Expert Opinions: Russia, Eurasia

Ukrainian writer and journalist Nikita Grigorov was a university student studying Russian literature at Donetsk National University when Russia launched its war in Donbas in 2014. He supported an independent Ukraine and watched in disbelief as friends turned against him, sometimes violently. Then he fled to Kyiv with his father. Listen to his story.

Spanish journalist Argemino Barro was one of the only foreign correspondents in Donbas when Russia ramped up its destabilization efforts there in 2014. He talks about what it was like to cover the story for a Spanish-language audience.

Tanya Kotelnykova was fourteen years old when Russian-backed separatists occupied Horlivka, her hometown in Eastern Ukraine. She was torn away from her family and has been displaced since.

Christopher Atwood lived in Donetsk in the early 2010s and found himself working in Russia during its initial invasion of Ukraine in 2014. Listen to his story.

Katia Shraga Davydenko was born in Kyiv in the 1960s. She immigrated to New York in 1992. Since 2014, she has dedicated all her free time to protesting Russia's aggression and volunteering to help Ukrainians.

Coming in mid-November with episodes dropping monthly. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

Daniel Brennan was a Peace Corps volunteer in Hlukhiv, Ukraine when was forced to evacuate because of the pandemic. He's been trying to go back since, but the war has upended his plans. Season 1 finale.

Volodymyr Rafeyenko, a Russian-speaking novelist, was living in Donetsk when Russia invaded the Donbas in 2014. He fled to Kyiv, learned Ukrainian and wrote Mondegreen in Ukrainian. Mark Andryczyk translated the novel and was planning to bring Rafeyenko on book tour to the U.S. when Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Ivan Nebesnyy is a renowned Ukrainian composer whose music we've been using throughout the series. In this episode you'll get an introduction to Ivan and listen to some of his work.

The Kyiv Independent's Contributing Editor Lili Bivings talks about the state of journalism in Ukraine, the implosion of the Kyiv Post, the founding of the Kyiv Independent, and the publication's coverage of Russia's war against Ukraine.

The Kyiv Independent's Deputy Chief Editor Toma Istomina talks with the site's contributing editor Lili Bivings about being included on Forbes 30 under 30 in Europe list, leaving war-torn Ukraine to attend a conference in Norway, and what it's like to cover a war unfolding in your own country. This episode contains explicit language.

The Kyiv Independent's editor-in-chief Olga Rudenko talks with the site's contributing editor Lili Bivings about her reaction to the Pulitzer citation for Ukrainian journalists and what it's like to cover a war unfolding in your own country.

Many listeners have asked Masha about her pronunciation of Kyiv (it sounds like Cave). She turned to linguist Yuri Shevchuk for a breakdown of the pronunciation and, in the process, ended up getting a lesson in politics and culture.

Olena Martynyuk was seven months pregnant and living in the U.S. when Russia invaded Ukraine. Her parents are in Ukraine and refuse to evacuate.

Peter Zalmayev grew up in Donetsk in Eastern Ukraine and immigrated to the United States, where he got citizenship. His parents stayed in Ukraine and, in 2014, after Russia invaded Donbas, he had to evacuate them from a war zone. Two years later, Peter moved back to Ukraine, settled in Kyiv, and launched a talk show. After Russia attacked the capital he evacuated his wife and two small children to Western Ukraine and traveled back toward Kyiv to report on the war.

After Russia invaded Ukraine, Antonina Berezovenko stayed in Kyiv in spite of the constant shelling. She is one of the few people left in her building, sheltering in the basement during air raids.

Mariya Chukhnova was born in Lutsk in Western Ukraine in the late 1980s. She participated in the Orange Revolution while she was in college. Then, like many Ukrainians of her generation, she ended up immigrating abroad and watching Ukraine's transformation, and now the war, from afar.

Serhii Tereshchenko, a Columbia University doctoral student, was working on his dissertation in Kyiv and planning to get married when Russia invaded Ukraine. On his scheduled wedding day, he evacuated to Lviv with his fiancée and her sister.

Introducing our new podcast, Voices of Ukraine. Hear stories of lives upended by Russia's war against Ukraine. Trailer written and produced by Masha Udensiva-Brenner and edited by Daniel Alarcón.

In the latest episode of Expert Opinions, a podcast from the Harriman Institute at Columbia University and Eurasianet, Masha Udensiva-Brenner interviews Kimberly Marten about her research on climate change in the Russian Arctic.

In the latest episode of Expert Opinions, a podcast from the Harriman Institute at Columbia University and Eurasianet, Masha Udensiva-Brenner interviews Freedom House researchers Nate Schenkkan and Isabel Linzer about their report on transnational repression. Photo by Photo by Angela Compagnone on Unsplash

In the latest episode of Expert Opinions - Russia, Eurasia, a podcast from the Harriman Institute at Columbia University and Eurasianet, Masha Udensiva-Brenner interviews anti-corruption investigator Thomas Mayne about kleptocracy and what it means for democracies all over the world.

In the latest episode of Expert Opinions - Russia, Eurasia, a podcast from the Harriman Institute at Columbia University, Masha Udensiva-Brenner interviews Alexis Lerner about her scholarship on authoritarianism and dissent in Russia, particularly in the context of imprisoned Russian opposition leader and political activist Alexei Navalny. They also discuss Lerner’s book project on graffiti in post-Soviet countries and how the Russian authorities use graffiti as a way to drown out public dissent. Photo by Tamara Malaniy on Unsplash

In the latest episode of Expert Opinions - Russia, Eurasia, a podcast from the Harriman Institute at Columbia University and Eurasianet.org, Masha Udensiva-Brenner interviews Matthew Murray about recently-imprisoned Russian opposition leader and political activist Alexei Navalny and his transparency efforts in Russia. Murray started doing business in St. Petersburg in 1991 and became involved in business ethics and anticorruption efforts there. He got to know Navalny personally in the mid aughts, and also knows Sergei Kolosenikov, the whistleblower featured in Navalny’s recent video exposing Vladimir Putin’s alleged scheme to build a lavish palace on the Black Sea with Russian taxpayer money. Photo by Mitya Aleshkovskiy via Wikimedia Commons.

Masha Udensiva-Brenner tells the story of New Yorker staff writer Adam Davidson's two investigations into Trump Organization deals in Baku, Azerbaijan and Batumi, Georgia. This episode is the third in a three-part series on offshore finance, money laundering, and Trump’s real estate deals in the post-Soviet region.

The story behind, "Trump's Business of Corruption," Adam Davidson's New Yorker article about Trump's licensing deal in Batumi, Georgia. Guests: Columbia Journalism Investigative Fellows, Manuela Andreoni and Inti Pacheco. This is the second in a three-part series on offshore finance, money laundering, and Trump’s real estate deals in the post-Soviet region.

Alexander Cooley, co-author of Dictators Without Borders: Power and Money in Central Asia, discusses how luxury real estate can enable money laundering. This is the first in a three-part series on offshore finance, money laundering, and Trump’s real estate deals in the post-Soviet region.

Guests: Rachel Denber, Deputy Director, Europe and Central Asia Division, Human Rights Watch; Thomas de Waal, Senior Fellow, Carnegie Europe All eyes turned to Chechnya in early April, after the independent Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta exposed the kidnapping, unlawful detention, and torture of more than 100 gay men by the Chechen authorities. How did these purges start? What is missing from the prevailing media narrative? And how has Russia’s relationship with the republic affected what is going on there now?

On March 2, 2017, Russian anti-corruption campaigner Alexey Navalny released a report and video accusing Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev of massive corruption, and calling Russians to the streets on March 26. The Russian authorities, who remained silent about the accusations, did not issue permits for the protests, but tens of thousands of people took to the streets all over Russia anyway, leading to the largest protests the country has seen since 2012. Why did so many people turn out, why did so few see it coming, and what will happen next?