Tag: Russian government
The Trump Indictment Puts the GOP on Trial
Updated at 7:45 p.m. ET on August 1, 2023
Earlier today, Donald Trump was indicted for a third time, on the charge that he attempted to subvert the 2020 presidential election. The indictment, filed by Special Counsel Jack Smith, accuses Trump of a conspiracy to defraud the United States by “using dishonesty, fraud, and deceit”; a conspiracy to “corruptly obstruct and impede” an official proceeding of the U.S. government and for actually partaking in that obstruction; and a
One Life Among the 298 Ended by a Russian Missile
Jon O’Brien’s son, Jack, was on the type of summer-long Euro trip that marks an end to late adolescence and a step into early adulthood. Jack was 25; the seven-week trip was the longest he had been away from his parents. His travels included a road trip around Iceland, a train ride through Russia with stops in Moscow and St. Petersburg, and a visit to the Camp Nou soccer stadium in Barcelona. In mid-July 2014, Jack arrived in
Ukraine and the Words That Lead to Mass Murder
In the terrible winter of 1932–33, brigades of Communist Party activists went house to house in the Ukrainian countryside, looking for food. The brigades were from Moscow, Kyiv, and Kharkiv, as well as villages down the road. They dug up gardens, broke open walls, and used long rods to poke up chimneys, searching for hidden grain. They watched for smoke coming from chimneys, because that might mean a family had hidden flour and was baking bread. They led away
The Four Ways Sanctions Work (Or Don’t)
The United States, the European Union, and countries around the world have cut Russia out of the global economy. Moscow’s central bank is struggling to support the ruble. Russian financial institutions are blocked from the global payments system. Far-reaching import and export bans have choked off trade to and from the country. Russian markets have seized. Will these sanctions pressure Vladimir Putin to withdraw the Russian military from Ukraine? Or will their main effect be to hurt Russian civilians and
No One in Kyiv Knows Whether Russia Is Bluffing
Children twirled around a skating rink just outside the president’s office in central Kyiv last week, while tourists took pictures of themselves in front of onion-domed, snow-dusted churches nearby. The stores were full of people shopping for the New Year’s holiday and Orthodox Christmas, just as they always are at this time of year. The airports were crowded.
In other words, nothing unusual was happening in the Ukrainian capital—nothing except for the contingency plans being made for a possible Russian