Modern Great Game Watch

Russian Geostrategy Monitor, Issue 30: June 2025

The Rondeli Foundation’s Russian Geostrategy Monitor is a monthly brief that tracks Russian geostrategy worldwide employing the framework set in The Structure of Modern Russia’s Foreign Strategy. Russian geostrategic activities are also tracked on the regularly updated interactive Russian Geostrategy Map.

Issue 30 covers the Russian geostrategy for the month of June 2025. The numbering and contents of the Outcomes, Goals and Objectives follows The Structure of Modern Russia’s Foreign Strategy framework.

Objective 3: Enhancing internal political instability and polarization within Western states

• On 4 June, the Russian foreign ministry spokesperson accused the French authorities of “refusing to cooperate on the issues of decolonization” and ignoring the French Polynesia’s “right to self-determination and independence.”
• On 5 June, Intelligence Online reported Russia had been using the Savoy separatists to make “new inroads for Russian propaganda” and “sow discord” in France.
• On 18 June, Argentina‘s authorities announced they had uncovered a Russian spy network tasked with “disinformation campaigns and operations against the Argentine state.”

Objective 9: Achieving de-sovereignization of Ukraine

• In the Russo-Ukrainian War, during June 2025 the Russians continued their gradual advance on a number of sections of the frontline. This included their new advances in the areas of Kostantynivka and Pokrovsk, including on the flanks the two cities.

Objective 14: Entrenching Russian influence in the MENA region

• On 4 June, Africa Intelligence reported “intensified military cooperation” between Russia and the Haftar regime, which controls the eastern and southern Libya, involving “new deliveries of military equipment” by Russia.

Objective 15: Entrenching Russian influence in the Western Balkans

• On 17 June, FPRI reported that Russia had “provided cover for the illegal use of sonic weapons against demonstrators by the Serbian police by sending Federal Security Service (FSB) officers to Belgrade to investigate the incident,” who then “cleared the Serbian police of any such violation even though the use of a sonic weapon was demonstrated worldwide in numerous videos of the event.”

Objective 16: Entrenching Russian influence in sub-Saharan Africa

• On 23 June, Russia and Mali signed a package of deals aimed to “bolster trade and economic ties,” covering among other fields nuclear energy and Mali’s natural resources.
• On 29 June, Russian sources reported the participation of Russian troops in the Malian regime’s operations against the jihadist rebels in the area near Mali’s border with Niger.

Objective 25: Developing partnerships with regional powers in the Southern Hemisphere 

• On 20 June, Russia and Indonesia signed strategic partnership and expanded trade agreements. Indonesia also signed a free trade deal with the Russian-led Eurasian Economic Union.

Objective 27: Alignment with North Korea

• On 7 June, Ukraine’s military intelligence head Kyrylo Budanov stated Russia had helped North Korea establish the Shahed drones production and improve North Korean ballistic missiles.

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