Karl Marx wrote that “history repeats itself twice, the first time as tragedy and the second time as farce.” The collapse of the Soviet Union was not a tragedy, nor is what is happening in Russia now a farce. Still, the collapse of the Soviet Union was a defining moment in human history. Russia’s current struggle with itself doesn’t begin to rise to that level.

The mayor of Prague has said he is under police protection from a “risk to my life”, with one Czech investigative outlet reporting he had been targeted in a Russian poisoning plot. Zdeněk Hřib confirmed on Monday that police had placed him under protection several weeks ago after identifying a threat against him, but declined to say whether had been been targeted by Russia or reveal the nature of threat.

When I woke up and read the headline “Russia sent humanitarian aid to USA,” I had a flashback. I remembered the morning of Aug. 11, 2014, when Russia sent its “aid” to Eastern Ukraine after discussing this with Jose Manuel Barroso. The only difference between our countries at that moment was the size, military might and the United States wasn’t under Russian military attack.

Russia recorded 5,642 new coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours, bringing its nationwide tally to 52,763, the Russian coronavirus crisis response centre said on Tuesday. Fifty-one people with the virus died in the last 24 hours, pushing the death toll to 456, it said. The number of coronavirus cases in Russia began rising sharply this month, although it had reported far fewer infections than many western European countries in the outbreak’s early stages.

OPEC and allies led by Russia agreed on Sunday to a record cut in output to prop up oil prices amid the coronavirus pandemic in an unprecedented deal with fellow oil nations, including the United States, that could curb global oil supply by 20%.

Sometime Wednesday, perhaps around the time this article is published, NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy and his two Russian crew mates—Anatoly Ivanishin and Ivan Vagner—will repair to their quarantine crew quarters for movie night in the Cosmonaut Hotel.

A possible preview of what's to come for public health issue number one.

President Vladimir Putin is taking precautions to protect himself against coronavirus, the Kremlin said on Wednesday, as Moscow authorities launched a smartphone app to track people who have been ordered to stay home because of the outbreak.

New legislation in Russia that will mandates all smartphones, computers and smart televisions to have Russian-made software pre-installed has been postponed, with provisions not kicking in until January 2021.

Citing the coronavirus, Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday postponed a nationwide vote on proposed constitutional amendments that include a change potentially allowing him to stay in office until 2036. Putin didn’t set a new date for the plebiscite originally scheduled for April 22, saying that it would depend on how the pandemic develops in Russia.

As the coronavirus pandemic continues to spread around the world, there are growing questions in Russia about the official number of cases that have been declared.

Facebook and Twitter revealed evidence Thursday suggesting that Russian efforts to interfere in the U.S. presidential election are getting more sophisticated and harder to detect.

The Canadian psychology professor Jordan Peterson has been described as “the most influential public intellectual in the Western world.” He is an exponent of the Jungian concept of the hero’s journey, in which an ordinary person heeds a call to adventure and goes out into the world to struggle and suffer, only to return with heightened self-knowledge.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday opened the door to constitutional changes

Since Russia’s stunning influence operations during the 2016 United States presidential race, state and federal officials, researchers, and tech companies have been on high alert for a repeat performance. With the 2020 election now just seven months away, though, newly surfaced social media posts indicate that Russia’s Internet Research Agency is adapting its methods to circumvent those defenses.

Putin proposes to enshrine God, heterosexual marriage in constitution

Russia's capital Moscow, which for the past months has largely been deprived of its traditional seasonal covering of snow, has seen its warmest winter since records began, the state weather service said on Saturday. The head of Russia's forecasting centre Roman Vilfand told the TASS news agency that the average temperature in Russia from December to February has been some 2.5 degrees Celsius (4.5 Fahrenheit) warmer than the previous record of minus 2.8 degrees seen in the winter of 1960-1961.

Russians have been adjusting to a winter almost without snow in Moscow amid record warm temperatures.

This isn’t the first time Russia has engaged in such maneuvers. It’s very unclear how the US will respond.

On January 20, something rather strange happened in orbit. A Russian satellite suddenly maneuvered itself so that it was closely shadowing a US spy satellite. The pair are now less than 186 miles (300 kilometers) apart—a short distance when it comes to space. While we don’t know for sure what’s going on, the Russian satellite’s actions strongly suggest it is there to spy on the US one—and there is very little the US can do about it.