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Jan 23, 2025 | 
journalofdemocracy.org | Lucian Kim |Kathryn Stoner
It is almost a year since the death of Alexei Navalny. The Russian opposition leader sought to channel Russian nationalism as a challenge to Putin’s autocracy. He gave everything in the fight. By Lucian KimJanuary 2025Perhaps the greatest paradox of Alexei Navalny was that although he called himself a Russian nationalist, supporters at home and abroad saw him as a liberal who would bring Russia closer to the West.
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Sep 17, 2024 | 
nationalinterest.org | Kathryn Stoner
Any judgment of the wisdom of Ukraine’s seizure of Russian territory in the Kursk region on August 6, and its continuing occupation of now slightly more than 500 square miles of Russian territory and growing, must consider the wider context in which it has occurred. As Ukrainian armed forces emerge from the main battlefields in the country’s southeast, it appears that it may have been a wise tactical move if we consider how it fits with Ukraine’s broader strategic goals.
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Mar 19, 2024 | 
nbr.org | Kathryn Stoner
Vladimir Putin was elected president of Russia for the first time in March 2000 with 53% of the vote, narrowly escaping a required runoff against the next highest-ranking candidate.
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Mar 15, 2024 | 
journalofdemocracy.org | Vladimir Milov |Kathryn Stoner |Robert Person |Michael A. McFaul
Russia’s dictator lives in fear. He knows the Russian people don’t support him. He can’t even muster a street rally without bribes or threats. No number of fake elections will change that. March 2024Vladimir Putin lives in fear. He knows that the Russian people would never choose him if they had a free choice, so he holds fake elections, hoping to disguise his weakness.
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Feb 22, 2024 | 
journalofdemocracy.org | Zoltan Barany |Robert Person |Michael A. McFaul |Kathryn Stoner
Two years ago, Vladimir Putin launched an unprovoked full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Hundreds of thousands have been wounded or killed in this war of attrition. In the Journal of Democracy’s latest online exclusive, Zoltan Barany reflects on what has changed since last year, and on how democracies and autocracies wage war differently. As the war enters its third year, Ukrainian arsenals are drained and allied support is flagging.
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Feb 22, 2024 | 
journalofdemocracy.org | Zoltan Barany |Kathryn Stoner |Robert Person |Michael A. McFaul
Putin doesn’t care how many of his troops die. He is looking to win a war of attrition. On the second anniversary of Russia’s invasion, Ukraine needs the West’s help—and it needs it now. By Zoltan BaranyFebruary 2024The second anniversary of Russia’s 24 February 2022 invasion finds Ukraine in a precarious position. Its much-anticipated summer 2023 counteroffensive failed. Quarrels over strategy have riven its political and military elites.
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Feb 21, 2024 | 
journalofdemocracy.org | Zhanna Nemtsova |Kathryn Stoner |Robert Person |Michael A. McFaul
Alexei Navalny was one of the bravest and most influential political leaders of our time. His assassination should be a wake-up call for Western democracies. By Zhanna NemtsovaFebruary 2024I was lucky enough to have known Alexei Navalny personally. He was in prison in February 2015 when my father, Boris Nemtsov, was assassinated in Moscow. Though Navalny was not allowed to attend the funeral, we met later at the memorial dinner.
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Feb 17, 2024 | 
journalofdemocracy.org | Kathryn Stoner
Vladimir Putin may have imprisoned, tortured, and killed the brilliant opposition leader, but even now Navalny is a threat to the corrupt autocracy Putin has built. By Kathryn StonerFebruary 2024Courageous, funny, brave, brilliant, creative, tenacious, charismatic — these are all the things that Alexei Navalny was in life, and what made him such a dangerous foe for a paranoid authoritarian ruler like Vladimir Putin.
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Feb 16, 2024 | 
journalofdemocracy.org | Lucian Kim |Kathryn Stoner |Maria Snegovaya |Michael A. McFaul
Alexei Navalny loved Russia and was willing to risk everything for it. It is hard to grasp the magnitude of his death for his people and his country. By Lucian KimFebruary 2024Alexei Navalny defied death several times in his career as Vladimir Putin’s chief domestic opponent. When I worked as National Public Radio’s correspondent in Moscow a few years ago, my editors asked me to prepare an obituary in the event of Navalny’s untimely death.
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Jun 26, 2023 | 
rsn.org | Kathryn Stoner
In announcing that Yevgeny Prigozhin, the leader of the short-lived rebellion against Russia’s military leadership, would be permitted to “retire” to Belarus in exchange for stopping his “March of Justice” to Moscow, the Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov explained that the deal, purportedly brokered by Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko, “was for the sake of a higher goal—to avoid bloodshed, to avoid internal confrontation, to avoid clashes with unpredictable results.” That sounds...
