“Death of Stalin”: Satirical Film Not to be Distributed in Russia: Denies it is Censorship

© filmpro.ru

KAZAN, January 25. /TASS/. Withdrawing of the distribution certificate for The Death of Stalin movie has nothing to do with censorship, Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.

“I don’t agree that it is a manifestation of censorship,” he said.

Russian Culture Ministry yanks distribution certificate for The Death of Stalin

January 23, 18:52UTC+3

 

The Death of Stalin, a British-French political satire film directed by Armando Iannucci, is based on a graphic novel by Fabien Nury and Thierry Robin

MOSCOW, January 23. /TASS/. The Russian Cultural Ministry has decided to withdraw the distribution certificate for the British-French political satire film The Death of Stalin, Acting Director of the ministry’s Cinema Department Olga Lyubimova told TASS on Tuesday.

On Monday, a public screening of the picture took place, attended by film industry figures, State Duma (lower house of parliament) MPs, representatives of the Russian Historical Society as well as members of the Culture Ministry’s Public Board. According to the Board’s head Yuri Polyakov, the movie should not be screened in Russia as it seems to be a tool for “ideological struggle.” He pointed out that, “nobody spoke out in favor of the film as a work of art.” The movie industry people who watched the flick requested the Culture Ministry yank its distribution credentials.

“The distribution certificate for The Death of Stalin has been withdrawn,” a spokesperson for the Culture Ministry said.

A group of the Russian Culture Ministry’s lawyers earlier requested Culture Minister Vladimir Medinsky yank the distribution certificate for The Death of Stalin, citing the film’s extremist nature.

“The Death of Stalin is aimed at inciting hatred and enmity, violating the dignity of the Russian (Soviet) people, promoting ethnic and social inferiority, which points to the movie’s extremist nature,” the attorneys said. “According to the rules of issuance and withdrawal of film distribution credentials, such a certificate must be withdrawn in case a movie contains information the dissemination of which is prohibited by Russian legislation,” the address says.

According to the lawyers, the film portrays some historical characters, including Soviet Marshal Georgy Zhukov, in a distorted way. “Zhukov is portrayed as a militant comedian, while he was actually a prominent commander, a gifted strategist and a marshal of the Soviet Union, who made a great contribution to our army’s victory in the Great Patriotic War, so his name is inextricably linked to the great Victory. However, the movie shows no respect for our history and the memory of previous generations,” the address stressed.

“We are confident that the movie was made to distort our country’s past so that the thought of the 1950s Soviet Union makes people feel only terror and disgust,” they added.

The Death of Stalin, a British-French political satire film directed by Armando Iannucci, is based on a graphic novel by Fabien Nury and Thierry Robin. The Russian release of the picture, which premiered worldwide in September 2017, is due for release January 25. The movie is centered on the pursuit for power in the USSR following the death of Joseph Stalin in 1953. The film stars Steve Buscemi, Jason Isaacs and Olga Kurilenko to name a few.

Russian Cadets in Trouble for Dancing in Underwear in This Video

The video, showing a group of first-year students dancing provocatively along to Satisfaction by Benny Benassi at the Ulyanovsk Institute of Civil Aviation, has been viewed more than five million times on Russian social media network VKontakte.

School authorities threatened expulsion, but social media users so enthusiastically supported the fun video that the cadets are going to be given a pass.

In response to the support for the cadets the Governor of the Ulyanovsk region declared – and posted on Facebook, – that expelling the students would not “add to their patriotism or upbringing”, and said he will meet with the young men and their parents to discuss the issue.

British Army Soldiers posted a similar video in 2015, but it is not known whether this was the inspiration.

Russia’s “It Girl” is a Presidential “Anti-Establishment” Candidate

MOSCOW, January 22. /TASS/. Activists from TV host Ksenia Sobchak’s election headquarters have collected more than 101,000 signatures in her support, edging past the needed 100,000, according to a counter at Sobchak’s election website.

Sobchak is running for the Russian presidency as a nominee from the Civil Initiative party. Candidates from non-parliamentary parties have to collect at least 100,000 signatures for the election and file no more than 105,000 with the Central Election Commission (CEC).

According to the site’s counter, 101,008 signatures have been collected to date. The CEC will be receiving signatures and documents for the registration until 18:00 Moscow time January 31. Sixty thousand signatures in support of each candidate will be subject to review by the CEC.

TV personality and socialite Ksenia Sobchak announced plans to run for president of Russia in 2018. Sobchak, 35, is the daughter of late Anatoly Sobchak, the first democratically elected mayor of St. Petersburg who was once a political mentor to Russian leader Vladimir Putin.

The presidential election in Russia will take place on March 18, 2018.

FILE – In this Wednesday, Jan. 18, 2012 file photo Russian socialite and TV host Kseniya Sobchak, daughter of the late St. Petersburg mayor, Anatoly Sobchak, takes a photo of journalists during her interview in the Echo Moskvy (Echo of Moscow) radio station in Moscow, Russia. “I’m Ksenia Sobchak, and I’ve got something to lose. But I’m here.” This is what the blond socialite and TV personality said when she began her unlikely foray into political activism by taking the stage at a huge anti-Putin rally in December. Once considered untouchable because of her family’s close personal ties to President Vladimir Putin, Sobchak has since found that she does indeed have something to lose, as her apartment has been raided by police and she has been called in for interrogation. It has been a quick change of fortune for Russia’s It Girl, who like many Russians of her generation experienced a civic awakening after many years of political passivity. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko, file)
Russian socialite and TV host Kseniya Sobchak, center, daughter of the late St. Petersburg mayor, Anatoly Sobchak, and State Duma deputy Ilya Ponomarev, second left, walk with protesters in downtown Moscow, late Tuesday, May 8, 2012 a day after Putin’s inauguration. Vladimir Putin took the oath of office in a brief but regal Kremlin ceremony on Monday, while on the streets outside thousands of helmeted riot police prevented hundreds of demonstrators from protesting his return to the presidency. (AP Photo/Sergey Ponomarev)
Russian reality television star and socialite Kseniya Sobchak, left, and Russian film director and actor Ivan Okhlobystin arrive at the f MuzTV Awards ceremony, in Moscow, Friday, June 3, 2011. (AP Photo/Mikhail Metzel)
ITAR-TASS 63: MOSCOW, RUSSIA. MARCH 14. TV personality Ksenia Sobchak in pink outfit with poodles on the set of Circus With Celebs Show (Tsirk So Zvyozdami) broadcast on Russia’s Channel One. (Photo ITAR-TASS / Ruslan Roshchupkin)

ITAR-TASS 10: MOSCOW, RUSSIA. FEBRUARY 8. TV host and socialite Ksenia Sobchak poses for the press in the shopping centre European at the Russian premiere of William Heins comedy Pledge This! starring Paris Hilton. Ksenia Sobchak is the voice of Paris Hilton in the comedy released in Russia under the title Blonde in Chocolate. (Photo ITAR-TASS / Vitaly Belousov)

MOSCOW, RUSSIA. NOVEMBER 29, 2014. TV presenter Ksenia Sobchak at the opening of the GUM Skating Rink in Moscow’s Red Square. Ilya Pitalev/TASS

MOSCOW, RUSSIA. MARCH 3, 2015. Actress Anna Ukolova (L) as bride Agafya and TV presenter Ksenia Sobchak as matchmaker Fyokla Ivanovna perform in a scene from Nikolai Gogol’s play The Marriage staged by Filipp Grigoryan at the Theatre of Nations in Moscow. Mikhail Japaridze/TASS

ITAR-TASS 04: MOSCOW, RUSSIA. NOVEMBER 20, 2009. TV presenter Kseniya Sobchak attends the Glamour Women of the Year awards ceremony. (Photo ITAR-TASS / Maxim Shemetov)

ITAR-TASS 36: MOSCOW, RUSSIA. JANUARY 22, 2010. Socialite Kseniya Sobchak and dancer Yevgeny Papunaishvili dancing during the shooting of the show ‘Dances With Stars: 2010 Season’ for the Rossiya TV Channel. This is a Russian version of the BBC’s ‘Strictly Come Dancing’. (Photo ITAR-TASS / Alexei Ladygin)

Photo courtesy Valery Sharfulin for TASS

 

Wreckage of Soviet plane shot down over Auschwitz in 1945 found in Poland

© The Close Places of Memory Fund
The plane’s wreckage was found in a pond whose owner pumped water out of it in early winter
In Auschwitz-Birkenau, fascists killed in gas chambers and burnt in crematorium furnaces over 1 million Jews, and also dozens of thousands of representatives of the Polish intelligentsia and Soviet prisoners-of-war.

WARSAW, January 19. /TASS/. The wreckage of an Ilyushin Il-4 bomber that was shot down in January 1945 during the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp by the Soviet troops has been found in Poland, member of the Close Places of Memory Fund Artur Chongala told TASS on Friday.

The plane’s wreckage was found in a pond whose owner pumped water out of it in early winter and noticed the bomber’s fragments protruding from the silt. He told the Fund about his discovery. The Fund started examining the plane’s wreckage.

“We recovered several fragments, by which we were able to make it clear that this was precisely an Il-4 plane [a two-motor bomber of the period of the Soviet Union’s 1941-1945 Great Patriotic War against Nazi Germany],” the Fund’s representative said.

“A legend had long been circulated in Auschwitz about a wrecked Soviet plane but no one knew where it was,” he stressed.

“Now it is known that the plane fell short of a couple of kilometers to fly to the Birkenau camp,” he added.

Nothing is known about the fate of the bomber’s pilots. No remains were found inside it. An effort is under way to identify the names of the pilots with the help of the Russian embassy.

“We would very much like to learn their names,” Chongala said, adding that the Fund would demonstrate the plane’s discovered wreckage at an exhibition.

In Auschwitz-Birkenau, fascists killed in gas chambers and burnt in crematorium furnaces over 1 million Jews, and also dozens of thousands of representatives of the Polish intelligentsia and Soviet prisoners-of-war. Estimates indicate that overall from 1.5 million to 2 million people of various nationalities died in that camp. The concentration compound was liberated by the Soviet troops on January 27, 1945.

The Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp was liberated in the course of the Vistula-Oder operation by Soviet divisions making part of the 60th army of the First Ukrainian Front.

According to the 60th army’s roster (the document was declassified several years ago), Auschwitz-Birkenau was liberated by combatants of 39 nationalities. Various estimates indicate that from 234 to 350 Soviet soldiers and officers died during the liberation of the concentration camp.

 

Putin takes icy plunge into waters of Lake Seliger

All photos courtesy Alexei Druzhinin, Russian Presidential Press and Information Office, TASS.

Putin often attends church services during major Orthodox Christian holidays, but this is the first time the Kremlin has reported that the president has participated in the ice swimming event

MOSCOW, January 19. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin visited a monastery to the northwest of Moscow on Thursday and took a dunk in the icy waters of Lake Seliger to celebrate the Epiphany, which commemorates the baptism of Jesus Christ, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.

“On the occasion of Epiphany, Putin attended a liturgy and also took part in the Epiphany bathing in Lake Seliger,” Peskov said.
Putin visited the Nilo-Stolobensky monastery in the Tver Region after wrapping up his working visit to St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region.

TVER REGION, RUSSIA – JANUARY 19, 2018: Russia’s President Vladimir Putin dips in the icy waters of Lake Seliger during the celebration of Epiphany. In Eastern Christianity, the feast of Epiphany commemorates the Baptism of Jesus. The Russian Orthodox Church celebrates the holiday according to the Julian calendar. Alexei Druzhinin/Russian Presidential Press and Information Office/TASS
Ðîññèÿ. Òâåðñêàÿ îáëàñòü. 19 ÿíâàðÿ 2018. Ïðåçèäåíò Ðîññèè Âëàëèìèð Ïóòèí âî âðåìÿ êðåùåíñêèõ êóïàíèé íà îçåðå Ñåëèãåð. Àëåêñåé Äðóæèíèí/ïðåññ-ñëóæáà ïðåçèäåíòà ÐÔ/ÒÀÑÑ
TVER REGION, RUSSIA – JANUARY 19, 2018: Russia’s President Vladimir Putin is about to dip in the icy waters of Lake Seliger during the celebration of Epiphany. In Eastern Christianity, the feast of Epiphany commemorates the Baptism of Jesus. The Russian Orthodox Church celebrates the holiday according to the Julian calendar. Alexei Druzhinin/Russian Presidential Press and Information Office/TASS
Ðîññèÿ. Òâåðñêàÿ îáëàñòü. 19 ÿíâàðÿ 2018. Ïðåçèäåíò Ðîññèè Âëàëèìèð Ïóòèí âî âðåìÿ êðåùåíñêèõ êóïàíèé íà îçåðå Ñåëèãåð. Àëåêñåé Äðóæèíèí/ïðåññ-ñëóæáà ïðåçèäåíòà ÐÔ/ÒÀÑÑ

This winter season, central Russia has not encountered traditionally cold weather and this night the temperature failed to go below minus 6-7 degrees Celsius, Peskov said. This is not the first time Putin has gone for such icy ritual immersions. The president has taken part in the ice-hole bathing event “for several years already,” he added.

Putin often attends church services during major Orthodox Christian holidays, but this is the first time the Kremlin has reported that the president has participated in the ice swimming event.

The ritual dunks in frigid waters take place overnight to January 19 on one of Orthodox Christianity’s major holidays, Epiphany. However, ice swimming is a folk custom rather than a religious ritual.

The love for the Motherland is extremely important: Vladimir Putin

© Alexey Nikolsky/Presidential press service/TASS

MOSCOW, June 21. /TASS/. The loss of patriotism is the first step to a global catastrophe and needs to be prevented, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at a meeting with teachers.

“It is a very dangerous thing, the first step to a global catastrophe,” he said. “We should by no means let this happen,” the Russian leader added.

At the same time, he emphasized the importance of preserving national identity. “This is what allows us to pick up our spirits and close ranks,” he pointed out. The president also said that this referred to various nationalities living in Russia, as well as to the nation in general. “This is what unites us, this is what we’ve got,” Putin stressed.

He then quoted a poem by 19th century poet Mikhail Lermontov, entitled Motherland, in which the poet said that he had “a strange love” for his country. Putin quoted the lines where Lermontov says he loves Russia’s forests and rivers, as well as the song and dance of drunken countrymen.

“The love for the Motherland is extremely important,” the head of state said.

He added that if people felt this love, they would not leave the country to reside abroad.

Depression in Muscovites Caused by Dark December: Moscow saw only 6-7 minutes of sunlight

© Ilya Pitalev/TASS

Darkest December: Moscow got 7 minutes of sun in final month

According to Moscow State University’s observatory, Moscow saw only six or seven minutes of direct sunlight in December 2017

January 16, 2018

MOSCOW, January 16. /TASS/. Muscovites witnessed one of the darkest months in history in December 2017 when they saw sunlight for just six or seven minutes, head of Russia’s Federal Service for Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring Roman Vilfand said on Tuesday.

“According to Moscow State University’s observatory, Moscow saw only six or seven minutes of direct sunlight in December. Once learning about this, many people comprehend why they were suffering from depression,” Vilfand told a news conference.

By mid-January, the sun began shining on Moscow longer than in November and December.

Coldest Place on Earth Actually Draws Tourists: Yakutsk, Russia

Coldest Place on Earth Actually Draws Tourists: Yakutsk, Russia

In this photo taken January 13, 2018, Anastasia Gruzdeva poses for selfie as the temperature dropped to about -50C (-58 degrees Fahrenheit) in Yakutsk, Russia © sakhalife.ru photo via AP

YAKUTSK, January 17. /TASS/. Life has been going on as usual in the Oymyakon District in northern Yakutia, Russia, where temperatures have recently exceeded minus 60 degrees Celsius (-76 degrees Fahrenheit). Moreover, the region, considered to be the Northern Hemisphere’s Pole of Cold, has been welcoming foreign tourists.

YAKUTSK, RUSSIA – JANUARY 16, 2018: Local residents seen in a city street. This past weekend temperatures in some areas in the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) dropped to -60 degrees Celsius and lower. Vadim Skryabin/TASS

“January has been particularly cold this year, temperatures of minus 65 were recorded on Sunday,” said Tamara Vasilyeva, a local historian and a guest house owner. “Tourists from all over the world come here to experience freezing cold. This year, we have welcomed tourists from India, China, Vietnam, Switzerland and Australia,” she added.

According to Vasilyeva, tourists are first and foremost interested in extremely low temperatures and the local way of life. “We take them on ice fishing trips, to folk concerts, and show them horses bred in extremely cold climate,” she said, adding that she was currently receiving a shooting team from Japan who were working on a documentary about the Pole of Cold. “Today they went to bathe in the Indigirka River, while the temperature was minus 58 degrees. Some parts of the river do not ever freeze because there are some hot springs,” the guest house owner said.

Temperatures in the Ust-Nera town dropped to minus 62 degrees Celsius (-79.6 degrees Fahrenheit) this week, chair of the Oymyakon district deputy council Tatyana Alfyorova said. “Everything is going on as usual: people go to work, only dress warmer. Utility and emergency services have been put on alert,” she added.

CORRECTS DATE In this photo taken on Saturday, Jan. 13, 2018, Anastasia Gruzdeva, left, poses for selfie with her friends as the temperature dropped to about -50 degrees (-58 degrees Fahrenheit) in Yakutsk, Russia. Temperatures in the remote, diamond-rich Russian region of Yakutia have dropped to near-record lows, plunging to -67 degrees Centigrade (-88.6 degrees Fahrenheit) in some areas. (sakhalife.ru photo via AP) 

According to her, schools have been closed recently. “However, children continue to attend a sports school. They play tennis and football, so life never stops,” Alfyorova said.

The Tomtor area in Yakutia’s Oymyakon district is believed to be the Northern Hemisphere’s Pole of Cold. Temperatures of minus 67.7 degrees Celsius (-89.9 degrees Fahrenheit) were recorded there in February 1933. The Oymyakon valley is one of the coldest permanently inhabited places on earth.

Vladimir Putin’s campaign website up and running

Photo: Russia’s Presidential Election will be help March 18, 2018 © Sergey Fadeichev/TASS

MOSCOW, January 15. /TASS/. The campaign website of Russian President Vladimir Putin who will be running for the nation’s highest office as an independent candidate this coming March got started at putin2018.ru.

According to Elena Shmeleva, co-chair of Putin’s campaign office, plans are to make this website as informative and convenient as possible.

“We want it to contain a lot of factual information related to the current projects and those projects Vladimir Putin was involved in,” she said. “We are also planning to post information on the authorized agents.”

Incumbent Russian President Vladimir Putin will be running in the coming presidential election scheduled for March 18, 2018, which will be his fourth, as an independent candidate this time. To be registered as a contender, he needs to collect at least 300,000 citizens’ signatures. The drive to collect signatures kicked off on January 5.

 

According to Andrey Kondrashov, a spokesman for Putin’s election team, over 711,000 signatures have been collected as of the morning of January 15.

Although a presidential contender needs to submit no more than 315,000 signatures to the Central Election Commission for verification, the election team promised that the signature collection drive would be continued so that all those willing could express their support for Putin.

 

 

Sex reassignment surgeries are based on lies & deceit: Russian Orthodox Archbishop

Photo by Dmitry Feoktistov, TASS

Russian Orthodox archbishop says Western Europe’s gender policy an “enormous tragedy”

January 14, 3:14UTC+3

“All sex reassignment surgeries are based on lies and deceit,” he said

MOSCOW, January 14. /TASS/. Western Europe’s gender policy is “an enormous tragedy and next generations will see its repercussions,” Metropolitan Hilarion (Alfeev) of Volokolamsk, head of the Moscow patriarchate’s department for external church relations, said on the Rossiya’24 television on Saturday.

“The decisions taken in many European countries nowadays are enforced by the same ideology which has already destroyed many families, the ideology which claims that an individual can choose gender, that even in their childhood a person can define who will be their partners in the future – same-sex or not,” Metropolitan Hilarion said.

“All sex reassignment surgeries are based on lies and deceit,” he said. “The lies are introduced through ideology, which in its turn comes through school education. It is an enormous tragedy of contemporary Western Europe and the entire contemporary Western world. Perhaps, only next generations will understand the scope of the tragedy.”

It is impossible to change gender, he said but “a mask can be put on the gender reassignment.”

“It means a human being’s external characteristics are possible to be alternated. So let’s suppose a man will look like a woman,” the archbishop said. “However, such a man cannot have a baby and will never become a real woman.”

The Church “will always come forward against these lies and deceit,” he added.

“What is a mental disorder, what could be corrected and cured, is presented as a norm and people are forced to disfigure themselves. There are many cases when people come to senses. When they have undergone toughest operations, reassigning gender or changing skin color,” Metropolitan Hilarion said. “Afterwards, they realize they have been merely deceived but nothing can be repaired.”.