The Naked Pravda

On this week’s show, The Naked Pravda looks back at some of the journalism and scholarly work in 2021 that made significant contributions to our knowledge about Russia. These nine articles feature incredible fieldwork, insights into how power works in Russia, and compelling stories that you might have missed over the year. Meduza spoke to the authors of three of these articles — Julia Ioffe, Pjotr Sauer, and Maria Danilova — and we asked historian Sean Guillory of The SRB Podcast for his five favorite scholarly books on Russia and the Soviet Union released in 2021. Timestamps for this week’s episode: (3:15) “A Black Communist’s Disappearance in Stalin’s Russia: What Happened to Lovett Fort-Whiteman, the Only Known African American to Die in the Gulag?” by Joshua Yaffa (The New Yorker) (6:25) “Climate Change Is Melting Russia’s Permafrost — and Challenging Its Oil Economy” by Ann Simmons and Georgi Kantchev (The Wall Street Journal) (8:58) “On a Pacific Island, Russia Tests Its Battle Plan for Climate Change” by Anton Troianovski (The New York Times) (11:51) “The Great Russian Oil Heist: Criminals, Lawmen, and the Quest for Liquid Loot” by Sergei Khazov-Cassia (RFE/RL) (15:47) “Inside Wagnergate: Ukraine’s Brazen Sting Operation to Snare Russian Mercenaries” by Christo Grozev, with contributions from Aric Toler, Pieter van Huis, and Yordan Tsalov (Bellingcat) (21:48) “Lyubov Sobol’s Hope for Russia” by Masha Gessen (The New Yorker) (28:05) Meduza speaks to Julia Ioffe about her story, “‘These Bastards Will Never See Our Tears’: How Yulia Navalnaya Became Russia’s Real First Lady” (Vanity Fair) (45:22) Meduza talks to Pjotr Sauer about his investigation, “A Royal Mark Up: How an Emirati Sheikh Resells Millions of Russian Vaccines to the Developing World,” coauthored with Jake Cordell and Felix Light (The Moscow Times) (54:07) Meduza asks Maria Danilova about her report, “Russia Has an Opioid Crisis Too — One of Untreated Pain” (Vice) (1:04:11) Sean Guillory discusses “Cold War Correspondents: Soviet and American Reporters on the Ideological Frontlines” by Dina Fainberg (1:10:09) Sean talks about “Utopia’s Discontents: Russian Émigrés and the Quest for Freedom, 1830s-1930s” by Faith Hillis (1:14:05) Sean recommends “Navalny: Putin’s Nemesis, Russia’s Future?” by Jan Matti Dollbaum, Morvan Lallouet, and Ben Noble. (1:18:32) Sean recalls why he loved “Flowers Through Concrete: Explorations in Soviet Hippieland” by Juliane Fürst (1:22:05) Sean ends his list with “The Things of Life: Materiality in Late Soviet Russia” by Alexey Golubev (1:24:03) Closing remarks and a reminder to contribute to Meduza if you’re not already doing so! “The Naked Pravda” comes out on Saturdays (or sometimes Fridays). Catch every new episode by subscribing at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or other platforms. If you have a question or comment about the show, please write to Kevin Rothrock at kevin@meduza.io with the subject line: “The Naked Pravda.”Как поддержать нашу редакцию — даже если вы в России и вам очень страшно

The lawyers and journalists who worked with the Team 29 project specialized in Russia’s most hopeless political prosecutions — the treason case against journalist Ivan Safronov, the extremism charges against Alexey Navalny’s Anti-Corruption movement, and dozens more indictments all but doomed to convictions. Earlier this year, the project was forced to disband after Russia’s federal censor started blocking its website. In November 2021, the Justice Ministry designated Team 29’s former members as “foreign agents” and many of those people subsequently fled the country. Valeria Vetoshkina, today’s guest on The Naked Pravda, is one of those people.  Timestamps for this week’s episode: (0:00) Filmmaker Alexander Sokurov lectures Vladimir Putin about Russia’s “constitutional crisis” (4:23) Analysts and experts battle in op-ed columns and online over the right strategy in Ukraine (6:46) Moving closer into the Kremlin’s orbit than ever, the social network Vkontakte gets new owners (11:02) The head of Russia’s Federal Investigative Committee has no sense of humor and no patience for exoneration (13:21) Human rights lawyer Valeria Vetoshkina, a former member of the now dissolved Team 29 project, describes her education in law school and the state of her field in Russia today “The Naked Pravda” comes out on Saturdays (or sometimes Fridays). Catch every new episode by subscribing at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or other platforms. If you have a question or comment about the show, please write to Kevin Rothrock at kevin@meduza.io with the subject line: “The Naked Pravda.”Как поддержать нашу редакцию — даже если вы в России и вам очень страшно

Earlier this week, events in space flirted with a real-life adaptation of Alfonso Cuarón’s 2013 motion picture “Gravity” when the Russian military blew up an inoperative Soviet satellite that had been orbiting the Earth since the early 1980s. Moscow insists that the debris didn’t get within 40 kilometers (25 miles) of the International Space Station, but NASA says the astronauts and cosmonauts aboard ISS were awakened early and ordered to retreat to their docked spacecraft in case an impact prompted an evacuation. U.S. officials say they’ve tracked 1,500 pieces of orbital debris caused by the Soviet satellite’s destruction, but there are likely “hundreds of thousands” more smaller pieces that also endanger anything or anyone in their path. According to NASA, this trash will circle the Earth for decades, posing a constant threat to the operations of all spacefaring nations. Russia says the Americans are a bunch of hypocrites. To shed some light on Russia’s weapons test, independent analyst and disarmament expert Pavel Podvig to returns to The Naked Pravda. Timestamps for this week’s episode: (6:09) Standup comedy in Russia: reviewing Denis Chuzhoi’s new special, and Vera Kotelnikova weighs the usefulness of speaking up for persecuted colleagues (10:17) Corruption news: Crimea arrests its potty-mouthed culture minister, Mediazona investigates two possibly wrongfully jailed police officers outside Rostov, and Novaya Gazeta unearths an honest judge in Chelyabinsk (13:47) Pavel Podvig joins the show “The Naked Pravda” comes out on Saturdays (or sometimes Fridays). Catch every new episode by subscribing at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or other platforms. If you have a question or comment about the show, please write to Kevin Rothrock at kevin@meduza.io with the subject line: “The Naked Pravda.”Как поддержать нашу редакцию — даже если вы в России и вам очень страшно

Our main story this week is Russia’s place in Europe’s energy crisis. Political risk analyst Nick Trickett, the author of the OGs and OFZs newsletter, joins the podcast to explain what consumers want from Moscow, why being a “swing producer” is inherently political, and how inflation endangers ordinary Russians. Timestamps for this week’s episode: (3:28) Law enforcement news: Hooded thugs disrupt a film screening at Memorial, and police arrest a prominent university administrator (9:46) Culture wars: Parents in St. Petersberg oust a biology teacher for using Instagram to share sex ed, and comedians in North Ossetia apologize in tears for a suggestive joke about “thigh pie” (13:48) Nick Trickett breaks down Russia’s place in Europe’s energy crisis, focusing on gas deals and inflation “The Naked Pravda” comes out on Saturdays (or sometimes Fridays). Catch every new episode by subscribing at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or other platforms. If you have a question or comment about the show, please write to Kevin Rothrock at kevin@meduza.io with the subject line: “The Naked Pravda.”Как поддержать нашу редакцию — даже если вы в России и вам очень страшно

Our main story this week is the treason case against Ilya Sachkov, the 35-year-old CEO of the cybersecurity firm Group-IB. On Wednesday morning, September 29, hours after officials raided the company’s Moscow office, a local court jailed Sachkov for the next two months, pending trial. That will likely be extended several times, as the authorities collect more evidence. The Naked Pravda explores why Sachkov may have been arrested and asks what his case means for Russia’s cybersecurity industry and Moscow’s troubled cooperation with the United States against cybercrime. Timestamps for this week’s episode: (2:12) Developments in Russia’s expanding regulation of “foreign agents” (7:57) A blogger’s scandalous offense, plus RT enlists the might of Russia’s federal censor in its battle with YouTube (13:00) Dr. Josephine Wolff, an associate professor of cybersecurity policy at the Tufts University Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy (16:58) Dr. Julien Nocetti, an associate fellow at the French Institute of International Relations (19:45) RFE/RL journalist Mike Eckel “The Naked Pravda” comes out on Saturdays (or sometimes Fridays). Catch every new episode by subscribing at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or other platforms. If you have a question or comment about the show, please write to Kevin Rothrock at kevin@meduza.io with the subject line: “The Naked Pravda.”Как поддержать нашу редакцию — даже если вы в России и вам очень страшно

Earlier this month, Moscow was one of just a few regions in Russia to offer electronic voting in three-day parliamentary elections. In the capital, multiple opposition candidates led in-person voting but ultimately lost when electronic votes were added late to the final tallies. In the week since the voting ended, the campaign teams for several losing candidates have compiled and presented evidence that they say proves voter fraud in the online ballots.  The Naked Pravda returns for its second season with interviews featuring economist Dr. Tatiana Mikhailova and BBC Russia reporter Liza Fokht in an episode devoted to assessing the opposition’s claims of electronic voter fraud. The show begins with a roundup of news stories from the week (cases of censorship in Russia and commentary in the Russian media about life in the West). Dr. Mikhailova joins the podcast at 13:31 and Liza Fokht’s remarks begin at 22:32. “The Naked Pravda” comes out on Saturdays (or sometimes Fridays). Catch every new episode by subscribing at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or other platforms. If you have a question or comment about the show, please write to Kevin Rothrock at kevin@meduza.io with the subject line: “The Naked Pravda.”Как поддержать нашу редакцию — даже если вы в России и вам очень страшно

Khalimat Taramova is only 22 years old, but she’s been through a lot, especially in the past two weeks. Kept under lock and key at home in Chechnya, her family beats her and even forced her to undergo so-called “conversion therapy.” Taramova identifies as bisexual. Last month, she reached out to a prominent LGBT rights group begging them to help her reach safety. On June 6, when she got to a women’s shelter in Dagestan, a couple of hours outside Chechnya, it seemed like she was finally safe. She wasn’t.  For a better understanding of Taramova’s case and its broader context in Chechnya, The Naked Pravda spoke to human rights professionals Veronika Lapina, executive advocacy and international litigation advisor to the Russian LGBT Network, and Vanessa Kogan, the director of the Russian Justice Initiative. “The Naked Pravda” comes out on Saturdays (or sometimes Fridays). Catch every new episode by subscribing at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or other platforms. If you have a question or comment about the show, please write to Kevin Rothrock at kevin@meduza.io with the subject line: “The Naked Pravda.”Как поддержать нашу редакцию — даже если вы в России и вам очень страшно

Last week, investigative journalists at Meduza and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty revealed that a Russian marketing firm recently tried to recruit European bloggers in a secret media campaign to smear Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine. To find out more about these solicitations and to learn how this fits into Russian politics, The Naked Pravda spoke to Meduza investigations head Alexey Kovalev and RFE/RL journalists Mark Krutov and Carl Schreck. “The Naked Pravda” comes out on Saturdays (or sometimes Fridays). Catch every new episode by subscribing at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or other platforms. If you have a question or comment about the show, please write to Kevin Rothrock at kevin@meduza.io with the subject line: “The Naked Pravda.”Как поддержать нашу редакцию — даже если вы в России и вам очень страшно

On May 13, a Ukrainian court placed pro-Kremlin oligarch and lawmaker Viktor Medvedchuk under round-the-clock house arrest pending trial for high treason. The country’s Prosecutor General had signed off on the charges two days earlier, indicting not only Medvedchuk, but also his closest ally and fellow lawmaker, Taras Kozak, in connection with three episodes of illegal activity.  Both politicians belong to Opposition Platform — For Life, a pro-Russian opposition party that holds 44 seats in the Ukrainian parliament. But Medvedchuk is perhaps best known for his murky business dealings and personal ties to Vladimir Putin (the Russian president is said to be the godfather of Medvedchuk’s youngest daughter).  The treason charges came a few months after the Ukrainian authorities imposed sanctions on Kozak and Medvedchuk for allegedly financing terrorism. As part of these sanctions, Kozak’s three pro-Russian television channels were taken off the air. The Ukrainian authorities also sanctioned Medvedchuk’s wife and froze the couples’ assets for three years. Medvedchuk has denied all of the allegations, claiming that the charges are politically motivated. That said, prosecuting Medvedchuk coincides with other steps the Ukrainian government is taking to combat corruption and oligarchic influence. Moreover, this is happening at a time when President Volodymyr Zelensky appears to be changing his stance on Russia and his approach to resolving the conflict with Russian-backed separatists in Ukraine’s east.  To discuss Viktor Medvedchuk’s Kremlin ties and his place in the Ukrainian political landscape, as well as what the Zelensky government is doing to combat oligarchic influence in Ukraine, “The Naked Pravda” turned to independent journalist and disinformation researcher Olga Tokariuk, a freelance correspondent in Kyiv for the Spanish EFE news agency. “The Naked Pravda” comes out on Saturdays (or sometimes Fridays). Catch every new episode by subscribing at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or other platforms. If you have a question or comment about the show, please write to Kevin Rothrock at kevin@meduza.io with the subject line: “The Naked Pravda.”Как поддержать нашу редакцию — даже если вы в России и вам очень страшно

As you may have learned from the crowdfunding banners now adorning this website, the Russian authorities designated Meduza as a “foreign agent” on April 23. Our new status in Russia has chased away advertisers and deprived us of revenue, endangering Meduza’s continued existence. That’s the sad truth of our situation right now, but what does it mean to be a “foreign agent” in Russia? How does it change life and daily business for individuals, NGOs, and media outlets? Russian lawmakers argue that these regulations are Moscow’s response to similar rules and restrictions in the United States, but does that comparison stand up to scrutiny? To answer these questions and more, “The Naked Pravda” turned to Middlesex University London Associate Lecturer in Journalism Dr. Sasha Raspopina, Higher School of Economics Associate Professor Dr. Dmitry Dubrovsky, “Memorial” Human Rights Center lawyer Marina Agaltsova, and journalist Casey Michel, whose forthcoming book, “American Kleptocracy,” is due out this November. “The Naked Pravda” comes out on Saturdays (or sometimes Fridays). Catch every new episode by subscribing at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or other platforms. If you have a question or comment about the show, please write to Kevin Rothrock at kevin@meduza.io with the subject line: “The Naked Pravda.”Как поддержать нашу редакцию — даже если вы в России и вам очень страшно