Aug 31 Buonasera Mag
Day 189: Kherson, Zaporizhzia, Mariupol, EU military, EU visa ban, Bayraktar, Gorbachev. UA stamps, Arts & posts: Avdeeva, Brazil, Picheta, Davis, Cox-Richardson, Lautman, Snyder, NAFOFellas
Catching up…
EA Worldview’s Ukraine Up-date- hop over to Scott’s amazing hourly Ukraine up-date page. I’ll fill in with some bits and bobs.
What is happening in Kherson…
Ukraine’s military reports hitting bridges near occupied Kherson, again. Operational Command “South” reported on Aug. 30 that the Ukrainian artillery hit Antonivsky automobile and railway bridges, as well as Darivskyi bridge near the Russian-occupied Kherson again, “to confirm their inoperable status.”
Rusland Trad: “For the past weeks, we have been intensively monitoring the military developments in southern and eastern Ukraine, including the occupied zones. The Ukrainian army has destroyed so many depots of the Russian army that it is no longer news. It is already not daily, but hourly.”
Ukrainian armoured forces have continued to assault Russia’s Southern Grouping of Forces on several axes across the south of the country since Monday. These formations have pushed the front line back some distance in places, exploiting relatively thinly held Russian defences.
In line with this doctrine, Russia will likely now attempt to plug the gaps in its line using pre-designated mobile reserve units. These will likely include some of those from the Eastern Grouping of Forces.
Russia continues to hurry the recruitment of new forces for Ukraine. Volunteer battalions of the new 3rd Army Corps had departed their home base near Moscow by 24 August, but they probably are not going to Ukraine. We don’t know how operationally effective they are.
The 3rd Army Corps is highly likely short of personnel and these troops have had limited training.
Stories we’re following…
UN nuclear watchdog group on their way to Zaporizhzhia NPP. During a briefing in Kyiv, IAEA Director General Mariano Grossi said the mission will cross the front line for the first time and requires security guarantees from Russia and Ukraine. They are expected to arrive on Thursday.
Up-date 15:27: The IAEA delegation is standing in line at the checkpoint in the Zaporizhzhia region. The pro-Russian authorities refused to give them special passes, the so-called "head of the administration of the Zaporizhzhia region" Yevhen Balytskyi said.
Russian troops shell Enerhodar amid UN nuclear inspectors moving into Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant. Yevhen Yevtushenko, the head of Nikopol’s district military administration, called the attack a provocation.
Death toll from Russian attack on Kharkiv rises to 5. Kharkiv Mayor Ihor Terekhov reported that five people have been killed and 7 injured. Kharkiv Oblast Governor Syniehubov added that 9 people have been injured thus far on August 30.
Mariupol journalist citing city morgues reports at least 113,750 residents died during Russia’s assault, siege and ghettoisation of the Ukrainian city.
Russia draws more mercenaries for its war in Ukraine as covert mobilization fails. Ukraine's Intelligence Directorate said on Aug. 30 that since the covert mobilization in central and southeastern regions of Russia is falling, the country’s defense ministry decided to increase the number of mercenaries to fight against Ukraine.
Russian outlet Ridus has reported that a local military recruitment centre in the Tver region has received complaints that conscripts are being coerced through psychological pressure into signing military contracts. The Russians lock conscripts into a hot room with no water until they agree to sign on.
Ukraine's Cabinet approves sanctions against Russian Orthodox Church leader Kirill. Announcing the sanctions against Patriarch Kirill and seven other representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church, Culture Minister Tkachenko said that the Russian Orthodox Church supports the war against Ukraine, and "everyone involved should be held accountable."
EU member states agree on working towards a new military assistance mission for Ukraine, top EU diplomat says. “It’s clear that we need to be quick and ambitious, demonstrate added value, flexibility, once again based on the needs of Ukrainian armed forces."
Zelensky signs law on 'customs visa-free regime' with EU. President Volodymyr Zelensky said in an evening address on Aug. 30 that he had signed an agreement to the accession of Ukraine to the Convention on a Common Transit procedure.
The Bayraktar Kizilelma will be manufactured in Ukraine. A big triumph for UAV cooperation between Turkey and Ukraine, which was widely discussed before the war, and Turkish sources have expressed optimism these drones will arrive in Ukraine to help it in time for the current war.
Minister: Ukraine received record foreign aid in August. Finance Minister Serhiy Marchenko announced on air on Aug. 30 that Ukraine received a record-breaking $4.6 billion of foreign aid in August, Interfax reports.
EU gas reserves at 80% storage capacity. At the Baltic Sea Energy Security Summit, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced that the EU had filled its gas storage sites to an average of 80% thus hitting their target ahead of schedule.
France says that Gazprom's temporary Nord Stream gas export cutoff is a pretext. Russia's weaponization of gas against Europe could be reaching new heights.
EU foreign ministers have just agreed to fully suspend the union's 2007 visa facilitation agreement with Russia, announces EU foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell in Prague.
Poland, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia have declared that they will independently introduce restrictive measures for the entry of Russians, if such a decision is not taken at the EU level.
EU foreign ministers are today looking into suspending most/all of the visa facilitation agreement with Russia & targeting multi-entry visas. So far today, Austria and the Netherlands are willing to discuss ‘restrictions’. France and Germany are against a visa ban, saying it would politicize the process.
Deutsche Welle: Heavy flamethrower system may be responsible for explosion at Olenivka POW camp. In a comment to DW, the Prosecutor General’s Office said that, based on open-source information, Russia likely used a thermobaric munition at Olenivka.
UNESCO wants to add Odesa, Kyiv and Lviv to the List of World Heritage in Danger, as they are under threat due to Russia's ongoing war.
Ukrposhta sells $150,000 in stamps through eBay, Amazon. Ihor Smelyansky, head of Ukraine’s state-owned postal service, said that Ukrposhta was the first post office in the world to open a store on Amazon and eBay.
The BBC, Mikhail Gorbachev: Last Soviet leader dies aged 91
Mikhail Gorbachev was one of the most influential political figures of the 20th Century. He presided over the dissolution of a Soviet Union that had existed for nearly 70 years and had dominated huge swathes of Asia and Eastern Europe.
Yet, when he set out his programme of reforms in 1985, his sole intention had been to revive his country's stagnant economy and overhaul its political processes.
Note: while leaders world-wide have expressed their condolences and high regard for Gorbachev, Russian military bloggers are happy to see him go. WarTranslated provides some reactions from various channels. This is one:
This creature does not need to wish for eternal shame – he has acquired it forever. It makes no sense to curse this creature – contempt is the best that he deserved and deserves.
OCCRP investigation in Germany
German customs raids network of companies suspected of selling precursor chemicals to Russia.
The key German company, Riol Chemie GmbH, had made more than 30 shipments of chemicals and laboratory equipment to Russia's Chimmed Group, a wholesaler, over the past 3.5 years without the necessary export permits, according to an investigation by Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and its media partners published on Aug. 30.
Russian procurement records acquired by OCCRP show that the Chimmed Group was contracted by the Russian intelligence agency FSB Criminalistics Institute in 2016. It is accused of attempting to use Novichok poison to kill the now-imprisoned Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny in 2020.
Russia is threatening Scholz indirectly through his propaganda mouthpiece.
Matt Brazil, Brussels, the Den of Spies- SpyTalk
By comparison, Brussels seems overlooked by spy novelists and film directors, but its unusual concentration of diplomatic missions to the European Union, NATO, and to Belgium itself brings a high ratio per square kilometer of diplomats and lobbyists—as well as spies. “Washington and Brussels compete for the largest number of embassies and other representations on earth” remarked an ICT (information and communications technology) executive close to the Belgian authorities. He added that the spy agencies of numerous countries, including America, Russia, and China “do whatever they want here; there are so many [espionage] issues going on that Belgian authorities don’t know where to start.”
Rob Picheta, Darya Dugina's death provides a glimpse into Russia's vast disinformation machine -- and the influential women fronting it- CNN
Websites like Dugina's are not uncommon, according to Olga Lautman, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA), who labeled their output "extremely important" to Russia's soft power objectives.
"The reader reads it in their language, they're comfortable reading it, but they're not necessarily sure where the information is stemming from," Lautman added. "The whole point on a bigger scale is to shift the balance of power from the United States to Russia, and to allow the rise of authoritarianism and the subversion of democracy."
Julia Davis reports: disinfo about the Zaporizhzhia NPP
Stanford Internet Observatory, Pro-Kremlin Twitter Network Takes Aim at Ukraine and COVID-19
Following our analysis of the tweets, accounts, and the timeframe of their activity, we were able to identify four clusters:
NewsFront accounts sharing articles in Russian, German and Serbian
Accounts amplifying pro-Kremlin narratives surrounding the pretext of the invasion of Ukraine
Accounts coordinating to spread rumors around COVID-19
A small group of accounts focusing on regional issues in Ukraine
Putin supports idea of creating 'adaptation centers' for migrants- Meduza
According to a transcript published on the Kremlin's website, Russian President Vladimir Putin supports an initiative to create adaptation centers for migrants put forward by Igor Barinov, head of the Federal Agency for Nationalities (FADN).
During the meeting, Barinov stated that the Russian economy needs an inflow of foreign labor, but noted that a large number of migrants may lead to changes in the "ethno-cultural landscape," which will increase the risk of ethnic enclaves and the growth of "ethnic criminality."
Timothy Snyder Lectures available on YouTube
The top secret documents were locked up.
Olga Lautman adds: “I keep saying journalists need to put every single Republican on the record about this dangerous insanity of trump stealing classified docs and obstruct their retrieval. Tell us again Lindsey Graham about these riots- GOP GOP Leader.”
Scott Lucas: “This is much farther than Justice Department has gone before in public statements/filings. The photo on final page is a tell that they're stepping this up, both in court, and in contest for public opinion.”
The Washington Post: "They found material so sensitive that 'even the FBI counterintelligence personnel and DOJ attorneys conducting the review required additional clearances before they were permitted to review certain documents'".
From Heather Cox Richardson- An overview
The DOJ laid out the timeline behind the attempt of the U.S. government to recover the materials Trump took. First, officials from the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) recognized that materials were missing and tried to get Trump to return them voluntarily. When he finally handed over 15 boxes, the officials recognized that some of the materials were “highly classified” and told the Department of Justice.
Trump delayed the FBI examination of the boxes, but when officials got into them, they recognized their haphazard storage threatened national security. They got evidence of more records at Mar-a-Lago, for which they obtained a grand jury subpoena. Trump’s representatives handed over a few more documents, and a lawyer certified that that was it—they had done a diligent search and now could confirm that there were no more documents left. They said there were no materials stored anywhere but a storeroom, but they refused to let agents look inside the boxes there.
It was a lie both that there were no more documents, and that materials were contained in the storeroom. The FBI learned there were still more documents, got a search warrant, and on August 8 seized from at least two locations 33 more boxes with more than 100 classified records—twice as many classified documents as Trump and his representatives had handed over under the subpoena.
The U.S. government spelled out that “those records do not belong to him”; they belong to the United States. It said that Trump never asserted that the records had been declassified or asserted any claim of executive privilege, and Trump’s representatives indicated they thought the documents were classified. It made a strong case that the former president and his lawyer obstructed the search for the documents.
Even more chilling than the words of the filing was the exhibit attached: a photo of SECRET, TOP SECRET, and SECRET/SCI files recovered from a container, spread out on a carpeted floor next to a banker’s box containing framed TIME magazine covers.
Trump has added Chris Kise, the former solicitor general of Florida, to his legal team. Although the Republican National Committee has been paying the former president’s legal bills since he left office, it will not pay the legal fees he racks up over this issue.
Will you marry me? Ти вийдеш за мене заміж?
NAFO expansion is non-negotiable…
