South African officials confirmed on July 19 that Russian President Vladimir Putin will not attend next month’s BRICS summit in Johannesburg amid fears that he may face arrest in connection with a warrant issued by the International Criminal Court over his alleged role in the mass abduction of Ukrainian children. Putin’s decision to stay away
Vladimir Putin’s decision to launch the full-scale invasion of Ukraine was based on a series of disastrous miscalculations. The most significant of these was his belief that Ukrainians are really Russians. Putin has long insisted Ukrainians and Russians are “one people” who have been artificially separated by the fall of the USSR. For Putin, this
The recent revolt by Russia’s Wagner Group was a short-lived affair but the repercussions continue to be felt throughout the Russian Federation and beyond. Perhaps the biggest single lesson from the aborted coup is the fragility of the Putin regime. For many years, the Kremlin has sought to present Vladimir Putin as a powerful and
The attempted putsch by Yevgeniy Prigozhin and his Wagner troops in late June is perhaps best understood as a symptom of Russia’s ongoing imperial decline. Much like the invasion of Ukraine itself, it is part of a broader historical process that can be traced back to 1989 and the fall of the Soviet incarnation of
As the Wagner mutiny unfolded in Russia over the weekend, Ukrainian social media was flooded with memes about popcorn as millions of Ukrainians settled down to enjoy the spectacle. This gleeful reaction was perhaps predictable, given the unimaginable horror and suffering Russia has brought to Ukraine over the past sixteen months, but there may also
Vladimir Putin claims one of the main goals of his Ukraine invasion is to prevent the country joining NATO. This objective may at first glance appear broadly reasonable, but on closer inspection, it actually goes directly against Russia’s own national interests. The idea that Ukrainian NATO membership would pose a security threat to Russia ranks
As Ukraine’s long awaited counteroffensive gets underway, a new survey has found that the overwhelming majority of Ukrainians are ready to continue the war beyond the summer campaign if necessary in order to complete the liberation of the country. The poll, conducted in late May and early June by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology
Vladimir Putin’s disastrous invasion of Ukraine is exposing all of his personal weaknesses as a ruler. It is also casting an unforgiving light on the extensive damage he has done to Russia. In the early 1990s, I encountered Putin several times at international meetings in St. Petersburg, but I never really met him. I talked
As Ukraine’s long anticipated counteroffensive gets underway, international attention is firmly fixed on military developments. If the Ukrainian Armed Forces are able to achieve significant advances, the authorities in Kyiv will also be faced with the challenge of reintegrating communities that have lived for more than a year, and in some cases over nine years,
The head of Russia’s Wagner mercenary group has launched a series of outspoken attacks on the country’s military leadership in recent weeks that point to mounting internal divisions within Putin’s invading army as it prepares to face a potentially decisive Ukrainian counteroffensive. In one of his most recent rants, Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin mocked Russian
