A member of the “Sibspas” Siberian search and rescue group dressed as Santa Claus (R), waits for his team mate, dressed as Father Frost, the Russian equivalent of Santa Claus, as he climbs the rock named “The Fourth Stolb” (the Fourth Pillar) at the Stolby national nature reserve during a training session of the Russian Emergencies Ministry, outside the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk, Russia December 15, 2015. (Photo by Ilya Naymushin/Reuters)

A Russian Orthodox believers dips in the icy water during a traditional Epiphany celebration in St. Petersburg, Russia, Wednesday, January 19, 2022. Thousands of Russian Orthodox Church followers plunged into icy rivers and ponds across the country to mark Epiphany, cleansing themselves with water deemed holy for the day. The temperature in St. Petersburg is –1C (30F). (Photo by Dmitri Lovetsky/AP Photo)

Kazakh girls watch as the Russian Soyuz TMA-15 rocket carrying Canadian astronaut Robert Thirsk, European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Frank De Winne of Belgium and Russian cosmonaut Roman Romanenko readies for take-off from the Baikonur cosmodrome, in Kazakhstan on May 27, 2009. Three astronauts, from Canada, Belgium and Russia, blasted off for the International Space Station in a landmark mission that will double its crew to six for the first time. (Photo by Dmitry Kostyukov/AFP Photo)

A street performer walks past an image of a Russian serviceman reading “The Motherland we defend” at a street exhibition of military photos in St. Petersburg, Russia, Tuesday, March 14, 2023. A campaign to replenish Russian troops in Ukraine with more soldiers appears to be underway again, with makeshift recruitment centers popping up in cities and towns, and state institutions posting ads promising cash bonuses and benefits to entice men to sign contracts enabling them to be sent into the battlefield. (Photo by AP Photo/Stringer)

Soyuz MS-12 spacecraft with crew members of Expedition 59/60 Russian cosmonaut Alexey Ovchinin, NASA astronauts Christina Koch and Nick Hague lifts off from the launch pad at the Russian leased Baikonur cosmodrome, Kazakhstan, 15 March 2019. Hague, Koch, and Ovchinin will spend six-and-a-half months living and working aboard the International Space Station. (Photo by Sergei Ilnitsky/EPA/EFE)

The War in Abkhazia from 1992 to 1993 was fought between Georgian government forces for the most part, and Abkhaz separatist forces, Russian armed forces and North Caucasian militants. Ethnic Georgians who lived in Abkhazia fought largely on the side of Georgian government forces. Ethnic Armenians and Russians within Abkhazia's population largely supported the Abkhazians, and many fought on their side. The separatists received support from thousands of North Caucasus and Cossack militants and from the Russian Federation forces stationed in and near Abkhazia. Here: Abkhazia. Sukhumi, 1993. A house-to-house combat. (Photo by Andrei Solovyov/ITAR-TASS)

A masked man in military fatigues brings a blindfolded Irma Krat, arrested and held by pro-Russian protestors before her meeting with journalists near of occupied police station in Slaviansk, Ukraine, 21 April 2014. Pro-Russian activists are demanding broader autonomy from Kiev and closer ties to Russia. Pro-Russian activists continued occupying government, police and other administrative buildings in eastern Ukrainian cities, in defiance of an ultimatum by the Ukrainian government to lay down their weapons. Russia, the United States, the European Union and Ukraine on 17 April had agreed on steps to de-escalate the crisis in Ukraine during talks in Geneva, Switzerland. (Photo by Roman Pilipey/EPA)

A wolf skin is on display for sale next to a painting of Russian communist revolutionary Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, also known as Lenin, at Izmailovo flea market in Moscow on December 3, 2017. (Photo by Mladen Antonov/AFP Photo)