19th April, RIA Novosti

The Russian Federation remembers the victims of the genocide of the Soviet people

Media and official structures of the Russian Federation marked 19 April 2026 as the first countrywide observance of the new memorial date dedicated to victims of the genocide of the Soviet people during the Great Patriotic War. Reporting that day highlighted exhibitions including “No Statute of Limitations,” archival work, and the declassification of historical case materials by the security services, while diplomatic and parliamentary voices linked the date to contemporary battles over historical interpretation.

19th April, Meduza

In Tomsk, the memorial to the victims of Bolshevik terror was dismantled

In Tomsk, the Square of Memory for Victims of Political Repression was closed off on April 19, and the “Stone of Sorrow” memorial plus other national memorial stones were dismantled, with eyewitnesses saying the whole square was being torn down. Police guarded the site, said the closure was connected to anti-landslide measures, and reportedly told people not to photograph it, while Tomsk city authorities first said the fencing was due to the risk of a garage collapse and that the removed monuments had been placed in storage. It is the first demolition of this kind.

18th April, Mediazona

For the first time, Rosreestr (The Federal Service for State Registration, Cadastre and Cartography) blocked the registration of rights to real estate at the request of the military registration and enlistment office

Russia’s state property registry, Rosreestr, has for the first time suspended a real-estate registration because of a military enlistment office order tied to failure to appear after an electronic summons. The case involved a reservist who received a notice through Gosuslugi in November 2025 for military training, did not appear, and then discovered in April 2026 that Rosreestr had blocked his property registration based on a restriction order dated November 27, 2025, issued by the enlistment office. This fits within a broader legal system in which people who ignore electronic summonses can face travel, driving, property registration, and financial restrictions, and activists warn that enforcement may spread further to tax authorities and banks.

17th April, Current Time

FSB officers will now be able to check phones and laptops when crossing the Russian border; refusal can lead to an arrest for up to 15 days

Amendments to Russia’s border law have come into force, giving FSB border officers the authority to inspect phones, tablets, laptops, and other devices when people cross the Russian border. It adds that officers may visually examine device contents and demand access if they suspect border-regime violations or the transport of prohibited items, and that refusing to unlock or hand over a device can be treated as disobeying a lawful order. The refusal can lead to a fine of 5,000–7,000 Rubles or administrative arrest for up to 15 days, while a lawyer quoted says such practices already existed informally and advises people not to cross the border with devices containing potentially compromising data.

17th April, Mediazona

A Ural lawyer was sentenced to 25 years in prison in the case of cooperation with the Freedom of Russia Legion

A military court in southern Russia sentenced Yekaterinburg lawyer Denis Tamantsev to 25 years in prison for alleged cooperation with the Freedom of Russia Legion, with the first three years to be served in prison and the rest in a high-security penal colony. According to the prosecution, he posted social media messages in August 2023 calling for violent actions against Russian officials and justifying the activities of the banned legion, then later corresponded with one of its members and filled out an application to join. Investigators also alleged that he planned an attack on court bailiffs in Yekaterinburg, travelled to Astrakhan to retrieve weapons and explosives from a stash, and was detained in December 2023.

16th April, RBC

Operators have frozen the expansion of communication channels to Europe

RBC reports that about 20 telecom companies handling Russia’s links to Europe agreed, at meetings with Digital Development Minister Maksut Shadayev, to stop expanding those international channels. The idea is to curb VPN use, because VPN traffic appears to operators as foreign traffic; if capacity stays capped while demand grows, operators may end up filtering that traffic or making access to foreign services more expensive. The authorities hope this will pressure foreign online services to place servers inside Russia, while operators may face extra approval requirements and monthly cross-border traffic reporting.

16th April, Kommersant

VPN services got waved off by their hosts

Draft amendments to Russia’s “Antifraud 2.0” legislation would bar hosting providers from supplying computing capacity to website and IT-system operators that enable access to information blocked in Russia, effectively tightening pressure on VPN-related infrastructure. The final text is still being coordinated by the Digital Development Ministry and other agencies, but the proposal could force Web hosts to move from being passive intermediaries to actively screening clients against Roskomnadzor requirements and refusing service to violators. Industry representatives say many providers are not yet technically ready for that role and warn that compliance costs, on top of existing regulatory and hardware pressures, would likely raise prices for other customers.

16th April, The Bell

"Now they decide everything." The Russian Internet has a new curator: the FSB agency responsible for Navalny's poisoning.

Russia’s recent crackdown on the internet - WhatsApp/Telegram calls, tougher anti-VPN measures, and the broader campaign against foreign platforms is being driven by the FSB’s Second Service, a political-security unit better known for targeting opposition figures than for telecom regulation. This marks a major institutional shift: control of the RuNet (Russian Internet) has moved away from more technical FSB structures and toward a branch associated with “defending the constitutional order,” ideological policing, and the persecution of dissidents, with Alexei Sedov’s team allegedly gaining broad authority after a 2025 meeting with Putin. This harder line has deepened tensions between security officials and civilian technocrats, while provoking public backlash, rising VPN demand, and concern inside the Kremlin over the political costs of internet restrictions.

16th April, Meduza

Russian users with VPNs enabled have had their access to the Gosuslugi website restricted.

The Gosuslugi (government digital platform) service has restricted access for users in Russia with VPNs enabled. Users of both the app and the website see the message: "For the app to function properly, please disable your VPN. Access is restricted for security reasons. "The Gosuslugi website can still be accessed from outside Russia with a VPN enabled. A similar situation has occurred previously, whereby users from abroad with a VPN could access websites that restrict access to Russian users who have enabled bypass tools.

16th April, Kommersant

Ten years with the right to appeal. The Government of the Russian Federation has approved the statute of limitations for privatisation disputes.

Russian business and legal reporting on 17 April said the government had approved and sent to the lower house a bill setting a 10-year limit for many legal claims over past privatisation deals. Russian reporting emphasised that the clock would run from the moment state ownership ended, while external reporting noted that the bill was meant to reassure business after a wave of state seizures and that important exclusions remained, including anti-corruption, extremism, and strategic-enterprise grounds. Selective stabilisation: enough reassurance to keep investment channels open, but not enough to suggest a more liberal settlement between state and capital.

16th April, Novaya Gazeta

The Prosecutor General's Office has determined that the Katyn massacre was carried out by the NKVD. An exhibition featuring historical falsifications is now open at the execution site.

A new exhibition at Katyn by the Russian Military Historical Society revives the old Soviet falsehood that the 1940 massacre of Polish prisoners was carried out by the Germans, even though Soviet authorities admitted in 1990 that the NKVD was responsible. The claim contradicts both late Soviet and current official records, citing the 1990 TASS statement, a 2005 letter from the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office, and a 2010 State Duma declaration acknowledging that the killings were carried out by the NKVD on Stalin’s orders. The new exhibition is a politically motivated distortion of established historical facts at the very site of the massacre.

15th April, RIA Novosti

Russian Federation's GDP has been declining for two months in a row, Putin said.

At an economic meeting in Moscow, Vladimir Putin said Russian GDP had fallen by 1.8% in January-February 2026 and noted that manufacturing, industrial output overall, and construction were in negative territory. He instructed the cabinet to prepare concrete proposals to restore growth, while Russian reporting emphasised that calendar and weather factors were part of the explanation but not the whole story. External reporting at the same time noted that the IMF had just raised its 2026 growth forecast for Russia to 1.1%, chiefly because higher oil prices were cushioning the slowdown.

15th April, Delovoy Peterburg

Gutsan announced the nationalisation of Russian enterprises acting in the interests of the Armed Forces of Ukraine

Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation Alexander Gutsan said Russia had nationalised 32 strategic enterprises whose owners were allegedly acting against Russia’s interests and in support of Ukraine and the Ukrainian armed forces. The seized assets total about 2.5 trillion Rubles, with Gutsan saying that prosecutors intervened because the owners were accused of moving dividends abroad, evading taxes, increasing debt, and financing anti-Russian activity.

15th April, Agenstvo

Schools have begun holding lessons about the “genocide of the Soviet people.” High school students are being told about “new Nazis” in Ukraine.

Russian schools are holding remembrance lessons for students in grades 9–11 ahead of the new April 19 Memorial Day for victims of the “genocide of the Soviet people,” using a teaching script tied to the “Navigators of Childhood” program. It reports that the lesson links World War II atrocities to the present war in Ukraine, describing Donbas as a special territory for Russians and referring to Ukrainian forces as “newly minted Nazis,” while also showing students a state-backed video about children in the occupied Donetsk region. Schools have also held these lessons for younger children than the guidelines specify, and the campaign comes alongside new official measures, including the first observance of the Memorial Day in 2026 and a law punishing denial of the claimed “genocide of the Soviet people.”

13th April, Meduza

In Moscow, a first-year student threw a moccasin at Lenin's sarcophagus due to his disagreement with his policies. The student was arrested for 10 days.

A Moscow court sentenced 18-year-old first-year college student Konstantin Bodunov to 10 days of administrative arrest for petty hooliganism after he went into Lenin’s Mausoleum, struck Lenin’s glass sarcophagus several times, and threw his moccasin at it on April 8. According to the court decision, Bodunov said he acted because he disagreed with Lenin’s “economic and religious policy,” although he did not admit guilt in court.

12th April, SOTA

The Moscow State University church was banned from holding a religious procession on the street under the pretext of COVID-19.

The Church of St. Tatiana at Moscow State University was barred from holding its usual Easter procession on the street and was told it could go no farther than the journalism faculty courtyard. According to MSU lecturer Natalya Loseva, officials cited “COVID restrictions” as the reason, even though the procession had reportedly taken place for about three decades. The article adds that COVID remains the formal justification for banning public rallies in Moscow, and notes that Loseva’s senior role at the Russian Federation propaganda effort cannot appeal the restriction.

11th April, Insider

References to Memorial have been removed from the Yeltsin Centre's exhibition.

Two plaques mentioning “Memorial” (a human rights group focused on the study of Soviet repressions) were removed from the Yeltsin Centre museum exhibition after Russian authorities said the organisation can no longer be referenced without special labelling. The Yeltsin Centre said it is discussing the issue with lawyers and expects changes to the exhibition, although it has not yet decided what those changes will be. It is connected to the recent decision by the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation to declare the so-called “International Public Movement Memorial” extremist and ban its activities, despite “Memorial” saying no such formally named organisation exists.

10th April 2026, Novaya Gazeta

Dmitry Medvedev became the editor-in-chief of new textbooks on social studies for grades 9-11

Dmitry Medvedev has been appointed chief editor of new Russian social studies textbooks for grades 9–11, a move announced by Deputy Education Minister Olga Koludarova. Officials say Medvedev made extensive page-by-page edits and comments, and that his work influenced not only the final textbooks but also the new federal standards and teaching programs; the author team also includes lawyers, economists, sociologists, and historians. According to Medvedev and the outlets citing him, the new books are meant to broaden students’ horizons and teach them to defend their views with arguments, while fitting into a broader reform that keeps social studies for grades 9–11 and reduces its place in lower grades.

10th April, Verstka

Novaya Gazeta journalist Oleg Roldugin arrested in a case of illegal use of personal data

A Moscow court ordered Novaya Gazeta journalist and Sobesednik co-founder Oleg Roldugin held in pretrial detention until May 10 in a criminal case over the alleged unlawful use of personal data. Investigators accuse him of illegally accessing, collecting, storing, or transferring computer information containing personal data, allegedly obtained through improper access and used in articles described by the authorities as having “negative” content. Oleg was detained after lengthy searches of Novaya Gazeta’s newsroom and his home on April 9, during which equipment and documents were seized, and lawyers noted the case may be the first criminal prosecution of a journalist in Russia for allegedly using bots to obtain data from databases.

10th April, Novaya Gazeta

Stanford University, the alma mater of Brin (and Kirill Dmitriev), was recognised as an "undesirable" organisation, and the grandson of the writer Alexei Tolstoy was recognised as a "foreign agent"

Russia’s Justice Ministry added Stanford University to its list of “undesirable organisations,” based on a Prosecutor General’s Office decision dated March 26, and also included two other groups: Stanford’s Centre for Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies and the German NGO Crisis Modelling for Peace. In addition, the ministry expanded its “foreign agents” register to include literary scholar Ivan Tolstoy, grandson of writer Alexei Tolstoy, along with several activists, an electoral expert, and the project “Tatar Shurasy,” accusing them of criticising the Russian authorities and opposing the war in Ukraine.

6th April, Verstka

Ex-governor of the Kursk region sentenced to 14 years in prison in the case of bribery during the construction of fortifications

A court sentenced former Kursk region governor Alexey Smirnov to 14 years in prison for taking large bribes, fined him 400 million Rubles, barred him from holding public office for 10 years, and ordered the confiscation of 20.9 million Rubles. Smirnov admitted guilt and struck a deal with investigators, while prosecutors said he and another official took nearly 13 million Rubles for protection in school-repair contracts and about 8 million more from a regional deputy whose company-built border fortifications with Ukraine. Investigators linked the fortification case to up to 1 billion Rubles in embezzlement, and Smirnov testified that former governor Roman Starovoit (who was found dead in July 2025) had suggested collecting percentages from contractors.

6th April, Meduza

The services of Sberbank, Alfa-Bank and telecom operators temporarily stopped working. Rostelecom's home Internet has been disconnected

On the evening of April 6, multiple services in Russia—including banking apps and websites, telecom providers, satellite TV companies, and the state services portal—experienced outages, according to the monitoring project Sboy.rf. The reported disruptions affected Rostelecom, Alfa-Bank, NTV Plus, Tricolor, Gosuslugi, T2, and Mosenergosbyt, while Detector404 also received reports about problems with Sber, Gazprombank, Okko, and World of Tanks. The exact cause was unclear at the time, although Rostelecom said it had recorded and quickly neutralised a major DDoS attack on its network, and even on Sboy.rf itself reportedly went down amid the incident.

5th April, BFM

Cloudwards: Russia took the penultimate place in terms of Internet freedom

According to Cloudwards’ 2026 internet freedom report, Russia ranked second from last with 4 points, ahead only of North Korea, which scored 0. The report evaluates how freely people can use the internet in different countries by looking at access to torrent sites, adult content, political and civic online expression, and VPN services, and it specifically singled out Russia as a country where VPNs are blocked or heavily restricted.

4th April, Meduza

Meduza asked historian Alexei Uvarov to carefully reread the entirety of two new history textbooks for high school students that have sparked a storm of criticism.

Meduza asked historian Aleksei Uvarov to re-read Russia’s new high-school history textbooks, and he argues that they contain numerous factual errors, distortions, and politically motivated framing, including exaggerated claims about Russia’s uniqueness and selective use of quotations from Vladimir Putin. History books also downplay or omit some of the Soviet state’s most brutal actions and human costs, such as mass repression, the suffering and deaths of Gulag prisoners, famine, and the treatment of Soviet POWs, while often presenting these events in sanitised or morally evasive language. The textbooks teach a stark “Russia versus the West” worldview and promote an anti-humanist message in which the state’s goals outweigh individual lives, rights, and moral judgment. The fact that textbooks systematically minimise or omit state-inflicted suffering, especially Soviet ones, is a reminder of a historical legacy that primarily originates from the Soviet background, not the prior history.

4th April, Vedomosti

Kasperskaya apologised to Roskomnadzor for linking the failure of banks with the blocking of VPN.

Natalya Kasperskaya (co-founder of Kaspersky Lab) apologised to Roskomnadzor after previously linking a mass outage at Russian banks and the Faster Payments System to efforts to block VPNs. After speaking with Roskomnadzor’s leadership, she said the disruption was apparently not caused by the regulator and may instead have stemmed from a problem at Sberbank, whose infrastructure is closely connected to other banks. Previously, she had warned that blocking VPNs could disrupt critical online services because VPN protocols overlap with infrastructure used by banks, while the outage itself affected major banking apps.

3rd April, Meduza

The head of the Investigative Committee instructed to check Yuri Dud because of an interview with the commander of the RVC, Denis Kapustin.

Investigative Committee chief, Alexander Bastrykin, ordered a legal review of journalist Yury Dud after Dud published a 4-hour-42-minute interview with Denis Kapustin, commander of the Russian Volunteer Corps, on April 2, 2026. The committee said Kapustin had already been sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment in Russia and claimed the interview contained positive assessments of banned extremist ideologies and signs of promoting violence against people on ethnic grounds. Because of those claims, Bastrykin instructed the Main Investigative Directorate to examine the published material.

2nd April, Gazeta

Medvedev called for countering the creation of ethnic enclaves in Russia.

Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council, called preventing the formation of ethnic enclaves by migrants in Russia an urgent issue that deserves close attention. He argued that when foreign nationals live in compact clusters in separate areas, this can hinder their adaptation and weaken compliance with Russian laws and “law-abiding behaviour.” He also spoke of a planned package of legislative measures to speed up decisions on declaring certain foreign nationals’ stay undesirable, including immediate deportation if a migrant is found to have a dangerous disease.

2nd April, ECHO

The Basmanny Court convicted German sculptor Jacques Tilly in absentia in the case of "fakes" about the army and insulting the feelings of believers.

Moscow’s Basmanny Court has sentenced German sculptor Jacques Tilly in absentia over charges of spreading “fake” information about the Russian army and offending believers’ feelings. The case was based on a Düsseldorf carnival work depicting Patriarch Kirill and Vladimir Putin, as well as an interview Tilly gave to Deutsche Welle, and the court sentenced him to 8.5 years in prison, fined him 200,000 Rubles, and banned him from administering websites for four years. The article adds that Tilly is known for papier-mâché political caricatures, including anti-war depictions of Putin used in German protests and carnivals, and that Deutsche Welle previously reported he donated related proceeds to help Ukrainians.

31st March, Business-Online

"Every second user does not turn it off at all": Russian Federation declares war on VPN.

The Russian Federation has intensified its campaign against VPNs with a set of measures that includes charging for mobile international traffic exceeding 15 GB a month, urging major platforms to restrict users with active VPNs, and stopping Apple ID top-ups through mobile operators. This is a government response to how widespread VPN use has become in Russia, with an expert noting that the country now leads the world in VPN usage and that about every second user keeps a VPN always activated. The authorities aim to make VPN use less convenient and more costly without openly relying on straightforward administrative punishment, which Digital Development Minister Maksut Shadaev has called a “difficult compromise.”

30th March, Kommersant

Sites that do not block VPN traffic can be excluded from the "whitelists"

The Digital Development Ministry of the Russian Federation has warned major online platforms that they could be removed from official “whitelists” of sites still accessible during mobile internet shutdowns if users can reach them while a VPN is enabled. The ministry has urged marketplaces, banks, and big tech companies to block access from VPN users, a move that could affect services such as Wildberries, Ozon, Yandex, and VK. Officials are trying to curb VPN use without imposing a full ban, even as VPN traffic in Russia keeps rising and regulators continue expanding blocks on VPN services. Will it treat all foreign visits as an attempt at evasion, reducing the spread of the pro-Russia message abroad?

30th March, Moscow Times

Russian Exiles in Europe Face a Catch-22

Anti-war Russian exiles in Europe are trapped by contradictory expectations: they are urged to be more visibly pro-Ukraine yet also pressured to stay out of sight because their presence is seen as inherently offensive. Many of these exiles have already sacrificed careers, homes and safety, but still face bureaucracy, xenophobia and suspicion in Europe, leaving them blamed both when they speak out and when they remain quiet. Instead of trying to prove themselves as “good Russians” or a model minority, exiles should focus on practical mutual aid and solidarity with other migrant communities, grounded in universal human rights.

29th March, Insider

Russia has banned all protests against internet blocking: at least six protest organisers have been arrested.

All planned protests against internet blocking in Russia on 29 March have been banned, and at least six organisers have been arrested, with two detained and four others facing pressure from authorities. Even a previously permitted rally in Penza was cancelled, despite being scheduled in a zone that normally does not require approval, as the Interior Ministry warned of possible administrative and criminal liability for participants. Non-religious demonstrations not aligned with the state are not permitted, with each region citing different reasons for this.

27th March, RBC

Peskov explained the business's idea of ​​making contributions to the state as a sense of duty.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said one participant at Vladimir Putin’s closed-door meeting with business leaders offered to give the state a “very large sum of money,” and that this was the businessman’s own family decision rather than a request from Putin. Peskov said the idea reflected a sense of duty, arguing that many of the businesspeople present started their companies in the 1990s and that their early success was connected in some way to the state. Peskov did not identify the businessman and specifically denied that the initiative had come from Rosneft chief Igor Sechin. A reminder that there are no oligarchs in the Russian Federation, just rich businessmen who owe their success to the state’s loyalty.

27th March, Interfax

The Ministry of Justice has designated Oscar-winning actor Pavel Talankin a foreign agent.

Among the newly designated “foreign agents” by the Justice Ministry is teacher and documentary co-author Pavel Talankin. He is accused of spreading what the authorities call false information about Russian state policy and opposing the war, with additional allegations of cooperation with foreign agents or “undesirable” organisations. Talankin recently co-created the Oscar-winning documentary Mr Nobody Against Putin, which a Chelyabinsk court had banned from distribution in the Russian Federation one day earlier, on March 26, 2026.

26th March, BFM

Putin ordered the introduction of quotas on the distribution of foreign films in the Russian Federation.

Vladimir Putin ordered officials to introduce quotas for foreign films in Russia as quickly as possible, saying at a meeting of the Council for Culture that Russia should more tightly regulate imported cinema, as France and China do. Putin argued that the issue is both ideological and financial: he criticised Russia for allowing what he called “stupid” and “unnecessary” material through while failing to support domestic producers. The discussion was closely tied to Nikita Mikhalkov’s lobbying on behalf of Russian cinema, noting that he had previously proposed a 5 million Ruble fee for foreign films and again raised the question of quotas at this meeting. Another idea supported by the president at a meeting of the Culture Council is to use artistic works without the consent of their heirs, if they refuse permission. Putin stated that a law should be passed that would permit the use of works without the consent of copyright holders who are not the authors and who set patently impossible conditions. In addition, Putin supported the idea of creating an award to rival The Nobel Prize in Literature.

26th March, Vedomosti

The Human Rights Council reported the disappearance of Nikita Zhuravel.

22-year-old Nikita Zhuravel, who was convicted of treason and for burning the translated Quran, has reportedly gone missing while being transferred to a penal colony, according to human rights advocate Eva Merkacheva of Russia’s Presidential Human Rights Council. Relatives often receive no timely information during prisoner transfers, even though Russian law requires a colony to notify a chosen family member within 10 days after the prisoner arrives, and the detention centre is supposed to notify them when the transfer begins. In February 2024, a court in Grozny sentenced him to 3.5 years on charges of insulting the feelings of believers and hooliganism, and in 2025, he was sentenced to 14 years in prison for treason. (He was lated found in the Ulyanovsk colony)

23rd March, RIA

The State Duma will consider a project to strengthen the protection of historical memory.

State Duma leadership stated that a second-reading debate was set for 24 March on amendments to the Criminal Code aimed at “protecting historical memory.” The package would expand criminal liability for desecration of memorials and burials associated with victims of the “genocide of the Soviet people,” including sites outside Russia, adding liability under the “rehabilitation of Nazism” article for publicly denying or approving that genocide. Reported maximum penalties included up to five years’ imprisonment for damage to protected burial/memorial sites, and up to three years for public denial and/or “insulting the memory” of victims. The initiative was explicitly framed as countering “falsification of history” and defending the multiethnic Soviet wartime “sacrifice.” 

23rd March, Vedomosti

"Where they can, they save": How Indians are settling in Russia.

Indian migrant workers are increasingly being recruited to Russia, especially for labour-demanding sectors such as garment production. It also shows the trade-offs of that move: many workers send most of their earnings home, live close to their workplaces, and some struggle with food, weather, or pay. More broadly, this migration is a part of Russia’s labour shortage, noting a 2025 Russia–India agreement on temporary employment, rising work-related entries by Indian citizens, and recruitment costs of about 170,000 Rubles per worker for employers. Will it develop into a stable community?

22nd March, Insider

An activist who tried to organise a rally against internet blocking in Rostov-on-Don was searched and beaten.

Security officers searched the home of Yevgeny Makovoz, a Rostov-on-Don activist who had applied to hold a protest against internet shutdowns and allegedly beat him during the raid. According to people close to him, nine unidentified men came to his home on March 21, seized all his equipment, and left him with a concussion. Proposed anti-shutdown protests were submitted in 28 cities across 17 Russian regions, with authorities reportedly rejecting 20 applications and approving four rallies when the article was posted.

21st March, Vedomosti

The Ministry of Digital Development has denied the introduction of "whitelists" for home internet providers.

Russia’s Digital Development Ministry denied reports that Moscow's home internet providers were introducing “whitelists,” calling those claims fake and saying there is no need for such a system. The ministry said that when there are security threats from drones, authorities may selectively shut down mobile internet in some regions because it can affect drone guidance, but these measures do not apply to fixed home internet.

20th March, Gazeta

Medvedev concluded that most UN countries are self-proclaimed

Dmitry Medvedev and Viktor Medvedchuk argued in a joint article that, by formal criteria, most UN member states could be considered “self-proclaimed.” They pointed to countries that declared independence from Spain, as well as the Netherlands and Belgium, and argued that these states emerged through the exercise of a claimed right to self-determination. They described the breakup of the Soviet Union and the emergence of new states in its place as an irreversible process, echoing a position that the article says Vladimir Putin has also expressed.

19th March, RBC

The State Duma will consider a bill to protect citizens of Russia arrested abroad.

The State Duma will consider a government-backed bill that would allow Russia to use its armed forces to protect citizens of Russia who are arrested, detained, or prosecuted abroad under decisions by foreign or certain international courts. The proposal would amend the laws on citizenship and defence and give the president of the Russian Federation the authority to deploy the military for that purpose. In essence, the measure is presented to shield citizens from legal actions by courts whose jurisdiction Moscow says it does not recognise.

19th March, Fontanka

Spring, a lesson, or a beautiful way out? The mysterious story of citizen Remeslo

Pro-government blogger and lawyer Ilya Remeslo suddenly spent about a day publishing unusually harsh attacks on the Russian authorities and President Vladimir Putin, insisting his Telegram channel had not been hacked, gave interviews, and then went silent. On March 19, 2026, he was hospitalised in St. Petersburg’s Skvortsov-Stepanov psychiatric clinic. His relatives called the ambulance, and there was no visible involvement by state bodies. For now, it remains an unresolved mystery.

19th March, Vedomosti

Svintsov, a deputy expelled from the Liberal Democratic Party, was unable to join A Just Russia.

State Duma deputy Andrei Svintsov, recently expelled from the LDPR, considered joining A Just Russia but failed. A source close to A Just Russia mentioned that Svintsov had become “toxic,” while New People’s vice speaker Vladislav Davankov also said the party would not take him in because he was too far from their values. Svintsov told Vedomosti that his expulsion was unexpected and that he had not yet decided whether he would run for the Duma again or for which party, while political analysts stated that his public image and past positions, including on Telegram restrictions, made him an unsuitable fit for A Just Russia.

18th March, Current Time

Political prisoner Vladimir Osipov, convicted in the case of "fakes" about the army, died in pretrial detention.

56-year-old Vladimir Osipov died in a hospital in Ukhta on March 18 after being sentenced to 6.5 years in prison for anti-war posts on Odnoklassniki, charges he denied. His relatives and friends say he was beaten during his arrest, suffered from severe hypertension and other health problems, and was repeatedly denied proper medical care in pretrial detention and prison before being hospitalised in a coma. This is the fourth death of a political prisoner that has become known since the beginning of 2026. And since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, from 2022 to 2026, at least 44 people imprisoned under political and anti-war articles have died in custody.

17th March, Afisha

A bill was submitted to the State Duma to ban the media from writing accusatory information before the court's decision.

A bill has been submitted to the State Duma that would bar the media from publishing accusatory information about a person before a court decision has entered into legal force. It would punish wording such as “according to sources,” “allegedly,” or “possibly” in reporting on a person’s possible involvement in a crime, allowing only neutral language until the court rules. The proposal, introduced by the State Council of Tatarstan, would also restrict journalistic investigations and impose fines of 100,000-300,000 Rubles for individuals, 300,000-700,000 for officials, and 1-2 million for organisations. (It was withdrawn on 31st March)

17th March, Gazeta

In 2025, 88% of films with state support did not pay off

Only 5 of 41 of Russia’s films made with state support recouped their costs in 2025, meaning 88% were commercially unsuccessful. The article says this was worse than in 2024, when about 78% of such films failed to break even, despite bigger budgets and several releases approaching or exceeding 1 billion Rubles in box office receipts.

16th March, Gazeta

The government supports the idea of expanding the grounds for the deportation of foreigners.

Russia’s government has backed a bill that would expand the grounds for deporting foreign nationals to cover about 20 additional administrative offences, including “discrediting” the army, distributing extremist materials, and displaying Nazi or extremist symbols. The proposal would also allow deportation for offences such as calls for terrorism, justification of terrorism, calls for sanctions against Russia, petty hooliganism, disobeying police, and violating rules for protests or public gatherings. The bill would also remove the requirement for a detailed personal-circumstances review before deportation in some cases, including certain drug-related administrative offences.

15th March, Meduza

Security forces descended on the "Funeral of Winter" metal festival in Yaroslavl. People were forced to the floor and stripped naked while searching for "forbidden" tattoos.

Security officers raided the “Funeral of Winter” metal festival in Yaroslavl on March 14, forcing attendees to lie face down on the floor and searching some of them for allegedly “banned” tattoos.  Witnesses said some people were made to undress, had their hair cut, and were marked with insults such as “queer” and “fascist.” At the same time, a military commissariat official reportedly urged male attendees to join the war. Men were reportedly held for around five hours with their hands behind their heads, women were released earlier, and it remains unclear whether anyone was formally detained.

13th March, Kommersant

(Internet) "Whitelists" have been introduced in Moscow.

Mobile internet access in Moscow has begun operating through “whitelists,” meaning service is available only for approved users or devices in at least some parts of the city.  According to the telecom-market sources, the system is now working, although coverage remains uneven because some base stations are still switched off in certain districts. Experts estimate that the total damage to Moscow’s businesses over five days was between 3 billion and 5 billion Rubles, with courier services, taxis, car-sharing companies, and retail businesses among those most affected by the outages.

13th March, RBC

Khrushchev's great-granddaughter was recognised as a foreign agent

The Justice Ministry of the Russian Federation added political scientist and writer Nina Khrushcheva, the great-granddaughter of Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, to its “foreign agents” register on March 13, 2026.  The ministry said she had spread what it called false information about government decisions, spoken out against the war in Ukraine, taken part in creating materials by designated “foreign agents,” and appeared on a platform provided by a foreign source while living outside the Russian Federation. The same update also added journalist Sergei Reznik, activist Alexei Nesterenko, economist Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, and publicist Vadim Shtepa to the list.

11th March, IStories

Star Factory (X-Factor) by Sergei Kiriyenko

The Kremlin is turning the “New Media Workshop,” launched under Sergei Kiriyenko and reportedly funded with about 1 billion Rubles in 2023–2024, into a pipeline for training loyal media managers and propagandists, after initially using it to staff propaganda work in occupied Ukrainian territories. The outlet says the program borrows the format of Western journalism fellowships but repurposes it to promote state messaging, with figures such as Vladimir Solovyov, Maria Zakharova, and other officials involved as mentors. Graduating from the program can open the door to careers, state grants, and influence across Russia’s media system, and many alumni have gone on to work in pro-Kremlin media projects in occupied parts of Ukraine.

11th March, Novaya Gazeta

Nuclear reaction to the occupation. The story of Zaporizhzhya NPP engineer Ruslan Lavrik: he refused to work for Rosatom and received 16 years in prison for treason.

Ruslan Lavrik, an engineer at the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant who refused to sign a contract with Rosatom, was later accused of passing coordinates of Russian troops and making small donations to support Ukraine and was sentenced to 16 years in a strict-regime colony for treason. Lavrik was abducted in June 2024, held for months through an “administrative carousel” of repeated short arrests, and subjected to beatings, electric shocks, and threats against his wife before being forced to sign confessions. Ruslan’s case fits a broader pattern of repression at the occupied plant, where workers who refused to cooperate with Rosatom were allegedly pressured, tortured, or imprisoned.

11th March, Meduza

Comedian Alexey Shcherbakov's concerts were cancelled following Nurlan Saburov's performances for an unknown reason.

All of comedian Alexey Shcherbakov’s scheduled concerts in Russia for 2026 were abruptly cancelled in March without explanation, tickets disappeared from sale, refunds were offered, and neither he nor his manager publicly commented. The cancellation could be linked to a broader crackdown around the “What Happened Next?” comedy circle, noting that his fellow host, Nurlan Saburov, had already been banned from entering Russia for 50 years and that pro-war channels later attacked Shcherbakov for avoiding overt support for the war. Shcherbakov is a performer known for deliberately crude, abrasive humour who largely avoided public anti-war statements.

11th March, OVD-Info

A Ural priest who called the founder of the Russian Volunteer Corps "a great guy" was sentenced to 5.5 years in prison.

 A military court in Yekaterinburg sentenced 55-year-old Hieromonk Yevgeny Pinchuk (Nikandr), a priest, to five and a half years in a general-regime penal colony for “justifying terrorism.” According to the report, the case was linked to a July 2023 comment in which he allegedly called the founder of the Russian Volunteer Corps a “great guy” and expressed respect for him; prosecutors had sought a six-and-a-half-year sentence. Pinchuk has been in pretrial detention since October 2025 and faces separate charges of rehabilitating Nazism and inciting extremism. Previously, he had faced administrative charges for making anti-war statements.

10th March, RBC

The Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) has revealed details of its advertising ban on Telegram.

The Federal Anti-Monopoly Service said advertising on platforms subject to access restrictions, including Telegram, YouTube, VPN services, Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp, is considered a violation of advertising law, and that both advertisers and ad distributors can be held liable. The regulator said this interpretation is based on a provision of the advertising law that bans ads on resources whose access is restricted in Russia, as well as on platforms run by organisations deemed undesirable or outlawed for extremism or terrorism. Fines can reportedly reach 500,000 Rubles for legal entities.

10th March, Forbes

14 new Russovian (citizens of the Russian Federation) billionaires in the Forbes world ranking

Forbes’ 2026 global billionaires list added 14 new billionaires from the Russian Federation, bringing the total number on the list to a record 155, continuing a four-year rebound after the sharp drop that followed the 2022 market collapse. According to Forbes Russia, seven of the 14 newcomers are linked to agriculture and food, ten built their businesses from scratch, and four inherited fortunes rooted in the privatisations of the 1990s. The richest new entrant is Ruslan Rakhimkulov, whose wealth is estimated at $1.9 billion, while the richest Russian overall in the ranking is Severstal co-owner Alexey Mordashov with $37 billion.

10th March, NG

Jurors are not allowed to observe the actual competition between the parties.

The Supreme Court (SC) of the Russian Federation forbade defence lawyers from discrediting the examinations of the prosecution in front of the jury. Such a measure should strengthen the authority of expert opinions, but the legal community is outraged that they thereby actually turn into indisputable evidence, which is unacceptable under the law. And the defence cannot really and publicly challenge the completeness, correctness and reliability of such scientific research in the presence of "people's assessors", who are thereby deprived of the opportunity to see the real adversarial nature of the parties. The article focuses on a Moscow region case in which the Supreme Court overturned a jury acquittal after the defence questioned a DNA report before jurors, while some legal experts said the ruling reflects an effort to keep courtroom debate from becoming a contest of competing pseudo-experts.

6th March, Interfax

The monument to Solzhenitsyn is planned to be moved from the centre of Vladivostok

Authorities in Vladivostok plan to relocate the monument to Alexander Solzhenitsyn from the city centre to Vera and Nadezhda Square on Ovchinnikova Street, near a memorial dedicated to victims of political repression. The city has awarded a contract worth 201,000 Rubles to dismantle, transport, and reinstall the 2.5-metre statue, with the work expected to be completed by 2 July 2026, the city’s anniversary day. The monument was erected in 2015 to commemorate Solzhenitsyn’s 1994 visit to Vladivostok, but it has remained controversial, has been vandalised several times, and has faced unsuccessful attempts at removal.

5th March, Insider

In St. Petersburg, a case was opened on "justification of terrorism" because of positive statements about Navalny

The Investigative Committee opened a criminal case on public justification and propaganda of terrorism against a resident of St. Petersburg, Nadzillo Idibekov. According to the investigation, on February 24, in the lobby of the Prospekt Bolshevikov metro station, he shouted statements that "positively assess the activities of a person included in the list of those involved in extremist activities or terrorism." This is the first known criminal case under the article on public justification and propaganda of terrorism, in which the reason was positive statements in support of Alexei Navalny, who, after the decisions of the Russian courts, was included by Rosfinmonitoring in the list of "terrorists and extremists”.

5th March, Fontanka

Arsen Markaryan was imprisonedfor 4.5 years for rehabilitating Nazism

The Moscow City Court sentenced blogger Arsen Markaryan to 4.5 years in a general regime colony for the rehabilitation of Nazism. He is also prohibited from administering websites for 4 years. The case was initiated following a video published in early 2025. According to the investigation, it contained a contemptuous and negative attitude to the feat of Alexander Matrosov, a Red Army soldier who closed the embrasure of the bunker in 1943.

4th March, TASS

The taxi industry expects Haval and Tenet to be accepted soon

The taxi industry expects the Ministry of Industry and Trade to soon include the Haval and Tenet brands in the list of cars that meet the criteria of the law on localisation. The federal law establishing requirements for the localisation of cars used as taxis came into force on 1 March 2026. Currently, a vehicle can be added to the regional register of taxis if one of two conditions is met. It appears that industries are struggling to keep up with the laws.

4th Match, RG.ru

Sobyanin announced that the number of civil servants in the capital will be reduced by 15%

Moscow will cut the number of civil servants by 15% and reduce the city’s 2026 investment program by 10% as part of a broader budget optimisation drive. Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said the move was prompted by weaker-than-expected revenue growth: in January–February 2026, budget revenues rose by 2% instead of the 6.5% projected when the budget was drafted.  At the same time, he said the cuts are intended to preserve Moscow’s social obligations, maintain city services, continue key development projects, and keep funding for the Defence Ministry and servicemen’s families.

4th March, KP.ru

Prison minimum in Russia: the number of prisonersfell to a record 308 thousand

Russia has updated the historical minimum in terms of the number of prisoners: 308 thousand people are now held in colonies, and pre-trial detention centres (209 per 100 thousand population), and another 89 thousand people under investigation are awaiting sentencing in detention centres. Whereas in the early 2000s, more than 1 million people were behind bars. According to Supreme Court official Vladimir Davydov, this drop reflects a long-term “humanisation” of criminal justice: the prison population fell to about 700,000 by 2013, and the share of sentences involving actual imprisonment declined from 40% over the past quarter-century to 26% in 2025.

3rd March, The Insider

University employees fined for mentioning "undesirable" organisations in dissertations published on university websites

Four university administrative staff in Russia’s Yaroslavl region were fined 20,000 Rubles each after FSB inspections found mentions of organisations labelled “undesirable” in Russia inside dissertations published on university websites. A repeat case within a year could trigger criminal prosecution with a penalty of up to five years in prison, and warns that this will likely make it risky to publish academic works containing such references in open access.

2nd March, Current Time

Russia’s Supreme Court has declared the Anti-War Committee of Russia a "terrorist" organisation.

Russia’s Supreme Court, at a hearing held behind closed doors, granted a request from the Prosecutor General’s Office to designate the Anti-War Committee of Russia a “terrorist” organisation and ban its activities in the country. Judge Oleg Nefedov delivered the ruling. He had previously declared the non-existent "international LGBT movement" and "international Satanism movement" to be "extremist" and designated Alexei Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation a "terrorist" organisation. The committee was founded in February 2022 to oppose Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and its members include prominent exiled Kremlin critics such as Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Garry Kasparov, Dmitry Gudkov, Vladimir Kara-Murza, Yekaterina Shulman, and Viktor Shenderovich. The FSB had already opened a criminal case against all committee members last year, alleging involvement in a “terrorist community” and a seizure of power, citing their support for Ukraine, the 2023 Berlin Declaration condemning the war, and their work with a Russian democratic platform in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. Previously, the group was also labelled “undesirable.”

1st March, Vedomosti

Putin expressed condolences over the death of Ali Khamenei.

Vladimir Putin sent his condolences to Iranian leader Masoud Pezeshkian following the death of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and his family. In his message, the head of state emphasised that the incident constitutes a gross violation of universal human principles and international law.

25th to 27th February, various sources

City halls across the Russian Federation have been denying permits for demonstrations against the Telegram block.

In Moscow, COVID restrictions were the reason, while in Novosibirsk, the application was rejected due to the application not being an organisation but by a citizen.

26th February, Vedomosti

Siluanov: The government is revising the budget rule for oil

The Russian government is dealing with the issue of tightening the budget rule in terms of the base oil cut-off price, said Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov. "I think that we will consider and make such decisions quickly enough," he told reporters. The minister said that Russia is less focused on oil and gas revenues (NGD), and in 2026 their share will be less than 20%. At the same time, according to him, new ambitious goals have been set for the current year. From this year, the cut-off price for oil according to the budget rule will begin to systematically decrease by $1 per year and by 2030 will reach $55 per barrel.

26th February, Meduza

Denying the "genocide of the Soviet people" will soon carry a prison sentence of up to five years. What does that term even mean?

The new bill would criminalise publicly denying or insulting the memory of the so-called “genocide of the Soviet people,” but the deeper purpose of the concept is political rather than purely historical.  Citing historian Konstantin Pakhalyuk, the article argues that the idea is meant to answer recurring accusations that the USSR helped start World War II by recasting the Soviet people as not only Nazism’s main conqueror but also its main victim, and therefore not responsible for unleashing the war. Furthermore, this reading is backed by documents from the first case to address the issue, where prosecutors said that “distorting” World War II history and comparing Nazism with other regimes serves to shift blame onto modern Russia, something they portrayed as a threat to Russian national security, European cooperation, and international stability.

26th February, Current Time

Telegram will be completely blocked in Russia starting in April

Several media in Russia, citing sources close to the Kremlin and the telecom sector, reported that Russia plans to fully block Telegram in early April, with April 1 mentioned as the likely start date.  According to the report, the reasons discussed include alleged recruitment for illegal acts through Telegram, claims that foreign intelligence can access Telegram correspondence, and accusations that the platform supports bots used to obtain Russians’ personal data. At the same time, Roskomnadzor did not clearly confirm the report, and the move has been controversial because Telegram is widely used by Russian forces in Ukraine, prompting officials to say it may remain available for military use at the front.

26th February, RTVI

Russia will not extradite migrants fighting in military formations to other countries.

Russia’s State Duma has passed a law banning the extradition of foreign nationals and stateless people who have served or are serving under contract in the Russian armed forces or other military formations, if another country wants to prosecute them or enforce a sentence against them. The measure is part of a broader legislative package that also seeks to block deportation, administrative expulsion, and other forced-removal decisions against such people, with officials saying the goal is to protect them from what Russia calls unjustified criminal prosecution abroad for participating in the war. Lawmakers pointed to cases in which foreign citizens who fought on Russia’s side were later punished in their home countries, including examples from Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan.

25th February, Novaya Gazeta

Scientist non grata. Andrei Lankov was expelled from Latvia and blacklisted.

North Korea expert Andrei Lankov was detained in Riga on February 24 shortly before a scheduled lecture, then expelled from Latvia after being placed on the country’s blacklist and banned from entry four days earlier.  Latvia’s Foreign Ministry later confirmed that Lankov had been declared persona non grata based on information from the country’s security services and under an immigration-law provision used against people seen as threats or as supporting violations of international law, including Russia’s war in Ukraine.  Lankov said he did not know the precise reason for the decision, suggested officials disliked his refusal to turn complex realities into a politically useful caricature, and said he did not plan to challenge the expulsion.

25th February, Meduza

Western analysts say Russia is on track to losing 50,000 soldiers a month. A Meduza investigation suggests those estimates are based on manipulated data.

Meduza argues that widely cited Western estimates of roughly 50,000 Russian losses per month are overstated because they rely on distorted open-source data rather than a real battlefield turning point. According to the investigation, Russia has been retroactively declaring large numbers of previously missing soldiers dead through court procedures, which makes many older deaths show up in databases as if they were new 2025 casualties. After adjusting for those reclassifications and for improved obituary-database coverage, Meduza estimates current Russian battlefield deaths at under 600 per day and total irreversible losses at about 27,000 per month, far below the headline figure.

23rd February, ECHO

Dispersal of "Bakshevskaya Maslyanitsya": Orthodox activists deny their involvement, z-bloggers are indignant

A police breakup of the long-running “Bakshevskaya Maslenitsa” festival near Moscow sparked backlash, after which the Orthodox activist group “Sorok Sorokov” said it did not ask authorities to cancel the event and only came after learning of the ban. However, prior posts from the group suggest its activists were present with police, and at least one person was detained after allegedly swearing during an exchange with a “Sorok Sorokov” representative. Pro-war bloggers condemned the situation as absurd and shameful, while “Sorok Sorokov” justified its attention by claiming the celebration may have included “pagan rites,” especially burning an effigy.

21st February, Novaya Gazeta

The court nationalised the KIMP bearing holding

The Gagarinsky Court of Moscow, at the request of the Prosecutor General's Office, seized a holding company for the production of KIMP bearings in favour of the state. "In the context of the armed conflict with Ukraine and the collective West, they devoted themselves to profit, betraying the vital interests of society and their state," the Prosecutor General's Office said earlier. Sounds a bit like the Soviet “revolutionary legality”.

20th February, ABNews

Roskomnadzor began to block the VLESS protocol in VPNs

Residents of several regions of Russia were cut off from the usual communication channels at once. Users from Novosibirsk, Yekaterinburg, Volgograd and Primorye complained about failures in the functioning of VPN services. According to local media, technical problems were provoked by the actions of Roskomnadzor, which targeted the Xray/VLESS protocol. Network specialists quoted in the piece argue the protocol can’t be fully eliminated yet, so users should expect intermittent outages and slower speeds while they may need to switch tools and servers more often to keep access.

20th February, RG

The Museum of the History of the Gulag will become the Museum of Memory of the Victims of the Genocide of the People of the USSR

Moscow’s Gulag History Museum, which stopped operating in November 2024 after a fire-safety inspection, is set to be rebranded as the “Museum of Memory” focused on victims of what officials call the “genocide of the Soviet people” and Nazi war crimes during World War II, with reopening planned for 2026.  Reports say the new concept will draw on archival materials from the “Without Statute of Limitations” project and will include sections on manifestations of Nazism, trials of Nazi criminals, and evidence related to biological weapons testing, including digital features for preserving personal family histories.  Natalya Kalashnikova (previously head of the “Smolensk Fortress” museum) has been appointed director, while questions and controversy remain over what happens to the former repression-focused exhibition and the museum’s thousands of artefacts.

20th February, ECHO

Kyrgyzstan denied asylum to an activist from Donetsk. Russia demands his extradition

The Kyrgyz authorities have denied political asylum to an activist from Donetsk, Artyom Borodin, who has been in a pre-trial detention centre in Bishkek for six months under extradition arrest. His extradition is demanded by the Prosecutor General's Office of Russia - a case has been opened against Borodin for calls for extremism. Kyrgyzstan has not recognised Russia's annexation of the Donetsk region, but Borodin's arrest warrant relies on Russian regulations declaring the occupied territories part of the Russian Federation and the 2015 "law" of the separatist "DPR".

19th February, Current Time

The Russian general boasted to his wife of the ears cut off by the Ukrainians. These were not the only tortures that he was proud of

A joint investigation by RFE/RL’s “Schemes” and “Systema” says an archive of messages from 2022–2024 shows Major General of the Russian Federation Roman Demurchiev bragging to relatives and fellow officers about abusing and killing Ukrainian captives and desecrating bodies, including sending his wife a photo of severed ears. The material indicates senior commanders were aware of—and did not stop—such conduct, and they situate Demurchiev as a decorated, high-ranking officer who held major command roles during the invasion.

18th February, Insider

The International Memorial Association was recognised as an "undesirable organization"

On 17 February 2026, Russia’s Ministry of Justice added the International Memorial Association (“Memorial”) and several other foreign NGOs and media projects (including Zukunft Memorial e.V., the Henry Jackson Society, JICA, “Arctida,” and Georgia’s Civic IDEA) to the country’s list of “undesirable organisations.” According to Russian law, participation in the activities of an organisation recognised as "undesirable" first entails administrative liability, and in the event of repeated prosecution, criminal liability. At the same time, financing such an organisation or collecting funds for it, as well as organising its activities, constitutes a criminal offence immediately, without prior administrative punishment.

18th February, Agenstvo

The State Duma unanimously voted to introduce “prevention” of “an incorrect understanding of the history of Russia.” It will be handled by the security services.

On 18 February 2026, Russia’s State Duma unanimously approved in first reading amendments to the 2016 “prevention of offences” law, adding “prevention/suppression of evasion of the duty to defend the Fatherland” and “countering distortion of historical truth” to the list of areas covered by preventive measures. Sponsors say this would empower security and law-enforcement bodies to act earlier via warnings, “preventive conversations,” legal education, and possible preventive supervision of people previously convicted under relevant articles (including “rehabilitation of Nazism,” insulting veterans, or evading military service), arguing that a “hybrid war” fosters “incorrect” views of Russia’s history.  During the debate, some deputies questioned how police can objectively judge contested historical issues, while critics warn the measure could broaden enforcement around “memory” laws and be used for political pressure.

16th February, SOTA

The 14th Free Russia Forum opened in Vilnius today

The forum coordinates the efforts of the Russian opposition and plans further actions to counter the Russian Federation’s regime. It has brought together various political forces to discuss key issues related to political activity in exile. For the first time, RVC is present.

14th February, Meduza

The Russian Federation authorities continue to break Telegram and WhatsApp

In the past few days, starting on February 9, the Russian authorities have resumed active attempts to break popular foreign Internet services and make them completely unavailable in the country. Telegram worked intermittently, and YouTube and WhatsApp were under the threat of complete blocking. Around the same time, outlets reported that YouTube, WhatsApp and other domains were removed from Russia’s National Domain Name System records, a move framed as a step toward tougher blocks. At the same time, the restriction of foreign messengers threatens not only communication between users. For example, Telegram is a whole ecosystem with information and entertainment channels, mini applications, its own cryptocurrency and much more.

13th February, Mediazona

The head of the Magnitogorsk Centre "E" (Centre for Combating Extremism) was detained in the case of selling personal data from the database of the Ministry of Internal Affairs to an acquaintance

In the Chelyabinsk region, FSB officers detained police lieutenant colonel Ilya Afonasenko, who heads the interdistrict branch of the Centre "E"(Centre for Combating Extremism) located in Magnitogorsk. Afonasenko is suspected of abuse of office (Part 3 of Article 286 of the Criminal Code). According to the investigation, in March and April 2025, the head of the Magnitogorsk Centre "E", on a "systematic basis”, was selling personal data from a state database about a specific person to an acquaintance for money.

11th February, Novaya Gazeta

The Kazakh authorities have agreed to extradite Yulia Emelyanova, a former activist of Navalny's headquarters, to Russia. Formally, she is accused of stealing a phone

Kazakhstan’s Prosecutor General approved Russia’s request to extradite St Petersburg activist and former Navalny volunteer Yuliya Emelyanova, who has been held in a detention centre.
Russia formally accuses her of stealing a taxi driver’s mobile phone worth about 12,000 Rubles.  Emelyanova and human-rights advocates say the case is fabricated and tied to her political activity. Her lawyer and support groups say the extradition order was issued without proper notification and before Kazakhstan finished considering her asylum request, which they call a procedural violation.

10th February, Kommersant

Films without distribution certificates will be checked on complaints to the Ministry of Culture

From 1 March 2026, Russia’s Ministry of Culture will start checking online films and series that lack distribution certificates for possible “discrediting” of traditional spiritual values. Reviews will be triggered by any citizen’s complaint and assessed via an expert mechanism. If violations are found, the ministry will send its conclusion to Roskomnadzor, which can require platforms to restrict access within 24 hours, preferably by deletion. Separately, a Duma committee backed amendments introducing administrative fines for distributing this kind of content up to 3 million Rubles after 1 March 2026, with the possibility of avoiding penalties by promptly deleting content after Roskomnadzor’s demand.

9th February, OVD-Info

A resident of the Murmansk region was fined under the article on discrediting the army because of likes on YouTube

A court in the Murmansk region fined 72-year-old Vasiliy Yovdiy 30,000 Rubles under the administrative article on “discrediting” the Russian army, for liking videos on YouTube, the first known case of this kind. According to the reports, FSB border officials gained access to his phone and found “liked” videos; the court treated his likes as a public “approval reaction,” including under videos linked to people labelled “foreign agents” and one about the killing of General Igor Kirillov. Lawyers and commentators note the contradiction that YouTube likes are generally not visible to other users and criticise the ruling as poorly reasoned and procedurally dubious.

6th February, Meduza

St. Petersburg scientist Alexey Dudarev was accused of treason for publishing scientific journals that "may have been read by Norwegian intelligence."

In St. Petersburg, scientist Alexei Dudarev, a Doctor of Medical Sciences and chief researcher at the Northwestern Scientific Centre for Hygiene and Public Health of Rospotrebnadzor, has been arrested on treason charges. The basis for the scientist's criminal prosecution was Dudarev's publications in open international scientific journals of the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme (AMAP). The programme operates within the framework of the Arctic Council, an intergovernmental forum of which Russia is a member. Investigators claim that information from the scientific publications could have been accessed and used by Norwegian intelligence.

6th February, Meduza

Comedian Nurlan Saburov was banned from entering Russia because of his unwillingness to cooperate with the FSB.

The ban on Nurlan Saburov's entry into Russia was initiated by the Service for the Protection of the Constitutional Order and the Fight against Terrorism of the FSB (Second Service) and its head, Alexei Zhalo, Important Stories reports. According to an acquaintance of the comedian, Saburov was summoned several times to the FSB building on Lubyanka, forced to cooperate, but he neither consented nor refused and "tried to freeze." As a result, the comedian, who holds Kazakh citizenship, was denied a residence permit in Russia three times, the journalist's interlocutor said. The source added that the last time Saburov was summoned to the FSB was in 2025, when he was given a choice: either sign a contract with the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation and go to the front for a year or leave Russia. On February 6, Nurlan Saburov was banned from entering Russia for 50 years.

3rd February, TASS

36 thousand citizens of Tajikistan were deported from Russia in 2025

About 36 thousand citizens of Tajikistan were deported from Russia in 2025. The Ministry of Labour and Social Protection reported that more than 124,000 Tajik citizens were added to Russia's registry of controlled persons (people who have overstayed their legal status), 68,000 of whom were removed from the list, and over 38,000 Tajiks legalised their status in Russia. The registry of controlled persons was created on February 5, 2025, and is maintained on the official website of the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs and on the Unified Portal of State and Municipal Services.

2nd February, Vedomosti

Scientists have been asked to "carefully evaluate" missions to unfriendly countries.

After the December arrest of archaeologist Alexander Butyagin in Poland, at the request of Ukraine, the Ministry of Education and Science of Russia recommended that universities and research institutes, when invited to events in "unfriendly" countries, evaluate them for possible politicisation of the agenda, and, if necessary, contact the department. The government list of "unfriendly" countries includes 49 countries, mainly the states of the European Union (EU), the G7 and three East Asian countries (Singapore, the Republic of Korea, and Japan). According to Vedomosti's interlocutor in the academic environment, several scientists at one of the federal universities were frozen on planned foreign business trips for the spring of 2026 even before the letter from the Ministry of Education and Science was sent out. Other interviewees say this further complicates already-reduced scientific exchange and is nudging travel toward “friendly” destinations such as Turkey and Saudi Arabia, with trips to Iran also rising.

2nd February, MoskvichMag

Soon, the "young people" of Afghanistan will be clearing snow from our (Moscow) yards.

Recently, the import of workers from India has been actively discussed. Migrants from Afghanistan could be another option. According to the ambassador of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan in Moscow, Gul Hassan, negotiations are at an advanced stage. The negotiations have taken place, and "there is reason to expect positive results." Hassan says that Afghanistan has a young population, and the authorities are interested in sending them to places with a shortage of workers. So far, neither specific figures nor deadlines have been named. However, the direction of work is clearly indicated. At the end of 2024, the authorities estimated the shortage of highly qualified specialists in our country at 1.5 million people, primarily in construction, transport and housing and communal services. By 2030, according to the Ministry of Labour's forecasts, this figure may rise to 3.1 million. The current situation in Afghanistan makes the issue of selection extremely problematic: Afghan passports are now issued to "a variety of people", not always ethnic Afghans, and control over this process is in the hands of the Taliban. As a result, "anyone" can theoretically come to Russia under the guise of workers, from random people to militants with experience in conflicts in Syria. The Russian Federation currently lacks the tools to screen these migrants fully.

30th January, Meduza

For the first time, the platform of the Russian opposition at PACE gathered in Strasbourg

On January 29, 2026, Strasbourg hosted the first meeting of a new platform of Russian democratic forces under PACE (Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe), with 15 approved members, including Garry Kasparov, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Vladimir Kara-Murza, Lyubov Sobol, and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, among others. Participants have agreed on basic procedures and said their priorities include supporting political prisoners and protecting the practical rights of anti-war Russians abroad, while also urging Europe to help Ukraine. The debut also highlighted ongoing frictions over the next year procedure and produced a viral moment when Kara-Murza dismissed a reporter from SOTA with the insult.

30th January, TVRain

A teenager kills a Roskomnadzor employee in Moscow, and state media is banned from writing about it

On January 19, a 16-year-old teenager killed 42-year-old Alexei Belyaev, an employee of the department, in the building of Roskomnadzor in Moscow, according to the anonymous telegram channel "Cheka-OGPU". According to the channel, the schoolboy stabbed Belyaev in the chest when he was leaving the office. The authors of the Cheka-OGPU learned about the incident by accident, noticing a woman on social media seeking a lawyer for her son. She allegedly has a resolution stating that the teenager is charged with murder motivated by political hatred (paragraph "l" of part 2 of Article 105 of the Criminal Code). According to the woman, the investigation calls the child "an ardent opponent of the activities of Roskomnadzor." Later, she deleted the post. Channel contributors then found information about the schoolboy, who ran a YouTube channel and was fond of games and animation. The school said that the teenager stopped attending classes. The Agency notes that Belyaev's Tax Identification Number was invalidated on January 19, that is, on the day of the alleged murder.  Meduza, citing sources, writes that media loyal to the Kremlin were advised not to publish information about the murder of Belyaev.

30th January, RBC

Prosecutor's Office asks U.S. to dismiss $225 billion in Tsarist debt against Russia

The Prosecutor General's Office demanded that the lawsuit of the American investment fund Noble Capital, which wants to recover $225 billion from Russia on imperial bonds. The Russian side does not admit responsibility for the securities of 1916. Noble Capital RSD filed a lawsuit in a U.S. court for the District of Columbia in June 2025. The fund demanded that Russia fulfil its obligations on bonds for $ 25 million, issued with a coupon of 5.5%, which were sold to American private investors in 1916. The law firm Marks & Sokolov, representing Russian interests in this case, stressed that neither the USSR nor Russia had ever admitted their responsibility for the bonds in accordance with established international law. Once again, the only viable historical continuation the Russian Federation has is with the USSR.

29th January, Insider

11 Russian universities will withdraw from the Bologna process

From September 1 of this year, additional universities in the Russian Federation will cancel the "bachelor" and "master" formats; instead, basic and specialised higher education will be introduced. The transition away from the Bologna system began in 2022 with a pilot in six universities, and the new model will now be tested in 11 additional institutions. In May 2022, State Duma Deputy Speaker Pyotr Tolstoy said that it was time for Russia to abandon the Bologna system and return to the "traditional Russian education system" so as not to "suffer an ideological defeat" and not to "lose our schoolchildren and citizens."

28th January, Garant

Operators will be obliged to turn off communications and mobile Internet at the request of the FSB of Russia

The deputies adopted in the first reading a bill that provides for the obligation of providers to stop providing communication services, including mobile Internet, at the request of the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation. Parliamentarians propose to supplement Article 44 of Law No 126-FZ with a new paragraph. According to it, operators will be exempt from liability for non-fulfilment or improper fulfilment of their obligations to the client if this is related to the fulfilment of the requirements of the federal security service.

28th January, Meduza

"Now I am a bum." The apartment of track and field athlete Daria Klishina was given to the military

Russian track and field athlete Daria Klishina said that her one-room apartment in Tver, which the authorities gave her in 2011, was taken away from her. "As they gave it, so they took it away," she said in an interview with Vita Kravchenko. She was discharged from the apartment in 2025. The keys to the apartment were handed over to a military man whom Klishina does not know. It was justified by the state due to Daria not being a member of a national team.

26th January, Meduza

The Kremlin said that 250 thousand Russians who returned from the war do not work anywhere. "On a call from above", media reports about this were edited

At the end of December 2025, the head of the presidential department for public projects, Sergei Novikov, said that 250 thousand soldiers who returned from the front were not employed anywhere. "We have a fairly large grey zone - these are tens of thousands of people who... did not find a job. They returned, do not work, or spend the money they received, or make a living in another way... And in general, 250 thousand people... did not find a job anywhere... We must, of course, do this," a senior Kremlin official said. RIA Novosti published his quote on December 23 in the news with the headline "About 250 thousand veterans NWO remain unemployed, Novikov said." But soon the publication was changed, removing the mention of 250 thousand unemployed from the text and headline. Now the news is talking about "tens of thousands" of soldiers out of work.

26th January, Kommersant

The government supported the introduction of liability for denying the genocide of the Soviet people

The Government Commission on Legislative Activity supported the initiative to introduce criminal liability for denying the fact of genocide of the Soviet people and insulting the memory of its victims. An amendment is made to the article on the rehabilitation of Nazism (Article 354.1 of the Criminal Code). The same bill introduces criminal liability (in Article 243.4 of the Criminal Code) for the destruction or damage of monuments and other memorial structures perpetuating the memory of the victims of genocide, as well as for the desecration of their burials. Under the article on the rehabilitation of Nazism, which also appeals to the conclusions of the Nuremberg Tribunal, the maximum punishment is three years in prison or a fine of 3 million Rubles. Will it spread to statements that could be interpreted as denigration of the Soviet people in the future?

26th January, Meduza

Russia has been using Interpol mechanisms for years to persecute its critics abroad. At the request of Moscow, they are put on the wanted list. The Russian Federation can find out where they go.

Russia uses lists of people wanted by Interpol to seek the arrest of political opponents, businessmen and journalists, and the organisation's messaging system to monitor critics of the Russian authorities abroad, the BBC and the French investigative project Disclose found out. The leaked files also indicate Russia uses Interpol’s secure messaging channels to request information and sometimes obtain details on targets’ movements, effectively enabling monitoring of critics outside the country. Over the past 11 years, the Commission for the Control of Interpol’s Files reportedly received more complaints about Russia than any other country: about 700 people complained, and around 400 succeeded in getting Russian notices cancelled. One highlighted case is Igor Pestrikov, an ex-co-owner of Solikamsk Magnesium Plant, who said being listed for two years harmed his ability to rent housing and access banking until the oversight body ruled the request largely political. While Interpol says it increased scrutiny after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, internal reports cited in the leak suggest ~90% of Russian requests still passed initial screening in 2024, alongside discussions in 2024–2025 about easing some extra restrictions on Russia.

23rd January, Istories

A deserter who survived a torture cellar and fled the front three times was denied asylum in Germany.

Georgy, a Russian conscript who fled the front three times, was placed in a basement for "refuseniks" in the village of Zaitsevo, and is wanted in Russia for desertion, has been denied asylum in Germany. Germany's Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) justified the refusal by claiming that mobilisation in Russia had supposedly been completed in October 2022, as Sergei Shoigu reported to Vladimir Putin at the time. BAMF employee also doubted the existence of torture cellars where Russian military personnel are illegally held and decided that deserter Georgy and his family would face no consequences upon returning to Russia other than a fine of 30,000 Rubles for evading a summons. According to Georgiy, German authorities initially refused to consider his case because he entered via Croatia, where he had already applied for asylum.

23rd January, Vedomosti

The total fertility rate continued to decline in 2025

Rosstat data cited by Vedomosti show Russia’s total fertility rate fell to 1.374 as of December 2025 (from 1.4 in 2024), staying around 1.37–1.39 during 2025. The article highlights sharp regional gaps: the rate was above 2 in Chechnya, Yamalo-Nenets AO, and Tuva, while among the lowest were Leningrad, Smolensk, and Vladimir oblasts; it also notes a decline in the indicator for third and subsequent births to 0.362. Experts argue that the effectiveness of pro-natalist policies depends on stronger, more up-to-date support for families—especially large families—and on more uniform implementation across regions, ideally without means-testing, with some measures folded into the national project “Family” (2025–2030).

23rd January, Kommersant

United and collective

At the “Znanie. Gosudarstvo” forum, Kremlin official Alexander Kharichev delivered a programme talk presenting the “pentabasis” model (person–society–family–country–state) as a framework for defining Russia’s direction. He contrasted Russia’s “sovereign traditionalism” with Western “liberal globalism” and said that research into a “civilizational code” shows that top-rated values include collectivism, service to the fatherland, and the unity of peoples, with rights and freedoms rated much lower. Kharichev also outlined five “polar vectors” (e.g., rationalism–idealism, individualism–collectivism, negative vs “positive” freedom) and linked policy responses to perceived threats ranging from “childfree” ideas and distrust of institutions to consumerism, virtual retreat, and transhumanism. According to him, the vision of an ideal Russia has five options: Great, Comfortable, Just, Modern, and Land of opportunity, which the administration hopes to unite into one vision, where a citizen is a proactive participant.

22nd January, Port Media

Russians have become the fifth-largest diaspora in the world.

The UN has published global migration data for 2024. According to the organisation, over 9.1 million Russian citizens were living outside of Russia in 2024. Also in the top are Ukraine (9.769 million emigrants), Mexico (11.596 million), China (11.701 million), and India (18.533 million). The 2022 report had 10.65 million Russians emigres and was ranked third. A clear indicator that sanctions and other restrictions did not cause ‘brain drain’ and instead buttressed the Russian Federation.

20th January, Meduza

A schoolgirl who posted a photo of RVC fighters on a school bulletin board was sentenced to four years in prison.

The First Western District Military Court in St. Petersburg sentenced 17-year-old schoolgirl Eva Bagrova to four years in prison for posting photographs of members of the Russian Volunteer Corps at school. The verdict was handed down in October 2025 but was previously unknown. Bagrova was found guilty of justifying terrorism (Article 205.2 of the Russian Criminal Code) and aiding terrorist activity (Article 205.1 of the Russian Criminal Code).

19th January, RBC

Patriarch Kirill called Putin an Orthodox leader.

Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia called Russian President Vladimir Putin an Orthodox leader. He made the statement during his Epiphany sermon at the Epiphany Cathedral in Moscow. “We have reached a time when the head of our state is a truly Orthodox leader, not, as they say, by protocol, but by conviction, Vladimir Vladimirovich [Putin],” the patriarch said after the liturgy. According to him, this indicates that “through the prayers of the holy saints” a “miracle of God” occurred.

15th January, Kommersant

Deputies will not let Russia “cheburakh” (tumble)

The State Duma Committee on Culture decided to hold a meeting on the state of Russian cinema. sparked by a bill that would give the Ministry of Culture the power to set “priority themes” for films seeking state funding. At the committee session, MPs complained about the alleged insider distribution of subsidies and “undesirable” filmmakers, criticised commercially successful fairy-tale franchises like Cheburashka and The Bremen Town Musicians for lacking the right message and values. They even floated the idea of letting the ministry intervene directly in the creative process. They are starting to intervene in non-political art, in a step from authoritarian to totalitarian.

15th January, Novaya Gazeta Europe

A political prisoner from the Omsk region died in a colony almost a year ago. The Federal Penitentiary Service reported this to an activist who was in correspondence with him

Roman Tyurin, a political prisoner from the Omsk region, who was convicted four times for posts on social networks, died in a colony almost a year ago, on February 17, 2025, Memorial reported. Human rights activists managed to find out about the death of the political prisoner when the activist, who was in correspondence with Tyurin, returned an unopened envelope with her letter. In February 2024, Tyurin was sentenced to four years in prison in a terrorism case (Article 205.2 of the Criminal Code). In the same month, the full namesake of the political prisoner was included in the register of extremists and terrorists of the Federal Financial Monitoring Service. In May of the same year, the term was increased to six years after the second sentence, in the case of military "fakes". In October 2024, the political prisoner was found guilty under the article on repeated discrediting of the Russian army (Article 280.3 of the Criminal Code), and in November, under the articles on calls for activities against the security of Russia (Article 280.4 of the Criminal Code) and repeated demonstration of prohibited symbols (Article 282.4 of the Criminal Code).On the aggregate of four sentences, the term of imprisonment for Tyurin reached six and a half years. Who else among political prisoners in Russia is already dead?

13th January, RBC

The court fined comedian Gudkov for the parody song "I am narrow"

A court in Krasnogorsk punished comedian Alexander Gudkov with a fine for parodying a song by singer Yaroslav Dronov (SHAMAN). Gudkov was found guilty under Article 20.3.1 of the Code of Administrative Offences - incitement to hatred or enmity, as well as humiliation of human dignity and was sentenced to an administrative fine of 11 thousand Rubles. "The court found that Gudkov A.V. posted a video on the social network "VKontakte" with the name "Alexander Gudkov - I am narrow", using the arrangement of the song "I am Russian", performed by the singer under the pseudonym SHAMAN, changed the lyrics of the song, using the phrase "I am narrow," the press service of the courts of general jurisdiction of the Moscow region said in a statement. (In the Russian language, words ‘narrow’ and ‘Russian’ do rhyme, hence the song parody) A psychological and linguistic study showed that the video recording contains actions aimed at humiliating the dignity of "a person and a group of persons based on origin." Since the video recording is available to an unlimited number of people, these actions are also public on the Internet. Seems that SHAMAN has become a protected image now, not allowed of parody.

12th January, Current Time

Gazprom-Media has invested hundreds of millions of Rubles in a system for searching for LGBT "propaganda" and drugs in films and TV series

Gazprom-Media Holding has invested several hundred million Rubles in the Predicto Platform module complex, one of the systems of which is designed to automatically check video content for the presence of "undesirable elements" - "propaganda" of drugs, alcohol, smoking, and LGBT people. After processing the video in this program, it returns a file with colour marking for the presence or absence of "signs" of smoking, alcohol, drugs, and LGBT people. The platform itself consists of 12 modules. In addition to the content verification module, as noted, it includes modules for content personalisation, user activity analysis, a recommendation system, search, and analytical systems. With more extremist monitoring being assigned to the AI, human personnel are focusing on a wider share of the population.

12th January, Kommersant

Gazprom's supplies to China exceeded exports to Europe for the first time in 2025

According to preliminary data, 38.8 billion cubic meters of gas were exported to China through the Power of Siberia gas pipeline, 24.8% increase compared to 2024. At the same time, Gazprom continued to supply to the near abroad. In 2025, exports to Central Asia and Transcaucasia increased: Russian gas supplies to Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan increased by 22.2%, and to Georgia by 40.4%. Another milestone in the economic shift.

11th January, URA.ru

Rossiyane/Russovians can lose their property after owing just 3,000 Rubles.

Bailiffs can seize property if the debt exceeds three thousand Rubles, Vladimir Gureev, chairman of the public council of the Federal Bailiff Service of Russia, has announced. "Current enforcement legislation allows for the seizure of a debtor's property for debts exceeding 3,000 Rubles (£28/€32/$38). Accordingly, foreclosure, generally, is possible starting from this amount," he said. Gureev noted that the debtor retains the opportunity to repay the debt voluntarily at any time, and if the seized property has not been sold within the framework of enforcement proceedings by that time, it will be returned to the debtor. A convenient method to take away the property of ‘foreign agents’ and those with frozen bank accounts.

8th January, Novaya Gazeta

The body of Russian journalist Yevgeny Safronov was found near Paris. Police are investigating the suicide, and media reports claim he may have received death threats.

On the morning of January 6, a 38-year-old Russian journalist was found dead in a Paris suburb, Le Figaro reports, citing a police source. The man's body was discovered beneath the windows of his apartment. Safronov left Russia before 2022, after the media outlet he worked for was designated a "foreign agent." At the end of 2024, Safronov "experienced a difficult and, as he claimed, unfair dismissal."  Yevgeny was reported to have been very depressed a week before the body was found, being crestfallen by the hacking of his accounts a week prior.  "During our last call, we were discussing the hacking of his accounts, and he still couldn't quite tell me what happened or how it happened. He was really depressed, totally on edge, and said he wanted to hang himself. "

7th January, TASS

Patriarch Kirill explained who is considered a traitor to the Motherland.

Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Rus' called those who fall outside the public consensus traitors to the Motherland. According to the patriarch, there must be a public consensus around the idea of ​​the state's existence. "If someone falls outside this consensus, then there is the definition: 'traitor to the homeland, with all the legal consequences that entail ', " the cleric said. Regarding the issues that citizens should focus on, he cited spiritual and moral aspects and security, “inherent in human moral nature.”

6th January, Delfi

Volkov regrets writing a message about Kapustin, the RVC, and Ukrainian officials. 

After controversial statements about Ukrainian officials made by Lithuania-based Russian opposition figure Leonid Volkov surfaced publicly, he admitted that he regretted his words. “I regret writing that message. It was a stupid, incorrect, and harshly emotional message that should not have been written,” Volkov told the portal on Tuesday.

“I was deeply outraged by the story of many Russians glorifying D. Kapustin as a hero. Someone wrote, ‘All hope is lost.’ ‘This is the real Russian opposition.’ ‘He’s fighting the right way, and everyone else is fighting the wrong way.’ This offends me. I do not like neo-Nazis. I believe that supporting them or collaborating with them is wrong, because they are evil, and fighting evil with evil is not the best idea,” he explained.

In late December, following reports of the alleged death of Denis Kapustin—the leader of the Russian Volunteer Corps—Volkov called him a Nazi in a letter and celebrated his “denazification.” On Monday evening, Volkov confirmed his words but clarified that the letter was personal and therefore emotional. After learning of Volkov’s letter, the Migration Department intends to decide whether he will be allowed to continue residing in Lithuania. Following a strong statement from Lithuania’s prime minister, Volkov may have to change his country of residence. This may signal a shift in the balance of power within the Russian opposition.

5th January, Mediazona

Hopping from one Wi-Fi hotspot to the next: Regions with internet "white lists"

Since May 2025, mass mobile internet shutdowns have been sweeping across Russia. The authorities claim this is necessary to defend against Ukrainian drones, yet the restrictions affect regions far from the front lines. In early August, the Kremlin announced that during these mobile blackouts, only specific, state-approved services would remain accessible. They are included in the so-called “whitelists.” Mobile internet shutdowns leave people unable to use everyday services like taxis, navigation, messaging, and many payment systems, forcing them to hunt for Wi-Fi and carry cash. Authorities and operators increasingly rely on “whitelists,” where only selected, approved apps keep working, pushing people toward those platforms, and narrowing what information and services remain accessible. The outages also raise personal safety risks and anxiety because people cannot reliably contact others or get help when they need it.

2nd January, RBC

Russia's richest businessmen earned nearly $32.8 billion in 2025.

The total fortune of the richest Russian businessmen increased by $32.8 billion in 2025, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. As of Friday, January 2, 20 Russians were included in the billionaire ranking. According to the ranking, Alisher Usmanov, the founder of the USM holding, showed the greatest growth among Russian businessmen. His fortune increased by $6.04 billion to $19.3 billion, followed by the founder of the Ural Mining and Metallurgical Company (UMMC), Iskander Makhmudov, whose fortune increased by $4.75 billion to $7.88 billion. A reminder that, if one of the sanctions goals was to put elites against the state, that goal has failed.

1st January, Novaya Gazeta

RDK leader Denis Kapustin is alive.

Denis Kapustin, the founder of the Russian Volunteer Corps, was not killed, as previously reported. This information was disseminated to cover up a Ukrainian intelligence operation to save his life. This was reported by Ukrainian intelligence agencies. According to the Main Intelligence Directorate, the murder of Denis Kapustin was ordered by Russian intelligence agencies, and half a million dollars was allocated for its implementation.