The Week's Best: RFE/RL Stories You Need To Read (Or Watch)

We know that rferl.org isn’t the only website you read, and it’s possible that you may have missed some of our most interesting journalism from the past week. To make sure you’re up-to-date, here are some of the highlights produced by RFE/RL’s team of correspondents, multimedia editors, and visual journalists over the past seven days.

The fighting between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the mountainous territory of Nagorno-Karabakh has been going, on and off, since the early 1990s. What’s new this time is the use of drones. By Mike Eckel

The owner of a shop in Belarus who handed out flowers to protesters was beaten so severely that he was barely able to walk and left a police station in an ambulance. He said he suffered a head injury and a broken nose. Flowers have become a symbol of the peaceful protests against Alyaksandr Lukashenka and the disputed results of the August 9 presidential election, which have been brutally repressed by security forces. By Ray Furlong and RFE/RL’s Belarus Service

The Revolution On Granite: Ukraine’s ‘First Maidan’

It’s been 30 years since communist Ukraine was shaken by a coterie of students who went on hunger strike in the heart of Kyiv to demand greater sovereignty and democratic reforms. On the anniversary of the so-called Revolution On Granite, we take a look at this seminal protest event, which helped shape Ukrainian history and had an often-overlooked impact on future generations of civic activists. By Coilin O’Connor and Halyna Tereshchuk

Nurse’s aide Maria Tyshko dreamed for years of becoming a nurse, and contracted COVID-19 while working in St. Petersburg. Then she died of the disease — and hospital officials refused to recognize her as a medical worker or offer her family compensation. By Tatyana Voltskaya and Robert Coalson

Amid Record COVID-19 Infections, Russian Medics Say Official Figures Can’t Be Trusted

Lines of ambulances wait hours to deliver their patients for lung scans at a hospital in Perm, as Russia reports record numbers of new COVID-19 cases on a daily basis. Official statements on October 15 reported 13,754 new infections, but health professionals do not believe the authorities are revealing the true numbers. By Ray Furlong and Current Time

A Hidden Force In Kyrgyzstan Hijacks The Opposition’s Push For Big Changes

The opposition parties that fared poorly in Kyrgyzstan’s controversial parliamentary elections of October 4 protested in the streets the next day and brought down the government. But while the opposition pondered its next move, a more organized group was reclaiming what it lost as the October 4 election results were annulled. By Bruce Pannier