Today, 25th October, marks the tenth anniversary of the arrest of Mikhail Borisovich Khodorkovsky, now Russia's most famous political prisoner. A short while ago, Ben Judah wrote to him asking about the circumstances of his imprisonment, and how that experience has changed him. This is what he sai
Russia’s foremost historian of culture reflects on the cultural functions of cynicism in Soviet and post-Soviet society. He ruefully concludes that Russia has yet to escape the Soviet paradigm: the Pussy Rioters, in their demonstrations against official cynicism, were merely the latest incarnation
For centuries, much of Europe was integrated into a vast African empire. Yet we refuse to fully understand our history. For this tradition of not knowing the West is paying a price it has not yet begun to calculate.
The Parthenon Marbles (or 'Elgin Marbles') were sculpted in Greece in 447–438 BC, and stolen from there by Lord Elgin in the early 19th century. They are kept in the British Museum. This is a speech recently given by Henry Porter, at an event calling for their return.
Harsh sentences have been meted out to Russians who took part in last year’s political demonstrations on Bolotnaya Square. But possibly none more chilling that the compulsory treatment in a mental hospital ordained recently for Mikhail Kosenko. Our regular contributor, Daniil Kotsyubinsky, discuss
The Russian Orthodox Church has, since the late 1990s, become an increasingly powerful force in Ukrainian politics and society. But the violent desecration of a piece of modern art shows it is also increasingly intolerant of different viewpoints.
The Valdai Conference was held on 16-19 September 2013 at a Potemkin village halfway between Moscow and St Petersburg. Vladimir Putin was holding court with a select group of invited guests, eager to hear him talk about “Russia’s Diversity for the Modern World.” Rodric Braithwaite makes sense of i
Houghton Hall, Norfolk has been drawing the crowds all summer to see the art collection of Sir Robert Walpole, subsequently sold to Catherine the Great of Russia. All the pictures hang in their original places, according to eighteenth-century plans recently discovered by the current owner. Colin A
The Commons chose to stand back from the cusp of military intervention in Syria. Is this a knock for British national pride or a chance to learn from our imperial past?
As the level of inter-ethnic violence reaches disturbing proportions, Emil Pain asks if Russia’s protest moment has turned nasty.
On Magna Carta day, 798 years after the Magna Carta was signed by King John, what is there to celebrate?
