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Vazhnyye Istorii/Important Stories
Important Stories (Важные Истории) - is an association of independent Russian-language journalists created in 2020 focused on reportage, investigative reporting and data research.
Photo of a russian soldier
FOCUS: Russia-Ukraine War
Important Stories

A Russian Soldier Confessed To Killing A Ukrainian Civilian — So Moscow Convicted Him Of Spreading Fake News

After Russian soldiers committed multiple war crimes last year during the attack on Kyiv and the surrounding region, some confessed to their crimes. But now they are being tried in Russia for spreading misinformation about the military.

Following multiple reports of war crimes in the early weeks of the war in Ukraine, Russian soldier Daniil Frolkin was interviewed last August by Vazhnye Istorii. In the conversation with the reporter for the independent Russian media, Frolkin confessed to the murder of an unarmed civilian who Ukrainian authorities believe was a 47-year-old named Ruslan Yaremchuk.

Now this public act of truth-telling has led to Frolkin standing trial in Russia and being convicted for spreading misinformation about the Russian military.

He was found guilty and sentenced to probation, though the Russian prosecutor had asked for six years of prison. After the court proceeding Wednesday, Frolkin quickly left and refused to talk to journalists.

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Photo of the ​The Bitter Memory of Childhood statue honoring the victims of the Holodomor famine in Kyiv, Ukraine.
FOCUS: Russia-Ukraine War
Boris Grozovskiy

How A 1930s Soviet Famine Targeted Ukraine — And Why It Matters More Than Ever

Ukraine and countries around the world recognize the Holodomor, the famine which killed millions of Ukrainians in the early 1930s, as a genocide caused by Soviet authorities. But Russia still refuses to admit responsibility. A new study uses agricultural records and mathematical modeling to show that the famine clearly targeted Ukrainians.

KYIV — The Holodomor was one of the greatest humanitarian disasters of the 20th century. In the course of just two years, from 1932 to 1933, between 5 and 10.8 million people died of hunger in the Soviet Union — at least 2.6 to 3.9 million of them in Ukraine alone.

Until the 1980s, the Soviet government denied that the tragedy happened at all. Modern Russian historians now agree that the famine was caused by human action. But while Ukraine, the European Parliament, the U.S. and Canada, among other countries, have all recognized Holodomor as a genocide, most Russian historians still disagree, arguing that people also died in other grain-producing regions of the Soviet Union.

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This historical dispute has strong political significance. The Ukrainian government often repeats its demand for apology and restitution from Russia, the legal successor to the USSR, for orchestrating the famine. The Kremlin says describing the Holodomor as a genocide is anti-Russian propaganda. After its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russian forces dismantled memorials to the Holodomor in occupied cities of Mariupol and Kreminna.

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Photo of a Russian Western Military District soldier inside a tank during a mission in Ukraine on March 7
FOCUS: Russia-Ukraine War
Yuri Fedorov

How Russia Planned For The Wrong War — With The Wrong Army

Russia is losing in Ukraine not just because of Putin's madness and the heroism of Ukrainians, but also because Russia's army is built for rapid invasion and occupation, not for the type of grinding war it is now fighting in Ukraine.

In the early days of the Russian invasion, both Moscow and the West predicted Ukraine would quickly be defeated.

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On Feb. 26, 2022, the American Institute for the Study of War wrote: “Russia will likely defeat Ukrainian regular military forces and secure their territorial objectives at some point in the coming days or weeks if Putin is determined to do so and willing to pay the cost in blood and treasure.”

Events, however, took a different path.

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Photo of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky participating in the flag-laying ceremony during his visit to the newly liberated city of Kherson.
FOCUS: Russia-Ukraine War
Konstantin Skorkin

Zelensky And The Delicate Task Of Tackling Corruption In Wartime

On the eve of Vladimir Putin's invasion, Volodymyr Zelensky was not a particularly popular figure in Ukraine. In the year since, he has achieved virtually universal support at home, and hero status abroad. What will the onetime anti-corruption crusader do with this political capital?

-Analysis-

KYIV — To understand Volodymyr Zelensky's spectacular rise, it's worth going back to his arrival on the political scene in Ukraine.

In the first round of the 2019 presidential elections, the well-known actor and comedian, and political novice, got 30% of the ballots, before rallying the entire protest vote in the second round to win with a sensational 73%. In May 2020, about 40% of Ukrainians supported Zelensky’s presidency. By 2021, that support had dropped by 10 percentage points, and by the beginning of Feb. 2022, he could claim on 24.6% support.

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Zelensky’s rating was affected by the inevitable disappointment of inflated expectations, as well as personnel failures, unpopular land reforms, rising utility bills and the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic.

One of his key promises — peace in the Donbas — remained unfulfilled. Despite a short détente in the summer and autumn of 2019, the Kremlin demonstrated that it did not intend to give in to Kyiv’s demands. Similarly, the Ukrainian public made clear that they were not ready to make concessions to the aggressor.

The Russian invasion of Feb. 24 changed everything. Zelensky went from fading president to supreme commander, leading a nation at war.

In the first days of the war, support for the Ukrainian president shot up to 91%. Zelensky refusal of offers from Western allies to move abroad for safety, and instead remain in Kyiv, then under attack by Russia, played a key role.

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Photo of S-400 missile systems rolling down Moscow's Red Square
FOCUS: Russia-Ukraine War
Maria Zholobova

How Russia Is Still Dodging Sanctions — With Help From Companies Everywhere

A healthy dose of cynicism and short cuts allows parts for weapons and other technology to still make their way into Russia. Independent Russian-language media Vazhnyye Istorii traces the way both Moscow and much of the rest of the world circumvent export bans.

When Western countries imposed sanctions on Russia after the invasion of Ukraine, exporting Western technologies to Russia was effectively banned — at least, on paper.

But through a web of third parties, Russia is still finding ways to dodge the sanctions and import crucial components for weapons and other technology.

In the United States, personal sanctions prohibit American citizens and companies from doing business with specific Russian people and businesses. Other sanctions prevent them from doing business with entire industries. Secondary sanctions may be imposed on non-US companies caught violating US prohibitions.

A special permit is required for any export of high-tech products to Russia. These are only issued in exceptional circumstances, if ever. The largest manufacturers of microelectronics — Analog Devices, Texas Instruments and others — have all ceased commercial activities in Russia.

Still, products made by these companies are increasingly being found in the remains of Russian drones and missiles.

Components continue to enter Russia through a chain of intermediary firms in different countries. For example, an American company can buy them from a manufacturer, then sell them to a Chinese company, which can in turn sell them to a Russian intermediary who is not formally connected with the defense complex — who will then transfer the goods to the arms manufacturer.

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Photo of Ukrainian Drone Operator in Bakhmut
FOCUS: Russia-Ukraine War
Irina Dolinina

"Pacifism Is Not An Option" — Meet The Anti-Putin Russians Supplying Drones To Ukraine

Russians who oppose the war in Ukraine face a tough moral question: How far are they prepared to go? Around the world, a group of Russians are organizing and raising money to send much-needed drones to help Ukrainian forces fight the Russian invasion.

Many Russians feel deeply conflicted by Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Some have walled themselves off from the news, believing that they are powerless to change anything. Others have refused to fight, left the country and stopped paying taxes — and others have sent humanitarian assistance to Ukrainians. A small few, however, have decided to help the Ukrainian army directly.

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Members of the Ukrainian Drone Forces volunteer group, which is run by Russians and supplies civilian drones to the Ukrainian Armed Forces, tell Russian independent news site Vazhniye Istorii (Important Stories) why they believe Russians must do more to help Ukraine.

When Russia began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, many Russians disassociated themselves from their country’s actions, stepping back from what was going on and remaining silent.

“Most Russians that I speak to are not prepared to financially support the Ukrainian army,” says Gleb, a 30-year-old sociologist. “I suppose I should be grateful that at least they don't give money to the Russian army. Yet the strangest argument for me, personally, is when people hide behind pacifism: ‘I am a pacifist. I will not give money to the army.’ But it’s a problematic position to take, because a person who refuses to interfere in the battle between the strong and the weak automatically takes the side of the strong.”

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How Crimea Was Carved Up And Sold At Auction To Putin's Oligarch Pals
FOCUS: Russia-Ukraine War
Important Stories

How Crimea Was Carved Up And Sold At Auction To Putin's Oligarch Pals

After the annexation of Crimea, the peninsula's prized resources were identified and distributed among Russian oligarchs with connections to the Russian President, handing out everything from wine vineyards to hockey clubs to steelworks.

After Russia's annexation of Crimea in 2014, Russia didn't just add land and people to its population. It also paved the way for oligarchs to dismantle the peninsula's state and private enterprises.

Russian independent news Vazhnyye Istorii (Important Stories) has conducted an in-depth investigation into the identities of Vladimir Putin’s friends who now own virtually the entire peninsula.

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Nationalization began in Crimea immediately after the annexation. Ukrainian state property became Russian, or rather Crimean, according to a resolution entitled “On the issues of managing the property of the Republic of Crimea.”

The list of what was taken over was long, and it is still growing. It includes thousands of businesses, apartments and land plots. The actual owners received no compensation, and any attempts to file lawsuits in Russia were in vain.

"In Crimea, the courts did not accept a single document on the right of ownership from people,” says Crimean lawyer Zhan Zapruta. “The law was placed in a compromised position, and they [the Russians] did with it what they wanted.”

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Photo of an indigenous woman with children gathers snow for melting in the Yamalo-Nenets autonomous area of Russia
FOCUS: Russia-Ukraine War
Sonya Savina

Indigenous Of Russia, The Silent Victims Of Putin's War

The number of indigenous people in Russia has been declining for decades, but the war in Ukraine has accelerated the trend. Already vulnerable, indigenous groups are more likely to be mobilized and bear the brunt of Western sanctions.

While Russia continues its supposed mission to “denazify” Ukraine, back on home turf its own indigenous people are bearing what may be the heaviest consequences of the Kremlin’s war.

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There are 47 indigenous groups living in Russia, some of them with populations of less than a hundred or even a few dozen. The 2021 All-Russian Population Census showed that the number of indigenous people has substantially declined in the last 10 years.

Russian independent news site Vazhnyye Istorii (Important Stories) reports on certain groups that were already on the verge of extinction, and how their situation has gotten even worse after Russia unleashed a full-scale war in Ukraine.

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