My take: the International Bureau of Weights and Measures is next on the Kremlin list

Amazing discovery! Especially in times when in Russia the Stalinist practices are back, and even the museum dedicated to repressions has been just shut down meduza.io/en/feature/2...

It’s the fourth anniversary of the Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Our list of verified deaths has reached a grim milestone: 200,000 names. Read about it, as well as a new map of Russian losses we are introducing, here: en.zona.media/article/2026...

Trump asked Putin to hold off—and Putin launched massive attacks instead, showing what he thinks of the Ukraine peace talks, Simon Shuster reports:

A Moscow court sentenced 4 journalists for alleged involvement in Navalny’s “extremist” Anti-Corruption Foundation: Antonina Favorskaya, Artem Krieger (both SotaVision), Konstantin Gabov (Reuters) and Sergei Karelin (AP) to 5.5 years in prison 📷 Alexandra Astakhova/Mediazona

In Russia, independent journalism faces severe repression. Any dissenting voice is deemed an "extremist" according to Russian law.

“Honest to god, I’ve never seen anything like it,” said Steven Levitsky, a Harvard political scientist and coauthor of “How Democracies Die” and “Competitive Authoritarianism.” - says it all... You can read it for free without a subscription. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/20/w...

Interesting and informed analysis

Putin planned to take Kyiv in three days, but he couldn't take Kyiv in three years. The only way Putin wins now—the only way he finally succeeds in destroying Ukraine’s sovereignty—is by persuading Ukraine’s allies to abandon Ukraine. www.theatlantic.com/internationa...

"They're celebrating in the Kremlin right now, they're popping Champagne." Putin critic and financier, Bill Browder, says President Trump's announcement about the war in Ukraine is his 'worst nightmare' come true. #Newsnight

Americans are getting a crash course on what things look like when autocrats consolidate power and why it’s hard to beat them in the ballot box when every organization controlling speech is aligned with the ruling party.

No surprises for those who follow the topic. But some people still believe autocrats care about their citizens and can sustain good living standards. They don't.