According to a friend of mine who retired out of railroad engine repair a few decades ago (and went on to found his own heavy metal fabrication business) rail trains derail more than you'd think - and sometimes that's on purpose: If there's a crew working on a rail section, they'd often put a gadget on the track that could derail any train heading towards them (in spite of that 'block' being closed to traffic). I've looked at images of some - all bright yellow, all have a warning sign "derail", some clamp onto the track, some bolt onto nearby ties.

Given that public protest in Russia is now impossible, I'd expect there are going to be more than the usual number of trains going off the rails. I didn't see any RR-derail systems that could be easily DIYed, but it seems a perfect way to 'protest'. Get in, clamp it down, get out. It might also let 'protesters' pick places where it'd be less convenient to re-rail (bridges, tunnels, curves atop embankments).

The RF has a huge expanse of poor farmland. That huge expanse allows them to produce a lot of wheat - but it also never made it feasible to build a complete road network, so they're quite RR dependent.

Just thinking aloud here...