INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
and the Persian Gulf selling out fast, Shamiev was left with a convoluted route out of Russia: a flight to the Urals city of Yekaterinburg,
said Shamiev, who has since left for a European Union country.Thousands of anti-war Russians have fled their homeland as authorities rammed
through draconian new laws against anti-war dissent and domestic repression ramped up
former Soviet space.It was last week, as rumors of impending martial law and border closures swirled in Moscow, when many Russians began to
make for the exits.The Mediazona news site, now blocked in Russia, reported military-age men being extensively questioned by the FSB
security service at the border, with some having their text messages read by officers.With European airspace closed and now-sanctioned
Russian airlines ceasing international flights after leasing companies began to demand the return of their planes, surging demand for
escapes met sharply declining supply.One-way tickets to Dubai were priced at almost $4,000, while flights to Yerevan, Armenia were going for
$1,840, according to the flight aggregator SkyScanner, which has since announced it is halting operations in Russia.The Georgian government
has said that as many as 25,000 Russians have entered the country in recent days as the wave of emigration accelerated.On social media, some
after the October Revolution and civil war in the 1920s.Tickets to Bishkek, a tree-lined, Soviet-built city largely unfamiliar to most
affluent middle-class families with children in strollers and bohemian youths, some clutching guitars, said they were relieved to have left
their homeland and anxious about their new lives as political emigres.With many having left in a hurry, Russian arrivals interviewed by The
26-year-old cryptocurrency investor who had fled St
Kyrgyzstani authorities seemed almost bemused by the new arrivals.Asked the purpose of her visit, one 20-something Russian woman prompted an
million of its 6 million citizens live and work, the Kyrgyzstani government has gone to great lengths not to offend Moscow, even as the
local currency has posted sharp losses against the dollar.Traditionally the most democratic country in Central Asia, having undergone three
revolutions since 2005, Kyrgyzstan has shut down two opposition media outlets for their coverage of the war.According to a Kremlin readout
ambassador from Kyrgyzstan.On the streets of Bishkek, where public opinion is broadly pro-Russian, there was occasional evidence of
opposition to the war.Since the beginning of the war, a small group of pro-Kyiv protestors have been picketing outside the Russian embassy,
a drab Soviet-era building on a central Bishkek street.On Saturday, The Moscow Times witnessed the protesters dispersed under threat of
away from home easy for the emigres.Over the weekend, U.S.-backed credit card providers announced they were blocking Russian-issued cards
from working overseas while allowing them to continue functioning in Russia
escalating, many emigres see staying abroad as preferable to running the gauntlet at home.Cryptocurrency investor Yaroshenko said he planned
to stay in Kyrgyzstan for the foreseeable future, and said that he was thinking of basing himself in nearby Almaty, Kazakhstan in the
