After “neo-Cossacks” brutally whipped anti-Kremlin demonstrators at the May 5 “He Is Not Our Tsar” protests, in downtown Moscow (see EDM, May 14), concerns in Russia have been mounting that the authorities will similarly employ such quasi-paramilitary forces to maintain order at the World Cup,... MORE

On April 9, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev asked his Cabinet for specific measures to alleviate the consequences of the economic sanctions the United States passed (on April 6—see EDM, April 9) against Russian companies and individuals, with metallurgy, the energy sector and the defense industry... MORE

Now that the Moldovan Constitutional Court has annulled the special status the Russian language has enjoyed in that republic since independence, Moscow is hoping to use the Gagauz nation within Moldova to defend the position of Russian there. But this decision to turn to the... MORE

In early April, the minister of defense of Russia, Sergei Shoigu, announced the relocation of the Caspian Flotilla from Astrakhan (Astrakhan oblast, on the northwest coast of the Caspian Sea) to Kaspiysk, a Dagestani city just south of the republican capital of Makhachkala. The first... MORE

In the week since Russian journalist Arkady Babchenko’s staged assassination on May 29 (see EDM, May 31), plenty of smoke and dozens of unanswered questions remain. At this point, Ukrainian law enforcement and the security services have still not provided any clear evidence of the... MORE

Despite wide international condemnation, on May 16 the Russian Federation completed the first phase of construction of a ten-mile bridge across the Kerch Strait, which links Russia proper with the occupied Crimean peninsula (TASS, May 16). The Kerch Bridge will have serious economic, social, demographic... MORE

Gazprom and the Turkish government signed a protocol, on May 26, on building another section of the Turk Stream pipeline that will deliver Russian natural gas to Turkey and Europe (Gazprom.com, May 26). Moreover, the Russian gas giant and the Turkish pipeline company BOTAŞ agreed to establish a joint venture to... MORE

At the end of April, the Khural (parliament) of the Republic of Buryatia abolished the Constitutional Court of this federal subject (Kommersant, April 24). The decision was made on the initiative of the head of Buryatia, Alexei Tsydenov, who last year was appointed by the... MORE

In the last two weeks of May, Moscow has quietly shifted five naval vessels from the Caspian Flotilla to the Sea of Azov, a move the Russian authorities have cast as a step needed to defend against a Ukrainian attack on occupied Crimea. But both... MORE

The defense correspondent and fierce Kremlin critic Arkady Babchenko (41) was reported shot dead, on the evening of May 29, by an unidentified killer on the doorstep of his apartment in Kyiv. The news provoked an outpouring of grief and sympathy from many journalists, friends,... MORE