Latvia has the highest femicide rate in Europe — ranking above Russia. Its parliament just voted to exit a treaty protecting women from violence. meduza.io/en/feature/2...

A Bishkek court has just ruled that two of the countries most influential independent news sites Kloop and Temirov Live (both in exile abroad) are extremist organizations. This means that liking or reposting their content may be deemed a criminal act in Kyrgyzstan kloop.kg/blog/2025/10...

“Everyone understands that if Ukraine comes under Russian domination, or is even absorbed into a kind of reconstituted Russian empire, then we have a challenge that is so much larger,” a senior NATO official told Meduza in Brussels this week. meduza.io/en/feature/2...

Reporting from Bukhara, journalist @sashaslobodov.bsky.social explores how tourism and the diaspora sustain the last vestiges of Uzbekistan’s Jewish heritage. The Beet’s latest. meduza.io/en/feature/2...

New podcast alert! For The Naked Pravda, researcher @msnegovaya.bsky.social breaks down the rising costs straining the Kremlin’s war machine — and explores four possible scenarios for the Russia–Ukraine war’s next chapter. meduza.io/en/episodes/...

More than 1800 detainees are missing after the closure of Alligator Alcatraz. Their families and lawyers can’t find them and they’ve vanished from the ICE database. Feels like this should be a much bigger story www.miamiherald.com/news/local/i...

Russians say the suspension of Jimmy Kimmel’s show feels familiar. Here’s what became of the country’s TV comedy shows that dared to criticize the Putin administration. meduza.io/en/feature/2...

You may have noticed that many of our stories simply say “Meduza” in the byline. That's a safety precaution, as any cooperation with our newsroom is against the law in Russia. But we'd still like you to know the people who work here. meduza.io/en/feature/2...

Any English speakers in Bishkek who’d be interested in informal language exchange/English practice with some local journalists?

Ukraine has verified Russia’s deportation of nearly 20,000 children from occupied territories. Can the Trump administration help get them back? meduza.io/en/feature/2...

Just in case you like in-depth analytical angle on Russia, think about donating to ridl.io ridl.io/donate/

Any English speakers in Bishkek who’d be interested in informal language exchange/English practice with some local journalists?

[email protected] calls for immediate support, otherwise they are going to crash. I got to say - they are the best independent Russian media that does extensive coverage of everything that you need to know about Russia. meduza.io/en/feature/2...

In 2004, my family moved back to Russia from Alaska, where we lived back then. Putin was supposed to visit the school I attended in St.Petersburg, but never showed. I spent hours locked in a classroom because I had long hair and according to the principal would be an “embarrassment” in public

The draft media law has been in the works since 2022 and has been criticized by journalists, civil society, and human rights organizations from the outset.

It’s long been too dangerous for our readers in Russia to support us financially. Luckily, we have more than 3 million readers abroad — but only 2 of every 1,000 donate monthly. Unless that changes, we won’t last much longer. meduza.io/en/short/202...

Born in Philadelphia, Telo Tulku Rinpoche was sent to a monastery in India at age seven. At 19, he was chosen to revive Buddhism in Russia’s Kalmykia. He spent 30 years doing just that — then denounced the war in Ukraine. Now he can’t return to Russia. meduza.io/en/feature/2...

You’ve heard of the Chicago Pope — now meet the Philly Lama. I spoke to someone I’d been wanting to interview for years: Telo Tulku Rinpoche, who served as the head of Buddhists in Russia’s Kalmykia for decades until he denounced the war in 2022. meduza.io/en/feature/2...

My conversation with political analyst Balazs Jarabik about Zelensky’s anti-corruption reversal and the return of politics in wartime Ukraine. Check it out before the new bill goes to the Rada floor tomorrow! meduza.io/en/feature/2... @meduza.io

My summary of the story of a very, very American family

Former Kursk Governor Roman Starovoit, who was dismissed by Putin *earlier today* as Russia’s transport minister, has reportedly been found dead in his home in an apparent suicide. meduza.io/en/news/2025...

“When Alexei Navalny died, I thought, that’ll probably be me soon…And then something changed. It was clear that someone at the top said, ’Make sure he doesn’t die here. We don’t need that problem.’” Siarhei Tsikhanouski’s first interview after 5 years in prison in Belarus. apnews.com/article/bela...

very rare that an update from Gaza is good to hear — but WCK’s tenacious commitment to its kitchens there is that rarity I just donated again to support their work and hope you can & will too

Okay, that’s why.

My report from NATO def ministers’ last meeting in Brussels before the alliance’s annual summit later this month

“And then I’d sit in on yet another [online] safety training for journalists, listening to exiles telling me how important it is to ‘follow safety protocols’ — and it would drive me up the wall.” More invaluable reporting from my colleague Lilia Yapparova: meduza.io/en/feature/2...

Russian independent newsrooms in exile have been essential for our understanding of the Kremlin's crackdown on civil society in Russia: A lot of what we know about the closed-door trial of four journalists in Moscow is thanks to the excellent Mediazona: zona.media/online/2025/...

Russia has sentenced four journalists to 5.5 years in prison, including past Reuters and AP contributors, on charges of participating in an “extremist organization” for their alleged ties to Navalny’s organization. The trial was held behind closed doors. meduza.io/en/news/2025...

Kyrgyz human rights defender Rita Karasartova, who was imprisoned for months in 2022–2023 on bogus charges in the Kempir-Abad case, just had her home raided again and was taken in by law enforcement, according to her daughter Kasiet

NEW: Journalist Agnieszka Pikulicka-Wilczewska tells the story of how posting Wagner Group ads in Poland landed two Russian citizens in prison — and what their case revealed about the Kremlin’s covert operations in Europe.

Kseniia Petrova, a Harvard scientist who fled Russia after protesting its invasion of Ukraine, has been captive to the hard-line immigration policies of the Trump administration for nearly eight weeks. She fears arrest if she is deported.

For a close-up look at NATO’s mission to safeguard undersea infrastructure in the Baltic, I spent a day aboard a French Navy frigate. I also spoke to experts @katjabego.bsky.social, @keirgiles.bsky.social, @olivierschmitt.bsky.social, and Lukas Milevski about the value of such an operation.

Interesting dispatch from the Baltic Sea by my colleague @sambreazeale.bsky.social, who went on a patrol with a French Navy frigate to observe NATO’s new monitoring mission and report on its encounters with Russia’s “shadow fleet.” meduza.io/en/feature/2... @meduza.io

Kseniia Petrova, a Russian scientist at Harvard Medical School, was detained at Logan Airport after returning from France and sent to an ICE detention in Louisiana, The Insider reports. A big critic of Putin and the war in Ukraine, she may now be deported to Russia.

From Kerry Howley’s book Bottom’s Up and the Devil Laughs: A Journey Through the Deep State

I once received an electric shock during torture only for writing for Radio Liberty: I was told that it was "a CIA structure and an enemy of Russia", and for that reason alone I was already guilty. Now, the "enemy of Russia" is being destroyed by America itself, and my torture seems doubly in vain.

The destruction of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty is so utterly devastating. Despite all the attempts to shut them down in Kyrgyzstan, they remained by far the most trusted source of news. Same goes for the rest of the region

Another year, another women’s march in Bishkek. Kyrgyzstan is the only country in Central Asia that has allowed a sanctioned women’s rights protest this year. Lots of familiar faces, a small window of hope in a country where freedom of expression is under attack

It’s been three years since Mediazona’s website has been blocked in Russia—but we’re still standing. We need your support. Donate to keep us going: donate.zona.media/en www.youtube.com/shorts/ouAIN...

I understand that the world is on fire, but I was commissioned to do a story about life in an East German town under AfD rule, which unfortunately got axed. It's based on over a month of in-depth reporting on the ground and I'm still hoping to salvage it. Any suggestions? @okwonga.bsky.social maybe?

In the last month, the Trump administration has barred the AP from events over its editorial policy and taken control of the White House press pool. For @peterbakernyt.bsky.social, who lived in Moscow in the early 2000s, these moves feel familiar.

Since the 1950s, Summer Language Workshops at Indiana University have provided training in Russian, East European, and Central Asian languages. Generations have come to Bloomington to study Romanian, Polish, Kazakh, etc. Rubio just cancelled all of them languageworkshop.indiana.edu/summer-langu...

Riddle Russia, an excellent outlet working in exile, has lost their core grant. They're facing a possible shutdown unless they can come up with an infusion of cash to buy them time to look for new funding. A decimation of independent Russian media is happening as we speak. ridl.io/donate/

This story from my colleague @sambreazeale.bsky.social is one of the most beautiful things I've read all year. This is how Lena Wolf & her family, like so many families, were entangled in the disasters & upheaval of Russian empire — migration, deportations, a brutal state, & how it shapes people.

For @meduza.io's The Beet, I wrote about a family whose story, shaped by Stalin's mass deportations, spans from southern Ukraine to Kazakhstan to Latvia to Germany. Thanks to Lena Wolf for sharing her story with me and @eilishhart.bsky.social for lots of editing. meduza.io/en/feature/2...

In a few minutes, Putin is set to begin his “direct line and press conference,” fielding pre-gathered questions from citizens and answering journalists. It’s the first time he’s held the event since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Follow along with us: meduza.io/en/live/2023...

I wanted to contextualize Russia's ban on the "LGBT movement" and figure out why Putin's anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric often sounds so familiar to me as an American, so I went to the experts: historian Dan Healey, sociologist Alexander Kondakov, and political scientist Leandra Bias. meduza.io/en/episodes/...

To learn what Russia’s ban on the “LGBT movement” will mean for LGBTQ+ Russians and how the Kremlin uses the idea of “traditional values” to justify war, Meduza spoke to historian Dan Healey, sociologist Alexander Kondakov, and political scientist Leandra Bias. meduza.io/en/episodes/...

RBC reports that President Vladimir Putin has pardoned one of the men involved in the 2006 killing of investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya. Sergei Khadzhikurbanov received a pardon for participating in the war in Ukraine. meduza.io/en/news/2023...