Nov 17 Buonasera Mag
Day 266: MA17, Dzhankoi, Odesa, Dnipro, Naftogaz, grain, Poland, HUN, FIN, Pelosi, EU-A&Ps-Avdeeva, Zelensky, Kuleba, Milley, Tokariuk, Babij, Scherba, MacDonald, Hudson, Walsh
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…
The Hague District Court found Russians Igor Girkin and Sergey Dubinsky, and a Ukrainian Leonid Kharchenko guilty of shooting down the Boeing 777 flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur on July 17, 2014, and killing all 298 people on board. The fourth suspect, a Russian citizen Oleg Pulatov, was acquitted. Girkin, Dubinsky, and Kharchenko were sentenced to life inprisonment and paying a 16 million euros in compensation to the relatives of the victims. The suspects were tried in absentia.
Explosions are being reported in the occupied town of Dzhankoi in Crimea. According to Ukrainian media reports, a Russian airfield was hit. Ukrinform said the explosions were heard late on Wednesday evening, citing local Telegram channels.
Russia carried out another mass strike on Ukraine today. Strikes on critical infrastructure in Odesa and Dnipro have been confirmed by the presidential administration and the respective regional heads. In Kyiv and Dnipro, air defence systems are working to shoot down incoming rockets, say officials. Unofficial channels are reporting the use of air defence systems in several other cities across Ukraine.
Isobel Koshiw from Dnipro: mayor Borys Filatov says a city hall employee was caught up in this morning’s attack while at helping infirm, elderly women as part of their job. He said that the employee is being operated on and published a picture of shrapnel fragment which has pierced their coat.
This is the coat. And this is a fragment. ... The coat belongs to an employee of the city hall. My employee. She is now being operated on. …
During today’s rocket (attack), she and her colleague were just doing their job. Helping infirm elderly women. ...
When you (say) your prayers to heaven, please do not forget words of thanks for ordinary people: social security workers, postmen, energy workers, doctors, rescuers, utility workers. All those who fight without weapons in their hands and save our lives.
Naftogaz chief executive Oleksiy Chernyshov said Russia had carried out a “massive attack” on the infrastructure of gas producer Ukrgazvydobuvannia in eastern Ukraine. Cherynshov said: “Currently, we know of several objects that have been destroyed. Others have suffered damage of varying degrees.”
Ukraine’s infrastructure minister, Oleksandr Kubrakov has said that the Black Sea grain initiative will be prolonged for 120 days. He said in a tweet that the deal was agreed between UN General Secretary Antonio Guterres and Ukraine’s president, Volodimir Zelenskiy. He added that Ukraine had officially appealed to extend the initiative, which was agreed in July and enables Russian and Ukrainian wheat and fertilisers to be exported through the Black Sea, for one year and to include the Mykolaiv port.
Ukrainian investigators in the region of Kherson have uncovered 63 bodies bearing signs of torture after Russian forces left, said Ukraine’s interior minister Denys Monastyrsky.
President Zelensky says Ukraine wants to establish all the facts surrounding the missile that landed in Poland on Tuesday, killing two people. Zelensky said in his daily video address that "clarification of all the circumstances of how Russian aggression crossed the Polish border" was now an issue before the UN Security Council.
"The Ukrainian position is very transparent: we want to establish all the details, every fact. That is why we need our experts to join the work of the international investigation and to get access to all the data available to our partners and to the site of the explosion."
Poland will not invoke Article 4 of the NATO Treaty in connection with the fall of a missile in the village of Przewodów, said Prime Minister Morawiecki in an interview with the TVP channel.
Ukrainian investigators have arrived at the site in eastern Poland struck by a missile on Tuesday, a source has told CNN. A joint Polish and US investigation is underway at the site outside Przewodow.
I thanked the U.S. for its crucial defense assistance and emphasized that deliveries of air defense systems to Ukraine need to be sped up. NASAMS have proved their efficiency already. I am also convinced that the time for “Patriots” has come./2
The international payment system Payoneer will finally suspend operations in Russia, Russia’s DTF media outlet reported on Nov. 15, with reference to an email received by Russian clients. The company suspended its activities in Russia in early March 2022, closing the registration of new accounts. However, these restrictions could be bypassed using VPN and third-party services.
The Security Service of Ukraine put the head of the Chechen Republic Ramzan Kadyrov on the wanted list. Data about this published on the website of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine. Kadyrov is listed as "a person hiding from the pre-trial investigation authorities."
Lithuanians bought marine drone for Ukraine for $250 000 and with amazing 12 000 votes in just several hours named it "PEACE Дец" Our best wishes for peace go for russian Black Sea fleet Funding for another drone from Lithuania is underway.
Finland will send its biggest military aid package for Ukraine so far, worth EUR 55 million.
The EU’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell has said Russia has shown no signs of being ready to withdraw its troops from Ukraine. Borrell told Reuters: “I am afraid Russia is not ready to withdraw and as far as it doesn’t withdraw, peace will not be possible.” He added: “It is Russia who has to make peace possible, the aggressor has to withdraw if he wants a sustainable peace.”
The European Commission has called for Bulgaria, Croatia, and Romania to be admitted to the Schengen area to allow travel between these countries and most of Europe without border controls.
The Russian state-controlled RT media group says it has launched an online Serbian-language project, RT Balkan. "The new multimedia website will cover the most important regional and international events from an alternative point of view," RT announced on November 15, adding that a new television station broadcasting in Serbian will be operational by 2024.
Republicans have won back control of the U.S. House of Representatives — but are on track for only the smallest of majorities despite pre-election predictions that a red wave was coming, our Stateside colleagues report.
Malta is set to change its abortion laws to allow doctors to terminate a pregnancy when the woman’s health is at grave risk. The move comes after American woman, Andrea Prudente, was refused an abortion in Malta despite the risk to her life.
Nancy Pelosi to step down as House Speaker: Ms. Pelosi rose to prominence in California as the leader of the state party, then as a member of the U.S. House from San Francisco and finally as the determined force at the helm of House Democrats.
Top US general: Russia has lost strategically, operationally and tactically- CNN
Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Mark Milley says Russia has failed "every single" objective in its war against Ukraine.
“Russians have failed every single time. They’ve lost strategically, they’ve lost operationally and, I repeat, they lost tactically. What they’ve tried to do, they failed at,” Milley said Wednesday at a press conference with Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin after a meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group. “The strategic reframing of their objectives, of their illegal invasion, have all failed, every single one of them.”
Milley listed Russia’s failure to “overrun all of Ukraine” at the start of the war as well as after their refocus on the Donbas region and the capture of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson.
“Across the entire frontline trace of some 900 or so kilometers, the Ukrainians have achieved success after success after success, and the Russians have failed every single time,” said Milley.
Larissa Babij, a Kind of Refugee / 13.11.2022
The 7th floor is quiet after climbing the stairs. No children screaming across the hall. No cat face—eyes flashing green in the dark—to greet me when I open the apartment door.
Now my life is structured by the schedule of rolling blackouts: 4 hours off, 5 hours on, 4 hours off… The schedule varies from day to day. Mondays, Thursdays and Sundays are the worst: the power is off from 9 AM—1 PM and again from 6—10 PM. If I have to go out and meet somebody in the afternoon, I have practically no chance to work at the computer with Internet. Scrambling to finish my shower or an email that can’t wait till tomorrow, I anticipate the impending power cut. But the abrupt change to total darkness is always a shock.
Michael Kofman: 'After Kherson, gains for Ukraine may come at slower pace'- The Kyiv Independent
The KI: Now that the Ukrainian forces have retaken Kherson, what prospects does it open for the counteroffensive? How can Ukraine use this momentum?
Michael Kofman: I think Ukraine has the initiative, and from the standpoint of morale it does have momentum. Ukraine may now shift the bulk of the forces there to a different front, but they likely need rest and refit. The fighting in Kherson was grinding and costly.
As winter approaches, November and December in particular are difficult months to conduct offensives. Russian forces will seek to entrench for the winter, using the Dnieper (Dnipro River) as a natural defensive barrier in the south. In the east their position remains vulnerable, trying to retain a defensive line between Troitske, Svatove, Kreminna. It may be smart for Ukraine to keep pushing now, before mobilization can increase Russian manpower availability in 3-4 months, but weather conditions and force availability may make that unsound. The short answer is, it depends.
John Hudson, U.S. intelligence report says key gulf ally meddled in American politics- WaPo
The United Arab Emirates steered U.S. foreign policy in its favor through a series of legal and illegal exploits, according to an unprecedented U.S. intelligence document.
The activities covered in the report, described to The Washington Post by three people who have read it, include illegal and legal attempts to steer U.S. foreign policy in ways favorable to the Arab autocracy. It reveals the UAE’s bid, spanning multiple U.S. administrations, to exploit the vulnerabilities in American governance, including its reliance on campaign contributions, susceptibility to powerful lobbying firms and lax enforcement of disclosure laws intended to guard against interference by foreign governments, these people said. Each spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss classified information.
Walsh, Russian spying in Europe dealt ‘significant blow’ since Ukraine war, MI5 chief says- CNN
Russia’s ability to spy in Europe has been dealt the “most significant strategic blow” in recent history after coordinated expulsions of diplomats since the invasion of Ukraine, with a hundred diplomatic visa requests refused in the UK alone in recent years, according to the head of the UK’s security services, MI5.
“We’ve continued to work intensively to make the UK the hardest possible operating environment for Russian covert action,” said McCallum. “In the UK’s case, since our removal for 23 Russian spies posing as diplomats, we have refused on national security grounds over 100 diplomatic visa applications … the serious point is that the UK must be ready for Russian aggression for years to come.”