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Yuri Chekalin24.10.2026

Time moved differently here than in Shinjuku, where it raced along on roller skates, or in quiet Nakano, which always seemed to have been pressed flat with an iron. Ikebukuro was like the worn pocket of a fall coat, where you might find someone else’s fifty-yen coin, a movie ticket from five days ago, and […]

Sergey Stankevich24.10.2026

The first tankers carrying diesel loaded at Russia’s Baltic port of Primorsk are already on their way to their destinations. The diesel deal between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin began on October 9th, 2026, following a lengthy telephone conversation in which the two presidents agreed on its terms. Mr Trump announced the agreement on Truth […]

Yuri Chekalin23.10.2026

That November in Tokyo was unusually cold and rainy. Every morning I got up at six, made coffee in an old Italian moka pot, and watched the gray Tokyo sky grow lighter beyond the window of my rented apartment in Gotanda. My contract was ending in December. Soon I’d have to pack my things, say […]

Kamil Askerkhanov22.10.2026

Is a struggle for influence inside Ankara reshaping Turkey’s place in a changing world order? Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan recently issued a striking warning. Great nations, he suggested, face great trials, and Turkey once again finds itself at the center of a broader geopolitical struggle. He cautioned that forces seeking to divide the region […]

Dmitri Drobnitsky20.10.2026

The Starshield Controversy and the Question of Presidential Authority. Reuters appears to be pursuing a sustained effort to establish one politically consequential proposition: that an order to restrict Ukraine’s access to SpaceX’s Starshield services originated in the White House, but not with President Donald Trump. A new Reuters report, already generating considerable discussion in the […]

Kamil Askerkhanov18.10.2026

The conflict in Ukraine is inexorably approaching its end. Yet the cessation of hostilities will leave behind questions far more complicated than those currently being discussed at the negotiating table. What political order will emerge in the region? Where will new borders be drawn? And what security architecture will take shape amid the ruins of […]

Sergey Stankevich16.10.2026

How a fuel shortage has entangled geopolitics, energy markets and America’s midterm elections Thousands of social-media commentators who were discussing America, Iran or Ukraine only yesterday have abruptly discovered a new obsession: the global diesel crisis. As usual, a torrent of ill-informed commentary threatens to drown out the few surviving voices of reason. Let us […]

Yuri Chekalin14.10.2026

That winter I turned fifty-four, and I’d just about stopped expecting anything to happen to me. It wasn’t despair. It was more like the way you stop hearing your refrigerator. It hums somewhere in the background. You know it’s humming, but after a while you no longer notice. I translated articles from Russian into English […]

Kamil Askerkhanov13.10.2026

The past few days’ events make it worth returning to a concept I first outlined back in 2023: Europe’s energy ring-fencing. What we may now be seeing is the transition to a new stage. After restricting access to energy supplies, the battle appears to be shifting toward control over their eventual return to the European […]

Kirill Benediktov12.10.2026

Another thaw has arrived in U.S.-Russian relations. Donald Trump finally called Vladimir Putin to wish him a happy birthday. A little late, admittedly. Putin’s birthday was October 7; the call came on October 9. Even allowing for the time difference, Trump was more than a day behind schedule. But never mind. Wishing someone a happy […]

The Narrow Door

The Diesel Deal Gets Moving

A Confession of Love

Erdoğan’s Warning

Who Is Really Calling the Shots?

Ukraine: From Nation-State to Diasporic Nation

Diesel Fever Grips The World

A Minor Breakdown

Who Powers Europe?

A Thaw Too Late?

The Narrow Door

The Diesel Deal Gets Moving

A Confession of Love

Erdoğan’s Warning