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.
Ukrainian Art History: “A year ago, died genial Ukrainian artist Liubov Panchenko (born 1938). She died after the russian occupation in Bucha, Kyiv region. She died because of starvation and dehydration. One month after the liberation of Bucha, doctors were fighting for her life. We remember.”
Stories we’re following…
The Russian forces have begun a renewed pre-dawn massive missile attack over the past 24 hours in 9 oblasts, killing 1 civilian over past day. Russian forces have attacked Sumy, Chernihiv, Kharkiv, Kherson, Mykolaiv, Zaporizhzhia, Dnipropetrovsk, Luhansk, and Donetsk oblasts. The strikes were aimed mostly at railway and other Ukrainian infrastructure but also hit civilian targets.
Explosions reported in Kyiv. Ukraine's Presidential Office head Andrii Yermak said air defense is at work amid a massive air raid alert on May 1. According to preliminary information, all russian missiles and UAVs were shot down in the airspace of Kyiv by air defense forces, — the Kyiv State City Administration.
The Russian occupation forces carried out an attack on the city of Kherson, causing private houses to go up in flames and injuring at least one civilian. Russian aircraft also dropped bombs on a village in Kherson Oblast on Monday evening.
At least 34 known to be injured, including five children, after Pavlohrad attack. Suspilne, Ukraine’s state broadcaster, has reported updated casualty figures after the attack on the Ukrainian city of Pavlohrad overnight which appeared to have targeted an ammunition depot as well as striking apartment buildings and homes.
Minister urges Ukrainians in occupied territories to refuse Russian passports contrary to Ombudsman's advice. "My recommendations to Ukrainians in the temporarily occupied territories remain the same: do not take Russian passports, do not cooperate with the occupiers, leave if possible, wait for the Armed Forces," Minister for Reintegration of the Temporarily Occupied Territories Iryna Vereshchuk wrote on May 1.
Russian occupiers are preparing for a possible future evacuation from the territory of the temporarily occupied Zaporizhzhia Oblast, according to the National Resistance Center. The Centre also reports that the Russian occupation forces are issuing instructions to destroy documents and military equipment. Days earlier, it was reported that top managers of branches of Russian companies in the temporarily occupied Crimea were instructed to prepare for evacuation, and prepare shelters for those remaining.
According to the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, around 70 residents of the eastern city of Luhansk and its outskirts forcibly mobilised to fight on the Russian side are being killed each day. The General Staff also reported that hospitals in the Russian-occupied city of Luhansk are struggling to deal with the increasing number of injured Russian soldiers.
“To prevent expressions of discontent among local residents, funeral services have been advised to limit the number of people attending funeral processions to six people and also insists that the dead be cremated rather than buried."
Tass reports that Alexander Bogomaz, governor of Bryansk, has posted to his Telegram channel to say that a freight train was derailed as a result of an explosive device blowing up on railway tracks in the region.
Meanwhile, Aleksandr Drozdenko, governor of Leningrad region, has claimed on his Telegram channel that a power transmission line support was blown up there. He wrote that an explosive device was also found on a second power pylon, but that electricity supplies had not been disrupted.
Some of the staff of the German embassy in Russia, declared persona non grata after Berlin expelled Russians engaged in an activity incompatible with their diplomatic status, returned home on Monday. This was announced by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Federal Republic of Germany in a statement quoted by AFP.
CDS Daily Brief: Vladimir Putin addressed his rubberstamp parliament on the day of parliamentarianism. set the priority for his government to support his war efforts and integrate the newly annexed Ukrainian territories. "These are our historical lands and native people for us. Many of you have been there. How do they differ from the other part and other parts of our people? In no way. This is part of our people. And we must do everything to defend and protect their unequivocal choice - to return to Russia," he said.
CDS Daily Brief: Russian Ministry of Education presented a new history textbook for 11th graders, including a chapter on why Russia started the war in Ukraine. "Schoolchildren need to be explained why the "special operation" was inevitable - that is why a section on "special operation" will appear in the new history textbook," the minister said.
7 Known 'Wagner Cemeteries' in Russia and Occupied Ukraine. The discovery of mass burial sites for slain Wagner fighters has shed light on the mounting death toll suffered by Russian forces in Ukraine as the conflict enters its 15th month. While there are no official figures available for Wagner’s war losses, U.S. officials claimed over 30,000 Wagner fighters had been injured or killed as of February 2023.[continue]
Poland’s ministry of foreign affairs, Łukasz Jasina, has issued a statement condemning the former children’s ombudsman of Russia, Pavel Astakhov, for comments he made on Russian state TV that murdering ambassadors is “within the framework of international law”, with specific reference to Poland’s ambassador.
Péter Szijjártó on Facebook, in response to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s statement, said that his country has paid "too high a price" for the war in Ukraine. This was in response to president Zelensky’s statement that Hungary’s behaviour, and its relations with Russia, contravened its status as a NATO ally state. “Many Hungarians”, he added, “members of the Hungarian community in Zakarpattia, have already been killed in this war.”
CDS Daily Brief: Angela Merkel defended her disastrous Russian energy overdependence policy and called for a possible negotiated solution to the Ukraine-Russia war. She believes it was right to try everything possible to avert the war though those efforts failed. Yet she doesn't want to admit that her desire to create a common space from Lisbon to Vladivostok after Russia's aggression against Georgia and greenlighting the Nord Stream II without any security assistance to Ukraine after the illegal annexation of Crimea and Moscow's proxy war in Donbas were read by Russians as an invitation to push further.
Monique: I’m with Anne-Elisabeth! I won’t be buying any more of these products, nor will I be stepping into Auchan in Siena. I’m also boycotting all Italian brands that continue to run businesses in Russia.
A top official in a pro-Russian political party was detained at a Moldovan airport as she prepared to leave the country. The May 1 detention of Marina Tauber was announced by the Moldova’s Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office, which has accused her of involvement in illegal funding of the Shor Party. Tauber’s detention comes days before another planned anti-government demonstration.
Novaya Gazeta interviewed Jan Lipavský, the Foreign Minister of Czechia, on the country’s support of Ukraine, visa bans for Russians, the attitudes within Czech society, and Russian imperialism.
We don’t want to be part of Russia. Ukrainians made a clear decision that they want to be part of this [Western] society, and I am ready to help them to defend themselves from Russian imperialism. I do not blame any single citizen for that. I blame Russian imperialism which needs to be rooted out, because this is what endangers my country and the way we live.
The Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Andrii Melnyk, in an interview withMorgen Post said that "[a] rotten compromise cannot ensure a stable peace for all of us, at most - a fragile truce. Any talk of negotiations is also complete nonsense because the Russians do not want to negotiate at all”.
Alicia Kearns, UK Conservative MP and chair of the foreign affairs select committee at the HoC, has tweeted in favour of what she calls “an ‘economic “Ramstein”’ of those fighting for Ukraine’s freedom.” Responding to a thread of figures, published by Robin Brooks, showing that sanctions have not had as a big an impact on Russia’s economy as western nations had intended, she said:
This highly detailed thread gives even more credence to the need for an ‘Economic “Ramstein”’ of those fighting for Ukraine’s freedom. It is clear we have failed to adequately financially suffocate Putin’s war machine, and we must prevent him being able to fund his attacks on civilians. We can only do that if we mobilise as governments to coordinate economically as well as militarily.
Ukraine and the Turkish company Baykar signed three new agreements for Ukrainian manufacturers during the international aviation exhibition Teknofest 2023 at Istanbul's Ataturk Airport, as reported by Oleksandr Kamyshin, Minister of Strategic Industries of Ukraine.
Russia’s Olympic Committee has complained that a recommendation that would allow Russian and Belarusian athletes to return to competition only as neutral participants was “excessive and discriminatory.” The IOC is to decide on the participation of Russian and Belarusian athletes at the 2024 Paris Games at a later date. Ukraine has threatened to boycott the event if Russians are allowed to compete there.
Oleksandra Matviichuk, April 30: “Today at Leipziger Buchmesse 2023 I was asked about the role of intellectuals. I said it's time to take responsibility. Many of them have been looking at our part of the world through the Russian prism for too long. Russia used its culture as a weapon to dominate other peoples and destroy other cultures. And many intellectuals helped to do this by repeating Russian narratives.”
Seriously, we can do without [Twitter]. After all, this is just a foreign social network operating in the interests of the American establishment. We quite cynically used it to advance our propaganda goals.
Our main task is completely different: to inflict a devastating defeat on all enemies – the Ukronazis, the US, their minions in Nato, including vile Poland, and other western nits.
We must finally return all our lands. Forever protect all of our people. We will work hard for this.
Happy 1 May everyone!
List of nuclear threats from the Russian leadership under Putin
Gallop Poll: Disapproval of Russia’s leadership hit a record-high 57% worldwide in 2022. Majorities in 81 out of 137 countries disapproved of Russia’s leadership. Approval dropped to a new low of 21%.
Pope Francis in Hungary
Pope Francis said that the Vatican is involved in a peace mission to try to end the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, adding that it was also ready to help repatriate Ukrainian children taken to Russia or Russian-occupied land.
“There is a mission in course now but it is not yet public. When it is public, I will reveal it,” the pope told reporters according to Reuters.
“I think that peace is always made by opening channels. You can never achieve peace through closure. ... This is not easy.”
The pope added that he had spoken about the situation in Ukraine with Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban and with Metropolitan (bishop) Hilarion, a representative of the Russian Orthodox Church in Budapest.
“In these meetings we did not just talk about Little Red Riding Hood. We spoke of all these things. Everyone is interested in the road to peace,” he said.
This report details changes in the Russian military command since Russia began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine without a clear and doctrinal command structure and his reluctance to appoint an overall theater commander have had lasting effects on the structure of the Russian command in Ukraine.
Putin’s regular command changes have led to an increasingly factionalized Russian military and disorganized command structures that are degrading the Russian military’s ability to conduct a cohesive campaign in Ukraine. Factions are not a phenomenon particular to the Russian military, although their current dynamics within the Russian military are shaping decision making to an unusual degree. The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) and the Kremlin have been deliberately vague about most of these command changes.
ISW’s timeline of the changes is based on official Russian statements as well as analysis of unconfirmed claims and reports from Russian, Ukrainian, and Western sources. The exact dates of command changes are based on the first reporting of a change and may not correspond with the formal date on which a change occurred. These command changes were likely not discrete events resulting from decisions made suddenly but were instead drawn-out bureaucratic affairs. [continue reading]
Programming note…
EuroFile on Zoom: we’ll be holding our first ever EuroFile on Zoom for paid subscribers tomorrow at 6pm CET (Rome) to chat about current affairs, your questions and comments and just to get to know each other.
The link will be sent out an hour before kickoff. I hope to see you there.
