Charles Mains
speaker
145 appearances
32 recordings
1 series
first heard Feb 2025
last heard 24 Jul
Charles Mains’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
Trend
recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 16 in all, peaking in Nov 2025 with 4.
Appearances
Others were less diplomatic.
Former President Dmitry Medvedev, who now sits on Russia's Security Council, said the move amounted to an act of war against Russia.
Trump announced the sanctions earlier this week, linking the move to Russian President Vladimir Putin's failure to negotiate a peace deal with Ukraine in good faith.
Charles Mainz, NPR News, Moscow.
At stake are parliamentary seats that determine whether President Maya Sandu can continue to advance Moldova's bid for European Union membership by the end of the decade.
Sandu has accused Russia of carrying out a massive influence campaign in a bid to sway the results in a country of just 2.4 million people.
It's a charge backed by multiple independent media investigations.
Earlier in the week, Moldovan police also arrested more than 70 people in raids tied to alleged Russian-backed efforts to foment unrest.
The Kremlin denies interfering in the vote and argues Sandu's government is stoking anti-Russian sentiment to mask voter dissatisfaction over pro-EU reforms in one of Europe's poorest countries.
Charles Mains, NPR News, Moscow.
Russian authorities say air defenses downed more than 60 Ukrainian drones on approach to Moscow, forcing the temporary closure of two of the capital's main airports. The Ukrainian attacks followed Russia's deadly bombardment of Ukraine's second-largest city, Kharkiv, Saturday that also injured scores of people.
All that as a weekend agreement to exchange prisoners, and the remains of soldiers broke down in acrimony. Russia accused Ukraine of delaying the swap after Moscow's defense ministry brought trucks it claimed contained the bodies of Ukrainian soldiers to the border.
In turn, Ukrainian officials claimed details for the exchange had never been finalized and accused Russia of playing, quote, dirty games. Charles Mainz, NPR News, Moscow.
The Russian attack struck cities and towns across Ukraine with images posted online showing several houses and apartment buildings reduced to rubble. Ukrainian officials accused Russia of deliberately targeting civilians, yet in a statement Russia's defense ministry said it had carried out precision strikes against a range of military targets.
The ministry also accused Ukraine of sending waves of drones into Russian airspace for the third day in a row. All of this has unfolded as Moscow and Kiev made good on a pledge to free 1,000 prisoners from both sides, the lone substantive result from recent peace talks that saw Russia refuse to join Ukraine in agreeing to a U.S.-backed ceasefire. Charles Manson, PR News, Moscow.
The phone calls come in the wake of peace talks between Russian and Ukrainian delegations in Istanbul, Turkey on Friday, their first direct negotiations since the early days of the war. That led to an agreement for a mass prisoner swap, but fell short of Western demands. Russia joined Ukraine in signing on to an immediate 30-day ceasefire.
Instead, Russia has kept up the military pressure, launching mass drone attacks over the weekend. Charles Mainz, NPR News, Moscow.
There had been speculation as to whether Putin would attend the talks ever since the Russian leader proposed them, choosing to reveal the idea to journalists in a surprise announcement over the weekend. Putin's offer came amid pressure from Western powers to agree to an immediate 30-day ceasefire or face new sanctions on Russian banking and energy.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had committed to attend the negotiations if Putin did the same, but President Trump, currently in the Middle East, also said he might join if it helped bring the sides together. Yet late Monday, the Kremlin announced it was sending mid-level technocrats to Istanbul, several of whom were involved in earlier failed negotiations three years ago.
Charles Mainz, NPR News, Moscow.
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