0725GMT//Crisis talks between Russia and Azerbaijan; Kremlin "shocked" by minister's suicide
TRANSPORT MINISTER SUICIDE: The Kremlin said on Tuesday that it was "shocked" by the suicide of transport minister Roman Starovoit. (COMMENT: Starovoit shot himself in the head with his pistol after being accused of stealing from funds to build defences along the border with Ukraine in Russia's Kursk region when he was the governor. The optics here for the Kremlin are terrible. It looks like endemic corruption is cracking the "court of Putin". Analysts described "shockwaves" flowing through the Russian elite at Starovoit's suicide. Kremlin-linked media has been on overdrive to discredit Starovoit by publishing reams of details about his corruption.)
RELATIONS WITH AZERBAIJAN: Intermediaries between Vladimir Putin and Azerbaijani Pres. Ilham Aliyev held talks on Tuesday aimed at smoothing damaged Russia-Azerbaijan relations. Russia's emergencies minister Alexander Kurenkov and Azerbaijan's emergencies minister Kamaladdin Heydarov met for talks in Baku. Russian commentators described Kurenkov as close to Putin and Heydarov as close to Aliyev. (COMMENT: These are crisis talks. By sending Kurenkov to Baku, Putin is essentially signalling that he regards the row between Azerbaijan and Russia to be serious and wants it patched up. Bilateral relations were damaged when Russian air defence systems shot down an Azerbaijani airliner on Christmas Day. Tension was sparked off again last month when police in Yekaterinburg arrested ethnic Azerbaijani gang members and Azerbaijan responded by arresting Russian tech workers and journalists.)
TRUMP CRITICISM OF PUTIN: Donald Trump accused Putin of talking "bullshit" by continuing his war in Ukraine despite talking up peace prospects. (COMMENT: Negotiations to end the war in Ukraine have stalled over the past couple of months, frustrating Trump who had claimed that it would be "easy to solve". This is just the latest indication of the rift between Trump and Putin.)
RUSSIA'S "GIG SPIES" IN THE WEST: Russian spies linked to the Wagner mercenary group hired five young Britons to burn a warehouse in London last year full of supplies for Ukraine, a British court heard on Tuesday as the judge sentenced the men to prison. (COMMENT: This was a low-grade arson attack but it does give insight into new tactics by the Russian security services. As they pursue their "asymmetric" warfare in Europe, Russian spies are increasingly recruiting impressionable and disillusioned local young men. These "gig economy terrorists" have proved easy to recruit and are difficult for European security agencies to spot. Low-grade attacks, mainly sabotage against infrastructure, have increased markedly across Europe in the past 18 months.)
FSB PRE-TRIAL DETENTION CENTRES: Russia's parliament on Tuesday passed a bill allowing the FSB security services to set up their own pre-trial detention centres across Russia. The FSB will be allowed to interrogate people accused of treason, espionage, terrorism and extremism at the centres. (COMMENT: The FSB did have their own pre-trial detention centres until 2006. These centres may become lawless "black holes" for the FSB.)
DRONE ATTACK: Russia launched 728 drones and 13 missiles against Ukraine on Tuesday evening/Wednesday morning, reportedly its largest drone attack of the war. (COMMENT: This is a reflection of Russia's massively increased drone production system, a Kremlin priority over the past year.)
CAR DEALERSHIPS GO BANKRUPT: Roughly 200 car dealerships in Russia have gone bankrupt this year, Alexey Podshchekoldin, president of the Association of Russian Automobile Dealers, said on Tuesday. He also said that another 1,200 were in "dire financial trouble". (COMMENT: This means that around 5% of Russia's total number of car dealerships have gone bankrupt, a reflection of the poor state of the economy. Analysts have said that car sales in Russia this year have dropped by 25%.)
LABOUR SHORAGE: Russia needs to recruit 2.2m more workers in the civilian engineering sector by 2030, Russian PM Mikhail Mishustin. (COMMENT: The Kremlin's war in Ukraine is the main source of this labour shortage. In response, Russian companies are trying to recruit more "pre-retirement workers" who are more than 50 years old.)
PORK PRICES RISE: Pork prices in Russia have jumped by a third in the past year, the Kommersant newspaper reported. (COMMENT: It said that the sharp rise was linked to increased prices for animal feed. Food products have soared in price since the Kremlin invaded Ukraine.)
NEWS MATRIX:
The exposure of Russia's "gig agents" operating in Britain by a court on Tuesday showed the extent of this new tactic by Russian agents to recruit impressionable and disaffected young men in Europe. It's not an entirely new story but it is important. Russia-Azerbaijan crisis talks and more poor economic data are also important but not surprising. Kremlin reaction to the suicide of its transport minister has been underwhelming but what did we expect?