FEB 17, 2023
ABOARD A US MILITARY AIRCRAFT (AP) — The first class of 635 Ukrainian fighters has finished a five-week advanced U.S. training course in Germany on sophisticated combat skills and armored vehicles that will be critical in the coming spring offensive against the Russians, the Pentagon said Friday.
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The first group of Ukrainian forces arrived at the base on Jan. 15 and was put through an intense course that prepared them to take Bradley fighting vehicles and M109 Paladins into battle. The Bradleys and Paladins are two of the many armored vehicles and tanks that the U.S. and allies have pledged to the Ukrainians to help them punch through entrenched Russian troop lines. The Paladin is a self-propelled howitzer that runs on tracks rather than wheels.
Ryder said another battalion of Ukrainian troops began training on the Bradley fighting vehicle two weeks ago, and a field artillery battalion started instruction on the Paladin. Those two units total about 710 troops. Another field artillery unit and a Stryker battalion will start training next week, involving about 890 troops. That will be the first Ukrainian battalion to get training on the Stryker, an armored personnel carrier.
FEB 18, 2023
UNITED NATIONS (AP) — A week before the anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Kremlin’s U.N. ambassador claimed that the West is driven by its determination to destroy Russia and declared: “We had no choice other than to defend our country — defend it from you, to defend our identity...
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A week before the anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Kremlin’s U.N. ambassador claimed that the West is driven by its determination to destroy Russia and declared: “We had no choice other than to defend our country — defend it from you, to defend our identity and our future.”
Western ambassadors shot back, accusing Russia of using a Security Council meeting it called on lessons learned from the failure to resolve the conflict between Ukraine and Russian-backed separatists that began in 2014 to justify what France’s U.N. Ambassador Nicolas De Riviere called “the unjustifiable” – Russia’s invasion of its smaller neighbor on Feb. 24, 2022.
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — The Dutch government said Saturday that “a number” of Russian diplomats will have to leave the Netherlands, accusing Moscow of trying to smuggle spies into the country that is home to institutions including the International Criminal Court and the global chemical...
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The announcement is the latest twist in a diplomatic dispute between the two countries that began shortly after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine nearly a year ago sparked
a war on Europe’s eastern flank.
“Despite numerous attempts by the Netherlands to find a solution, Russia continues to try to get intelligence officers into the Netherlands under diplomatic cover,” Foreign Affairs Minister Wopke Hoekstra said in a statement. “We cannot and will not allow that.”
BERLIN (AP) — Just hours before Russia began its invasion of Ukraine nearly a year ago, actor Sean Penn had his first on-camera meeting with the country's president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
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Just hours before
Russia began its invasion of Ukraine nearly a year ago, actor Sean Penn had his first on-camera meeting with the country’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
“It was as if he was realizing himself, that he was born for this moment,” Penn recalled in an interview with The Associated Press at the 73rd Berlin International Film Festival on Saturday, a day after the festival premiere of his documentary “Superpower.”
Penn and his co-director Aaron Kaufman were in Kyiv to film a
profile of the comedic actor-turned-president when the war broke out. It would be the image of the president walking into the room for that first interview that would have the biggest impact on Penn.
FEB 19, 2023
Munich (AP) — Estonia’s prime minister on Sunday insisted that once the war in Ukraine ends, Russia must be brought to justice for war crimes as well as for the decision to invade its neighbor if it is to have any chance of developing a normal relationship with the West.
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Estonia’s prime minister on Sunday insisted that once the war in Ukraine ends, Russia must be brought to justice for war crimes as well as for the decision to invade its neighbor if it is to have any chance of developing a normal relationship with the West.
Kaja Kallas, whose
small Baltic country is the biggest per-capita contributor of military aid to Ukraine, told The Associated Press that the conflict cannot end with a peace deal that carves up the country and doesn’t hold Moscow to account.
WASHINGTON (AP) — One year ago, President Joe Biden was bracing for the worst as Russia massed troops in preparation to invade Ukraine.
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As many in the West and even in Ukraine doubted
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s intentions, the White House was adamant: War was coming and Kyiv was woefully outgunned.
In Washington, Biden’s aides prepared contingency plans and even drafts of what the president would say should Ukraine’s capital quickly fall to Russian forces — a scenario deemed likely by most U.S. officials. Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, was offered help getting out of his country if he wanted it.
Yet as
Russia’s invasion reaches the one-year mark, the city stands and Ukraine has beaten even its own expectations, buoyed by a U.S.-led alliance that has agreed to equip Ukrainian forces with tanks, advanced air defense systems, and more, while keeping the Kyiv government afloat with tens of billions of dollars in direct assistance.
