(C) Meduza This story was originally published by Meduza and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . The Real Russia. Today. Monday, May 20, 2024 — Meduza [1] [] Date: 2024-05-21 The war in Ukraine 🪖 Belousov gets an ally subordinate at the Defense Ministry: Vladimir Putin has appointed another former Economic Development Ministry official to a senior Defense Ministry position. Oleg Savelyev is the first deputy named to serve under Russia’s new defense minister, Andrey Belousov. Savelyev replaces Colonel General Yuri Sadovenko, a longtime close colleague of Sergey Shoigu, Belousov’s predecessor. Vladimir Putin has appointed another former Economic Development Ministry official to a senior Defense Ministry position. Oleg Savelyev is the first deputy named to serve under Russia’s new defense minister, Andrey Belousov. Savelyev replaces Colonel General Yuri Sadovenko, a longtime close colleague of Sergey Shoigu, Belousov’s predecessor. 🏠 Seizing homes on occupied lands: Moscow-appointed officials in occupied Ukraine have declared more than 13,000 apartments and private homes to be “abandoned properties” and plan to confiscate them for the state, according to a new report by Novaya Gazeta Europe. Additionally, the average number of homes pro-Russian officials are claiming each month has skyrocketed from 234 in the first year of Russia’s invasion to roughly 1,500 homes now. Journalists established that most of the homes in question belong to refugees who have fled the war’s violence, though reporters found at least one man in Donetsk whose home was declared “abandoned” while he was on the front lines fighting for Russia. More than three-fourths of the properties are located in the Ukrainian territories occupied after 2022. Most of the flagged homes are located in more affluent areas farther from frontline combat, suggesting that occupation officials are possibly targeting valuable properties, perhaps with self-interested motives. Moscow-appointed officials in occupied Ukraine have declared more than 13,000 apartments and private homes to be “abandoned properties” and plan to confiscate them for the state, according to a new report by Novaya Gazeta Europe. Additionally, the average number of homes pro-Russian officials are claiming each month has skyrocketed from 234 in the first year of Russia’s invasion to roughly 1,500 homes now. Journalists established that most of the homes in question belong to refugees who have fled the war’s violence, though reporters found at least one man in Donetsk whose home was declared “abandoned” while he was on the front lines fighting for Russia. More than three-fourths of the properties are located in the Ukrainian territories occupied after 2022. Most of the flagged homes are located in more affluent areas farther from frontline combat, suggesting that occupation officials are possibly targeting valuable properties, perhaps with self-interested motives. 👋 Outreach media project for persons caught inside Russia runs out of cash: Ilya Krasilshchik’s Helpdesk project has ceased media operations. An announcement posted on Monday explains that the outlet’s funding has run out. “Helpdesk Media positioned itself as a service journalism startup that told stories about the war, raised money for its victims, and ran a support hotline for Russians and Ukrainians,” explains The Moscow Times. Helpdesk will continue its fundraising efforts for Ukraine and maintain its chat hotline for persons seeking to leave Russia (to escape mobilization, flee political persecution, return to Ukraine, and so on). Until recently, Ukrainian national Serhiy Hulko was a high-achieving medical student at Russia’s top university. Then his classmates reported him for anti-war posts he made on his private Instagram account. In May, after serving three back-to-back jail terms, Hulko withdrew from the university and managed to leave Russia. According to Meduza’s sources, Hulko may have avoided criminal charges thanks to the intervention of Maria Vorontsova, the deputy dean of the school’s medical department and the daughter of Vladimir Putin. Meduza spoke to Hulko about his arrests, his departure, and why he chose to stay in Russia as long as he did. Journalists at iStories spoke to the wife of a jailed Crimean Tatar political activist and a lawyer who defends such activists in Russian court. The article’s publication coincides with the 80th anniversary of the Soviet government’s decision to deport the ethnic group from the peninsula for supposed cooperation with the Nazis. iStories describes how Crimean Tatars struggled to survive the mass expulsion, preserve their culture in exile, and fight for decades to return home. Since annexing the peninsula in 2014, Crimean Tatars have had to rely on their group solidarity again in the face of police raids, the designation of the Noman Çelebicihan volunteer battalion as a terrorist group, and the opening of a second pretrial detention prison in Crimea to accommodate arrested Crimean Tatars and other Ukrainians abducted in other occupied parts of the country. iStories’ sources say that many in the community fled Crimea during Russia’s wave of “partial mobilization” but later returned. As men among the Crimean Tatar have been jailed for political activism on “terrorism” charges, many of their wives have taken up their work while maintaining a support network and trying to draw public attention to their prosecutions. We got The Beet. Don’t miss Meduza’s weekly newsletter (separate from the one you’re reading here)! Russian politics and policy 🏫 Russia’s SAT made voluntary in occupied Crimea: The Russian governor of Sevastopol has made two key standardized tests voluntary for local high school students due to safety concerns over the “unstable situation” in the area caused by Ukrainian attacks on the city. For the past two years, Russia’s Education Ministry has allowed students in war-affected regions seeking admission to universities to take entrance exams instead. The Russian governor of Sevastopol has made two key standardized tests voluntary for local high school students due to safety concerns over the “unstable situation” in the area caused by Ukrainian attacks on the city. For the past two years, Russia’s Education Ministry has allowed students in war-affected regions seeking admission to universities to take entrance exams instead. 🛢️ Moscow suspends gasoline export ban for a month: Russia’s government is temporarily lifting its export ban on gasoline, effective between May 20 and June 30, 2024. Officials say the measure is necessary to desaturate Russia’s automotive fuel market, prevent slowdowns at refineries, and free up ports by shipping away undelivered fuel that’s been taking up space. Despite increased drone attacks by Ukraine against Russian oil refineries in 2024, Russia has managed swift repairs and already restarted production at key facilities, reports Reuters. Russia imposed its gasoline export ban on March 1, ostensibly for six months, saying the measure was needed to “maintain a stable situation” amid high demand. Earlier this month, the American Political Science Review published relevant new research by political scientist David Szakonyi, an assistant professor at George Washington University and a co-founder of the Anti-Corruption Data Collective. In the article, titled “Corruption and Co-Optation in Autocracy: Evidence from Russia,” Dr. Szakonyi explores if corrupt State Duma deputies “govern differently” and tries to establish what the governing costs of such corruption might be. The methodology he uses will be familiar to The Naked Pravda’s listeners who know the techniques of anti-corruption activists like the researchers at Alexey Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation. A new long-form report by Meduza’s Margarita Lyutova and Andrey Pertsev describes how economist Maxim Oreshkin has built clout in the Kremlin largely by supplying rosy forecasts that have made him valuable to Putin as the president grasps for an ideological and propagandistic vision to justify (and conceal) the sacrifices of Russia’s escalating confrontation with the West. In addition to his unflinching economic optimism and capacity for deliberate embellishment, Oreshkin has exploited the mass media and established good relationships with key figures in the Putin administration, despite lacking any overarching “clan” protection and occasionally clashing with State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin and Central Bank Governor Elvira Nabiullina (albeit only “intellectually” with the latter). After terms as economic development minister and presidential adviser on economic issues, Oreshkin was recently appointed to serve as Putin’s deputy chief of staff in charge of the economy and transportation, putting him on the level of influential officials like domestic policy czar Sergey Kiriyenko and media czar Alexey Gromov. Oreshkin has expediently adapted his public rhetoric to Moscow’s changing political winds, always finding a positive spin on whatever is happening geopolitically. Since the February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, he’s reportedly helped fuel Putin’s belief that Russia’s economy is actually thriving under Western sanctions. Oreshkin is credited with designing one of Moscow’s “signature gambits” to counter those sanctions: forcing Europe to pay for Russian gas in rubles bought on the Moscow Exchange from Gazprombank, shielding both the lender and the market itself from more sanctions. Amid his unrelenting optimism, Oreshkin has also adapted his policy preferences when necessary. For example, as economic development minister, he advocated and instituted budgetary restrictions to fight inflation and grow the Russian National Wealth Fund to guard against shocks in oil prices and the ruble’s exchange rate. This fiscal discipline was one of Oreshkin’s crowning achievements in office, but he’s seamlessly transitioned to supporting the government’s spending sprees since 2020. Beyond economics, he’s also attached himself to broader patriotic propaganda initiatives. The law and human rights 🔥 25 years for an arson that never happened: A military court in Novosibirsk has sentenced a local man to 25 years in prison for supposedly throwing a Molotov cocktail at a local children's music school and later plotting to burn down a military enlistment office, allegedly on orders from the Azov Battalion in Ukraine. The court convicted Ilya Baburin of multiple felonies: treason, terrorism, participation in an illegal armed formation and terrorist group, and illegal wiretapping. Baburin initially confessed to the charges but later retracted his words, saying police interrogators tortured him. A military court in Novosibirsk has sentenced a local man to 25 years in prison for supposedly throwing a Molotov cocktail at a local children's music school and later plotting to burn down a military enlistment office, allegedly on orders from the Azov Battalion in Ukraine. The court convicted Ilya Baburin of multiple felonies: treason, terrorism, participation in an illegal armed formation and terrorist group, and illegal wiretapping. Baburin initially confessed to the charges but later retracted his words, saying police interrogators tortured him. ⚖️ Return of the Yukos Case: Russia’s Prosecutor General is reportedly suing former oil tycoon and ex-Yukos owner Mikhail Khodorkovsky, his former business partner Platon Lebedev, and the Siberian Leasing Company for more than 1.4 billion rubles ($15.4 million) they say belongs to the Russian state in “damages previously established for tax crimes.” The money is now supposedly held in numerous bank accounts registered to Khodorkovsky and Lebedev. A Moscow court is scheduled to consider the claim on May 27. (In 2005 and 2010, Russian courts convicted Khodorkovsky and Lebedev of large-scale fraud, money laundering, and tax evasion in connection with Yukos. Russia’s Prosecutor General is reportedly suing former oil tycoon and ex-Yukos owner Mikhail Khodorkovsky, his former business partner Platon Lebedev, and the Siberian Leasing Company for more than 1.4 billion rubles ($15.4 million) they say belongs to the Russian state in “damages previously established for tax crimes.” The money is now supposedly held in numerous bank accounts registered to Khodorkovsky and Lebedev. A Moscow court is scheduled to consider the claim on May 27. (In 2005 and 2010, Russian courts convicted Khodorkovsky and Lebedev of large-scale fraud, money laundering, and tax evasion in connection with Yukos. 💣 Z-blogger bomb courier’s sentence goes unchanged: A Moscow military court has upheld Daria Trepova’s 27-year prison sentence for her role in the April 2023 assassination of self-described “war correspondent” pro-invasion blogger Vladlen Tatarsky. Trepova asked to have her sentence reduced to time already served in pretrial detention. A Moscow military court has upheld Daria Trepova’s 27-year prison sentence for her role in the April 2023 assassination of self-described “war correspondent” pro-invasion blogger Vladlen Tatarsky. Trepova asked to have her sentence reduced to time already served in pretrial detention. 🪮 Illegal hair dye: Earlier this month, a man in Moscow named Stanislav Netesov was convicted of “discrediting” the Russian army for dyeing his hair the colors of the Ukrainian national flag. Police cited Netesov for this violation when he came to a police station to report being robbed and assaulted in the city’s center. On May 20, a Moscow district court set Netesov’s fine: 50,000 rubles ($550). He has insisted that he supports neither “the Ukrainian regime” nor the “special military operation” and says his hair color is not a political statement. The trial of antiwar director Zhenya Berkovich and playwright Svetlana Petriychuk began on Monday in a Moscow military court. The two women are accused of “justifying terrorism” in their award-winning production of a play about a group of Russian women who decide to marry Islamists and move to Syria. Prosecutors say Berkovich and Petriychuk “entered into a criminal conspiracy” when staging their play and releasing a recording online, but the artists maintain that their play is an anti-terrorist condemnation of recruiting women into such organizations. Witnesses for the defense who work in the theater industry also testified that the adaptation of “Finist the Brave Falcon” is meant to highlight the problem of women being recruited by terrorists. The proceedings lasted more than nine hours on Monday and will resume on Tuesday. As the world turns 💥 Moscow’s alleged hybrid assaults test European legal system: According to a new investigation by The Wall Street Journal, European investigators believe that the Russian authorities are involved in a rising number of attempts to sabotage strategic infrastructure, but officials struggle with Europe’s high evidence standards and the legal challenges of prosecuting suspects. Specifically, sources told the WSJ that investigators suspect Russia of using civilians and commercial vessels to survey and possibly attack railways and maritime facilities such as undersea connections, offshore energy facilities, transport networks, and military installations. According to a new investigation by The Wall Street Journal, European investigators believe that the Russian authorities are involved in a rising number of attempts to sabotage strategic infrastructure, but officials struggle with Europe’s high evidence standards and the legal challenges of prosecuting suspects. Specifically, sources told the WSJ that investigators suspect Russia of using civilians and commercial vessels to survey and possibly attack railways and maritime facilities such as undersea connections, offshore energy facilities, transport networks, and military installations. 🇮🇷 Putin mourns Raisi: In an official statement published on Monday, Vladimir Putin “expressed his deepest condolences to Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran Ayatollah Ali Khamenei over the death of Iran’s president, Ebrahim Raisi.” Putin went on to describe Raisi as “a true friend of Russia” who made “an invaluable personal contribution to the development of good neighborly relations between our countries and made great efforts to advance them to the level of strategic partnership.” Russian military deserters are feeling uneasy in Kazakhstan amid the case against Kamil Kasimov, the first Russian contractor soldier to be arrested in Kazakhstan with the participation of Russian law enforcement. In late April, officials apprehended Kasimov directly at his place of work in Astana and transported him to a Russian military base leased in the town of Priozersk. Military investigators at the Russian base are handling Kasimov’s desertion case, though jurisdiction technically belongs to the military investigators in Ulan-Ude, where he was stationed before he fled abroad. However, a human rights activist named Artur Alkhastov told journalists at iStories that military crimes under Kazakhstani law aren’t subject to extradition, meaning that Kasimov’s case could set a new precedent. Or he could be convicted of a civilian travel violation like Mikhail Zhilin, a major in Russia’s Federal Protective Service, who currently is the only Russian deserter successfully extradited from Kazakhstan. (Zhilin was sent back to Russia for violating Kazakhstan’s border.) No country can be free without independent media. 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