New Organization Focusing on Russia Outside of Moscow Registered in US

Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 5 – Russia and Eurasia as a whole are going through “one of the most important historical moments since the end of the USSR,” Askat Dukenbayev says; but many are missing the most important aspects of this development because they are focused on Moscow alone rather than on the multiplicity of regions and republics within the borders of that country.

            To overcome that problem, the scholar, originally from Kazakhstan but now living in the United States, has registered with the Ohio government a new organization, “The Bell Center for Russian and Eurasian Research,” in the hopes of changing the primary focus of research on that part of the world away from Moscow alone (region.expert/kolokol-center/).

            In an interview he gave to Vadim Shtepa, the editor of the Tallinn-based Region.Expert portal, Dukenbayev says the new center will seek to devote its attention to “the problems of Russian federation and the cases of its continuing degradation as well as issues of regional development and post-imperial transformation.”

            Dukenbayev says that he is confident of success in raising funds and sponsoring research on such issues because as a result of Putin’s war on Ukraine, there is a growing interest in what is happening in the Russian Federation beyond the  ring road, an interest that is no longer confined to the non-Russian nations but also to predominantly ethnic Russian regions.

            The independent scholar says he and his colleagues are “at the very beginning of the project’s development and that in the short term, we plan to focus on monitoring current political, social and economic processes in Russia” and plan to focus on crises and transformations being driven by both internal and external factors.

            Dukenbayev concludes: “Our goal is to build a knowledge and competency base, as well as an expert-analytical platform, focused on regional development in Russia and Eurasia, bringing together researchers, analysts, and experts from various countries and disciplines.”

An Inspiration for Others – Russian Environmental Activists Win Record 175 Victories in 2025

Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 5 – Many Russians do not take part in protests of any kind because they assume that they will accomplish nothing besides falling victim to repressions by the Putin regime. But that is far from the case in at least one embattled sector – environmental protection.

            According to the Ecology Crisis Group, Russian environmentalists and activists won a record 175 victories over business and government during 2025, a record and one that show protests can be effective (https://semnasem.org/news/2026/06/05/rossijskie-ekoaktivisty-oderzhali-v-2025-godu-rekordnye-175-pobed-v-borbe-za-prirodu).

            According to the monitoring group, 89 of these victories came when activists protested efforts by businesses or governments to violate rules governing specially protected nature preserves and parks, cases where the environmentalists demanded that those in power live by laws and where the courts agreed.

            Unfortunately, of course, the activists did not win all their battles or even most of them; but in the increasingly dark picture presented by Putin’s Russia, it is important to remember that protests can work, one of the major reasons that the Kremlin works so hard to ensure that they do not even take place. 

Ukrainian Drones Transforming Russia’s Enormous Size ‘From an Asset to a Liability,’ Sergey Medvedev Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 4 – Ukrainian drones have not only embarrassed Putin by spoiling his celebrations this year but also and more importantly called into question the long-standing assumption that Russia’s enormous size is an asset that represents “the ultimate guarantee of the state’s invulnerability,” Sergey Medvedev says.

            In fact, the Radio Liberty commentator says, as the drone attacks have highlighted, “Russia’s immense territorial bulk … is transforming from an asset into a liability [because] it is virtually impossible to shield or defend” all of it (svoboda.org/a/drony-protiv-imperii-sergey-medvedev-o-territorialjnom-proklyatii/33771956.html).

            Russia’s oil and gas infrastructure, its transportation routes, and its defense industries are all dispersed and all are now at risk, Medvedev says. Exclaves like Kaliningrad are even more so, but “even heavily protected areas like Moscow and St. Petersburg are no longer invulnerable.”

            “As a result,” he continues, “we have a country burdened with excessive, unprofitable and indefensible territory which it can’t continue to drag further into the 21^st century” and like the dinosaurs in the past, “Russia will not survive to the end of this century with its heavy and clumsy territorial body.”

            Putin’s war in Ukraine did not begin this process, but it has “only accelerated this process of decolonization and loss of control over space,” Medvedev says. And thus, “having begun the war by seizing territories, Russia will eventually lose them – and not only those it occupied in 2014 and 2022,” but many it occupied centuries earlier.

For Russia to Catch Up with Advanced Countries, It Needs Concrete rather than Asphalt Highways, Duma Member Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 4 – Only 34 percent of Russia’s federal highways and only four The m over them, Artyom Kiryanov says. As a result, Russia has to spend enormous sums repairing them each year and cannot build the new highways it needs.

            If Russia were to shift to using concrete rather than asphalt as countries like China and the US have done, it would not need to repair its roads as often and they would survive longer, the deputy chairman of the Duma economics committee says (octagon.media/ekonomika/betonnyj_argument.html).

            At present, Kiryanov continues, only two percent of Russian highways and only 0.08 percent of all roads are concrete, something that requires they be repaired every year or two and would increase the period between major overhauls from a few years to as many as 12 to 15.

            The advantages of concrete roads have already been recognized by other advanced countries: Cement covers 45.8 percent of the length of roads in the US, 47.2 percent of those in China, and 10 to 40 percent in European countries. They thus spend less on repairing existing roads and more on building new ones.

            Some Russian officials remain trapped in the past, convinced that the weather in Russia and the damage done to road surfaces by winter tires make a change impossible. But they are wrong: others are building concrete roads in even worse climates and concrete has now been developed to withstand even winter tire damage.

            The main problem lies elsewhere, Kiryanov says. “There is no legally enshrined mechanism for mandatory comparison of rigid and non-rigid pavement options that requires the calculation of full life cycle costs at the design stage.” Were one introduced, Moscow would recognize how much it could benefit from a shift to concrete. 

Violent Attacks in Russian Schools Reach All-Time High, Prompting Calls to have Veterans of Putin’s War in Ukraine Guard Them

Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 4 – The number of violent attacks in Russian schools rose by 80 percent between 2024 and 2025 and reached an all-time high last year, with the numbers so far in 2026 making it likely that this year the figure will be even higher. In response, Russian politicians are calling for Moscow to deploy veterans of Putin’s war in Ukraine to defend Russian schools.

            There were “at least” 25 violent attacks on schools last year, in which 38 people were injured and four killed, Novaya Gazeta Europe reports. Both numbers were all-time highs (novayagazeta.eu/articles/2026/06/04/chislo-napadenii-na-rossiiskie-shkoly-v-2026-godu-dostiglo-istoricheskogo-maksimuma).

            Most occurred in schools rather than university-level institutions; and overwhelmingly, they took place in federal subjects outside of the capitals of Moscow and St. Petersburg. In the past, attackers used mostly knives; but ever more often, officials say, they are using handguns or other weapons.

            Some observers place the blame on popular culture or on the schools themselves which have a massive shortage of psychologists who might be able to identify and help those thinking about committing such crimes and which often have extremely inadequate perimeter defense systems.

            Russian politicians are calling for units of the National Guard to be deployed around schools or even to use veterans of Putin’s war in Ukraine to guard Russian educational institutions and prevent further incidents of violence against Russian young people.

Last Year, 96 Percent of Russians Moscow Called ‘Foreign Agents’ Didn’t Get Any Funding from Abroad

 Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 4 – In 2025, 206 of the 215 Russians Moscow called “foreign agents” --  a staggering 96 percent -- did not receive any foreign funding, a radical shift from the period before Putin launched his expanded war in Ukraine when that was the only basis for classifying people that way and one that means any Russian potentially can be so charged.

            According to an OVD investigation, Russian officials insist that those charged as being foreign agents who in fact did not receive any funding from abroad were nonetheless under “foreign influence” (istories.media/news/2026/06/04/v-2025-godu-96-inoagentov-poluchili-svoi-status-ne-iz-za-zarubezhnogo-finansirovaniya/).

            That change has been conceded by Russian Deputy Justice Minister Oleg Sviridenko who argued that foreign influence takes many forms and restricting it to financial support as Moscow did before 2022 had put the security of the country at risk and that many who never receive such payments thus deserve to be identified and restricted as “foreign agents.”

Russia under Putin ‘an Information Dictatorship, Not a Totalitarian State’ and Humor There Reflects That, Arkhipova Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 4 – In Russia today, Aleksandra Arkhipova says, “there is an information dictatorship not totalitariansm.” That is, unlike in Stalin’s time, very few Russian residents are repressed because they are members of a particular group and that repressions are carried out randomly with the intention to intimidate rather than incarcerate.

            The Russian anthropologist who now lives and teaches in Paris tells Ilya Azar of the Cherta portal that this difference between 1937 and now along with the fact that people can still leave the country helps to explain both the way Russian humor has changed and the way Moscow officials respond to it (cherta.media/interview/politichesike-anekdoty/).

            Among the most intriguing observations she makes in the course of a long and wide-ranging interview are the following five:

·       The form of anecdotes in Russia has changed. In Soviet times, they were textual and told. Now they often involve pictures with memes and so many, not hearing what they had come to expect, assume there are fewer. That isn’t the case.

·       Anecdotes have changed in other ways as well. Now, there are fewer about Putin or the war and more about daily life and fewer with those featured in them being members of the intellectual elite, like Rabinovich, and more often ordinary people

·       That makes such stories less threatening to the regime, and it also means that the powers that be monitor them less closely. The E Center, for example, focuses almost exclusively on texts rather than on reels and so misses much of the humor now circulating.

·       That means Instagram and video sites are increasingly where Russian humor is located and why portals like anekdot.ru can continue to operate. They feature subjects and people the Putin regime isn’t especially concerned with.

·       After Putin began his expanded war in Ukraine, there were many anecdotes about him and that conflict. Now, there are far fewer, not because Russians have stopped having negative views about both but rather because humor is a way of coping with change. Now, both Putin and the war are the new normal and less often laughed about.

Common Law Wives of Russian Soldiers Can Get Payments Only If Couple Lived Together and had at Least One Child Together, Moscow Rules

Paul Goble

              Staunton, June 3 – Common law wives of Russian soldiers who have fought and died in Ukraine have appealed a Russian government decision not to grant them any benefits unless they can prove they lived with such men for at least three years and had at least one child in each case.

              This issue has become increasingly explosive not only because of mounting fraud – women who claim benefits without such ties are an increasing problem – but also because of the explosive growth in the number of young Russians who live together without getting married officially (nakanune.ru/articles/124713/).

              One reason many Russian women have given for joining the suit is that they began living together with someone who then volunteered to fight in Ukraine before they had been together for three years but fully expected to return alive and continue the relationship after doing so.

              But there are two major reasons why the government is resisting: the amount of money given to widows of combat victims is large and there is a fear among officials that if the women win this case, others will use it as precedent to expand the rights of common law wives to claim property or inheritances, issues still muddy in Russian law. 

Even for Housing without Indoor Plumbing, Residents of Regions Outside of Moscow Must Save for Years, ‘Horizontal Russia’ Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 1 – That people in the Russian Federation beyond Moscow’s ring road are more likely to be poor than residents of the capital is common knowledge; but just how great their suffering is as a result and how long they must wait to purchase housing is all too often ignored, according to the Horizontal Russia portal.

            The portal, which focuses on developments outside Moscow, found that in some places, families with two children and an average income for their federal subjects must save for decades and in one case more than 90 years to be able to get into substandard housing often without indoor plumbing (semnasem.org/articles/2026/06/01/do-90-let).

            The situation in the North Caucasian republic of Karachayevo-Cherkessia is the worst of those regions and republics Horizontal Russia examined. There, such families may have to wait as long as 91.5 years. In many places, the wait is only a few years; but in other non-Russian republics, it may be as long as 20 years.

            This is a measure of poverty that is rarely taken, but it is a sign of just how dire the situation is for many in the Russian Federation whose government is quite willing to spend billions of rubles on Putin’s war in Ukraine – and one that suggests that in some places at least, the potential for a social explosion is very real indeed. 

Officials Obscuring Siberia’s Economic Decline by Not Factoring Inflation into Statistics, Verkhoturov Says

Paul Goble

              Staunton, June 3 – Adjusted for inflation, Siberia has been declining economically since at least 2020, Dmitry Verkhoturov says; but that decline has been hidden from Moscow and the population by officials in the region who report annual figures as if there had been no inflation.

              But over this period, the Siberian economics reporter says, inflation has exceeded 50 percent; and that means that any figures for 2025 that have not increased by more than that amount over the same period in fact show that the economy has been declining (sibmix.com/?doc=21449).

              In all but two of the 10 federal subjects in the Siberian Federal District, the inflation-adjusted figures show a decline; and in two, Kemerovo and Altai Kray, the increases are far smaller than the 50 percent rise that inflation alone would have boosted them, Verkhoturov continues.

              This statistical sleight of hand not only highlights the incompetence of regional leaders to make real progress but explains why the Siberian FD is losing population. Residents can see that they have few prospects for a better life there if they remain and so are choosing to leave. 

              Unless Siberian FD officials are forced to be more honest, the situation is only going to deteriorate, regardless of how many positive things these officials or those in the Russian capital continue to utter. 

Central Asians Consume 2.5 to 5 Times the Amount of Water Russians Do, Ecologists Say

Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 2 – The debate on whether to divert water from Siberian rivers to Central Asia continues, but except for plans to use pipes rather than canals, little has changed since plans to do so were debated and shelved in Gorbachev’s time, the Kedr environmentalist portal says.

            But there is one major change that few have been talking about that suggests that, in the words of the portal, “no matter how much water comes from Siberia, it will not be enough” to solve Central Asia’s shortages (kedr.media/stories/skolko-by-vody-ni-prishlo-iz-sibiri-ee-budet-malo/).

            The reason, Kedr says, is that Central Asians use vastly more water per capita than do Russians because the former overuse water for agricultural uses and lose much because of inadequate distribution channels. Unless that changes, the situation is going to remain hopeless whatever Russia does.

            According to statistics the portal cites, Kazakhstan uses 3397 liters of water per person daily; Tajikistan, 4153;  Uzbekistan, 4778; and Turkmenistan, 15,445, figures 2.5 to five times more than in the Russian Federation. (The site does not give figures for Kyrgyzstann, but they are certainly above the Russian figure as well.)

            These disproportionate figures suggest that any talk about Siberian river diversion should end until the Central Asians do something about their over-consumption of water.  

New Ethnographic Dictionary of Terms Russian Soldiers in Ukraine Use Highlights Tension between Their Reality and What Moscow Says, Compilers Say

Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 1 – A Russian anthropologist and a Russian psychologist have analyzed the language Russian soldiers use when they appeal to the Russian human rights ombudsman to call attention to the tension between what soldier actually experience and what they feel they can say to Russian officials.

            The two, Aleksandr Arkhipova, who now works in Paris, and Yury Lapshin, who writes for the SHKRAB telegram channel, examined 9476 soldiers’ letters they gained access to and have now released a dictionary of 77 of the most common and revelatory terms (echofm.online/opinions/chto-takoe-etnograficheskij-slovar-vojny-i-kak-on-ustroen).

            In presenting these terms and their definitions, they stress that they are aware of both the tension between the official version of reality and that of the soldiers’ experiences and the way that the compromises the soldiers make in writing to officials nonetheless provides a window into their world.

            The dictionary which is soon to be published in hard copy is already available online at slovar-svo.online/. Among some of the most intriguing and suggestive terms are the following:

·       The word “enemy” isn’t found and there is almost no mention of Ukrainians.

·       “Contract” refers to “the new social contract: ‘Take money and be ready to die for the motherland.’”

·       “Liquidate” is used in place of “kill” or “destroy.”

·       “Musician” is used for Wagner Group members because of the association of the name of their units with Richard Wagner.

·       “Negative lists” refer to lists of those killed in combat.

·       “Bird” is a drone.

·       “Write-Off” refers to those discharged from the military for health reasons.

·       “Black widow” refers to women who enter into marriages, often fictitious, with war veterans as a way to make money.

Varangian-Local Division among Russia's Governors No Longer Only One That Matters, Kynyev Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, May 1 – Ever since Vladimir Putin began installing as governors people from the outside, known in Russian as “Varangians,” analysts and observers have been dividing the gubernatorial corps of the Russian Federation between them and people who have grown up in the federal subject where they are now head, Aleksandr Kynyev says.

            But in a new study, the HSE political scientist argues that, the real divide is now between those who act simply as agents of the Kremlin regardless of how local people feel and those who mobilize the population by reaching out and winning local support (ru.themoscowtimes.com/2026/06/01/regionalnaya-nomenklatura-v-2026-godu-evolyutsiya-i-adaptatsiya-v-novih-usloviyah-a196888).

            Kynyev, who gained wide.spread attention for his 2024 book that compared these two groups and helped solidify the Varangian-local divide, now says that recent developments show that the situation has become more complicated in part because many Varangians have learned that only by reaching out can they be effective. 

            And as the Kremlin has made effectiveness ever more important than personal loyalty among governors (club-rf.ru/theme/693), that is a powerful incentive to work more closely with local elites rather than use Moscow’s backing to override any and all opposition to what Moscow wants.

            Obviously, that does not mean that governors from the outside appointed by Putin are going to cease to do what he wants or that this shift, which involves only some of the governors even now, is about to return the Russian Federation to the 1990s when governors were local powerhouses and regularly opposed Moscow.

            But it does introduce a new element in regional politics and may mean, during the looming succession crisis, even Varangians who have reached out to the population, may more quickly move to its side against some in Moscow than analysts have suggested in recent years.

            For that reason, the details that Kynyev offers in his 8,000-word analysis of changes in gubernatorial behavior over the last several years are important and suggest that even the appointment of Varangians doesn’t ensure that they will remain on the sidelines if they calculate the center is weakening. 

Russia has Been Redirecting Ukrainian Drones to Attack Latvian Targets, Riga Says

Paul Goble

              Staunton, June 1 – Over the last month, three drones have crashed in various parts of Latvia; and according to the Latvian defense ministry, “as a rule,” these are Ukrainian drones that Kyiv targeted against Russia but that Russian electronic warfare specialists have hacked and retargeted to hit Latvia.

              While the number of such attacks has been small, the impact of these has been large, with constant air raids, canceled year-end examinations, the drones themselves, and the loss of tourists, Latvian officials say (svoboda.org/a/latgalia-granitsa-rf-upali-tri-bespilotnika/33770038.html).

              But perhaps the most important aspect of this history lies in a different place: If Moscow is in fact redirecting Ukrainian drones, the Russian government has the capacity to do this in a more serious way and can use such tactics to avoid responsibility and engage in a covert war for a long time that some won’t identify as being the handiwork of Russia.

              Indeed, what the Latvian defense ministry is reporting may be a signal of just how Moscow intends to ramp up tensions across the Baltic region and to prepare for what could prove to be an attempt by Russian forces there to seize territory in ways that could lead to controversies within NATO as to how to respond.

Russian Psychiatric Society Says Russian Troops in Ukraine Should Serve There No Longer than Six Months and in Many Cases Far Less Long

Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 1 – The Russian Society of Psychatrists says that no Russian soldier should remain in the war zone in Ukraine for more than six months and that any who are involved in continuous fighting should be replaced after no more than two weeks and in cases of heavy losses after a few days, Kommersant reports.

            The society’s recommendations have been send to the Russian health ministry for approval and are, in its words, “aimed at preventing the depletion of adaptive resources and reducing the risk of developing post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) (kommersant.ru/doc/8707885).

            It is unlikely that the Russian authorities will follow the society’s advice given how pressed for man power it already is; but this declaration by psychiatric experts will likely lead ever more Russians to oppose the way Putin’s war in Ukraine is being fought and come out in opposition to it.

            One recommendation the society has made could actually lead to changes, if not in the use of Russian servicemen on the battle fronts but in their treatment after they return home. Up to now, Russia has not used the latest international definitions of PTSD, and the society calls for the adoption of these and for updating treatment protocols. 

Another Act of Muscovite Discrimination Against Non-Russians: Russian Officials Seek Return of Disproportionate Share of Ethnic Russian POWs

Paul Goble

            Staunton, May 31 – Moscow drafted and sent to fight in Ukraine a disproportionate number of non-Russians and now it is discriminating against them at the other end as well: Only 66 percent of POWs Ukraine has held are ethnic Russians, but among those Moscow has sought to have returned in prisoner exchanges, 83 percent were members of that dominant ethnic group.

            That is a clear sign of ethnic discrimination, according to the I Want to Live project which examined statistics on returnees between 2022 and 2025; and it is certain to further exacerbate ethnic tensions in the Russian Federation (svoboda.org/a/pochemu-semji-voennoplennyh-iz-natsrespublik-govoryat-o-diskriminatsii/33764665.html).

            Mariya Vyshkova, a Buryat expert on the ethnic composition of those killed on the Russian side, says that she and other observers “have noticed all this time that representatives of the indigenous peoples of Siberia and other national minorities, when captured, are much less likely to be exchanged than ethnic Russians.”

            Until now, however, this was “more of an intuitive feeling based on news reports and stories we received; but now these figures confirm that. Why is this the case? On the one hand, she says, “we can say that this is discrimination on ethnic groups: representatives of ethnic minorities are considered less valuable.”

            “But it seems to me, she says, “that this is a matter of political visibility, of what political consequences there may be if this particular individual is not exchanged and thus is also a matter of how noticeable his story is” and how likely it will attract media or at least public attention.

            She adds that non-Russians “really get used to the fact that they are second-class citizens and that they are much less likely to be heard … In general, this reflects reality.” Consequently, it is difficult to say which plays the larger role: the way they are viewed or the fact that they have fewer opportunities to get publicity.”