Courts in Russia, both military and civilian, have convicted eight thousand current and former participants in the full-scale invasion of Ukraine by Russian troops, Novaya Gazeta Europe reported on December 9, citing court statistics. We are talking only about “civilian cases,” that is, these statistics do not include cases related to military service, for example, unauthorized abandonment of a unit or desertion.

The State Duma has authorized the clear cutting of the dead forest around Lake Baikal. This will affect at least four thousand hectares of forest (that is, 40 square kilometers - or almost six thousand football fields) Gallo Images / Orbital Horizon / Copernicus Sentinel Data / Getty Images Forest fire in Buryatia, near Lake Baikal.

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky said that he is ready to participate in the presidential elections, RBC-Ukraine reported on December 9. According to Zelensky, the assertions that the authorities in Ukraine are “holding onto the chair” and therefore the war is not ending are “absolutely inadequate.” The Ukrainian leader stressed that voting can only take place subject to security guarantees for the country's citizens. “To hold elections, there are two issues.

Envoys of US President Donald Trump gave Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky several days to respond to the peace plan proposed by Washington, the Financial Times reported on December 9, citing sources. The Ukrainian leader told European allies that US presidential envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner pressured him to make a quick decision on the proposal during a Dec. 6 phone call. Officials aware of the negotiations told the newspaper about this.

The Bell provides details about the hacker attack that caused the collapse of Sheremetyevo Sergey Bulkin / TASS / Profimedia Sheremetyevo Airport, July 28, 2025 On the morning of July 28, 2025, all Aeroflot information systems stopped working - from corporate mail to passenger check-in. As a result, hundreds of flights were delayed or cancelled, and a transport collapse occurred at Sheremetyevo, the airline’s base airport. It affected tens of thousands of passengers.

The Russian government plans to introduce a ban on international incoming calls without the subscriber’s consent; such calls will be required to be marked, TASS reported on December 9. Such proposals were included in the second package of measures to protect citizens from telephone and Internet fraud, said Deputy Prime Minister and Chief of Staff of the Government Dmitry Grigorenko. In total, according to him, the package contains about 20 initiatives.

Bots acting in the interests of the Kremlin launched a massive campaign on the VKontakte social network in support of blocking the Roblox gaming platform, a representative of the Botnadzor project, which monitors the activity of bots, told the Agency. The campaign began on December 3, immediately after Roskomnadzor announced the blocking of Roblox. Since then, bots have left 11.1 thousand comments under 599 posts on VKontakte.

Let's talk about each of this list Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky named candidates for the post of head of his office. This position became vacant at the end of November after the resignation of Andrei Yermak, who until recently was called the most influential person in the country after the president. Ermak was fired after his place was searched in connection with a high-profile case of theft at the state-owned company Energoatom.

A Chechen woman who was murdered in Armenia after escaping her abusive family was a relative of Chechnya Governor Ramzan Kadyrov, according to human rights advocates. Twenty-three year old Aishat Baimuradova was found dead in her Yerevan apartment in October. Activists reported at the time that she had recently met with an Instagram acquaintance who had social media connections to people in Kadyrov’s circle.

Vladimir Putin said on December 9 that Russia’s “foreign agents” law is more lenient than its counterpart in the United States. “There, violating this law threatens with imprisonment, but we don’t have that,” the Russian President said at a meeting of the Human Rights Council (HRC), commenting on the speech of director Alexander Sokurov.

“People greet Russian soldiers with the words: ‘We have been waiting for you.’” He thinks so by the end of the fourth year of the war Donbass is our historical territory. People greet Russian soldiers with the words “we were waiting for you.” We are trying to end the war started by the Ukrainian authorities. The SVO will be brought to its logical conclusion. There is no need to go crazy applying the foreign agent law. And it was not we who invented it, but the USA.

State Duma deputies immediately adopted amendments in the second and third readings that will allow Rosfinmonitoring to receive information about the operations of the National Payment Card System ( NSCP , the Mir card operator) using bank cards and through the Fast Payment System ( SBP ), RBC reports . The amendments complement the anti-money laundering legislation. They determine the procedure for interaction between Rosfinmonitoring and the NSPK and will come into force on September 1, 2026.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said that he sometimes moves without accompanying motorcades with flashing lights. He made this comment at a meeting of the Human Rights Council when discussing the topic of traffic violations by delivery couriers. Putin said he “understands” the problem “with this delivery” and noted that the governor of St.

The UK authorities have updated the sanctions list against Russia. The philosopher and propagandist Alexander Dugin was added to it, as well as the pro-war telegram channel “Rybar”, according to the corresponding document ( .pdf ) on the website of the country’s government. Dugin and the authors of “Rybar”, according to the British government, are participating in the destabilization of Ukraine: they support and promote policies that destabilize the country and threaten its sovereignty.

Photographer Martin Parr understood kitsch like no one else - and his latest exhibition looks like a luxury hotel Nikita Teryoshin for Grand Hotel Parr / PhotoBookMuseum Martin Parr's retrospective at the New Museum in Nuremberg, Grand Hotel Parr, which opened on October 24, turned out to be his last lifetime exhibition: on December 6, the photographer died at home in Bristol at the age of 73.