Russia on Tuesday slammed U.S. President Donald Trump for reinstating its ally Cuba on a list of state sponsors of terrorism, saying the measure was aimed at destabilizing the island and prompting regime change. Trump on Monday reversed his predecessor Joe Biden’s decision to remove Cuba from a blacklist of state sponsors of terrorism. Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in a statement that the newly inaugurated Trump’s order was undoubtedly “aimed at further tightening financial and economic restrictions in the hopes of destabilizing the situation and changing power in Cuba.” The move is unjustified because Cuba is an active participant in “international cooperation on counterterrorism,” Zakharova said. The U.S. must realize such measures “have an extremely negative influence on the quality of life of the island’s population,” she added, suggesting it was aiming to provoke “social discontent.” Russia will continue to provide “necessary support to Cuba” to back its...

Exiled Russian opposition activist Mikhail Khodorkovsky said he was in attendance at U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration on Monday. “May as well check it out, since I’ve been invited,” Khodorkovsky posted on X, describing security measures at the event as “laid-back.” Khodorkovsky attached a selfie of himself in a tuxedo, followed by photographs of the inside of Capital One Arena in downtown Washington and a guest pass for a Jan. 18 “cabinet reception.” Public spectators are watching the inauguration from Capital One Arena while Trumpa’s swearing-in ceremony is taking place at the U.S. Capitol due to cold weather. Khodorkovsky, once Russia’s wealthiest man, left the country after he was pardoned by President Vladimir Putin and freed from prison in late 2013.  The Kremlin said last week that it would not send a representative to the event. At the inauguration today—may as well check it out, since I’ve been invited, it’s a good chance to...

Russian activist Gleb Babich said Monday afternoon that he was detained by police in Moscow and taken to a military enlistment office. Babich, an environmentalist who mounted a failed bid to get on the ballot for the 2024 Moscow City Duma elections, said the incident occurred while he was filming police raids against undocumented migrants outside the Teply Stan metro station. “Seconds later, a riot police officer jumped on me, stamped my face into a police van, hit me several times on the legs [and] dragged me into the van,” Babich wrote on Telegram, adding that he was threatened with charges of “terrorism.” Pro-Kremlin media reported that several hundred undocumented migrant workers were detained during the raid, some of whom were taken away in police vans. Babich said a police officer took his passport after discovering that he was not registered for military service due to his deferment as a student....

Russia on Sunday said it had opened a criminal investigation into allegations that Ukrainian troops killed civilians in a Russian village that had been seized by Kyiv’s army. Ukraine has taken dozens of border settlements under its control in the western Russian Kursk region since launching a surprise offensive there last August and says around 2,000 civilians still live in areas under its occupation. Russia has slowly been pushing Ukraine back and has retaken a number of villages. Russia’s Investigative Committee, which probes major crimes, on Sunday alleged Ukrainian troops “committed the murder of at least seven civilians, who were sheltering in the basement of a residential house” in the village of Russkoe Porechnoye, some 20 kilometers (12 miles) from the border. Several Russian state media outlets had overnight published a video, supplied by the army, that they said showed Russian troops discovering several dead bodies in a dark basement....

Telegram founder Pavel Durov has told investigating magistrates in France, where he was charged with infractions linked to enabling organised crime, that he “realised the seriousness of all the allegations,” AFP learned Saturday from a source familiar with the case. The messaging service Durov founded with his brother in 2013 “was not created to be a platform for criminals,” he told investigators through an interpreter, according to extracts from his questioning in December provided by the source. “Its growing popularity, the overall increase in the number of our users, meant that the number using Telegram for criminal purposes also increased,” added the 40-year-old, who possesses multiple passports including French. news ‘The West, Like Russia, Is Trying to Pressure Him’: What Do Russians Think About Pavel Durov’s Legal Battle in France? Read more “Every time we’ve been informed of illicit usage, we’ve tried to remove the users who have broken the...

Germany’s defence minister said he was open to sending German soldiers to Ukraine to help secure a demilitarised zone there if a ceasefire were agreed with Russia, in remarks published Saturday. In an interview with the Suddeutsche Zeitung newspaper, Boris Pistorius also said Germany should aim to spend around 3% of GDP on defence. U.S. President-elect Donald Trump wants members of the NATO military alliance to devote five percent of their national output on defence, a demand that has already been rejected as too high by German Chancellor Olaf Scholz. Asked about a possible deployment of German troops to help secure a buffer zone between Russia and Ukraine if one were agreed, Pistorius said, “We’re the largest NATO partner in Europe. We’ll obviously have a role to play.” He said the issue would “be discussed in due time.” Trump, who takes office on Monday, said during his election campaign he...

Russian law enforcement authorities have issued an arrest warrant for Alesya Marokhovskaya, the head editor of the independent investigative outlet IStories, the publication reported Friday. It was not immediately clear what charges Marokhovskaya faces, though she has previously been fined twice for allegedly violating Russia’s restrictive “foreign agent” law. Marokhovskaya was designated a “foreign agent” by Russia’s Justice Ministry in August 2021. This designation requires her to submit detailed financial reports and include lengthy disclaimers on all published content, including social media posts. Last month, IStories reported that a Russian police investigator contacted Marokhovskaya via Telegram, threatening to add her to the country’s wanted list if she did not return to Russia. In December, police reportedly executed a search-and-seizure warrant at her parents’ home in the Far East city of Magadan. Since Russia introduced its “foreign agent” law in 2012, hundreds of journalists, cultural figures and organizations have been hit with...

Authorities in Moscow designated Idite Lesom, an exiled nonprofit that helps Russian men avoid military service, as a “foreign agent” on Friday. The organization, founded in Tbilisi, Georgia after Russia announced a “partial” mobilization in the fall of 2022, is led by Grigory Sverdlin, a former head of the Nochlezhka homeless aid charity. Sverdlin was himself labeled a “foreign agent” in November 2023. Russia’s Justice Ministry accused Idite Lesom of spreading false information about government policies to “form a negative image” of the military, which has been engaged in a full-scale invasion of Ukraine for nearly three years. Sverdlin, who fled Russia shortly after the invasion began in 2022, ridiculed the designation. He said his nonprofit has helped nearly 1,500 soldiers desert the Russian army and assisted nearly 43,000 men in avoiding conscription altogether. “We’ve been working for over two years, and they’re only declaring us foreign agents now,” Sverdlin...

On New Year’s Eve, 22-year-old Vika shared an unboxing of the new iPhone 16 with her Instagram followers. The phone, she said, was a gift from her husband, a serviceman fighting with the Russian army in Ukraine.  “As he [my husband] said: ‘Only the best for my wife’,” Vika said of her gift, which costs hundreds of dollars more in Russia than in the U.S. Faced with a shortage of men willing to carry out its invasion of Ukraine, which has killed thousands of Ukrainian civilians, Russia has gradually hiked financial incentives for signing a military contract. This has given many men and their families an unprecedented means of upward social mobility, creating a new social class described by President Vladimir Putin as Russia’s “new elite.” As these military households come into their newfound wealth, soldiers’ wives and girlfriends are taking to social media to show off their comfortable new...

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s advisers are crafting an oil sanctions strategy aimed at advancing a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine, Bloomberg reported Thursday, citing unnamed sources familiar with the discussions. The proposed plan uses a “carrot-and-stick” approach. In one scenario, Trump’s team could ease sanctions on Russian oil producers by issuing general licenses or raising the G7 oil price cap above $60 per barrel if a resolution to the war appears imminent. Conversely, the team is considering tightening sanctions to gain leverage over Moscow. Potential measures could include stricter secondary sanctions targeting European shippers and major buyers in China and India, as well as enhanced monitoring of tanker routes through the Danish and Turkish Straits. These early-stage discussions reportedly involve Trump’s cabinet nominees and former sanctions officials, but final decisions will depend on the president-elect himself, Bloomberg wrote. Trump’s team is expected to confront challenges similar to those faced...