Russia’s oil industry lacks the infrastructure to avoid spills and leaks; and the environmental consequences are horrific.
In Siberia, agriculture faces crisis after crisis as small farmers find themselves in debt caused by bad weather, bureaucracy and corruption.
The ‘rationalisation’ of medical and social services in rural Russia has compelled people to acquire new skills in order to survive, but life for the weakest is very hard – and very expensive.
President Putin’s special envoy to the Urals, recently praised the region’s farmers for their heroic efforts to save the harvest. But it won’t save them.
In Novosibirsk ‘Orthodox activists’ have declared open war not only on rock fans but on the mayor and governor as well. на русском языке
Andrei Balobanov, a radio telephonist in a Russian motorised rifle company, was serving in Ukraine; he was captured, supposedly asked for asylum, and then just disappeared. На русском языке
The Russian-led Customs Union has introduced new rules on slaughtering livestock. A massive rise in meat prices is forecast; and the end of small-scale farming.
Farm workers in the Omsk region, cheated out of their land by big business, have taken their cases to the courts; and taken the matter into their own hands… на русском языке
Six years ago the Omsk regional authorities embarked on a programme aimed at rehousing people living in unsafe and dilapidated accommodation. But the results are far from satisfactory. на русском языке
Russia’s oil goliaths have been devastating vast areas of natural landscape, and indigenous people’s lives, in their rush to extract the black gold that lies beneath. But a family of reindeer herders has taken them on. на русском языке
In Russia, 23 February is celebrated as Defender of the Fatherland Day. But despite a law entitling them to decent housing, many World War Two veterans in Siberia have little to celebrate.
The murder of a young boxer in Omsk two months ago opened a real can of political worms, with the local Roma community in particular becoming the butt of neo-Nazi threats
