Meduza fact-checks Putin’s most problematic claims in his latest call-in marathon Grigory Sysoev / RIA Novosti / Sputnik / Profimedia On Friday, President Vladimir Putin held his annual Direct Line call-in show, where he fielded questions from carefully selected journalists and Russian citizens for nearly four and a half hours.

Meduza analyzes the pressure on Ukraine’s defenses as Russia’s offensive continues Like our earlier reports on the combat situation in Ukraine, this article reviews recent battlefield developments based on open-source information. Meduza has condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine from the outset, and our military analyses reflect our commitment to objective reporting on a war we firmly oppose.

The Russian government has allowed the Ministry of Defense to terminate military agreements with 11 European countries that were signed from 1992 to 2002. The list includes international cooperation agreements with Germany, Poland, Norway, Bulgaria, Romania, Denmark, the Netherlands, Croatia, Belgium and the Czech Republic. In addition, the list mentions a mutual assistance agreement with Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

The Russian Ministry of Finance has approved new minimum prices for vodka, cognac and brandy, which will be in effect through 2026, Interfax reported on December 19, citing the department’s order. Here's how alcohol prices will increase (per half a liter): for vodka - from 349 to 409 rubles, for brandy - from 472 to 605 rubles, for cognac - from 651 to 755 rubles. Selling prices from manufacturers and wholesale prices will also increase.

The widow of one of the leading compilers of sports maps, Konstantin Tokmakov, Polina Tokmakova, told the circumstances of his death in the forest in the Vladimir region in April 2025. Her story is given in the minutes of the reporting conference of the Orienteering Federation, held on November 29, Mediazona reports. According to the widow, 52-year-old Tokmakov received an order from the director of the local orienteering school, Vladimir Gorin, who was fulfilling a government contract.

In Kyiv, 15 monuments and other objects related to the history and symbolism of Russian imperial and Soviet politics are being dismantled, including the monument to the writer and playwright Mikhail Bulgakov on Andreevsky Spusk. This decision was made by the City Council at a meeting on December 18, writes Ukrayinska Pravda.

Update. According to the Moscow Region Ministry of Health, 30 people were injured as a result of mass poisoning at the boarding house. One of them died, 27 were taken to hospitals. What happened to the other two victims is not specified. Three people died and 15 were hospitalized as a result of being sent to a private boarding house in the city of Vidnoye in the Moscow region, the press service of the Investigative Committee for the region reported.

We publish two reviews at once - one is not even completely abusive “Nationality: No,” an album released by Miron Fedorov without any announcement after a year of silence, judging by the reaction of social networks, almost no one liked it. The rapper did not comment in any way on the “Creative Method” podcast, where he was accused of grooming and sexualized violence, but the new record is criticized not only for this.

Her name is Christine Cabot. And this random video almost ruined her life Christine Cabot Archive In the summer of 2025, a video from a Coldplay concert in a Boston suburb went viral on social media. The so-called kiss cam, which snatches couples in the audience and puts them on big screens, has caught a man and a woman hugging. When they noticed that they were being filmed, the man hid behind the fence, and the woman covered her face with her hands and turned away.

A Russian Orlan-10 drone crashed in Kocaeli province in northwestern Turkey, the country's Interior Ministry reported. “An unmanned aerial vehicle, presumably of Russian origin, of the Orlan-10 type, used for reconnaissance and surveillance, was discovered,” the report said. The drone was found in the Çubuklubal area in Izmit district. According to Turkish publications , the drone fell in the countryside, local residents found it practically undamaged.

Europe still hasn’t figured out what can be done with the 200 billion euros frozen after the start of the big war Thierry Monasse/Getty Images Portuguese Prime Minister Luis Montenegro, French President Emmanuel Macron and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban at the EU summit in Brussels on December 18, 2025 The EU countries at the summit in Brussels on December 18 were unable to agree on financing a loan to Ukraine using frozen Russian assets.

The management of the Hermitage asks its employees not to talk about the detention in Poland of their colleague, archaeologist Alexander Butyagin, and does not allocate funds for his release from prison. Art critic and editor-in-chief of the Tretyakov Gallery magazine Ksenia Korobeinikova reported this with reference to museum employees.

These are the main points from Putin's four-hour speech. Often they raise doubts, and even more often they are simply not true Grigory Sysoev / RIA Novosti / Sputnik / Profimedia On December 19, Russian President Vladimir Putin held his annual “direct line” ( here are all the details of how it happened). He answered questions from journalists and residents of Russia.

Russian goalkeeper of the French club PSG Matvey Safonov broke his left hand in the final of the Intercontinental Cup , the club reported . The goalkeeper will now miss three to four weeks. PSG head coach Luis Enrique said that Safonov himself does not know how and when he was injured. “We think it happened on the third penalty when he made a strange move. He has a fracture and saved the last two penalties despite the injury,” added Enrique.

Anton Vaganov / Reuters / Scanpix / LETA The rise in car prices in Russia breaks records from year to year. In October 2025, the weighted average price of a new passenger car increased to 3.43 million rubles, and of a used car - to 1.23 million rubles. These are the highest figures in the entire history of market observations.