson region used a photo of a far-right rally in Moscow in 2012 to "prove" that there are Nazis in Ukraine...
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No exaggeration to say that the apparent scale of the collapse of the Russian army poses potentially the biggest threat to Putin’s rule since he came to power 22 years ago. Hardliners are furious, security chiefs unwilling to be made scapegoats. Next week cld be very interesting.
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Spoke to a pro-Russian Ukrainian in Izium. He insisted that Russian soldiers were "kind" before admitting that they had thrown him into a pit to interrogate him, chopped off a friend's finger and tortured another with eletric shocks until he lost his mind.
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New Russian history book for 11th graders says Trump lost the 2020 elections "as a result of obvious electoral fraud by the Democratic Party"...
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Tucker Carlson has been in Moscow for the past three days, according to Russia's Mash outlet. He was spotted at the Bolshoi Theatre today.
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A US couple and their three kids have received political asylum in Russia after fleeing the lack of family and traditional values at home, Russia says. The dad thanks Putin in this video for making Russia into a "place for families." I give them six months...
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Moscow saying that Ukraine should be labelled a terrorist state if any connection to the assassination of Dugin's daughter. Glad Russia finally agrees that blowing people up in other countries is wrong...
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Russians already joking that Putin is wearing Navalny's stolen blue novichok underwear.
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Even short walks in Moscow right now feel like vital research. Findings today - sugar is back, but not everywhere. Moscow mayor's newspaper contains not a single mention of the "special operation" in Ukraine. Chatted to a dissident pensioner. Baby "Z" t-shirts now on sale.
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11 dead in shooting carried out by 2 people at a military training ground in Russia's Belgorod region , near the Ukrainian border, according to Russian defence officials Independent media put the death toll as high as 22. Moscow calling it a "terrorist attack.'
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Protest today in Yakutsk, northeastern Siberia. Temperature minus 52C (-62 Fahrenheit)
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Despite everything, the people's memorial to Boris Nemtsov near Red Square is still in place.
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Three Kazakh security officials died this morning, according to Interfax. Suicide, heart attack and falling from apartment window...
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The police station where Navalny's court hearing is taking place has a photo of Genrikh Yagoda, a Stalin-era secret police chief and the founder of the Gulag. on the wall.
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Moscow. No food shortages, but limits on purchases of sugar, buckwheat and cooking oil. All (!) Eng-lang books on Putin's Russia, including recent one by
@CatherineBelton
gone from shelves of central bookshop. Staff said "all sold out." Hmm. Replaced with books on the Soviet era.
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As Russia carcks down on rap and other music, worth reading again this Soviet era list of banned Western rock and pop. Julio Iglesias banned for “neo-fascism,” The Talking Heads for promoting the “myth of the Soviet military threat”. Others were barred for crime of “punk”.
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Central Bakhmut today. Heard incoming missiles and saw smoke rising after one attack. So much for Putin's Christmas truce.
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This huge tribute to Mikhail Bulgakov in central Moscow contains not a single reference to the fact that his best known novel, Master and Margarita,was banned for three decades. It does mention, however, that the novel describes the "good lives" enjoyed by Soviet writers.
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Teen power at anti-putin protest in central moscow. Crowd chantinh " down with the tsar." Police orders to disperse ignored.
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Kazakhstan's ruling Nur Otan party officially won over 70% of the vote at last year's parliamentary elections. Today its headquarters in Almaty were set on fire by protesters.
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Bullet and shell scarred mural of John Lennon in Izium, near Kharkiv. The caption says "Give peace a chance." The nearby Yoko cafe was totally destroyed.
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I've been in Russia for all of Putin's two-decade rule. Here's what it was like.
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Just to debunk this: подпись неразборчива (signature unclear) is a call sign linked to this group. That took me like 5 minutes to check. Still seems dodgy but not because of this.
Russian FSB has fabricated a "plot" to kill Russian TV propagandist Solovyov. Allegedly by Ukrainian SBU and Nazis. One of the "evidences" is neonazi inscription on a book. Signed by "Signature unclear". Yes, FSB got an order to sign it with a "signature unclear" - and did so!
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My favourite question to Putin so far was the one when the poverty-stricken pensioner living on the edge of a toxic landfill asked him: "Why have you created a system where the only realistic chance i see to solve my problems is to call your annual Q&A session?" That was good.
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Kremlin aide Vladimir Medinksy has just said: "The very existence of Russia is at stake today. This is the greatest challenge in history and we need to act on that challenge." The Kremlin has said it will only use nuclear weapons, if Russia's existence is threatened.
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Russian propaganda television channel NTV celebrates missile attacks on the "Kyiv regime" with footage of a burning children's playground (video first highlighted by
@francis_scarr
)
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"Navalny isn't a big enough figure to spend so much time on," says Russian state TV after spending 10 mins on prime TV time explaining to Russians why he is bad.
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Soviet ruin. Kirovsk, the Russian Arctic. (An abandoned train station) Tumbled down a snowbank to get to it, but there was too much snow to get inside.
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He also seems to have deliberately mangled Putin's name as payback for Putin's apparent inability to pronounce his name.
This is an encapsulation of the tables turned in the Kazakhstan-Russia relations: President of Kazakhstan pulls a power move and opens his speech to the visiting Russian delegation headed by Putin speaking Kazakh. You can see the bewilderment and confusion among the delegation
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Russia is now imprisoning poets. Artyom Kamardin and Yegor Shtovba today were sent to prison for 7 years and 5.5 years (!!) over anti-war verse. I translated Artyom's best known poem for
@thetimes
in March.
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Russian police arresting Lyubov Sobol, a Navalny ally, after she knocked on the door of the FSB agent who apparently admitted to trying to kill Navalny.
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Taxi driver near Moscow: "i really want to visit england. I was watching tv yesterday and they were talking about some cathedral. It has a spire 123 metres high! Can you imagine?!"
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Anti-Putin parties have taken 11 out of 12 seats in local council elections in Tverskaya district, which neighbours the Kremlin. Sensation.
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I suspect if Yashin had come out at last week's press conference and shouted Slava Ukraini! 10 times and announced he was heading to the front on Monday to fight for Kyiv there wld have been those who said "why not 15 times? And why not on Sunday?"
Ilya Yashin on today's Youtube livestream: 'The criminal war of aggression against Ukraine should be stopped immediately... Russia must withdraw absolutely all troops from the territory of Ukraine... The main task of the Western world today, as it seems to me, is to save Ukraine
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I wonder how many Russians who are afraid of getting Covid vaccines are at the same time gobbling down analgin, a painkiller that is banned in the west due to proven side effects that include damage to the human immune system. But on sale in every chemist in Russia.
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С какой целью вы включили композицию Цоя? — спрашивает судья.
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The opening of the Cathedral of the Armed Forces near Moscow. Patriarch Kirill, Defense Minister Shoigu, other officials all present. No masks. In God we trust?
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Over 800 people detained across Russia at protests against plans to raise the pension age. Me for
@guardian
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My report on the build-up to Victory Day in Moscow, escalating rhetoric & fear. “Do you really expect me to stand here and talk to you about what I think?” said a woman dressed all in black, as the tanks rolled off into the Moscow night.
"Seriously?”
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In case anyone misunderstood - this is sarcasm. Just spoken to the editor. It's a local newspaper, usually focused on repairs, parks, etc. Editor said: "It would have been strange to just out out our usual paper and pretend that nothing is going on..."
Local newspaper in Moscow. "NOTHING IS HAPPENING. Walk on by. A special operation is underway. No one is growing poor. The economy is growing."
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The interviewer, for the record, is Marat Markov, the head of the Belarusian state TV channel ONT and a former member of Lukashenko's administration. Protasevich is also forced to say that he "unquestionably" respects Lukashenko.
Protasevich in torture “interview” video says he was mistaken about Lukashenko. “He’s a man with steel balls,” he says.
These aren’t his words of course.
And nor is the interviewer a journalist. Certainly not a member of a profession I recognise.
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My report from the Donbas. "A tank bearing the Kremlin’s pro-war Z symbol lay semi-submerged in a river, its gun poking from the water. Nearby was another destroyed tank, its turret sliced off. The stench of death hung in the air."
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-44C in Yakutsk this morning. The taxi driver said "it's getting cold now. Last week, it was like spring...-35C or something."
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A 52-year-old American teacher faces 20 years in a Russian prison after ordering a cleaning product from
@AliExpress_EN
that turned out to contain a banned substance. He's been beaten and refused medical treatment. Me for
@thetimes
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Putin said Navalny "consciously - and I want to underline this - went abroad for treatment" even though he knew he had to report to a Moscow parole office. He was airlifted to Berlin in a coma!
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Russian police detained all journalists planning to cover Navalny rally in Volgograd on Sunday and drove them round the city while the protest was taking place.
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Some of these discussions are very similar in spirit to Russian TV in the 1990s. I.e before Putin transformed into a Kremlin propaganda machine. Hard to believe these are all scripted. Significant, if not.
Some more soul searching on 🇷🇺 TV last night:
Karen Shakhnazarov describes what happened in Kharkiv Region as a "defeat", while Sergei Mikheyev slams the Defence Ministry for its linguistic gymnastics
"If it was a regrouping to the Donetsk area, then show us some success there"
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I wish people like this would be as shocked at their own smug and shortsighted sense of righteousness as they are about pretty much anything. (16,500 Russians had been arrested at anti-war protests before yesterday, 100 people facing up to 15 years in prison).
I wish Russians would be as shocked about the war crimes their people have committed in Ukraine as they are about mobilisation.
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Peak madness. A joint Russian and North Korean ensemble singing a song called "Putin-Kim Jong Un." I hear Roger Waters is preparing a cover version.
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Lavrov tells Lukashenko "Greetings from Vladimir Vladimirovich" and not to forget what you promised him in Sochi. No one knows what that was, but judging by Lukashenko's expression, it was clearly a promise that he was hoping would be forgotten.
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Marina Zolotova, the editor of
@tutby
Belarus' best news website, charged with tax fraud & faces up to 7 years in prison. It's clearly revenge for exposing Lukashenko's violent crackdown. When i met her in 2019, she was very keen to stress Tut By was neither pro-govt, nor pro-opp
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My trip to hell. "Workers revealed that they are under orders to clean the disposable sheets that patients die on. The sheets are then returned to the wards. The policy is enforced even if the patients died of tuberculosis or other infectious diseases."
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I visited the Cathedral of the Russian Armed Forces where support for Putin was very high. “The enemy is at our gate. This isn’t a case when we can turn the other cheek." “I know the Bible tells us not to kill, but Orthodoxy allows Russia to defend itself"
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I think Vladimir the Poisoner of Underpants is a much better translation of "Владимир Отравитель Трусов" than Vladimir the Underpants Poisoner. Thoughts?
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Someone put a copy of American Psycho in the middle of the Trump display in Moscow's main bookshop.
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In 1913, it took 10 Russian soldiers 2 months to carry this piano across the Pamir mountains from Kyrgyzstan to Khorog, a small town in Tajikistan. It was the region’s first piano.
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Dozens of tanks and other military hardware rolling through Moscow at midnight. Victory Day parade rehearsals.
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I was at the scene yesterday. It's around 150 miles west of the Donbas.
A prime example of Russian state media disinformation:
On last night's primetime TV news, this image was used to illustrate "Ukrainian shelling" on Donbas
Except it's actually from the Russian missile strike in Zaporizhzhia that so far has left eight Ukrainian civilians dead
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The Belarusian state security services are looking more and more like an occupying army.
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There is no shortage, yet anyway, of western soft drinks/ snacks in Moscow. (No real food shortages either in Russia, just panic buying of sugar by pensioners with very sweet teeth). Medicines are running out though, as well as tampon and sanitary pads.
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Spoke to a former Ukrainian football "ultra" who is now serving in the army but misses punch-ups with fans of other teams. "When there is peace, we will be able to fight again," he told me, wistfully.
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Officials in St Petersburg have ordered the removal of this portrait of the (genius) absurdist writer Daniil Kharms from the house where he lived, even though the artist received permission from residents and the property management company. Locals are pledging to defend it.
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@Mike_Eckel
@TadeuszGiczan
Even if she recorded it in Lithuania, it's clear the authorities in Belarus have a hold over her as her husband in in prison. I'd imagine they said something like "Sveta, think, anything could happen to him, you know?"
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As if someone would uproot their entire life, leaving behind family members, because they can't buy western goods (which are available all over Moscow, btw).
Did anyone ever suggest US citizens should leave their homeland for moral reasons after Vietnam & Iraq? If not, why not?
Absolutely hilarious Romanian comedian
@VictorPatrascan
roasts a russian crowd member at a show in Belgrade😂😂😂
"Coca Cola Refugee" is the perfect nickname
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Russian state media runs "gothic satire" about new reported novichok poisonings in Britain. "Skripals' cat taking revenge on Britain"
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An exhibition has opened in Russia of "everyday items" taken from the homes of Ukrainians by Putin's forces...Books, license plates, ID cards, medals, newspapers ...
В Нефтеюганске открыли выставку с «бытовыми вещами украинцев из городов в зоне СВО». Среди экспонатов: книги на украинском языке, автомобильные номера, ордена и удостоверение личности
Видео: NEFT
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Psychedelic Islam Karimov. One of the very many weird paintings at the Karimov exhibition hall in Tashkent.
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Hanging out with Sparta, the 28,000 year old cave lion cub that was found in the Siberian permafrost. When you see her up close, it's as if she is sleeping.
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Supporters of Yevgeny Roizman, the last major Russian opposition politician not to have been imprisoned, chanting "freedom" ahead of his court appearance today. He's been charged with "discrediting" the Russian army.
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“I would never have picked up a weapon if I hadn’t seen a real need for this,” Akel told me...
My portrait of Dani "Apostle" Akel, the Russian citizen who died fighting for Ukraine last month.
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Police in St Petersburg beating a protester under a sign that reads "Truth Street."
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One of Russia's biggest tabloids has published an article with the headline "Britons warn Moscow about Ukrainian terror acts on the streets of Russia." Source? A single comment by a
@thetimes
reader under an article i wrote. Literally one person! Insane.
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Russian police have seized...some balloons at the start of a protest against internet censorship. Here they are, trying to force them into a police van.
Перед митингом в защиту интернета полицейские объявили воздушные шары "беспилотным летательным средством". Изъяли их и погрузили в полицейский автобус. То есть арестовали воздушные шары. Наилучшее название путинского режима, конечно, не "кровавый", а "идиотский".
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Six years since I wrote this and the title gets more and more appropriate with every passing year.
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Mikhail Bulgakov wondering why he never thought to write a novel set in a snow-bound, deserted Moscow in the grip of a virus.
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Unexpected bonus from trip to visit Ukrainian troops near Kherson - honey from a beekeeper turned soldier (his wife sent him a huge tub from their home in the Vinnytsia region.)
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Just hit me that Roman Protasevich wasn't even born when Lukashenko came to power in 1994...
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@PjotrSauer
I wasn't suggesting he was. Blame games can quickly spiral out of control though, when highly placed officials involved. Not saying he is going to be toppled, just noting that the risk of a coup type situation is arguably at its highest level since 2000.
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Just spoke to Maria Andreeva, their de facto leader. Said journalists being arrested cos when no media, police will be able to "beat us to the ground" But afraid to do so now b/c of optics of arresting wives & mothers of serving soldiers. "All our freedoms have been taken away."
Russian officials appear to have decided that, rather than arrest the protesting wives of soldiers, they'll arrest the journalists who cover the events. Virtually all of the 27 people detained today are male journos.
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If anyone is interested, the company that organises these marriage proposals is
https://www.спецназшоу.рф
They cost from 25,000 roubles, Sergei, the owner, told me.
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A family that had never voted before turned up at their local polling station for the Putin 2036 referendum, only to find that officials had already marked them down as having cast their ballots. "Accept our apologies." "No, i won't accept your apologies."
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Dunkin' Donuts Khachapuri in Georgia. (No, I didn't try it).
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“In Russia, the authorities don’t fight against corruption—they fight against those who fight against corruption.” My latest for
@Newsweek
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Russia's main TV channel devoted 40 seconds to Prigozhin's death. It was the 14th out of 17 items in a 53-minutes news programme.
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Russian state media says Trump "more dangerous" and "more impulsive" than Kim Jong un. What a difference a couple of months makes
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Joke on Russian social media. “Coronavirus quarantine means Putin is barred from leaving the presidency until 2036.”
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"Rocket launch buttons" in apartment building lift. Targets for each button: Tel-Aviv, Ottowa, Warsaw, London, San-Diego, New York, Honolulu, Lvov, Washington...(Plus "with Putin" and "sanctions")
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What a weird story. Russia: "We fired at one of your warships." Britain: "No you didn't." Russia: "Yes we did, we even dropped bombs!" Britain: "No, you didn't - you weren't even being aggressive."
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Remember when all those British football fans accused western journalists of painting too dark a picture of Putin’s Russia after they were shown a good time by the Kremlin at the 2018 World Cup?
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Kyiv said it would organise an evacuation corridor in the Kursk region for civilians, who would be free to travel to Ukraine or on to Kremlin-controlled areas of Russia.
"Kremlin-controlled areas of Russia."
What a concept.
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They face up to ten years in prison. This is a milestone and ominous that it comes just days after Putin's "election victory." Things are going to get even darker now in Russia.
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