(C) Meduza This story was originally published by Meduza and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . The Real Russia. Today. Thursday, May 23, 2024 — Meduza [1] [] Date: 2024-05-24 The war in Ukraine Russia arrested two more top Defense Ministry officials on May 23 in what appears to be a widening anti-corruption sweep. Four generals are now in pre-trial detention on felony charges, with three accused of taking multimillion-ruble bribes and the fourth suspected of large-scale fraud. The arrests have coincided with the ouster of longtime Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu, who lost his post earlier this month to Andrey Belousov, a former deputy prime minister who specializes in economics. Speaking to journalists on May 23, Vladimir Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov rebuffed questions about a “purge” of the Defense Ministry. Here’s what we know about the arrests so far. Federal Security Service Director Alexander Bortnikov claimed during a visit to Bishkek on Friday that his agency has proof that “Ukraine’s military intelligence is directly related” to the Moscow concert hall terrorist attack on March 22. Bortnikov told a meeting of the Council of Heads of Security Agencies and Special Services of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) that FSB investigators have established that attack plans, financing, and escape logistics were coordinated online by members of the Islamic State – Khorasan Province terrorist group. Bortnikov added that the FSB believes one of the terrorists’ goals was to damage Moscow’s relationship with other CIS members “by using religious and ethnic factors.” On Thursday, Vladimir Putin ordered his cabinet to develop a procedure for transferring U.S. property and property “related to U.S. persons” as compensation in case of damages suffered by Russian stakeholders due to American authorities' actions. U.N. Human Rights Council expert Karinna Moskalenko told Agentstvo Media that the presidential order violates Russia’s Constitution, arguing that Putin’s confiscation fails to meet the democratic criteria laid out for such interference. Separately, attorney Dmitry Zakhvatov told The Insider that the executive order could be turned against Russians themselves. For example, designated “foreign agents” would be vulnerable to property confiscations if the authorities decided that they were “controlled by the United States.” It’s still unclear how Russian officials would determine the damages suffered by Russian stakeholders in America in the event of asset seizures. Putin says his order is a response to the U.S. government’s plans to allow the White House to confiscate billions of dollars in Russian sovereign assets now frozen in U.S. banks and transfer them to Ukraine. In February 2024, claiming that Russia has “no fewer” frozen Western assets than the West has Russian assets, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov warned that Moscow would respond “symmetrically” to actions taken with Russian assets abroad. We got The Beet. Don’t miss Meduza’s weekly newsletter (separate from the one you’re reading here)! Russian politics and society Anastasia Kashkina at Sota Project reviews Indika, a new video game from Odd Meter, a Russian studio that left Moscow after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine and moved to Kazakhstan to finish the game’s development. Despite this relocation (and public anti-war statements from game director Dmitry Svetlov), some Ukrainian gamers have expressed reluctance to support Indika because it is the work of Russian nationals. Meanwhile, back in Russia, conservative commentators like Yegor Kholmogorov at Tsargrad have denounced Indika for its “blasphemous” content and called on government censors to block access to the game. Kashkina’s review is largely positive. She highlights some technical bugs in the gameplay but praises its mature, morally ambiguous story and haunting visuals. Spoilers ahead: In Indika, you play as the titular character, a young nun who struggles with her faith and the demon who possesses a part of her mind. After being expelled from her convent, her misery continues outside, where players are introduced to an alternate 19th-century Russia that combines steampunk and chthonic-underworld themes, mixing crumbling villages with disorientingly large industrial settings. Indika meets Ilya, an escaped prisoner at a train wreck, and the two eventually set out in pursuit of a religious artifact in the hope of healing his gangrenous (later amputated) arm and exorcizing her demon. Russia’s ruling political party, United Russia, is currently holding electronic primary voting for candidacy in city and regional elections scheduled for September. The party has extended special privileges to soldiers participating in the invasion of Ukraine, waiving the requirement for publishing video messages and goosing their tallies with a 25-percent bump to whatever they receive in actual votes. According to United Russia representatives, more than 18,000 individuals — including more than 200 active servicemen and veterans of the Ukraine invasion — have registered for candidacy in the primaries. Journalists at 7x7 profiled five of these soldiers, describing their backgrounds, past civic engagement, and political leanings. Several of the men in 7x7’s story have criminal pasts. The most colorful of these subjects is Yuri Panov, whom United Russia ultimately refused to register for the primaries after discovering that he concealed that he’d served four years in prison for weapons trafficking, kidnapping, and torture. In fact, Panov was once the head of a gang in Magnitogorsk. Last month, he extended his military service contract and remains on the front lines in Ukraine, where he posts photos with threatening messages addressed to Ukraine. The four other soldiers profiled in the story include (1) a decorated 21-year-old man who lost a leg in battle before becoming an aide to a State Duma deputy and working with youths, (2) a former health and safety teacher who also won a medal in Ukraine and remains committed to youth engagement, (3) a former Wagner Group mercenary with a suspended driver’s license for drunk driving, and (4) a psychotherapist from a military family who now gives lectures on “lessons in courage” and actively promotes an ideology of anti-Western, self-professed patriotism. Olya Romashova at Mediazona looks back at a 19-year-old man’s 12-year prison sentence handed down last October for a particularly futile antiwar protest. In early May 2022, Ilya Podkamenny wrapped a copper wire around the tracks of Russia’s East Siberian Railway outside Irkutsk to trigger a false crossing signal and force an emergency stop. When the train engineer and technicians inspected the blockage, they found several antiwar leaflets Podkamenny had scattered on the tracks. Due to a lack of evidence, investigators were reluctant to pursue the case, but after a year, they identified Podkamenny and two accomplices (one of whom later hanged himself). Officials apparently relied on Telegram data for the collar, but they never released the details of their forensic work because of Podkamenny’s cooperation. He confessed to plotting a terrorist act, “justifying terrorism,” assisting terrorist activities, undergoing training to commit terrorism, and two counts of publicly inciting extremism. Romashova’s article describes how Podkamenny’s online identity as “Rebellion Cat,” a radical antiwar separatist bent on overthrowing the Putin regime, coincided with his struggles to fit in socially with contemporaries and find success in school. Before the railway incident (which injured no one), Podkamenny plotted multiple arson attacks against railway relay boxes and army recruitment centers that his mother prevented. She later testified in court against her own son as a witness for the prosecution, but Podkamenny objects to media reports claiming that his mother “informed on him.” In letters from pretrial detention, he expressed faith that he would be released early from prison “by late 2025.” No country can be free without independent media. In January 2023, the Russian authorities outlawed Meduza, banning our work in the country our colleagues call home. 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