[Update] Yandex data center in Vladimir halted outright after a drone…

On 11 October presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov, in a conversation with Russia channel journalist Pavel Zarubin, said Vladimir Putin had asked former German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder during their Moscow meeting how he would react to possible negative fallout if news of the meeting became public. Schroeder answered that there was nothing to worry about, Peskov said. He added that upon learning Schroeder was in Moscow on business for a German company, Putin invited him to his home for a birthday celebration. On 9 October the Kremlin published a photograph showing Putin and Schroeder shaking hands.

Deputy chairman of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev wrote on his Max messenger channel that there is no reason to rejoice over Donald Trump's statement that Ukraine needs a new president: in his view it will have no consequences and Zelensky will keep extracting huge sums of money and new weapons from Europe. So those who got overly happy should pull themselves together; only our men, ballistics and Geran drones bring victory closer, he said. He also saw some benefit in the remark, saying the Ukrainian regime is in a stupor.

Interfax, citing journalist Pavel Zarubin, reported that Vladimir Putin will chair a cybersecurity meeting next week. The president is also scheduled to meet participants in the Delovaya Rossiya congress, and his schedule includes many other events, Zarubin added. The article gives no specific date or agenda for the meeting.

On 11 October US President Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social that from now on an energy truce is taking effect in the war between Russia and Ukraine, that both sides have agreed to it and that it should not be violated. Gazeta.Ru presents this as the US leader's claim. The article recalls the 9 October phone call between Putin and Trump, after which the American side said Russia would soon supply more than 300,000 tonnes of diesel to the United States and 500,000 tonnes of fuel to international markets.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Fox News that European leaders criticism of the Russian-American diesel supply deal is hypocritical. Europe, unable to give up Russian energy, has paid Moscow more than it has paid Kyiv, he said, so its statements that it cannot get a break from high diesel prices are sheer hypocrisy. The article recalls the outcome of the 9 October Putin-Trump call and EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas saying on 10 October that the European Union was unhappy with the US decision to allow imports of Russian diesel.

Saudi Arabia's General Authority of Civil Aviation said a rocket strike on King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh killed 12 people and raised the number of injured to 309, some of them in critical condition. The dead include four Saudi nationals, two Bangladeshi citizens and one citizen each of the United States, Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Palestine and Sudan. The airport was struck the previous afternoon, and at the time of publication no one had claimed responsibility for the attack on the civilian facility. The outlet notes this was the third attack on the airport this week: earlier, on Thursday, a massive shelling by Yemen's Houthis killed four people. In recent days the Houthis also struck other Saudi airports, in Abha, Jizan and Najran.

Kommersant reported that the Yandex data centre in Vladimir was attacked by drones and its operation was completely halted. The company said there were no casualties, specialised teams were dealing with the aftermath on site, and some Yandex services were unavailable to users. At 04:00 Moscow time the company had reported a power problem at the facility affecting the ru-central1-a availability zone of the Yandex Cloud platform, without naming a cause at that point. An outage-tracking service recorded a morning rise in user complaints about Yandex Go, Yandex Music, Yandex Pay and other services. The report notes that on 8 and 9 October two other Yandex data centres were hit by drones, in Sasovo in Ryazan region and in Kaluga, with the Sasovo site brought to a full stop by fire. Compared with the 10 October item on Yandex adding drone attacks to its force majeure list, the new elements are the strike on the Vladimir site and the power failure in the availability zone.

Dmitry Pirogov, head of Yandex's fintech business, said on 11 October that Yandex Pay was still recovering from damage to a data centre and that users could not yet check balances, make purchases or transfer money. He stressed that customer money is safe because it is not held directly in data centres; account information is kept in several copies across different sites, and the company verified their integrity and confirmed that not a single record was lost. Pirogov apologised for the disruption and said he could not yet give a precise timeline for a full recovery. The report recalls that a fire at the Sasovo data centre in Ryazan region on 8 October followed a drone attack, that drones struck a Kaluga region facility on 9 October, and that the Vladimir data centre was hit in the early hours of 11 October and stopped completely. On the evening of 11 October the company said access to Alice, Search, Maps, Taxi, Mail and other services was being gradually restored, with some functions still limited.

Alexander Safonov, a professor at the Financial University under the Russian government, said the 2027 minimum wage will reach 28,935 roubles a month. The figure is fixed in the draft federal budget law for 2027 and the 2028-2029 planning period that the government submitted to the State Duma. Compared with 27,093 roubles in 2026, that is an increase of 6.8 percent, a rate he linked directly to expected growth in average wages across the country. Finance Minister Anton Siluanov had earlier said the government would fulfil Putin's instruction to raise the minimum wage, reaching 35,000 roubles by 2030.

The press service of the Emergencies Ministry's Stavropol Krai directorate said a magnitude 3.8 seismic event was recorded in the Krasnogvardeysky district at a depth of ten kilometres. The agency said there were no casualties, no damage and no social tension, and that all utilities and life-support services were operating normally.

Vladimir region governor Alexander Avdeyev said heating and hot water supplies had been restored in the city after drone strikes on infrastructure in its suburbs. Because drone debris damaged power lines, about 1,600 customers in Vladimir and the Sobinsky district remain without electricity, he said; in the regional capital, engineers planned to restore power to 760 customers by about 19:00 and to the rest by the end of the day. Overnight into 11 October drones struck an infrastructure facility in the Vladimir suburbs, starting a fire and knocking out two substations that supplied about 5,000 residents; people were evacuated from nearby homes. Preliminary information indicated no injuries.

The Federal Air Transport Agency said restrictions on aircraft arrivals and departures had been lifted at Moscow's Vnukovo and Domodedovo airports. It noted the restrictions had been introduced to ensure flight safety. Earlier, at 21:08 the same day, restrictions were imposed at Domodedovo, Vnukovo, Zhukovsky and Sheremetyevo.

Yaroslavl region governor Mikhail Yevrayev said that, for safety reasons, traffic out of Yaroslavl towards Moscow has been closed from the intersection of Moskovsky Prospekt and the South-Western ring road. He urged people to avoid travelling in that direction and its surroundings or to choose a route bypassing the section. The statement did not give the reason for the closure or when it would be lifted.

The Belgorod region operational headquarters said on the evening of 11 October that a drone struck a car on the Posokhovo-Kazinka road in Valuysky district and a man died at the scene. In Novostroyevka-Pervaya in Grayvoron district, a 15-year-old boy and a 13-year-old girl were injured in a drone attack and taken to the Grayvoron district hospital; the boy suffered a blast injury and a forearm burn. In Ilyok-Koshary in Rakityansky district a woman was wounded by shrapnel in her legs and arms when an FPV drone detonated. Private houses were damaged in Grayvoron district, and in Shebekino a drone damaged an infrastructure facility and the glazing of an apartment block. Compared with the 10 October item on two drones detonating in a company car park in Rakityansky district and damaging 12 cars, the new elements are the civilian death and injuries to minors.

The press service of the Investigative Committee's Western interregional transport directorate said a jack-up platform sank in the Baltic Sea near Svetlogorsk in Kaliningrad region. A case was opened under Article 263 Part 1 of the Russian Criminal Code, covering violation of safety rules for the operation of sea transport. Preliminary data indicate the platform was damaged off Svetlogorsk: storm winds tore away the wooden deck and all superstructures, followed by the detachment of the floating module and hydraulic supports. The platform drifted in the coastal waters of Svetlogorsk, then sank and was washed ashore. Damage was assessed at more than 1 million roubles.

Uralvagonzavod director general Alexander Potapov told journalists that the group uses no imported components in the production of tanks and vehicles based on them, with the main import-substitution work on previously foreign-made parts completed before the start of the special military operation. On electronics, he said the plant has been under sanctions since 2014, fully ended dependence on Ukraine over 2014-2015 and on other countries over 2015-2017, describing dependence on South-East Asia as a risk issue. He said sanctions had not materially affected development timelines or costs, and that since 2018 serial-production tanks have carried domestically made thermal imaging sights. On competition, he said NATO countries will not buy Russian equipment, South Korea has made major progress, China may compete in certain markets and Turkey is also moving in that direction.

Rosatom chief Alexey Likhachev told journalists on 11 October that the corporation continues to increase its staff at the Bushehr nuclear plant in Iran: nine more specialists arrived the previous day for scheduled preventive maintenance of operating unit No. 1, bringing the total number of engineering and technical personnel on site to 135. He said Rosatom specialists are involved in work on three units, two under construction and one in operation. Earlier reports said 80 people had returned to the Bushehr plant.

At the European youth boxing championship for 15-16 year-olds in Budva, Montenegro, Russian boxers won four gold medals: Yelizaveta Taratynova (up to 48 kg), Darya Sazhina (up to 60 kg), Akmal Dustiyev (up to 48 kg) and Sergey Kurochkin (up to 80 kg). Silvers went to Darya Shilyayeva (up to 70 kg), Matvey Zaytsev (up to 54 kg), Magomed Gadzhiyev (up to 63 kg) and Abdullah Vashayev (over 80 kg). Bronzes were taken by Yustina Anufriyeva (up to 66 kg), Polina Ustimenko (up to 75 kg), Maria Krashenina (over 80 kg), Stepan Demyanov (up to 50 kg) and Roman Golovko (up to 75 kg). The Russian team competed under its national flag and anthem.

The solar astronomy laboratory of the Russian Academy of Sciences Space Research Institute reported that Earth is experiencing its strongest geomagnetic storm in three months, accompanied by intense auroras. The storm has been recorded since about 20:00 Moscow time and is currently rated G3; a storm of comparable strength was last observed on 4 July 2026. Intense auroras are being seen at latitudes of 50 degrees and above. The event was caused by plasma clouds ejected during a strong burst of solar activity earlier in the week reaching Earth, and the geomagnetic disturbance may continue for about another day.

Compared with the previously reported damage to the Kaluga data center, what is new here is that the Vladimir data center was struck and taken fully offline, and that services began to come back gradually the same evening. According to the company press service as quoted by Interfax, infrastructure at the Yandex data center in Vladimir was damaged by a drone attack on the morning of 11 October, the data center was fully shut down, some Yandex services became unavailable to users, there were no casualties, and specialist teams were dealing with the aftermath. In-app notices reviewed by RIA Novosti reporters showed technical failures at Yandex Pay, Yandex Lavka and Yandex Eda, while Yandex Go users in the Moscow region could not reach support through the app. At 17:15 the company said access was gradually being restored to Alice, Search, Yandex Maps, Taxi, Mail and other services, with some functions still unavailable, prioritizing the most-used services first. Vladimir is the third Yandex infrastructure site hit in recent days, after data centers in the Ryazan and Kaluga regions. The reports do not say whether Yandex Market was affected; applicability to Chinese sellers remains unconfirmed.

In a Sunday social-media statement, the company said M.Video services hit technical difficulties caused by an accident at its cloud provider: the site and app were running intermittently, and users could face problems placing orders, arranging delivery and retrieving order information. M.Video specialists were working with the provider team to restore services. The same report notes that the Vladimir data center damaged that morning is the third Yandex infrastructure site hit by drone attacks in recent days, after data centers in the Ryazan and Kaluga regions. The report gives neither the outage duration nor the number of affected orders, and does not say whether the company storefronts on marketplaces were involved.

According to NF Group forecasts, warehouse real estate deal volume in Moscow and the Moscow region could rise 25% year on year to 2 mn sq m this year. Earlier consultant expectations were far more cautious: Ricci had forecast 8% growth to 1.5 mn sq m, and NF Group itself had initially expected a 20–30% decline to 1.3 mn sq m. IBC Global managing partner Stanislav Akhmedzyanov attributes the revision to the gradual cut in the central bank key rate, which released deferred deals; IBC Real Estate department head Yevgeny Bumagin adds a possible recovery in the consumer market, noting that in September the economy ministry raised its full-year retail trade growth expectation to 4.6% from 0.8% in its May forecast. Bumagin data shows 2 mn sq m of warehouse deals closed in January–September, up 41% year on year, with about 62% of that volume in July–September. Over those three months the vacancy rate in Moscow and the region fell from 7.8% to 5%, while rents rose 13% to 10,300 rubles per sq m, according to Yegor Dorofeyev of CMWP. He says warehouse demand is currently driven mainly by e-commerce companies, logistics operators and retail chains. The text offers no calculation of the pass-through to rental costs for Chinese sellers.

Compared with the previously reported partial lifting of the diesel export ban from 10 October and a first stage of 500k tonnes, what is new here is how access will be granted and the accompanying measures. As Kommersant learned, under the partial export opening only selected oil companies will be able to supply diesel to world markets, and only against quotas; at this stage the government plans to export 500k tonnes of fuel. The embargo on producers had been in force until 31 October, and on other market participants until the end of January 2027. The report says that during a telephone call presidents Vladimir Putin of Russia and Donald Trump of the United States agreed on supplies of Russian diesel to the US and world markets, and that the US Treasury has already issued the relevant licence. The government is also discussing a moratorium on the zeroing of diesel damper payments, which occurs when wholesale prices exceed indicative levels by 30%; the measure is seen as insurance for oil companies bearing refinery repair costs. The text gives neither the quota allocation list nor its method; impact on Chinese sellers is inferential, via fuel and freight costs.

Compared with the earlier report that Federation Council chair Valentina Matviyenko proposed scrapping the reduced 10% VAT on oysters, lobsters and other seafood, what is new here is the Accounts Chamber formal recommendation and the specific list. As RBC reported, citing the watchdog press service, the Accounts Chamber proposes expanding the list of delicacies excluded from the reduced 10% VAT to include jamón, prosciutto, oysters, lobsters, sea scallops and cuttlefish, taxing them at the standard 22% rate; the recommendation is contained in the Accounts Chamber 2026 report, and the body also asked the relevant ministries to assess the current approach to food taxation. Matviyenko had earlier said that removing these preferences could bring the federal budget about 6 bn rubles, noting that some seafood is currently taxed at 10% rather than the standard 22%. The text gives no effective date or implementation form; this is at the recommendation stage.

The federal veterinary and phytosanitary surveillance service has returned the federal state information system for pesticide and agrochemical traceability (FGIS Saturn) to normal operation after it ran in emergency mode because of a power outage in the Vladimir region. The agency had earlier reported that, due to the outage, both FGIS Saturn and the veterinary federal state information system (FGIS VetIS) were switched to emergency mode, and according to a same-day 10:40 report it was issuing veterinary accompanying documents in emergency mode. The article explains that Saturn is the federal state information system for tracing pesticides and agrochemicals in circulation in Russia, while VetIS is the centralized digital platform for veterinary affairs. The outage followed a drone attack in the Vladimir suburbs that knocked out two substations. The text does not quantify the backlog of documents accumulated during emergency mode or the actual effect on import and export shipments; applicability to Chinese sellers remains unconfirmed.

Dmitry Pigorov, head of fintech at Yandex, said the Yandex Pay team is working to restore services but cannot give an exact completion time; as a result users are having problems checking balances, paying for purchases or transferring funds through Yandex Pay. He stressed that account and customer funds data are safe, adding that where money is involved it matters not only to bring Yandex Pay back as fast as possible but also to make sure everything works reliably. The article notes that the Vladimir data center damaged that morning is the third Yandex site hit by drone attacks in a matter of days. No figures are given for affected users or transaction volumes, and there is no statement on cross-border collection or settlement.

Compared with the previously recorded note that the 10 October rate set was published on the coverage day and took effect the next day, what is new here — verified directly against the Bank of Russia official rate endpoint — is that this set was also in force on the coverage day (Sunday 11 October) and carries through 12 October. Queries with date_req=11/10/2026 and date_req=12/10/2026 both return a rate date of 10.10.2026: US dollar 84.9048 rubles, euro 94.9745 rubles, yuan 12.6739 rubles, with a nominal value of 1 for all three currencies. The endpoint does not state the next repricing date, and none is inferred here.

Over the past few days drones disrupted operations at three Yandex data centers, causing large-scale failures in the company services and those of its cloud partners; other data center operators have already begun buying equipment to protect against drone attacks, which may push cloud service prices up. An IT-market source said Yandex has currently paused reserving capacity for other companies "in order to keep it for itself"; equipment-market participants believe replacement equipment lead times run to six months, that the company will buy through various channels including foreign ones to make up losses faster, and that hardware prices will rise in the short term. NTI expert Ilya Ilyinsky noted that Yandex will have to replace lost capacity on the most expensive market in recent years, which will hit capital expenditure and, with some lag, cloud service prices for customers. Separately, RBC reported that the Yandex press service denied pausing capacity reservations that evening: "This is not true. We continue to help our partners within the platform current resources." The text gives no estimate of the size of the price increase; the effect on IT and cloud costs for sellers in Russia is inferential.

According to the business data service Kontur.Fokus, as of early October roughly 1.86 thousand pig-breeding enterprises were registered in Russia, down 5.8% year on year; sole proprietors fell 5.7% to about 1.45 thousand and legal entities 6% to 404. Yury Kovalyov, head of the National Union of Pig Breeders, attributes the decline mainly to market consolidation and the scaling-up of existing operators; Andrey Kucherov, head of the agro-industrial competence center at Reksoft Consulting, says the top 20 companies now hold about 80% of the market, with that share rising only from 79.6% to 80% over 2025, meaning consolidation has entered a mature phase. Agriculture ministry data shows that in January–August agricultural organizations produced almost 4 mn tonnes of pigs for slaughter in live weight, up 3.3% year on year. Kucherov estimates that foreign shipments of pork have fallen about 3% in value since the start of the year; producer prices for pork in January–August averaged 10.7% below a year earlier, with the gap reaching 17% in May–June, while production and financial costs in the industry are not falling. The text says nothing about sales through marketplaces; the direct link to assortment and pricing decisions remains unconfirmed.