Siberia.Realities is a regional news outlet of RFE/RL's Russian Service.
For more than three years, most of Russia has viewed the war sparked by the Kremlin's full-scale invasion of Ukraine from afar. Now, some say, an audacious attack by Kyiv deep inside Russia means it has arrived on their doorstep.
Putin has promised repeatedly that young Russian conscripts would not be deployed in combat with Ukrainian forces. But dozens of conscripts have gone missing or captured after Ukraine’s cross-border invasion last summer. And others have reported ending up in outright combat.
Russian recruitment for men to fight in Ukraine is soaring in many of the country's regions, with signing bonuses and other incentives reaching new records in some places.
Russian families continue to mourn young conscripts sent home in coffins, despite President Vladimir Putin’s initial pledge that only “professional military personnel” would fight in the Kremlin’s all-out war on Ukraine.
In areas far from Russia's big cities, more than 120 monuments glorifying Russia's "special military operation," attempt to link the invasion of Ukraine to the Soviet victory in World War II.
Relatives of former RFE/RL contributor Nika Novak, who was sentenced to prison last year by a Russian court for carrying out her professional duties, have voiced alarm over what they called a "difficult" transfer to a Siberian jail.
The FBI has charged Russian national Nomma Zarubina with providing false information to U.S. law enforcement and maintaining connections with Russian intelligence services, linking her to another suspected spy who fled the United States while being pursued by authorities.
A court in the Siberian city of Chita has sentenced journalist Nika Novak, a former contributor to RFE/RL's Siberia.Realities project, to four years in prison on a charge of "collaboration with a foreign organization on a confidential basis."
The United States has blasted a decision by Russian authorities to sentence a former employee of the U.S. Consulate in Vladivostok to a lengthy prison term on charges Washington has called baseless.
The Primorye regional court in Russia's Far East on November 1 sentenced Robert Shonov, a former employee of the U.S. Consulate in Vladivostok, to a lengthy prison sentence on charges of "confidential collaboration with a foreign state," which Washington has called baseless.
Russia approached the Day of Remembrance of Victims of Political Repression on October 30, amid a troubling landscape marked by a mix of solemn commemorations and unsettling governmental shifts.
A Russian man was found alive in a catamaran two months after it went missing off the Russian Pacific region of Khabarovsk and drifted about 1,000 kilometers across the Sea of Okhotsk.
A monument has been erected in the Siberian city of Nizhnevartovsk to honor victims of the brutal purges from the 1930s to the 1950s, despite efforts by the Russian government to glorify Soviet dictator Josef Stalin and downplay the extent of Soviet-era political repression.
Amid intensifying pressure on technology platforms, Roskomnadzor, Russia’s communications regulator, on October 8, announced the official blocking of the Discord messaging platform, citing violations of Russian law.
The twin brothers were popular, hard-working young men from Siberia who were drafted for their year of military service in November 2023. With only a few months left to go, Konstantin and Dmitry Reshka were posted near the Ukrainian border. That's the last their family heard of them.
Mikhail Afanasyev, the imprisoned editor-in-chief of the Novy fokus (New Focus) online newspaper covering the Siberian region of Khakassia, has been given a 2024 Free Media Award for journalistic bravery.
Russia's Investigative Committee said on September 17 that nine people were arrested in the Siberian region of Krasnoyarsk after the deaths of three people who died while receiving IV treatments.
Jailed Russian anti-war activist and journalist Maria Ponomarenko has started a hunger strike to protest a new charge laid against her and a prison report saying she was reprimanded seven times for violating penitentiary rules.
A military court in the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk said on September 12 that it sentenced Private Oleg Gorbachyov of the Russian armed forces to 8 years in prison for beating his wife to death.
Two more former convicts recruited by the Wagner mercenary group have been handed lengthy prison terms for murders in Siberia.
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