An American correspondent stationed in Moscow just forwarded me a WikiLeaked diplomatic cable about me, The eXile, and the Kremlin media-stomping in mid-2008 that killed my newspaper and sent me fleeing home. The June 16, 2008 US Embassy cable–marked “CONFIDENTIAL”–correctly put the crackdown on The eXile in the context of a wider (and scarier) crackdown on other Russian media outlets that coincided with the handover of power from Vladimir Putin to the newly-”elected” President Dmitry Medvedev. The cable was given the highly-ironic header “MEDVEDEV ON FREEDOM OF THE PRESS AND THE RULE OF LAW.” (more…)
Before heading back to Moscow in June 2008 to face the Kremlin “audit” of The eXile, which I knew meant the death of the newspaper at the very least, I worked out a deal with my editors at Radar…
It’s been over two years now since the very last edition of The eXile came out. That’s 24 months and counting without its acerbic and brilliantly grotesque portrayals of Russian life, death and everything in between.. A mind-bending cocktail of…
Faced! Wheelchair-bound eXiled Editor Yasha Levine finds out that in Russia, provincial clubbing ain’t for cripples Editor’s note: We reprint this eXile Classic, first published in The eXile on September 25, 2007, to commemorate Russia’s recent triumph in the Vancouver Winter…
Like all healthy folks, I hate cops. The only thing worse than cops are Russian cops. And the only thing worse than Russian cops are the OMON–the Interior Ministry’s paramilitary goons famous for brutalizing anyone who dares to oppose the…
This article was first published on November 21, 2007 in The eXile. It was just after 1 a.m. on Monday morning when I pulled my rental car up to my apartment building. I’d just spent the last 48 hours working as…
November 21st, 2007
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OMON’s first ever meet-the-press event, organized to change the special force’s image from brutal and incompetent to professional and deadly.
Two Fridays ago, The staff of the eXile was shocked by the appearance of the Moscow Tribune‘s “Time Out” nightlife section-a new club listings page which included snappy, no-holds-barred descriptions of bars and clubs making liberal use of such phrases…
A British expat goes down to the local kiosk to buy himself a pack of cigarettes, and notices a street bum begging for money. He hands the bum 3000 rubles, gets his cigarettes, then leaves. The next morning, passing the…
The Victim Where are your greatest dangers?-in pity. – Nietzsche I did everything I could to avoid her. She’d been leaving message after desperate-rape-victim-voice message on my answering machine. What could I say? You were your own worst enemy, Marina….
