October 25th marked the one year anniversary of oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky’s arrest at gunpoint on a Siberian airfield, an anniversary which not only escaped my notice, but the notice of most of the...
Archive - 2004
AndyRussia’s Booming Baby Market
Hot on the heels of German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, Hollywood star Angelina Jolie has adopted a Russian baby. Mosnews broke the news on Monday, revealing that Jolie fell in love with baby Gleb the moment she saw...
Unspeakable
I never thought I’d live to see the day when terrorists went so far as to deliberately target schoolchildren.
I was wrong.
Two jetliners crash in Russia
Two Russian passenger jets crashed yesterday within minutes of each other, killing all 89 passengers. Both planes flew out of the same Moscow airport (Domodedovo) yesterday evening, and both crashed within two to three...
Terek on the march again
Remember how back in May I told you about Terek Grozny upsetting the odds to win the Russian football cup and qualify for the UEFA (European) Champions League? Well, their Champions League campaign has begun… and...
Schroeder adopts Russian orphan
The Guardian newspaper reports that German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and his wife have recently adopted an orphan from Russia… Three-year-old Victoria, from St Petersburg, has been living at the...
Ingushetia latest
A couple of days after the raid on Ingushetia, everyone seems to be getting their bearings and slowly figuring out what exactly happened. Here are a few of the key developments of the last 24 hours: ITAR-TASS has a...
Major raid in Ingushetia
Monday night/early Tuesday morning several major battles took place in the Russian Republic of Ingushetia where up to 200 rebels launched a major raid. The bulk of the fighting was in the town of Nazran (a city of...
Operation Bagration
What was the most important military operation of June 1944? Not Operation Overlord (D-Day), but Operation Bagration, says Mike Davis. The operation began on 19 June 2004, when …a Soviet guerrilla army emerged...
What to do when the water runs cold
The first thing I ever bought in Irkutsk was an electric kettle. It was the best thing I ever bought. Not because it could make a mean cup of chai (although it could). But because it was my shower. Oh, I had a real...