Jeremy Nicholl Photography

In 2002 Russia’s northern capital of St. Petersburg was preparing to celebrate its 300th birthday the following year. Encouraged by Russian President Vladimir Putin, himself a Petersburger, the home of the Tsars and cradle of the Russian Revolution was undergoing a remarkable transformation. In the previous decade the city had struggled to find a place in post Soviet Russia, mostly featuring in news reports as Russia’s bandit capital. But Putin’s elevation to the Russian Presidency led to a turnaround in the fortunes of his home city. The Russian government is in Moscow, but now that it was packed with Putin’s men from the North a suitable anniversary for the Presidential birthplace was assured. Look through Russia’s window on the West in the short dark days of winter and the long white nights of summer as it prepares to celebrate.

In October 1993 a constitutional crisis that had been brewing in Russia since the collapse of the Soviet Union finally came to a head. On 21 September President Boris Yeltsin dissolved the Country’s parliament, the Supreme Soviet, despite lacking the legal authority to do so. The parliament replied by declaring the dissolution null, impeaching Yeltsin and declaring Vice President Alexander Rutskoi Acting President. With two rival wings of government claiming to rule the country the scene was set for a violent confrontation. After over a week of watching armed opposition supporters set up camp in and around the parliamentary White House, and with a sense that power was slipping away, Yeltsin had police and Interior Ministry troops seal off the parliament with barbed wire. Opposition demonstrators responded by constructing burning barricades in central Moscow, and on Sunday 4 October fought their way through police lines to free the parliament building. The following morning Yeltsin, after pleading with army generals overnight for support, sent tanks and special forces to storm the White House. Official records state that 147 people were killed in the fighting, although the opposition claimed the casualties were much higher; the true figure will probably never be known. The confrontation left Boris Yeltsin in undisputed control of Russia for the first time.

Russia has long tried to exploit its resource-rich Arctic territories. Its latest attempt is the Bovanenkovskoye and Kharasaveyskoye gas fields, which are unique in the scale of their reserves. In Gazprom’s own words, their new gas production centre in the Yamal Peninsula is key to the development of the Russian gas industry. But the area is also home to the Nenets, a nomadic people whose lives are governed by the herds of reindeer they follow across Siberia. In their language “Yamal” means “edge of the world”, and now they fear that they may be pushed over that edge by the changes that industrialisation will inevitably bring.

On 31 January 2020 the first confirmed UK case of coronavirus, also known as COVID-19, was recorded in York, Yorkshire. What had begun as a mysterious illness in a remote part of China, and had then travelled to Europe, had arrived in Great Britain. Throughout February as the virus spread the politicians were slow to react. Despite increasing alarm from medical professionals this new illness was treated as simply a flu variant. In Reading on 5 March COVID claimed its first victim in Britain. It was only as a sense of panic began to sweep the population, with supermarket shelves swept bare in mid March, that the government began to act with alacrity. On 23 March under the slogan "Stay home, Protect the NHS, Save Lives” the entire UK went into lockdown. The government imposed a stay-at-home order banning all non-essential travel and contact with other people, and shut almost all schools, businesses and gathering places. Police were empowered to enforce the measures, and the Coronavirus Act 2020 brought in emergency powers not used since the Second World War. But the enforcement powers were largely not required. With the Prime Minister himself hospitalised, government advisors and MPs yet to be caught breaking their own instructions and a rapidly mounting death rate, most people needed little encouragement to isolate. Faced with a threat the like of which they had never known, the population largely obeyed the new rules and stayed home. High streets fell silent and shopping malls closed their doors. Airports were deserted; railway stations vacant as trains ran empty. City traffic jams disappeared and motorways lay abandoned. These photographs were all taken in England at the height of the lockdown in April and May, at times and locations that would normally be crowded. The title is from a series of artworks by Mark Titchner that I came across at various locations.

Chinggis Khan has generally had a bad press in the West. Not only did we change his name to Genghis: almost 800 years after his death the founder of the largest empire the world had ever seen - from Bohemia to Beijing - is still remembered mainly as a bloodthirsty warrior who ruthlessly subdued more civilised nations. Needless to say, the Great Khan’s descendants take a different view of history. The Mongolian war machine of the 13th century was the finest fighting force of its time, and its dominance rested on two factors: horsemanship and archery. So every July Mongolia grinds to a halt as Chinggis Khan’s descendants celebrate their traditions at the National Naadam Festival of the “three manly sports”: horse-racing, archery and wrestling. And the lesser known, less manly sport of ankle bone shooting. Part family reunion, part fair and part nomad Olympics, Naadam has its roots in the assemblies and hunting extravaganzas of the Mongol armies, and it attracts some 750,000 people to the capital Ulaanbaatar and surrounding villages. Modern life getting you down? Shake off those PC shackles, get medieval and join the locals at Mongolia’s Naadam festivals.

Chernobyl: In The Belly Of The Beast On 26 April 1986 an unauthorised test led to two explosions in the Chernobyl nuclear plant, blowing a hole in the roof of Reactor Number 4, which spewed radioactivity into the surrounding Ukrainian countryside. For almost two days, while emergency crews struggled to contain what was to be the world’s worst nuclear accident, Soviet authorities claimed that only a minor incident had occurred. It was only when the evacuation of residents began and radiation alarms were triggered in Sweden that the Soviet government finally admitted a nuclear accident had occurred. Once the reactor fire was extinguished the next problem was to prevent the continuing spread of radioactivity from the disaster zone. This was already becoming widespread through wind and rainwater, as well as the presence of birds and other wildlife. The solution was to encase the ruins of Reactor Number 4 in a huge steel and concrete structure that became known as the sarcophagus, constructed from June to November of that year. In October 1995 I was the first Western photographer to gain access to the sarcophagus enclosing the remains of Reactor Number 4.

In January 1995 Grozny, capital of the Russian republic of Chechnya and a city of 400,000 inhabitants, ceased to exist in any meaningful sense. An advancing Russian army, repulsed by bands of Chechen fighters, settled for bombarding the city into submission. The firepower directed by the besieging Russian forces was unparalleled in Europe since the Second World War. At the height of the siege of Sarajevo, the Bosnian capital was being hit by 1,000 shells a day. In mid-January explosions rocked the centre of Grozny at a rate of 900 an hour - one every four seconds. After two months the Russian army entered the city, or what remained; the fighters had fled, leaving a devastated city littered with corpses. “I fear the Chechen destiny is that historians will search for evidence of them in the future just as they search for the remains of the Inca today,” said Mafsud Bayalyev, a former factory manager. “I fear that the ruins of this city are the tomb of the Chechens. What will be left to remember them by?”

After years of neglect Sandunovsky Banya, Russia’s most famous public bathhouse, has been restored to its former splendour. Located close to the Kremlin, the 100 year old former haunt of senior Communist apparatchiks is now a favoured meeting place for Russia’s new businessmen. The banya is an ancient tradition, a quintessential Russian experience, but it’s about far more than scrubbing off the day’s dirt. It’s a communal encounter, a social occasion, and for many the place where real business gets done, no matter at what level: President Yeltsin enjoyed conducting negotiations with foreign leaders in the banya. The banya’s traditional combination of the parilka’s fierce heat, energetic veniki thrashings, an ice-cold pool followed by a potent dose of vodka appeals to Russian machismo, and most banya aficionados are dismissive of the western sauna - “not the real thing”, they sniff. Decide for yourself. Grab a bottle of the hard stuff, some pickled cucumbers, enter Sandunovsky and banya up.

On 12 June 2021 football fans around the world watched horrified as Danish international Christian Eriksen collapsed with cardiac arrest in his opening Euro 2020 match against Finland. For me it was an especially strange experience, for I watched the match from my hospital bed, having collapsed unconscious with heart problems in Russia just a few days earlier. After a series of tests doctors discovered that a pacemaker I had previously had implanted had failed. I was taken to the Russian Cardiology Research and Production Complex, where I had two operations: the first an ablation to lower my speeding heart rate, and the second to remove and replace the faulty pacemaker.

A small selection of our politics and current affairs photography from Moscow, Russia and the Former Soviet Union.

A small selection of our photojournalism and reportage photography from Moscow, Russia, the Former Soviet Union and elsewhere

A small selection of our portrait photography from Moscow, Russia and the Former Soviet Union.

A small selection of our editorial photography from Moscow, Russia, the Former Soviet Union and elsewhere.

A small selection of our corporate photography from Moscow, Russia and the Former Soviet Union.