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MOSCOW — When Russian President Vladimir Putin’s approval rating began to rise last year, patriotism crept into Russian consumer preferences, branding experts say, so much so that companies are now catering to this newfound domestic pride. Branding agency Depot WPF recently developed a new design for a juice brand, using elements of traditional Russian painted […]
MURMANSK — Dasha Metelyova gets up shortly before 6 a.m. to apply her makeup and do her hair. In the hall of her apartment building, the paint is peeling from the walls. Dasha steps outside, where it is still dark because this time of year here it only gets light around 10 a.m. Soon the […]
The increasingly authoritative stances of Presidents Vladimir Putin and Recep Erdogan are only isolating them inside their own countries and on the global stage.
MOSCOW — If you happen to produce widgets in Russia and sell them in foreign currency, your time has come. Konstantin Babkin, president of a company that produces tractors, is convinced that the ruble should have been devalued long ago. “An excessively strong ruble already killed our airplane construction, food and light manufacturing industries,” he […]
As the ruble nosedives and Russia chokes on Western sanctions, the president –once compared to a bear or bull — now looks smaller to his countrymen in an unusual recurring survey.
-OpEd- MOSCOW — The dials of the propaganda machine were never properly calibrated. Instead of talking about fighting Ukrainian nationalists, who like nationalists anywhere are dangerous and unsavory, it was simply Ukrainians and Ukraine that Russians were fighting. Less than a year later, this indiscriminate approach has had identifable results. In an October survey of […]
In Russia’s capital, environmental protection is victim of manufacturers who don’t want to reform and a government that won’t challenge them. The result is there for all to see…and smell.
SEOUL — For a long time, China was the only ally of real consequence of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. This is no longer the case, as Moscow and Pyongyang have been edging closer together over the past year. Russia’s multiplying contacts on the North Korean spectrum, where it has played a very discrete […]
In a country estimated to spend billions on faith healers and fortune tellers, many Russians opt for alternative medicine over certified doctors.
Russian doctors often push mothers to abandon disabled newborns to the state. The result is growing numbers of orphans, two years after Russia imposed a ban on American adoptions.
Nestled in between Poland, Lithuania and the Baltic Sea, far from mainland Russia, Kaliningrad feels much more like Europe, and its residents are proud of its Western-like values.
-OpEd- BERLIN — As German military theorist Carl von Clausewitz once wrote, the aggressor is always peace-loving. He wants to take over our land, our people, our resources without firing a single shot. By this same logic, the defender is always the aggressor. This truth has seldom been better illustrated than by events in eastern […]
The Russian capital has invested in new mobile applications aimed to better aid and involve citizens. The results are mixed: parking app is good, democracy app not so much.
After its annexation of Crimea, Moscow is hoping to accelerate a long dormant project to build a bridge connecting Russia across the Kerch Strait. But there is the Sochi lesson to consider.
A new survey asking Russians how they think people abroad view them and their country is overly optimistic, revealing a “warped” sense of reality.
Unlike with Washington, Moscow and Beijing agree on how the state can monitor the Internet. Kommersant reports on a new Sino-Russia partnership set to be signed next month.
-OpEd- MOSCOW — Patriotic hysterics between Ukraine and Russia have given birth to a host of scathing labels — terms such a “fifth column” and “friends of the junta” — that state-owned television channels and some newspapers are employing with increasing zeal to identify Russia’s many “internal enemies.” The number of people targeted with these […]
MOSCOW — At the beginning of the 1990s, no one was talking about fighting copyright piracy. It was a wild time, and the government in Moscow had more urgent things to think about as the Soviet Union was unraveling. Back then, amateur thieves didn’t think twice about slipping into an apartment — or even a […]
This week’s UN General Assembly highlighted the need for cooperation in the fight against ISIS and other Islamic terror networks. And that could extend to sworn enemies.
One effect of Russia’s embargo on Western food products is the disappearance of imported Polish mushrooms. Microcosm of economic warfare around a Russian culinary tradition.
The Russian President is again one step ahead of the U.S. and Europe, and many have begun to wonder if sanctions are even worth it. And then there is the question: where to after Ukraine?
Motivations and expectations of Russian volunteers in Eastern Ukraine are nothing like those who were sent to fight in Chechnya and Afghanistan. Maybe even more is at stake now.
MOSCOW — It’s a typical summer night at Gorky Park on the bank of the Moskva River. The day has been heavy and humid, nearly 30° C (86° F), and then out of nowhere the clouds rolled in. The lightning started 30 minutes ago. It’s been like this for weeks in Moscow — scorching sun […]
The Kremlin is spinning domestic protectionism and anti-West food sanctions as a way to help Russia’s farmer. But it’s really just a recipe of pure politics – and bad economics.
Though Belarus is part of a Customs Union with Russia and Kazakhstan, it is cooling toward Moscow. As Minsk hosts Russia-Ukraine talks, much is at stake in the old Soviet orbit.
The Russian hacking community is as ambigious as the country itself: admired and feared, all at once. A reformed hacker takes us into the bowels of the criminal Deep Web.
Move the shot glasses aside and make way for some stemware. One expert characterizes the Russian wine market as one of the “most promising in the modern world.”
A five-year economic agreement in the works between Russia and Iran signals efforts by both countries to protect themselves from global isolation. Of course, it’s mostly about oil.
Russian travel agencies are going bankrupt as the Ukraine crisis clips the wings of tourism and keeps Russians at home. Many who have ventured abroad have found themselves stranded.
Reactions are coming in after the U.S. and Europe doubled down on economic sanctions against an ever more defiant Moscow.
MOSCOW — Finally, an engagement that Vladimir Putin could enjoy. Wearing dark aviator glasses against the bright sun, the Russian president attended the Russian “Navy Day” parade last Sunday at the Norwegian sea port of Severomorsk. A warship recently put into service fired some salvoes, and sailors responded to Putin’s greeting with three cries of […]
The country’s old imperialist ambitions are back. If you are inside or outside, and trying to understand Vladimir Putin’s 21st century Russia, keep that in mind in making your calculations.
A Russian settlement in remote Norway has impressive roads, schools and monuments. But not a soul lives in this ice-preserved community, after its residents mysteriously left one day in 1998.
The downing of Malaysia Airlines’ flight MH17 may change Putin’s hand in eastern Ukraine, but a weak and divided Europe is still no match for the well-armed Russian poker player.
SAINT PETERSBURG — It is two steps away from the Hermitage Museum, a few steps more from the Kazan Cathedral, at the corner of Nevsky Prospect, Saint Petersburg’s principal avenue. This is, in other words, a prestigious address. The spacious premises exude comfort and money and are seemingly designed for welcoming businessmen rather than students […]
KLAIPEDA — The entrance to this Lithuanian city’s port is a lesson in geopolitics. Klaipeda is the major transit hub for Russia on the Baltic Sea, but there’s no overlooking the huge semi-domes of the new terminals for LNG (liquefied natural gas) which Lithuania hopes will free the country from its energy-dependence on Moscow. There […]
It is said that Russian parents start thinking of ways to get male children out of required military service before they are even born. Can Moscow change the system without weakening defense?
MOSCOW — Earlier this week, all of Russia’s ambassadors were called home from their stations abroad to attend an event with members of the Russian Parliament and, of course, President Vladimir Putin. The only ambassador missing at the event was Mikhail Zurabov, ambassador to Ukraine. Apparently, the time he spent in Moscow after being recalled […]
Ukrainian Orthodox Church Metropolitan Volodymyr died on Saturday. The showdown between Kiev and Moscow makes picking his successor more than a religious event.