How a veteran with very little experience in foreign intelligence ended up overseeing the nation’s spy agencies.

Russia's Defence Ministry said on Friday that its forces had taken control of the villages of Nadiivka, Novosilka and Novoocheretuvate in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine.

Foreign intelligence officials are treading carefully as they navigate a president with a history of spilling secrets.

Valery Fyodorov, general director of the Russian Public Opinion Research Center, noted that today Russians feel like part of a civilization separate from the West with its own traditions, goals and va ...