Jun 2: E-Stories
Day 463: Kyiv Belgorod UARUSitRep BlackSea 2500UAKids MOL NATO Sweden CZ PutinPalace Levchenko Gazprom NovorossiyaRail Shebekino A&P UKDef Nauseda Avdeeva Blinken Hummelt DoomsdayWatch Tokariuk MacKay
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…
Russian forces launched missile strikes June 1 on Kyiv killing 3 people, including 1 child. It was International Children’s Day. The Russian missile attack also injured 11 more people, reported the Kyiv police. [photo source: Sergiy Okunev]
General Staff: Ukrainian Air Force shot down 10 Iskander missiles on June 1. Ukrainian Air Force shot down all Russian aerial targets during the attack on Kyiv on June 1, according to the preliminary information from Ukraine's General Staff. Yury Ignat, a representative of the Air Force Command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, explained why Russian troops began to use Iskanders for attacks on Kyiv.
“The enemy uses precisely these operational-tactical complexes in order to have a minimum of time to react. Because if cruise missiles are flying from the Caspian or the Black Sea, then, accordingly, there is about an hour to react and go into cover. Here we are talking about a matter of minutes. The enemy wants to take us by surprise so that our air defenses cannot react. But, as we can see, it worked this time as well,” RBC-Ukraine quotes a representative of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
Border Guard Service: Russian forces blow up road linking Ukraine's Chernihiv and Russia's Bryansk. According to the State Border Guard Service spokesperson Andrii Demchenko, cited by Ukrainska Pravda news outlet, the explosion occurred on May 30 on the road linking Ukraine's northern city of Chernihiv and Russia's Bryansk.
Russian forces are trying to surround Ukrainian Defense Forces in the Bilohorivka area and intensified its activity in the Vuhledar area. There have been 22 combat clashes in various directions. There were 9 Russian ships in the Black Sea. They were patrolling primarily in the areas near Novorossiysk. Three of them (a corvette and two Project 636.3 submarines) are equipped with "Kalibr" missiles, with a total salvo of up to 16 missiles.
Residents of Shebekino, Belgorod, and Graivoronsky district have begun to leave the areas from early morning due to heavy shelling, reports Podyom. Authorities have set up an evacuation hotline, but local residents complain that they cannot get through. The local administration notes that there are no gathering points because it is not safe.
An anti-Kremlin group released drone footage it claimed showed Russian military equipment being destroyed in Russia’s Belgorod region. The video was released by the Freedom of Russia Legion, which says it was formed in spring 2022 “out of the wish of Russians to fight in the ranks of the armed forces of Ukraine against Putin’s armed gang”.
The Security Service of Ukraine announced the detention of a Russian "mole" in the ranks of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, who collected information about Western weapons and air defense. The suspect is a resident of Bakhmut, recruited by Nikita Klimovsky, a representative of the 72nd intelligence center of the GRU, even before the start of a full-scale invasion.
Zakarpattia Oblast votes to ban Moscow Patriarchate church in region. Zakarpattia Oblast Council voted on June 1 to prohibit all activities of religious organizations connected to Russia, citing national security needs.
Monique: For the first time since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Boris Nadezhdin called for the election of a new president as reported below by the UK’s daily intelligence brief. Nadezhdin is a former Duma member and used to work for Zakhar Prylepin, who supported Russian forces in Eastern Ukraine. If he expressed these views on Russian TV, which is controlled by the Kremlin and intelligence services, then there’s a reason for it being put into circulation at this time. Information is released for a purpose, and I’ll be monitoring the infosphere to see what that could possibly be.
ISW: The Kremlin expects to replace the Wagner PMC with Chechen special forces Akhmat fighters after the departure of Prigozhin’s irregular troops from the front line, experts at the ISW write in their daily report. On May 31, the Russian Ministry of Defense and the head of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, reported that the Chechen special forces and the Sever-Akhmat regiment had begun some kind of offensive operations in the area of Maryinka, Donetsk region.
Military intelligence: Russia building new facilities for sorting, storing bodies of its dead soldiers. Russia is building facilities for sorting and storing corpses of its soldiers killed during Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, the Ukrainian military intelligence (HUR) claimed on May 31.
Russian government creates state corporation called ’Novorossiya Railroads’ to manage trains in annexed Ukrainian territories. The new entity will manage logistics and other services in the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk “republics” and the Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions.
Against the backdrop of rising prices for motor fuel in Russia, the number of "grey" filling stations has increased dramatically, said Evgeny Arkusha, president of the Russian Fuel Union (RTS). Shady businessmen are converting gazelles and buses into mobile gas stations, opening fuel dispensers on the territories of the road network of settlements and private land plots, Arkusha told Izvestia. According to him, these are "time bombs" that "interfere with the work of honest business."
Gazprom's deliveries to Europe in May 2023 were down 14.7% on a daily basis compared to the April average as spot gas prices fell closer to the lows of the beginning of the year, Reuters calculations show. based on average daily export data for Turkish Stream and the Ukrainian route. After the cessation of Russian gas supplies via the Yamal-Europe gas pipeline and Nord Stream, the only routes for its transportation to Europe were transit through Ukraine and one string of the Turkish Stream. Gazprom's exports to non-CIS countries, including China and Turkey, fell by almost 46% in 2022 to 100.9 billion cubic meters. (Oksana Kobzeva).
It is estimated that Russia may have forcibly transferred approximately 2,500 orphans from Ukraine,” according to the Russian independent media outlet Important Stories. Lawyers from the Lithuanian human rights organization Every Human Being, along with activists from the Kidnapping project, have urged the United Nations to investigate the actions of Karim Atassi, the head of the Russian office of the U.N. Refugee Agency. They have accused Atassi of negligence and concealing the forced transfer of Ukrainian children to Russia.
The Russian occupiers have announced that they have transferred 375 children from the temporarily occupied territories of Kherson Oblast to the Western Caucasus for "rehabilitation," according to Yuriy Sobolevsky, the First Deputy Chairman of the Kherson Regional Council. The official stressed that these figures cannot be confirmed as accurate and final.
According to the Ministry of Health press service, 284 healthcare facilities have been fully reconstructed since the onset of the full-scale war in Ukraine. Additional 319 facilities were partially restored. The statement highlights that a total of 1,327 healthcare facilities suffered damage, with 183 facilities completely destroyed during the 15 months of full-scale war.
Military intelligence helped deputy suspected of bribery to leave country ‘at request of another structure.’ Ukraine’s military intelligence (HUR) confirmed that it helped the Kyiv City Council deputy Vladyslav Trubitsyn, who is suspected of taking bribes, to leave the country, the investigative project Schemes reported on May 31.
Ukraine and its allies are preparing to hold a summit to discuss Kyiv’s 10-point Peace Formula with the participation of the representatives of Brazil, India and China, countries that have offered to mediate to bring an end to the full-scale war, as reported by the Wall Street Journal. Western diplomats involved in the preparation of the peace summit hope to hold it before the meeting of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation leaders in Vilnius, scheduled for 11-12 July.
Moldova is hosting the European Political Community (EPC) meeting in Moldova, a gathering of 50 heads of EU states, including president Zelensky. Initially envisaged by the French president, Emmanuel Macron, as a platform for unity across the wider European front, the EPC will bring together the leaders of the 27 EU member states, as well as 19 other countries including the UK, Ukraine, Turkey and Moldova’s Balkan neighbours. President Zelensky met with Moldovan president Maia Sandu. "Many bilateral meetings. We develop a coalition of fighters and offer coalition of «Patriots». EU, NATO, Peace Formula. That is all to protect our future," the President writes.
NATO Foreign Ministers Meeting in Olso: The admission process for Sweden is high on the agenda, as well as the topic of conflict in Ukraine. The Nato alliance needs to think about what kind of security guarantees it can give Ukraine, Reuters reports French foreign minister Catherine Colonna said on Thursday, while Lithuania’s foreign minister Gabrielius Landsbergis said the time has come for Nato members to find a concrete answer to the question of how Ukraine can become a member.
Swedish foreign minister Tobias Billstrom is in Olso, and said the time has come for Turkey and Hungary to ratify his nation’s Nato membership application. “We have fulfilled all our commitments,” Billstrom said.
Germany hands over military aid to Ukraine, pledges 130 new armored vehicles. According to a German government's news release from May 31, Berlin has recently delivered to Ukraine ammunition for Leopard 1 tanks, two 8x8 HX81 trucks, and seven remote-controlled THeMIS infantry vehicles. Germany has also announced it will deliver new 64 tracked Bandvagn 206 vehicles and 66 armored personnel carriers.
In Italy, a criminal case opened against the architect of the "Putin's Palace". The Italian Ministry of Justice has opened a criminal case against the architect of the "Putin's Palace" near Gelendzhik, Lanfranco Cirillo, reports Rai, Italy’s state broadcaster. Last summer, the Guardia di Finanza, Italy’s financial police, accused Cirillo of tax evasion from 2013 to 2019 in the amount of 50 million euros, seizing 141Mln euro of property, including houses, a helicopter, banking assets, cash, jewelry, as well as works of art, including works by Picasso, Cezanne and Kandinsky. Cirillo is still at large at first in Russia, where he is a citizen, and now in Dubai.
Tasssilo Hummelt et al, The meat magnate who pushed Putin's agenda in Germany—Reuters
For nearly two decades, German meat magnate Clemens Toennies was a friend to Russia.
He spoke warmly of Vladimir Putin and said he gave the Russian president a cured knuckle of pork whenever they met. The logo of Russia’s state gas company Gazprom was emblazoned on the shirts of players at the soccer club Toennies chaired. And when others warned that Russia was becoming a global menace, Toennies backed the Kremlin.
For decades, Russia cultivated relations with politically connected German industrialists. Successive German leaders, starting with Cold War-era Chancellor Willy Brandt, promoted economic cooperation with Moscow in an effort to secure peace and prosperity. Germany became Russia’s most important Western partner and the biggest importer of its gas. Berlin’s trust in this policy, known as “Ostpolitik,” endured even as Russia took a darker turn under Putin.
Now interviews with more than 40 people who had direct knowledge of Toennies’ activities or Gazprom’s efforts to win allies in Germany, as well as a review of hundreds of documents, give insight into how Russia turned this bond to its advantage, and how Toennies drew commercial benefit. [continue]
Programming note…
I was once asked which podcasts I listen to. This is it: Arthur Snell’s “Doomsday Watch: The War in Ukraine”. In the evening, if there’s no breaking news I need to follow, I sit and listen, and I love it. So I’ll post the link to the first episode here, and I hope you enjoy it.
Episode 1: How Russia’s febrile history, Putin’s paranoid resentment and Western complacency led to an historic crime against a peaceful nation, the destruction of the rules-based international order, the largest European land action since the Second World War… and a conflict of unprecedented brutality.
In weekly episodes Arthur Snell talks to soldiers, civilians, analysts and journalists to tell the story of the war and capture the enormity of Russia’s crimes. This is the first draft of history.