Corey Flintoff
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Tens of thousands of Ukrainians fled to Russia when fighting began in 2014. The welcome they received has cooled as Russia's economy sags, and very few have been granted formal refugee status.
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Two years ago, a news crew for Russian state TV was hit by mortar fire, a soundman and reporter were killed. On trial for their murder is a female military pilot serving in the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
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The former Soviet republic of Azerbaijan was once seen as a dynamic economic hub. Like other nations almost totally dependent on oil revenues, it's feeling the effects of the recent drop in prices.
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In Russia, relatively few people seem to be following the U.S. presidential election campaigns closely, but most people know the names of the front-runners.
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The poster at a Moscow bus stop read: "Smoking kills more people than Obama, although Obama kills a lot of people. Don't smoke! Don't be like Obama!" No one has claimed responsibility for it.
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The official line in Russia is that it doesn't matter who wins in November, since it won't change what the Kremlin sees as Washington's anti-Russia stance. But some candidates are better than others.
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The Russian protest group skewers Russia's prosecutor-general, Yuri Chaika, who's accused of corruption. The video stars one of two Pussy Riot members jailed in 2012 for "hooliganism."
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The Russian government has reacted angrily to the British inquiry into the murder of Alexander Litvinenko. Moscow says what should have been a criminal inquiry was politicized by the British government, and risked damaging relations between the two countries.
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"It is not borders and state territories that matter," Putin told the German tabloid Bild, "but people's fortunes."
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Boris Nemtsov was murdered last February. Prosecutors indicted four men in the killing but they say the alleged mastermind is still at large. The opposition says the charges are part of a cover-up.