Face masks depicting Russian President Vladimir Putin, right, and Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin displayed at a souvenir shop in St. Petersburg, Russia. Prigozhin reportedly died in a plane crash on Aug. 23.
(AP Photo, File)
Russian mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin, the founder of the Wagner Group, reportedly died when a private jet he was said to be on crashed on Aug. 23, 2023, killing all 10 people on board.
AAP/AP/Razgruzka_Vagnera telegram channel
The apparent death of the warlord in a plane shot down over Russia tells us much about the fragility that surrounds Russian politics.
Wagner Group boss, Yevgeny Prigozhin, rose through the ranks from Vladimir Putin’s caterer to the boss of Russia’s most powerful private military company.
Associated Press/Alamy Stock Photo
The Wagner Group boss had died in mysterious circumstances when his private jet crashed on August 23 2023.
Wagner group founder Yevgeny Prigozhin, photographed on June 24, 2023, in Russia.
Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
The lesson in the presumed death of the mercenary leader two months after his mutiny against Putin: Don’t make yourself an enemy of Russia’s leader.
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, hands out medals to servicemen at a hospital in the Zaporizhzhia region, August 2023.
EPA-EFE/Office of the President of Ukraine
A selection of the best of our coverage of the conflict from the past fortnight.
The town of Sviatohirsk in Ukraine’s Donbas Region. Just a few months ago, it was occupied by Russian forces.
Sipa/Alamy
Russian and Ukrainian communists who in 1919 mapped out the border between Ukraine and Russia took as their starting point the former Russian empire’s provincial boundaries.
A Ukrainian soldier on territory recaptured from Russia in July 2023.
EPA-EFE/Oleg Petrasyuk
A selection of the best of our coverage of the conflict from the past fortnight.
Visitors to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum in Hiroshima view a large-scale panoramic photograph of the destruction following the 1945 bombing.
Carl Court/Getty Images
The United States and Russia, the two biggest nuclear powers, have no imminent plans for talks on a nuclear deal. That should change, writes a former US diplomat.
Valery Sharifulin/Kremlin Pool/EPA/AAP
Putin has progressively sickened Russian society, creating a toxic culture that celebrates xenophobia, nativism, and violence.
Vladimir Putin is trying to repair the damage done by his decision to pull out of the grain deal which had supplied many African countries.
EPA-EFE/Sergei Bobylev/Tass
Vladimir Putin is engaged in a bid to woo support among African leaders, but the summit masks the darker reality of Russian influence-seeking in Africa
Russian President Vladimir Putin (left) shake hands with Chinese Presiden Xi Jinping.
plavi011/Shutterstock
Following deteriorating relations with the West, Russia has shifted focus to Asia, and hold China to help expand its influence.
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The NATO summit in Vilnius has kicked the prospects of Ukraine’s membership into the long grass. Kyiv, however, has other security tricks up its sleeve.
Delegates at the Russia-Africa Economic Forum in Sochi, 2019.
Kremlin Press Office / Handout/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
African leaders at the second Africa-Russia summit need to speak with one voice.
Seeking divine help? Neither Moscow nor Minsk wants Wagner Group mercenaries stationed in Belarus to get out of control.
EPA-EFE/Alexander Demyanchuk/Sputnik/Kremlin pool
Wagner Group mercenaries in Belarus remain a worrying wild card with possible consequences for the conflict and the wider region.
SB 266 aims to stop college professors from teaching about systemic racism.
Spencer Platt/Getty Images
Tactics used to censor the teaching of American history in Florida schools bear much in common with those seen in the illiberal democracies of Israel, Turkey, Russia and Poland.
Russian President Vladimir Putin at the Russia-Africa Summit in 2019 in Sochi, Russia.
Mikhail Svetlov/Getty Images
The Russia-Africa summit has obvious benefits for Moscow: it conveys a perception of normalcy and the tacit approval of African elites.
Fuel tanks burn after a shelling Russian officials said was conducted by Ukrainian forces at a fuel depot in Makiivka in Russian-controlled Donetsk region on July 5, 2023.
(AP Photo/Alexei Alexandrov)
Claiming the moral high ground in any war isn’t just about justifying a war effort — it’s also about how a war is fought. Both Ukraine and Russia, sadly, have plenty of civilian blood on their hands.
A Ukrainian soldier prepares to fire a Russian TOS-1A Solntsepyok heavy flame-thrower rocket launcher, captured by a Ukrainian army battalion, towards Russian positions on the frontline near Kreminna, Luhansk region, in July 2023.
(AP Photo/Libkos)
The slow pace of the Ukrainian counteroffensive against Russia doesn’t suggest military success for Ukraine is impossible.
Traffic was stopped on the bridge, linking Crimea with Russia, on July 17 after a suspected drone attack.
Sipa/Alamy
Crimea has historic symbolism to Russians, so attacks there are considered highly damaging.
Members of the Wagner Group on a tank in Rostov-on-Don, Russia, during the lightning march on Moscow on June 24 2023.
AP/Alamy
Machinations over the march on Moscow are continuing.