Russia Attacks Ukraine - 23 Feb 2022 **Media Thread** NO DISCUSSION #4

[PommyMommy]

JUL 29, 2022

Russia and Ukraine trade blame for shelling of POW prison

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia and Ukraine accused each other Friday of shelling a prison in a separatist region of eastern Ukraine, an attack that reportedly killed dozens of Ukrainian prisoners of war who were captured after the fall of a southern port city in May.

apnews.com

Russia said Ukraine’s military used U.S.-supplied multiple rocket launchers to strike the prison in Olenivka, a settlement controlled by the Moscow-backed Donetsk People’s Republic. Separatist authorities and Russian officials said the attack killed 53 Ukrainian POWs and wounded 75.

The Ukrainian military denied making any rocket or artillery strikes in Olenivka, and said it only aims for Russian military targets. It accused the Russians of shelling the prison to cover up the alleged torture and execution of Ukrainians there.

Kremlin warns US against 'provocative' moves toward China

MOSCOW (AP) — The Kremlin on Friday offered strong support to China amid the tensions over Taiwan, warning the United States against any “provocative" moves that could exacerbate the situation. Chinese President Xi Jinping warned against meddling in China’s dealings with Taiwan during a phone...

apnews.com

Chinese President Xi Jinping warned against meddling in China’s dealings with Taiwan during a phone call Thursday with U.S. President Joe Biden,

Speaking in a call with reporters, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Russia staunchly supports China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.

“We believe that no other country has the right to call (that) into doubt or take any provocative steps,” Peskov said.

He warned the U.S. against “destructive” moves, adding that “such behavior on the international arena could only exacerbate tensions as the world is already overloaded with regional and global problems.”

Zelenskyy observes ships loaded with Ukrainian grain exports

ODESA, Ukraine (AP) — President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited one of Ukraine’s main Black Sea ports Friday, a week after a deal was struck with Russia, Turkey and the United Nations to create safe corridors for ships to export grains that have been trapped in the country since the war began five...

apnews.com

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited a Black Sea port Friday as crews prepared terminals to export grain trapped by Russia’s five-month-old war, work that was inching forward a week after a deal was struck to allow critical food supplies to flow to millions of impoverished people facing hunger worldwide.

“The first vessel, the first ship is being loaded since the beginning of the war,” Zelenskyy said at a port in the Odesa region.

 

[PommyMommy]

Russia’s defence ministry says 40 POWs killed in Donetsk strike​

Russia and Ukraine accuse each other of carrying out strike that killed 40 Ukrainian prisoners of war in Donetsk region.

www.aljazeera.com

• ''Russia and Ukraine have blamed each other for the strike that killed 40 Ukrainian prisoners of war in the separatist region of Donetsk.
• Russian private military firm Wagner has likely been allocated responsibility for specific sectors of the front line in eastern Ukraine, Britain’s ministry of defence says.''

''French President Emmanuel Macron and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman have agreed to work “to ease the effects” of the war in Ukraine during talks in Paris, the French presidency said.

“The President and the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia underlined the need to bring an end to this conflict and intensify their cooperation to ease the effects in Europe, the Middle East and the wider world,” a statement said.

Aides to the French president had indicated before the talks that Macron planned to urge Saudi Arabia to increase its oil production to help bring down crude prices.''

Ukraine’s military has denied carrying out an attack on a prison in separatist-held territory that Russia’s defence ministry said killed 40 Ukrainian prisoners of war, and blamed it on Russian forces.

“The armed forces of the Russian Federation carried out targeted artillery shelling of a correctional institution in the settlement of Olenivka, Donetsk oblast, where Ukrainian prisoners were also held,” the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces said in a statement.

“In this way, the Russian occupiers pursued their criminal goals – to accuse Ukraine of committing ‘war crimes’, as well as to hide the torture of prisoners and executions …”

''Anton Gerashchenko, an adviser to Ukraine’s internal affairs ministry, said the allegations were fake and blamed Russia for the attack.

“All Russian media are full of claims that Ukraine made a rocket strike on prison in Elenovka near Donetsk – where Ukrainian POWs were, mostly from Azovstal,” he said in a tweet.

“Obviously, Ukrainian Army would never shoot any object like that. It is either a fake altogether or another horrible Russian crime.”

 

[PommyMommy]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1553037518253314054

https://twitter.com/x/status/1553047627624759297

https://twitter.com/x/status/1553125152631791616

 

[PommyMommy]

Russian energy firm cuts off gas to Latvia 'for not paying in roubles'​

Gazprom said it had stopped gas shipments to Latvia over contract violations, but did not elaborate further - it is believed the move is over the country's refusal to pay in roubles

www.dailymail.co.uk

Gas storage EU:
Gas Infrastructure Europe - AGSI+

 

[PommyMommy]

”In a democratic country, war is no reason to hamper the work of journalists,” said Jeanne Cavelier, the head of RSF’s Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk. “Restrictions linked to national security are legitimate but must be proportionate. In view of the interference observed in the field, we urge the Ukrainian government to issue clear directives on reporting conditions and to ensure that they are respected by all the forces involved.”

RSF urges the Ukrainian authorities to lift arbitrary restrictions on reporters in the field​

As well as risking their lives at the front line, some 9,000 or so reporters covering the war in Ukraine have difficulties gaining access to certain places and difficulties filming or taking photos, and even are occasionally detained. Reporters Without Borders (RSF) condemns these abuses and...

 

[PommyMommy]

Ex-KGB Agents Explains What Putin is Doing (Jack Barsky Interview)​

 

[PommyMommy]

July 31 2022

Putin's health is under fresh scrutiny amid footage of limp right arm​

• ''Putin was seen seemingly unable to move his right arm to swat away mosquitoes
• He only used his left arm to slap the insects away and itch all around his head
• The incident took place during a tour of a military monument by Ksenia Shoigu
• Russia's president was seen walking awkwardly with a slight limp beside the defence minister's daughter
• Putin is rumoured to be suffering from a variety of significant health issues ''

''The clip captured the moment Putin, 69, was given a tour of a military museum as part of a weekend of festivities marking Russia's Navy Day, celebrated on the last Sunday of every July.

The Kremlin chief is seen speaking with Ksenia, daughter of defence minister Sergei Shoigu, when mosquitoes begin buzzing around the right side of his face.

Putin raises his left arm in an attempt to swat them away while his right arm hangs limply by his side.

He continues to itch and swat all around his head with one arm before walking alongside Ksenia with a slight limp as she continues her tour.

The clip is the latest of a litany of videos which appear to show the Russian president walking with a limp, struggling with strange ticks including odd foot and leg contortions, and un-coordinated movement. ''

 

[PommyMommy]

JUL 31, 2022

Drone explosion hits Russia's Black Sea Fleet headquarters​

''KYIV, Ukraine (AP) - A small explosive device carried by a makeshift drone blew up Sunday at the headquarters of Russia's Black Sea Fleet on the Crimean Peninsula, wounding six people and prompting the cancellation of ceremonies there honoring Russia's navy, authorities said.

Meanwhile, one of Ukraine's richest men, a grain merchant, was killed in what Ukrainian authorities said was a carefully targeted Russian missile strike on his home.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the drone explosion in a courtyard at the naval headquarters in the city of Sevastopol. But the seemingly improvised, small-scale nature of the attack raised the possibility that it was the work of Ukrainian insurgents trying to drive out Russian forces.

A Russian lawmaker from Crimea, Olga Kovitidi, told Russian state news agency RIA-Novosti that the drone was launched from Sevastopol itself. She said the incident was being treated as a terrorist act, the news agency said.

Crimean authorities raised the terrorism threat level for the region to “yellow,” the second-highest tier.''

 

[PommyMommy]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1553745385784483842

https://twitter.com/x/status/1553763358339366912

https://twitter.com/x/status/1553813821961158656

 

[PommyMommy]

JUL 31, 2022

US envoy: Russia intends to dissolve Ukraine from world map

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations said Friday there should no longer be any doubt that Russia intends to dismantle Ukraine “and dissolve it from the world map entirely.”

apnews.com

[...]

Thomas-Greenfield cited evidence of mounting atrocities including the reported bombings of schools and hospitals, “the killing of aid workers and journalists, the targeting of civilians attempting to flee, the brutal execution-style murder of those going about their daily business in Bucha,” the suburb of Ukraine’s capital Kyiv where local authorities said hundreds of people were killed during its occupation by Russian forces.

She said there is evidence Russia forces “have interrogated, detained forcibly, deported an estimated hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian citizens, including children -- tearing them from their homes and sending them to remote regions in the east.”

Nearly 2 million Ukrainians refugees have been sent to Russia, according to both Ukrainian and Russian officials. Ukraine portrays these journeys as forced transfers to enemy soil, which is considered a war crime. Russia calls them humanitarian evacuations of war victims who already speak Russian and are grateful for a new home.

[...]

 

[PommyMommy]

AUG 1, 2022

1st ship carrying Ukrainian grain leaves the port of Odesa

The first ship carrying Ukrainian grain has set out from the port of Odesa. The departure of the ship laden with corn follows an internationally brokered deal that is expected to finally allow large stores of Ukrainian crops to reach foreign markets and ease a growing hunger crisis.

apnews.com

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — The first ship carrying Ukrainian grain set out Monday from the port of Odesa under an internationally brokered deal to unblock the embattled country’s agricultural exports and ease the growing global food crisis.

The Sierra Leone-flagged cargo ship Razoni sounded its horn as it departed with over 26,000 tons of corn destined for Lebanon.

[...]

 

[PommyMommy]

AUG 2, 2022

Russia declares Ukrainian military unit a terrorist group

The Russian Supreme Court on Tuesday declared Ukraine’s Azov Regiment a terrorist organization banned in Russia, a designation that fuels the Kremlin's narrative of the war in Ukraine and that may expose Ukrainian prisoners of war held by Moscow to terrorism charges.

apnews.com

[...]

Russia’s Prosecutor General’s office filed a motion to designate the regiment as a terrorist organization in May.

Azov in an online statement Tuesday dismissed the Supreme Court’s ruling, accusing Russia of “looking for new excuses and explanations for its war crimes.” Azov urged the U.S. and other countries to declare Russia a “terrorist state.”

“Russia has been proving this status for many years with its daily actions,” the statement said.

Scores of Azov fighters are being held captive by Moscow. The Russian authorities have opened multiple criminal cases against them, accusing them of killing civilians.

[...]

Some flee eastern Ukraine, others defy govt order to leave

KRAMATORSK, Ukraine (AP) — Maryna Havrysh struggled to hold back her tears as she helped a group of volunteers load her elderly parents into an evacuation van in Kramatorsk, near the front line of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

apnews.com

[...]

Even as the August weather remains warm in eastern Ukraine, authorities are preparing for the cold months of fall and winter, when they fear that many of the roughly 350,000 residents still inside Donetsk may not have access to heat, electricity or even clean water.

On Tuesday, Ukraine’s deputy prime minister, Iryna Vereshchuk, said a train carrying evacuees from Donetsk had arrived in central Ukraine, representing the start of what authorities are describing as a compulsory evacuation effort that would take 200,000-220,000 people out of the eastern province by fall.

On the outskirts of Kramatorsk, which has undergone frequent Russian shelling, volunteers have set up a collection point for gathering evacuees who are then transported to the nearest working train station in Pokrovsk, 50 miles (85 kilometers) to the southwest.

As she struggled to board the van bound for the train station, Valentyna Abramanovska, 87, carried only a black-and-white photograph of her mother and sister taken nearly 50 years ago on the Sea of Azov, a memento of her life to carry with her.

[...]

 

[PommyMommy]

Russia-Ukraine war: explosions reported across Mykolaiv and occupied Donetsk – live

Two districts of Mykolaiv, which has been targeted frequently in recent weeks, are reported to have been shelled

www.theguardian.com

2h ago05.58

Summary​

It is nearly 1pm in Kyiv. Here is the latest from our live coverage of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

• The UN is conducting a fact-finding mission in response to requests from both Russia and Ukraine after 53 Ukrainian prisoners of war were killed in an explosion at a barracks in separatist-controlled Olenivka. The warring nations have accused each other of carrying out the attack. Ukraine claims it was a special operation plotted in advance by the Kremlin, and carried out by Russian mercenaries from the Wagner Group. Russia’s defence ministry, however, claims the Ukrainian military used US-supplied rockets to strike the prison.
• Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, wants to talk directly to China’s leader, Xi Jinping, in the hope China can use its influence with Russia to bring the war to an end. According to a report in the South China Morning Post, Zelenskiy said: “It’s a very powerful state. It’s a powerful economy. So (it) can politically, economically influence Russia. And China is [also a] permanent member of the UN security council.” So far, China has refused to condemn Russia’s invasion and its president, Xi Jinping, told Putin it would support Russia’s “sovereignty and security”.
• The US Senate has ratified Finland and Sweden’s accession to Nato, voting 95-1 in support. The US is the 23rd member state to ratify what would be the most significant expansion of the 30-member alliance since the 1990s as it responds to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. “This historic vote sends an important signal of the sustained, bipartisan US commitment to Nato, and to ensuring our alliance is prepared to meet the challenges of today and tomorrow,” the president, Joe Biden, said in a statement. All 30 Nato members must ratify the accession before Finland and Sweden can become members.
• Ukraine is pulling out its 40 peacekeepers from the Nato-led mission in Kosovo, which totals 3,800 members, according to Ukrainian news. In March, Zelenskiy issued a decree for all missions to return to Ukraine to support the war.
• The head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog has again appealed for access to a Ukrainian nuclear power plant now controlled by Russian forces to determine whether it was a source of danger. Contact with the Europe’s largest nuclear plant, which is at Zaporizhzhia and is being operated by Ukrainian technicians under occupation, was “fragile” and communications did not function every day, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) head Rafael Grossi told a Swiss newspaper.
• The first shipment of grain to leave Ukraine under a deal to ease Russia’s naval blockade has reached Turkey. The Sierra Leone-registered ship Razoni set sail from Odesa port for Lebanon on Monday under an accord brokered by Turkey and the UN. The ship has been inspected by members of the joint coordination centre, and is now expected to move through the Bosphorus Strait “shortly”.
• Ukraine failed to stop a Syrian-flagged vessel claimed to be carrying stolen Ukrainian grain from leaving Lebanon. The Lebanese government reported on Thursday that the Syrian-flagged Laodicea had left its territorial waters, despite appeals from Kyiv to reverse a court decision allowing its departure. Russia has denied stealing the grain on the ship, which was reported to be sailing to its ally, Syria.
• The UN has said that there have been over 10m border crossings into and out of Ukraine since Russia launched its invasion of the country on 24 February. Data gathered by the UNHCR states that 6,180,345 individual refugees from Ukraine are now recorded across Europe. Ukraine’s neighbours have taken the largest individual numbers. Poland has 1.25 million refugees.
• Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has branded “disgusting” the behaviour of the ex German chancellor Gerhard Schröder. The former German leader has come under fire, after he went on holiday to Moscow and had a private meeting with Vladimir Putin. Schröder told German media in a lengthy interview he had nothing to apologise for over his friendship with the Russian president.

 

[PommyMommy]

Russia sanctions LGBTQ activist, Freeland and Joly's staff, singer Chantal Kreviazuk​

www.cp24.com

''Russia has also sanctioned pastor Brent Hawkes, the LGBTQ activist who officiated Canada's first legal gay marriages, and Juno-award winning singer-songwriter Chantal Kreviazuk, who is of Ukrainian and Indigenous heritage.''

 

[PommyMommy]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1555786998471954433

https://twitter.com/x/status/1555902453354217479

https://twitter.com/x/status/1555937260192808961

 

[PommyMommy]

AUG 6, 2022

Ukrainian unit digs in for Russian assault on eastern city

SLOVIANSK, Ukraine (AP) — Ukrainian military personnel are fortifying their positions around the eastern city of Sloviansk in expectation of a fresh Russian attempt to seize the strategic point in the fiercely fought-over Donetsk region.

apnews.com

“I think it won’t be calm for long. Eventually, there will be an assault,” Col. Yurii Bereza, the head of the volunteer national guard regiment, told The Associated Press on Friday, adding that he expected the area to get “hot” in the coming days.

Sloviansk is considered a strategic target in Moscow’s ambitions to seize all of Donetsk province, a largely Russian-speaking area in eastern Ukraine where Russian forces and pro-Moscow separatists control about 60% of the territory.

Russian forces begin assault on two eastern Ukraine cities

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russian forces began an assault Saturday on two key cities in the eastern Donetsk region and kept up rocket and shelling attacks on other Ukrainian cities, including one close to Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, Ukraine's military and local officials said.

apnews.com

The governor of the eastern Dnipropetrovsk region said three civilians were injured after Russian rockets fell on a residential neighborhood in Nikopol, a city across the Dnieper River from the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station. The nuclear plant has been under Russian control since Moscow’s troops seized it early in the war.

“After midnight, the Russian army struck the Nikopol area with (Soviet-era) Grad rockets, and the Kryvyi Rih area from barrel artillery,” Valentyn Reznichenko wrote on Telegram.

Another Russian missile attack overnight damaged unspecified infrastructure in the regional capital of Zaporizhzhia. On Thursday, Russia fired 60 rockets at Nikopol, damaging 50 residential buildings in the city of 107,000 and leaving residents without electricity.

Rafael Grossi, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, warned this week that the situation was becoming more perilous day by day at the Zaporizhzhia plant.

“Every principle of nuclear safety has been violated” at the plant, he said. “What is at stake is extremely serious.”

 

[PommyMommy]

Aug 8 2022
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/ukraine-nuclear-plant-shelled-1.6544727
''Russia and Ukraine traded accusations Monday that each side is shelling Europe's biggest nuclear power plant in southern Ukraine. Russia claimed that Ukrainian shelling caused a power surge and fire and forced staff to lower output from two reactors, while Ukraine has blamed Russian troops for storing weapons there.

Nuclear experts have warned that more shelling of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station, which was captured by Russia early in the war, is fraught with danger. The Kremlin echoed that statement Monday, claiming that Ukrainian shelling could create "catastrophic" consequences for Europe.

Rafael Grossi, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, has warned that the way the plant was being run under Russian forces, and the fighting going on around it, are posing grave health and environmental threats.

Ukraine's military intelligence chief, Andriy Yusov, countered the Russian statements by saying his organization had received credible information from several sources that Russian forces have planted explosives at the Zaporizhzhia plant to head off an expected Ukrainian counteroffensive in the region. Previously, Ukrainian officials said Russia is launching attacks from the plant and using its Ukrainian workers as human shields.''

 

[PommyMommy]

Ukrainian forces were behind an explosion at a key Russian airbase on the Crimean Peninsula on Tuesday.
This was an air base from which planes regularly took off for attacks against our forces.

Five injured as blasts rock Russian air base in annexed Crimea​

Blasts rocked a Russian air base near seaside resorts in the annexed Crimean peninsula on Thursday, injuring five people according to local authorities in what Moscow attributed to detonations in ammunition stories.

www.reuters.com

 

[PommyMommy]

AUG 10, 2022​

Ukraine says 9 Russian warplanes destroyed in Crimea blasts​

www.cp24.com

''KYIV, Ukraine (AP) -- Ukraine's air force said Wednesday that nine Russian warplanes were destroyed in massive explosions at an air base in Crimea amid speculation they were the result of a Ukrainian attack that would represent a significant escalation in the war.

Russia denied any aircraft were damaged in Tuesday's blasts - or that any attack took place.

Ukrainian officials have stopped short of publicly claiming responsibility for the explosions, while poking fun at Russia's explanation that munitions at the Saki air base caught fire and blew up. Analysts have also said that explanation doesn't make sense and that the Ukrainians could have used anti-ship missiles to strike the base.

While dodging credit, several Ukrainian officials have pointedly underscored the importance of the peninsula, which Moscow annexed eight years ago.

Crimea holds huge strategic and symbolic significance for both Ukraine and Russia - further emphasized by how both danced around what actually happened. The Kremlin's demand that Ukraine recognize Crimea as part of Russia has been one of its key conditions for ending the hostilities, but Ukraine has vowed to drive the Russians from the peninsula and all other occupied territories.

Hours after the blast, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy promised again to do just that.

“This Russian war against Ukraine and against all of free Europe began with Crimea and must end with Crimea - its liberation,” he said in his nightly address.

The explosions, which killed one person and wounded 14, sent tourists fleeing in panic as plumes of smoke towered over the nearby coastline. Video showed shattered windows and holes in the brick work of some buildings.''

 

[PommyMommy]

Explosions at a base in Crimea destroyed about at least eight Russian jets, satellite photos indicate.​

www.nytimes.com

Russian authorities said munitions stored at the site — the Saki Air Base, on Crimea’s western Black Sea coast — had exploded, and denied that any aircraft had been destroyed. But pictures released by Planet Labs, a satellite imaging company, appear to show at least three blast craters in areas where planes were parked near the runways, leaving blackened debris.

A senior Ukrainian official has said the blasts were an attack carried out with the help of partisans, but was not more specific, and the Ukrainian military has not publicly acknowledged any involvement. Military analysts have said Ukraine does not have missiles that can reach the base from territory it controls, well over 100 miles away, and that Ukrainian jets would have been unlikely to penetrate that far into Russian-controlled airspace.

Since seizing Crimea from Ukraine in 2014, Russia has heavily militarized it, and has used it as a vital jumping-off point for military operations since its broader invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24. Even so, the attack on the air base suggests that Ukrainian forces are able to carry out guerrilla operations there.