- COP29 fight looms over climate funds for developing world
- Shanghai stocks soar to extend stimulus rally amid Asia-wide drop
- Will Tesla's robotaxi reveal live up to hype?
- 'Invisibility' and quantum computing tipped for physics Nobel
- Oil prices extend gains on Mideast tensions, Wall Street falls
- 'Dark day': Victims mourned around the globe on Oct. 7 anniversary
- Mission to probe smashed asteroid launches despite hurricane
- Oil prices extend gains on Mideast tensions, Wall Street slips
- Europe's asteroid mission Hera launches despite hurricane
- Oil prices extend gains on Mideast tensions, Wall Street retreats
- What is microRNA? Nobel-winning discovery explained
- Weather may delay launch of mission to study deflected asteroid
- China to flesh out economic stimulus plans after bumper rally
- Asian markets track Wall St rally on US jobs data
- World marks anniversary of Oct. 7 attack on Israel
- Asian markets track Wall St rally on jobs data
- Cancer, cardiovascular drugs tipped for Nobel as prize week opens
- Tunisia incumbent Saied set to win presidential vote: exit polls
- 'Difficult day': Oct 7 commemorations begin with festival memorial
- Commemorations begin for anniversary of attack on Israel
- Tunisia voting ends as Saied eyes re-election with critics behind bars
- Drowned by hurricane, remote N.Carolina towns now struggle for water
- Two elephants die in flash flooding in northern Thailand
- Tunisia votes with Saied set for re-election
- Too hot by day, Dubai's floodlit beaches are packed at night
- A 'forgotten' valley in storm-hit North Carolina, desperate for help
- Italy targets climate activists in 'anti-Gandhi' demo clampdown
- US trade chief defends tariff hikes when paired with investment
- EU court blocks French ban on vegetable 'steak' labelling
- Meta AI turns pictures into videos with sound
- US dockworkers return to ports after three-day strike
- DR Congo to begin mpox vaccination campaign Saturday in east
- Meta must limit data use for targeted ads: EU court
- Oil extends gains, jobs report lifts Wall Street
- US hiring soars past expectations in sign of resilient market
- As EU targets Chinese cars, European rivals sputter
- Top EU court finds against FIFA in key transfer market ruling
- Oil extends gains, Hong Kong stocks resume rally
- 'A man provides': Ukrainian miners send families away as Russia advances
- EU states greenlight extra tariffs on EVs from China
- Hong Kong stocks resume rally, oil dips after Middle East-fuelled surge
- Crude stable after Israel-Iran surge, Hong Kong stocks resume gains
- Hera spacecraft to probe asteroid deflected by defence test
- US dockworkers to head back to work after tentative deal
- After Helene's destruction, North Carolina starts to rebuild
- Dockers end three-day strike at Montreal port
- What next for OpenAI after $157 billion bonanza?
- Israel-Hamas war causes 86-percent dive in Gaza GDP: IMF
- Milan's Morata moves house after Inter-fan town mayor 'violates' privacy
- 'Devastating' storm hits Augusta National but Masters will go on
RBGPF | -1.97% | 58.94 | $ | |
SCS | -0.15% | 12.95 | $ | |
BCC | 1.68% | 141.27 | $ | |
NGG | -1.56% | 65.48 | $ | |
CMSC | -0.53% | 24.57 | $ | |
RELX | -0.54% | 46.04 | $ | |
RIO | -0.11% | 69.62 | $ | |
GSK | -0.49% | 38.63 | $ | |
CMSD | -0.09% | 24.79 | $ | |
VOD | 0.31% | 9.69 | $ | |
RYCEF | -1.45% | 6.88 | $ | |
JRI | -0.76% | 13.18 | $ | |
BCE | -0.54% | 33.53 | $ | |
AZN | -0.78% | 76.87 | $ | |
BP | 0.78% | 33.14 | $ | |
BTI | -0.26% | 35.2 | $ |
'Vladimir, answer us': Russian soldier mothers challenge Putin
Their videos are flooding Russian social media -- mothers and wives of soldiers mobilised to fight in Ukraine, urgently demanding that the military make good on promises made by President Vladimir Putin.
Anger and concern have built across Russia since September, when the Kremlin announced that hundreds of thousands of well-trained and well-equipped men would be conscripted and sent to the battlefield to bolster Moscow's struggling campaign in Ukraine.
But chaos ensued, with widespread reports of exempted men -- the elderly or infirm -- being dispatched to the front or conscripts dying after receiving nearly no training, forcing the Kremlin to concede "mistakes".
In a sign that Putin takes the growing malaise seriously, he is expected on Friday to meet a group of military mothers and wives for the first time since ordering Russian forces into Ukraine nine months ago.
But some relatives have already dismissed the meeting as carefully choreographed and one that will not offer a platform for frank discussion.
"The president will meet with some mothers pulled out of his pocket, who will ask the right questions and thank him," said Olga Tsukanova, an activist mother.
"As usual."
Her 20-year-old son is currently doing his military service and she wants to make sure he will not be sent to Ukraine.
Tsukanova travelled 900 kilometres (560 miles) from the city of Samara on the Volga river in the hope of being seen at the Kremlin.
- Sour memories -
"I'm not alone. Invite us, Vladimir Vladimirovich, answer our questions!" she said, referring to the president by his patronymic.
Anger over the fate of mobilised men, which risks degenerating into real discontent, has put the Kremlin in an uncomfortable position, analysts have said.
While authorities have unleashed an unprecedented crackdown on political dissent while troops fight in Ukraine, the word of mothers is sacred in Russia.
Imprisoning them is not an option.
For Putin, the sight of angry relatives may bring back difficult memories from the start of his rule more than two decades ago.
In August 2000, the Russian leader was criticised for responding too slowly when the Kursk submarine sank, killing all 118 crew onboard.
Two wars in Chechnya led to the rise of the mothers' movement in Russia that became a thorn for the Kremlin.
But this time the climate is different, with no independent media left in the country and a de facto ban on public criticism of Putin's offensive.
This means there has been little public questioning of the operation in Ukraine. But in Russia some are asking questions about the conditions in which relatives are sent to fight.
- 'Hold power to account' -
Mothers' and wives' status as relatives of mobilised men serving the country gives them a form of protection, rather than being considered ordinary opponents.
"There is a subconscious feeling that women have that right," to hold power to account, sociologist Alexei Levinson of the independent Levada Centre said.
"But this is not a woman for peace movement," he warned.
"They want the state to fulfil its responsibility as a 'collective father' towards the mobilised."
For now, the soldiers mothers' movement is uncoordinated and disparate, mainly consisting of worried relatives posting videos on social media, where some informal groups have formed.
This is how Tsukanova, who has links to controversial opposition figure Svetlana Peunova -- accused in Russia of spreading political conspiracy theories -- became involved in the mothers' movement.
In a climate of suspicion not seen since the Soviet era, many women fear that complaining about the offensive could mean trouble and refrain from speaking to the foreign press.
"We have sent letters to authorities," one woman told AFP anonymously.
"It's not the journalists that will take our guys out of the trenches and we do not want to harm them even more."
A.Agostinelli--CPN