In Ukraine’s presidential elections, life is imitating Netflix
Servant of the People is a hilarious Ukrainian situation comedy currently running on Netflix. It opens with a young high-school…
Dau is the strangest and most unsettling piece of art to come out of Russia in years
Dau is not so much a film as a document of a mass human experiment. The result is dark, brilliant…
Does Putin intend to go to war with Ukraine?
On Europe’s eastern borderlands, trouble is brewing. Two headstrong leaders — Vladimir Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart Petro Poroshenko —…
How Bellingcat outfoxes the world’s spy agencies
Bellingcat is an independent group of exceptionally gifted Leicester-based internet researchers who use information gleaned from open sources to dig…
The magnificent Atkinsons: rigours of travel in 19th-century Russia
Russia has always attracted a certain breed of foreigner: adventurers, drawn to the country’s vastness and emptiness; chancers, seeking fortunes…
Why the Romanovs were doomed
The true tragedy of the last Romanovs was a failure of imagination. Both during his last disastrous months in office…
Putin says he’s making Russia great again. In reality, it’s crumbling
This is Putin’s time. Next week, the Fifa World Cup kicks off in Moscow, and the Kremlin has spared no…
Vladimir Putin’s toxic power
Vladimir Putin’s spies have a dizzying variety of weapons at their disposal. This week Britain learned of a new one:…
For Putin, the World Cup is not about football but global respect
Authoritarian regimes love grand international sporting events. There’s something about the mass regimentation, the set-piece spectacle, the old-fashioned idea of…
A love letter to Turkey’s lost past
Patricia Daunt’s collection of essays is a fascinating exploration of some of Turkey’s most beautiful and evocative places, from the…
The hunger
In 1933 my aunt Lenina Bibikova was eight years old. She lived in Kharkov, Ukraine. Every morning a polished black…
Ukraine’s last best hope
Georgia’s former president may be a reckless narcissist, but he could change everything
Putin’s Syria problem
For Vladimir Putin, Syria has been the gift that kept on giving. His 2015 military intervention propelled Russia back to…
Only obeying orders
Spare a thought for the poor Gulag guard: the rifleman standing in the freezing wind on the outside of the…
Red faces
How to celebrate the centenary of the Russian revolutions of 1917? Modern Russians are deeply divided over the legacy of…
Russia’s puritan revolution
Last weekend a group of young activists turned out on a Moscow street to protest against western decadence. They were…
Russia’s dumping ground
Almost as soon as Siberia was first colonised by Cossack conquistadors in the 17th century, it became a place of…
Bear baiting
Oh those Russians. When they’re not beating up English football fans, they’re cheating at the Olympics. They occupy other countries…
Putin’s great game
In Syria, the Russian leader is on the verge of his biggest – and riskiest – coup yet
How Putin outwitted the West
His cynical statecraft in Syria has run rings around Britain and America
Putin and the polygamists
The Kremlin is tying itself in ideological knots as it tries to make new friends in the Muslim world
Diary
Moscow Here we go again. The rouble slides, then tumbles, and slides again. For those of us who remember the…
Letter from Donetsk
For what is technically peacetime, there’s a lot of shelling going on round here. Donetsk airport is still held by…
The frightening face of Russia’s future
Cuddly liberals aren’t going to displace Putin: his real challengers are ultra-nationalists like Igor Strelkov
Empire of deceit
Putin’s answer to the destruction of Flight MH17 has been more propaganda. In Russia, at least, it seems to be working
