Canada comparative: Russia slightly more than 1.7 times the size of Canada.

Law on religion in October 1997 is complex, with many ambiguous and contradictory provisions. The law's most controversial provisions distinguish between religious "groups" and "organizations" and introduce a 15-year rule, which allows groups that have been in existence for 15 years or longer to obtain accredited status. Senior Russian officials have pledged to implement the 1997 law on religion in a manner that is not in conflict with Russia's international human rights obligations. Some local officials, however, have used the law as a pretext to restrict religious liberty.

The Mongols did not completely invade Kievan Rus until fifteen years later, by which time the brothers still had not learnt their lesson, and were still fighting each other tooth and nail. In the year 1237, the Mongols returned and this time they burnt Muscovy (Moscow) to the ground and completely destroyed Kiev. Kiev would never recover from the devastation, but Moscow would grow to become a bustling city, complete with postal network system and fiscal system.

Before the title of Tsar was adopted, the word autocrat was synonymous with the term of “ultimate ruler”.

Although Yeltsin came to power on a wave of optimism, he never recovered his popularity after endorsing Yegor Gaidar's "shock therapy" of ending Soviet-era price controls, drastic cuts in state spending, and an open foreign trade regime in early 1992 (see Russian economic reform in the 1990s). The reforms immediately devastated the living standards of much of the population. In the 1990s Russia suffered an economic downturn more severe than the United States or Germany had undergone six decades earlier in the Great Depression.

A lot of emphasis was put on rebuilding the Russian economy after World War II which a power struggle began to take place against the United States and Western Europe.

Under PETER I, hegemony was extended to the Baltic Sea and the country was renamed the Russian Empire.

While the Narodnik movement was gaining momentum, the government quickly moved to extirpate it. In response to the growing reaction of the government, a radical branch of the Narodniks advocated and practiced terrorism. One after another, prominent officials were shot or killed by bombs. Finally, after several attempts, Alexander II was assassinated in 1881, on the very day he had approved a proposal to call a representative assembly to consider new reforms in addition to the abolition of serfdom designed to ameliorate revolutionary demands.