Russia is reopening the first of several regional airports that were closed when the country invaded Ukraine more than two years ago, state civil aviation agency Rosaviatsia announced Friday.
Russian officials said on Friday that Ukrainian bombardments had left two people dead in separate attacks on the border region of Kursk, and in Ukrainian territory occupied by Russian soldiers.
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A veteran of Russia’s war on Ukraine has been appointed as a district head in his home region on Monday, marking the first known example of a participant in the war being named to public office in Russia. “Today, deputies of the Berezovsky District Duma unanimously endorsed the candidacy of Ruslan Alexandrov for the post of the head of the Berezovsky district,” said an announcement on the district’s official website. “The inauguration of the new [district] head will take place shortly,” it added. Alexandrov, from the Khanty-Mansi autonomous district in western Siberia, enlisted as an army volunteer in 2022 and served in an intelligence unit on the front lines in Ukraine, local news website Tyumen Online reported. After he was wounded, Alexandrov returned to his native Berezovsky district and started working at a local enlistment center for military volunteers, according to the news outlet. Prior to jump-starting his military career, Alexandrov worked as an environmental specialist in the Berezovsky district administration and also held a job at a sports center in the region’s capital of Khanty-Mansiysk, according to Tyumen Online. In a speech earlier this year, President Vladimir Putin said participants of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine were the country’s “future elites,” hinting at an upward social mobility for war veterans. “The real elites of the country who can take over Russia must be formed from these people [who fought in Ukraine],” Putin said. “This means they need to receive support, they need to receive help.”
When the water started rising sharply in Orenburg, a regional capital near Russia’s border with Kazakhstan, Veronika realized that a “gigantic tragedy” was unfolding before her eyes. “It was such a terrible, nerve-wracking situation because the water kept rising and rising,” Orenburg resident Veronika told The Moscow Times. “Every day you wake up, scroll through the news feed, and all of Orenburg is occupied by checking the level of the Ural River every hour.” Since the river started flooding the city on April 5, breaking the record set in 1942 a week later, Orenburg residents have been gripped by anxiety, said Veronika, who asked to change her name due to the potential risks of speaking to a media outlet labeled as a “foreign agent” by Russia.
Independent news outlet Novaya Gazeta Europe reported on Monday that Ramzan Kadyrov, the strongman leader of Chechnya, has been living with a potentially fatal illness for more than five years, prompting the Kremlin to start working on a plan for a managed transfer of power.
Three people have been killed and two injured in a fire at a machine-building plant in the southern Russian city of Voronezh, Russia’s Emergency Situations Ministry said Monday.