stories

Support independent journalism like this! Meduza has won more Redkollegia awards than any other Russian-language media outlet. Here’s a selection of our winning reporting.

9:08 pm, September 4, 2025

Source: Meduza

The Redkollegia is a prestigious, independent Russian media award that supports free, professional journalism. Established in 2016 by businessman and philanthropist Boris Zimin, it’s presented monthly to journalists who have published interesting and high-quality work in the Russian language. Meduza’s staff have won more than 40 Redkollegia awards in total — more than any other media outlet. However, we’re proud to say that many of these prize-winning stories were the result of collaborations with our esteemed colleagues from other publications.

Above all, the Meduza team wants to continue producing this type of work — not for the sake of winning awards, but to provide our millions of readers in Russia and around the world with reliable independent journalism. However, great reporting costs money. And that’s why we need help from readers like you. If you live outside Russia, please consider supporting our newsroom with a monthly donation. Otherwise, Meduza as you know it may cease to exist.

The following list is a selection of Meduza’s Redkollegia-winning stories that you can read in English. You can find links to all 40+ winners in Russian here.

Support independent journalism like this! Meduza has won more Redkollegia awards than any other Russian-language media outlet. Here’s a selection of our winning reporting.

Journalists from Meduza and Mediazona uncover a way to calculate Russia’s military losses during the first year of the full-scale war against Ukraine

Bring out your dead A joint investigation by Meduza and Mediazona reveals the true number of Russian soldiers killed so far in the invasion of Ukraine

Bring out your dead A joint investigation by Meduza and Mediazona reveals the true number of Russian soldiers killed so far in the invasion of Ukraine

Who comes up with the lies Kremlin propagandists spread? A joint investigation by journalists from Meduza, iStories, and The Bell.

Russia’s sprawling wartime fake news machine Meet the organization behind the Kremlin’s disinformation about Ukraine

Russia’s sprawling wartime fake news machine Meet the organization behind the Kremlin’s disinformation about Ukraine

The inner workings of Russia’s Institute for Internet Development — and why even anti-war dissidents turn to it for funding

‘Let’s make something uplifting’ Why Russia’s liberal creatives seek grants from an institute that pours money into online Kremlin propaganda

‘Let’s make something uplifting’ Why Russia’s liberal creatives seek grants from an institute that pours money into online Kremlin propaganda

Meduza investigates what happens to Ukrainian civilians held captive in the Russian prison system

‘I prayed I wouldn’t be next’ The secretive prisons where Russia hides and tortures Ukrainian civilians

‘I prayed I wouldn’t be next’ The secretive prisons where Russia hides and tortures Ukrainian civilians

Shura Burtin’s reporting from Ukraine during the early months of the full-scale invasion

‘The siren was sounding, but I had no instinct for flight’ Ukrainians speak of their wartime memories, trauma, and how the invasion has changed their ways of being human

‘The siren was sounding, but I had no instinct for flight’ Ukrainians speak of their wartime memories, trauma, and how the invasion has changed their ways of being human

Our dispatch from Tuva, the Russian region with the highest confirmed number of soldiers killed fighting in Ukraine

‘They’re mostly after loans’ Tuvans, trying to scramble out of poverty, are dying in a foreign war

‘They’re mostly after loans’ Tuvans, trying to scramble out of poverty, are dying in a foreign war

The story of how a once-progressive news aggregator ruined Yandex’s reputation, caused an employee exodus, and landed its deputy CEO on sanctions lists

'Toxic assets' How Russia’s invasion of Ukraine tore Yandex apart

'Toxic assets' How Russia’s invasion of Ukraine tore Yandex apart

How fear and a sense of humiliation defeated Russians’ humanity

Feeling around for something human Why do Russians support the war against Ukraine? Shura Burtin investigates.

Feeling around for something human Why do Russians support the war against Ukraine? Shura Burtin investigates.

Meduza’s joint investigation with Astra into the atrocities Russian troops committed during the occupation of a Ukrainian village

‘I can do whatever I want to you’ Russian soldiers raped and murdered Ukrainian civilians in the village of Bohdanivka

‘I can do whatever I want to you’ Russian soldiers raped and murdered Ukrainian civilians in the village of Bohdanivka

Lilia Yapparova’s reporting from Kyiv during the first weeks of Russia’s full-scale invasion

‘They’re already on their way’ After three weeks of war, Kyiv and its residents have changed irrevocably. A dispatch from Meduza’s Lilia Yapparova.

‘They’re already on their way’ After three weeks of war, Kyiv and its residents have changed irrevocably. A dispatch from Meduza’s Lilia Yapparova.

Inside the apparatus turned against Russia’s independent journalists

The Enemies List How the authorities divide the labor of crushing Russia’s free press

The Enemies List How the authorities divide the labor of crushing Russia’s free press

Meduza explains Putin’s obsession with a field of science that was heresy in the USSR

From gene bombs to classroom curriculum How Vladimir Putin became infatuated with genetics and entrusted the industry to friends and family

From gene bombs to classroom curriculum How Vladimir Putin became infatuated with genetics and entrusted the industry to friends and family

The story of how oligarch Alexander Mamut sought to create Russia’s biggest Internet holding company — and ended up losing it all

The media mogul who failed Meduza profiles Alexander Mamut, the Russian oligarch who lost his empire when his luck and clout ran out

The media mogul who failed Meduza profiles Alexander Mamut, the Russian oligarch who lost his empire when his luck and clout ran out

Meduza and iStories pull back the curtain on Russia’s ‘professional witnesses’

‘The judge hears all of it’ How Russian police officers use compromised witnesses to frame innocent people — and keep getting away with it

‘The judge hears all of it’ How Russian police officers use compromised witnesses to frame innocent people — and keep getting away with it

Meduza’s journalists track down the contractors and blueprints behind Putin’s ‘palace’

It’s good to be the president Meduza spoke to contractors who helped build Vladimir Putin’s alleged seaside palace. Also, new blueprints reveal a subterranean fortress, multiple ‘aqua-discos,’ and more.

It’s good to be the president Meduza spoke to contractors who helped build Vladimir Putin’s alleged seaside palace. Also, new blueprints reveal a subterranean fortress, multiple ‘aqua-discos,’ and more.

In which Lilia Yapparova managed to order a mass demonstration that drew a hundred men ready to brawl

Above the law How veterans of Russia’s ‘local wars’ privatized political violence at home and broke free from police control

Above the law How veterans of Russia’s ‘local wars’ privatized political violence at home and broke free from police control

A 2018 dispatch about a wave of suicides that swept Bashkortostan’s police force

Enough’s enough Police officers across Russia are taking their own lives, and the justice system itself is partly to blame

Enough’s enough Police officers across Russia are taking their own lives, and the justice system itself is partly to blame

A report on a Moscow clinic that offered ‘female circumcision’

Until earlier this month, a health clinic in Moscow was offering clitorectomies on religious grounds to girls as young as five

Until earlier this month, a health clinic in Moscow was offering clitorectomies on religious grounds to girls as young as five

Meduza’s 2018 dispatch from China’s Xinjiang

An internment camp for 10 million Uyghurs Meduza visits China’s dystopian police state

An internment camp for 10 million Uyghurs Meduza visits China’s dystopian police state

Ivan Golunov’s revealing deep dive into Russia’s funeral industry

Coffins, graveyards, and billions of dollars How gangsters and officials in the police, military, and state carve up Russia’s funeral business

Coffins, graveyards, and billions of dollars How gangsters and officials in the police, military, and state carve up Russia’s funeral business

The real story of the Novocherkassk massacre

The Novocherkassk massacre How the Soviet authorities murdered peaceful demonstrators in 1962 and kept it a secret for decades, until the victims fought back

The Novocherkassk massacre How the Soviet authorities murdered peaceful demonstrators in 1962 and kept it a secret for decades, until the victims fought back

A gay Chechen man recounts how queer people are persecuted, tortured, and killed in Russia’s Chechnya

“Either you kill him or we will. You choose.” A gay Chechen man speaks

“Either you kill him or we will. You choose.” A gay Chechen man speaks

The story of the developers behind the facial-recognition technology now used to monitor Russia’s streets

The end of privacy ‘Meduza’ takes a hard look at FindFace and the looming prospect of total surveillance

The end of privacy ‘Meduza’ takes a hard look at FindFace and the looming prospect of total surveillance