Mar 8: Buonasera Mag
Day 378: Sevastopol RUbarbarity Bakhmut China Malofeev Novashov Ivanov TransparancyInt'l Memorial 307UAchildren UAeco trolls NATO EUgas-A&Ps-Lautman ISW Zelensky Alander Cuda
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.
On Monday, a video was shared online in which an unarmed Ukrainian soldier, Tymofiy Mykolayovych Shadura, was shot dead after saying "Slava Ukraini (Glory to Ukraine)," a Ukrainian national salute. I won’t post the video. Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba asks the ICC to investigate the execution.
Stories we’re following…
The Russian-installed governor of Sevastopol in Crimea has denied reports that explosions have been heard near Belbek airbase. Russian state-owned media Tass quotes Mikhail Razvozhaev’s Telegram channel, where he has posted:
The public is again writing about some kind of explosion near the airfield. This is a lie. Ship crews are training in the outer road. Everything is calm in the city.
Russian forces carried out 50 airstrikes and five missile strikes overnight and Ukrainian forces repelled 37 attacks in the area around Bakhmut, according to the latest update by the General staff of the armed forces of Ukraine.
President Zelensky’s vow to defend Bakhmut following a meeting with senior military officials may be at odds with the developing situation on the ground.
Cabinet of Ministers approves mandatory evacuation of families with children from active combat zones. Children being evacuated from active combat zones must be accompanied by a parent or legal guardian, the Ministry of Integration clarified.
The situation is “stable and controlled” in the Luhansk region the governor, Serhiy Haidai said. In a post on Telegram, Haidai said the number of attacks in the direction of Bilogorivka and Kreminnaya had increased. Today, he said, the Russians have “pulled back to replenish their reserves”.
NYT story: I’m posting the story for awareness, “Intelligence Suggests Pro-Ukrainian Group Sabotaged Pipelines, U.S. Officials Say” - again NYT is publishing a story on supposition with no real details. What is going on at the NYT?
“U.S. officials declined to disclose the nature of the intelligence, how it was obtained or any details of the strength of the evidence it contains. They have said that there are no firm conclusions about it, leaving open the possibility that the operation might have been conducted off the books by a proxy force with connections to the Ukrainian government or its security services.”
“U.S. officials who have been briefed on the intelligence are divided about how much weight to put on the new information. All of them spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss classified intelligence and matters of sensitive diplomacy.”
Russia has lost 5 times more soldiers in Bakhmut than Ukraine. Russian troops have lost at least five service people for every Ukrainian soldier killed defending Donetsk Oblast's Bakhmut, CNN reported on March 6, citing an unnamed NATO military official.
Chinese foreign minister China’s Qin Gang has defended the close friendship between China and Russia, a relationship closely watched by the west in light of the war in Ukraine. He said the ties between Beijing and Moscow “set an example for global foreign relations”.
The United States should change its "distorted" attitude towards China or "conflict and confrontation" will follow, China's foreign minister said, while defending its stance on the war in Ukraine and its close ties with Russia.
PMC "Wagner" began to recruit patients of psychiatric hospitals. Engaged in conflict with the Defense Ministry and cut off from the possibility of recruiting prisoners, the head of the PMC "Wagner" Evgeny Prigozhin has switched to the psychiatric hospitals.
Russian FSB claims it prevented an assassination attempt on conservative media group founder Konstantin Malofeev by the head of the Russian Volunteer Corps. The same unit that raided two towns in Bryansk last week.
Agence France-Presse reports that Prigozhin would not comment on defence minister Sergei Shoigu’s earlier remarks that the capture of the eastern Ukrainian town of Bakhmut was key to launching a further offensive in the wider region. He estimated that between “12,000 and 20,000” Ukrainian troops were still defending the city. “It is very complicated to kill between 12,000-20,000 Ukrainian soldiers by tomorrow morning. Such masters only exist in the depths of the general staff or at Soyuzmultfilm,” Prigozhin said, referring to the Russian cartoon studio founded in the Soviet era.
Belarus claims to have detained sabotage group who targeted Russian planes near Minsk. Belarus detained on Tuesday what it said was a Ukrainian “terrorist group” working with Kyiv’s intelligence services over attempted sabotage at a Belarusian airfield, Reuters reports, citing the Belta news agency.
Andrey Novashov, the first journalist to be convicted of spreading “disinformation” about the Russian army, is sentenced to eight months of corrective labor. Novashov was first charged after he made an anti-war post on social media in March 2022. He pleaded not guilty to the charges and intends to appeal his sentence.
“Peace to Ukraine, freedom to Russia! My example should not scare you. We have to do a lot to live in the country we deserve and to end this war.”
“You must understand that Russia is not Putin. Tens of millions of Russians are against this criminal war … This is a dark moment in our history, but it is always darkest before dawn,” Ivanov added.
Russia’s Prosecutor General has officially declared the anti-corruption non-profit Transparency International “undesirable” in Russia. According to an official statement about this decision, Transparency International “intrudes in Russia’s internal affairs, presenting a threat to Russia’s constitutional foundations and state security.”
Russian federal officials begin investigation human rights workers at Memorial for “rehabilitating Nazism”- reportedly for disseminating “false information” about Soviet actions during WWII. The source says authorities suspect that Memorial included individuals who collaborated with fascists during World War II on a list of repressed people. The criminal case reportedly involves “unidentified employees” of the human rights organization.
Ombudsman: Ukraine has returned 307 children from occupied territories. Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets reported on March 6 that an 8-year-old boy was recently returned to Ukraine from the occupied territories.
Economy ministry cuts Ukraine's 2023 GDP growth forecast to 1%. Ukraine's Ministry of Economy has lowered its GDP growth forecast for 2023 to 1%, the Interfax Ukraine news agency reported on March 6, citing Deputy Minister Oleksii Sobolev.
UN secretary-general, Antonio Guterres, will meet President Zelensky in Kyiv on Wednesday to discuss extending a deal with Moscow that allows the Black Sea export of Ukraine grains, according to Reuters.
Five EU members in September proposed that the bloc must stop importing diamonds from Russia, but Belgium rejected the ban. A US industry trade association—the Jewelers Vigilance Committee—is warning diamond traders to prepare for new sanctions. “Russia continues to earn billions of dollars from the diamond trade, and the discussion centered on the most effective and impactful ways to disrupt that revenue stream,” the report says.
More on EU Sanctions: 9 individuals and 3 organizations are expected to be listed under these measures, which will be part of the human rights sanctions regime, said one of the diplomats. They stressed that this is the first time this framework will be used to punish violence against women.
PoliticoEU: Today, EU countries were supposed to give the final sign-off on a landmark law that effectively bans the sale of new gasoline and diesel-powered cars from 2035. The vote was meant to be a formality — EU countries and the European Parliament last year agreed on the law, which is a cornerstone of Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s plan to make the bloc climate neutral by 2050. Germany is threatening to derail the plan at the last second — forcing a delay of the vote until the Commission passes new exemptions that many warn will undermine the law. [continue reading]
EU defense ministers meet today in Stockholm to discuss joint weapons procurement for Ukraine. EU industry chief Thierry Breton is eyeing ways to turbo-charge a new EU program for joint weapons procurement and to use it as a front-line vehicle for getting Europe’s manufacturers scaled up to wartime production needs.
Britain's government will set out plans for a new law barring those entering the country through unofficial routes from claiming asylum, in a bid to stop migrants arriving on its shores in small boats. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has made stopping boat arrivals one of his five key priorities.
Minna Ålander, Future security architecture in Europe- Say Trump wins?
Europeans - and Germans most of all - need contingency plans. Germany has been able to rely on strong transatlantic backing because Biden is extraordinarily accommodating, and as damage control after the Trump years, has been willing to give Scholz all the Extrawurst he needed.
Even if Trump doesn’t return, any republican administration is likely to be much less understanding with Germany’s hesitant adaptation to the changed circumstances and slow progress in bearing the responsibility for European security that corresponds to its economic weight.
And it’s not just republicans: also democrats are growing more impatient with the constant need to hold Germany’s hand when it comes to Ukraine military aid and with the lack of long-term strategy in Germany’s Zeitenwende.
After big announcements, Germany is expected to deliver. The current German government would likely have a very hard time to work with a Trump 2.0 administration (and can’t be blamed for that).All the more reason to start making contingency plans for the worst case scenario. There is currently no way around the transatlantic alliance
But there is one country for which the return of Trump would be no problem: Poland under PiS-government. There has been a lot of talk about power in Europe shifting to the east and Poland has been singled out for its staunch support of Ukraine & steep increase of defence spending Poland’s economy is still far from Germany and France - and economic power is what matters in the EU.
But as security has returned to the agenda, Poland can indeed become a key player. Either if there is a pro-European change in govt, bringing Poland back to European mainstream.
Or, if Trump indeed returns and PiS stays in power, Poland would be a like-minded partner for a second Trump administration. That could lead to a scenario where the US focuses more on deepening security cooperation with Poland instead of dealing with Germany’s peculiarities.
The best scenario for Europe and the West would be if Biden stays in power, Germany gets serious about delivering on Zeitenwende now and not in 10 years, and France starts seeing European strategic autonomy as complementary to US presence instead of an alternative.
Heidi Cuda, How I Lost My Father to Fox News- Bylines Supplement
I divorced broadcast news in 2013 – I, too, had started to drift and needed to make my way back to my pre-Fox self. But by then my dad was hooked. That so many of his immigrant friends also became radicalised at the time seemed confusing to me then, but looking back, it is all becoming clear.
Fox News was preying on older, white men, getting them hooked on right-wing victimhood.
“What happened to Dad?” asked filmmaker Jen Senko at the beginning of her documentary The Brainwashing of My Dad. She intended to find out. Her film is a personal story similar to mine – where she watched her father who “never had an unkind word to say about anyone” become angry and radicalised by watching Fox News and listening to Rush Limbaugh. Her father also started receiving aggressive right-wing emails around 2011.
Both our fathers were smart, successful professionals, and Senko bristles when radicalised people are dismissed as ‘stupid’.
“I think that’s stupid,” she told Byline Supplement. “Because then you don’t get at the root problem.”