On March 18, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed laws prohibiting “obvious disrespect” to Russian authorities and the distribution of “untrue public information” (Novaya Gazeta, March 18). Effectively, these laws appear to introduce direct government censorship in Russia. Kremlin propaganda itself facilitates the distribution of disinformation... MORE

In the 1920s, Joseph Stalin divided up the Circassians into four major “nations” as part of his initiative to block any efforts by that deported nationality to restore a single titular republic, attract millions of its co-ethnics back from abroad, and create a powerful bulwark... MORE

Ethnic Russians have never formed a major proportion of the population of Dagestan, the most Islamic of the republics within the Russian Federation. Their greatest number and highest share were recorded in the 1959 census, when there were 213,754 Russians, who together made up 20.1... MORE

At 8:52 in the morning, on October 31, a 17-year old student and self-described anarchist at the local college walked into the Archangelsk field office of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), pulled a homemade explosive device from his backpack, and detonated it. The bombing,... MORE

For the first time this year, masked Russian police officers detained Muslim worshipers coming out of a mosque near Moscow, raising fears in the local Islamic and human rights community that the authorities may be readying for a broader crackdown against Muslims there. Such a... MORE

Weeks of mass protests by the residents of Ingushetia against the transfer of part of the republic’s territory to neighboring Chechnya became one of the most significant events in the political life of the Russian regions in the last month (Zona.media, October 18). On September... MORE

The age of warlords in Afghanistan may finally be ending. The beginning of the end started before Afghanistan attracted the world’s attention on September 11, 2001: thus, September 9, 2018, marked the death, 17 years ago, of Ahmad Shah Masoud, a Tajik commander who was... MORE

Much of the recent focus on Russia has been on the World Cup and the Helsinki Summit, but Russians domestically have not forgotten about the government’s controversial ongoing pension reform plan. The population is extremely unhappy with the proposal to raise the pension age from... MORE

Since 1991, Moscow has generally been careful to send Russian ambassadors with impeccable diplomatic credentials to the post-Soviet states. Nevertheless, many non-Russians have still suspected some of these diplomats of being officers of the Federal Security Service (FSB—one of the main successor agencies of the... MORE

Since the 2014 EuroMaidan revolution, a series of “de-Communization” efforts have been taking place in Ukrainian regions and cities across the country. One of the main streets in the resort town of Zaporozhia, for example, has been changed from Lenin Street to Cathedral Street. Of... MORE