IStories

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She is a St. Petersburg artist and co-owner of the channel. Her company was mentioned in the criminal case of the Deputy Defense Minister’s nephew

25 October

Roman Katin

IStories Reveal the Wife of Popular Pro-War Telegram Channel Rybar’s Founder

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The Case of Children Deportation from Ukraine to Russia

Oleshky Specialized Boarding School was one of the best institutions in Ukraine for children with special needs. It is still unknown what happened to some of its residents.

23 October

Katya Bonch-Osmolovskaya

How the War Destroyed the Orphanage in Oleshky

Exclusive

Judges Versus Migrants

In the first half of 2024, Russian courts fined migrants a record amount and ordered 86,000 foreigners to be expelled from Russia

09:40 - 21 October

Judges Versus Migrants

How Russia evades sanctions with a fake transit scheme and why it is difficult to fight it

17 October

Editors

Western Companies Supply Russia with Billions of Dollars Worth of Goods But They Do Not Realize It

News

Exclusive

The Traitors, The Spies, The Terrorists

Russian courts break the record for state treason convictions, and the number of convicted military personnel continues to rise: the IStories data team research on the convictions in Russia for the first half of 2024

07:00 - 18 October

The Traitors, The Spies, The Terrorists

Exclusive

Russian Soldiers Have Become More Likely to Receive Real Sentences as Punishment

Almost half of the convicted servicemen were sentenced to real imprisonment, whereas earlier their share did not exceed one third. The damage caused by military crimes has increased more than 30 times

17:36 - 15 October

Russian Soldiers Have Become More Likely to Receive Real Sentences as Punishment

Exclusive

Russia Plans to Recruit at Least 225,000 People on Contract with the Defense Ministry in the Next Three Years

This follows from the draft expenditure budget for 2025–2027

13:51 - 4 October

Russia Plans to Recruit at Least 225,000 People on Contract with the Defense Ministry in the Next Three Years

Exclusive

Russian Authorities Plans to Send 40% of Accused Persons to War

About 20 thousand people may go to the war front from pre-trial detention centers

05:07 - 1 October

Russian Authorities Plans to Send 40% of Accused Persons to War

Exclusive

Who Runs One of the Most Popular Pro-War Telegram Channels

IStories reveal how an Airborne Forces officer, the son of a former deputy minister and possibly a General Staff officer make money from exclusive snuff videos from the war in Ukraine

11:00 - 24 September

Who Runs One of the Most Popular Pro-War Telegram Channels

Exclusive

The Pace of Contract Soldier Recruitment in 2024 Has Accelerated by at Least 6 Times Compared to Last Year

This follows from data on federal budget expenditures for one-time payments for the contract signing

16:56 - 9 September

The Pace of Contract Soldier Recruitment in 2024 Has Accelerated by at Least 6 Times Compared to Last Year

Exclusive

Telegram’s Muddy Money

IStories found out that among the investors in Pavel Durov’s cryptocurrency were companies involved in schemes to export coal and metals from the occupied territories of Ukraine. They purchased resources taken from Donbas from Victor Yanukovych’s “purse” linked to Putin’s administration

11:59 - 6 September

Telegram’s Muddy Money

Pavel Durov Has Visited Russia More Than 50 Times Since His “Exile” in 2014

He was in Russia when he was being sued by the FSB and on the day the Kremlin publicly dropped its claims against Telegram

16:06 - 27 August

Pavel Durov Has Visited Russia More Than 50 Times Since His “Exile” in 2014

Labor migrants are needed not less, but more, experts say

16 October

Russia is Launching a Campaign Against Migrants, But In Fact, They are Lacking

Russian authorities say banning childfreeness will help boost birth rates. Looking into whether this is true

24 September

A Holy War for the So-Called Traditional Values: Why Russia Is Fighting Against Childfree People

Since the beginning of the war with Ukraine, Vladimir Putin has been threatening the West with nuclear weapons and trying to make it part of the conflict. Nuclear policy experts explain to what extent he succeeds in that

20 September

“Nuclear Escalation Is a Two-Sided Game. It Is Not Being Played with Russia”

Should we believe the polls that show that more than 80% of Russians support Putin? Maybe people are just afraid to tell the sociologists the truth?

21 August

Editors

Is Putin’s Popular Support Real

An extended commentary by Grigory Yudin on a study that concludes that Russians’ actual support for Vladimir Putin is close to what sociological polls show

21 August

Grigory Yudin

Why the Discussion of Putin’s Support Has Lost Its Meaning

Explanations by political scientist, Z-propaganda researcher and military expert

16 August

Why Pro-Russian War Supporters Call It a “Deal”

There are Russian military personnel in Ukrainian captivity who are considered dead in their homeland. Their relatives have even managed to bury “remains” in closed coffins. The Russian Defense Ministry did not provide the DNA testing results to the relatives

6 August

Dead Russians Revived

The Russian army could recruit one and a half times fewer new contract soldiers than the Defense Ministry claims. Are Russians willingly going to war? A research by IStories and CIT

1 August

Katya Bonch-Osmolovskaya, Sonya Savina

More Soldiers at All Costs

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Important Documentaries

A documentary by IStories

21 December

Wives of Mobilized Men on the War, Putin and the Future of Russia

How adoptees and their siblings live separated in Russia and abroad

15 June

“Detective Found My Family”

Stories of those missing in action and survivors’ accounts

18 January

Irina Dolinina, Rina Nikolaeva

Hell for the Mobilized Near Svatove

IStories looked into the life stories of the convicted criminals who died in Ukraine and were recruited by Russia’s infamous paramilitary organization Wagner PMC, talked to the victims of their crimes, relatives and friends

3 May

Alesya Marokhovskaya, Ekaterina Fomina

Faces of Wagner

True crime from modern-day Russia

21 October

“Putin Pardoned the Murderers of Our Children.” A Film by IStories

IStories found military officers who fled Russia — they told us about the war crimes they have witnessed and why it is almost impossible to leave the Russian army

15 August

Ekaterina Fomina

How the Russian Servicemen Are Deserting and Escaping Russia so as Not to Kill in the War

How the kidnapping, torture and terror is organized in the center of Ukrainian guerrilla resistance — Russian-occupied Melitopol

3 October

Polina Uzhvak, Rina Nikolaeva

“You Will Die and No One Will Know”

Buryatia’s losses in the war — what will the mobilization result in? A documentary by IStories

24 September

“Guys Die for Nothing”

The phone of a local resident who survived a mass shooting was found in Bucha. The occupiers used this phone to call home. IStories found them

27 June

Ekaterina Fomina

Eight Pskov Paratroopers in Bucha

How they lose, escape, and help during the war

27 May

Irina Dolinina, Ekaterina Fomina

Refugees 2022. A Documentary by IStories

The month of Putin’s war in Ukraine is being told by the voices of people on both front lines in the IStories’ film

29 March

The Voices of the War in Ukraine

20 million Russians may not be able to wait for an ambulance to arrive when their lives are at stake. A research and reportage by IStories

26 July

Sonya Savina, Editors

“They Have Been Re-optimized to the Point That Soon No One Will Be Able to Get Sick at All”

In Russia, one baby dies during labour or pregnancy every minute — an IStories investigation

1 June

Sonya Savina, Editors

“I’m Never Going Back to That Hell. I Don’t Want to Give Birth in This Country Anymore”

A documentary by IStories

2 November

What the Post-war Future Holds for Russia: Drawing on the Case of Post-nazi Germany

Journalists from IStories and Meduza found more than 140 “regular” witnesses who testified in Moscow courts in the so called “drug” trials. They are the acquaintances of the policemen or those who are dependent from them. Despite gross violations of the law, the judges sent hundreds of people to jail

18 February

Alesya Marokhovskaya

“I’m a Witness!” Who Helps the Police to Fabricate Drug Related Cases

Thousands of emails sent and received by Kirill Shamalov — Vladimir Putin’s former son-in-law — showcase the fantastic wealth and personal power that come with access to Russia’s first family

7 December

Roman Anin, Alesya Marokhovskaya, Irina Dolinina, Dmitry Velikovsky, Sonya Savina, Editors

Love, Offshores, and Administrative Resources: How Marrying Putin’s Daughter Gave Kirill Shamalov a World of Opportunity

How a “marathons of desire” participant and a Ukrainian physicist from a European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) project assemble drones for the Russian army

17 July

Egor Feoktistov

“Ideologically Powered to Fight for Russia”

The story of one of the most closed officials in Russia — the chief personnel officer of the Russian regime

9 July

Maria Zholobova, Roman Anin

Dmitry Mironov, A Putin’s “Sonny”

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An investigation into how presidential administration employee, Sergey Novikov, became the chief censor of Russian culture

8 July

Svetlana Reiter, Maria Zholobova, Kristina Safonova, Andrey Pertsev

From Passion to Persecution: How the Kremlin Chief Censor’s Cultural Dream Became a Russian Nightmare

Details of Russian investigation claims against Roman Anin and Ekaterina Fomina

17 June

Editors

Criminal Proceedings Initiated Against the IStories’ Editor-In-Chief and a Former Journalist of the Outlet

Russian weapons are being manufactured on foreign machinery — but why are they still running? An investigation by IStories

13 June

Anastasia Korotkova

“We Can Still Contact Technical Support in the West”

How Russian billionaires manage their biographies on Wikipedia since the start of the war by deleting information about their citizenship, property, sanctions, and ties to the Kremlin. An investigation by IStories and Wikiganda

15 April

Yulia Starostina

The Great Wikipedia Edit War

Russian defense manufacturing plants benefit from British measuring equipment and software systems

7 March

Anastasia Korotkova

Bypassing Sanctions: How British Company Renishaw Assists the Russian Army