🇷🇺Week of November 2

US presidential special envoy Steve Witkoff announced that three-way talks between Russia, Ukraine and the United States will be held in Abu Dhabi on November 10-11. The meeting brings the three delegations together under US mediation.123

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed the Abu Dhabi dates and said Vladimir Medinsky will head the Russian delegation. Witkoff and Jared Kushner will lead the US delegation.456

The Russian service of The Moscow Times put the appointment in the frame of repetition, reporting that Putin had again sent Medinsky to talks with Ukraine.7

Nezavisimaya Gazeta reported that the agenda covers de-escalation, security guarantees and steps toward peace.8

The Abu Dhabi meeting follows Vladimir Putin's phone calls with Finnish President Alexander Stubb and Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre, who urged him to resume peace negotiations.8

The Russian Finance Ministry has drafted a bill to move the funded part of pensions into the long-term savings programme, with pension savings to be transferred automatically from 1 April 2027. A government commission approved the draft on converting the funded part of pensions into the programme.12

Attributed claim: The proposal covers the pension savings of millions of Russians. One account put the sums at about 6.6 trillion rubles belonging to around 71 million people, while a Sevastopol outlet reported the figure as 6.6 trillion rubles affecting 36.5 million Russians.34

The Finance Ministry's plan would move the savings of so-called silent citizens, those who left their funded pension in the state system, into the long-term savings programme in 2027.5

The draft was reported on Monday, and by Thursday outlets were describing the transfer as approved and explaining what it would mean for savers.678

A cyberattack on the Russian Emergency Situations Ministry's mobile app sent users false notifications, including messages about nuclear warheads launched "across all regions" of the country. The alerts reached users in Russia and Ukraine, according to accounts of the breach.123

Interfax reported that 33 regions received a false message during the attack on the ministry's mobile app. Other outlets described the incident as a hack of the emergency notification app that pushed fake messages to Russian users.456

Coverage on Thursday described the incident as a mass cyberattack on the ministry's app, with intruders breaking in and sending out false messages. Regional and wire outlets carried the same account of the breach.78910

Ten drones were shot down overnight in the Ryazan region, and one person was injured, according to regional governor Pavel Malkov's account of the attack on Ryazan on 4 November. The injured person was hurt in the city during the drone attack, and a house in one of the districts was damaged.1234

Fires broke out on the grounds of industrial facilities in Ryazan after the drone attack. Telegram channels reported fires at an oil refinery and at a Wildberries warehouse.567

Ukrainian drones attacked the Ryazan region overnight into 5 November, Malkov said. The Moscow Times' Russian service reported that the drones struck an oil refinery that supplies Moscow and a Wildberries warehouse in Ryazan.78

The drone danger alert in the Ryazan region lasted more than eight hours.9

A large-scale failure at the Russian hosting provider Beget left its control panel and client websites unavailable, and the outage also took down the website of the Chestny Znak traceability system. Beget acknowledged the disruption, saying "we had a major incident," and did not give a timeline for full restoration.12345

The company described the problem as complex in nature, and the failure affected hundreds of sites hosted with the provider.65

Access to the Chestny Znak portal was fully restored, while reports on the state of Beget's own servers and the wider recovery continued.78