In a thoughtful and nuanced analysis of the internet’s role in Russian civil society (which just happened to include a few thoughtful and nuanced reflections from your humble blogger:), Radio Liberty’s Daisy Sindelar writes: “The Russian Internet, or RuNet, is the first medium in the country to come without a built-in ideological bent. And along […]
Morally bankrupt movie star Hilary Swank attended the festive birthday party of dictator Ramzan Kadyrov in the Chechen capital of Grozny on Wednesday, accompanied by a number of other celebrities including pop culture oddity Jean-Claude Van Damme and British violinist Vanessa Mae. Reportedly, Ms Mae was paid half a million dollars to attend the party […]
Recent accusations that millions of dollars were funneled from Azerbaijan in exchange for assurances that Azerbaijani boxers would win gold medals at the London Olympic Games in 2012 have led to denials from the world’s Olympic boxing organization, indignation from Baku, and an ad hoc committee that will investigate the claims. Since the the airing […]
Nostalgia is everywhere these days, a far cry from the good old days when we used to live for the future. Woody Allen. South Africa politicians. Even Mad Men are in on the act. But nostalgia for the Soviet war in Afghanistan? “Car bombs and suicide attacks, which have become a permanent threat in today’s […]
Starting Sunday, September 25, the Kyrgyz government introduced a ban on all foreign news broadcasting for the duration of the presidential campaign – until election day on October 30, 2011. During the five week moratorium, Kyrgyzstan’s television stations and cable operators are barred from rebroadcasting foreign news bulletins, reports EurasiaNet. The motivation behind the law […]
Did you know that Skype comes from Estonia? Ok, smartypants. But did you know Skype loves the Soviet Union? Well, maybe not loves exactly, but at least gives credit where credit is due. For some reason, Baltic people are not exactly what you’d call nostalgic for their former Slav overlords. So I was surprised to […]
In 2024, I’ll be middle aged, turning 40. Maybe filthy rich, much more probably struggling to feed the kids. Or without any kids. Or maybe even dead – who knows? The polar ice caps might be gone and the US broken up into individual chunks run by China and Norway. Maybe not. But one thing […]
Another of Azerbaijan’s prominent defense lawyers was effectively disbarred late last week, the third such incident involving attorneys for opposition figures in recent months. Elchin Namazov, who had been representing four defendants involved in street protests in April, was expelled from Azerbaijan’s “Collegium,” an organization that vets attorneys for participation in felony trials. Lawyers Khalid […]
The assassination of former President Burhanuddin Rabbani is a signal of things to come: the Taliban have demonstrated that they have upper the hand over the Afghan military and police. The Taliban have shown that they are not weakening and that they will not settle the conflict in Afghanistan on any terms but their own. […]
Of all the things to envy about Alexander Lebedev – his billions, his international media empire, his mansion on the grounds of Hampton Court Palace – what most Russians are really jealous of is that it was he and not them who knocked out Sergei Polonsky. Sergei who? Now internationally ridiculed as the man who split […]
I remember when Russian haute cuisine was a 10 letter word: mayonnaise. When the first “Western” pizzeria opened in my home town of Murmansk around 1994, its house specialty certainly looked like pizza: a slick flatbread baked in a giant rectangular pan and sliced into plate sized squares. I queued for ages to get my […]
Ten years ago the story of the Taliban as a criminal organization began its unfolding international public narrative. Ten years ago the story of Islamist rebellion and insurgency in Afghanistan dovetailed directly with the story of American politics in the 21st century. That story is run through with cheap talk, carnage, forsaken promises and missed […]
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