March 21:
RosBalt reports that as economic conditions continue to worsen, poverty is widening within the Russian Federation. According to ROSSTAT, Russia's state statistics agency, the number of poor people in Russia has reached its highest point in a decade. In 2015, ROSSTAT has disclosed, the number of those considered poor within the Russian Federation reached 19.2 million - up more than three million souls from the year prior, and the highest point since 2006, when 21.6 million Russians were considered poor.
March 22:
Ukraine's Foreign Ministry has issued a demarche to the Kremlin in response to the March 21st conviction of imprisoned helicopter pilot Nadiya Savchenko. "We view this judicial farce as yet another undeniable evidence of the Russian Federation's failure to comply with the Minsk Agreements," the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry said in an official statement carried by Interfax. "The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry demands that Russia immediately reverse the unlawful and inhumane decision, and immediately free Nadiya Savchenko. We also demand the release of all Ukrainian citizens who are being held unlawfully, and who are political hostages and victims of Russia's aggression against Ukraine."
March 23:
The Duma is rolling back new restrictions on press freedoms in Russia. The Meduza news portal reports that, only two weeks after President Vladimir Putin signed into law new legislation that denies journalists free access to voting centers during elections, the Duma has moved to revoke the measure. Under the compromise amendment now being considered in Russia's lower house of parliament, "reporters would only need to inform election officials about their activities," rather than formally request permission to be there - a right Duma lawmakers have insisted is enshrined in the country's constitution.
March 25:
Moscow and Washington may still be at loggerheads over Kremlin policy in Ukraine, but counterterrorism cooperation between the two countries has begun quietly moving forward once again. Kuwait's KUNA news agency reports Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov as telling reporters that - after months of tension as a result of Russia's military intervention in support of the Assad regime in Syria - the U.S. and Russian governments have come to terms on "real and efficient coordination of actions to exterminate the so-called Islamic State (IS) and Jabhat Al-Nusra."
Russia is escalating its long-running territorial dispute with Japan. The Azerbaijani Press Agency (APA) reportsthat the Kremlin plans to deploy missile systems in the Kuril Islands, which are jointly claimed by Japan. The news was broken by Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, who said during a Ministry meeting that "The planned rearmament of contingents and military bases on Kuril islands is under way. Already this year they will get Bal and Bastion coastal missile systems as well as new-generation Eleron-3 unmanned aerial vehicles."
The goal of the move is clear: to solidify Russia's claim to the disputed territory, and to diminish Japan's claim to the same. Moscow is interested in "developing military infrastructure in the Arctic and Kuril island zones" as part of its presence in both places, Shoigu has confirmed.
The Kremlin is taking aim at the Church of Scientology. According to The Moscow Times, Russian authorities have carried out regular raids on the Moscow branch of the controversial group. The Church now boasts several thousand members in Moscow, and some tens of thousands of adherents throughout the Russian Federation, its officials say. But its growth has put Scientology at odds with Russia's Orthodox Church, the country's dominant religious institution. Over the past two decades, the Orthodox Church has carried out extensive research into "totalitarian sects and destructive cults" - of which it deems Scientology one - and has mobilized tremendous resources to marginalize the group. "The Russian Orthodox Church is trying to root out its 'competitors' with the help of the authorities," notes religious scholar Yekaterina Elbakyan. "By doing so, it is also making itself part of the government apparatus and making itself dependent on the state."
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