Window on Eurasia -- New Series: 2026

Tuesday, June 9, 2026

Central Muslim Spiritual Directorate Rejects Suggestions Its Imams are Promoting Extremism

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 8 -- Nearly three weeks after Russian officials charged more than a dozen senior Muslim leaders with various crimes, an action Russian commentators said reflected the Central MSD’s promotion of extremism, that body which is headed by Ravil Gainutdin has responded with a public declaration denouncing all these charges and suggestions.

(On the arrests and commentaries in May, see windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2026/05/moscow-arrests-ten-senior-muslim.html and jamestown.org/moscows-arrests-of-muslim-spiritual-directorate-officials-likely-to-backfire/; for the Central MSD’s response, see dumrf.ru/upravlenie/documents/26455 and agents.media/duhovnoe-upravlenie-musulman-vpervye-prokommentirovalo-kampaniyu-po-presledovaniyu-islamskih-bogoslovov/.)

The Central MSD declared that “we categorically reject assertions made in certain media reports and by bloggers alleging that the Spiritual Administration of Muslims of the Russian Federation is linked to extremism, radicalism, foreign influence, or inter-ethnic discord.”

“On the contrary,” it continues, “since its inception, the Spiritual Administration—representing a significant portion of Russia’s Muslims—has operated within the framework of Russian law and in the interests of inter-ethnic, interfaith, and civic harmony; it conducts religious-educational and social activities aimed at fostering the unity of all the peoples of our country.”

Consequently, “attempts to portray the Spiritual Administration of Muslims as a source of extremism serve not to protect society, but rather to fuel mistrust between state institutions and believers, as well as among the peoples of Russia. Amidst external pressure on the country, such a campaign plays into the hands of its adversaries by undermining internal unity and eroding trust in traditional religious institutions.”

And it concludes: “the Spiritual Administration of Muslims of the Russian Federation considers it unacceptable to turn isolated, controversial incidents into a campaign aimed at discrediting a traditional religious institution of Russian Muslims. Such a campaign risks stoking inter-ethnic and interfaith tensions, undermines confidence in legitimate religious organizations, and distracts state authorities from addressing genuine threats.”

In short, the Central MSD and its leader Mufti Ravil Gainutdin have not been intimidated by the arrests and are coming out swinging as it were in defense of themselves and those who have been charged by the state authorities, a response that may make the government think twice about pursuing this campaign or face the consequences of resistance by Muslim leaders.

Russia’s Conflict with the West will Last ‘Decades’ and be Both Hot and Cold, Bezrukov Says

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 6 – Andrey Bezrukov, an MGIMO professor with close ties to the Russian intelligence services, says that Russia’s current conflict with the West will last “decades” and involve both “hot” and “cold’ periods, thus throwing cold water on many in Russia and the West that the situation will improve radically after Putin leaves the scene.

In comments to the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, the foreign policy expert said that everyone must be ready for two generations that are going to live in a situation that will be “practically at war” and that Moscow must “be ready for this” and modify the economy and the state budget to support that situation (nakanune.ru/articles/124733/).

Other Russian experts at the meeting disagreed, but Bezrukov’s words stand out not only because he is known to be extremely influential and has ties with those close to Putin but because what he is saying about changing Russia to put it in a position to continue to fight the West is consistent with Putin’s line.

‘To Intimidate a Thousand Russians, One Need Punish Only One,’ Rights Activists Say

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 8 – To intimidate a thousand residents of the Russian Federation, the organs need punish only a few, often young people who are arrested and charged with serious crimes like terrorism as a result of provocations carried out by the police or the security services Memorial, OVD and other Russian human rights groups and experts say.

In reporting this unanimity, Nataliya Kildiyarova, a North Caucasus broadcaster at Radio Liberty, provides the number these groups and experts point to and the way actions against individuals affect their families, friends, and then larger groups (svoboda.org/a/chtoby-zapugatj-tysyachu-dostatochno-nakazatj-odnogo-podrostkov-na-yuge-i-severnom-kavkaze-presleduyut-za-terrorizm/33775795.html).

Perhaps the most striking fact she advances comes from Russian sociologist Dmitry Dubrovsky who points out that “the number of known cases of prosecuting minors in the republics of the North Caucasus appears to be smaller than in neighboring regions of the south of Russia.”

The scholar says he isn’t surprised because the strength of family ties in the North Caucasus is so strong that families can be intimidated just by suggestions that charges might be brought against one of their number whereas elsewhere, where families are less strong, that is not the case and the authorities have to bring charges to achieve their goals.

What that confirms, although the sociologist is not explicit on this point, is that there are more real crimes by young people in the North Caucasus than elsewhere and than are being reported and that the reason the authorities are going after young people is first and foremost to intimidate others.

Where the organs don’t have to bring charges to achieve that end, they are less likely to; but where they have to bring charges or the population will not be intimidated.

Putin Tells Shipbuilding Corporation Head There Must Not Be Further Delays in Building Icebreakers

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 8 – Vladimir Putin told Andrey Puchkov, head of Russia’s United Shipbuilding Corporation, that there must not be any delays in the building of icebreakers lest such delays allow the West to challenge Russia’s position on the Northern Sea Route and block Russia’s access to products and technologies.

This meeting and Putin’s blunt message calls attention not to the successes Russia has had in the construction of icebreakers but precisely to its failure to meet plans, something that is often passed over in silence (newizv.ru/news/2026-06-08/pomeshat-budet-slozhno-putin-ukrepil-liderstvo-rossii-v-ledokolnom-flote-440447).

And the failures of Russia to produce enough icebreakers are all too real. Despite Putin’s repeated interventions, Russia has built only one icebreaker since the start of his expanded war in Ukraine (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2025/09/russia-has-built-only-one-icebreaker.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2023/10/ukrainian-war-costs-forces-moscow-to.html).

Moreover, the current projects in the yards both regarding construction and refitting are lagging behind, even as climate change and Russia’s needs to modernize its fleet to handle both its riverine needs and growing ice problems in the eastern portions of the NSR that frequently trap Russian and foreign ships and embarrass the Kremlin.

Fate of Ethnic Finns in USSR Detailed in New Book and Electronic Data Base

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 8 – The Finnish National Archives has released its final report on The Fate of Finns in the Soviet Union 1917-1964 (in Finnish) in the form of both a book by Alexi Manio and an interactive data base with information on some 38,000 Finns (mariuver.eu/2026/06/08/sudby-finnov-v-sovetskom-sojuze/).

(The full text of the itself book is available in full in Finnish online at drive.google.com/file/d/19_FRE2rQs9HgBG7JE0HoAe9p3OtfOyBq/; the electronic data base also in Finnish can be found at kohtalonaneuvostoliitto.kansallisarkisto.fi/index.php.)

These new publications are especially valuable for the light they shed on the number of ethnic Finns who fell victim to Stalinist repression and to the very different ways these repressions hit the various waves of Finnish migration into the Russian Empire and then the USSR.

These waves of migration included “the "old" Finns, who lived in St. Petersburg before the revolution, the "red refugees" who left Finland after the Civil War of 1918 and the American Finns who came to Karelia from the USA and Canada fo find work during the depression of the 1930s,” Mari El reports in its review of the book and data set.

In Online Vote, 4,000 Karelians ‘Like’ a Post Calling for Ouster of Their Republic’s Leaders

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 8 – The Internet is transforming things, not least of which are public opinion polls and even elections, given that individuals can go online and express their opinions in ways that officials in many countries, including prominently the Russian Federation don’t want them to.

An intriguing example of this is taking place in Karelia now. There in the space of less than 24 hours, 4,000 people have chosen to “like” a post calling for the ouster of the Moscow-appointed head of the republic, Artur Parfenchikov, and his prime minister, Irina Kolykhmatova (nemoskva.net/2026/06/08/bolee-treh-tysyach-zhitelej-za-noch-podderzhali-trebovanie-ob-otstavke-rukovodstva-karelii/ and ru.thebarentsobserver.com/novosti/post-za-otstavku-glavy-karelii-za-sutki-nabral-cetyre-tysaci-lajkov/452158).

In addition to these “votes,” more than 700 people have left commentaries on the post, overwhelmingly sharing the original author’s position and adding new details of what people feel about the regime of the two officials, already known to be extremely unpopular by the population of that republic.

Obviously, the Kremlin isn’t going to accept the results of this “vote” and replace one or both of these officials; but such a vote matters in at least two important ways. On the one hand, Moscow officials will certainly take note of such expressions of anger at their agents in the federal subject and are likely to view such voting as a black mark on the latter.

And on the other – and this is both far more likely and far more important – people in Karelia who are angry about what their Moscow-imposed rulers are certain to be energized by this expression of solidarity in opposition to the exiting regime, something that may matter even more if such a tactic spreads to other regions and republics in the Russian Federation.

Samizdat and Tamizdat Today Different from What They were in Soviet Times, Klots Says

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 8 – In Soviet times, there were three kinds of literature – gosizdat published with the imprimatur of the communist authorities, samizdat which was issued by people who wanted to communicate with others but couldn’t get or didn’t want official qpproval, and tamizdat which was published abroad and smuggled back in.

Yakov Klots, a scholat at Hunter College who runs the Tamizdat Project there, says that “gosizdat in its pure Soviet form does not exist in Russia today” as publishing houses there now are privately owned however much government controlled (novayagazeta.eu/articles/2026/06/08/my-perevodim-knigi-ne-dlia-togo-chtoby-razvlech-zapadnogo-chitatelia-skazkami-ob-uzhasakh-putinskoi-tiurmy).

But both samizdat and tamizdat have changed. “Samizdat has acquired a new technological dimension,” with online electronic forms now dominating the scene and able to reach their audiences “thousands of times better” than was the case in Soviet times with handwritten or typed documents.

Despite that difference, however, Klots continues, there is “a paradox” in that “digital samizdat retains a key property of its Soviet ancestor: it has a limited, hermetic, and niche audience living inside a certain information bubble.”

Tamizdat, he continues, is both similar and different from its Soviet antecedent. It is, of course, “a phenomenon that is directly oppose that of émigré literature, as the key distinguishing feature of tamizdat is that the text crosses the state border while its quthor remains within the metropolis where this text cannot be published.”

“If we look at the present day through this lens, Klots continues, “we will see that the real tamizdat is alive. There are many authors who, for various reasons, stay inside Russia, write there, but send their texts for publication to foreign independent publishing houses, often under pseudonyms or anonymously.”

“But, as before, the "new tamizdat" is dominated by authors who have already emigrated, that is those who have for some time now found themselves in the same jurisdiction and geography where their books are published,” a difference that sometimes leads to confusion.

The Hunter College scholar notes that “the role of paper has also changed. If Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago had been released simply in epub or Print on Demand format today, it would not have become the tectonic shift it was in 1974. Today's Gulag Archipelago would only be an event if it was released as a series on Netflix.”

And that in turn helps to explain why tamizdat and even samizdat issued now seldom has the same impact that they did in Soviet times.

‘The Russian Economy isn’t Dying; It’s Being Sovietized by Means of Force and Violence,’ Lea and Tashkin Say

Paul Goble

Staunton, June 5 – The Putin regime has “never been a market economy in the Western sense, Aaron Lea and Borukh Taskin say. Instead, “it was and has remained the political economy of regime survival” whose real success is “whether it is capable of financing war and suppressing internal resistance for long enough.” From that perspective, “it is still coping.”

All too often, however, the two Israeli analysts of Russian background say, both Russian and Western analysts evaluate the Russian economy as if it were a market economy rather than one devoted to regime survival and then conclude that the situation in Russia is becoming dire, a doubly serious mistake ” (kasparovru.com/material.php?id=6A22CB4835805).

On the one hand, such predictions discredit serious analysis; and on the other, and more seriously, they give many Western governments the false impression that the sanctions regime is working as intended and that all they have to do to bring Putin down is “to wait a little longer.”

Analysts who approach Russia as if it were a market economy ignore the case of Iran “which has survived under sanctions for 46 years” and pursued an aggressive policy abroad and a repressive one at home. But it is clear, the two analysts say, that Putin has paid attention to what Iran is doing and copying much of it for his own country.

What analysts of the Putin regime should be focusing on is not when will the Russian economy die but rather “what is emerging in its place … a unique hybrid, an analogue of the degrading economy of late Soviet times without the former autarky – locked inside a Chinese financial noose, propped up by nuclear weapons, led by a new class of accomplices vitally interested in endless war, and open to laundering any money on the planet for a modest Kremlin interest.”

“It is thus pointless,” the two analysts say, “to wait for this structure to in response to Western sanctions.” To defeat Putin and his system, they argue, the West must “change the vector and scale of sanctions” and stop telling themselves and others that what they are doing now will work sooner or later.

Saturday, June 6, 2026

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.

Friday, June 5, 2026

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.

Thursday, June 4, 2026

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.

Monday, June 1, 2026

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.”

Sunday, May 31, 2026

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.

Saturday, May 30, 2026

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.

Northeastern Russia Failing to Get Support for New Railroads from Either Moscow or Beijing

Paul Goble

Staunton, May 28 – Officials and businesses in the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) and the Magadan Oblast continue to push for the construction of new railroads in that enormous region but neither Moscow nor Beijing currently appears interested in spending the enormous sums such projects would cost, Yuliya Fursova says.

When Putin began his expanded war in Ukraine in 2022, the Siberian Economist journalist says, Moscow removed such projects from its plans over the next decade or more; and China after signing a letter of intent has since done the same, with neither apparently ready to back such projects (sibmix.com/?doc=21390).

But in the hopes of forcing one or the other or both to do more and to help local entrepreneurs who are building smaller lines there, officials in the two federal subjects of Russia’s northeast, a region which suffers from a severe shortage of transportation infrastructure have continued to meet and press their case, so far unsuccessfully.

According to Fursova, this means that the region will stagnate and prevent the Russian Far East from developing at anything like the past that Moscow and presumably Beijing want. (For background on this debate, see https://sibmix.com/?doc=4576, https://sibmix.com/?doc=7714 and https://sibmix.com/?doc=14759).

What makes this case especially intriguing is that it is a rare example of a non-Russian republic working hand in glove with a predominantly ethnic Russian region to press Moscow and as an alternative Beijing to help both. That kind of cooperation, if it spreads, will present the Russian capital with problems and the Chinese one with opportunities.