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Story Archives of 'Russia'
Russian Whistleblower Turns to YouTube
By Virginia Prescott on Monday, November 16, 2009.
Police corruption is no secret in today's Russia, but it’s rarely discussed out loud. Aleksei Dymovsky, a police officer in the Black Sea port city of Novorossiisk threw his career to the wind and decided to go public - on YouTube.
In a series of three 2-7 minute long videos released over the past two weeks, Dymovsky faced the camera and addressed his complaints directly to Vladimir Putin. "I want to work," he says, in one video, "but I can no longer stand investigating made-up crimes, imprisoning people we are told to imprison. I can’t stand crimes made-on-order. I’m sick of it all."
Dymovsky was quickly fired, but his videos have drawn more than 1 million hits on YouTube and he is being hailed as a hero, and joins the growing number of Iranians, Chinese and other citizens using the Internet to defy government secrecy.
Miriam Elder covers Russia for GlobalPost. She’s been reporting on Dymovsky’s case and joins us from Moscow.
GlobalPost: Russia's whistleblower cop is a YouTube sensation
Russia's Doomsday Machine
By Virginia Prescott on Thursday, September 17, 2009.
When Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited Russia earlier this year, she gave the Russian foreign minister a big red “reset” button. In spite of a translation gaffe, the message was clear: the Obama Administration hopes to improve a tense relationship between the two countries.
During the height of the Cold War, American fears of a Soviet doomsday machine permiated popular culture. This ultimate weapon that would trigger an apocalyptic nightmare was the focus of the Stanley Kubrick satire Dr. Strangelove.
Wired editor Nicholas Thompson reveals new evidence of a real Soviet doomsday machine in his book The Hawk and the Dove: Paul Nitze, George Kennan, and the History of the Cold War. Nicholas will be speaking at River Run Bookstore in Portsmouth on Monday, but before he heads up to the Granite State, he joins us from his office in New York.
Tuva's Tick Problem
By Angela Robson on Thursday, July 9, 2009.
A rise in global temperature has brought on a rise in diseases spread by ticks--diseases that can be fatal. An Oxfam report out this week warns that the health implications of climate change must be taken seriously.
From Russia With Lumber
By Virginia Prescott on Wednesday, June 24, 2009.
Lumber for the poor? Here in the U.S., the unemployed masses have food stamps and welfare to fall back on when unemployment checks run out.
But in Russia, local governments are looking for more tangible ways to help out-of-work citizens make ends meet. They are handing out everything from free plots of land to discounted lumber in an effort to keep social unrest at bay.
Andrew Osborn, Moscow correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, wrote about these unusual subsidy programs in a recent edition of the paper and he joined us on the line from Moscow.
The Wall Street Journal: Russia, a Lumbering Giant, Asks: Care for Some Cut-Rate Logs?
(Photo by sarniebill1 via Flickr/Creative Commons)
Inside the Stalin Archives
By Virginia Prescott on Monday, December 29, 2008.Yesterday evening, Russian television viewers awaited results of a nationwide vote for greatest historical figure. Medieval hero Alexander Nevsky came in at number one. In third place, with more than a half-million votes, was Josef Stalin. His 31-year reign left an estimated 20 million people dead, but many Russians still praise his strong hand in shaping Soviet industry and defeating Hitler. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin recently approved a textbook used in schools across Russia that highlights Stalin’s achievements. Stalin was never held to account for his crimes. There was no Nuremberg trial and no truth and reconciliation commission for the leader who sent not only enemies, but close allies to their deaths.
Jonathan Brent is an editor at Yale University Press, publisher of the 20-volume Annals of Communism series. Inside the Stalin Archives is Jonathan Brent’s personal story of the 16 years he spent driving the project. From 1992 to 2008, he met with archive directors, former KGB agents, researchers and bureaucrats to unlock millions of documents left behind from the Soviet era. In the process, he witnesses a new Russia taking shape.
Jonathan Brent joins us on Word of Mouth to discuss his work and modern Russia.
Alina Simone and the Songs of Yanka
By Virginia Prescott on Thursday, October 9, 2008.
Russian poet and songwriter Yana Dyagileva – or simply Yanka, as she was better known—had a music career that only ran four years. But her songs had a lasting impact on the Russian underground music scene. She gained a following as her tapes were passed around hand-to-hand below the radar of authorities in the late 1980s and early 1990s. But as the Soviet Union began to fall apart, so did Yanka’s personal life. She moved back to her family’s home in Siberia and isolated herself from the rest of the world. She was 24 years old when she went missing one spring day; A week later, her body was found in a nearby river.
Her music lives on, though, most recently through the voice of artist Alina Simone. Alina has released a full album of Yanka cover songs, and the new record is developing a following of its own. It’s called “Everyone is Crying Out to Me, Beware”, and Alina joins us live on Word of Mouth to discuss it.
Global Voices: Bloggers React to Conflict in Georgia
By Virginia Prescott on Wednesday, August 13, 2008.
The recent conflict between Georgia and Russia pulled headlines away from the start of the Olympics over the weekend, and for the past few days we’ve heard stories of military clashes, causalities, and – now – negotiations to end the fighting in the region. As often is the case with tragic stories like this, the most difficult voices to hear can be from those who are affected the most – the ordinary citizens who watch as armies roll into their towns and drop bombs on their buildings, those who huddle in their homes or flee them as they piece together what’s happening around them.
Thanks to the immediacy and accessibility of the internet, though, we no longer have to wait for a journalist to find those people and tell their stories. Bloggers have been posting their own first-person accounts since the fighting began. The website Global Voices collects the stories found on blogs around the world, and we often turn to one of its editors and writers, Deborah Dilley, to fill us in. Deborah joins us on Word of Mouth to review some of the blogs from Georgia, and to highlight some other stories buzzing around the international blogosphere.
(Map courtesy WikiMedia Commons)
Here are links to the stories mentioned in today's Global Voices segment:
Georgia, Russia: Tbilisi Reports
Georgia, Russia: Blogger From Poti Recounts the Bombing
Georgia, Russia: More Reports On the Conflict From Russophone Bloggers
India: Abortion, Parents and the Indian Law
Russia Resurrected
By Laura Knoy on Monday, August 4, 2008.A decade ago Russia struggled to be a force on the world stage. But now, fueled by vast petroleum reserves, the former Communist nation has become an economic juggernaut, unafraid to flex its muscles. But as its political clout has grown, Russia seems less committed to democracy and has drifted closer to its authoritarian past. We’ll look at Russia’s changing landscape, its larger role in the international community, and the country’s increasingly bumpy relationship with the United States.
Guests
- Lionel Ingram, former US Army Colonel and a senior lecturer in the Political Science department at the University of New Hampshire
- Ken Yalowitz, Director of the Dickey Center for International Understanding at Dartmouth College and a former ambassador to Georgia and Belarus
Russians in Hollywood
By Liz Bulkley on Friday, August 24, 2007.Tonight on the Front Porch, we're looking at Russians in Hollywood, going back to the early days of film history. We’re going to look at the ways Russians have been portrayed on American screens, before, during and after the Cold War, and we’ll trace the origins of some of the eastern Europeans who helped make Hollywood what it is today.
We'll talk with Harlow Robinson, author of the new book Russians in Hollywood, Hollywood's Russians: Biography of an Image.
The Portsmouth Peace Treaty
By Laura Knoy on Sunday, August 7, 2005.One hundred years ago this week, Japanese and Russian delegates came to our seacoast to hash out an agreement ending their war over territory. We'll examine this often overlooked treaty and its importance to New Hampshire and the world. Laura is joined by Chuck Doleac, chair of the Portsmouth Peace Treaty Centennial Committee, and President of the Japanese-American Society of New Hampshire, and Bill Martel, Professor of National Security Affairs at the Naval War College in Rhode Island. We will also hear from Marguerite Mathews, Artistic Director for the play "The Peace of Portsmouth" being performed at the Pontine Theatre.
