Free Republic

Pro-war Russian nationalist Igor Girkin, who is in custody awaiting trial for inciting extremism, said on Sunday he wanted to run for president even though he understood the March election would be "sham" with the winner already clear. Girkin, who is also known by the alias Igor Strelkov, has repeatedly said Russia faces revolution and even civil war unless President Vladimir Putin's military top brass fight the war in Ukraine more effectively. A former Federal Security Service (FSB) officer who helped Russia to annex Crimea in 2014 and then to organise pro-Russian militias in eastern Ukraine, Girkin said before his...

An outspoken pro-war blogger who has fiercely criticised Russia's military strategy in Ukraine has said he wants to challenge Vladimir Putin in next March's presidential elections. Igor Girkin, 52, led pro-Russian fighters in eastern Ukraine in 2014, following Moscow's annexation of the southern Crimea peninsula. Girkin is in jail awaiting trial for extremism, which he denies. He said he wanted to disrupt the "sham" poll with the winner already known. This comment is widely seen in Russia as a reference to President Putin, who is yet to publicly declare that he will run again. In a letter to supporters published...

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in an interview published on Friday that he hoped President Vladimir Putin would run in the March election for another term as Russian president, a move that would keep Putin in power until at least 2030. -snip- Asked by the student television channel of Moscow State Institute for International Relations (MGIMO) what the next president after Putin should be like, Peskov said: "The same." "Or different but the same," Peskov told MGIMO 360 with a smile. "Putin has not yet announced his intention to run but I sincerely want to believe that he will do...

Russia's top security official today warned of biological warfare and ordered regional governors to put their economies on a war footing. Security council secretary Nikolai Patrushev, 72, is seen by some as Vladimir Putin’s likely successor. A strong anti-Western hardliner, he claimed that the conflict in Ukraine could see biological warfare while also suggesting a new round of mobilisation in Russia after heavy losses of conscripts. -snip- “Unauthorised access to collections of dangerous pathogens, destruction and looting of laboratory premises, as well as loss of biological samples, cannot be ruled out….” He warned of Ukraine infecting refugees who travel from...

For Darya Stepanova, a mother of two who lives in a small town on the eastern side of the Ural mountains, soaring prices for everything from baby food to nappies have forced her family to cut back on most treats and eating out. The Stepanov family is one of millions of Russian families having to cut back due to the significant changes forced on Russia's economy by the war in Ukraine and the myriad sanctions imposed by the West. Stepanova, 34, her five year old son and newborn son, try to make ends meet on the 50,000 roubles ($550) a...

-snip- The changes Putin greenlighted limit coverage of Central Election Commission sessions to registered media outlets, which could exclude freelancers or independent journalists, according to the reports on Tuesday. The amendments prohibit media from reporting on the commission’s actions at military bases or in areas under martial law without advance clearance from regional and military authorities. They also bar the publication of any campaign content on “blocked sources”, referring to restricted websites and social media services. Under an intensifying crackdown on the opposition and the flow of information, Russia has banned an array of websites and services, including Facebook and...

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said today that no decision has been made regarding the possible candidacy of Russian President Vladimir Putin for the presidential elections next year. -snip- “It is quite clear that this topic is now increasingly attracting the attention of political experts, but so far no decision has been made in this regard. It is understandable that the time of announcing the election is approaching, but for now there are no decisions in this regard. You will be informed as soon as they are,” said Peskov. Presidential elections in Russia should be held in March next year.

The Kremlin says it’s confident that Russian President Vladimir Putin will win the 2024 presidential election if he decides to run for another term in office. Neither Putin, 71, nor the Kremlin has confirmed he will run for another six-year term in office -snip- Senior Russian official Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin’s press secretary, told CNBC that though there has been no formal announcement that Putin will run for reelection, he believes the president will win the vote set to be held in March. “There has been no formal announcement yet. But I have no doubt that if he puts forward...

Ramzan Kadyrov, head of Russia’s Chechnya region and close ally of President Vladimir Putin, proposed on Saturday that a presidential election due next March should either be postponed due to the war in Ukraine or limited to one candidate- Putin.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has not made any announcements that he will run for another term and the campaign has not yet been announced, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday. "The president has not made any statements" about this, Peksov said when asked about a Reuters report that Putin had decided to run.

The Kremlin, asked about President Vladimir Putin's political ambitions, said on Tuesday that the campaign for next year's presidential election in Russia had not yet begun and that there could be a varying number of candidates in the contest. -snip- When asked when the 71-year-old Russian leader would officially announce his candidacy for next year's presidential race, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said: "There is no first candidate yet, there will be a first candidate after they are registered. There may be a varying number of candidates. "Our constitution stipulates who can stand for the post of president. Many people fulfil...