(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – April 22, 2014) President Vladimir Putin has signed into law a bill that requires foreigners to prove their ability to speak Russian while also giving his seal of approval to a separate bill that will make it easier to grant citizenship to Russian-speakers in former Soviet states. The new immigration rules for foreign citizens, published […]
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The Charlie Rose Show covers unfolding events in the ongoing crisis in Ukraine, including occupied Crimea. Rose talks with Stephen Sestanovich, Stephen Cohen and Ian Bremmer.
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MOSCOW/VIENNA. March 20 (Interfax) – Moscow may draft its own “blacklist” of American officials as part of a response that will “mirror” the sanctions imposed by the United States on Russia, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said. “If Washington restarts measures to escalate tensions and confrontation, as well as attempts to tell us what we should do using the […]
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MOSCOW. March 20 (Interfax) – The sanctions imposed on Russia by the European Union and the United States do not have international legal grounds, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said. “Unilateral sanctions have never done any good. They are not legal. And they do not have international legal grounds,” Lavrov said at a State Duma sitting on Thursday. “The UN […]
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MOSCOW. Feb 12 (Interfax) – The Federal Migration Service and the Economic Development Ministry have drawn up a law, which facilitates naturalization of foreign citizens, Kommersant wrote on Wednesday. The simpler naturalization procedure will be primarily granted to businessmen who invest at least ten million rubles in Russia and foreign alumni of Russian colleges and universities who work in Russia […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Matthew Bodner – January 29, 2014) The Parliamentary Assembly for the Council of Europe, or PACE, voted overwhelmingly on Tuesday to approve a resolution critical of Russia for its handling of the investigation into the death of Sergei Magnitsky, over the fierce objections of Russian lawmakers present for the vote. By adopting the resolution, which […]
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(RIA Novosti – January 23, 2014) Russia is planning to introduce mandatory fingerprinting for all foreigners applying for visas to the country. Under the terms of a draft presidential decree posted online Thursday, the Foreign Ministry will launch a pilot project in July to test the necessary equipment and procedures. The project envisions fingerprinting of foreigners at Russian embassies and […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Yekaterina Kravtsova – January 20, 2014) An official from the European Union spoke out about several concerns over Russia during a visit to Moscow on Friday, warning that plans for a visa-free regime would be put on hold until issues of corruption and human rights are addressed. The meeting came shortly after the EU decided […]
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(Business New Europe MOSCOW BLOG – bne.eu – Ben Aris – January 15, 2014) The international press threw up a hue and cry on January 14 after it emerged a US journalist David Satter had been barred from re-entering Russia. Superficially, it appears the Kremlin has banned a western journalist because he was critical of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s regime. […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Ivan Nechepurenko – January 16, 2014) As pundits speculated about possible political repercussions of Russia’s decision to bar U.S. journalist David Satter, the country’s often cumbersome and conflicting visa application process came into the spotlight on Wednesday. While for some observers the visa bureaucracy was seen as a tool to cushion the state’s political decisions, […]
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BRUSSELS. Jan 14 (Interfax) – A Russia-European Union summit, due to open in Brussels on January 28, could be a “suitable moment” to sign an agreement to further simplify visa rules, while the launch of talks on visa-free travel could send a favorable signal for further promoting the sides’ strategic partnership, Russia’s envoy to the EU Vladimir Chizhov said. “The […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Ivan Nechepurenko – January 14, 2014) Russia has barred a U.S. journalist for five years in a move that has triggered a frenzy between Russian authorities and Western media on Tuesday, signaling possible heightened tensions ahead of upcoming Winter Olympic Games in Sochi. It was not clear whether David Satter, 66, was banned entry into […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – January 13, 2014) A record total of about 250,000 U.S. nonimmigrant visas were issued to Russians last year, a jump of 15 percent compared to the previous record year, U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul said Monday. In 2013, more than 30 percent of Russians obtained U.S. visas without going through an interview due to […]
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(Interfax – December 18, 2013) The so-called Magnitsky List is an utterly unfriendly step regarding Russia and Moscow will take proportionate measures if it is expanded, Russian Federation Council Speaker Valentina Matviyenko said. “I think that this law is an unfriendly step regarding us and does not contribute to improving the climate in our bilateral relations with the United States. […]
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MOSCOW. Dec 16 (Interfax) – Russia will answer symmetrically if the United States expands the so-called Magnitsky List, i.e. the list of Russian officials suspected of human rights abuses and subject to U.S. financial and visa sanctions under the Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act of 2012, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said. “Decisions on putting more Russian […]
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WASHINGTON, December 9 (By Carl Schreck for RIA Novosti) The United States and Russia face a potential renewed blacklist war as a deadline looms this week for Washington to report on controversial sanctions against alleged Russian rights abusers. The US administration has until Saturday to submit to Congress its inaugural annual report on any additions to the so-called “Magnitsky […]
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MOSCOW. Nov 20 (Interfax) – A third of migrant workers do not speak Russian, Federal Migration Service head Konstantin Romodanovsky said. “We are witnessing a surge in the arrivals of migrants from CIS member countries. As of now, 11.1 million foreigners are staying in Russia, and almost three-quarters of them enjoy the visa-free travel regime,” he told a roundtable in […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – November 20, 2013) The United States may publish the extended version of the “Magnitsky list” as early as next month, while Europe is expected to pass a similar measure, Hermitage Capital investment fund president and bill supporter William Browder said. The Magnitsky Act, enacted by the U.S. Congress in December 2012 and named after late […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – November 13, 2013) Lawmakers from 21 countries have formed a commission to promote sanctions against Russian officials implicated in the prison death of whistle-blowing lawyer Sergei Magnitsky in 2009. The Justice for Sergei Magnitsky commission, which was holding its inaugural meeting at the European Parliament in Brussels on Wednesday, includes lawmakers from Canada, Britain, France, […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Sam Skove – October 18, 2013) When Nuri Katz, founder of investment firm Apex Capital, heads for the customs gate, he gets to decide which of his three passports to use – a privilege that his Russian clients would pay up to 5 million euros to enjoy. Katz is in the citizenship-by-investment business. Select […]
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(RIA Novosti – MOSCOW, October 17, 2013) Russia wants to begin drafting a deal on visa-free travel with the EU early next year, a senior Russian diplomat said in an interview published Thursday. That deal, however, requires the EU to make a “political decision to begin negotiations on drafting the agreement,” Deputy Foreign Minister Alexei Meshkov told RIA Novosti. The […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Natalya Krainova – September 27, 2013) As U.S. and Russian officials enter the umpteenth month of wrangling over how to address the Syrian civil war, and politicians from the former Cold War foes maintain their hostile rhetoric, one of the countries’ last bilateral agreements is turning one year old, and its success is showing that […]
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(RIA Novosti – MOSCOW, August 28, 2013) About one million foreigners are officially registered with the migration authorities in Moscow and 1.5 million in surrounding areas as of Tuesday, a senior migration official said. “We have a centralized database of foreign nationals. Today we have obtained the most recent figures: there is about a million of foreign nationals in Moscow […]
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(RIA Novosti – MOSCOW, August 2013) Former US intelligence contractor Edward Snowden is legally free to travel around Russia and occupy any non-state job in the country, a senior migration official said on Friday. Last week Russia granted Snowden – who is wanted by the United States on espionage and theft charges after leaking classified information about the US […]
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(RFE/RL – rferl.org – Tom Balmforth – July 26, 2013) Fugitive U.S. intelligence contractor Edward Snowden has applied for temporary asylum in Russia and is expected to soon be given a document that would allow him to leave the transit zone of Sheremetyevo Airport — where he has spent the past month. RFE/RL takes a look at the procedure for […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW, July 29, 2013) Moscow hopes to sign a visa relaxation agreement with the European Union before the end of 2013, Russian Foreign Ministry Ambassador at Large Anvar Azimov said. “We expect the signing of the updated agreement before the end of this year. This will require political will to be demonstrated by EU member states. Russia has […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW. July 24) Russian citizens received over 111,000 U.S. visas from January-June 2013, the U.S. embassy in Russia said. “Over 111,000 visas were issued in Russia in the first half of the year. Over 20% more tourist visas than the same period last year,” the U.S. embassy tweeted.
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(Interfax – MOSCOW. July 17, 2013) Former CIA employee Edward Snowden has no right to submit documents for Russian citizenship, Civil Assistance human rights committee head Svetlana Gannushkina told Interfax on Wednesday. Lawyer Anatoly Kucherena, who is helping Snowden, said on Wednesday that Snowden did not exclude applying for Russian citizenship. “As of today, Snowden has no right to submit […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW, July 16, 2013) A decision on granting asylum to ex-CIA employee Edward Snowden will be made within three months, a highly-placed official with the Federal Migration Service told Interfax on Tuesday. “A decision will be made in compliance with the legal timeframe, within three months,” he said. Federal Migration Service spokeswoman Zalina Kornilova has confirmed to Interfax […]
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(Interfax – July 12, 2013) Aleksey Pushkov, chairman of the State Duma International Affairs Committee, has warned against “whipping up” tension in relations between Russia and the USA, commenting on reports that Washington is planning to expand the Magnitskiy list after a court in Moscow found the late lawyer, Sergey Magnitskiy, and the head of the Hermitage Capital Management fund, […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW, July 12, 2013) The Russian Foreign Ministry has urged Washington to stow plans for an extended Magnitsky List and warned it would react sternly, given the rights abuses the United States is committing globally. “We urged the U.S. administration to demonstrate wisdom and not to take steps that would spoil the atmosphere of bilateral relations,” Russian Foreign […]
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(Interfax – July 9, 2013) Russian veteran human rights defender, Moscow Helsinki Group (MHG) head Lyudmila Alexeyeva has supported the British ban on 60 Russians on the Magnitsky List from entering the UK. “Certainly, I would like people involved in the Magnitsky case to be punished here, in Russia. That would have displayed our wish to become a democracy, put […]
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(RIA Novosti – WASHINGTON, June 19, 2013) Russian technology start-ups that were selected as finalists in a prestigious US business development competition might not be able to take part in the months-long contest because of visa problems, the head of an investment company that is co-sponsoring the event said Thursday. Four teams of two Russians from start-ups developing apps […]
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(Interfax – May 27, 2013) About 167 million people and nearly 27 million vehicles crossed the Russian state border last year, which was 22 percent more than in 2011. “The trend persists in 2013. Back in the Soviet period, the number of persons allowed to cross the state border was roughly 2-2.5 million per year. The number grew to 167 […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines/RIA Novosti – rbth.ru – Fyodor Lukyanov – April 24, 2013) Fyodor Lukyanov, the chairman of the Presidium of the Council for Foreign and Defense Policy, explains why the Magnitsky Act will have long-term consequences on U.S.-Russia relations. Conflicts associated with the Magnitsky Act are not going away any time soon. Congress will not drop the subject, […]
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(Interfax – MAKHACHKALA, Russia – April 22, 2013) Russia’s Federal Migration Service (FMS) has an uncollected Russian internal passport to the name of Tamerlan Tsarnaev in its files, a suspected co-perpetrator of the Boston Marathon bombings killed by police who tried to arrest him, a senior FMS official said. In July 2012, Tsarnaev “filed an application saying that he had […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – April 22, 2013) Russians want to ask President Vladimir Putin on his televised call-in show this week about whether they will face U.S. visa restrictions after the Boston bombing attacks and why he is cracking down on his critics. Those are among the 28 most frequently asked questions that have been submitted by telephone and […]
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(RFE/RL – rferl.org – April 19, 2013) The mother and widow of whistle-blowing Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky were in Washington on April 17, just days after the White House issued a blacklist of more than a dozen Russian officials implicated in Magnitsky’s prosecution and death in jail in 2009. RFE/RL’s Richard Solash spoke to Magnitsky’s mother, Natalia, at a reception […]
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(Moscow TImes – themoscowtimes.com – Michael Bohm – April 19, 2013) Michael Bohm is opinion page editor of The Moscow Times. You would have thought that the Kremlin would have shown a little more appreciation for the fact that U.S. President Barack Obama approved only 18 minor figures for the open portion of the Magnitsky list. After all, the original […]
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(RFE/RL – rferl.org – April 18, 2013) U.S. Representative James McGovern was one of the leading sponsors of legislation that mandated sanctions against Russians implicated in the prosecution and death of whistle-blowing lawyer Sergei Magnitsky. McGovern, a Massachusetts Democrat, spoke to RFE/RL’s Richard Solash on the sidelines of a Washington reception held on April 17 honoring the Magnitsky family. RFE/RL: […]
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(Interfax -MOSCOW. April 16, 2013) The closed part of the list of U.S. citizens prohibited to visit Russia is longer than the open part, a source at the Russian Foreign Ministry told Interfax on Tuesday. “Concerning the Russian list, its closed part carries more names than the open one,” he said. The source said he did not know how many […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Ivan Nechepurenko – April 16, 2013) The Kremlin said the United States has sent Russia a “positive signal” by dispatching a high-profile delegation to Moscow headed by U.S. National Security Adviser Thomas Donilon, who delivered a letter Monday with “concrete measures” on missile defense, nuclear arms reduction and trade. The meeting occurred amid ongoing strains […]
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(RIA Novosti – Carl Schreck – WASHINGTON, April 15, 2013) The United States and Russia struck a conciliatory chord Monday following tit-for-tat blacklists of alleged human rights violators, but the contentious US legislation that sparked the diplomatic dust-up appears set to become a permanent fixture in ties between Washington and Moscow. “There is no sunset clause on the Magnitsky […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Vladimir Chukov, Stepan Serdyukov, Anna Laletina, special to RBTH – April 15, 2013) RBTH continues its coverage of the U.S. Work & Travel program by asking three former participants about their experiences. The Summer Work and Travel program, created as a public diplomacy tool in 1963, allows foreign university students to work and […]
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(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, April 14, 2013 – http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2013/04/window-on-eurasia-battle-of-lists.html) The publication of the Magnitsky List and the Russian response have prompted widespread speculation not only about the secret and supposedly much larger and possibly expandable lists attached to each but about the meaning of this exchange for the future of Russian-American relations. In an article entitled […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW. April 12, 2013) Most of the Russian officials added on Friday to the U.S. Department of the Treasury Office of Foreign Assets Control’s Specially Designated Nationals List (OFAC’s SDN list) under the Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act of 2012 are no longer working in the positions they occupied when an investigation against Hermitage Capital lawyer […]
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(RIA Novosti -ST. PETERSBURG, April 12, 2013) Federation Council Speaker Valentina Matvienko lashed out at European politicians at an international conference in St. Petersburg on Friday, claiming Russophobia in the Parliamentary Assembly Council of Europe (PACE) was obstructing Russian-European cooperation and suggesting the EU’s stance on visa requirements and human rights was hypocritical. “Not so long ago, our partners […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – April 12, 2013) The Kremlin was bracing for the release late Friday of a U.S. blacklist of more than 100 Russians that could include Investigative Committee chief Alexander Bastrykin and Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov. At the same time, the authorities were preparing to release their own blacklist with an equal number of U.S. citizens. Washington […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW, April 11, 2013) Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has branded the U.S. Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act as a manifestation of “the Russophobia that is traditionally present” in U.S. Congress. One of the architects of the Magnitsky act was Hermitage Capital investment fund chief executive William Browder, who “illegally hoarded a large fortune in the […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW, April 11, 2013) Moscow can see no obstacle to Russia and the United States abolishing the entry visa regime in travel between them, according to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. “As far back as two years ago, (Russian President) Vladimir Putin proposed that we do not limit ourselves to loosening the visa regime but that we move […]
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