10 years ago former tennis prodigy Viktor Potemkin (not his real name) decided to come off heroin and leave the criminal world. He did this using the detox approach. Now he teaches, and trains future tennis stars. He talked to Mumin Shakirov.
Russia’s summer of the wildfires brought about a change in society, says Andrei Loshak. Previously the only possible options for those disenchanted with the system were to take the streets or pack our bags and leave. Now we have another: self-help and self- organisation, much in the spirit of the
Last Thursday, Pavel Stroilov presented a piece that alleged I had been paid to publish articles in the Independent, and that I published on the instructions of its owner. Nothing could be further from the truth, writes Mary Dejevsky.
What else could possibly be written about Tolstoy? Before reading Rosamund Bartlett’s new biography, Susan Richards did wonder. But the fall of Soviet power has revealed material which allows us to appreciate how vividly his legacy has lived on and how relevant it remains today
Researching the Russian nationalistic right is a game of high stakes. Last year, I found out the hard way, writes Andreas Umland.
Voting at the recent local elections in Orenburg Oblast was listless and perfunctory. Voters don’t know the candidates, who in their turn make no attempt to remedy the situation, so why should people turn out to vote for them? Elena Strelnikova tries to make sense of the election process
What do you need to succeed in business?A mixture of luck and good judgement, according to Mikhail Fridman, one of Russia’s richest men and currently head of the Alfa Group.Gorbachev’s 1980s reforms made private enterprise possible – Fridman and others like him did the rest, as can be seen from th
At the beginning of September, the Independent’s Mary Dejevsky presented an improbably flattering portrait of St Petersburg's governor Valentina Matviyenko. Pavel Stroilov was one of 33 co-complainants who referred the article to the Press Complaints Commission for alleged political bias. Here he
Bill Bowring is well known to anybody interested in international law, and especially in human rights in Russia. Professor of Law at Birkbeck College and a practising barrister, it was he who in 2002 established the European Human Rights Advocacy Centre, which has since helped many applicants, mai
The recently published Russian government strategy paper for the North Caucasus chooses to focus solely on the socio-economic development of the region. The refusal to address key political or religious issues undermines the whole rationale for the document, laments Sergei Markedonov
The sacking of Moscow mayor Luzhkov and the continuing debacle of Khodorkovsky's second trial could be seen as tests for the Russian President. Will Medvedev pass muster? Mikhail Zygar considers the options.
In Stalin’s time there were nearly a hundred GULag camps in Ivdel. Today, the maximum security penal colony FBU-IK 56 survives in their place. Ekaterina Lushnikova travelled there to speak to the inmates — some of Russia’s most hardened criminals.
