Rupert Murdoch, America’s premier purveyor of conspiracy theories, is planning his fifth wedding. His bride-to-be, Elena Zhukova, the ex-wife of one Russian oligarch and the former mother-in-law of another, is a choice that suggests a match made in Hollywood.
NEW YORK – Russia has little trouble making headlines, and March was no exception. First, tens of thousands of Russians turned out to mourn opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in an Arctic penal colony last month. Then, many Russians lined up to vote against Vladimir Putin in the recent presidential election in a coordinated protest, so that no one could mistake for the truth the Kremlin’s inevitable declaration that Putin had won his fifth six-year term in a landslide. Finally, a horrifying terrorist attack on a concert venue outside of Moscow – attributed to the ISIS-K branch of the Islamic State – killed 143 people and wounded more than 300.
NEW YORK – Russia has little trouble making headlines, and March was no exception. First, tens of thousands of Russians turned out to mourn opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who died in an Arctic penal colony last month. Then, many Russians lined up to vote against Vladimir Putin in the recent presidential election in a coordinated protest, so that no one could mistake for the truth the Kremlin’s inevitable declaration that Putin had won his fifth six-year term in a landslide. Finally, a horrifying terrorist attack on a concert venue outside of Moscow – attributed to the ISIS-K branch of the Islamic State – killed 143 people and wounded more than 300.