Meduza’s daily newsletter: Monday, September 30, 2024 The West (again) considers advancing Ukraine’s NATO membership bid, defending journalist Elena Chernenko against anonymous allegations, and Dostoevsky’s old digs are up for sale

The Naked Pravda: The North Caucasian clan warfare behind a deadly dispute at Wildberries, ‘Russia’s Amazon’

Wildberries founder and CEO Tatyana Kim (who recently restored her maiden name) has been having a hell of a time shaking loose her husband, Vladislav Bakalchuk, but their very public divorce is just the tip of the iceberg in what’s become a battle between some of the most powerful political groups in Russia’s North Caucasus. On September 18, Vladislav Bakalchuk tried to storm the company’s office in the Romanov Dvor business center, leading to a shootout that left two Ingush men dead and more than two dozen suspects in police custody, though Vladislav Bakalchuk miraculously escaped charges as a mere witness. He claims he merely showed up for a planned business meeting, but Tatyana Kim calls the incident a failed attempt at a hostile takeover. To learn more about this story and its broader political context, The Naked Pravda spoke to Ilya Shumanov, the general director of Transparency International-Russia in exile.

• 🤝 Wildberries CEO Tatyana Kim announces completion of “restructuring” of newly merged company with Russ Group, states readiness for new projects and holiday-season business
• ⚔️ A recent report from Novaya Gazeta Europe argues that Wildberries founder and CEO Tatyana Kim managed to deliver a public “slap in the face” to Chechen ruler Ramzan Kadyrov by aligning herself with his regional rivals in Dagestan and Ingushetia

We got The Beet. Don’t miss Meduza’s weekly newsletter (separate from the one you’re reading here)!

Meduza’s feature reporting

• 🪖 Russia surrounds key ‘fortress town’ in southern Donbas as battlefield crises mount for Ukraine
• 🛂 Seeking to distract from the war in Ukraine and rising prices at home, the Kremlin is amplifying anti-migrant rhetoric
• ❤️‍🩹 A baker, a nurse, and a drone pilot: Photos from a rehab center for Ukrainians wounded in Russia’s war

The news in brief

• 🕵️ Kommersant editor-in-chief Mikhail Lukin defended Elena Chernenko, the newspaper’s star reporter and in-house nuclear policy expert, against anonymous posts on the popular Rybar Telegram channel claiming, without evidence, that Chernenko’s journalistic and scholarly contacts with British officials and American scholars constitute espionage
• 🔍 The Insider obtained prison records showing that officials consistently removed references to symptoms afflicting opposition leader Alexey Navalny before his death in February. The outlet claims that the symptoms described in the original documents are inconsistent with the recorded cause of death and “clearly indicate that Navalny was poisoned.”
• 🕊️ In a September 26 editorial, The Economist argues that Kyiv and its Western allies should accept that they cannot “drive Russia from all Ukraine” and should instead pivot to ensuring the existence of a “prosperous, Western-leaning democracy” as the war’s “most important prize.” The magazine says the best means of achieving this is (1) more weapons for Kyiv and permission for long-range attacks inside Russia using Western-supplied weapons and/or (2) inviting Ukraine to join NATO immediately.
• 🇺🇸 A Western official briefed on Zelensky’s talks in Washington told The Financial Times that there were “tentative signs” that President Biden “might agree to advance the status of Ukraine’s NATO membership bid” before he leaves office in January. “Land for [NATO] membership is the only game in town. Everyone knows it,” another Western official said.
• ✡️ Citing coronavirus restrictions on public assemblies, local officials in St. Petersburg denied a permit for a memorial ceremony honoring Jewish people killed by the Nazis in a nearby city in 1941. (The same ceremony received permits in 2021, 2022, and 2023.)
• 💰 Russian federal budget allocations to the presidential administration will rise 25 percent next year to 30.9 billion rubles ($331.7 million), largely due to salary increases and higher spending on goods and services
• 💰 According to lawmakers’ explanatory note, Russian federal defense spending in 2025 will rise to a record level of 13.5 trillion rubles (roughly $138.46 billion). This is slightly higher than the 6.2-percent increase Bloomberg reported last week 
• 🖋️ By executive order, Russia’s National Security Council has four new members: presidential adviser and former secret service member Alexey Dyumin, First Deputy Prime Minister Denis Manturov, Head of the Federal Medical-Biological Agency Veronika Skvortsova, and Chief of the Presidential Main Directorate for Special Programs Alexander Linets. The same presidential decree removes Federation Council First Deputy Speaker Vladimir Yakushev from the National Security Council.
• 🏚️ A real estate listing in St. Petersburg advertises an apartment that housed writer Fyodor Dostoevsky while he wrote his first novel, Poor Folk. The four-bedroom, 104-square-meter (1,120-square-foot) home is available for 25.5 million rubles ($261,000), but be warned: it’s a wreck.

No country can be free without independent media. In January 2023, the Russian authorities outlawed Meduza, banning our work in the country our colleagues call home. Just supporting Meduza carries the risk of criminal prosecution for Russian nationals, which is why we’re turning to our international audience for help. Your assistance makes it possible for thousands of people in Russia to read Meduza and stay informed. Consider a small but recurring contribution to provide the most effective support. Donate here.