Sept 2 Buonasera Mag
Day 191: Zaporizhzhia, Kherson, Pushilin, EU gas cap, RU illegal arms shipping, Estonia, LEGO, ENI, US chips. Arts & Posts: Lukashenko, Rob Lee, Ben Schmitt, Hoaxlines, OCCRP, Putin's agents in GER
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.
Zaporizhzhia
Russian officials at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station are manipulating and distorting information shared with IAEA officials, Ukrainian officials have said.
Ukrainian state owned operator Energoatom said Russian officials “are making every effort to prevent the International Atomic Energy Agency mission from getting to know the real state of affairs” at the Russian-held power plant.
“They spread manipulative and false information about this visit,” the company added in a statement shared to its Telegram channel this morning.
Rafael Grossi: “It is obvious that the plant and physical integrity of the plant has been violated several times. I worried, I worry and I will continue to be worried about the plant until we have a situation which is more stable, which is more predictable.”
Lithuania suggests sending UN Police to Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant. Arunas Paulauskas, a senior Lithuanian police official, said that the UN police corps could ensure the security of a long-term mission of the UN nuclear agency on the site.
Stories we’re following…
Kherson: we can’t say much about what is happening, but various feeds are saying that Ukrainian troops have “pushed back” Russian forces at “several points” around Kherson. Officials estimate that around 20,000 Russian troops are in the pocket of the southern region.
The Russian-installed head of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), Denis Pushilin, has restated the expansionist military aims of Russia’s invasion, saying “Our task is to liberate all Russian cities that were founded by Russian people during the time of the Russian Empire, and developed during the Soviet Union thanks to the help of our entire vast country. And this is not only the territories of Novorossia [the Donbas], but also much wider. It will not be any other way.”
The Russian Orthodox Church will begin assisting schools in Donbass to establish an education curriculum that promotes the importance of Orthodox Christian culture, socially conservative values and prayer life.
Ukraine’s agriculture ministry has said grain exports are down 54.5% year-on-year in the 2022/23 season so far at 4.16m tonnes, Reuters reports.
Russian forces fail to open schools in occupied Mariupol. An advisor to Mariupol mayor Petro Andriushchenko said that only first and last-grade students "were forced" to attend homerooms on Sept. 1. Five out of 16 schools in the city that the occupying forces said were ready to open do not have roofs, Andriushchenko said.
LEGO Foundation donates $13.4 million to support education of Ukrainian children.
Ukraine claims Russia transporting weapons to Black Sea ports using cargo ships. Ukraine requested Turkey to take action against four Russian cargo ships allegedly delivering military equipment from a Russian base in Syria through the Bosporus on to the Black Sea ports in support of Russia's war effort.
Russian forces forcibly move Ukrainians to Russia. According to a new report by Human Rights Watch, Ukrainians are being transferred to Russia or Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine. Russia also subjected thousands of Ukrainians to a form of compulsory, punitive, and abusive security screening called “filtration,” the nonprofit said.
Western Allies Expected to Commit to Russian Oil Price Cap today: On Thursday (September 1), The Wall Street Journal reported that finance ministers from the G-7 will meet on Friday to endorse a multilateral effort to set a price cap on Russian oil and commit to finalizing their plans by the end of the year.
Janet Yellen, the US treasury secretary, has said that a G7 price cap on Russian oil would help fight inflation while delivering a blow to Moscow’s ability to finance its war in Ukraine.
The Kremlin has warned it will stop selling oil to countries that impose price caps on Russia’s energy resources. Peskov told reporters today: “Companies that impose a price cap will not be among the recipients of Russian oil. We simply will not cooperate with them on non-market principles. One thing can be said with confidence: such a move will lead to a significant destabilisation of the oil markets.”
German Government Announces Fifth Floating LNG Terminal: Berlin has arranged for a fifth floating liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal in order to increase the amount of LNG the country is able to import, which may be a boon to the country’s landlocked neighbors.
Eni hit by cyberattack. The computer network of Italian energy major Eni was hacked, Bloomberg reports. According to a company representative, “internal protection systems have detected unauthorized access to the company network in recent days.” Between August 28 and 29, unknown cybercriminals breached GSE, the State-controlled energy services operator, overseeing (among other things) the storing and distribution of natural gas and renewable power.
Russian Oligarchs Moor Superyachts in Turkey: According to research by The Times, a quarter of the superyachts suspected of being owned by Russian oligarchs are moored in Turkish waters, where they cannot be seized. The total value of oligarchs’ fleet in Turkish waters is estimated at £2.2 billion.
US restricts computer chips sales to China, Russia. The U.S. has limited sales of high-end graphics processing units that power supercomputers and artificial intelligence, the NYT reported. Supercomputers are used for weapons development and intelligence gathering.
EU Publishes Guidance on Asset Freezes: On August 26, and August 30, 2022, the European Commission updated the FAQ on Asset Freezes. The Commission answered two questions relating to employment contracts and beneficial ownership.
Scholz Pitches Major EU Enlargement — with Reform: The EU should significantly expand but must first undergo fundamental reforms to ensure an enlarged bloc can still function, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Monday.
Military analyst Rob Lee on Ukraine’s push to liberate Kherson and Russia’s manpower problem- Meduza
Ukraine’s long-awaited counteroffensive to recover territories in the southern Kherson region is now underway, but the situation at the front remains under wraps. The Ukrainian Defense Ministry has barred journalists from reporting in front-line areas and has urged the press “not to question the actions of the command and not to serve as additional tools in the hands of Russian propaganda.” (Russian state media claimed that the counteroffensive had failed before it had even begun.) In this context, one of the only ways to assess the situation on the ground is to sift through and verify bits and pieces of open-source information.
This morning, September 2, a long line of people willing to donate blood lined up in the Mykolaiv regional blood transfusion station. The institution's administration expressed admiration for the people of Mykolaiv and sincerely thanked them for their help.
Hoaxlines, Jack Posobiec and QAnon groups amplifying Russian state-affiliated and pro-Kremlin posts about the power plant
In the case of one QAnon group with over 100,000 subscribers, the admin shared a post titled “Russian Defence Ministry report on the progress of the special military operation in Ukraine” from August 28, 2022. This specific QAnon group describes itself as a “Special Qperation,” which is the Kremlin’s euphemism to refer to its brutal invasion of Ukraine.
OCCRP, The Banality of Brutality (must read)
What was it really like to live through those 33 days of occupation?
OCCRP and its Ukrainian partner Slidstvo.Info obtained the logs of a Telegram chat used by 88 people from a single apartment building in Bucha, known as Block 17.
“I opened my eyes. I couldn’t see anything. The plaster had fallen off. The ceiling had collapsed. Luckily, I have a habit of sleeping with my mouth open — otherwise my eardrums would have ruptured.”
Speigal International, How Putin's Agents Are Infiltrating Germany
The purported married couple Andreas and Heidrun Anschlag, who worked for the foreign intelligence service SWR from a single-family home in Michelbach in the German state of Hesse, behaved less conspicuously. At events, the two would speak to members of the military and businessmen, politicians and scientists. The husband had taken a job at an automotive supply company as his cover.
Emil Advaliani, Georgia: A Deluge of Russians- CEPA
The Russians are coming to Georgia. This time at least they’re not in tanks, but as visitors either arriving as tourists or staying in the country indefinitely. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine forced many liberal Russians to flee the country, and Georgia which offers a unilateral visa-free regime, quite naturally represented an attractive destination.
School in Ukraine started yesterday like this…
This is how some Ukrainians started school in Estonia
Spiegel, Mo, Spiegel! Great dispatch, though.