Free Republic

Chechen warlord Ramzan Kadyrov has slammed Russia's 'weak' attacks on Ukraine in the latest show of high profile dissent from one of Vladimir Putin's biggest cheerleaders. The colonel general ordered Kremlin troops to 'wipe out Ukrainian cities off the face of the earth' in a chilling video message on Telegram. The head of the Chechen Republic said Russia should respond with fire and fury to the surge in counterattacks on its border regions. His dire threats come as Moscow doubled down on its warning that Kyiv is preparing to use a 'dirty bomb', amid fears the Kremlin could stage a...

Activists from the western Russian city of Smolensk have petitioned the country's parliament, the Duma, to demolish a symbolic memorial site to the Katyn massacre and a cemetery for its victims, Russian daily Kommersant has reported. Images posted online showed heavy machinery, bearing the pro-war 'Z' and 'V' symbols, approaching the Katyn monument in an apparent bid to destroy it. The memorial site and monument commemorate the Katyn Forest Massacre in western Russia, a series of mass executions of Polish POWs, mainly military officers and policemen, carried out by the Soviet NKVD security agency in April and May 1940. The...

She finished her university education and became an engineer, got married and had a son. Later she divorced and remarried in her 40s to Valerii Verbitski, whom she described as a "good man." Her life was simple and peaceful. That peace lasted until February 24, when Russian forces launched an unprovoked attack on Ukraine, barreling through her city, shelling neighborhoods, blowing up a government building, and encircling Kharkiv's estimated 1.4 million residents. "There was no water or power, we couldn't buy food. It became impossible to live," she said, "The air raid sirens never stopped, there was explosion after explosion....

In April 2007, the former Soviet republic of Estonia decided to relocate a monument of gratitude out of the centre of its capital city, Tallinn. The bronze statue depicts a pensive soldier with his head bowed, one hand holding a helmet and the other curled into a fist. For Estonia’s Russian minority, it was a symbol of the country’s liberation from fascism by the Red Army. For Estonians, it was a reminder of the country’s occupation by the Soviet Union. On 26 April, as authorities cordoned off the monument in preparation for its removal, hundreds of ethnic Russians descended on...