All of Russia celebrates the glorious liberation of Medvedchuk, probably.

“I’m extremely unhappy about yesterday’s news. The whole situation doesn’t even make sense to me. Whenever combat or tactical decisions have been made, they’ve always consulted with us, the active participants in the special [military] operation. But now…” Kadyrov wrote. “Handing over even one of those Azov terrorists should have been out of the question,” he wrote.

It's little known in the West (and even in Russia, where it's not spoken about publicly), but the sacred cause of installing Medvedchuk as the president of Ukraine was the entire real reason why Putin has sent many thousands of his people to their deaths and may well start a nuclear war over it because why not.

From early February (3 weeks before the invasion):

Great wars sometimes start over small offenses. A murdered duke. An angered pope. The belief of a lonely king that his rivals aren’t playing fair. When historians study why armies began gathering in Europe during the plague of 2021, their interest might turn to a teenage girl, the goddaughter of Moscow’s isolated sovereign.

Her name is Daria, a young Ukrainian with a shy smile and big brown eyes. When she was born in 2004, her parents asked their friend Vladimir Putin, then a few years into his reign in Russia, to christen her in the Orthodox tradition they all share. The girl’s father, Viktor Medvedchuk, has been close to Putin for decades. They holiday together on the Black Sea. They conduct business. They obsess over the bonds between their countries and the Western forces they see pulling them apart.

“Our relationship has developed over 20 years,” Medvedchuk told me in a rare interview last spring in Kyiv, near the start of the current standoff between Russia and the West over Ukraine. “I don’t want to say I exploit that relationship, but you could say it has been part of my political arsenal.”

Putin could say the same about Medvedchuk. The leading voice for Russian interests in Ukraine, Medvedchuk’s political party is the biggest opposition force in parliament, with millions of supporters. Over the past year, that party has come under attack. Medvedchuk was charged with treason in May and placed under house arrest in Kyiv. Just last month, the U.S. accused him and his allies of plotting to stage a coup with help from the Russian military.

https://time.com/6144109/russia-ukraine-vladimir-putin-viktor-medvedchuk/

All of Russia celebrates the glorious liberation of Medvedchuk, probably.

“I’m extremely unhappy about yesterday’s news. The whole situation doesn’t even make sense to me. Whenever combat or tactical decisions have been made, they’ve always consulted with us, the active participants in the special [military] operation. But now…” Kadyrov wrote.

Chechnya’s head referred to the Azovstal defenders as “fascists” and “terrorists,” saying it was unacceptable to trade them for Russian soldiers. “Handing over even one of those Azov terrorists should have been out of the question,” he wrote.

It's little known in the West (and even in Russia, where it's not spoken about publicly), but the sacred cause of installing Medvedchuk as the president of Ukraine was the entire real reason why Putin has sent many thousands of his people to their deaths and may well start a nuclear war over it because why not.

From early February (3 weeks before the invasion):

Great wars sometimes start over small offenses. A murdered duke. An angered pope. The belief of a lonely king that his rivals aren’t playing fair. When historians study why armies began gathering in Europe during the plague of 2021, their interest might turn to a teenage girl, the goddaughter of Moscow’s isolated sovereign.

Her name is Daria, a young Ukrainian with a shy smile and big brown eyes. When she was born in 2004, her parents asked their friend Vladimir Putin, then a few years into his reign in Russia, to christen her in the Orthodox tradition they all share. The girl’s father, Viktor Medvedchuk, has been close to Putin for decades. They holiday together on the Black Sea. They conduct business. They obsess over the bonds between their countries and the Western forces they see pulling them apart.

“Our relationship has developed over 20 years,” Medvedchuk told me in a rare interview last spring in Kyiv, near the start of the current standoff between Russia and the West over Ukraine. “I don’t want to say I exploit that relationship, but you could say it has been part of my political arsenal.”

Putin could say the same about Medvedchuk. The leading voice for Russian interests in Ukraine, Medvedchuk’s political party is the biggest opposition force in parliament, with millions of supporters. Over the past year, that party has come under attack. Medvedchuk was charged with treason in May and placed under house arrest in Kyiv. Just last month, the U.S. accused him and his allies of plotting to stage a coup with help from the Russian military.

https://time.com/6144109/russia-ukraine-vladimir-putin-viktor-medvedchuk/

All of Russia celebrates the glorious liberation of Medvedchuk, probably.

It's little known in the West (and even in Russia, where it's not spoken about publicly), but the sacred cause of installing Medvedchuk as the president of Ukraine was the entire real reason why Putin has sent many thousands of his people to their deaths and may well start a nuclear war over it because why not.

From early February (3 weeks before the invasion):

Great wars sometimes start over small offenses. A murdered duke. An angered pope. The belief of a lonely king that his rivals aren’t playing fair. When historians study why armies began gathering in Europe during the plague of 2021, their interest might turn to a teenage girl, the goddaughter of Moscow’s isolated sovereign.

Her name is Daria, a young Ukrainian with a shy smile and big brown eyes. When she was born in 2004, her parents asked their friend Vladimir Putin, then a few years into his reign in Russia, to christen her in the Orthodox tradition they all share. The girl’s father, Viktor Medvedchuk, has been close to Putin for decades. They holiday together on the Black Sea. They conduct business. They obsess over the bonds between their countries and the Western forces they see pulling them apart.

“Our relationship has developed over 20 years,” Medvedchuk told me in a rare interview last spring in Kyiv, near the start of the current standoff between Russia and the West over Ukraine. “I don’t want to say I exploit that relationship, but you could say it has been part of my political arsenal.”

Putin could say the same about Medvedchuk. The leading voice for Russian interests in Ukraine, Medvedchuk’s political party is the biggest opposition force in parliament, with millions of supporters. Over the past year, that party has come under attack. Medvedchuk was charged with treason in May and placed under house arrest in Kyiv. Just last month, the U.S. accused him and his allies of plotting to stage a coup with help from the Russian military.

https://time.com/6144109/russia-ukraine-vladimir-putin-viktor-medvedchuk/

All of Russia celebrates the glorious liberation of Medvedchuk, probably.

It's little known in the West (and even in Russia, where it's not spoken about publicly), but the sacred cause of installing Medvedchuk as the president of Ukraine was the entire real reason why Putin sent many thousands of his people to their deaths and may well start a nuclear war over it because why not.

From early February (3 weeks before the invasion):

Great wars sometimes start over small offenses. A murdered duke. An angered pope. The belief of a lonely king that his rivals aren’t playing fair. When historians study why armies began gathering in Europe during the plague of 2021, their interest might turn to a teenage girl, the goddaughter of Moscow’s isolated sovereign.

Her name is Daria, a young Ukrainian with a shy smile and big brown eyes. When she was born in 2004, her parents asked their friend Vladimir Putin, then a few years into his reign in Russia, to christen her in the Orthodox tradition they all share. The girl’s father, Viktor Medvedchuk, has been close to Putin for decades. They holiday together on the Black Sea. They conduct business. They obsess over the bonds between their countries and the Western forces they see pulling them apart.

“Our relationship has developed over 20 years,” Medvedchuk told me in a rare interview last spring in Kyiv, near the start of the current standoff between Russia and the West over Ukraine. “I don’t want to say I exploit that relationship, but you could say it has been part of my political arsenal.”

Putin could say the same about Medvedchuk. The leading voice for Russian interests in Ukraine, Medvedchuk’s political party is the biggest opposition force in parliament, with millions of supporters. Over the past year, that party has come under attack. Medvedchuk was charged with treason in May and placed under house arrest in Kyiv. Just last month, the U.S. accused him and his allies of plotting to stage a coup with help from the Russian military.

https://time.com/6144109/russia-ukraine-vladimir-putin-viktor-medvedchuk/

All of Russia celebrates the glorious liberation of Medvedchuk, probably.

It's little known in the West, but the sacred cause of installing Medvedchuk as the president of Ukraine was the entire real reason why Putin sent many thousands of his people to their deaths and may well start a nuclear war over it because why not.

From early February (3 weeks before the invasion):

Great wars sometimes start over small offenses. A murdered duke. An angered pope. The belief of a lonely king that his rivals aren’t playing fair. When historians study why armies began gathering in Europe during the plague of 2021, their interest might turn to a teenage girl, the goddaughter of Moscow’s isolated sovereign.

Her name is Daria, a young Ukrainian with a shy smile and big brown eyes. When she was born in 2004, her parents asked their friend Vladimir Putin, then a few years into his reign in Russia, to christen her in the Orthodox tradition they all share. The girl’s father, Viktor Medvedchuk, has been close to Putin for decades. They holiday together on the Black Sea. They conduct business. They obsess over the bonds between their countries and the Western forces they see pulling them apart.

“Our relationship has developed over 20 years,” Medvedchuk told me in a rare interview last spring in Kyiv, near the start of the current standoff between Russia and the West over Ukraine. “I don’t want to say I exploit that relationship, but you could say it has been part of my political arsenal.”

Putin could say the same about Medvedchuk. The leading voice for Russian interests in Ukraine, Medvedchuk’s political party is the biggest opposition force in parliament, with millions of supporters. Over the past year, that party has come under attack. Medvedchuk was charged with treason in May and placed under house arrest in Kyiv. Just last month, the U.S. accused him and his allies of plotting to stage a coup with help from the Russian military.

https://time.com/6144109/russia-ukraine-vladimir-putin-viktor-medvedchuk/