Hello, dear readers!
News from Russia is increasingly reminiscent of “Notes from a Dead House”:
Navalny was transferred for a year to a single cell-type room, EPKT, due to his “incorrigibility” (these are the strictest conditions of detention – they were preceded by SUON, SHIZO and PKT); Alexei Moskalev, who criminally “discredited” the Russian army, was sent to a punishment cell for the fifth time in a row (for leaning on his arm while sitting at the table), and Moscow municipal deputy Alexei Gorinov, convicted under the article on “fake news,” was sent to the third time (for failure to comply with morning exercises). Here is a cheerful interview about prison with Navalny’s Ufa comrade-in-arms Liliya Chanysheva, who was sentenced to 7.5 years. In Novosibirsk, on the way from interrogation to a pre-trial detention center, guards brutally beat Ilya Baburin, suspected of attempting to set fire to a military registration and enlistment office (they called him a “traitor to the motherland” and promised that it would be even tougher); in Moscow, police broke a guy’s arm, deciding that he was a drug pawnbroker. A resident of the Saratov region was fined 150 thousand rubles under a criminal article about “discrediting” the Russian army for showing the middle finger to the Z symbol; The court of cassation overturned the decision to terminate the criminal case against a Yekaterinburg resident who shouted at a child wearing a hat with the letter Z. Actionist Pavel Krisevich was sentenced to five years in prison for a simulated suicide rally on Red Square (“hooliganism using objects used as weapons”). In St. Petersburg, criminal cases of non-reporting were opened against two girlfriends of a nurse accused of attempting to set fire to a military registration and enlistment office. Street artist BFMTH, who created anti-war posters, left Russia after threats from security forces and administrative arrest. Here is an interview with the departed programmer Veprikov (he is accused under the article about “fakes”). A court in St. Petersburg arrested in absentia a resident of Vsevolozhsk who managed to leave, accused of “justifying terrorism.” The FSB reported on the initiation of a case of treason against a resident of Krasnodar, who wanted to participate in the war on the side of Ukraine; A Russian court in annexed Crimea sentenced two Ukrainian citizens to 15 and 16 years in a maximum security colony on espionage charges.
But there is also cultural news: the Yakut film “Aita” had its distribution certificate taken away; three Russian propagandists were given pigs’ heads (and before that busts were sent by mail); On Friday, a festive concert “One Country, One Family, One Russia” will be held on Red Square with the participation of Putin alone – in honor of the anniversary of the “annexation” of four regions of Ukraine (those who want to work as extras are offered only 600 rubles).
Everything is stable in the economy: the largest cryptocurrency exchange Binance announced its departure from Russia and the sale of its Russian business to CommEX; The Russian government expects to receive more than one hundred billion rubles in the form of “voluntary commissions” from foreign companies selling assets.
Military reports
On Thursday night, an air alert was declared across most of Ukraine due to the danger of missile and drone strikes.
There are no significant progress on the fronts. The Ukrainian military managed to take partial fire control of the Gorlovka-Bakhmut highway; A Ukrainian military man stationed on this section of the front confirmed to CNN reporters that the “Wagnerites” who had previously been in Belarus had returned to Bakhmut. The head of the press service of the Eastern Group of Forces of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Ilya Yevlash, said that the Russian army is forming new assault companies in the Liman-Kupyansk direction, and the adviser to the Ukrainian mayor of Mariupol, Pyotr Andryushchenko, said that the Russian occupation authorities are going to connect Mariupol with Rostov-on-Don by railway and They have already begun to build a bridge across the Kalmius River (this will radically reduce the dependence of the Russian army on the Crimean Bridge). You can find out what the situation looks like on the other side of the front from a conversation with a Russian mobilized from Komsomolsk-on-Amur.
The Insider discovered that the St. Petersburg Club of Submariners and Navy Veterans has opened a charity fundraiser in favor of the injured crew members of the Rostov-on-Don submarine – a missile attack on the dry dock where it was located by Ukraine on September 13. As for the consequences of the missile attack on the headquarters of the Black Sea Fleet in Sevastopol on September 22, the commander of the fleet, Admiral Sokolov, contrary to statements by the Ukrainian Special Operations Forces, seems to be still alive: a new video with his participation was distributed online – in order to film it, the football award ceremony the Chernomorets team had to do it one more time.
International echo of war
The Bulgarian Parliament approved the transfer of S-300 missiles in need of repair to Ukraine. Moscow is angry because it was not asked for written consent. Russia has banned the entry of 23 British citizens, among them Admiral Tony Radakin, head of the British Army Defense Staff, who, according to the Russian Foreign Ministry, “oversees the training of Ukrainian Armed Forces militants on British territory.” And to make London even worse, the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, accused the UK of “staged a provocation” in Bucha. The Guardian writes, citing a secret report that Kyiv handed over to the G7 countries in August, that more than 50 European components were found in the Iranian drones with which Russia attacks Ukraine. Since export restrictions obviously do not work, Ukraine proposes to solve the issue with the help of missile strikes on Shaheed production sites in Iran, Syria and Russia. According to the Agency, the German-Japanese company DMG MORI continues to supply Russian military-industrial complex enterprises with machines for the production of weapons, despite statements about leaving the Russian market. The Russian DMG MORI plant in Ulyanovsk is operating, and the head of the companies that own this plant received Israeli citizenship, changed his last name from Sokolov to Goldman and now lives in Berlin, working at the head office of DMG MORI. In Kazakhstan, a Russian woman, Natalya Narskaya, is being held in a pre-trial detention center for two months. She faces extradition to Russia on charges of “calls to extremism” – the problem is that she suffers from schizophrenia and, apparently, is deprived of access to medication in prison: she constantly screams, breaks down clothes and smears excrement on the walls of the punishment cell where she is being held. Kazakh human rights activists have not yet been able to achieve her transfer from the pre-trial detention center to the hospital. Putin gave Russian citizenship to the “ataman of the Australian Cossacks” Semyon Boykov – he has been hiding in the Russian consulate in Sydney for more than six months after a clash with a 76-year-old participant in a rally in support of Ukraine. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau apologized on behalf of Canada for the participation of 98-year-old veteran of the SS Galicia division Jaroslav Gunek in a parliamentary event at which Vladimir Zelensky spoke.
Around the world
More than 50 thousand refugees arrived from Nagorno-Karabakh, which came under the control of Azerbaijan, to the territory of Armenia. The flow does not stop, here are photographs, here is a video from the border Goris, here are the stories of Armenian volunteers. It seems that not everyone is allowed through the border: while trying to enter Armenia, the Azerbaijani military detained the former head of the government of the self-proclaimed Nagorno-Karabakh billionaire Ruben Vardanyan – he was taken to Baku in handcuffs. Azerbaijan announced 192 military deaths during “anti-terrorist measures” in Nagorno-Karabakh. Orientalist Ilya Kusa tells us what will happen next: the conflict, in his opinion, is far from being resolved. 30 years ago, control of Sukhumi passed from Georgian units to Abkhazian formations, which were supported by the Russian armed forces – here are the stories of Georgians and Abkhazians who suffered in this war. The Russian billionaire, founder of the Summa group, Ziyavudin Magomedov, who is serving a 19-year sentence, filed a lawsuit in the High Court of London against Rosatom and Transneft, demanding to pay him almost $14 billion for seized assets. Uzbekistan is helping Belarus sell fertilizers produced by Grodno Azot, which is under sanctions, to the EU. How exactly this is done, read the material of the “Belarusian Investigation Center”. In Belarus, a 63-year-old pensioner with a disability was sentenced to a year and three months in prison for insulting Lukashenko through a like and a short comment on Odnoklassniki, posted in 2021. The content of the comment is classified.
Six links
Talk about war. Conversation with philosopher Andreas Buller, author of the book “Morality and the Language of Totalitarianism: Bolshevism, National Socialism, Putinism.” Or an interview with psychotherapist Wolfgang Schmidbauer, who has been studying the echoes of war in German families for many years. Engineering. A story about the Soviet airliner TU-104 – the deadliest civilian aircraft in the world. Or a fragment from Alvy Ray Smith’s book “Pixel. The story of one point” (publishing house “Individuum”), which tells how and why the first digital images were created. Movie. Stanislav Zelvensky’s interview with Woody Allen, in which he is surprised that cinemas operate in Russia. Or an excerpt from Quentin Tarantino’s book “Film Speculations” (Individuum publishing house), dedicated to his relationship with Scorsese’s “Taxi Driver.”
Sincerely yours,
Seven forty
