Russia
Moscow's new Dostoevsky metro station: a 'suicide mecca'?
A Moscow metro station named after the famously gloomy Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky opened in June despite fears that its murals, considered "depressing" by some, will turn it into a "suicide mecca". Read more...
Russia invaded by… crickets
Southern Russia and eastern Ukraine have been inundated with a gigantic swarm of crickets. See the amateur images...
Towering penis graffiti startles St. Petersburg residents
A huge penis towered over the Russian city of St. Petersburg on June 14, right across from the infamous FSB (former KGB) headquarters. Images of the strange sight spread like wildfire on the Russian media and Internet. Even the Russian police were amused. Read more and see the photos...
Rock star corners Putin on live TV
When Vladimir Putin was asked a "practical question" by a Russian rock star on live TV, he had no option but to respond. So - what does the Russian prime minister really think about police crackdowns on opposition protesters? Read more...
Sri Lanka, Russia, Guinea... a sad state of affairs for human rights in 2009
Amnesty International released its annual report on Thursday, weighing up the world's worst human rights offenders of 2009, country by country. Our Observers from some of the 159 countries on the list give their reactions. Read more...
Commercial developers accused of razing listed buildings
Russian authorities are under fire from heritage conservation activists for not providing enough protection for listed buildings, which are being destroyed in the night by unknown culprits. Activists say that developers are demolishing the buildings illegally in order to acquire lucrative sites for commercial contracts. And while most Russian officials do little to stop them, the ones who do so are risking their lives. Read more...
If the bigwigs use flashing lights, the Moscovites will use blue buckets
The Moscow movement against self-declared VIPs - or bureaucrats who use flashing lights illegally to evade traffic queues - is growing in strength. On Sunday, two hundred Moscovites took to the streets with blue buckets secured, upside-down, on top of their car roofs. Did the police stop them? But of course! See the videos...
Road rage against self-declared VIP in Moscow
About a thousand officials in Russia have the right to use flashing lights on their cars. But many more use it without being allowed, and blatantly ignore traffic rules, driving on the wrong side of the road, passing through red lights and generally being a danger to other road users. To highlight this problem, a Russian businessman filmed himself blocking the Mercedes of an official driving the wrong way down a street in Moscow. Read more…
Moscow attacks in amateur images
Two explosions ripped through the central metro stations of Lubyanka and Park Kultury at rush hour this morning, killing at least 37 people. As the day wears on, increasingly graphic images are emerging on the Web. Read more…
Latvia's Soviet ghost town auctioned off to Russian pig farmers
A ghost town in Latvia that hosted giant Soviet radars has been auctioned off to a mysterious Russian investor for more than ten times the asking price. The buyer? A company registered as pig farmers at an address in Samara Oblast, over 2,000 kilometres away. Read more...
