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Russia Attacks Ukraine - 23 Feb 2022 **Media Thread** NO DISCUSSION #4
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Ukraine’s Grain Shipments Face Tight Capacity at Polish Ports
- Polish operator says its Baltic ports running at full capacity
- Some 80% of Ukrainian grain exports seen sent through Poland
OT Logistics SA said its port facilities in Swinoujscie and Gdynia on the Baltic coast are already operating at full capacity. Some clients are also pre-paying to dock their ships in the future. The company estimates the capacity of its Baltic terminals at about 1.6 million tons monthly.
About 80% of Ukraine’s grain exports will need to go through Poland due to the war, making the European Union member the key transport nation for one of the world’s biggest agriculture exporters, Ukraine’s ambassador to Warsaw, Andrii Deshchytsia, told daily Puls Biznesu. Besides troubles with different gauges of railroad tracks on the Polish-Ukrainian border, there’s also the issue of having enough capacity to ship the grains to third countries from Baltic Sea ports.
“We are now facing the need to transport about 25 million tonnes of agricultural produce from Ukraine,” deputy Chief Executive Officer Kamil Jedynak said on Tuesday. “Poland has no capacity for such amounts, both in ports, and at railway terminals near borders.”
(...)
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Plan to ship grain out of Ukraine dealt blow due to mines
Turkish offer to escort ships through Black Sea blockade would face six-month wait for mine clearance, says UkraineA plan mediated by Turkey amid a global food crisis to open shipping corridors out of Ukrainian ports has been dealt a blow as officials in Kyiv said it would take six months to clear the coast of Russian and Ukrainian mines.
As Russia’s foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, arrived in Ankara on Tuesday, Turkey’s defence minister, Hulusi Akar, said in a statement that his government was making progress with the UN, Russia and Ukraine on reopening ports under Russian blockade in the Black Sea.
Ships leaving Ukrainian ports would be escorted by Turkish naval vessels under the proposal being discussed.
The development appeared to offer some hope as the UN warned that the war in Ukraine – a world’s fourth biggest exporter of grain – was fuelling serious shortages of food around the world and pushing millions of people into famine.
According to the UN, Russia and Ukraine supply about 40% of the wheat consumed in Africa, where prices have already risen by about 23%.
However, Markiyan Dmytrasevych, an adviser to Ukraine’s minister of agrarian policy and food, said on Tuesday that even if Russia lifted its blockade, thousands of mines would remain floating around the port of Odesa, and elsewhere.
Dmytrasevych said that currently Ukraine was able to export a maximum of 2m tonnes of grain a month – compared with the 6m tonnes before the war – and that it would take until the end of the year to clear the mines.
“I think we reached the limit,” Dmytrasevych told participants at an International Grains Council conference. “The biggest amount we can export is about 2m tonnes a month.”
It is estimated that more than 20m tonnes of grain are stuck in Ukraine’s silos around Odesa due to a blockade of the port by Russian vessels. The country has faced severe capacity constraints when trying to export its grain by road, rail and river through Ukraine’s Danube ports.
Ukraine’s trade representative, Taras Kachka, said the EU needed to build warehouses and extend railway tracks across the Ukrainian border. Ukraine’s railway network has, like Russia’s, a slightly wider gauge, or distance between the two rails of a railway track, than its European neighbours such as Poland. As a result, grain transported by rail has to be unloaded and put on to different trains when it reaches the border.
(...)
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The Black Sea blockade: mapping the impact of war in Ukraine on the world’s food supply – interactive
Wheat is on the verge of rotting in Ukraine’s warehouses. Piles of it have been stuck in storage since Russia invaded in February and imposed a blockade on Ukrainian ports in the Black Sea, from where the bulk of wheat is exported. This immediately disrupted global wheat exports from the two countries, which together provide 30% of world supply, and completely cut off Ukraine’s 9% share.The blockade sparked global panic about where to buy wheat, particularly in countries in north Africa and the Middle East which rely on grain imports from the region and already face food shortages on top of economic and climate crises. Global wheat prices soared.
Ukraine lags behind China, the US, Canada and India in its wheat production but most of the harvests from these countries are consumed locally. With large wheat reserves, India initially appeared best placed as an alternative global supplier after the invasion, but the government said it is prioritising its own population after an intense heatwave damaged some of this year’s harvests.
(...)
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Russia-Ukraine war latest: fight in Sievierodonetsk is ‘for every house and every street’, says Ukrainian commander – live
Battle in Sievierodonetsk is being fought house to house under heavy Russian artillery barrages, local commander says
1h ago 08.57
Volodymyr Zelenskiy has compared Russia’s invasion to Covid and described weapons and sanctions as a vaccine, as Ukraine’s military position in Donbas worsens.
The Ukrainian president, speaking via video link at a gala to celebrate Time magazine’s 100 most influential people of the year, lobbied again for more outside help because “the Ukrainian military are dying on the battlefield”.
He asked rhetorically whether the US president, Joe Biden, and members of Congress were using “all the capacity of our influence and our leadership” and called on them to be “100% influential”.
“Weapons and sanctions are … a vaccine … against Covid-22 brought by Russia,” Zelenskiy said, hours after he warned that the fight for Sievierodonetsk could decide “the fate” of the entire Donbas – the name given collectively to the provinces of Donetsk and Luhansk in the country’s east.
Ukraine’s military is holding on to the industrial areas of the frontline city of Sievierodonetsk, as Russia concentrates airstrikes, artillery and mortar fire on taking control of the city.
At times Russian artillery has outnumbered the defenders by 10 to one, according to Ukraine’s military, and about a third of its total forces are concentrated around the city, where about 10,000 civilians remain, many of them elderly.
Serhiy Haidai, the governor of the local region of Luhansk, said on Thursday morning that “silence in Sievierodonetsk lasts only when guns are reloaded” and that “street fights continue in the regional centre” as Ukraine’s forces hang on.
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Russia-Ukraine war latest: fight in Sievierodonetsk is ‘for every house and every street’, says Ukrainian commander – live
Battle in Sievierodonetsk is being fought house to house under heavy Russian artillery barrages, local commander says
34m ago 09.30
'We fight for every house and every street' – Ukrainian commander in Sievierodonetsk
Petro Kuzyk, commander of the Svoboda national guard battalion, said street fighting in the city in eastern Ukraine was taking place under heavy Russian artillery barrages that endangered troops on both sides.
Reuters reports he told Ukraine’s national television “We fight for every house and every street. Yesterday was successful for us. We went on a counterattack and in some areas we managed to push them back by one or two blocks. In others we pushed them back literally by one or two houses.”
He said Ukrainian fighters had gone from “blind defence to small counter-offensives in some areas, in the hope Russian forces would reduce the intensity of their artillery fire.
“When we imposed street fighting on them, it worked for some time - they did not know where they were and where we were. But now they are simply covering both their own troops and our units with artillery fire,” he said.
Kuzyk appeared to rule out the retreat of Ukrainian forces, saying “There is an order to hold positions and we hold them.”
[...]
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JUN 2, 2022
www.theguardian.com
[...]
Ukraine’s backlog of 20m tonnes of grain needs to be exported quickly to avoid a further explosion of food prices, and also to preserve the next Ukrainian harvest that currently cannot be sent to already full storage facilities.
That is not possible due to the Russian naval blockade of the Black Sea port of Odesa, and Ukrainian floating mines planted to block the port from Russian attack. Russia, in return for lifting the blockade, wants any sanctions on its shipping and fertiliser products lifted. At issue is whether there is a deal to be done.
In what is beginning to look like the main plan, the Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, has agreed to meet the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, but not until 8 June, over proposals for Turkey to de-mine Odesa and then escort grain ships through to the Bosphorous along a naval corridor. Erdoğan spoke with Vladimir Putin about the proposal on Monday, and according to the Turkish read-out, Putin was willing to cooperate, on conditions.
[...]
Russia and the west compete to secure safe passage for Ukraine’s grain
Analysis: both sides agree grain must reach world markets soon but each wants to decide how
Ukraine’s backlog of 20m tonnes of grain needs to be exported quickly to avoid a further explosion of food prices, and also to preserve the next Ukrainian harvest that currently cannot be sent to already full storage facilities.
That is not possible due to the Russian naval blockade of the Black Sea port of Odesa, and Ukrainian floating mines planted to block the port from Russian attack. Russia, in return for lifting the blockade, wants any sanctions on its shipping and fertiliser products lifted. At issue is whether there is a deal to be done.
In what is beginning to look like the main plan, the Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, has agreed to meet the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, but not until 8 June, over proposals for Turkey to de-mine Odesa and then escort grain ships through to the Bosphorous along a naval corridor. Erdoğan spoke with Vladimir Putin about the proposal on Monday, and according to the Turkish read-out, Putin was willing to cooperate, on conditions.
[...]
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Putin likens himself to Peter the Great, suggests Russia is justified in invading Ukraine
Russian President Vladimir Putin compared himself favorably to Peter the Great, a Russian monarch from the late 17th century, using the likening to justify Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
During a visit Thursday to an exhibition dedicated to the first Russian Emperor, Putin attempted to liken Peter the Great's conquest of Sweden in the 18th century to his own modern day military invasion of Ukraine.
In his comments, Putin argued that Peter the Great was not conquering, but rather fighting over territory that rightfully belonged to Russia.
He went on to draw a parallel to today's war in Ukraine, suggesting Russia's recent military actions — where his troops have destroyed Ukrainian cities, and killed thousands of innocent men, women and children — are justified, because Ukraine is not a legitimate sovereign nation, but in fact Russian territory.
"Why did he [Peter the Great] go there?" Putin asked, "He took back and fortified. And it looks like our fate is to “take back and fortify” too, if we are going to assume that these basic values form the basis of our existence then we will succeed in the solution of the tasks that lie ahead," Putin said.
Putin continued, adding that European countries didn't recognize St. Petersburg as Russian at first, equating it to the current situation in the Russian-occupied Ukrainian territories, including Crimea, that the US and European allies don't acknowledge as Russian.
Live updates: Russia's war in Ukraine
Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky has said the fate of the whole Donbas region is being decided in the fight for the key city of Severodonetsk. Follow here for live updates.
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JUN 10, 2022
apnews.com
ZAPORIZHZHIA, Ukraine (AP) — As Russian artillery pummeled the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol in April, one family decided to flee, walking for miles with three young children in tow to a nearby village. But it was thanks to a volunteer driver who crossed the front line that they managed to eventually make it out of Russian-held territory.
[...]
On the edge of the conflict zone in Ukraine, which runs along the country’s east and south, volunteer drivers are risking everything to deliver humanitarian aid to Ukrainians behind the front lines, and to get people out. The routes are dangerous and long — sometimes several days’ long — and the drivers face detention, injury or death. More than two dozen drivers have been captured, held for more than two months by Russian-backed separatists in the eastern Donetsk region, Ukrainian activists say.
[...]
“I decided to do it because there are women and children there,” said Oleksandr Petrenko, who carried out several evacuations from areas in and around Mariupol before he deemed his risk of detention too great because of his repeated forays into Russian-held territory.
“I also have a mother, I have a girlfriend. These people don’t have to stay there, in that human grinder. Lives are broken there. If you don’t do it, people might die,” he said.
Joining more experienced drivers at first, Petrenko learned the routes and how to operate. He adopted a set of strict rules, which apply to drivers and passengers alike: Wipe photos and messages off mobile phones, don’t criticize Russia or Russian-backed separatists and never, ever get into political discussions — the wrong comment with the wrong people could cost you your freedom, or your life.
[...]
None of the drivers who were still crossing front lines would speak on the record, for security reasons.
The risks are clear. Among the detained drivers is Vitaliy Sytnykov, a 34-year-old rock-climbing Mariupol taxi driver. He has been held since late March, according to one of his friends, journalist Alevtina Shvetsova, who fled Mariupol herself with her family earlier in March.
[...]
The status of his and other drivers’ detention is unclear. Information is scarce, gleaned from others held in the same detention facility who are later released, or from limited footage that has appeared on Russian television, Shvetsova said.
“He could have stayed in a safe place with (his) family,” after he got out of the city, she said. “But ... he knew there were many women, children left in Mariupol.”
Farther to the east, in the Donetsk and the neighboring Luhansk regions where Russian forces are doubling down on their offensive, volunteers’ vans and minibuses zip through towns and down country roads, racing to evacuate civilians as the fighting draws closer.
[...]
Working with the Ukrainian aid group Vostok SOS, most of those he evacuates now from towns and cities such as Bakhmut, Kramatorsk and Sloviansk are elderly or ailing. Many cannot walk, and have to be carried out of houses and apartment blocks in stretchers or even in his arms.
[...]
Ukraine: Drivers risk all to bring aid, help civilians flee
ZAPORIZHZHIA, Ukraine (AP) — As Russian artillery pummeled the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol in April, one family decided to flee, walking for miles with three young children in tow to a nearby village.
ZAPORIZHZHIA, Ukraine (AP) — As Russian artillery pummeled the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol in April, one family decided to flee, walking for miles with three young children in tow to a nearby village. But it was thanks to a volunteer driver who crossed the front line that they managed to eventually make it out of Russian-held territory.
[...]
On the edge of the conflict zone in Ukraine, which runs along the country’s east and south, volunteer drivers are risking everything to deliver humanitarian aid to Ukrainians behind the front lines, and to get people out. The routes are dangerous and long — sometimes several days’ long — and the drivers face detention, injury or death. More than two dozen drivers have been captured, held for more than two months by Russian-backed separatists in the eastern Donetsk region, Ukrainian activists say.
[...]
“I decided to do it because there are women and children there,” said Oleksandr Petrenko, who carried out several evacuations from areas in and around Mariupol before he deemed his risk of detention too great because of his repeated forays into Russian-held territory.
“I also have a mother, I have a girlfriend. These people don’t have to stay there, in that human grinder. Lives are broken there. If you don’t do it, people might die,” he said.
Joining more experienced drivers at first, Petrenko learned the routes and how to operate. He adopted a set of strict rules, which apply to drivers and passengers alike: Wipe photos and messages off mobile phones, don’t criticize Russia or Russian-backed separatists and never, ever get into political discussions — the wrong comment with the wrong people could cost you your freedom, or your life.
[...]
None of the drivers who were still crossing front lines would speak on the record, for security reasons.
The risks are clear. Among the detained drivers is Vitaliy Sytnykov, a 34-year-old rock-climbing Mariupol taxi driver. He has been held since late March, according to one of his friends, journalist Alevtina Shvetsova, who fled Mariupol herself with her family earlier in March.
[...]
The status of his and other drivers’ detention is unclear. Information is scarce, gleaned from others held in the same detention facility who are later released, or from limited footage that has appeared on Russian television, Shvetsova said.
“He could have stayed in a safe place with (his) family,” after he got out of the city, she said. “But ... he knew there were many women, children left in Mariupol.”
Farther to the east, in the Donetsk and the neighboring Luhansk regions where Russian forces are doubling down on their offensive, volunteers’ vans and minibuses zip through towns and down country roads, racing to evacuate civilians as the fighting draws closer.
[...]
Working with the Ukrainian aid group Vostok SOS, most of those he evacuates now from towns and cities such as Bakhmut, Kramatorsk and Sloviansk are elderly or ailing. Many cannot walk, and have to be carried out of houses and apartment blocks in stretchers or even in his arms.
[...]
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https://twitter.com/KyivIndependent/status/1535644947046617088
Distribution of Russian passports starts in occupied Kherson. Russian state news agency Ria Novosti reported that only 23 people had received Russian passports in Kherson so far. These include pro-Russian ex-mayor Volodymyr Saldo.
In May Russian dictator Vladimir Putin signed a decree allowing Ukrainian residents of occupied parts of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson oblasts to obtain Russian passports under a simplified procedure.
Distribution of Russian passports starts in occupied Kherson. Russian state news agency Ria Novosti reported that only 23 people had received Russian passports in Kherson so far. These include pro-Russian ex-mayor Volodymyr Saldo.
In May Russian dictator Vladimir Putin signed a decree allowing Ukrainian residents of occupied parts of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson oblasts to obtain Russian passports under a simplified procedure.
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JUN 11, 2022
apnews.com
LONDON (AP) — The family of a British man condemned to death for fighting for Ukraine said it is devastated by the outcome of what it termed a “show trial” and called Saturday for him to be released and accorded the treatment an international human rights convention guarantees prisoners of war.
A court in the separatist-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic of Ukraine convicted two British fighters and one Moroccan on Thursday of seeking the violent overthrow of power, an offense punishable by death in the eastern territory controlled by Moscow-backed rebels.
[...]
A statement issued by Britain’s Foreign Office on behalf of Pinner’s family said the 48-year-old had been a resident of Ukraine for four years.
“We sincerely hope that all parties will cooperate urgently to ensure the safe release or exchange of Shaun. Our family, including his son and Ukrainian wife, love and miss him so much and our hearts go out to all the families involved in this awful situation,” the statement said.
The family also described Pinner as a proud “contracted serving marine in the 36th Brigade,” a Ukrainian naval infantry division that helped defend the besieged southern port city of Mariupol before it was captured by Russian forces.
As a member of the brigade, Pinner “should be accorded all the rights of a prisoner of war according to the Geneva Convention and including full independent legal representation,” the family said.
Ukraine and the West have denounced the proceedings in the unrecognized Donetsk republic as a sham and a violation of the rules of war.
[...]
Ukraine: UK man's family 'devastated' by death sentence
LONDON (AP) — The family of a British man condemned to death for fighting for Ukraine said it is devastated by the outcome of what it termed a “show trial" and called Saturday for him to be released and accorded the treatment an international human rights convention guarantees prisoners of war.
apnews.com
A court in the separatist-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic of Ukraine convicted two British fighters and one Moroccan on Thursday of seeking the violent overthrow of power, an offense punishable by death in the eastern territory controlled by Moscow-backed rebels.
[...]
A statement issued by Britain’s Foreign Office on behalf of Pinner’s family said the 48-year-old had been a resident of Ukraine for four years.
“We sincerely hope that all parties will cooperate urgently to ensure the safe release or exchange of Shaun. Our family, including his son and Ukrainian wife, love and miss him so much and our hearts go out to all the families involved in this awful situation,” the statement said.
The family also described Pinner as a proud “contracted serving marine in the 36th Brigade,” a Ukrainian naval infantry division that helped defend the besieged southern port city of Mariupol before it was captured by Russian forces.
As a member of the brigade, Pinner “should be accorded all the rights of a prisoner of war according to the Geneva Convention and including full independent legal representation,” the family said.
Ukraine and the West have denounced the proceedings in the unrecognized Donetsk republic as a sham and a violation of the rules of war.
[...]
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JUN 11, 2022
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/city-denied-outrageous-request-to-fly-russian-flag-1.6484890
''It simply shows the character of the Russian state.- Borys Gengalo, Ukrainian Canadian Congress Ottawa''
''The Russian Embassy in Ottawa asked the city to fly the Russian flag and illuminate a wing of City Hall in red, white and blue to mark Russia Day on Sunday, but the city refused.
According to a statement from Arnold McLean, the city's chief of protocol, his office received the request from the Embassy of the Russian Federation on Feb. 23, the day before Russian troops invaded Ukraine.
The embassy asked the city to "raise their flag, and to illuminate the Heritage Building in recognition of Russia Day on June 12, 2022," according to the statement.
Russia Day commemorates the creation of the Russian Federation on June 12, 1990. The national holiday was first observed in 1992.''
"[It's] outrageous that they would even consider asking for it, and I told them under no circumstances will we raise your flag until you're out of Ukraine, and we have the Ukrainian flag that is still flying and will remain flying on our plaza until the Russians leave the country," Watson said Friday.
[...]
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/city-denied-outrageous-request-to-fly-russian-flag-1.6484890
''It simply shows the character of the Russian state.- Borys Gengalo, Ukrainian Canadian Congress Ottawa''
''The Russian Embassy in Ottawa asked the city to fly the Russian flag and illuminate a wing of City Hall in red, white and blue to mark Russia Day on Sunday, but the city refused.
According to a statement from Arnold McLean, the city's chief of protocol, his office received the request from the Embassy of the Russian Federation on Feb. 23, the day before Russian troops invaded Ukraine.
The embassy asked the city to "raise their flag, and to illuminate the Heritage Building in recognition of Russia Day on June 12, 2022," according to the statement.
Russia Day commemorates the creation of the Russian Federation on June 12, 1990. The national holiday was first observed in 1992.''
"[It's] outrageous that they would even consider asking for it, and I told them under no circumstances will we raise your flag until you're out of Ukraine, and we have the Ukrainian flag that is still flying and will remain flying on our plaza until the Russians leave the country," Watson said Friday.
[...]
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JUN 12, 2022
apnews.com
[...]
At one of the central squares in the city of Kherson, Russian bands played a concert to celebrate Russia Day, the holiday that marks Russia’s emergence as a sovereign state after the collapse of the Soviet Union, according to Russia’s state news agency RIA Novosti.
In the neighboring Zaporizhzhia region, Moscow-installed officials raised a Russian flag in Melitopol’s city center.
Ukrainian media reported that few, if any, local residents attended the Russia Day festivities in the two cities.
[...]
The Kremlin’s administrators in the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions have voiced plans to incorporate the areas into Russia, despite protests and signs of an insurgency among local residents.
[...]
Also, heavy fighting continued for control of Sievierodonetsk, an eastern city in Luhansk province with a prewar population of 100,000 that has emerged as central to Russia’s campaign to capture the Donbas, Ukraine’s industrial heartland.
Russian forces shelled a Sievierodonetsk chemical plant where up to 500 civilians, 40 of them children, were holed up, Luhansk Gov. Serhii Haidai said.
An official with the pro-Moscow, self-proclaimed Luhansk People’s Republic, Rodion Miroshnik, said 300 to 400 Ukrainian troops also remained inside the plant. He said that efforts were underway to evacuate the civilians.
[...]
Moscow-backed officials try to solidify rule in Ukraine
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Kremlin-installed officials in occupied southern Ukraine celebrated Russia Day on Sunday and began issuing Russian passports to residents in one city who requested them, as Moscow sought to solidify its rule over captured parts of the country.
apnews.com
At one of the central squares in the city of Kherson, Russian bands played a concert to celebrate Russia Day, the holiday that marks Russia’s emergence as a sovereign state after the collapse of the Soviet Union, according to Russia’s state news agency RIA Novosti.
In the neighboring Zaporizhzhia region, Moscow-installed officials raised a Russian flag in Melitopol’s city center.
Ukrainian media reported that few, if any, local residents attended the Russia Day festivities in the two cities.
[...]
The Kremlin’s administrators in the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions have voiced plans to incorporate the areas into Russia, despite protests and signs of an insurgency among local residents.
[...]
Also, heavy fighting continued for control of Sievierodonetsk, an eastern city in Luhansk province with a prewar population of 100,000 that has emerged as central to Russia’s campaign to capture the Donbas, Ukraine’s industrial heartland.
Russian forces shelled a Sievierodonetsk chemical plant where up to 500 civilians, 40 of them children, were holed up, Luhansk Gov. Serhii Haidai said.
An official with the pro-Moscow, self-proclaimed Luhansk People’s Republic, Rodion Miroshnik, said 300 to 400 Ukrainian troops also remained inside the plant. He said that efforts were underway to evacuate the civilians.
[...]
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JUN 13, 2022
www.theguardian.com
Russia-Ukraine war: what we know on day 111 of the invasion
Zelenskiy calls fighting in Sievierodonetsk ‘one of the most violent battles in Europe’ as Russia destroys all three bridges to city
- Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has said the intense battle for Sievierodonetsk is taking a “terrifying” toll on Ukraine. “The human cost of this battle is very high for us. It is simply terrifying. The battle for the Donbas will without doubt be remembered in military history as one of the most violent battles in Europe,” he said in an address to the nation late on Monday.
- All three bridges to the embattled eastern city of Sievierodonetsk have been destroyed, according to the governor of the Luhansk region, Serhiy Haidai. In a video update, Haidai said Russia had not “completely captured” the city and “a part of the city” was under Ukrainian control. Russian artillery was hitting an industrial zone where 500 civilians were sheltering in the eastern Ukrainian city, Haidai added. Ukrainian troops in the city must “surrender or die”, a Russian-backed separatist leader in the self-proclaimed republic in Donetsk warned.
- Ukrainian authorities said they discovered a new mass grave of civilians near Bucha in the Kyiv region. Investigators exhumed seven bodies from makeshift graves in a forest outside the village of Vorzel, less than 10km from Bucha, the scene of previous alleged Russian atrocities. Kyiv region’s police chief, Andriy Nyebytov, said: “This is another sadistic crime of the Russian army.” One man, he said, “has two injuries. He was shot in the knee with a gun. The second shot was into his temple.”
- The mayor of Mariupol, Vadym Boychenko, has accused “traitors” of passing on vital information to Russian forces during the bombardment of the southern port city at the beginning of the invasion. Boychenko said the destruction of the city’s critical infrastructure, including power supplies, was well-coordinated because Russia was provided with the coordinates.
- About 1,200 bodies, including those found in mass graves, have not yet been identified, according to the head of the national police in Ukraine, Ihor Klymenko. Criminal proceedings had been opened over the deaths of more than 12,000 Ukrainians, Klymenko said. About 75% of the dead were men, 2% children and the rest women, he said.
- Ukraine has lost a quarter of its arable land since the Russian invasion, notably in the south and east, deputy agriculture minister Taras Vysotskiy said. At a news conference on Monday, Vysotskiy insisted food security for the country’s population was not under immediate threat: “Crop planting this year is more than sufficient [and] the current situation of crop planting areas … does not pose a threat to Ukraine’s food security”.
- The Wikimedia Foundation, which owns Wikipedia, has filed an appeal against a Moscow court decision demanding that it remove information related to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The foundation arguing that people have a right to know the facts of the war and that removing information is a violation of human rights.
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JUN 13, 2022
www.rferl.org
[...]
Under long-standing national security rules, his work in a defense factory raised the prospect that he might not be allowed to leave Russia; he had previously been barred from traveling abroad due to some prior work with classified materials. At the time of his resignation, however, the rules did not apply to him, he said.
On March 18, about two weeks after his work formally ended, officers of the Federal Security Service (FSB) -- Russia's main domestic intelligence agency -- arrived at his apartment with a search warrant. The probable cause on the warrant was "disclosure of state secrets."
During the search, which lasted between three and four hours, nothing was seized; his phones, computer, photographs were reviewed by the officers, he said. They asked him about his contacts abroad.
Three days later, on March 21, he received a call from his former employer, summoning him to review new restrictions that barred him from traveling abroad for another five years, he said.
He didn't go.
He and his wife decided to leave the country.
[...]
The Russian government "has traumatized people for generations, and the current people my age have grown from those who were traumatized by the Soviet Union," he said. "Everyone has a desire to join the strong, that is, to be close to those who are stronger and who are more confident, more aggressive. Standing on the opposite side [of the issue] is somehow unpopular, you are an outcast if you argue with the authorities."
Russia, he said, "pretends to be strong. But it really shows how reckless it is, that it is generally ready for anything, ready to easily destroy, to completely, indiscriminately destroy people in another country, ready to destroy its own citizens, ready to brandish a nuclear club."
[...]
Escape From Orenburg: A Russian Defense Engineer's Flight To Europe
"I had to wade -- take off my clothes and cross the water to the other side." How a Russian engineer resigned from his defense-industry job and fled to Lithuania on foot via Belarus in the dead of the night.
www.rferl.org
Under long-standing national security rules, his work in a defense factory raised the prospect that he might not be allowed to leave Russia; he had previously been barred from traveling abroad due to some prior work with classified materials. At the time of his resignation, however, the rules did not apply to him, he said.
On March 18, about two weeks after his work formally ended, officers of the Federal Security Service (FSB) -- Russia's main domestic intelligence agency -- arrived at his apartment with a search warrant. The probable cause on the warrant was "disclosure of state secrets."
During the search, which lasted between three and four hours, nothing was seized; his phones, computer, photographs were reviewed by the officers, he said. They asked him about his contacts abroad.
Three days later, on March 21, he received a call from his former employer, summoning him to review new restrictions that barred him from traveling abroad for another five years, he said.
He didn't go.
He and his wife decided to leave the country.
[...]
The Russian government "has traumatized people for generations, and the current people my age have grown from those who were traumatized by the Soviet Union," he said. "Everyone has a desire to join the strong, that is, to be close to those who are stronger and who are more confident, more aggressive. Standing on the opposite side [of the issue] is somehow unpopular, you are an outcast if you argue with the authorities."
Russia, he said, "pretends to be strong. But it really shows how reckless it is, that it is generally ready for anything, ready to easily destroy, to completely, indiscriminately destroy people in another country, ready to destroy its own citizens, ready to brandish a nuclear club."
[...]
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@jimsciutto
Russian opposition leader Alexey @navalny is missing from penal colony where he has been serving his term. “He didn't show up for the meeting with his lawyers today. We have no further information on where Navalny is being taken,” the head of his Investigation Dept tweeted.
Russian opposition leader Alexey @navalny is missing from penal colony where he has been serving his term. “He didn't show up for the meeting with his lawyers today. We have no further information on where Navalny is being taken,” the head of his Investigation Dept tweeted.
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