Our work is only possible through the generosity of private philanthropy. Find out how you can support our mission and can contribute to our work.
Join the HJS mailing list and keep up to date.
Originally published in the Guardian.
by David Clark
The recent rise of the populist right in Hungary and Poland has raised the alarm about the future of democracy in Europe, as constitutional safeguards, media pluralism and civil society come under sustained attack.
But …
Originally published in Heat Street
Twenty-five years ago, in December 1991, the Soviet Union fragmented, ending the Cold War. Today, Russia and the West seem again set on an intractable conflict. Here Dr Andrew Foxall, an academic and Russia expert, imagines how …
Originally published in CapX
Twenty five years ago, on 8 December 1991, the leaders of Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine signed the Belavezha Accords, an agreement that dissolved the Soviet Union.
Fewer than two weeks afterwards, leaders from all but one of the …
Originally published by Heat Street
On Tuesday, Boris Johnson raised more than a few eyebrows when he called for “demonstrations” to take place outside Russia’s embassy in response to the Kremlin’s war crimes in Syria.
But the Foreign Secretary’s comments were soon overshadowed …
Originally published by New Statesman
Wednesday’s House of Commons debate on Aleppo achieved little with regards to the establishment of no-fly zone over the besieged Syrian city, but it was notable for the foreign secretary’s call for “demonstrations” to take place outside Russia’s …
This Article Originally Appeared in The New York Times
Britain’s referendum decision last month to leave the European Union has plunged Europe into crisis. There will be institutional and political upheaval for years to come while the terms of Britain’s knotty disentanglement …
Originally published in the American Interest
In Syria, as in Ukraine and Georgia before, Russia is using warfare to achieve its goals, operating through brute force and fear. In the West, it uses lawfare, exploiting the rule of law to launch …
Originally published in the Wall Street Journal
On Thursday, a British inquiry into the polonium poisoning death of former Russian agent Alexander Litvinenko in 2006 implicated Russian President Vladimir Putin in the murder. The announcement was the first step toward justice …
Originally published in The New York Times
Ukraine and Russia are still at war. Since the Minsk II peace agreement came into effect on Feb. 15, nearly 400 Ukrainian soldiers and more than 200 civilians have been killed. Many more may …
Originally published in the American Interest.
Putin has tried turning a civil war into a counter-terrorism operation before. It’s unlikely to work out so well for him this time.
Having established Russia’s ability to project its military might in the Middle East …
Over a year and a half has passed since Russia annexed the Crimean peninsula from Ukraine. Since then, Russia has waged a campaign of aggression against Kiev and, despite Western economic and political pressure on Moscow, Moscow has not changed …
Posted in Human Rights, Opinion Editorial, RSC Editorial, Russia
Syria is being destroyed. The civil war, now more than four years old, has left the country in ruins. The implacable Islamic State controls vast areas of the north and east, and the barbaric regime of President Bashar al-Assad maintains its Damascus …
Posted in Opinion Editorial, RSC Editorial, Russia, Russia Studies Centre
Originally published in the Wall Street Journal
One year ago Friday, Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was destroyed over eastern Ukraine while on a scheduled flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur. All 298 people on board were killed.
Overwhelming evidence suggests that the …
Originally published in Foreign Policy
Czech oligarch Andrej Babis, his country’s second-richest man and one of the most politically powerful billionaires in the world, is expanding his business empire into Prague’s corridors of power.
Babis currently serves as finance minister, but his ambitions are far grander. The …
Originally published in The New York Times
Just over a year ago, Russia annexed Crimea in the first major land grab in Europe since World War II. The world has paid little attention to Crimea since then, but developments on the …
Originally published in the Financial Times
Unwilling to go to war with Russia, the west’s main levers for persuading Vladimir Putin to back down over Ukraine are economic sanctions. Their importance was underscored last week, when the US announced new measures …
Originally posted in the Wall Street Journal
Abducted and imprisoned in the same jail where Sergei Magnitsky was killed, this Ukrainian MP and former military pilot has been on a hunger strike for eight weeks.
On Saturday, Nadiya Savchenko began the eighth …
Dr Andrew Foxall, Director of the Russia Studies Centre at The Henry Jackson Society, provides commentary on the inquiry into the death of Alexander Litvinenko.
The long-awaited public inquiry into the death, in November 2006, of the Russian dissident Alexander Litvinenko …
Originally posted in World Affairs
Obscured by the attacks in Paris a day later, the January 6th suicide bomb attack in Istanbul was nonetheless a significant one. It was not the first terrorist attack to be carried out by a Russian …
Originally published in The Moscow Times
‘In his speech at last month’s annual Valdai Club meeting, President Vladimir Putin accused the West of “double standards” in Ukraine. This is nothing new. Putin has habitually spoken of the West’s double standards since he first came to power.
Those wishing to understand …
Originally published in World Affairs
Fifteen years ago last week, Russia went to war in Chechnya for the second time in five years. “The collapse of the Soviet Union ends in Grozny,” declared the recently appointed and little-known Russian prime minister, Vladimir Putin. …
Originally published in Conservative Home
‘It was all going so well for Vladimir Putin. At the beginning of July, the Russian President was in the driver’s seat. The European Union was divided over whether to impose tougher economic sanctions against Moscow, …
Originally published in Financial Times
‘The “stage three” sanctions announced by the US and the European Union against Russia last week are designed to bring about change in President Vladimir Putin’s behaviour by targeting Russia where it is most vulnerable – …
Six days after protests initially broke out on the streets of Sukhumi, the president of the unrecognized Georgian break-away region of Abkhazia, Aleksandr Ankvab, resigned. The resignation came shortly after Vladislav Surkov, a close aid to the Russian President Vladimir …
Posted in RSC Editorial, Russia, Russia Studies Centre
Never before has the Russian media offered such extended coverage of a foreign trip by President Putin as it did to his two-day trip to Beijing, earlier this week, that culminated with the signing of a 30-year gas deal between …
Posted in RSC Editorial, Russia Studies Centre