There are a lot of unverified claims on social media right now and it’s hard to know for sure what’s really going on. I will do my best to keep readers updated as soon as I get meaningful and credible information. The timeline from RT below is from earliest events to most recent – Natylie

RT, 6/23/23

There is some turmoil in Russia after Evgeny Prigozhin, the head of Wagner Group private military company, was accused by the government of staging an armed insurrection.

The charges were brought late Friday night [Moscow time] after Prigozhin accused Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu and General Valery Gerasimov, the chair of the Russian general staff, of serious crimes.

Prigozhin claimed to have ordered troops loyal to him to move towards Rostov-on-Don, a major city in southern Russia. Security measures were also reportedly beefed up in Moscow.

• On Friday, Evgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Russian private military company Wagner Group, claimed that senior Russian commanders were traitors and demanded the prosecution of Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu and General Valery Gerasimov, the chair of the general staff.
• Later in the day Prigozhin claimed that the Russian military had attacked Wagner reserve positions. Prigozhin announced that forces loyal to him were moving towards the city of Rostov-on-Don.
• The Defense Ministry denied the claim. The Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) accused Prigozhin of staging an armed coup and called on Wagner fighters to apprehend him.
• Moscow’s police have increased their presence in the city, taking additional measures to protect the Russian capital’s ‘most important buildings, public authorities and transport infrastructure’, the news agency TASS has reported. Several pictures and videos of military hardware moving through the city’s streets have appeared on the web.
• Putin is being informed on all the latest developments regarding the ‘armed coup attempt’ by Wagner PMC and its boss Evgeniy Prigozhin, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has stated, according to TASS news agency. Peskov said Russia’s Ministry of Defense, FSB and National Guard are feeding information after ‘receiving orders from the president’.
• Senior Russian military commanders, including Deputy commander of the Russian Joint Forces, Army General Sergey Surovikin and Lieutenant General Vladimir Alekseev have recorded public video addresses to Wagner troops. They denounced Prigozhin’s actions and called on the fighters to stand down.“This is a stab in the back to the nation and the president,” Alekseev said, warning that there was a risk of a civil war in Russia. Surovikin urged the soldiers to return to their positions and seek a peaceful resolution of the situation.
• The White House has said it is “monitoring the situation” in Russia. President Joe Biden has been informed about the developments, National Security Council spokesperson Adam Hodge told the media. US officials indicated that they consider the situation ‘serious’ and beyond Prigozhin’s previous statements launched against the Russian military leadership in the past, according to CNN.
• Despite claims by Evgeny Prigozhin, there appears to be no video or photo evidence of any PMC forces moving through Russia. There are also no reports of any battles or skirmishes.
• The situation in Rostov-on-Don appears to be relatively calm, according to media reports from the city. Troops are deployed at the headquarters of the Russian Southern military district, but there are no signs that they are preparing to fight off an attack, according to Kommersant daily.
• TASS has reported increased security on the highway connecting Rostov-on-Don with central Russia, including Moscow. Police presence has been increased, and inbound traffic is kettled and subject to inspections. Vehicles are not allowed to travel from the city towards the capital at all, according to the news agency.
• The Russian Defense Ministry has warned on its Telegram channel that Ukrainian forces were preparing to use “Prigozhin’s provocation” to launch an assault in the vicinity of Artyomovsk. The Donbass city, which Ukraine calls Bakhmut, was the focal point of an intensive months-long battle, in which PMC Wagner played a significant role. The city was taken by Russian forces last month.
• Traffic camera video feed from Rostov-on-Don, which could have shown the alleged columns of Wagner military hardware moving through the streets, is presently unavailable. When trying to access the feed, users are greeted with a message saying ‘Access to the broadcast is temporarily limited’.
• No unusual activity has been noted near the Wagner PMC headquarters in St. Petersburg, according to a TASS correspondent at the location. The news agency added that security guards have also denied reports that a search was underway in the building.
• Rostov Region Governor Vasily Golubev has urged residents via his Telegram channel to “keep calm and not leave home without need.” He added that law enforcement was doing everything necessary to ensure the safety of civilians.
• A video purportedly showing an armed confrontation between Wagner PMC forces and the Russian Army has been making the rounds on social media. However it has not been independently verified. (Go to RT link above to view the video – NB)
• The Russian social network VK has blocked one of the statements released by Prigozhin’s press service on the platform. The post now states that the message is not available in Russia, based on a decision by the Prosecutor General’s office.
• There are also claims that some news about Prigozhin’s latest steps are being blocked by Yandex, the Russian tech giant that runs an eponymous web search engine.
• The Rostov Region branch of the Emergencies Ministry has warned about a fake post issued in its name on social media. The message falsely claims that a curfew has been imposed in the region, adding that those spreading the message are apparently seeking to cause panic.
• Igor Artamonov, the governor of Lipetsk Region, has announced increased security measures, with particular focus on protecting critical infrastructure. He called on residents to avoid traveling to southern parts of Russia, including the neighboring Voronezh Region.
• “The latest events have disturbed all of us. But I ask you all to keep calm,” he said on his Telegram account.
• Lipetsk is located some 370 km south of Moscow and 590 km north of Rostov-on-Don.
• The road connecting the city of Rostov-on-Don with the Azov Sea port of Taganrog, some 60 km to the west, has been fully shut down for traffic, a TASS correspondent has reported. Similar restrictions have also been reported relating to north-bound traffic on the M4 highway, which leads to Moscow. Other exits from Rostov-on-Don remain available, according to the report.
• A video purportedly filmed in Rostov-on-Don shows a tank and an armored personnel carrier (APC) driving past a group of police officers who are guarding a fuel station. More military hardware, including another tank, another APC, two armored cars and a truck, follow shortly afterwards.
• The footage circulating online could not be immediately verified.
• A military column is on the move on the M-4 highway connecting Voronezh and Rostov-on-Don, local authorities have announced on Telegram, asking local residents to temporarily refrain from using the road. The statement adds that law enforcement agencies in the region are “taking all necessary measures to ensure the safety.”

By Matthew Bunn, The National Interest, 6/10/23

Sixty years ago, in the aftermath of the Cuban Missile Crisis, President John F. Kennedy gave probably the greatest speech on nuclear arms ever given by an American President. Speaking only months after the crisis, Kennedy could have lashed out at the Soviet Union’s reckless behavior in putting missiles in Cuba. Or he could have taken a triumphal tone, highlighting his success in forcing the Soviets to pull the missiles out (with the public then in the dark on his secret promise to pull similar U.S. missiles out of Turkey).

Instead, in a June 10 commencement address at American University, Kennedy made the case that the horrors of a potential nuclear holocaust made it urgent to find a path to peace and that doing so required both sides of the Cold War to change. He announced that the United States would unilaterally stop testing its nuclear weapons until a treaty banning such tests could be reached. “Some say that it is useless to speak of peace,” Kennedy noted, “until the leaders of the Soviet Union adopt a more enlightened attitude. I hope they do. I believe we can help them do it.”

World response was immediate. The NATO allies hailed the speech. The Manchester Guardian ranked it “among the great state papers of American history.” The Soviets turned off their giant radio jammers so that Soviet citizens could hear the speech on Voice of America, and they printed the full text in both Pravda and Izvestia. (The Soviets had some warning: Kennedy’s team had consulted with them informally before he gave his speech.)

Although the Soviets made no formal announcement of a testing halt, they, too, paused nuclear testing. Less than ten days after Kennedy’s speech, the United States and the Soviet Union agreed to the creation of a “hotline” between the two governments. In a month and a half, the Limited Test Ban Treaty had been completed, putting an end to the constant explosions that were spewing radiation across the world, contaminating even mothers’ milk. Kennedy called the treaty “a victory for mankind,” and said that even if the journey to peace was a thousand miles, “let history record that we, in this land, at this time, took the first step.” Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev hailed the treaty in similar terms.

In the months that followed, the two sides each announced unilateral cutbacks in the production of fissile material for nuclear weapons; reductions in their military spending; and modest pullbacks of troops from the front lines in Central Europe. None of these initiatives were negotiated in detail ahead of time, or verified, though there were informal consultations on each one before they were announced. Khrushchev called it “a policy of reciprocal example in the matter of reducing the armaments race.”

At the UN, the sides also managed to reach an agreement on the Outer Space Treaty, banning nuclear weapons in orbit. The atmosphere of heated Cold War confrontation changed markedly, paving the way for the start of negotiations of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and then strategic arms talks.

Kennedy’s initiative—sometimes called “the Kennedy Experiment”—drew on the ideas of psychologist Charles E. Osgood, who had published a paper on a strategy he called “Graduated Reciprocation in Tension-Reduction,” or GRIT. The concept was that with two sides in a high state of tension, one side could unilaterally take a tension-reducing step—large enough to be noticed, but small enough not to endanger its security—and challenge the other side to take a step of its own. Osgood argued that the challenge should not be a specific demand, because, in such a state of high tension, the other side would likely see a specific demand as asking too much. Osgood proposed that the first step be accompanied by an unambiguous statement of a new, peaceful policy—exactly what Kennedy did in his American University address.

Osgood went further and argued that even if the other side did not reciprocate—perhaps not fully accepting that its adversary was genuinely trying to reduce the temperature—the side trying to reduce tension should continue with additional small steps, to make the changed approach impossible to deny. It is that idea of continuing even without any positive response that most justifies the GRIT acronym. If the other side did reciprocate, then the initiating side could take a somewhat larger step and see if that was also reciprocated. Osgood hoped to “run the arms race in reverse.”

Osgood suggested that if the opponent makes a warlike move, there should be a “measured response”: enough to show the opponent that the new strategy did not indicate weakness, but not so much as to close the door to further progress.

Decades after Kennedy’s initiative, this approach worked again. In 1991, as the Soviet Union hurtled toward collapse, President George H.W. Bush announced a dramatic set of unilateral initiatives, pulling back U.S. tactical nuclear weapons from around the world (except for a small force that remained in Europe) and destroying most of them; eliminating nuclear weapons from surface ships; and taking strategic bombers off alert. The Soviet Union, and then Russia, reciprocated with similarly sweeping (though not identical) reductions. These “Presidential Nuclear Initiatives” resulted in the fastest nuclear arms reductions that have ever taken place.

Today, tensions between Washington and Moscow are higher than they have been since Kennedy spoke, after Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine and repeated nuclear threats. Hostility between the United States and China is growing—and North Korea’s dictator keeps up a relentless pace of missile testing and reckless nuclear rhetoric. These tensions between nuclear-armed states matter: the more hostile two states are, the more likely it is that a crisis will occur, that the crisis will escalate to conflict, and that conflict will escalate to the use of nuclear weapons. Hence, in each of these cases, it is time for new action to bring down the temperature.

President Joe Biden has taken a few small initial steps. The Biden team announced that the United States would unilaterally pledge not to conduct direct-ascent antisatellite (ASAT) weapon tests that would create showers of space debris, endangering other satellites. And they put forward a set of political commitments on “responsible” military use of artificial intelligence—including a commitment that the decision to use nuclear weapons would always be made by a human, not a machine. Scores of other countries have signed on to the ASAT initiative—though not, so far, Russia or China.

Unfortunately, Biden faces obstacles to doing more that President Kennedy did not. In particular, Kennedy spoke when the Cuban Missile Crisis was over: the Soviets had withdrawn their missiles. Today, Russia’s war on Ukraine continues, with new violations of the laws of war almost every day.

Nevertheless, the need for reducing tensions is urgent, and there is more Biden could do. He could announce that a portion of U.S. nuclear missiles would be taken off alert: surely not all of them need to be ready for immediate launch. He could commit that the United States would never use nuclear weapons first unless the very survival of our country or one of our treaty allies was at stake. He could commit that the United States would never deploy its missiles where they could reach Moscow or Beijing in just a few minutes. He could offer to let Chinese or Russian experts monitor U.S. weapons-maintenance experiments to confirm American compliance with the nuclear test ban. He could commit that all U.S. nuclear enrichment and plutonium reprocessing activities would be available for international inspection to confirm they were not being used to make new material for nuclear weapons.

None of those steps would endanger U.S. security. If reciprocated, each of them would improve security significantly. They might be a first step toward new arms restraints that could take the place of New START—the last remaining treaty limiting U.S. and Russian strategic nuclear force numbers—when it expires in early 2026.

The world today is very different from the world of six decades ago. But the need to manage hostility among nuclear-armed states is no less. Biden should draw on Kennedy’s example and pursue new steps to reduce nuclear dangers.

Matthew Bunn is the James R. Schlesinger Professor of the Practice of Energy, National Security, and Foreign Policy at Harvard Kennedy School and Co-Principal Investigator for the Project on Managing the Atom at the Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs.

Image: Courtesy of the JFK Library.

Link here.

Speech by RFK Jr. starts at around the 11-minute mark.

By Greg Link, World Socialist Website, 6/10/23

“The war in Ukraine is also a battle for raw materials. The country has large deposits of iron, titanium and lithium, some of which are now controlled by Russia.” That’s what the federally owned German foreign trade agency Germany Trade and Invest (GTAI) reported on its website on January 16 under the title “Ukraine’s raw materials wealth at risk.”

There are trillions at stake. According to the GTAI, “raw material deposits worth $12.4 trillion” remain beyond the control of the Ukrainian army, “including 41 coal mines, 27 gas deposits, 9 oil fields and 6 iron ore deposits.” Ukraine has not only coal, gas, oil and wheat but also rare earths and metals—especially lithium, which has been called the “white gold” of the transition to new energy and transportation technologies. The country accounts for around one-third of Europe’s explored lithium deposits.

Only the ignorant could believe that this is irrelevant to NATO’s war aims. It would be the first major war in over 100 years that is not about mineral resources, markets and geostrategic interests. The World Socialist Web Site has pointed out in previous articles that deposits of critical raw materials in Russia and China, which are essential to the transition to electric mobility and renewable energy, are an important factor in the war calculus of NATO states.

Yet they go unmentioned in the media’s round-the-clock war propaganda. The media wish the public to believe that NATO is waging this war to defend “freedom” and “democracy”—and that after bombing Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria back into the Middle Ages under similar pretexts.

Relevant trade journals, industry magazines and think tanks, on the other hand, rave about Ukraine’s mineral wealth and discuss how best to capture it. It was to this end that German Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Green Party) even traveled to Ukraine at the beginning of April with a high-ranking business delegation.

According to the industry magazine Mining World, Ukraine has a total of around 20,000 raw material deposits, of which only 7,800 have been explored. Numerous other articles and strategy papers openly state that this is what the war is about.

On February 24, 2022, the day of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the largest German business magazine, Capital, published an article stating that “Europe’s supply of raw materials” was “threatened” by the Russian occupation of eastern Ukraine. Ukraine was not only “the leading grain exporter” but also the largest EU supplier of iron ore pellets and “a linchpin for Europe’s energy security.” Among investors, the magazine said, there is “concern that the war will cut off exports of key raw materials.”

The GTAI article cited earlier reports that European steel mills were sourcing nearly one-fifth of their iron ore pellets from Ukraine in 2021. GTAI goes on to write that Ukraine is among the top ten producers of iron ore, manganese, zirconium, and graphite, and is “among the world leaders in titanium and kaolin.” In addition to “untapped oil and gas fields,” Ukraine’s lithium and titanium deposits, in particular, hold “enormous potential” for the European economy. In 2020, production volumes amounted to 1,681,000 tons of kaolin, 537,000 tons of titanium, 699,000 tons of manganese and 49,274,000 tons of iron ore.

Lithium for electromobility and energy storage

The price of lithium has increased more than eightfold in the last decade and is the subject of intense speculation. The metal is of strategic importance to the major imperialist powers because it is used in lithium-ion batteries installed in electric vehicles and off-grid renewable energy sources, and is also needed for lightweight aluminum alloys in the aerospace industry.

The largest lithium deposit in Europe is located in the Donetsk Oblast in the middle of the embattled Donbas region, only kilometers from the front lines. An article in the Tagesspiegel, published two months after the Russian invasion, points to untapped lithium reserves of 500,000 tons in Shevchenko near Potrovsk and at least two other Ukrainian deposits.

Western companies and Ukrainian oligarchs were already fighting bitterly for control of this “white gold” before the war. As the Tagesspiegel reports, “Ukrainian businessmen” (who stood close to the Ukrainian government of the time under the oligarch Petro Poroshenko) with connections to Western mining companies obtained mining licenses, without a tender process, for the lithium deposit in Shevchenko as early as 2018.

The company in question, Petro Consulting—which was renamed “European Lithium Ukraine” shortly before the war began—is expected to be bought out by the Australian-European mining company European Lithium once its access to Ukraine’s lithium reserves is secured.

In 2018, when the Ukrainian Geological Survey refused to issue a “special permit” for Ukraine’s second largest lithium deposit at Dobra, likewise bypassing the tender process, Petro Consulting went so far as to sue the agency. After the Ukrainian Procurator General’s Office eventually launched an investigation into the allegedly illegal special permits, Petro-Consulting had its Shevchenko mining license revoked by the courts in April 2020 until further notice.

However, a spokesman for European Lithium told Der Tagesspiegel that the company bears “no risk in connection with the Ukrainian deposits.” He expressed confidence that the projects would be “made production-ready” after the end of the war.

Titanium for the Western arms industry

In a September 2022 article titled “Ukraine’s Titanium Can Armor the West,” the transatlantic think tank Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA) wrote: “Support for Ukraine has been driven by strategic concerns and moral-political values. But long-term Western help should also be based on solid material interests.”

“Ukraine’s substantial titanium deposits” are “a key resource critical to the West” because the metal is “integral to many defense systems,” such as aircraft components and missiles. Currently, the raw material for Airbus, Boeing and Co. is extracted “in an expensive and time-consuming six-step process” from titanium ore, which until then had been sourced to a considerable extent from Russia. This “dependence” on “strategic competitors and adversaries” is unacceptable from the West’s point of view and can be ended with the help of Ukrainian resources:

For example, Dnipro-based Velta, the largest private exporter of raw titanium in Europe, has developed a new production system that bypasses the intensive process of producing titanium sponge and could supply the US and European defense and aerospace industries with finished metal. Given there are only five countries in the world actively producing titanium sponge —China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Japan and Ukraine — Velta’s technology could be a game changer for the supply chain by cutting reliance on Russia and China.

CEPA is funded by US and European defense contractors and lists as members of its “scientific advisory board” Donald Trump’s National Security Advisor General H. R. McMaster, former German Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, former Swedish Prime Minister Carl Bildt and publicists Anne Applebaum, Francis Fukuyama, and Timothy Garton Ash among others.

The CEPA article continues, “Reorienting titanium contracts to Ukraine would stimulate the country’s economy, even during wartime, not to mention during postwar reconstruction, and simultaneously strike another blow at Russia’s war machine.” The goal, it states, should be “cementing Ukraine’s integration into Europe.”

A January 28, 2023 report in Newsweek reports, “there is a nascent effort underway in the U.S. and allied nations to identify, develop, and utilize Ukraine’s vast resources of a key metal crucial for the development of the West’s most advanced military technology which will form the backbone of future deterrence against Russia and China.” The report adds, “If Ukraine wins, the U.S. and its allies will be in sole position to cultivate a new conduit of titanium.”

“Strategic raw materials partnership” between EU and Ukraine

The US and EU efforts to plunder Ukraine’s lithium and titanium deposits are part of the broader goal of tying Ukraine to the West as a strategic raw materials supplier. In particular, the EU is seeking to free itself from dependence on China—currently its most important raw materials supplier—against which the imperialist powers, especially the United States, are preparing to wage war.

On July 13, 2021, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal and Maroš Šefčovič, Vice President of the European Commission, signed a “Strategic Partnership on Raw Materials and Batteries” in Kiev to “integrate critical raw materials and battery value chains.” Ukraine’s inclusion in the European Raw Materials Alliance (ERMA) and the European Battery Alliance (EBA) serves to “bolster Europe’s resilience and open strategic autonomy in key technologies,” the EU Commission said.

Referring to the list of critical raw materials in the EU’s associated “action plan,” Šefčovič told the press, “21 of these critical raw materials are in Ukraine, which is also extracting 117 out of 120 globally used minerals.” He added: “We’re talking about lithium, cobalt, manganese, rare earths—all of them are in Ukraine.”

Following the signing, EU Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton, who is also responsible for the defense and space industries of EU countries, praised the “high potential of the critical raw material reserves in Ukraine” that could help in “addressing some of the strategic dependencies [of the EU].”

Speaking at Raw Materials Week in Brussels in November 2022, Prime Minister Shmyhal stressed that Ukraine is “among the top ten producers of titanium, iron ore, kaolin, manganese, zirconium and graphite” and renewed his pledge to make the country an “integral part of industrial supply chains in the EU.”

The EU’s “strategic dependencies” are by no means limited to Russia or China and certainly not to Ukraine. A global race for strategic sources of raw materials has long since begun, in the course of which the US and the leading EU powers are attempting to divide among themselves the mineral resources and other resources of the “weaker” states. Although they are jointly waging war against Russia in Ukraine, this inevitably exacerbates conflicts between themselves as well.

The escalation of the war in Ukraine shows that the ruling elites are willing to go to extremes to enforce their profit interests. Only the working class can put an end to permanent war and the prospect of devastating nuclear war by bringing the resources of the entire planet under its democratic control on the basis of a socialist program and holding war profiteers to account.

Intellinews, 6/9/23

Vkusno I Tochka, the fast food chain established following the exit of McDonald’s from the Russian market, is already outperforming the American chain after just a year of operations, the company has revealed.

McDonald’s made the decision to exit Russia in March 2022 due to significant pressure exerted on the company following President Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. By June 2022, all of the company’s restaurants had been sold to local licensee Alexander Govor, who renamed the chain “Vkusno I Tochka” (Tasty, period). One year later, Vkusno I Tochka has successfully rebranded over 860 outlets throughout the country and has served more than 400mn burgers and 200mn servings of fries to its customers. The company claims to have approximately 1.8mn people come through its doors daily.

Speaking at a press conference commemorating the anniversary, Govor explained that Vkusno I Tochka had received over 500mn visits in the past year. He further revealed plans not only to reopen and rebrand all former McDonald’s restaurants, but also expand into new, remote cities that had previously been out of reach of the iconic American fast food brand.

“At the end of May 2023, our share among the three major fast-food players was 58%,” Govor said. “This exceeds the best performance of our predecessor [McDonald’s] and the combined share of our two main competitors. These results have been achieved thanks to the rapid refurbishment of the menu and key services.”

The best performance of McDonald’s in Russia, in terms of both sales and operating income, occurred in 2021. In 2023, Vkusno I Tochka’s sales have consistently surpassed the sales of the corresponding months in 2021.

In an interview with the Russian state-run media RIA Novosti, Oleg Paroev, the CEO of Vkusno I Tochka, disclosed that the company achieved its break-even point in autumn 2022, despite incurring various expenses, including rent and salaries, during the three-month period following McDonald’s departure and the subsequent rebranding and reopening of the outlets.

“When we started operating as Vkusno I Tochka on 12 June last year, the businesses opened gradually, and the entire chain was fully operational only by the end of September,” Paroev explained. “At that time we were working with a limited menu and set of services. But for all that, from autumn onwards, we reached the break-even point, and as far as plans for this year are concerned, we plan to run it at a profit.”

According to Paroev, the company’s biggest difficulties have been replacing popular menu items from McDonald’s, such as the Big Mac and Happy Meal, and managing increased costs while striving to maintain a low-cost business model and generate profits.

“The ruble exchange rate has risen, we are no longer part of a large corporation so we no longer receive the substantial discounts for volumes, and logistics are now becoming a very significant factor in production costs,” he explained. “The average increase in the cost of our products for the whole year has not exceeded 4%. It is very important for us to remain affordable.”

Despite experiencing initial growing pains when the chain first opened, Vkusno I Tochka’s popularity has continued to rise. Concerns about a potential decline in quality control and the standard of produce, in comparison to McDonald’s renowned consistency across different locations worldwide, have proved unfounded. Furthermore, after months of struggling to develop the sauce, Vkusno I Tochka has successfully introduced its own copy of the iconic Big Mac, named the Big Hit. The restaurant now even offers seasonal promotional items, such as the current Spanish-themed ‘Barcelona Burger’ that includes beef, bacon and Emmental cheese.

However, despite a nationwide advertising campaign, constant TV commercials and collaborations with high-profile actors Yulia Peresild and Miloš Biković, most Russians still continue to refer to Vkusno I Tochka by its old name.

“It tastes the same, it looks the same and all the menu items I like are still on sale,” one student in Vkusno I Tochka in Moscow’s Bauman Region told bne IntelliNews. “So I still call it MakDak.”

bne IntelliNews’ correspondent in Moscow also had the opportunity to try the Big Hit and verified that it tastes identical to McDonald’s classic Big Mac.

Vkusno I Tochka is not the only Western fast-food brand to have undergone a rebranding and name change in the past year. In April, former KFC restaurants in Russia began reopening under the new name Rostic’s. This change took place after Yum! Brands, the US owner, completed its exit from Russia and transferred the rights to a local company named Smart Service. Despite the rebranding, Smart Service has chosen to retain its employees, suppliers and the KFC menu, with only a few dishes receiving new names. The distinct red-white colour scheme and the iconic KFC buckets, which have become synonymous with the brand, will also remain unchanged. Over the next 18 months, the company plans to convert all KFC locations in the country to Rostic’s.

Other changes include Stars Coffee (Starbucks) and Pizza N (Pizza Hut).