Politician was taken to hospital from jail where he was detained over call for protests
The Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny remains in hospital after being rushed there on Sunday morning with symptoms that one of his doctors said could indicate poisoning.
Navalny was taken to hospital from jail, where he was serving a 30-day sentence after being arrested last week for calling people to attend an anti-government protest.
Continue reading...Further action planned to press authorities to let candidates stand in Moscow city elections
Russian opposition politicians have called on their supporters to keep up with street rallies, the day after the most forceful police response to protests in the country for years.
More than 1,300 people were detained by police on Saturday, at a protest called in response to the refusal of electoral authorities to register independent candidates for the Moscow city council elections in September.
Continue reading...Russian police arrested more than 600 people, including prominent activists, around a political protest in Moscow to demand that members of the opposition be allowed to run in a local election later this year. The protest, which authorities declared illegal beforehand, did not represent a significant challenge to Vladimir Putin and his allies, who have the resources to break up such demonstrations and jail people. Chants of 'Russia without Putin' and 'Putin resign' echoed through central Moscow as guardsmen clad in riot gear beat back protesters with batons and roughly detained people. Jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny had called for the protest
Continue reading...An archive of artefacts from Stalin’s brutal reign should stand as evidence against Putin’s vision of a ‘heroic’ Soviet past
• Irina Sherbakova was a founding member of the human rights organisation Memorial
Great expectations characterised 1989. In Russia, the rock band Kino sang “We are waiting for changes!” In huge public rallies on the streets of Moscow, millions demanded freedom and democracy. The Gorbachev era brought about a frenzy of change, and people witnessed incredible events on a weekly basis: they snatched up newspapers, hung on every word broadcast on TV, and with every passing day they felt more alive and free.
Related: 'Homage to evil': Russian activists detained over Stalin protest
Continue reading...Russia refuses to release details about vessel or its mission ‘to protect national security’
The Kremlin has said it will not reveal the vessel type or mission of the 14 sailors who died onboard a top-secret submersible on Monday because the information is a closely guarded state secret.
The remarks came as information has trickled out about the vessel, reported to be an advanced “spy submersible”, and its highly decorated crew, which served in a secretive unit under Russia’s main directorate of deep-sea research and represented some of the navy’s best and brightest.
Continue reading...Vladimir Putin says deal due to expire on Sunday will be extended by six to nine months
Russia has agreed with Saudi Arabia to extend by six to nine months a deal with Opec on reducing oil output, the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, said, as oil prices come under renewed pressure from rising US supplies and a slowing global economy.
The Saudi energy minister, Khalid al-Falih, said on Sunday that the deal would most likely be extended by nine months and no deeper reductions were needed.
Continue reading...Jimmy Carter has called Donald Trump an “illegitimate president” who was helped into office by Russian interference in the 2016 election.
Related: Jimmy Carter calls Donald Trump an 'illegitimate president' – live
Continue reading...PM addresses Russian leader at G20 over ‘wider pattern of unacceptable behaviour’
Theresa May has upbraided Vladimir Putin for the Salisbury poisoning, calling it a “truly despicable act”, during a frosty one-to-one meeting at the G20 summit in Osaka that is likely to be their last encounter.
After exchanging a handshake, during which May appeared stern, the pair held the first half of their 80-minute meeting alone, with only translators in the room.
Continue reading...US president appears to make light of 2016 scandal before meeting at G20 summit
Donald Trump has sardonically asked Vladimir Putin not to meddle in the 2020 US election, smirking and pointing his finger as he did so and appearing to make light of a scandal that led to an investigation of his campaign’s contact with the Kremlin during the 2016 election.
The US president and his Russian counterpart were heading into talks on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Japan’s western city of Osaka, their first formal face-to-face meeting since a high-profile summit in Helsinki last July.
Continue reading...Asked by a reporter at the G20 summit in Japan whether he would raise the issue of electoral interference during a meeting with his Russian counterpart, the US president says: 'Yes, of course I will.' He then points his finger at Putin and gives the directive twice while pointing at him and smiling, appearing to make light of
a scandal that led to a two-year investigation into his campaign's
contact with the Kremlin in 2016. Putin smiles without comment throughout
Russian president aiming to improve relations with Britain, Kremlin says
Vladimir Putin will meet Theresa May at this week’s G20 summit in Japan with a view to seeking improved relations between the countries, the Kremlin said on Wednesday.
The outgoing UK prime minister’s spokesman stressed that the meeting with the Russian president did not represent a normalisation of ties.
Continue reading...Truth or consequences, a parlour game in which players are penalised for dishonesty or wrongdoing, is mostly fun – but it also reflects a broad moral consensus about the unacceptability of lying. This long-held belief is deeply rooted in popular culture. Truth or Consequences was the title of a postwar American TV quiz show whose success was so great that a New Mexico town was named after it. Put simply, and as a general rule, most people expect that if you tell whoppers, you get punished.
Why, then, do so many modern leaders seem to think they can lie and get away with it? A propensity to deny, dodge or disown the consequences of political actions is spreading globally like a toxic virus. There was a time, as David Miliband, the former foreign secretary, argues in this year’s Fulbright Lecture, when public accountability was on the rise. Not any more. In what he calls the age of impunity, “those engaged in conflicts around the world believe they can get away with anything, including murder”.
Continue reading...I agree with Natalie Nougayrède’s point that “universalism is not a dirty word” (Hong Kong’s struggles are ours too, Journal, 19 June), but I don’t think it is “beautiful” either.
As I understand it, it entails a challenge to all of us to assume responsibility for our condition. This cannot be achieved by affirming values as universal because they belong to our particular vocabulary (“basic human aspirations”, “fundamental rights and freedom”, “essential, individual rights”, etc). It can only be achieved by grappling with the different realities of those who think and feel not as we do.
Continue reading...Russian president helps Chinese counterpart celebrate 66th birthday in style on Sunday, giving him Russian ice cream and sharing champagne before a summit in Tajikistan. The two leaders reportedly consider each other to be close friends.
Discussion of senior leaders' private lives is extremely rare in China and their exact birth dates are considered a state secret.
Continue reading...Hundreds of people were detained in central Moscow on Wednesday as protesters rallied to demand that charges be brought against the police officers who planted drugs on Ivan Golunov, an investigative journalist whose arrest sparked widespread public anger. Ovd-info, a website that tracks arrests, said at least 423 people had been detained
Continue reading...Protesters call for charges to be brought against police officers who arrested journalist
Hundreds of people have been detained in central Moscow as protesters demanded charges be brought against the police officers who planted drugs on Ivan Golunov, an investigative journalist whose arrest sparked widespread public anger.
Alexei Navalny, a prominent Kremlin critic, was among those arrested when police, some clad in riot gear, moved in on 1,500 peaceful protesters who were attempting to reach the headquarters of the interior ministry that oversees police work. The protest, which was not approved by the authorities, took place on Russia Day, a national holiday in honour of the country’s independence from the Soviet Union.
Continue reading...Tonight With Vladimir Putin portrays Russian president as a talkshow host
Russia’s government-owned news service RT has denounced a BBC comedy chatshow featuring a 3D animation of Vladimir Putin interviewing the likes of Alastair Campbell.
The BBC described Tonight With Vladimir Putin, which has yet to air, as a “television first” with new technology enabling a “3D digital cartoon of Putin to walk around and sit behind the desk, interviewing real human guests in front of a studio audience, all in real time.”
Continue reading...Secretary of state’s visit will be first high-level meeting since redacted Mueller report release
Mike Pompeo is to meet Vladimir Putin in Russia at a time of heightened fears of a clash between the US and Iran, a Moscow ally.
A Kremlin spokesman, before the meeting on Tuesday, accused the US of applying a “maximum pressure policy” against Iran, a reference to a harsh US sanctions regime and military deployments to the Middle East.
Continue reading...The report concluded that Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election was ‘sweeping and systematic’
Donald Trump and Russia’s Vladimir Putin discussed what Trump again dismissed as the “Russian hoax” in their first known phone call since the release of the special counsel Robert Mueller’s report on Russia’s extensive meddling during the 2016 election campaign.
In an hourlong “very good talk” on Friday, Russia’s president “sort of smiled” about Mueller’s conclusions, Trump told reporters at the White House.
Continue reading...Sarah Sanders says pair had ‘very good’ talk on Friday morning in which Venezuela was also discussed
Here’s an updated recap of today’s political news as we close out the Friday night live politics blog:
The president elaborated his complaints about conservative “censorship” on social media, highlighting his concerns about the treatment of Diamond and Silk, two online commenters who have been championed by Republicans for being black women who support Trump, James Woods, and Paul Watson, a British editor of Infowars, Alex Jones’ conspiracy site.
Trump appeared on Infowars, which has promoted multiple conspiracy theories, including the conspiracy that the Sandy Hook Elementary School mass shooting was a hoax, in 2015, and told host Alex Jones “Your reputation is amazing. I will not let you down.”
The wonderful Diamond and Silk have been treated so horribly by Facebook. They work so hard and what has been done to them is very sad - and we’re looking into. It’s getting worse and worse for Conservatives on social media!
So surprised to see Conservative thinkers like James Woods banned from Twitter, and Paul Watson banned from Facebook! https://t.co/eHX3Z5CMXb
He is very very very very very very very very very very very obviously an extremist. https://t.co/4pK2klhbqi
Continue reading...