Free Republic

Russian President Vladimir Putin has said Moscow should amend its adoption agreements with countries which have legalised gay marriage. Asked about the legalisation of same-sex marriage and adoption in France, he said other countries should respect Russia's "moral standards". French President Francois Hollande is expected to sign the bill into law after it was passed by parliament.It has emerged that Russia warned the Irish Republic last month that it could stop the adoption of Russian children by Irish parents if the parliament in Dublin endorsed the Magnitsky Act.The act places sanctions on 18 Russians allegedly involved in the death of...

“He’s doomed to not be loved!” Never was there a more clear-cut case of “commentator’s curse” than when Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was inaugurated on a sunny Kyiv day exactly five years ago. The TV narrator’s inference was that, after a landslide election victory with 73% of the vote, it could only go downhill for him. While his approval ratings have inevitably waned, Volodymyr Zelensky has been able to use his enduring appeal, along with a desire for stability, to extend his term in office. In peacetime it would have expired, and an election would have been called. But the...

... However, Russia experts and a Wagner defector who told the ICC that the Kremlin had ordered "atrocities" in Ukraine have noted several bizarre occurrences on the night of the terror attack. Former GRU Colonel Igor Salikov says that police units supposedly disappeared around the time of the attack, while Vlad's elite forces stationed nearby also failed to show. He claims it all points to a "botched inside job" by the FSB or a poorly executed response by Russian emergency services. Another key detail is the amateur way the four gunmen handled their Kalashnikov machine guns despite ISIS fighters undergoing...

'elite' hoho unit annihilated...

Russian President Vladimir Putin has accused Ukraine of trying to disrupt his country’s presidential election by shelling Russian territory and using 2,500 soldiers to try to pierce Russia’s borders, promising to punish Kyiv for its actions. Polls opened across 11 time zones in Russia on Friday to begin three days of voting with Putin almost certain to secure his fifth term since winning his first election in 2000 with dissent in the country almost completely stifled. The shadow of the Ukraine war fell across the election with what Putin said was repeated shelling of western Russia and an attempt by...

Russia went to war in Ukraine two years ago with twice as many artillery pieces as Ukraine had. But it isn’t the advantage in howitzers that really matters – it’s the advantage in shells. The Czechs found, for Ukraine, nearly a million shells precisely when Ukraine needed those million shells the most: at the peak of Russia’s winter offensive. It’s not an exaggeration to say that the Czech artillery initiative probably saved entire Ukrainian cities, by giving the Ukrainian army the firepower to resist a much bigger Russian army. It’s no secret how Ukraine got into an artillery bind late...