Russian lawmakers pass a bill punishing online searches for information deemed to be ‘extremist'
The bill passed by the lower house, the State Duma, moves to its all-but-certain endorsement in the upper house and then goes to President Vladimir Putin to be signed into law.
The legislation punishes what it describes as 'deliberately searching for and accessing extremist materials' online. First-time offenders face a fine of up to the equivalent of $64.
The official definition of extremist activity is extremely broad and includes opposition groups like the Anti-Corruption Foundation, created by the late opposition leader Alexei Navalny, and the 'international LGBT movement.'
It's not clear how authorities will track down violators. Officials and lawmakers said ordinary internet users won't be affected and only those who methodically seek outlawed content will be targeted. They didn't explain how the authorities would differentiate between them.
Some observers have suggested the information would likely come from internet providers or social media platforms, and police also could randomly check the search history of cellphones or computers.
The new legislation also contained a ban on advertising of virtual private network services and fines for VPN resources that fail to comply with government regulations, but stopped short of banning their use. It did list the use of a VPN as an 'aggravating circumstance' in case of other violations of the law.
Russians widely use VPN services for access to banned content, but authorities have sought to tighten restrictions, trying to close the loopholes. The state communications watchdog has increasingly used technology to analyze traffic and block specific VPN protocols.
The Russian authorities have ramped their multipronged crackdown on dissent after sending troops into Ukraine in February 2022.
Since then, online censorship and prosecutions for social media posts and comments have soared. Multiple independent news outlets and rights groups have been shut down, labeled as 'foreign agents' or outlawed as 'undesirable.' Hundreds of activists and critics of the Kremlin have faced criminal charges.
The new legislation has sparked broad public criticism. The Duma, which unanimously supports most government initiatives, was markedly divided in Tuesday's vote, with 306 backing the measure, 67 voting against it and 22 abstaining. Among those who opposed the bill were some members of the Communist Party, Just Russia and the liberal New People party who usually follow the Kremlin's wishes.
Liberal politician Boris Nadezhdin, who sought to challenge Putin in last year's presidential election but was denied a spot on the ballot, told reporters outside the State Duma that he opposed the new legislation. 'It creates real problems for tens of millions of people,' he said.
Nadezhdin's aide, Dmitry Kisiev, who picketed the parliament building with a poster likening the legislation to the world of George Orwell's dystopian '1984,' was quickly rounded up by police, who also detained several reporters covering the protest.
Even some pro-Kremlin figures have criticized the bill, arguing it would make it impossible for them to track down and deflect comments by Kremlin critics.
Margarita Simonyan, head of the state-funded RT channel, has spoken against the legislation, questioning how her media group could 'investigate and bring to shame' anti-Kremlin outlets 'if we are forbidden to even read them.'
And Yekaterina Mizulina, whose group Safe Internet League has frequently reported dissenters to authorities, also strongly condemned the new bill, arguing it would make it impossible for her group to monitor 'extremist communities' on the web.
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San Francisco Chronicle
17 minutes ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
Trump's religious rhetoric clashes with Canada's secular politics
MONTREAL (AP) — Throughout his new term, starting with his inaugural address, President Donald Trump has said he was 'saved by God' to make America great again. In Canada, Prime Minister Mark Carney rarely evokes religion in public; his victory speech in April never used the word God. 'Canada forever. Vive le Canada,' he ended. As Canada and the U.S. now skirmish over Trump's tariff threats and occasional bullying, the leaders' rhetoric reflects a striking difference between their nations. Religion plays a far more subdued role in the public sphere in Canada than in its southern neighbor. Trump posed in front of a vandalized Episcopal parish house gripping a Bible. He invites pastors to the Oval Office to pray with him. His ally, House Speaker Mike Johnson, says the best way to understand his own world view is to read the Bible. Such high-level religion-themed displays would be unlikely and almost certainly unpopular in Canada, where Carney — like his recent predecessors — generally avoids public discussion of his faith. (He is a Catholic who supports abortion rights.) There are broader differences as well. The rate of regular church attendance in Canada is far lower than in the U.S. Evangelical Christians have nowhere near the political clout in Canada that they have south of the border. There is no major campaign in Canada to post the Ten Commandments in public schools or to enact sweeping abortion bans. Kevin Kee, a professor and former dean at the University of Ottawa, has written about the contrasting religious landscapes of the U.S. and Canada, exploring the rise of American evangelist Billy Graham to become a confidant of numerous U.S. presidents. Christianity, Kee said, has not permeated modern Canadian politics to that extent. 'We have a political leadership that keeps its religion quiet,' Kee said. 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'I feel isolated because our traditional Christian views are seen as old-fashioned or not moving with the times,' said Mégane Arès-Dubé, 22, after she and her husband attended a service at a conservative Reformed Baptist church in Saint Jerome, about 30 miles (nearly 50 kilometers) north of Montreal. 'Contrary to the U.S., where Christians are more represented in elected officials, Christians are really not represented in Canada,' she added. 'I pray that Canada wakes up.' The church's senior pastor, Pascal Denault, has mixed feelings about the Quiet Revolution's legacy. 'For many aspects of it, that was good,' he said. 'Before that, it was mainly the Catholic clergy that controlled many things in the province, so we didn't have religious freedom.' Nonetheless, Denault wishes for a more positive public view of religion in Canada. 'Sometimes, secularism becomes a religion in itself, and it wants to shut up any religious speech in the public sphere,' he said. 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Repurposed church buildings abound in Montreal In the Montreal neighborhood of Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, the skyline is dotted with crosses atop steeples, but many of those churches are unused or repurposed. For decades, factory and port workers worshipped at Saint-Mathias-Apotre Church. Today it's a restaurant that serves affordable meals daily for more than 600 residents. The manager of Le Chic Resto Pop, Marc-Andre Simard, grew up Catholic and now, like many of his staff, identifies as religiously unaffiliated. But he still tries to honor some core values of Catholicism at the nonprofit restaurant, which retains the church's original wooden doors and even its confessional booths. 'There's still space to be together, to have some sort of communion, but it's around food, not around faith.' Simard said during a lunch break, sitting near what used to be the altar of the former church. Simard says the extent to which the Catholic Church controlled so much of public life in Quebec should serve as a cautionary tale for the U.S. 'We went through what the United States are going through right now,' he said. Elsewhere in Montreal, a building that once housed a Catholic convent now often accommodates meetings of the Quebec Humanist Association. The group's co-founder, Michel Virard, said French Canadians 'know firsthand what it was to have a clergy nosing in their affairs.' Now, Virard says, 'There is no 'excluding religious voice' in Canada, merely attempts at excluding clergy from manipulating the state power levers and using taxpayers' money to promote a particular religious viewpoint.' History reveals why role of religion is so different in U.S. and Canada Why are Canada and the U.S., two neighbors which share so many cultural traditions and priorities, so different regarding religion's role in public life? According to academics who have pondered that question, their history provides some answers. The United States, at independence from Britain, chose not to have a dominant, federally established church. In Canada, meanwhile, the Catholic Church was dominant in Quebec, and the Church of England — eventually named the Anglican Church of Canada — was powerful elsewhere. Professor Darren Dochuk, a Canadian who teaches history at University of Notre Dame in Indiana, says the 'disestablishment' of religion in the U.S. 'made religious life all the more dynamic.' 'This is a country in which free faith communities have been allowed to compete in the marketplace for their share,' he said. 'In the 20th century, you had a plethora of religious groups across the spectrum who all competed voraciously for access to power,' he said. 'More recently, the evangelicals are really dominating that. … Religious conservatives are imposing their will on Washington.' There's been no equivalent faith-based surge in Canada, said Dochuk, suggesting that Canada's secularization produced 'precipitous decline in the power of religion as a major operator in politics.' Carmen Celestini, professor of religious studies at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, said that even when Canadian politicians do opt for faith-based outreach, they often take a multicultural approach — for example, visiting Sikh, Hindu and Jewish houses of worship, as well as Christian churches. Trump's talk about Canada becoming the 51st state fueled a greater sense of national unity among most Canadians, and undermined the relatively small portion of them who identify as Christian nationalists, Celestini said. 'Canada came together more as a nation, not sort of seeing differences with each other, but seeing each other as Canadians and being proud of our sovereignty and who we are as a nation,' she said. 'The concern that Canadians have, when we look at what's happening in America, is that we don't want that to happen here. '
25 minutes ago
First group of Syrian refugees returns home from Lebanon under new UN plan
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Yahoo
30 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Major cyber attack closes hundreds of pharmacies across Russia
Hundreds of pharmacies have been forced to close across Russia due to a major cyberattack. The Stolichki pharmacy chain, which has around 900 stores across the Moscow region, closed on late Tuesday morning, followed by Neofarm, which also has stores in the Russian capital. It has left thousands of customers unable to access medication. It is unclear when the chains are expected to reopen. It comes a day after Russia's flagship airline Aeroflot was rocked by a major attack, leading to dozens of flight cancellations and delays on Monday and again this morning. The Silent Crow and Cyber Partisans hacker group, which support Ukraine, claim to have been lurking in Aeroflot's systems for a year and have now carried out a 'large-scale operation' that led to the 'complete compromise and destruction' of Aeroflot's internal IT infrastructure. In a rare admission of vulnerability, the Kremlin said reports of a cyberattack against Aeroflot were 'worrying'. The second day of cyberattacks came hours after Ukraine was rocked by a series of overnight Russian attacks, which killed 27 people. Four powerful Russian glide bombs hit a prison in Zaporizhzhia, authorities said. They killed at least 16 inmates and wounded more than 90 others, Ukraine's Justice Ministry said. Meanwhile, a 23-year-old pregnant woman was among those killed in a strike on a maternity hospital in the central region of Dnipro. Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, said the strikes were 'deliberate', highlighting that they came just hours after Donald Trump reduced the deadline for Vladimir Putin to agree to a ceasefire. 'These were conscious, deliberate strikes — not accidental,' he said on Telegram. The Kremlin pushed back, with a top Putin mouthpiece warning the US president against 'playing the ultimatum game with Russia.' 'Russia isn't Israel or even Iran,' former president Dmitry Medvedev, who is deputy head of the country's Security Council, said in response to Mr Trump's threats. 'Each new ultimatum is a threat and a step towards war. Not between Russia and Ukraine, but with his own country,' he added. 01:57 PM BST Thanks for following our live coverage Thanks for following our live coverage of the war in Ukraine. It has now ended. Here's a summary of today's events: Russian strikes killed at least 27 people and injured 80 more overnight Strikes targeted a prison in Zaporizhzhia and a maternity hospital in Dnipro, where a 23-year-old pregnant woman was killed The strikes came hours after Donald Trump issued a new deadline of 'about 10 or 20 days' to end the conflict or face tough sanctions The UK condemned Russia's overnight attacks, claiming it is 'not serious' about peace Hundreds of pharmacies across Russia - primarily in Moscow - are closed due to a cyberattack The Kremlin insisted it remains 'committed' to peace in Ukraine hours after it killed dozens of people in overnight strikes We'll be back soon with more updates and analysis. 01:52 PM BST Pictured: Injured prisoner after Russian drone strike 01:35 PM BST US 'likely moved nuclear weapons to UK' amid Russian threats The US likely stationed some of its nuclear weapons arsenal in the UK for the first time since 2008 amid Russian threats, according to reports. On July 16, a US military aircraft flew from a US nuclear weapons depot at Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico to an airbase in in Lakenheath, England, according to open-source data. The C-17 transport aircraft flew with its transponder on -- making its location publicly visible - and involved the US Air Force's Prime Nuclear Airlift Force, Bloomberg reported. The weapons deliveries likely comprise of the B61-12 thermonuclear bombs, a newer tactical nuclear weapon first developed during the Cold War, the outlet reported, citing defence analysts. 01:02 PM BST Unidentified drone crashes in Minsk An unidentified drone flying over the Belarusian capital of Minsk was downed by the military overnight, its defence ministry said. The drone crashed into an apartment building and hit a parked car, according to local media. No injuries were reported. The defence ministry said air defence forces detected the unmanned aerial vehicle around 2am local time and intercepted it using electronic warfare systems. Investigators claim it was carrying a warhead filled with explosive material. 12:18 PM BST UK condemns Russia's overnight attacks The UK has condemned Russia's overnight attacks, claiming it is 'not serious' about peace. 'Russia is terrorising Ukrainian civilians,' the UK embassy in Kyiv said in a post on X. 'Last night glide bombs hit a detention facility, killing at least 16 and injuring 35. 'A maternity hospital was damaged, and 2 people died. 'The Kremlin is not serious about peace. The UK will continue to ramp up the pressure on Russia.' 11:54 AM BST Hundreds of Russian pharmacies hit by cyberattack Hundreds of pharmacies across Russia - primarily in Moscow - are closed due to a cyberattack, according to reports. The Stolichki pharmacy chain, which has around 900 stores across the Moscow region, has been forced to close. Accounting systems are not working, with employees sent home as a result. It comes a day after Russia's flagship airline Aeroflot was rocked by a major attack, leading to dozens of flight cancellations and delays. 11:17 AM BST Strip young Ukrainian men of benefits, says German politician Ukrainian men of fighting age should be stripped of social benefits in Germany, the right-wing CSU party - the sister party of Merz's CDU - has said. Stephan Mayer, the CSU's foreign policy spokesman, said it did not make sense that Ukrainian who should be serving in their army were on benefits in Germany. 'The citizen's allowance for male Ukrainians of military age must finally be ended . If almost 151,000 Ukrainians between the ages of 18 and 63 are receiving social benefits from us, then something is wrong,' he said. 'This group of people is not entitled to this social benefit and must either work here in Germany or perform military service in Ukraine.' 10:53 AM BST Kremlin insists it remains 'committed' to peace The Kremlin has insisted it remains 'committed' to peace in Ukraine hours after it killed 22 people in overnight strikes. A spokesperson for Vladimir Putin also said it had 'taken note' of Donald Trump's threat to impose heavy sanctions on Russia in '10 or 12 days' if he does agree to peace. Moscow added that there had been a 'slowdown' in an attempt to restore relations the US against the backdrop of Mr Trump's repeated threats. 'There is indeed a slowdown,' Dmitry Peskov told reporters answering a question about Moscow's ties with Washington, adding: 'We would like to see more dynamics. We are interested in this. In order to move forward, we need impulses from both sides'. 10:48 AM BST Trump opens golf course in Scotland Donald Trump is speaking at the opening of a new golf course in Scotland. Yesterday he revealed at Trump Turnberry that he was reducing his deadline for Vladimir Putin to agree to peace in Ukraine. We're not sure if he's going to address the war in Ukraine this morning but you can follow live coverage here. 10:46 AM BST Russian shelling kills five in Kharkiv Russian shelling of Ukraine's north-east Kharkiv region killed five people and wounded three, local police said this morning. 'According to preliminary data, five civilians were killed and three more were wounded to varying degrees as a result of the shelling,' the police said on Telegram, adding that Russia struck the area 'presumably with a multiple launch rocket system'. 10:39 AM BST Russia's Aeroflot cancels more flights after cyberattack Russian airline Aeroflot cancelled dozens more flights today after it was rocked by a major cyberattack. Two pro-Ukraine hacking groups claimed on Monday to have carried out a year-long operation to penetrate Aeroflot's network. They said they had crippled 7,000 servers, extracted data on passengers and employees and gained control over the personal computers of staff, including senior managers. The Interfax news agency said Aeroflot had cancelled 59 round-trip flights from Moscow on Monday out of a planned 260. It said that a further 22 flights out of Moscow and 31 into the capital were cancelled today so far. 10:09 AM BST German politician secretly fights for Ukraine A 22-year-old member of Germany's hard-right AfD revealed he has been secretly fighting for Ukraine, meaning he could be expelled from the party. Tim Schramm, deputy chairman of the AfD (Alternative for Germany) district association in Wuppertal, first arrived in Ukraine in 2022, delivering aid, Die Welt reported. By 2024, he had joined the Ukrainian Territorial Defence Forces (TDF) and served on the eastern front, taking part in combat operations against Russian troops. Speaking to he described Russia as an 'authoritarian country permeated with propaganda'. 'The Ukrainian fight is also a German one,' he said. 09:47 AM BST Pictured: Aftermath of overnight attacks 09:18 AM BST Russian strike on Ukraine prison was 'deliberate', says Zelensky Volodymyr Zelensky has said that a Russian airstrike on a prison in Ukraine was 'not accidental' and that Russia 'must be compelled to stop the killing and make peace.' 'It was a deliberate strike, intentional, not accidental. The Russians could not have been unaware that they were targeting civilians in that facility,' the Ukrainian president said in a statement on social media. 09:04 AM BST Zelensky: Russia deserves 'very harsh' sanctions after attacks Volodymyr Zelensky has said Russia deserves 'very harsh, painful' sanctions after overnight attacks killed at least 22 people, including a 23-year-old pregnant woman. 'Every killing of our people by the Russians, every Russian strike – at a time when a ceasefire could have long been in place, if not for Russia's refusal – all of this shows that Moscow deserves very harsh, truly painful, and therefore just and effective sanctions pressure,' the Ukrainian president said. 'They must be compelled to stop the killing and make peace.' 08:32 AM BST Opinion: Vladimir Putin has finally run out of time President Donald Trump has issued a new ultimatum to Russia. A bold move, but is Putin likely to accede to Trump's demands? Russia's most recent conduct suggests no. Hours before Trump's statement, Russia launched a drone and missile barrage against Ukraine that forced Poland to scramble fighter jets over its airspace. Russian official rhetoric has been equally bellicose. In response to Trump's statement, former president Dmitry Medvedev warned that the US was taking a step towards war with Russia. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has declared that 'Russia is fighting alone against the entire West'. But Putin's determination to call Trump's bluff is a dangerous miscalculation. He appears to have predicted that Trump would withdraw military support for Ukraine upon taking office and hand Russia a blank cheque for further aggression, but these assumptions were mistaken. Trump has now earmarked Russia as the sole obstruction to peace in Ukraine and is devising a robust deterrence policy. 08:07 AM BST Pictured: Ukrainian troops defend Dnipropetrovsk Ukrainian troops have been defending Dnipropetrovsk, which has come under an increasing number of attacks by Russian forces. Over the weekend, the Russian army said its forces had 'liberated' the village of Maliyevka, weeks after it seized the first settlement in the region. The region was not one of the five illegally annexed by Vladimir Putin in 2022 but the Russian president has threatened to take further territory from Ukraine if it does not agree to give up territory. 07:46 AM BST Ukrainian drones strike Russian train station Ukraine launched a large-scale drone attack on a train station in Russia's Rostov overnight, local officials have said. Videos shared online show a large blaze burning at a railway station, sparking travel chaos in the region. Located near the Azov Sea and bordering Ukraine, Rostov plays a key logistical role in Russia's war effort due to its proximity to the front line. Credit: @JayinKyiv / X 07:32 AM BST Kyiv accuses Russia of war crimes in overnight strikes A senior Ukrainian official has accused Russia of committing a war crime by striking a prison in Zaporizhzhia. Andriy Yermak, a senior adviser to Volodymyr Zelensky, said: 'Russia has struck a correctional facility in the Zaporizhzhia region. Sixteen people are confirmed dead, and 35 injured. Nearby residential buildings have been destroyed. 'This is yet another war crime committed by the Russians — and they won't stop unless they are stopped.' 07:20 AM BST Ukraine reacts to Trump deadline Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, hailed Mr Trump's 'clear stance' towards Putin that came 'right on time, when a lot can change through strength for real peace'. 'Today, there was an extremely significant statement by President Trump. And it is true: it is Russia who is doing everything to undermine peace efforts and drag out the war,' the Ukrainian president said in his evening address. 'Every night there are strikes, constant Russian attempts to hurt Ukraine. Indeed, peace is possible if we act strongly and decisively, and we have repeatedly said—and all partners know this—that sanctions are a key element.' 07:06 AM BST As it happened: Trump shortens Putin deadline for ceasefire Donald Trump gave Vladimir Putin less than two weeks to agree to a ceasefire in Ukraine or face heavy sanctions. Speaking to reporters yesterday alongside Sir Keir Starmer at his Turnberry Golf Club in Scotland, the US president said he was 'very disappointed' with Putin over continued strikes against Ukrainian civilian targets. He announced he would be reducing an earlier 50-day deadline to end the war in 'about 10 or 12 days', starting immediately, because did not see 'any progress' being made towards a ceasefire. Mr Trump had threatened earlier this month to impose 'very severe' tariffs on countries that trade with Russia if it did not agree to a ceasefire by Sept 5. 'We thought we had that [ceasefire] settled numerous times, and then president Putin goes out and starts launching rockets into some city like Kyiv and kills a lot of people in a nursing home or whatever,' he said. 'You have bodies lying all over the street, and I say that's not the way to do it. So we'll see what happens with that.' 07:01 AM BST 20 killed across Ukraine At least 20 people were killed and more than 40 wounded in overnight Russian strikes on Ukraine, regional officials said this morning. Russia carried out eight strikes on the Zaporizhzhia region, hitting a prison, according to Ivan Fedorov, the head of the military administration. '16 people were killed, 35 were wounded,' he said on Telegram, adding that the premises were destroyed and that nearby houses were damaged. People were also killed and more wounded in attacks on the Dnipropetrovsk region, according to regional government officials. A missile strike on the city of Kamyanske killed two people, wounded five and damaged a hospital, Sergiy Lysak, head of the regional military administration said on Telegram. Another person was killed and several wounded in an attack on the region's Synelnykivsky district, he said. In a separate attack on Velykomykhaylivska, Monday night, a '75-year-old woman was killed. A 68-year-old man was wounded. A private house was damaged,' he posted on Telegram. 07:00 AM BST Welcome to our live coverage Good morning and welcome to our live coverage of the war in Ukraine. We'll bring you the latest news and analysis throughout the day. Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
