For many Russian viewers, the series provides a rare portrayal of queer lives and relationships at a time when LGBTQ+ visibility inside Russia has largely vanished.

Russian and Ukrainian media recently reported that Kadyrov may be suffering from kidney failure and has been exploring potential successors. Here's what we know.

In November, The Moscow Times spoke to former U.S. officials and analysts about how Russia might respond to a direct confrontation between Venezuela and the United States.

Article by me for @themoscowtimes.com. "Nothing in living memory compares with the scale and speed of the change to U.S.-Russia relations [under Trump]. His administration seems to be abandoning not just leadership of the West but membership of it, in favor of [...] alignment with the Kremlin."

Some very poignant and revealing quotes here

“If something like that had happened, the whole town would have been talking about it,” one resident told the Mozhem Obyasnit outlet.

In our final Regions Calling newsletter of 2025, we look back at our coverage of Russia's regions and choose one policy, person and place that left the most pronounced impact this year.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is set to hold his annual Direct Line call-in show and press conference with Russian citizens and journalists Friday. To help you watch it as it unfolds, The Moscow Times has created our own version of “Putin Bingo,” with some of the tropes and phrases we expect.

Former Yandex CEO Arkady Volozh has done what many business elites could not after the invasion of Ukraine: successfully leave the Russian market and parlay his old venture into a new one abroad. How did he pull it off?

WSJ published a great report about how Russia is pushing for the U.S. to tack business and investment deals onto the Ukraine peace plan. @themoscowtimes.com has been reporting this since February. www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/02/18/k... www.themoscowtimes.com/2025/04/21/t...

@themoscowtimes.com’s excellent Regions Calling newsletter brings you stories from Russia’s regions that you won’t find in other English-language media. And it’s free. You can subscribe here: mailchi.mp/moscowtimes/...

St. Petersburg woman Lena Patyayeva, who has repeatedly called for answers about the fate of her friend Seda Suleimanova after she was forcibly returned to Chechnya, was arrested while staging a solo picket on Tuesday. Photo: Slovo Zashchitye

Opinion: To Putin, the Trump peace proposal proves that he has won. But there is much in its pages that he won’t agree to, argues former Russian diplomat Boris Bondarev.

Activists and experts say the Kremlin's two new holidays are more for propaganda than a genuine expression of care for Indigenous communities.

The band Stoptime rose to viral fame for performing anti-Putin and anti-war anthems in St. Petersburg — and were jailed for nearly two weeks as a result. Here is a closer look at some of the songs they performed:

Diana Loginova was filmed earlier this week leading a crowd in central St. Petersburg in singing the lyrics to the exiled rapper Noize MC’s hit song “Swan Lake Cooperative.”

The Moscow Times spoke to five residents of Russia’s second-largest city about how the war has transformed their everyday lives.

The Central Bank asked Russians to choose the design of the new 500-ruble note. It set off a spat between Chechen officials and pro-war bloggers, accusations of rupturing national unity and even claims of foreign meddling — not to mention all the memes.

#OpEd Jimmy Kimmel's removal from late night television resembles when the Kremlin attacked a television channel that satirized Putin — and even the liberal media rationalized what happened as if it was acceptable, warns Andrei Soldatov.

Russian pop icon Alla Pugacheva’s first interview since the invasion of Ukraine has been viewed 20m times since it premiered last week. It’s worth the watch (and has English subtitles)

Russia has blocked voice and video calls on WhatsApp and Telegram. Yet Russians who spoke to MT reported that the restrictions are far from foolproof — at least for now — and can vary based on one's mobile carrier and geographic location.

In this new two-part series, MT explores the political context that set the stage for the Kushtau protests — one of the few successful grassroots protests in Russia’s modern history — and how they unfolded.

Powerful reporting from Donetsk, where Ukrainian soldiers struggled to protect a strategic road from Russia’s advance “Contacted after our departure, Vitalii said the team had been ordered to abandon the road and fall back to Kharkiv. ‘It has become too dangerous. We are pulling back’.”

#OpEd "The flame of independent journalism Derk lit 30 years ago has not been extinguished. And we will bring it back to Russia," writes Moscow Times publisher Alexander Gubsky.

Apakhonchich’s creative reports to the Justice Ministry chronicle both the absurdity and brutality of Russia’s “foreign agents” law. They will be shown at Artists Against the Kremlin, an upcoming exhibition co-organized by MT in Amsterdam.

The latest round of Russia-Ukraine peace talks has ended after about 40 minutes. t.me/kommersant/8...

Activists warn the planned mine at Kyrktytau could harm ecosystems as far away as Kazakhstan — and its copper could be shipped as far as the EU.

The digital campaign, called Give Me a Choice, calls on doctors to take action against growing abortion restrictions inside the country.

Trump has privately encouraged Ukraine to step up deep strikes on Russian territory, even asking Zelenskyy whether he could strike Moscow if the US provided long-range weapons, according to people briefed on the discussions. w/ @henryjfoy.ft.com @maxseddon.bsky.social. www.ft.com/content/b66f...

Орешник?

"The truth is that repression in Russia is still very selective and limited. Even if you're against the war, it's much more likely that you'll be hit by a car or killed by a falling brick than be repressed. But you don't get paranoid about bricks every time you go outside, do you?"

BREAKING: Pro-Kremlin media report that former Transportation Minister Roman Starovoit, who was dismissed by Putin earlier Monday, has been found dead at his home in an apparent suicide.

In this week's edition of the Regions Calling newsletter, @leylalatypova.bsky.social explores how the latest hostilities in the Middle East have hit home for residents of Russia’s North Caucasus republic of Dagestan:

Can an ordinary person in Russia be imprisoned for sharing a book sold in bookstores? Grigory Skvortsov, a photographer from Perm, was sentenced to 16 years in prison Thursday for doing just that.

NEW: The Kremlin is struggling to respond to the Israel-Iran conflict after it failed to anticipate the outbreak of hostilities, leaving it powerless to support a key ally, four sources in Russia’s foreign policy establishment told MT.

Nadezhda Rossinskaya’s Army of Beauties volunteer initiative claims to have helped 25,000 people in occupied Ukraine between 2022 and 2023.

In the latest Regions Calling newsletter, @leylalatypova.bsky.social recounts a recent opposition event where the unhealthy power dynamic between the ethnic Russian majority and the few Indigenous attendees present was on full display.

Residents of the Ukrainian capital voiced feelings of shock and stress as they grappled with the aftermath of the attack that killed at least 14 people.

A potentially significant step in the search for answers over what happened to Seda Suleimanova nearly two years since she was abducted

If I don’t emerge from my apartment for the next six months, this is the reason why

The head of a Berlin gallery that also exhibits anti-war artists tells me it was his understanding that the Paris gallery never tried to hide the fact that Liza was working there

The Moscow Times examined new footage released by Ukraine's Security Service, showing a range of aircraft targeted across four air bases.

“There are quite a lot of Ukrainians living here on our [land]...This will be our way of showing that we respect them for preserving their culture,” Bashkortosan’s leader said. In fact, the Ukrainian diaspora in Russia face immense pressure and persecution:

EXCLUSIVE: When Putin visited Kursk this month, reports said his helicopter was targeted by Ukrainian drones. In reality, this was a PR move aimed at convincing Russians that Putin is ready to put his own life at risk for the country, officials told MT. @kozlov.bsky.social reports:

This is pretty depressing. Nasiliu.Net joined the first-ever episode of The Naked Pravda almost six years ago. Very sad to see Russia’s “foreign agent” paranoia hurting vulnerable groups like this. meduza.io/en/news/2025...

Aman Malyshev, a 22-year-old conscript, was killed in Russia’s Bryansk region near the Ukrainian border this spring. His family’s search for justice reflects the careful line that military families must tread when seeking answers from the government.

Why is Tatarstan in the running to host the Russia-U.S. hockey match — and what does this say about the republic’s growing role in the Kremlin’s foreign policy outreach? MT’s @leylalatypova.bsky.social explores more in this week’s edition of Regions Calling:

NEW: Vladimir Putin has no intention of accepting Volodymyr Zelensky’s offer to meet in Istanbul, sources in the Russian government, the Foreign Ministry and close to the Kremlin have told MT. @kozlov.bsky.social reports:

I feel personally attacked by this content