Worldcrunch
Yevgeny Prigozhin is gone, two months to the day of his aborted insurrection against the Russian military. The Wagner Group chief was likely killed in a plane crash on orders from the Kremlin. A piece written after Wagner’s coup offers a reminder that Russia is in the hands of a man obsessed with control, who wields his cowardice as a weapon.
Narendra Modi’s fixation with unflinching loyalty from those close to him is a worrying trait that betrays the Indian prime minister’s own insecurities.
Drone air attacks continue in Russia’s capital, with evidence that Ukraine has figured out how to target certain buildings belonging to Vladimir Putin’s entourage. It’s a clear message from Kyiv.
The war in Ukraine has become globalized, with its effects being felt from Africa to China. The only hope of de-escalation is in a potential diplomatic summit between the U.S. and China this autumn.
War can unify a nation, but it can also contribute to the deepening of social tensions — especially when times get tough on the front line. A reflection forward, and back, including the experience of George Orwell calling out the bad Brits during World War II.
Though Russia’s intentions to take over Ukraine on the ground have failed, they are winning in the field of cartography. Maps seen in respected books and periodicals around the world offer a distorted view of who has the right to territory — and who is the aggressor. A campaign is underway to change maps to change perception of reality.
Moscow relies on international shipping companies to ship its oil, especially tankers flying the Greek flag. To protect its lucrative business, Athens is resisting tougher sanctions — and thus playing right into Vladimir Putin’s hands.
In the Kakhovka Reservoir region, life used to revolve around the community’s direct access to water – until the dam was attacked two months ago. Locals are now trying to build a new life, carrying with them hope for the end of the war and the return of their precious reserves.
Alexei Dyumin, a former bodyguard of Russian President Vladimir Putin, has been touted as a likely successor to the man he once protected. Russian independent news outlet Important Stories takes a closer look at a man who prefers to keep a low profile.
Colombia’s leftist president claims Russia and the United States act in “much the same” way in the world, disregarding the fact that only one of those states poisons or throws critics out the window.
In recent days, multiple drone attacks targeted and hit skyscrapers in Moscow’s business district. These strikes are thought to have been led by Ukrainian unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), reportedly belonging to a new category of “Beaver” drones. Here’s what we know about them.
Saudi Arabia is set to host non-Western countries to discuss how to initiate peace talks between Russia and Ukraine. Moscow-based daily Kommersant takes an in-depth look at what the high-level talks, slated for Aug. 5 in Jeddah, mean for Russia — who wasn’t invited to the summit —, Ukraine and the world.
Created by Donald Trump four years ago, the new U.S. military branch embodies the strategic importance of space defense. Faced with competition from China and Russia, Washington is renewing its commitment (and drastically increasing the amount of money it devotes) to space — marking quite the reversal of fortune for Space Force, which not so long ago was the target of pastiche and mockery.
July 31 – August 6, 2023
Warfare is not only traumatic for people and infrastructure but also has a large impact on the natural environment. The environmental damages of the Ukraine war will likely be be so great that even neighboring countries will suffer their effects.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was received warmly in the U.S. and in France — visits which must have provoked some jealousy in Turkey, where President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who faces many of the same anti-democratic criticisms as Modi, can’t expect the same kind of red-carpet welcome in Washington.
Many Russians have tried to avoid being conscripted to join the war in Ukraine, but many others believed deeply in the constant campaign of state propaganda. Here are some of the stories of the lucky ones who made it back — and those who didn’t.
July 24 – July 30, 2023
A year after scientific academies called for rebuilding the country’s intellectual infrastructure, not much has changed, as many researchers fled the country and still aren’t planning on coming back to a landscape of destroyed equipment and underfunded programs.
The last of the former convicts who served under the Wagner mercenary are heading home. According to private Telegram chats of the soldiers’ relatives, many are currently staying in resorts and hotels along the Black Sea awaiting pardons, and behaving badly. Some may end up staying on with Wagner in Belarus.
The French dairy group Danone and Denmark’s Carlsberg brewer were in talks with buyers to limit their financial losses in Russia. But the Kremlin’s sudden “temporary” takeover of the two companies Sunday night (involving the seizure of Danone by Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov’s “favorite” nephew) may in fact be a sign that business is over once and for all for Western subsidiaries that have pulled out since the war began.
A bill introduced to the Russian State Duma this week would allow the National Guard of Russia to receive tanks and other heavy military equipment and could turn the structure directly under Putin’s command into a second army.
Russia has occupied of parts of Ukraine for almost a decade, busy promoting a pro-Russian narrative in those territories. Moscow’s aim is to ensure loyalty and deliberately create tensions among Ukrainians in free territories. It is a formula that has been
Ukraine was promised fast-tracked NATO membership last week. But promises often are overtaken by politics, and voices in and around the U.S. government are looking for softer ways out of the Ukraine war, including freezing the conflict like what was done between the two Koreas 70 years ago.
Russia has deployed more than 100,000 troops in the northeastern regions of Ukraine that were liberated by Kyiv late last year, which appears to come in response to the Ukrainian counteroffensive.
For many observers, Ukraine’s counteroffensive seems to be progressing too slowly, with losses leading some critics to call it a “suicide mission.” Yet the view from the frontline makes clear that Kyiv is pursuing a strategy that has already proven successful.
Iran can expect few real economic benefits from joining the China-dominated SCO, but its leaders hope China and Russia will help the regime tighten its grip at home.
The prospect of Ukraine joining NATO has been postponed. Vladimir Putin will be pleased, knowing that Russia’s best hope is for a long war.
After a rocky start, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had reason to be happy after this week’s NATO summit. The military bloc pledged fast-tracked membership once the war is over, as well as military support from the entire G7 block for the duration of the conflict.
After the Wagner mutiny, the palatial home of the mercenary group’s founder, Yevgeny Prigozhin, was searched in St. Petersburg. Among other chilling finds was a framed photograph of the severed heads of slain Africans. It fits in with the profile of a man Proekt media calls “Putin’s Sadist.”
The NATO Summit in Vilnius will confirm that Ukraine’s entry to join the alliance must be delayed. U.S. President Biden has implied Ukraine could get similar security guarantees and support as Israel. There are clear pros and cons of such a security model, which did not happen overnight.
Former Director for European Affairs for the U.S. National Security Council, Alexander Vindman is the Ukrainian native who got ensnared in Donald Trump’s first impeachment investigation. Since the Russian invasion of his native Ukraine, he has been urging more Western support for Kyiv. The coming NATO summit is key, but so to are the 2024 U.S. elections.
Though the U.S. and Ukraine haven’t signed onto the arms convention banning the dangerous weapon, many of their closest allies have. Thus both Washington and Kyiv are coming under fire for the announcement of new U.S. supplies of cluster bombs.
A month into Ukraine’s counteroffensive, claims that it has failed are wildly premature. Even more troubling are the steady whispers that Kyiv must sit down with Russia to negotiate. But it’s clearer than ever that only complete Ukrainian victory can bring lasting peace.
The post-coup mystery continues with reports that Wagner founder Yevgeny Prigozhin is not, in fact, in Belarus, but in Russia. A look at what it says about Vladimir Putin’s hold on power.
The Wagner mercenaries, who came to the world’s attention for their involvement in the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and more recently in the coup attempt, have been operating in Africa and elsewhere for years with a profitable formula to cash in on ongoing conflict.
While the Ukrainian counteroffensive is mainly happening on the Southern and Eastern fronts, the struggle for Ukraine’s future is also being waged on the “Western front,” where more aid is desperately needed. Here, Kyiv needs to convince even the most resistant allies that a Ukrainian defeat would leave the European Union and the U.S. much weaker on the global stage.
Two Asian giants are facing each other: China, whose economic and military power is no longer in doubt, and India, whose weapon is demography and who dreams of being the equal of its Chinese rival. The effects will reverberate everywhere.
Writer and activist Victoria Amelina died from injuries sustained in a Russian missile strike on a restaurant in the eastern city of Kramatorsk. Her death is a cruel irony that reminds the world of both Moscow’s objectives, and tactics.
Kyiv is accusing Russia of planning to blow up the occupied Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant in eastern Ukraine, which would cause incalculable horror, and extend beyond the borders of Ukraine. But it may be messages in Beijing and Washington that can dissuade Vladimir Putin even more than exposing civilians, including Russians, to nuclear fallout.