Since End of 2025, ‘Not a Single New Foreign Brand has Entered Russian Market,’ ‘Vedomosti’ Reports

Paul Goble

            Staunton, May 29 – Trade between countries is not simply about the volume of sales but also about the circulation of brands. When trade is relatively free, new brands move from one country to another; when it is restricted either by outsiders through sanctions or the regime by the promotion of import substitution, such circulation slows or even stops.

            The Moscow newspaper Vedomosti reports that since the beginning of 2026, “not a single new foreign brand has entered the Russian marketplace, according to the CORE.XP consulting company (vedomosti.ru/business/articles/2026/05/29/1201058-v-rossii-vpervie-za-poslednie-godi-ne-poyavilos-ni-odnogo-inostrannogo-brenda).

            In 2025, 12 new foreign brands did, the consulting company says; in 2024 and 2023, 24 each; and in 2021 and 2022, 16 each.  The Russian government is likely to view this as an indication that its program for import substitution is working, although the rising tide of Russian consumer pessimism casts doubt on that conclusion.

            As far as Western sanctions are concerned, this is evidence of what the most thoughtful observers and officials have pointed out. It takes a long time for sanctions to work; but when they do, the citizens of the countries against which they are targeted not only don’t get what they were used to getting but don’t have a chance to acquire new products from outside either. 

Putin Plans to Return Dzerzhinsky Statue to Moscow's Lubyanka Square Soon, Zygar Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, May 30 – The Putin regime is planning to put the statue of Feliks Dzerzhinsky, the founder of the Cheka,whose removal in August 1991 signaled the collapse of communism in the USSR, back up in Lubyanka Square in front of what was KGB headquarters and now is that of the FSB, according to Mikhail Zygar.

            The well-connected telegram channel author made that statement in his column for the German news magazine Der Spiegel and suggests this action will occur soon, close to the 35^th anniversary of when the statue was taken down and close to the 35^th anniversary of that action (vot-tak.tv/93559691/pamyatnik-dzerzhinskomu-moskva-vozvrashenie).

            More than 40 monuments of Dzerzhinsky have been put up in the Russian Federation since Putin came to power, but the return of the largest one to the Lubyanka Square would certainly lead many to decide that the current Kremlin leader plans to take Russia back even further toward the aggressiveness and repression of Soviet times.

In Calling for Book on Putin’s Ancestors, University Head Says He ‘Understands What the Kremlin Expects’

Paul Goble

            Staunton, May 30 – Some of the most obsequious moves by Russian officials appear to be independent efforts to curry favor with the Kremlin, but others are clearly taking place because the Kremlin has ordered them or has ensured that it has put in place people who know in advance what Putin and the Presidential Administration want.

            A case of the latter concerns the actions of Andrey Loginov, rector of the Russian State University of the Humanities, who has pushed what to many seem actions more “Catholic than the pope” or in this case more Putinist than Putin but who is in fact ready to say that he knows what the Kremlin leader wants and is acting accordingly.

            Several weeks ago, Loginov’s university posted an announcement offering to pay someone to compile a book on the ancestors of Vladimir Putin between 1861 and 1917 (agents.media/rggu-nachal-iskat-biografa-roda-putinyh-kogda-rektor-ponyal-chego-ot-vuza-ozhidaet-kreml/).

            This announcement draw snickers from Putin critics but it was fully consistent with what Loginov, a longtime official in the Presidential Administration, has been doing since becoming rector two years ago in promoting Kremlin ideas and an extreme Russian nationalist agenda including courses on people like Ivan Ilin and books on the war in Ukraine.

            When others have taken similar actions, they have been careful to specify that they were acting on their own so that if too much criticism arose, those above them could change things quickly and in any case could avoid taking any responsibility for such steps. But Loginov has taken a different tact.

            The rector says that “in the course of two years of work in the university, I have formed a clear vision of our tasks and possibilities. We understand what is expected of the Russian State University of the Humanities in institutions above us, from the Presidential Administration to the Russian Academy of Sciences.”

            Loginov is thus saying that he is doing what he has been told is “expected,” a declaration that shows just how far Putin has gone in promoting his personalist and nationalist agenda and how even the most outrageous steps in this direction must be laid at his feet rather than blamed on anyone else. 

Duma Now Focusing on How to Save ‘Ethnic Russian State-Forming People’

Paul Goble

            Staunton, May 30 – The Kremlin has been devoting ever more attention to the collapse of the Russia population as a whole given that fertility rates are now well below the replacement level of 2.2 children per woman per lifetimes overall and below even on child per woman per life time in major cities.

            But behind this concern about the decline of the population of the Russian Federation as a whole has always been a particular worry about the decline in the number of ethnic Russians because in the minds of Putin and his regime, they represent “the state-forming people” on whom the fate of the country depends.

            The Kremlin has usually been cautious in the ways it expresses that concern lest it exacerbate anti-ethnic Russian attitudes among non-Russians, a category that is gaining in share even if in many cases its component parts are also declining because they are declining less rapidly than the ethnic Russians.

            But now, in a sign that the Putin regime is going to be more open about what it really cares about – and thus about what it doesn’t care nearly as much about – the Russian Duma has held a roundtable on “Legislative Support for the Development of the Ethnic Russian State-Forming People” (svpressa.ru/society/news/517572/).

            The round table had as its subtitle “Problems, Prospects and the Role of Civil Society in shaping the Desired Vision of the Future,” an indication that the Russian parliament acting at the behest of the Putin regime is likely to pass a variety of laws in the coming months to try to boost birthrates among ethnic Russians in particular.

            Focusing on ethnic Russians alone and especially doing so by stressing that they and they alone are “the state-forming people” of the country are going to infuriate many non-Russians who will view such actions as yet another sign that they are second-class citizens in the Russian Federation and prompt ever more of them to think about alternative outcomes. 

Putin’s Campaign against Armenian PM Backfiring, Polls Suggest

Paul Goble

            Staunton, May 30 – Vladimir Putin’s efforts to defeat Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan because of the latter’s turn to Europe, by highlighting just how thuggish Moscow can be, are backfiring, with the share of Armenians saying they will vote for Pashinyan’s party rising from 24 percent when Putin began his campaign to 32 percent now.

            That rise has left Pashinyan’s opponents, many of whom are pro-Russian, far behind with none having more than six percent now, down from nine percent three months ago, according to International Republican Institute polls (caspianpost.com/opinion/moscow-wanted-to-hurt-pashinyan-it-may-have-done-the-opposite).

            Unless something changes dramatically in the next week, Pashinyan and his party are likely to win enough votes to continue their turn to the West, yet another case where Putin’s heavy-handed approach has not only failed to achieve his goals but in fact has left his country in a worse position than it was.

            Had Putin now adopted such thuggish positions, in fact, Pashinyan might be doing less well and his opponents better; but Putin’s statements and behavior has reminded Armenians of all the reason they have to seek to get out from under Russian dominance and seek to become part of the European Union.

            But because thuggish behavior often is how authoritarian leaders rose to power and because it is often popular among their supporters, Putin and others in this category are likely to continue to behave as they do especially abroad and thus lose some of the positions their countries had earlier.

Moscow has More than Trebled Number of Criminal Cases against Russian Lawyers Since 2023-2024, Memorial Reports

Paul Goble

            Staunton, May 28 – The Russian government has not only increased criminal charges against its opponents over the last three years, it has more than trebled the number of charges against lawyers who defend them and other Russians charged with crimes, according to the Memorial Human Rights organization.

            That makes it more difficult for those accused of political or other crimes to get a defense by removing some lawyers from legal practice and intimidating others from taking cases that could lead to their own indictments (semnasem.org/news/2026/05/28/chislo-ugolovnyh-del-protiv-advokatov-v-rossii-vyroslo-v-neskolko-raz-za-god).

            As Memorial makes clear, criminal charges are more frequently brought against lawyers who have defended political opponents of the Putin regime, an indication that the attacks on lawyers are part of a more general Kremlin effort to suppress any and all opposition.

Ukraine’s Successful Drone Campaign May Not End the War on Kyiv’s Terms, Pastukhov Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, May 28 – There has been a tendency to see whatever tactic either side in Putin’s war in Ukraine is introducing and having success with inevitably presages the victory of that side because many people ignore the near certainty that the side losing because of that tactic will come up with one that will give it better chances, Vladimir Pastukhov says.

            That is what has happened in response to Ukraine’s remarkably successful use of drones against targets often deep inside the Russian Federation and led to widespread assumptions that Kyiv is now in a position to gain most of the goals it has set for itself, the London-based Russain analyst says (t.me/v_pastukhov/1914 reposted at echofm.online/opinions/my-chyotko-fiksiruem-novuyu-fazu-vojny).

            But despite Ukraine’s success with drones, Pastukhov continues, “serious doubts” remain that “such a favorable scenario for Ukraine to end the war is now the only possible one.” That it is one is a good thing, “but it is not so uncontested so that anyone should be speaking about that as categorically as many are doing.”

            “Historical experience shows,” he continues, “that when the blind mole of the Russian military machine runs into an insurmountable obstacle, it does not crawl out with a white flag but rather immediately begins to dig another tunnel nearby, and it is difficult to imagine that the Kremlin does not realize the impasse of the situation and isn’t looking for a favorable way out.”

            “In the near future,” as the Russian attacks on Kyiv show, Pastukhov argues, “we may witness an attempt to sharply aggravate the terrorist nature of the current war and qualitatively increase strikes on the civilian infrastructure of Ukraine to deplete its air defense resources and destroy the very logistics that allow maintaining the notorious kill zone at the front.”

            Given Moscow’s own difficulties, it is difficult to specify exactly what Moscow can and will do. But three steps are likely. First, Pastukhov says, Moscow is likely “to take more risks including with it aviation.” Second, “it will likely focus on objects that for some reason it has not yet touched, including Dniepr bridges and railway junctions.”

            “And third, it will begin to ‘work dirty,’ that is, by targeting and inflection disproportionate damage to the civilian population” as it appears to be doing now with its attacks on Kyiv and its people.

            That, rather than an easy road to peace, is what Ukraine and its supporters need to recognize and plan to respond to, Pastukhov suggests; and Ukraine’s response almost certainly will involve more drone attacks on Russian sites, likely sending up casualties on the Russian side as well and making what has been a bloody war even more so.