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Russia has blamed the "hostility" of Baltic states for them severing most of their ties with the country. "Because of the openly hostile line of Vilnius, Riga and Tallinn, all interstate, interdepartmental, regional and sectoral ties with Russia have been severed," said Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharov on Sunday. She warned Moscow would respond with asymmetric measures, though did not specify exactly what the Baltics had supposedly done. "We will also respond to the hostile actions of the Baltic states with asymmetrical measures, primarily in the economic and transit spheres," Zakharov detailed. Russia's 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine has...

Critics of the Russian regime have accused Vladimir Putin of sending spies to disconnect CCTV cameras at a prison complex just days before prominent Kremlin opponent Alexei Navalny died. Several officers from the FSB, Russia’s intelligence service, visited the Polar Wolf prison camp earlier this week, according to activists at the human rights group gulagu.net, before the opposition figure dropped dead aged 47 on Friday. The organisation has also claimed CCTV cameras were shut off at the complex in the hours before, as well as suggesting the speed at which authorities made comments on the incident was deeply suspicious. A...

Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny has died in prison, the country's state media reported Friday, ending a yearslong fight against corruption and the Kremlin that saw him survive several poisoning attempts. He was 48.

Vladimir Putin's fierce rival and critic Alexei Navalny has died, according to the prison service. The Russian opposition leader, who was the most prominent and persistent domestic foe of President Vladimir Putin, had been serving a 19-year sentence on an extremism conviction. He had been incarcerated in central Russia’s Vladimir region, 140 miles east of Moscow. Navalny has been behind bars in Russia since January 2021, when he returned to Moscow after recuperating in Germany from nerve agent poisoning that he blamed on the Kremlin. Before his arrest, he campaigned against official corruption and organized major anti-Kremlin protests.

I'm hearing a lot of chatter tonight that the Ukrainian position in Avdeevka has all but collapsed. Evidently the air defense base anchoring their southern defenses was flanked and rapidly overrun, with the Russian flag planted on it. I'm also hearing: The Neo-Nazi Azov brigade (disingenuously referred to simply as the 3rd Brigade in Washington/MSM propaganda today) was sent to bolster Ukrainian defenses on the flanks while troops in forward positions retreated, but they were caught in the open field, massacred, and are refusing to follow orders. This would help explain the general collapse scenario. Maybe it is not so...

Feb 12 (Reuters) - A preliminary analysis concluded that Russia hit Kyiv last week with the hypersonic Zircon missile, its first use in the nearly two-year-old war, the head of a Kyiv research institute said on Monday, presenting a new challenge to Ukraine's air defences. Oleksandr Ruvin, director of the Kyiv Scientific-Research Institute for Forensic Examinations, said on his Telegram channel that his institute completed a preliminary analysis of missile fragments from a Russian attack on Feb. 7. He included a video of alleged missile wreckage showing specific markings. "In this case, we see elements that are characteristic of the...

MOSCOW, February 12. /TASS/. The West prepares to establish the office of a "viceroy" in Ukraine with constant access to Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) Director Sergey Naryshkin said in a statement. "The West continues to strengthen the mechanisms of direct external management of Kiev-controlled territory," Naryshkin said. "According to the obtained information, the US and the UK try to convince other G7 states to establish the office of a 'special representative' for Ukraine." "It is expected that this person will have constant access to President Zelensky and know about all his plans. The 'special representative'...