Jun 13: E-Stories
Day 467: Noskvchne Storozhove Bakhmut Energodar Armyansk Luhansk IAEI NATO G7 Japan EU UN Leake Silvio Boris Trump A&P Maliar Martin Junisbai Ilves Rumer The Guardian Raufoglu UKDef
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.
Stories we’re following…
Ukraine liberates Neskuchne village, reclaims position near Avdiivka in Donetsk Oblast on June 10, the 7th Motorized Infantry Battalion of Ukraine's 129th Territorial Defense Brigade reported on June 11. They have also liberated the settlements of Storozhove and Novodarkova in Donetsk Oblast, which had been under occupation since March 2022, Deputy Defence Minister Hanna Maliar reported on Telegram. The fifth village has now been corroborated by the Zaporizhzhia separate territorial defence brigade, which said they had taken Novodarivka.
The main striking forces of the Ukrainian Defense Forces have not yet been deployed in active operations.
Twenty-five battles had taken place over the past day near the eastern town of Bakhmut and further south near Avdiivka and Maryinka, all in the Donetsk region, but also near Bilohorivka in the Luhansk region, Ukraine’s armed forces general staff said. According to Russian military bloggers, the battle is on now for Urozhaine to the south, as the Ukrainians fight their way village to village, on both sides of the river.
Ukrainian state broadcaster, Suspilne reports: In the morning and at night, the Russian army attacked Kharkiv oblast: a man was wounded in Shevchenkove, another was injured during the shelling of Vilkhuvatka. In Khorosheve, one two-story building was destroyed, the other was damaged.
UK official anticipates 'major' Ukrainian attack in Donbas in 'next few days'. Tobias Ellwood, the head of the U.K. Parliament's defense committee, believes Ukraine would launch a "major attack" against Russian forces in the eastern Donbas region "in the next few days."
Russia hasn't granted access to the U.N. to the illegally occupied territories of the Kherson oblast. On Ukraine's invitation, representatives of the International Criminal Court arrived in the Kherson Oblast to investigate the destruction of a Nova Kakhovka dam which caused an environmental catastrophe in Ukraine.
The residents of Kryvyi Rih are facing the need to reduce water consumption by 40%, said Oleksandr Vilkul, the head of the military administration of Kryvyi Rih. According to Vilkul, the Ukrainian authorities have been preparing for such scenarios for the past year. Extensive work has been undertaken to ensure that water levels in the Pivdenny and Karachunski reservoirs are at their maximum, enabling the city's water utility to operate almost normally while monitoring water quality.
The water level at the ponds used to cool the reactors at Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant remain stable and sufficient despite the falling water level of the Kakhovka reservoir nearby, Reuters reports Ukraine’s environment minister said on Monday.
The Russian invaders are preparing a man-made disaster at the Crimean Titan chemical plant, located in temporarily occupied Armyansk in the northern part of the Crimean Peninsula, reports Ukraine Defence intelligence.
"Due to the enemy's terrorist attack on the Kakhovskaya HPP and, as a result, the lack of water in the North Crimean Canal, manufacturing processes at the Crimean Titan plant in Armyansk have been disrupted to a critical level.”
Simultaneously, over the past few days, the engineering units of the occupying army have been placing mines within the workshops of the operational enterprise while also planting explosives in both the factory and the surrounding area.
Military intelligence: Russia preparing evacuations, sabotage in Crimea amid Kakhovka dam breach. Russia is preparing evacuations in the occupied city of Armiansk in northern Crimea amid the Kakhovka dam breach, as well as "sabotage operations" at a factory in the region, Ukraine's military intelligence reported on June 12.
Who congratulated Putin on Russia Day? The head of North Korea, Kim Jong-un, was one of the first to congratulate Putin. President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko in his congratulations wished Putin good health, and the people of Russia "peace and harmony" and noted that Putin's policy "consistently strengthens positions in the international arena." The head of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, and Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev also sent a congratulatory telegram to Putin as well as the leaders of Kyrgyzstan, Armenia, Turkmenistan, and Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
It is Russia day today, and in occupied Luhansk the Russian-imposed leader Leonid Pasechnik has issued a statement saying that the claimed annexation of the Ukrainian region by the Russian Federation had given it “a new life”.
Having reunited with Russia, we felt the attention from the state, the unity and mutual assistance of the peoples of a vast country. Social protection, large-scale construction, modernisation of education and healthcare, the revival of agriculture and industry – Luhansk region, without exaggeration, received a new life.
IAEA head to meet Zelensky, discuss impact of Kakhovka dam disaster. Rafael Grossi, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said on June 12 that he was on his way to visit President Volodymyr Zelensky to present an assistance program for the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant.
NATO ministers to meet defense firms to discuss Ukraine's need for ammo. NATO defense ministers will convene with the heads of 25 major defense manufacturers on June 15 to discuss Ukraine's need for more ammunition as well as the need to replenish allies' stockpiles, Euractiv reported on June 12.
Five more Patriot air defense systems will be delivered to Ukraine by the end of 2023, — WSJ The chief executive officer of Raytheon, the company that produces the Patriot, confirmed these plans and said that the concern is increasing production to 12 complexes per year.
The Group of Seven (G7) rich nations are working on a scheme to combat the suspected theft of Ukraine’s grain by using chemical identification of grain origin, Britain’s food and farming minister Mark Spencer said on Monday. Spencer told an International Grains Council (IGC) conference in London that Britain was leading on the scheme.
Japan has passed a new law allowing it to start exporting weapons for the first time since WW2. The new law also makes it possible to produce more weapons for the needs of the Japanese military itself.
Lithuanian government officials were the first to come to the help of Belarusian dissidents back in the late 1980s. The share a long history of fighting Russian capture in Belarus. They also had to deal with the first information operations on YouTube that were being run by Russian intelligence which sought to discredit Lithuanian officials.
The EU is thinking about how to use Ukrainian storage facilities for its own gas in case of a sudden increase in demand and prices during winter. As Bloomberg reports, EU sites are already edging close to capacity — currently more than 70% full — storing the fuel in Ukraine could prevent a glut in the coming months. Europe's storage sites are expected to reach capacity limits as soon as early September. This initiative is part of efforts to avoid the that led to record prices and state intervention last year.
The United States intends to invite six new permanent members to the UN Security Council, writes The Washington Post, citing officials from the administration of President Joe Biden. The White House is preparing a plan for the reconstruction of the most influential body of the UN. “The time has come for the UN to become a more inclusive organization that will more effectively respond to the needs of the modern world,” Biden said at the time. He also urged other permanent members of the Security Council to limit their use of their veto to "rare, emergency situations."
Musician Travis Leake spoke up about freedom of speech in Russia with Anthony Bourdain in 2014. Now he’s been detained. Russian media published video footage of Mr Leake’s arrest on 8 June. Tabloid station Ren TV reported that Mr Leake said: “I don’t understand why I’m here. I don’t admit guilt, I don’t believe I could have done what I’m accused of because I don’t know what I’m accused of.” Darya Tarasova produced the Parts Unknown episode broadcast in 2014. She told CNN that the “band wasn’t that famous but Travis and his friends had been very vocal about the freedom of speech and state oppression in Russia”.
Silvio Berlusconi died on June 12 at San Raffaele Hospital in Milano. He had been ill for some time.
Boris Johnson has officially resigned as MP from the House of Parliament. It brings to an end his eight years as MP for Uxbridge and South Ruislip in west London. Since being ousted in July last year Johnson has spent large amounts of time abroad earning money through speeches and going on holiday, reports Peter Walker at The Guardian.
I think he’s a little upset.
UK Defence on Bakhmut: "In February 2022, Russia likely planned to complete the capture of the whole of the Donbas region within 10-14 days. But in Bakhmut, for every 48cm gained, one of its soldiers has been killed or wounded. Ukraine fights on," the British Ministry of Defence said in a Twitter message.
Russia puts flooded town of Hola Prystan under quarantine, preventing evacuations. Russian forces announced a quarantine in the town of Hola Prystan in the Kherson Oblast, which suffers unprecedented flooding Russia blew up the Kakhovka dam up the Dnipro River, the local media reported on June 11.
International Criminal Court starts investigation into destroyed Nova Kakhovka dam. President Volodymyr Zelensky said on June 11 that the International Criminal Court had already launched an investigation following Russia's destruction of the Kakhovka dam in Kherson Oblast on June 6.
Governor: Water level drops in Kherson Oblast after Kakhovka dam disaster. The total flooded area in Kherson Oblast after the Kakhovka dam disaster has nearly halved, decreasing from 139 to 77.8 square kilometers, Oleksandr Prokudin, the regional governor, reported on June 11.
Consequences of the destruction of the Kakhova Dam by the Russian forces
The destruction of the Kakhovka Dam by the Russian forces is swiftly evolving into a long-term environmental catastrophe affecting drinking water, food supplies and ecosystems reaching into the Black Sea. The short-term dangers can be seen from outer space — tens of thousands of parcels of land flooded, and more to come.
Experts say the long-term consequences will be generational. The Associated Press reported:
For every flooded home and farm, there are fields upon fields of newly planted grains, fruits and vegetables whose irrigation canals are drying up. Thousands of fish were left gasping on mud flats. Fledgling water birds lost their nests and their food sources. Countless trees and plants were drowned.
[video: Kherson is famous for its watermelon fields. Experts says that this crop will disappear for years. About 94% of Kherson's irrigated land has been left without water. Kherson steppes, where cereals, oil crops, watermelons, tomatoes, peppers, aubergines and other vegetables were grown thanks to well-established system of irrigation canals, may turn into deserts next year. And the current crop of watermelons in the flooded areas of the region has been washed away almost completely.]
If water is life, then the draining of the Kakhovka reservoir creates an uncertain future for the region of southern Ukraine that was an arid plain until the damming of the Dnipro River 70 years ago. The Kakhovka Dam was the last in a system of six Soviet-era dams on the river, which flows from Belarus to the Black Sea.
Then the Dnipro became part of the frontline after Russia’s invasion last year.
“All this territory formed its own particular ecosystem, with the reservoir included,” said Kateryna Filiuta, an expert in protected habitats for the Ukraine Nature Conservation Group.
Inside Russia, the view of itself as a selfless and benevolent “big brother” that gifted modernity & prosperity to non-Russian societies which comprised the USSR is ubiquitous. The term “colonialism” is routinely used to condemn OTHER nations but the gaze seldom turns inward.
The refusal to recognize, let alone genuinely engage with, the issues of Russian colonial legacy & modern day Russian imperialism is a defining trait of modern Russia. This trait is shared by a wide range of people including, troublingly, some prominent critics of the Kremlin.
Indeed, the hearty approval rating jumps enjoyed by Putin whenever 🇷🇺 launches wars against former 🇷🇺 colonies are hard to miss. Of course, there are those who recognize that 🇷🇺 is a crumbling colonial power engaged in a futile attempt to turn back time but they are a minority.
When Putin lamented the collapse of the USSR as a “geopolitical catastrophe” he was capturing the zeitgeist of his people. Insistence on the “Putin‘s War” narrative by the 🇷🇺 opposition is politically expedient but fails to acknowledge the imperial yearning of the Russian people.
However, this is not the whole story. On the international stage, there is also a troubling lack of recognition that Moscow used terror to colonize and control vastly diverse societies. And that the people of these societies are determined to never fall under Russian rule again.
Whenever I hear Western politicians and pundits talk about Russia’s “legitimate sphere of interests” being threatened by NATO expansion, I am struck by the way in which this framework erases the humanity and agency of those Russia once colonized.
The propaganda which rendered the brutal colonization and the colonized themselves largely invisible to the outside world is perhaps Russia’s most ambitious and successful export. This invisibility provides cover for Russian atrocities and it must be challenged and disrupted…
"Putin’s war has become the war of all Russians. His legacy will remain part of their legacy, and it will continue to weigh heavily on their domestic affairs and the country’s relationship with the rest of the world."
your daily summaries are so very good.
I know they take so much effort.
thank you.