Russia’s espionage agencies are redoubling efforts to penetrate NATO, Western intelligence officials say, and are focusing on recruiting moles in the defense ministries of the pact’s member states.
Italy expelled two Russian diplomats this week after they were caught in a parking lot in Rome handing cash to an Italian naval captain in exchange for sensitive military documents, which included NATO files.
For the better part of six years since Russia and Ukraine signed the Minsk II cease-fire accord for the disputed eastern Ukrainian region of Donbass, one question has loomed: How will the U.S. and NATO respond if Russian troops again cross back over the so-called Line of Contact, dividing Ukrainian forces from Russian-backed separatists? With reports now trickling in of a buildup of Russian military forces along the border and in Crimea, Washington and Brussels may need quick answers soon.
Two years ago, Russian activist Vladimir Kara-Murza pointed out that Vladimir Putin’s Russia had more political prisoners than the USSR did when Andrey Sakharov began calling attention to them in the USSR in 1976 (rferl.org/a/activist-number-of-political-prisoners-in-russia-twice-what-it-was-in-ussr/30048022.html).
In period since Kara-Murza made that calculation, Ellen Leafstedt of St. Antony’s College in Oxford says, the numbers of political prisoners in Russia have only increased and indeed continue to rise. In an article for the Riddle portal, she suggests that it is important to recognize their diversity (ridl.io/ru/nakazanie-bez-prestuplenija/).
A war memoir written by a former Russian paratrooper who fought in Syria for the Kremlin-backed mercenary Wagner Group, owned by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a plutocrat nicknamed “Putin’s chef,” had been eagerly awaited.
Reports this week that the United Arab Emirates is potentially financing Russian mercenaries in Libya affiliated with the notorious Wagner Group, according to a Pentagon watchdog, appear to be sending mini shockwaves through Washington. But the UAE has long had a fixation on mercenaries, and the fact that Russia is a regular supplier of soldiers of fortune should surprise no one. Much more worrying is the lack of policy coherence in Washington on what to do about it.
Turkey has announced that an agreement was reached with Russia on the technical details of a joint center soon to be established to monitor the ceasefire between Armenia and Azerbaijan in the Nagorno-Karabakh region.
Combatant from the Russian mercenary group tied to ‘Putin’s chef’ grants Meduza the first interview of its kind
How Russian banking regulators got rich on federal bailouts. A joint investigation by Meduza, Proekt, and VTimes.
Russian President Vladimir Putin declared on Tuesday that Azerbaijan and Armenia had signed a peace agreement, ending six weeks of fierce fighting between the two countries over Nagorno-Karabakh. The mountainous region is internationally-recognised as part of Azerbaijan but has been occupied and run by ethnic Armenians since 1994.
Russian Wagner Group mercenaries and the Sudanese Janjaweed forc es are still flooding into the city of Sirte to bolster the forces of Haftar, the Burkan Al-Ghadab (Volcano of Rage) operation said Wednesday.
The key city of Sirte, which lies some 450 kilometers (280 miles) east of the capital, is currently under the control of Haftar’s forces.
The naval vessels and units participating in the drill departed from Alexandria Naval Base in formation on their way to the Black Sea
A number of Egyptian naval vessels participating in the Egyptian-Russian maritime drill dubbed Friendship Bridge 3 have crossed the Dardanelles and Bosporus straits on their way to the Black Sea, the Egyptian Armed Forces said on Monday.