VISUAL REPORTS
West Slams Moscow's 'Disproportionate' Use Of Force
Police in Moscow detained more than 1,300 people in a day of protests against alleged irregularities in the run-up to local elections. Officers clad in riot gear used batons and force against demonstrators who had gathered on July 27 outside Moscow City Hall on July 27. (over 5 million combined views on Russian Service and Current Time)
Siberian Activists Fight To Commemorate Gulag Victims
Two women in a Siberian village have been joined by a volunteer search group to locate the graves of people who died in a gulag settlement in the 1930s. But reburying the victims and creating a memorial would require official permission, and the local authority says he would rather not "poke around in the past."
Serbian Protests Continue As Ruling Party Marks Seven Years In Power
Thousands of Serbs protested against the government in Belgrade on July 27 for the 34th weekend in a row. Some decried the leadership of President Aleksandar Vucic, while others marched to the headquarters of Serbia's public radio and television broadcaster RTS, where they removed the station's flag from a flagpole and replaced it with their own flags bearing the slogans "Free Elections" and "Free Media."
Protesters March In Bucharest Over Police Response To Teen Murder
Thousands of Romanians gathered on July 27 in Bucharest amid public outrage caused by reports that police neglected emergency calls made by a 15-year old girl before she was murdered. Romania’s interior minister dismissed the national police chief over the case.
OTHER NEWS
Russian Protest Leader Navalny Returned To Prison As Speculation Over Illness Continues
Russian opposition leader Aleksei Navalny has been released from a Moscow hospital due to an unspecified illness and taken back to prison under guard. "Aleksei has gotten better after an intense treatment with [steroid medication] prednisolone," his physician, Anastasia Vasilyeva, said in a statement she issued from the hospital. Navalny lawyer Olga Mikhailova has said that he had been poisoned by an unidentified chemical agent.
Bellingcat Says Staffers Targeted In Cyberattacks
The Bellingcat investigative news organization says staff members have been targeted in sophisticated cyberattacks through their ProtonMail accounts, hours after the e-mail service provider said evidence suggested Moscow was responsible.
Russian Embassy Visits Crew Members Of British Vessel Seized By Iran
Representatives of the Russian Embassy in Tehran have visited three Russian crew members from the British vessel Stena Impero who were detained by Iran. Spokesperson Andrei Ganenko was quoted by Interfax on July 27 as saying the embassy was in talks with Iranian officials to release the men.
Duma Bill Proposes Limiting Foreign Ownership Of Top Internet Companies
A bill submitted to parliament on July 26 would prohibit foreigners, including foreign companies, from owning more than a fifth of "significant" Russian online operators, including Yandex, sometimes called the Russian Google, and Mail.ru. Mail.ru controls the nation’s two largest social media platforms, Vkontakte and Odnoklassniki.
Russia Denies Frequencies For Global Satellite Internet Project
Russia’s State Radio Commission has rejected frequencies sought since 2017 by the British Internet satellite operator OneWeb for its work in Russia. The global satellite communications network is a joint project with the state-run Roscosmos, but the Federal Security Service expressed concern that it would not be able to control users, and declared the project a threat to national security in October 2018. (Russian Service)
More Than 1,000 Evacuated Due To Siberia Flooding
Authorities in the southeastern Siberian region of Irkutsk have evacuated more than 1,000 people because of heavy rain.
Ukraine’s Incoming Class Of Parliamentarians Is Getting Schooled
Before the 254 newly elected deputies of President Volodymyr Zelenskiy's Servant of the People party get down to governing, they're going back to school. At the initiative and expense of the party, the Kyiv School of Economics is giving them a crash course on economics and lawmaking.
Kyiv Mayor Klitschko Sues Kolomoyskiy TV Channel For Libel
Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko says he has filed a libel lawsuit against Ihor Kolomoyskiy’s 1+1 TV channel for "launching a widespread campaign" to discredit him and his former boxing champion brother Wladimir. The government is rumored to be considering replacing Klitschko as chairman of Kyiv's City State Administration with the station's General Director Oleksiy Tkachenko.
Armenian Judicial Council Rules To Investigate Kocharian Trial Judge
A decision by Armenia’s Supreme Judicial Council supports a petition by the country’s prosecutor-general’s office to allow for the investigation of a judge who presided over the trial of former President Robert Kocharian and released him on bail in May.
Trial Of Xinjiang Kazakh Activist Bilash Begins
The trial of Serikzhan Bilash, who leads a group that raised concerns over the internment of ethnic Kazakhs and Uyghurs in China's northwestern Xinjiang region, has begun. Bilash faces charges of extremist speech.
OBITUARY: Vladimir Kara-Murza Sr.
Vladimir Kara-Murza Jr. posted news of his father’s death on Twitter, writing, “Today, 28 July, Vladimir Alekseevich Kara-Murza (1959-2019) left this life. Historian, TV journalist, one of the founders of “Old NTV.” For many years, the award-winning journalist hosted the show "Грани времени", “Faces of Time,” for Radio Svoboda, RFE/RL’s Russian Service. (Russian Service)
MAJLIS PODCAST: Peeking Behind Turkmenistan’s Facade