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KIRILL KUDRYAVTSEV / Getty Putin’s ‘Rabble of Thin-Necked Henchmen’
Who will succeed Russia’s longest-serving ruler since Stalin? Not even the handpicked elite can say.
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Sefa Karacan / Anadolu Agency / Getty Alexei Navalny’s Last Laugh
Something I’ve seen in Putin’s most effective opponents: Even if it costs them their life, they defy him with humor.
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Illustration by The Atlantic. Sources: Adam Berry / … Putin’s Deal With Wife Killers
The most violent criminals get a Kremlin pardon if they agree to fight in Ukraine.
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Gueorgui Pinkhassov / Magnum How I Lost the Russia That Never Was
I sometimes felt that we told the truth only at the funerals of our assassinated friends. Was this what Russia had been all along?
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Rick Mave / Redux ‘Nobody Will Evacuate These Poor People’
Reaching flood victims in Russian-occupied Ukraine is so dangerous that only Ukrainians will do it. Where are the international organizations that were made for this?
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NurPhoto / Getty The Kremlin Has a Security Problem
Drone attacks in Moscow, incursions over the border—Russians are starting to wonder whether Putin really does have, as he promised, “everything under control.”
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Evgenia Novozhenina / Reuters Russia Escalates Its War on Reporters
The arrest on spying charges of the American journalist Evan Gershkovich is a grave—and cynical—new stage in Vladimir Putin’s repressions.
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Kyodo News / Getty The Bitter Truth Behind Russia’s Looting of Ukrainian Art
Kherson’s museums became a microcosm of the grim drama of collaboration and resistance that takes place under occupation.
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Artur Widak / NurPhoto / Getty; The Atlantic The Irreversible Change in Belarus
Belarus opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya discusses how the war in neighboring Ukraine is affecting her own people’s bid for freedom.
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Getty; The Atlantic ‘I Just Wanted the Whole Thing to Be Over’
Victoria Obidina’s account of her mistreatment in the Russian prison system is just one of thousands of reports of war crimes in Ukraine.
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Paul Spella / The Atlantic; Getty The New Stalin Era
For the great-granddaughter of Nikita Khrushchev, the Kremlin today is taking the country back to the authoritarian nightmare of the past.
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Nicole Tung / The New York Times / … One Ukrainian City in the Way of Putin’s New Total War
As they rush to evacuate children, the civilians of Zaporizhzhya face a double threat of nuclear devastation.
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Getty; The Atlantic ‘An Army of Zombies Is Leading Us to Hell’
An interview with a Moscow professional who just quit Russia to escape Vladimir Putin’s military draft
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Getty; The Atlantic The Doctors Who Are Now Prisoners of War
The experience of Ukrainian medics in the notorious Olenivka POW camp suggests that Russia’s treatment of captives is certainly inhumane and probably illegal.
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The Atlantic; Getty In Ukraine, Youth Has Ended
The country’s young people have been forced to make decisions much tougher than most adults are capable of. I feel some small sense of common cause.
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Courtesy of Ural Biennial Vladimir Putin’s Waning Tolerance for Art
A recent art exhibition in Russia made no mention of the current state of the country—saying more about Putin’s rule than any one exhibit could.
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Leni Kovaleva / Getty The People of the Soil Have Won
Vladimir Putin has nothing to offer Joe Biden because his balancing act between Westernizers and more conservative forces is over.
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Alexander Zemlianichenko / AP Russia’s Twin Nostalgias
Vladimir Putin has a fondness for the Soviet era. So do many Russians—but often not for the same reasons.
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Shamil Zhumatov / Reuters A Russian Journalist’s Arrest Counters the Image of Putin the Puppet Master
Abroad, Putin is perceived as the master orchestrator of all of Russia’s actions. But his hold on the state’s security services is more limited.
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Getty / The Atlantic The Trump-Putin Relationship, as Dictated by the Kremlin
Why does the White House cede control of the narrative to the Russians?
