Here's the tweet that shows the Russian deputy PM in Svalbard, Norway:
Great quote from Joseph Brodsky: "The average length of a good tyranny is a decade and a half, two decades at most. When it's more than that, it invariably slips into a monstrosity. Then you may get the kind of grandeur that manifests itself in waging wars or internal terror, or both. Blissfully, nature takes its toll, resorting at times to the hands of the rivals just in time; that is, before your man decides to immortalise himself by doing something horrendous."
That concludes our live blogging for Saturday, April 18. Follow our continuing coverage of events in Ukraine and throughout RFE/RL's broadcast region here.
Russian and international news agencies quote Ukrainian authorities as saying that masked men have toppled several more statues of Soviet leader V.I. Lenin in eastern Ukraine in a fresh show of anti-Russian sentiment as Kyiv battles pro-Moscow separatists.
Two statues were demolished at universities in the government-controlled city of Kharkiv late Friday, a week after the parliament approved a bill banning Soviet symbols in Ukraine.
The law, which also bans Nazi symbols, has yet to be signed into law by President Petro Poroshenko.
On April 17, the pro-Kyiv governor's office in Luhansk, an eastern region partly split between the government and separatists, said another Lenin statue had been daubed in yellow and blue, Ukraine's national colors, and later toppled in the village of Stanytsya Luhanska.
Authorities in a government-controlled part of another contested region, Donetsk, also said unidentified people used cables to tug down a Lenin statue in the city of Kramatorsk on April 17.
From our newsroom:
Kyiv Lists Russian Military Units Allegedly In Ukraine
Ukraine's army chief of staff has listed for the first time some of the specific Russian military units alleged to be fighting against Kyiv alongside pro-Moscow rebels in eastern Ukraine.
Viktor Muzhenko, in an interview published by Ukraine's Defense Ministry on April 18, said, "Regular Russian army troops are still in Ukraine" despite a ceasefire agreement signed in February which ordered the withdrawal of foreign fighters from the frontline.
Russia has repeatedly denied claims by Kyiv and the West that it is arming and sending troops to help separatists who have gained control of parts of the east.
Muzhenko named the Russian army's 15th Mechanized Infantry Brigade, the 8th Mechanized Infantry Brigade, the 331st Airborne Regiment, and the 98th Airborne Division.
He said he had "proof" that Russian regular troops had fought in three clashes in the east in February, including a fierce battle for the rail hub of Debaltseve, which is now controlled by the separatists.
Based on reporting by AFP and lugansk-news.com
Interfax quotes Russian President Vladimir Putin as saying that he won't rule out his administration's recognition of the pro-Russian, breakaway Ukrainian regimes in Luhansk and Donetsk. He reportedly made the comments during the Vestia On Saturday program and added, after saying, according to Interfax, "I wouldn't like to talk about this now because, whatever I say, everything might be counterproductive," but that, "We'll see what circumstances arise."
What appears to be a Russian antiwar blog has posted a video that purports to show sexual shenanigans in the White House, which houses the Russian government. There are numberous reasons to doubt the authenticity of the video, which zooms in on two shadowy figures on a middle floor of the building at night. It looks like it is mostly being used to promote a web tome on "Sex in the U.S.S.R."
Volunteers in Russian-annexed Crimea turned out in Simferopol to redecorate a highway overpass with more Russia-friendly images.
