The association of Johnson’s Russia List with George Washington University will shortly be coming to an end. That will officially occur as of May 1 when funding runs out. I am grateful to GW’s Institute for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies for acceptance of JRL over the years. The long-time support of the Carnegie Corporation has been vital. The work […]
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“… At the start of the war, when Ukraine lost access to its deep-water ports in the Black Sea, the EU temporarily exempted Ukrainian lorry drivers from a permit system …. upset[ting] Polish drivers, who had dominated .. local freight …. [A] suspension of import duties and quotas on Ukrainian farm goods, produced by larger, more efficient outfits, posed competition […]
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“… [S]eek[ing] to influence congressional and other political debates to stoke anti-Ukraine sentiment, Kremlin-linked political strategists and trolls have written thousands of fabricated news articles, social media posts and comments that promote American isolationism, stir fear over the United States’ border security and attempt to amplify U.S. economic and racial tensions, according to a trove of internal Kremlin documents obtained […]
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“… Even when government campaigns are successful, they struggle for momentum. … Russian propaganda has been pushing stories about how wonderful the Russian medical care is – despite problems …. Such propaganda campaigns work for a few weeks, but then the conversation around this topic on social media becomes negative, and the Kremlin tries to drive it up again. Likewise […]
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“German diplomat says Moscow’s messaging combines greater subtlety and plausibility with automation” “Russian disinformation campaigns to undermine support for Ukraine in Europe have grown significantly in scale, skill and stealth, [Ralf Beste of Germany’s Federal Foreign Office] has warned. ‘It is absolutely a threat we have to take seriously’ … ‘Overall, [there] is an increase in sophistication and impact ….’ […]
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“Many units, which say the official conscription system is dysfunctional and unwieldy, have started their own recruitment campaigns to fill ranks depleted in the war with Russia.” “… Slick recruiting campaigns brimming with nationalist fervor have become ubiquitous in Kyiv … and other Ukrainian cities … perhaps the most visible sign of a push to replenish Ukrainian troops depleted by […]
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“Moscow has found better ways to conceal influence operations that spread arguments for isolationism, officials and experts say.” “Russia has intensified … online efforts to derail military funding for Ukraine in the United States and Europe, largely by using harder-to-trace technologies to amplify arguments for isolationism ahead of the U.S. elections, according to disinformation experts and intelligence assessments. … [I]ntelligence […]
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“Campaign is part of push to divert attention from security failures, analysts say” “Reeling from an apparent security lapse that allowed … heavily-armed men to massacre dozens of concertgoers in Moscow … Russia has gone into overdrive advancing a narrative that pins the blame on a usual suspect: Ukraine. Western officials have said Islamic State is responsible for the March […]
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“Whitehall figures fear hostile states have helped to fuel wild conspiracy theories in attempt to destabilise nation” “China, Russia and Iran are fuelling disinformation about the Princess of Wales to destabilise the nation, Whitehall sources believe. Senior Government figures fear … hostile states are behind the spread of wild conspiracy theories and online rumours surrounding the Princess’s health. After the […]
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“Two authoritarian U.S. adversaries, Russia and China … carry[] out what some … call[] a ‘hidden war on democracy,’ attempting to shape global opinion using deception and false narratives. … Russia [reportedly] spends about $1.5 billion a year and China $7 billion or more annually to influence overseas audiences. … The Global Engagement Center (GEC), headquartered at the State Department, […]
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“Kremlin campaign to focus on legitimacy as vote scrapped Ukrainian leader sensitive over issue as war footing shifts” “… With … Ukrainian territory under Russian occupation, millions … having fled … and [Ukraine’s] infrastructure battered … martial law has imposed restrictions on elections. Zelenskiy … would otherwise be campaigning for a vote held at the end of March if he […]
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“Volodymyr Zelenskyy says there have been at least 5 assassination attempts made against him” “Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in an exclusive FOX News interview, appealed to President Biden and Republican front-runner Donald Trump to visit Ukraine and see for themselves at the front lines of ‘this tragedy.’ … Baier met with Zelenskyy near the front lines in Kharkiv, just a […]
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“… But it wasn’t getting bogged down in historical minutiae that most hurt Putin’s case. He undermined his claim to be ready for practical diplomacy by endlessly parading his ethno-nationalist obsessions. And not all of these were matters of distant history. Blaming Poland rather than Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin for starting World War II was only the most egregious […]
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“Long-winded, often factually erroneous arguments back his conviction that Russia has a historic right to Ukraine” “[In his] two-hour interview with Tucker Carlson … Putin recounted events of centuries past and trotted out 17th-century documents … expounding on deeply held views about the past, many widely disputed by historians, that have driven him to launch the continent’s bloodiest conflict since […]
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“… [V]acillating among pedantic, sarcastic and aggrieved, Putin spent the first uninterrupted half-hour on his tired claims that Ukrainians are not a nation, that they’re neo-Nazis, persecute Russians, and are tools of the West. He then turned to … all the ways in which the United States has humiliated, betrayed and insulted Russia, and how Ukraine and … [the] C.I.A. […]
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(Moscow Times – Andrei Muchnik – Feb. 12, 2024) Trailer: https://youtu.be/Aw0oLoPdy7Q “The Master and Margarita” was only released less than a month ago but it has already become one of the highest grossing and most talked about films in Russia in recent years. In the first weekend alone the film amassed almost half a billion rubles. The film is based […]
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“… Putin spent the first 30 minutes of his two-hour interview with … Tucker Carlson giving a revisionist historical tirade on the founding myths of Russia and Ukraine, the breakup of the Soviet Union and NATO expansionism. From there, admonishing Carlson when he interrupted, Putin pontificated on everything from the war in Ukraine and relations with the United States, the […]
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(PONARS Eurasia Policy Memo No. 873 – Anton Shirikov, Postdoctoral Scholar in Russian Politics at the Harriman Institute, Columbia University – Jan. 29, 2024 – Click here for PDF) How do the lies of Russian propaganda work? In recent years, Kremlin-controlled media have promoted thousands of fabricated stories, including some completely absurd narratives — e.g., about “Nazis” in Kyiv or […]
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“Online commentator TuckAdd New Poster Carlson interviewed … Putin as part of a trip to Moscow, the Kremlin confirmed … Wednesday. … [O]n Tuesday, Carlson said he wanted to focus on the war in Ukraine. He is also seeking to interview … Zelenskiy. … There’s no airdate for the [Putin] interview … but Carlson said it would be free to […]
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(Russia Matters – russiamatters.org) “The ‘rules-based order’ that President Biden proclaims has become a slogan rather than a fact,” WP’s David Ignatius argues in his preview of how the Russian-Ukrainian war and other conflicts will evolve in 2024. In his latest column, Ignatius blasts Vladimir Putin’s aggression again Ukraine, but also reminds us how there was an “element of truth” in […]
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“The German tabloid ‘Bild’ said …. President Biden and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz … plan to force Ukraine into peace talks next year by denying it the weapons needed to win. … Team Biden is more interested in avoiding confrontation with Russia than in defeating it. To oppose aid to Ukraine is to ensure a Russian victory, but funding [] […]
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(Moscow Times – Nov. 18, 2023) Russia has added The Moscow Times to its list of “foreign agents” alongside several other journalists and activists, the Justice Ministry announced Friday. Russia’s “foreign agents” registry, launched in 2012 in response to similar legislation in the United States, has been disproportionately used to target independent journalists, activists and NGOs in recent years. The […]
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“Is … Putin dead? … [M]ysterious Russian Telegram channel … ‘General SVR’ and [prominent Russian political analyst] Valery Solovey … [say] yes. … [Putin] supposedly breathed his last … Thursday, Oct. 26. The Putin we see now [allegedly would] … actually his double … [already] filling in for the sickly real Putin for several months. Few Russian or Western analysts […]
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“Filmmakers are going beyond the news-bite to document the wider impact of the war in a variety of ways” “… Ukraine announced that its candidate for the Academy Award for Best International Feature Film would be a documentary. Mstyslav Chernov’s 20 Days in Mariupol presents a harrowing chronicle of the Russian siege of the coastal city from within. This gritty […]
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“It is often hard to know when battlefield reports are false or why they may have been disseminated.” “… [M]isdirection, disinformation and propaganda are weapons regularly deployed in Russia’s war in Ukraine to buoy spirits at home, demoralize the enemy or lead opponents into a trap. … Ukraine has deftly used misdirection …. Through the summer of 2022, multiple officials […]
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“Muscovites go about their daily lives with little major disruption. But the war’s effects are evident — in the stores, at the movies and in the increasingly repressive environment.” “… Muscovites are experiencing dual realities: The war has faded into background noise … yet … remains ever-present in … daily lives. … Advertisements to join the military are … on […]
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(Moscow Times – Sept. 19, 2023) The Kremlin is considering running media personality Alexei Venediktov as Vladimir Putin’s “liberal” rival in the 2024 presidential elections, the Vedomosti business daily reported Tuesday, citing four anonymous sources close to the presidential administration. Venediktov is the former editor-in-chief of Ekho Moskvy, a liberal-leaning radio station that was blocked by authorities days after Russia […]
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“… Russia initially cultivated lively debate and flamboyantly welcomed the world, then gradually choked off freedoms and closed itself off while its citizens fled and uneasy foreigners felt compelled to leave. In 2022, it launched a war against Ukraine that sharply intensified the growing isolation. I spent 24 years … as a Moscow-based [AP] correspondent … cheered by Russia’s steps […]
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“X’s failure to slow the spread of disinformation on the Internet would have violated E.U. social media law, had it been in effect.” “… The E.U. has taken a far more aggressive regulatory approach to government-backed disinformation than the United States …. The Digital Services Act … requires [so-called social media companies] to assess the risk of false information, stop […]
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“Traditional military power will not be enough to win the Ukraine war or the larger struggle over the global order.” “… Are cyber attacks, disinformation and influence campaigns still relevant? The answer is a resounding ‘Yes.’ Ukraine is but a single front in a [global conflict] … over what is and is not permissible in international relations. … [T]he war […]
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(Russia Matters – russiamatters.org) The U.S. has included cluster munitions in its latest $800 million package of military aid to Ukraine. More than 100 countries have signed onto the Convention on Cluster Munitions, vowing to never use them, but the U.S. is not one of them. A significant percentage of the submunitions often fail to detonate, effectively turning them into […]
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“… [The] Ukraine … conflict has involved horrific atrocities, many … extensively recorded in real time …. [U]nlike in Syria and other recent wars, these crimes are being documented with the explicit aim of amassing evidence that can be used in courts. Since the war began, dozens of investigative journalists have been trained to become war crimes researchers, gathering images, […]
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(Russia Matters – russiamatters.org) Russian intelligence services may have known in advance of Yevgeny Prigozhin’s plan to stage a mutiny, but it nonetheless materialized to pose the greatest military and security threat to Vladimir Putin’s rule since the end of the second Chechen war. The mutiny itself lasted only 36 hours, never spread to Moscow and ended with its chief […]
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“… [I]n Russia … [and] occupied regions of eastern and southern Ukraine, millions of people absorb the Kremlin line about Ukraine through Russian television. Its central message, like a genocidal fever dream mixed in among gardening shows and soap operas, depicts Ukraine’s existence as a historical mistake, its government a cabal of satanists and neo-Nazis intent on Russia’s destruction. Zelensky, […]
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“[After militant incursions into Russian territory,] [c]ombined with … Moscow drone attack[s], it’s now clear … Russia’s war has come home to roost … The Ukrainians have also been stepping up their drone attacks on oil refineries, airfields, and other critical sites deep inside Russia. … [T]he Russians seem to be unraveling. … [such as with] the bitter conflict between […]
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“1. Avoid [bothsidesing] this manmade humanitarian and ecological catastrophe …. 2. Russian spokespersons claiming … Ukraine did something … is not … [describing] the real world. … * * * 5. [If citing Russian propaganda, include considerations of what has been said inside Russia itself.] … Russian propagandists have … long argu[ed] [in favor of blowing up] Ukrainian dams … […]
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(Russia Matters – russiamatters.org) Fighting flared up this week between Russian and Ukrainian forces, with the former bombarding Kyiv with missiles and drones and the latter reportedly sending pro-Ukrainian Russian fighters to stage incursions into Russia’s Belgorod region, according to FT and Bloomberg. Ukrainian forces regained control over 51 square miles of their land in the past month, while Russia […]
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(Moscow Times – June 1, 2023) As many as 30% of employees in the Russian presidential administration continue to use iPhones for personal communication, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Thursday. Peskov’s comments came after Russia’s Federal Security Services (FSB) announced that it had detected “anomalies” in some iPhones in Russia caused by “malicious software” that it linked to “surveillance operations […]
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“If the crime is promoting distrust in institutions, the evidence is strongest against the FBI and media.” “… In response to fake and possibly planted Russian intelligence, the FBI improperly and insubordinately meddled in the Clinton email case (as per the inspector general) in a way that accidentally helped elect [] Trump. This story, still hidden in a classified appendix […]
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“… [A] Russian state television [anchor] … quickly interrupted … opposition politician Boris Nadezhdin after he suggested … Putin be ousted …. [O]n the [NTV] program Mesto Vstrechi (Meeting Place), Nadezhdin, who has opposed Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, said that under the current political regime … ‘there is no way for us to come back to Europe.’ ‘We simply have […]
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(Russia Matters – russiamatters.org) Chinese President Xi Jinping told leaders of the five Central Asian republics that Beijing is ready to help them strengthen “their law enforcement, security and defense” capacities. Playing host to these leaders in Xian during a two-day summit, Xi also said China would provide $3.7 billion in financing support and “free assistance” to the five republics […]
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“Latvia is fighting to counter the spread of Moscow’s disinformation. Given its large Russian-speaking community, this is a tough task.” “… Latvia gained its long-awaited independence in the 1990s … then became a member of the [EU] and NATO. But … the country’s Soviet past still has a potent impact …. Even before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine … Latvian […]
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“The Biden administration [reportedly] is scouring the globe for offers that could entice Russia to release two wrongfully detained Americans, Evan Gershkovich and Paul Whelan …. The U.S. [reportedly] does not currently have any high-level Russian spies in its custody … [and therefore is] approaching allied countries [holding] Russian spies …. U.S. officials [reportedly] have also been surveying allies without […]
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“Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell held a call with a pair of Russian pranksters posing as … Zelenskiy, according to video shown on Russian state television. Apparently thinking he was speaking to Zelenskiy, the video shows Powell answering questions on topics ranging from the outlook for inflation to the Russian central bank. There were several clips lasting about 15 minutes […]
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“Senior U.S. envoys travels to Balkans, an information battleground.” “The State Department is increasing efforts to push back against … Kremlin[] disinformation … even as Russian propagandists have sought to exploit the extensive leak of purported U.S. classified information. … [A] senior U.S. envoy outlined proposals to help [Balkan] governments … ferret out Russian and Chinese disinformation sites on their […]
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“The secret documents were first posted in January to a small group on a messaging channel that trafficked in memes, jokes and racist talk.” “One of the most significant leaks of highly classified U.S. documents in recent history began among a small group of posters on … [the] [Discord] messaging channel that trafficked in memes, jokes and racist talk. Sometime […]
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Russian military blogger Vladlen Tatarsky was laughing about bombs with his apparent assassin at an event in St. Petersburg minutes before he was killed by a bomb hidden inside a gifted statuette, eyewitnesses told The Moscow Times. Daria Trepova, who gave Tatarsky the golden figurine of himself, told the pro-war blogger in front of the dozens of attendees that security […]
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(Russia Matters – russiamatters.org) Russia’s new foreign policy concept declares “an era of revolutionary change” in the world order, but leaves the door open to normalizing relations with the West. To facilitate the formation of a “more just, multipolar world,” Russia will prioritize the “elimination of vestiges of dominance by the U.S.,” according to the new document, which replaces Russia’s […]
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(Article text Copyright © 2023 RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave NW, Ste 400, Washington DC 20036. – rferl.org – Robert Coalson – March 9, 2023 – article text also appeared at rferl.org/a/russia-opposition-fractured-navalny-venediktov/32310660.html) A major new investigative report by the team of imprisoned Russian opposition politician Aleksei Navalny charges that the Moscow […]
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(Moscow Times – Tom Masters – March 1, 2023) Sean Penn and Aaron Kaufmann’s long-awaited documentary about Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, which recently premiered at the Berlin Film Festival, is proof that even with the best luck and access imaginable, an extraordinary journalistic opportunity can easily be missed. Double Oscar-winning actor-turned-activist Penn and his crew were in Kyiv filming the […]
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