The History Bureau Putin and the Apartment Bombs 6: The Trial In 2003, four years after the apartment bombs, there was a trial of the suspected bombers. Mikhael Trepashkin, who believed that the ‘Chechnyan terrorists’ was a cover-up for FSB involvement , went to a journalist at the Moscow News before planning to appear at the trial to present his evidence. A few days before the trial he was arrested. The trial went ahead without him; the two ‘terrorists’ were found guilty and the case sealed for 75 years. Trepashkin was tried for possession of FSB material and two bullets (which he claims were planted on him) and sentenced to four years jail. Putin was elected for a second time with 70% of the vote. The template for Russian coverup was established: move fast; flood the media; and then seal any investigations. Ten years later Scott Anderson wrote about the bombings in an article called ‘Vladimir Putin’s Dark Rise to Power’ but GQ spiked the story and would not allow it to be published online although it did reappear later.
Short History Of… The Silk Roads (broadcast 23 Feb 2026) Note that ‘s’ in Silk RoadS because there were multiple silk roads, forming a lattice of networks over about 1000 years, spreading from the steppes in the north, Afghanistan in the south and reaching across to Persia and later the Mediterranean in the west, and China in the east. We know of the roads from 9th century BCE with trade between the Greeks and Persians, and in 4th century BCE Alexander the Great travelled along them. Coming from the opposite direction, in 2th century BCE the Han dynasty in China sent an envoy to see what was beyond the steppe horsemen who were blocking their progress, and he came home with tales of wealth and plenty. Now the Han knew that they were just one corner of a global path. Because of danger, traders would form caravans, stopping at pluralistic way-stations along the way. In the 2nd century CE there was a rare period of peace when the Romans, Parthians, Kushans and Han all wanted peace. Trade and goods moved across the Silk Roads, but so did ideas, particularly religious ideas – for example in the depiction of the Buddha. Maths, cartography, artistic systems, astrology all moved across west and east. In late antiquity (approx 550 to 1000 CE) the Sogdians from modern-day Uzbekistan and Tajikistan began operating over huge distances, instead of the small relay-like journeys that had been undertaken in the past. By 610CE the rise of Islam brought new political and social networks, as Arabic became the lingua franca and as pilgrims moved along the silk roads. By the 11thcentury CE the Crusades brought a new age of war fuelled by faith. In the 13th century the Mongols sought to impose the world’s largest contiguous empire. In 1279 Marco Polo traversed the road to meet with Kublai Khan. In the mid 14th century, the Black Death travelled along the Silk Roads. By the 15th century, under the Ottoman Empire, ships linked ports between Europe, Asia and Africa and the dominance of the Silk Roads faded. In the 19th century European explorers and archaeologists rediscovered them. Today, there are new versions of the silk roads, with trains traversing the land, and modern versions like China’s Belt and Road Initiative, or India’s Cotton Route replicating the crossing of the original Silk Roads. Features Peter Frankopan, Professor of Global History at Oxford University, and author of The Silk Roads.
The Resident Judge of Port Phillip 