#Hotel Moscow Leader

[uniquegalaxyfox]

"Sisters"

[fancyfeathers]

Society of Protection (Yandere Bungo Stray Dogs x reader x original characters) (normalized yandere au)

Chapter Sixteen

Moscow Nights

Prologue and oc intro

Chapter one

Chapter two

Chapter three

Chapter four

Chapter five

Chapter six

Chapter seven, part one

Chapter seven, part two

Chapter eight

Chapter nine

Chapter ten

Chapter eleven

Chapter twelve

Chapter thirteen

Chapter fourteen

Chapter fifteen

Mori led you into the large tower, taking you to one of the upper floors. He gave you clean clothes to change into, a simple black turtleneck and red dress, along with a new coat, gloves, and scarf for when you’re ready to leave. You made a mental note to stop on the way back home to check for tracking devices, couldn’t have anyone else know where the Society headquarters are after the Guild incident. 

After you got changed you stopped by Mori’s office like he requested, just to talk he said. The office was just as nice as Miss Jane’s, a familiar decor, just a lot darker. Mori sat in a velvet chair, facing the window that looked over Yokohama, fitting. On the ground next to him was that little blond girl he asked you to help find all those months ago, Elise you think. Lastly in the chair next to him was that red head in the fedora, the one who bought flowers from your shop, that Fyodor went on to frame for breaking into your apartment, Chuuya. The two of them seemed to be discussing something important. You knocked on the doorframe which caught their attention. Mori smiled and waved you over, interrupting their conversation. “Miss (Name), please come in and may I say you look lovely.”

“Oh thank you, Mr. Mori.” You stepped into his office, closing the door behind you. “I’m afraid I can’t stay long, I have to be back home, I promised William to-“

“I understand you’re a busy woman, Miss (Name). So I’ll get straight to the point.” Mori interrupted you, picking up something on the coffee table in between himself and Chuuya, it was a file. “I know about your charity ball, and I know there is an auction happening on one of the floors above. If any of the Port Mafia member goes in there they’ll be recognized. That’s where you come in.”

“M-me?” You should have realized that Mori was up to something when you came in here. Gaston was right, you can’t trust anyone outside of the society. 

“Yes, Miss (Name), come here.” You walked up nervously and took the file he was handing you, most of the information was blacked out but the lot number was there, lot six-six-five. “It’s files under the guise of a first edition book, you probably are not familiar with the organization the Rats of the House of the Dead, but I do trust you are familiar with their leader, Fyodor Dostoevsky.”

Your eyes unknowingly went wide in shock and horror, this hasn’t gone unnoticed by Mori and Chuuya. Mori chuckled and Chuuya sighed. “Boss, now you’re just scaring her.”

“The first to make a move wins, but there is no need to fear about the demon. Earlier today I have received word from one of my executives that a bounty hunter he hired caught him.” Part of you calmed when Mori spoke those words, but you know Fyodor, he was almost able to outsmart Gaston, keyword almost. You know how Gaston triumphed in the end, making them all dance like actors on a stage, that composer scared you sometimes. But Mori’s words quickly caught you out of your thoughts. “Now, we’ll be giving you a cap of a million to bid on this item and afterwards you will meet Chuuya here outside the hotel to give him the files or report that you lost it and return the cash and tell us who bought it and we’ll deal with it as such.”

“And if I don’t?”

“Well I could always make good of my promise of making sure you never see the light of day again.” A wicked smile comes across Mori’s face and you took a step back in unease at that. He chuckles and shakes his head. “But something about your reaction tells me that you’ll accept, and don’t worry for the information you’ll get us, you’ll be probably compensated, information perhaps? It’s negotiable.”

“I guess I don’t have much of a choice, it’s a deal then.” You respond and Mori smiles, not as madly as before.

“Wonderful, now then you are welcome to stay and chat if you would like to, if not I can have one of my men escort you back-“

“No thank you, I’ll be fine. I’ll be calling one of the society’s chauffeurs to pick me up. I can’t be having you know where the Society’s headquarters is, now can I? I do wish you well, and I trust we’ll be in contact.” You cut Mori off with a smirk and pull out your phone, glancing back at the two of them before you step out into the hall. “Chuuya, one thing, a question.”

“Huh? What do you want?” He asked, not necessarily angry, even sounding too tired to be angry.

“That day when you bought those flowers, roses I remember, why and what did you do with them?” You looked away, still in thought. “It’s a weird question I know, but that same evening my apartment was broken into and framed to make it look like you did it.”

“Well, I got them because I felt bad cause I was just bothering you at work, I put them in my room.” He answered your question bluntly and almost a bit nervous. “Do you know who broke in?”

“I do, he’s the most dangerous individual I have ever met.” You began dialing up the number of your chauffeur as you spoke. “Fyodor Dostoevsky.”

You watched as a slight look of shock came across their faces. “But… how did he possibly know about the roses I bought?”

“Apparently he has been watching me, it must have been easy work for him to do so.” You stepped even farther into hallway, ready to hit the call button for your chauffeur. “My final word of warning if what you say is true about Fyodor being in your custody, I would be careful. This is a game for Fyodor that you are unknowingly pieces in, I have made that mistake of underestimating him before when I didn’t listen to Gaston’s warnings. So listen to mine, never let your guard down, never trust anyone outside your close allies for it you do it may mean your end and as much as I hate to admit it this city needs the Port Mafia. As a member of the Society this city can go on without me and it will one day when I leave it when the Society’s purpose is done here.”

“You’ll be leaving? I know you’re not from Yokohama but this is your home, isn’t it?” Mori asked, his curiosity peaked. You nodded with a smile.

“Yes, I will be. I was indeed born in England, and now I have mystery I want to solve. It’s the mystery on where my father is, call it a hunch but I think he’s still alive.” You laugh to yourself and wave goodbye. “Now, that’s enough of my crazy thoughts, I’ll be off now.”

—————————

You arrived back at the apartment building, it was late when you got back, practically everyone was asleep but judging by the sound of music from a certain composer’s room you knew someone else was awake. You walked over and knocked and the music stopped and Gaston answered, looking slightly disheveled like he normally does after working on his music. “Oh (Name), welcome. I was just composing but you are are always welcome.”

“Thanks Gaston, but I need to talk to you.” You stepped inside as you spoke. “It’s about Fyodor.”

Gaston grew silent for a long moment before sighing. “I’ll get the whiskey.”

You sat down on the couch in Gaston’s lounge as he went to the drink cart and poured two of glasses of whiskey for the two of you. He sat down on the couch across from you, setting your drink on the table in between the two of you. He took a long drink before sighing and setting his drink down on the table. “Now, what is this about Fyodor?”

“An unknown Port Mafia executive had a bounty hunter capture him, apparently it was successful.” You replied before taking a long sip from your own glass.

“And who told you this?”

“Mori Ougai himself.” And as soon as you said this Gaston took off his glasses and pinched his nose, and running his hand the his hair. You could hear small swears from under his breath.

“This isn’t good, he’s obviously playing them. He wants something.” He stood up from his chair and gripped his hair and swore even more under his breath. “You warned them, right?”

“I did, if they take me seriously not is up to them, they may not out of pride or a need for vengeance for what he has done.” You responded as you watched Gaston picked up his drink and downed the rest of his drink. “I don’t know what we’ll do, I don’t know what his ability or even how to deal wit-“

“I know his ability and someone to deal with it, he’s a Society of Protection member as well. He just tends to be a tad busy.” He sighs and looks out the window and the snowy landscape before you all. He stared out at it for a long time before walking over to the piano and he picks up one of the picture frames on it. He looks at the photo for a long time like he did with the snow. “I’ll give him a call here soon. We just need to have patience. The strongest of all warriors are these two — time and patience.” He paused and laughed to himself. “God, I even sound like him.”

 You downed the rest of your drink like him before standing up. “I’m going to bed, I’ve had a long day. Good night, Gaston.”

You walked towards the door and you heard his voice call out as well to you. “Sweet dreams, mon ange.”

��————————

In the snowy city of Moscow sat a young man. He lived in a large manor, no, palace would be a better word. He sat in a lounge chair, tea set out on a side table next to him along with a old telephone, like one of the roaring twenties and a photo of the young noble with an all to familiar Gaston Leroux, old friends. His eyes were firmly fixed on the storming city outside, snow so thick it was hard to see. The room was silent until soft clicks of heels broke it.

“My liege, there is call for you from a Mr. Leroux.”

The young man looked over his shoulder at the butler and nodded. “Put him on the line.”

The butler nodded and ran off and soon the phone next to him began to ring. The man picked up and a smile came across his face as he spoke. “What do I owe this pleasure, Mr. Leroux? It has been quite some time.”

Across the world on the other end of the line was Gaston standing in his luxury apartment all the way in Yokohama. “Good morning your highness, I was just wondering if you remember the job I did for the European Union three years ago?”

The Russian man paused at his old friend’s question. “Yes, I do. Is this about Fyodor?”

There was a hum on the other end of the line. “Yes, yes it is, see Fyodor is here in Yokohama and I believe he wants it to be war between us…”

“So you need peace to balance the scales…” The Russian man finished his friend’s sentence before taking a sip of his tea. “You realize that while I may be your friend and member of the society, I am still royalty.”

“Yes, I know.” There was a chuckle from Gaston. “But who better than a Royal to teach our friend that Crime and Punishment mean nothing to War and Peace. Isn’t that right, Prince Leo Tolstoy?”

There was silence as the Prince sat there, pondering the question before turning to his butler. “Make preparations, I shall be off to Yokohama tomorrow morning.”

“So I take it that you’ll be here soon then?” Gaston asked on his end on his phone. The Russian laughed and took a sip of his tea before setting it aside.

“Most definitely, my dear old friend.” He leaned back into his chair with a closed eyed smile. “It has been far to long, perhaps I have forgotten what my fellow man means so me. Fyodor may not carry a sentimental attachment to his own, but I don’t think I could ever loose my love I have for my compatriots. Especially you Leroux, after all, three years ago when you first faced Fyodor, you saved my life.”

“I know, no need to bring up the past. Gaston said with a light laugh on the end of the phone.

“Oh but how could I, after all the past is what keeps me bonded to you all. We must seize the moments of happiness, love and be loved! That is the only reality in the world, all else is folly. It is the one thing we are interested in here.” The Prince sighed and smiled, eyes still closed. “I think it is time for Fyodor to learn that we can love a person dear to us with a human love, but an enemy can only be loved with divine love and that God may not smile on him for much longer.”

[alinalioness]

Surprise for Alina 6 Chapter:Olivia and Sicily.

Meanwhile, with girls.

The girls with new costume (I had completely forgotten about them) had already arrived and were waiting for friends near the hotel. Suddenly they were surprised to see friends with lost costumes that they didn't know. In the hotel, someone was watching the heroes from above and a female and friendly voice was heard.

Female's voice:Not happening. These are the costumes that I left for Balan about memory.

When the characters came the lost costumes were surprised to see the new costumes.

Disguise:Are these new costumes?

Alina:(Nodded) Yes... and you mean the lost costumes.

Scarecrow Weed:All right. You will even be surprised if they come to us... (Noticed someone) Olivia and Sicily.

When the others also turned around, they were surprised to see a white alicorn in a purple dress, with a pink shreve and tail. And the other person is a figurative negative in a dress with purple and blue patterns and a scarf around his neck.

Olivia (Alicorn):So we met.

Tricky:It's Olivia and Sicily. The very ones that the costumes said.

Sicily(Negative):Are you familiar with them?

Alina:Yes. We even know Balan, Lance, the costumers and the inhabitants. They're in Moscow now, just like us. We're looking for them.

Olivia and Sicily:Are you looking for them?

Alina:They got there when Balan, Lance and their representatives remembered you. By the way, the inhabitants were rescued by Leo and Emma and they are here too.

Olivia:They remembered us.

Sicily:So we can go back home.

Emoji:(To Olivia) Are you the ones who created me and my friends? Great.

Olivia:How did they not notice you?

BombFish:We escaped from danger, that is, from Lance.

Stretchinpillar:We have been hiding for a long time, until Balan found us and thinks that we are suitable for a new world and a surprise.

Heroes:What's the surprise?

BombFish:You'll find out. (To Alina) Especially you.

Alina did not understand what was going on, but she already feels suspicious, but she could not seriously express herself to her friends, because she loved them very much. The new costumes whispered to Olivia, Sicily and the lost, which they immediately understood.

Olivia:Everything Is Clear. (To everyone) Well, then. Now let's talk about the abilities, but we need to find a place where it's safe.

The heroes decided to find out in an empty place near the forest.

Olivia:Now see what abilities the lost suits have. The Scarecrow Weed makes the weeds appear to hit the negatives. (Scarecrow Weed causes weeds, and then the weeds go away) The drop is able to swim in water places. Diggers are able to dig roads in certain places. (Diggers dig holes and come out of there) Koalacrobat is capable of hitting not once but three times. A Disguise can disguise itself so that no one sees it (Disguise is masked). The Cutier Girl lures the negatives of the cute and attacks. Pawn Cannon has the same function as the Quad Cannon, but the cores are flying around. A frosty Lynx like a Cutier Girl lures with beauty and attacks with ice.

Krash:Like a Scarecrow Weed's.

Olivia:A nightmare can sneak up on you and scare the negatives. Inkolotl is able to paint the walls so that the passage opens. Sniffer Dog is able to search for drops for tims. And the Ghost is able to remove garbage with the help of flames.

Sicily:Scarecrow Weed, Drop, Disguise, Cutier Girl, Pawn Cannon and Frosty Lynx are the former representatives of the six inhabitants.

Alina:It's very interesting, it remains for us to come up with another plan.

Street Cat:That's what we've been thinking about.

Alina:Maybe we'll notice something on the way and come up with something, or does anyone have any ideas? It's just me thinking.

Carlin:You think well, Alina, it's just that not everyone comes up with something.

Alina:Then let's go ahead (Everyone is coming).

Sicily:She is your leader.

Lula:Yes, she tries to be rude to none of us.

The heroes almost passed by when they saw a poster with the inscription concert.

Alina:Why not take the stage? Our friends may be found.

To be continued...

[mariacallous]

In 1986, Mikhail Gorbachev initiated an era of political reform in the Soviet Union by liberating political prisoners and internal exiles, including the Nobel Prize-winning physicist Andrei Sakharov. During the next three years, Sakharov presided as the moral leader of the democratic opposition in Moscow and spoke his mind from the rostrum of the Congress of People’s Deputies. On the eve of a major debate, he told his wife, “Tomorrow there will be a battle.” He went to his study to take a nap and never woke up. Sakharov had died of natural causes, a free man in a fleeting era of hope.

In 2020, Vladimir Putin set out to crush popular dissent in Russia once and for all, ordering his secret police to hunt down his nemesis Alexei Navalny, the eventual winner of the European Parliament’s Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought. For nearly a decade, Navalny had driven Putin to distraction, denouncing his regime as a “party of crooks and thieves.” He campaigned for high public office and employed open-source reporting techniques to uncover the gaudy corruption of the regime: the yachts, the planes, the villas, the billions stashed abroad.

Agents of the F.S.B. trailed Navalny to Siberia. They broke into his hotel room and, in a plot that might have been scripted by Gogol, spiked his underwear with Novichok, a deadly nerve agent. Navalny wore the poisoned garment aboard his flight home to Moscow and, sitting in seat 13-A, he soon found himself howling in agony, as his body began to shut down. The plane made an emergency landing in the city of Omsk. Somehow, Navalny survived. He was eventually flown to Germany and, with his wife, Yulia Navalnaya, at his side, he came out of a medically induced coma and steadily regained his strength. But he declined permanent refuge in the West. Do not be afraid, do not give up, was his constant refrain, and he refused to betray his own counsel and principles. In January, 2021, Navalny boarded a flight to Moscow, knowing full well that his moral prestige represented an intolerable threat to the regime. Putin had him arrested at the airport.

At his trial, Navalny showed that he was worthy of the Russian dissidents of the past, men and women who risked everything to tell the truth, whether it was at show trials where the verdict was never in question or in samizdat manuscripts that were passed hand to hand. But Navalny, who preferred to see himself as a politician, was also distinctly modern. Rather than attack his persecutor in court with high-flown metaphors and allusions, he referred to Putin plainly, comically, as “this thieving little man in his bunker,” as “Vladimir, the Poisoner of Underpants.”

Part of Navalny’s appeal was that he evolved over time. He set aside the crude nationalism of his early rhetoric and learned to deploy both his courage and his humor. He came off not as a luftmensch, an ethereal intellectual, but as a grounded member of a hopeful generation: interested in freedom and prosperity. He even spoke of “happiness”––hardly a common term in the Soviet and post-Soviet political lexicon. His methods were entirely new. One of his earliest ventures into protest was as an activist shareholder; he used his small investments to uncover the ways some of the biggest Russian companies illegally enriched their Kremlin patrons.

Navalny knew how to talk to people on their level. He consumed many of the Russian classics and prison memoirs, but he also spoke of his affection for “Harry Potter” and “Rick and Morty.” In a letter written to his friend Sergey Parkhomenko shortly before his death, Navalny referred not only to the portrait of despair in Chekhov’s story “In the Ravine” but also to the no less gloomy late-Soviet landscape depicted in the popular film by Aleksei Balabanov, “Cargo 200.”

Last week, forty miles north of the Arctic Circle, at a prison camp known as Polar Wolf, Navalny was pronounced dead. Or, to call things by their proper name, he was murdered. The cause provided by the local prison authorities—“sudden-death syndrome”––was just an additional form of contempt and violence.

Speculative history can be hollow, and a country in need of martyrs and saints is not to be envied, and yet it is hard to overstate the loss of Navalny. Imagine the course of South African history had Nelson Mandela been killed on Robben Island. Or the fate of Czechoslovakia had Václav Havel been poisoned in his cell at Ruzyne Prison, near the Prague airport. Navalny was fearless, and a man of faith. When his friend Yevgenia Albats confided that she feared dying in exile, he told her, “There is no death.” And yet, as Albats said the other day, the loss is devastating: for now, at least, “hope is lost.”

In this moment, Putin’s self-possession can only be outsized. He is a few weeks away from winning another phony election. He senses that the war in Ukraine, which just entered its third year, is going his way and that the Republican Party and its standard-bearer have little interest in resisting that dark trend. Putin has every reason to think he is secure. Cruelty is his ultimate protection. There are hundreds more political prisoners languishing in his jails, including Vladimir Kara-Murza (who has been poisoned twice) and the Wall Street Journal’s Evan Gershkovich.

Certain reactions in the United States to Navalny’s death have been clarifying. Tucker Carlson, freshly returned from a Moscow grocery store and Putin’s knee, hustled to express Russia’s allure to Glenn Beck. Donald Trump went on Truth Social not to send his condolences but to compare his self-inflicted troubles to Navalny’s killing. President Biden, for his part, was admirably direct in his response: he squarely blamed Putin for Navalny’s death, met with his widow and his daughter in San Francisco, and announced a package of further sanctions as punishment for the murder and for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

In 2007, Putin went to the Munich Security Conference in order to unburden himself of his resentments against the West and to make it clear that he would carry out a politics based on that fury. Now, seventeen years later, at the same conference, Yulia Navalnaya exemplified the courage of the husband she had just lost and took the same stage. She stood tall. She refused despair. There will come a day, she insisted, that Putin will be called to account for what he has done to her family, for what he has done to Russia. “And that day,” she said, “will come very soon.” ♦

[dubstep2006]

Amazing Digital Circus Shape Challenge

this is my Amazing Digital Circus game, I would like to give credit to Gooseworx for making the official Digital Circus Characters, I'm a big fan of the amazing digital circus, so to celebrate it, I've decided to make my own digital circus game, I'm giving the official digital circus characters their own nationalities and languages in my own game to show the languages of the beauty in life

Check out my Amazing Digital Circus Boss Projects

Amazing Digital Circus Shape Challenge Bosses On YouTube

Here are the voice actors for the game

Lizzie Freeman a.k.a Pomni

Volodymyr Zelenskyy a.k.a Kinger

Amanda Hufford a.k.a Ragatha

Vladimir Putin a.k.a Jax

Greta Thunberg a.k.a Gangle

Ashley Nichols a.k.a Zooble

Dayo Okeniyi a.k.a DJ Disco

Keith David a.k.a Montgomery Gator

Jim Carrey a.k.a Ottoleaf

Erika Henningsen a.k.a Charlie Morningstar

Colin Farrell a.k.a Kaufmo

David Tennant a.k.a Bubble

Jennifer Lopez a.k.a Abstracted Pomni

Dami Im a.k.a Demi-Girl

Edward Bosco a.k.a Alastor

Justin Briner a.k.a Izuku Midoriya

Jun Fukuyama a.k.a Salvation

Alvaro Herreros Martinez a.k.a ITownGamePlay

Benjamin Aaron Shapiro a.k.a Ben Shapiro

Don Cheadle a.k.a Caine

Here are the Bosses in order:

Pomni-First Boss

Pomni has been mind-controled by Caine and has become the first boss of the game, she lives in Oklahoma, United States in America

Kinger-Second Boss

Kinger is the second Boss, he is located in Kyiv, Ukraine

Ragatha-Third Boss

Ragatha is the third boss, She lives in Nassau, Bahamas

Jax-Forth Boss

Jax is the forth boss, loves to hop around and dancing to Russian music, you'll find him in Moscow, Russia

Gangle-Fifth Boss

Gangle is the Fifth Boss, She lives in Stockholm, Sweden

Zooble-Sixth Boss

Zooble is the Sixth Boss, she is lives in Lusaka, Zambia

DJ Disco-Seventh Boss

DJ Disco is the New Digital Circus OC, he lives in Abuja, Nigeria

Montgomery Gator-Eighth Boss

Montgomery Gator is from FNAF SB and has become a digital circus Character, he lives in Washington D.C., USA

Ottoleaf-Ninth Boss

Ottoleaf is the New Digital Circus OC, he lives in Toronto, Canada

Charlie Morningstar-Tenth Boss

Charlie Morningstar is from Hazbin Hotel and became the a Digital Circus Character, she lives in Jerusalem, Israel

Kaufmo-Eleventh Boss

Kaufmo is the Eleventh Boss, he lives in Dublin, Ireland

Bubble-Twelfth Boss

Bubble is the Twelfth boss, he lives in Edinburgh, Scotland

Abstracted Pomni-Thirteenth Boss

Abstracted Pomni is the evil version of Pomni and the Thirteenth Boss, you'll find her in Brooklyn, United States

Demi-Girl-Fourteenth Boss

Demi-Girl has been brainwashed by Alastor, she lives in Seoul, South Korea

Alastor - Fifteenth Boss

Alastor is from Hazbin Hotel, he lives New Orleans, Louisiana

Izuku Midoriya - Sixteenth Boss

Izuku Midoriya is from My Hero Academia, he also reborn as a Drone, he lives in Musutafu, Japan

ITownGamePlay - Seventeenth Boss

ITownGamePlay is a Spanish Youtuber and lives in Valencia, Spain

Ben Shapiro - Eighteenth Boss

Ben Shapiro was a layer and became the ruler of new drop high school, he lives in Burbank, California, you'll face in New Dorp High School

Salvation - Nineteenth Boss

Salvation is the leader of the Church, he served God for many years, he lives in Tokyo, Japan on the highest Church

Caine - Final Boss

Caine is the final boss, and the Nintendo Game Master, you'll end his schemes in Havana, Cuba

[tomorrowusa]

Th Russian military has been in a greater state of turmoil than it usually is.

A senior Russian general in command of forces in occupied southern Ukraine says he was suddenly dismissed from his post after accusing Moscow’s Defense Ministry leadership of betraying his troops by not providing sufficient support. Gen. Ivan Popov was the commander of the 58th Combined Arms Army, which has been engaged in heavy fighting in the Zaporizhzhia region. He is one of the most senior officers to have taken part in the bloody Russian campaign in Ukraine. Popov said he had raised questions about “the lack of counter-battery combat, the absence of artillery reconnaissance stations and the mass deaths and injuries of our brothers from enemy artillery,” in a voice note published on Telegram late Wednesday.

In military terms, Russia can't even cope with the basics. Gen. Popov blames Putin crony Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.

Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu “signed the order and got rid of me,” the general also said in the recording, as he accused the top Kremlin official of treason. “As many commanders of divisional regiments said today, the servicemen of the armed forces of Ukraine could not break through our army from the front, (but) our senior commander hit us from the rear, treacherously and vilely decapitating the army at the most difficult and tense moment,” Popov said.

Russian senior officers have been taking it on the chin lately.

Another Russian General Killed in Occupied Ukraine

Russian Lieutenant General Oleg Yuryevich Tsokov was reportedly killed in an overnight attack by Ukrainian forces in the city of Berdyansk. The information was confirmed on the Telegram channel of the mayor of Mariupol, Peter Andryushchenko, and then by an advisor to the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine, Anton Gerashchenko, on Twitter. Later Andryushchenko suggested that this had been an attack against the “Duna Hotel” which had been commandeered as accommodation for the Russian military leadership in the occupied town. According to local reports, cited by the mayor, the hotel was all but completely destroyed in spite of reports that anti-missile defenses were sited close to the building. Unconfirmed reports say the building may have been struck by a Storm Shadow missile.

Cheers to the UK for supplying Ukraine with Storm Shadow missiles! 🍻🇬🇧

Russian commander killed while jogging may have been tracked on Strava app

A Russian submarine commander shot to death while jogging on Monday may have been targeted by an assailant tracking him on a popular running app, according to Russian media. Stanislav Rzhitsky was killed earlier this week in the southern Russian city of Krasnodar by an “unknown person,” state news agency TASS reported, adding that “the motive for the crime is being investigated.” [ ... ] Russian media earlier reported that Rzhitsky’s killer may have used Strava, a widely available app used by runners and cyclists, to follow his movements.

Yes, this is yet another idiotic lapse in basic security by Russians. Rzhitsky was essentially broadcasting to the world his exact location with an exercise app.

Top Russian General Missing Since Mutiny Is ‘Currently Resting,’ Lawmaker Says

Russian General Sergei Surovikin, the deputy commander of Russia’s war in Ukraine—who is also known to have ties with Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin—is “currently resting” and “not available for now,” said a lawmaker from Russia’s ruling party. The comment came in response to questions Wednesday about Surovikin’s whereabouts. Surovikin, who is known in the Russian media as “General Armageddon” due to the tactics he used in the bloody Syrian civil war, is one of several notable Russian military leaders who have not been seen in public since Wagner’s aborted mutiny last month.

Of course the place where "General Armageddon" is resting could very well be a gulag.

While regular press freedom no longer exists in Russia, there is still a rather robust exchange of information on Telegram. This news of chaos and incompetence among the top military leadership will gradually filter through much of the population – including the cannon fodder at the front.

[stele3]

[beardedmrbean]

"I will not bow to this regime... I will not play by its rules. I am on hunger strike. There is something greater than life itself — it's freedom," wrote prominent Georgian journalist Mzia Amaglobeli from her prison cell in the regional city of Batumi. 

Amaglobeli, founder of the news outlets Batumelebi and Netgazeti, was arrested in January amid ongoing anti-government protests on charges of "assaulting a police officer." The journalist now faces 4-7 years in prison. 

Amaglobeli and her team of independent journalists have been reporting on violent police crackdowns during demonstrations that have continued across the country since its contested October parliamentary elections and the ruling party's decision to freeze EU integration.

Numerous voting irregularities documented by election watchdogs have led many in the country to suspect the ruling Georgian Dream party of manipulating polling outcomes in its favor. The party, however, fiercely denies that violations affected election results. Opponents believe the party is gravitating towards Moscow, while the overwhelming majority of Georgians see their future in the EU.

"Today, it is me. Tomorrow, it could be anyone who dares to dream of just, democratic, European Georgia — untouched by Russian influence, unshackled by oppression. Fight while there is still time," the imprisoned journalist warned from behind bars. 

'Our only tool for fighting is the truth' 

Tensions were approaching a boiling point at protests in the seaside city of Batumi in January when about 10 people were arrested for putting up a stickers reading, "Georgia is going on strike." In a show of solidarity, Amaglobeli did the same and was arrested but later released, only to be arrested again after she slapped one of the policemen who encircled her and her colleagues. 

"It was a provocation. The police were cursing us, humiliating us. One should rather ask the question: What did the policemen do to provoke that reaction from her?" said Eter Turadze, a colleague who was present when the altercation took place. 

Social media footage of the incident shows Batumi Police Chief Irakli Dgebuadze dragging Mzia Amaglobeli to a police vehicle while making sexually degrading remarks. As Amaglobeli's colleagues told DW, Dgebuadze attempted to enter a room to physically assault the journalist after her arrest but was stopped short. Aamglobeli is believed to have had her face spat upon by the policeman and was denied access to water and a toilet for several hours after she was detained. 

"I know that the force that is fighting us is very strong and merciless. But our descent into authoritarianism is not complete just yet. They have to kill independent media first. Our only tool for fighting is the truth," Turadze told DW. 

Brutal attack on opposition party leader 

Amid the political turmoil, opposition politicians have also faced increasing violence and intimidation. 

Last week, Giorgi Gakharia, Georgia's former prime minister and now opposition party leader, was brutally beaten at the Batumi Sheraton Hotel and later hospitalized. The opposition has accused the ruling party of orchestrating attacks by armed groups. Officials, in turn, have accused Gakharia of provoking a fight in the hotel's lobby. 

The hotel is facing backlash as opposition party members have demanded the release of surveillance footage, albeit, to no avail. Now, they are accusing hotel management of "complicity."

The national confrontation, already heated, entered a new phase last November when opposition parties renounced their parliamentary mandates, accusing Georgian Dream of "vote rigging." 

The ruling party has been portraying opposition parties and critical media as "radicals" who want to "stage a revolution." 

"2025 will be crucial for our internal politics. We must deliver a decisive blow to the radicals in our country. Radicalism and liberal fascism must come to an end in Georgia,"  said Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze on Monday. 

'Freedom for the regime's prisoners' 

Despite regular clashes with police, protesters have been taking to the streets on a daily basis and going on intermittent strikes, mainly in Batumi and the capital Tbilisi, carrying banners reading, "Freedom for the regime's prisoners."

Beyond calls for a repeat of Georgia's disputed October election, a main opposition demand is the release of the protesters detained since last spring, when the government introduced its "foreign agents" legislation, also dubbed the "Russian law" as it is similar to a repressive Kremlin law aimed at crushing dissent. 

The spring mass protests are thought to have triggered the first major confrontation between the ruling party and pro-Western Georgians. Since then, hundreds of demonstrators have been arrested. 

Omar Okribelashvili, a 19-year-old activist who participated in so-called "No to the Russian law" protests, was one of the demonstrators sentenced in court this week. He will spend 18 months in jail for damaging a temporary metal fence at Parliament Square during protests last May. 

As the judge handed down his verdict, Okribelashvili's father looked at his son and sobbed, "I would give anything to be able to hug you now." 

[twentythreemillionstories]

Friday 17th January 2025, Moscow, 6.24pm.

#188,880 — A leader is betrayed by his closest collaborator. One day, as they are calling his name in the foyer of a hotel, he shouts his name around, as if it belonged to someone else. He was a time-bomb ready to explode at any moment. He eventually falls in love and marries her, but is never able to confess that he was the killer of her former husband.

[newstfionline]

Saturday, November 9, 2024

‘Total Nightmare’ as Wildfire Burns Through Southern California Homes (NYT) Firefighters struggled across steep terrain on Thursday to battle a fast-moving fire fueled by fierce winds in the jagged hills northwest of Los Angeles. The flames burned numerous homes, forced more than 10,000 people to evacuate and prompted Gov. Gavin Newsom of California to declare a state of emergency. The blaze, known as the Mountain fire, broke out in Ventura County on Wednesday morning and had grown to more than 20,000 acres. By Thursday evening, the wildfire had destroyed over 130 structures and damaged nearly 90 others, and it was only 5 percent contained, fire officials said.

Mexico appears to abandon its ‘hugs, not bullets’ strategy as bloodshed plagues the country (AP) For the last six years, Mexico bragged about its oft-questioned “hugs, not bullets” strategy, in which its leaders avoided confrontations with drug cartels that were gradually taking control of large parts of the country. The thinking was that social programs, not shootouts, would gradually drain the pool of cartel gunmen. Now, a month into the term of new President Claudia Sheinbaum, a string of bloody confrontations suggests the government is quietly abandoning the “no bullets” part of that strategy and is much more willing to use the full force of the military and the militarized National Guard. “There are traces of a change in tone toward organized crime, but it’s too early to call,” said Falko Ernst, a security analyst. “It seems unlikely that the Sheinbaum administration would risk a politically inconvenient, steady stream of violent imagery by betting on wholesale balazos (bullets)-only strategy,” but there may be more willingness to confront “the most overt and brazen displays of power” by the cartels.

Brazil: Beware of scorpions (AFP) In Brazil, higher temperatures, warming habitats, and increases in urbanization next to previously wild areas have combined for a sharp spike in scorpion stings, with scorpions becoming the most lethal poisonous animal in Brazil. The temperature increase means that scorpion metabolism is way up, which makes them more active and, thus, feistier. Last year, 152 deaths from scorpion stings exceeded the 140 deaths from snakebites in the country, and that’s significantly more scorpion-related fatalities than in 2019, when 95 people died from scorpions. According to the health ministry, there were over 200,000 scorpion sting incidents in Brazil last year, averaging 550 stings per day.

Israeli football fans attacked in Amsterdam, officials say (Foreign Policy) Overnight attacks on Israeli soccer fans in Amsterdam left at least five people hospitalized on Friday. According to the Israeli Embassy in the Netherlands, hundreds of Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters were attacked after Thursday’s match against Ajax Amsterdam, traditionally identified as a Jewish club. “Mobs chanted anti-Israel slogans and proudly shared videos of their violent acts on social media—kicking, beating, even running over Israeli citizens,” the embassy posted on X. Online footage shows some attackers shouting anti-Israeli slurs. Riot police were deployed to escort the Maccabi fans safely back to their hotels, and police detained more than 60 suspects, 10 of whom remain in custody as of this writing. Tensions were already high ahead of the match: Amsterdam police chief Peter Holla confirmed that Maccabi supporters on Wednesday had torn down a Palestinian flag from a building in the city center and set fire to it as well as attacked a taxi, and authorities banned a pro-Palestinian demonstration near the stadium. Online video also showed Maccabi fans chanting racist anti-Arab slurs and anti-Palestinian slogans ahead of the match.

Russians envision new global system with Trump victory (Washington Post) Across the corridors of power in Moscow, the win for Trump’s populist campaign, which argued that America should focus on its domestic woes over aiding countries like Ukraine was, being hailed as a potential victory for Russia’s efforts to carve out its own sphere of influence in the world. In even broader terms, it was seen as a victory for conservative, isolationist forces supported by Russia against a liberal, Western-dominated global order setting the rules for the entire world that the Kremlin (and its allies) have been seeking to undermine. “We have won,” said Alexander Dugin, the Russian ideologue who has long pushed an imperialist agenda for Russia. “…The world will be never ever like before. Globalists have lost their final combat,” he wrote on X.

2 million at risk of starvation in Myanmar state amid ‘total economic collapse’ (Guardian) According to the U.N., 2 million people living in Myanmar’s Rakhine state are at risk of starvation as local conflicts and trade blockades have pushed the region towards “total economic collapse” thanks to an extended conflict between the Arakan Army (an ethnic Rakhine separatist group) and Myanmar’s state military. The two sides have been locked in fighting since late last year, and the state military has imposed strong trade restrictions on the state to starve out the militant group. Some people, according to a U.N. official, have resorted to eating rice bran, which is normally used as animal feed. Monthly incomes in the state have dropped from 66,600 kyat ($31.70) to about 46,620 kyat ($22.21) since last year—with current prices, people are barely able to afford enough rice to eat on that budget, much less pay for housing or any other necessities.

China Reveals $1.4 Trillion Plan to Bail Out Local Governments (NYT) The Chinese government on Friday approved a $1.4 trillion plan to revive the economy, authorizing local governments to refinance crushing debts that have left some cities unable to pay their bills. The move caps a series of steps that China’s leaders started rolling out in September to stimulate growth. China’s economy has struggled to regain momentum this year. The grinding collapse of the real estate market, where most Chinese households build their wealth, has depressed prices and left consumers reluctant to spend. Home prices have fallen about 10 percent a year for the past three years, and foreclosures are soaring. At the same time, local governments have piled up unsustainable levels of debt. For years, they drove growth by borrowing enormous sums to pay for infrastructure projects. Then they took on even more of debt during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Typhoon floods villages, rips off roofs and damages 2 domestic airports in northern Philippines (AP) Typhoon Yinxing battered the northern Philippines with floods and landslides before blowing away from the country on Friday, leaving two airports damaged and aggravating a calamity caused by back-to-back storms that hit in recent weeks. The typhoon flooded villages, toppled trees and electricity poles, and damaged houses and buildings in Cagayan province, where Yinxing made landfall Thursday afternoon. There were no immediate reports of casualties from Yinxing, the 13th major storm to hit the disaster-prone Southeast Asian archipelago this year.

Trump to Renew ‘Maximum Pressure’ Campaign Against Iran (WSJ) President-elect Donald Trump plans to drastically increase sanctions on Iran and throttle its oil sales as part of an aggressive strategy to undercut Tehran’s support of violent Mideast proxies and its nuclear program, according to people briefed on his early plans. Trump took a dim view of Iran during his first term, aborting a six-nation agreement with Tehran—known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action—that sought to curb Iran’s nuclear weapons work. He also imposed what was described as a “maximum pressure” strategy in hopes Iran would abandon ambitions for a nuclear weapon, stop funding and training what the U.S. considers terrorist groups and improve its human-rights record. But when he takes office on Jan. 20, Trump’s approach to Iran is likely to be colored by the knowledge that its agents tried to assassinate him and former top national security aides after they left office, former Trump officials said. Iran is believed to be seeking revenge for a 2020 U.S. drone strike that killed Qassem Soleimani, head of Iran’s covert paramilitary operations. The people briefed on Trump’s plans and in touch with his top advisers said the new team would move rapidly to try to choke off Iran’s oil income, including going after foreign ports and traders who handle Iranian oil.

In Trump victory, Netanyahu sees himself as ‘the great winner’ (Washington Post) Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejoiced over Donald Trump’s election victory, as he banked on resetting relations with Washington and following through on his maximalist aims in the country’s multifront war. Netanyahu congratulated Trump on “history’s greatest comeback” in a post on X Wednesday morning as the results became clear, but before many had made a final call, hailing his return to the White House as “a new beginning for America and a powerful recommitment to the great alliance” between the U.S. and Israel. “It’s time for total victory,” crowed Itamar Ben Gvir, Netanyahu’s far-right national security minister, in an address to the Knesset on Wednesday, adding that he was confident Trump would see “eye to eye” with Israel on “all sorts of laws” that he has been trying to push through, including the death penalty for Palestinians convicted of terrorism. Israel Ganz, head of a council representing Israeli settlers across the occupied West Bank, celebrated the moment as a historic “opportunity for the settlement movement,” which has already made significant gains since Netanyahu returned to power in 2022.

Nearly 70% of verified Gaza war dead women and children, UN rights office says (Reuters) The U.N. Human Rights Office said on Friday nearly 70% of the fatalities it has verified in the Gaza war were women and children, and condemned what it called a systematic violation of the fundamental principles of international humanitarian law. The youngest victim whose death was verified by U.N. monitors was a one-day-old boy, and the oldest was a 97-year-old woman, the report said. Overall, children represented 44% of the victims, with children aged five-nine representing the single biggest age category.

Nigeria’s major cities suffer blackouts as the power grid collapses yet again (AP) Nigeria’s major cities including Abuja, Lagos and Kano suffered blackouts Thursday as the country’s electricity grid collapsed in the tenth such outage to hit the power system this year. Africa’s most populous country has the potential to generate 13,000 megawatts, but can only transmit 4,000 megawatts due to weak infrastructure, the transmission company said last year. That amount is not enough for a population of more than 200 million people. Apart from weak infrastructure, armed groups have also sabotaged power supplies. Last month, the northern part of the country was without power for more than seven days after insurgents vandalized transmission lines.

A Bad Day at Work (NYT) A caretaker entered an enclosure at a research center in South Carolina on Wednesday, cleaning the space and feeding the 50 rhesus monkeys inside. But on leaving, she failed to latch the double doors behind her. Forty-three monkeys saw a rare chance at freedom and took it, racing out of the enclosure. “It’s kind of like follow-the-leader—one goes out and there’s, like, a mad dash,” said Greg Westergaard, the chief executive of Alpha Genesis, which runs the research center. Now officials in the surrounding town of Yemassee, roughly 60 miles west of Charleston, are urging residents to close their doors and windows, and to avoid interacting with the animals. For the most part, nearby residents have been unfazed by the loose monkeys, said David Paul Murray, a town council member. It seems to happen a lot: 26 primates escaped from the facility in 2014, then there was another breakout of 19 in 2016, and then it was fined in 2018 related to escape of “dozens of primates.” “We’re not strangers to seeing monkeys randomly,” Murray said. “It’s something you don’t really think about until one runs across the road and you’re like, wait, what?”

[uniquegalaxyfox]

[brookstonalmanac]

Events 10.26 (after 1950)

1955 – After the last Allied troops have left the country, and following the provisions of the Austrian Independence Treaty, Austria declares that it will never join a military alliance. 1955 – Ngô Đình Diệm proclaims himself as President of the newly created Republic of Vietnam. 1956 – Hungarian Revolution: In the towns of Mosonmagyaróvár and Esztergom, Hungarian secret police forces massacre civilians. As rebel strongholds in Budapest hold, fighting spreads throughout the country. 1958 – Pan American Airways makes the first commercial flight of the Boeing 707 from New York City to Paris. 1967 – Mohammad Reza Pahlavi crowns himself Emperor of Iran. 1968 – Space Race: The Soyuz 3 mission achieves the first Soviet space rendezvous. 1977 – Ali Maow Maalin, the last natural case of smallpox, develops a rash in Somalia. The WHO and the CDC consider this date to be the anniversary of the eradication of smallpox, the most spectacular success of vaccination. 1979 – Park Chung Hee, President of South Korea, is assassinated by Korean CIA head Kim Jae-gyu. 1985 – The Australian government returns ownership of Uluru to the local Pitjantjatjara Aboriginals. 1989 – China Airlines Flight 204 crashes after takeoff from Hualien Airport in Taiwan, killing all 54 people on board. 1991 – Three months after the end of the Ten-Day War, the last soldier of the Yugoslav People's Army leaves the territory of the Republic of Slovenia. 1994 – Jordan and Israel sign a peace treaty. 1995 – Mossad agents assassinate Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader Fathi Shaqaqi in his hotel in Malta. 1995 – An avalanche hits the Icelandic village of Flateyri, destroying 29 homes and burying 45 people, and killing 20. 1999 – The United Kingdom's House of Lords votes to end the right of most hereditary peers to vote in Britain's upper chamber of Parliament. 2000 – A wave of protests forces Robert Guéï to step down as president after the Ivorian presidential election. 2001 – The United States passes the USA PATRIOT Act into law. 2002 – Approximately 50 Chechen terrorists and 150 hostages die when Russian special forces troops storm a theater building in Moscow, which had been occupied by the terrorists during a musical performance three days before. 2003 – The Cedar Fire, the third-largest wildfire in California history, kills 15 people, consumes 250,000 acres (1,000 km2), and destroys 2,200 homes around San Diego. 2004 – Rockstar Games releases Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas for the PlayStation 2 in North America, which sold 12 million units for the PS2, becoming the console's best-selling video game. 2012 – Microsoft made a public release of Windows 8 and made it available on new PCs. 2015 – A 7.5 magnitude earthquake strikes in the Hindu Kush mountain range in South Asia, killing 399 people and leaving 2,536 people injured.

[kookaburrabugle]

SHOCK AND CALLS TO QUIT AS IRISH POLITICIAN ADMITS HE TURNED DOWN OFFER OF RUSSIAN FREEBEE IN 2017

DUBLIN “HE’S NOT FIT to serve in the Dail,” said a parliamentary colleague of Peader Tobin TD, when the member of the Irish Parliament and leader of political party Aontu admitted that he had actually turned down a trip to Russia, a meeting with Vladimir Putin and a stay in a luxury Moscow hotel seven years ago. “He’s a disgrace to this place, to everything we stand for,” said another. “I mean…

[mariacallous]

A dark, satiric sensibility is a basic qualification for anyone in the Russian opposition. Those leaders I knew in Moscow, before I left Russia in 2022, liked to crack jokes during interviews with journalists and to judges at court hearings.

Boris Nemtsov, though he had been arrested many times and knew he should worry for his life, would laugh at President Vladimir Putin’s Russia as the “gangster state of absurdity.” He told the story of the time pro-Putin activists had sent a prostitute to his vacation hotel in a bungled attempt to fabricate kompromat.

In 2015, Nemtsov was shot in his back as he strolled across a bridge near the Kremlin. Some of his associates thought that it was, in the end, his mockery of Putin that had marked him out as a target for assassination. (Nemtsov and I shared a name, but we were not related.)

When I learned of Alexei Navalny’s death in prison on Friday, I posted on social media a picture of him with Nemtsov: both with big, radiant smiles, standing shoulder to shoulder in front of a banner that advertised an opposition rally in that spring of 2015. “How beautiful these men are, unlike that miserable little greedy coward,” one Russian follower commented.

Beautiful, perhaps. Brave, certainly. When I think of the two of them, I will always remember the words written on a piece of paper that Navalny held at one of his court hearings: “I am not afraid and you should not be afraid.” Navalny was still smiling and laughing on the eve of his death, as a video of his appearance at a court hearing on Thursday attests. The next day, he reportedly fell ill and collapsed after a walk in the compound of the former Soviet Gulag prison in the Arctic Circle where he was sent last year.

“Make no mistake: Putin is responsible for Navalny’s death,” President Joe Biden said at a White House news conference on Friday. Human-rights defenders who know Russia’s prison system agree. “Of course, he was murdered by a chain of actions ordered by Putin or by his men,” Sergei Davidis, the head of the political prisoners support program at the Memorial Human Rights Center, told me. “They were killing Navalny for a long time: First they poisoned him with Novichok, then arrested him illegally, then put him in solitary confinement for 300 days.”

Navalny was always angry at the corrupt and stupid public officials who, as he saw it, were robbing the Russian people. In one of several interviews I recorded with him, he referred to the Kremlin elite as an “idiotic regime.” But he was also critical of the “Western enablers,” the bankers, lawyers, and accountants who launder the oligarchs’ money abroad through real-estate deals in London, New York, and elsewhere.

Russia holds more than 500 political prisoners, according to the most recent tallies by Davidis’s group and U.S. officials. Deaths in prison are common. “Our group is monitoring the health of political prisoners; we are worried about at least four people who are in a critical condition,” he told me. Many wonder why Navalny returned to Russia from Germany, in 2021, after already suffering so much and in such open defiance of the opponent he called “Putin the thief.” “Navalny’s sacrifice will always be remembered,” Davidis said.

“I understand why Navalny returned to Russia, why Nemtsov came back,” Boris Vishnevsky, a member of the St. Petersburg city council, told me on Friday. He was mourning Navalny’s death, despite political differences they had had in the past. Vishnevsky’s opposition party, Yabloko, had previously criticized Navalny for participating in ultranationalist rallies. But Vishnevsky had since taken Navalny’s side. “As soon as Alexei returned to Russia and ended up behind bars, I immediately spoke against his arrest,” he said.

He understood the actions of Nemtsov and Navalny as very deliberate. “If you are a politician or an independent journalist in Russia today, you have to overcome fear,” he told me. “They made a decision to become martyrs.”

I remember a call I made to Nemtsov in September 2014, a few months before his death. I was reporting from a village in Dagestan with a sad name: Vremenny, or “temporary.” Russian security forces were demolishing houses there to punish the families of people accused of terrorism. I remember seeing the remains of children’s toys sticking up from the ground after the bulldozers had been through.

This was the year of Putin’s military intervention in the Donbas region of Ukraine, and of his annexation of Crimea. Nobody was paying much attention to human rights in a remote part of the North Caucasus. When I told Nemtsov something about my assignment in one of “the ’stans,” he laughed. When I explained where, he commented, “Dagestan will be always hot.” And then he said, “Listen, if I don’t joke, I will go nuts in our reality.” I spoke with him again, some weeks later, at his house in central Moscow. He told me that some of his friends were advising him to get out. “Why should I run?” he said. “Let Putin and his thugs run.”

That was my last interview with Nemtsov. When someone dies, you try to remember the last conversation you had with them. In 2020, I interviewed Navalny on camera for a documentary. I recall that he expressed a firm belief that, in 10 years’ time, we would speak again—and he would explain exactly how he’d won the war against corruption and for political freedom in Russia.

He was smiling. But this time, perhaps, he wasn’t joking.

[hotelsaccommodation]

Palestinian leader Abbas 'stands with' Russia as he meets Putin on Moscow visit https://hotels-accommodation.news-6.com/palestinian-leader-abbas-stands-with-russia-as-he-meets-putin-on-moscow-visit/

[realdeal-news]

Searching for Boris Birshtein

Boris Birshtein has made powerful friends and millions of dollars as a middleman between the West and the fractured former USSR. But who is he really, and who does he work for?

There was a joke more than 30 years ago, when immigrants from the former Soviet Union began settling in Toronto’s North York neighbourhood, that they came here because it was as drab and grey as the Soviet cities they’d left behind.

That description still fits parts of this vast and occasionally bleak suburb. But not this tidy, manicured avenue, lined as it is with multimillion-dollar houses – one of which, for me, is the end of a journey that began shortly after the January, 2017, inauguration of U.S. President Donald Trump, when a diplomatic source capped off our lunch in an Eastern European capital with this intriguing comment: “If you want to understand this whole Trump-Russia thing, look into a guy named Boris Birshtein.”

The broad outlines of the man, I discovered, were easy enough to discern: Boris Birshtein was born in 1947 in Soviet-occupied Lithuania. He first gained a measure of fame in the early 1990s, as one of the most powerful businessmen to emerge from the collapse of the USSR. He dabbled – not unlike Mr. Trump – in real estate and entertainment, and he dreamed, as well, of building a hotel in the centre of Moscow. In an era when the former Soviet Union was moving from outright communism to a form of crony capitalism still utterly dependent on political connections, he wielded enormous clout over the fledgling governments of Ukraine, Moldova and Kyrgyzstan; he did so by fashioning himself as a middleman for Western companies, including several in Canada, looking to expand into those newly independent states.

But the deeper I dug, the more labyrinthine the tale became. Law-enforcement and intelligence sources told me they themselves had struggled for decades to understand just who Mr. Birshtein was, and who, if anyone, he worked for. Some diplomats and intelligence agents described his powerful and multitentacled company, Seabeco, as a front for KGB-linked operations. Police told me they believed, but could never prove, that he operated under the protection of the Russian mafia.

And yet, others who dealt with Mr. Birshtein portray him more simply as a businessman with an uncanny knack for turning up in the middle of world-changing events.

There are photographs of Mr. Birshtein – who first emigrated from the USSR to Israel, before settling in Canada in 1982 under a fast-track program for wealthy investors – alongside former Canadian prime ministers Brian Mulroney and Jean Chrétien. He’s also been photographed in meetings with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, with Mr. Netanyahu’s predecessor Ehud Olmert, and with half a dozen other world leaders. He even seems to have had some kind of relationship with an ex-KGB agent who went on to become President of Russia, Vladimir Putin.

And Mr. Birshtein is not unacquainted with danger. He survived a 1991 car crash that killed the prime minister of Kyrgyzstan. No less than former Russian president Boris Yeltsin accused Mr. Birshtein of helping to finance a failed 1993 effort to oust him from power, a plot that deteriorated into deadly fighting on the streets of Moscow and which even saw shots fired into the home of a former business partner of Mr. Birshtein on Toronto’s Bridle Path.

Then, suddenly, Mr. Birshtein disappeared from the headlines, becoming just another Soviet emigré, if a remarkably wealthy one, living out his semi-retirement in staid North York.

But no sooner had Mr. Birshtein retreated from the spotlight than his son-in-law, Alex Shnaider, stepped into it. Himself a Russian émigré to Canada, also by way of Israel, Mr. Shnaider has told reporters that he stocked shelves at his parents’ North York deli before he came into contact with Mr. Birshtein.

Before long, a twentysomething Mr. Shnaider was working at Seabeco alongside Mr. Birshtein, who would eventually become his father-in-law. Within a decade, Mr. Shnaider was a billionaire, one who had made much of his fortune through an eastern Ukrainian steel mill that he and a partner gained control of while the country was ruled by a president seen as close to Mr. Birshtein. By 2007, Alex Shnaider was smiling for the cameras alongside an even more famous self-proclaimed billionaire, as he and Mr. Trump wielded golden shovels at the future site of the Trump International Hotel and Tower in downtown Toronto. (Remarkably, two of Mr. Birshtein’s other former employees at Seabeco were by then already involved in the financing of another Trump-branded tower.)

Mr. Birshtein wasn’t at the glitzy sod-turning ceremony at the corner of Bay and Adelaide. This past January, the one time I managed to speak with him, briefly, by telephone, he claimed that he had long since fallen out with Mr. Shnaider, who had recently divorced his daughter, Simona. Mr. Birshtein also said he had never met Mr. Trump.

So who is Boris Birshtein? A legitimate businessman whose greatest genius involved being in the right place at the right time? Or was his career built on connections to the KGB and the mafia?

I decided to try to find out.

Twenty months after being given that first tantalizing suggestion in the wake of Mr. Trump’s election, I stood on the steps of the stone house in North York, clutching a notebook containing far more questions than answers. To make sure I was in the right place, I peeked into a novelty mailbox mounted amid bushes in front of the $2.3-million house. After spotting mail addressed to Mr. Birshtein, I strode up and rang the doorbell.

As I stood on the front step, I could sense someone watching me on a security camera mounted just to the left of the entrance. But no one answered the door.

It was just one of the many dead ends I would encounter as I wandered the serpentine world of Boris Birshtein. It’s a place of murky transactions that connect the opaque world of post-Soviet capitalism to the tumult rocking Western politics today – via an elaborate web of companies that obscure the exact provenance of the wealth being generated and transferred, and which hands have sullied it along the way.