Nobody interested in the Russia-Ukraine conflict?

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Trying to find logic in Russian explanations?
They claim Ukrainians are nazi just for being Ukrainians, Russia is a saint just for being Russia and all the evidence suggesting otherwise has to be ignored. That's all.

A few weeks ago, Serhiy was a business analyst at an IT company. Zakhar was a civil engineer. Now they are soldiers, training to liberate Ukraine from Russia’s invasion — but doing it more than 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometers) away in Britain.

They are among several hundred Ukrainian recruits pounding through an intense form of infantry training at an army base in southeast England. One batch of the 10,000 Ukrainian soldiers that the British military has pledged to train within 120 days, they are spending several weeks learning skills including marksmanship, battlefield first aid and –- crucially for their country’s future — urban warfare.

As the Ukrainians practice house-clearing amid the rattle of gunfire and pall from smoke grenades on a mock-townscape where British soldiers once trained for operations in Northern Ireland, they think about driving Russian troops from the streets of their own cities..

“The most important part is urban training, because it’s the most dangerous combat, in cities,” said Serhiy, who like the other Ukrainians did not want his full named used because of security concerns. “The British instructors have a lot of experience, from Iraq, Afghanistan. We can adapt all this knowledge to the Ukrainian situation and use it to liberate our country from Russian invasion.”

British trainers are putting the Ukrainian troops through a condensed version of the British Army’s infantry training, covering weapons handling, first aid, patrol tactics and the law of conflict. The aim is to turn raw recruits into battle-ready soldiers in a matter of weeks. The first batch arrived last month and have already been sent back to replenish depleted Ukrainian units.

Hutton says many of the Ukrainian troops have little military experience but “they are so motivated. They have a fantastic will to learn, and they just want to practice, practice and practice more.”

More than 1,000 U.K. personnel are involved in the training mission, taking place at four bases around the U.K. Other countries are also sending trainers, including Canada, the Netherlands, New Zealand and the Nordic nations.

Britain is sending the Ukrainians home with new uniforms, body armor, helmets and other gear, part of 2.3 billion pounds’ ($2.8 billion) worth of U.K. military aid to the country that also includes anti-tank missiles and sophisticated rocket-launch systems.

Zakhar, the former engineer, said it was hard to be away from Ukraine as fighting rages in the eastern Donbas region and in the south.

Brigadier Justin Stenhouse, who is in charge of the training as commander of the 11th Security Assistance Brigade, said seeing the motivation of the Ukrainians is “humbling.”

But he acknowledged that preparing for the chaos of urban combat is “almost impossible to do in training.” The goal of the mission, he said, is to “train them so they can adapt to survive in those early weeks of combat.”

“They will learn more in the first weeks of combat than we can possibly give them here,” he said.

“The most important part is urban training, because it’s the most dangerous combat, in cities,”

Kyiv and Moscow continued to accuse each other on Friday of shelling Europe's largest nuclear power plant, stoking international fears of a catastrophe on the continent as Russian President Vladimir Putin said independent inspectors should visit the Zaporizhzhia plant "as soon as possible."

"The Russian side confirmed its readiness to provide the (International Atomic Energy) Agency inspectors with the necessary assistance," the Kremlin said in a statement after a call between Putin and French President Emmanuel Macron - their first call in nearly three months, the AFP news agency reported.

"The two presidents will speak about this subject again in the next few days following discussions between the technical teams and before the deployment of the mission," a French readout of the call said.

Earlier, Nikolai Patrushev, the secretary of Russia's Security Council, accused the United States of encouraging Ukrainian attacks on the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in southern Ukraine. The facility has been controlled by Russian forces since shortly after the invasion began on Feb. 24.

"In case of a technological disaster, its consequences will be felt in every corner of the world," Patrushev said. "Washington, London and their accomplices will bear full responsibility for that."

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said Friday that Russian troops' presence at the plant actually assured that a "Chernobyl scenario" would not unfold there, the Reuters news agency reported.

Ukraine has accused Russia of storing troops and weapons at the Zaporizhzhia plant and using its grounds to launch strikes against Ukrainian-controlled territory. Ukrainian officials and military analysts say Moscow's forces have cynically employed the plant as a shield, knowing that the Ukrainians would be hesitant to fire back.

Russia has denied the accusations and, in turn, accused Ukrainian forces of repeatedly shelling the plant.

Meanwhile, Ukraine's Energoatom state nuclear company said Friday that Russian troops planned to disconnect the plant from the Ukrainian power grid, according to Reuters. In a statement, Energoatom said it thinks Moscow was preparing to carry out a "large-scale provocation" there.

Following a visit to Ukraine on Thursday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Zelenskyy had asked him to ensure that Russia remove weapons stored at the plant as an "important step for world peace."

Russian authorities said Sunday they had opened a murder investigation after the daughter of influential, ultra-nationalist philosopher Alexander Dugin was killed by a car bomb on the outskirts of Moscow.

The Russian Investigative Committee said it believed someone planned and ordered the car explosion that killed Darya Dugina, based on evidence already collected from the blast. "Taking into account the data already obtained, the investigation believes that the crime was pre-planned and was of an ordered nature," the investigative committee said in a statement Sunday.

Dugina died at the scene after "an explosive device, presumably installed in the Toyota Land Cruiser, went off on a public road and the car caught fire" at around 9.00 p.m. local time on Saturday, near the village of Bolshiye Vyazemy, according to the press service of the Russian Investigative Committee, as reported by the Russian state news agency TASS.

Dugina's father is a Russian author and ideologue, credited with being the architect or "spiritual guide" to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. He is purported to have significant influence over Russian President Vladimir Putin and was described as "Putin's Brain" by Foreign Affairs magazine.

Both Dugin and his daughter have been sanctioned by the United States. The United Kingdom sanctioned Dugina in July for being "a frequent and high-profile contributor of disinformation in relation to Ukraine and the Russian invasion of Ukraine on various online platform," it wrote.

Videos of the explosion showed a vehicle on fire at the side of the road and smashed car parts strewn across the surrounding area. One unverified video appears to show Dugin at the scene.

A friend of Dugina told TASS that he believed Dugina's father was the true target of the blast -- or possibly both of them -- as the car belonged to Alexander.

"It's her father's car," Krasnov told TASS. "Dasha (Darya) drives another car, but she drove his car today, and Alexander went separately," Andrei Krasnov, head of the Russky Gorizont (Russian Horizon) social movement and a personal acquaintance of Dugina's family, told TASS.

A Russian foreign ministry official implied that Ukrainian state structures were responsible for the explosion, a claim that Ukrainian authorities have denied.

When Dugina "turned onto the Mozhaiskoye highway near the village of Bolshiye Vyazemi, there was an explosion, the car caught fire immediately," Krasnov told TASS.

Her father was also sanctioned by the United States in 2015 for being responsible for, or complicit in actions or policies that threaten peace, security, stability, or sovereignty or territorial integrity of Ukraine.

The US Treasury department also said that Alexander Dugin was a leader of the Eurasian Youth Union, which actively recruited individuals with military and combat experience to fight on behalf of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic and has stated that it has a covert presence in Ukraine.

In an interview with CNN in 2017, Dugin remarked on many similarities between his ideas and those of former US president Donald Trump. He called Trump's inauguration speech discourse "as if I would write it myself."

He also said that Putin provided inspiration for Trump, "a kind of... example to challenge the status quo, to challenge the conventional wisdom, challenge all this totalitarian principles of globalists and ultra-liberals."

"The flames completely engulfed it. She lost control because she was driving at high speed and flew to the opposite side of the road," Krasnov added, as cited by TASS.

In the meantime, forensic experts, investigators and experts in explosive engineering are inspecting the scene.
Dugina, the daughter, was born in 1992 and studied Philosophy at Moscow State University, according to TASS.

In March 2022, the US Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned Dugina for her contribution to an article on the United World International (UWI) website suggesting that Ukraine would "perish" if it is admitted to NATO. Dugina was UWI's chief editor.

She claimed in a recent interview with the Russian news channel, 1RNK, that the atrocities that happened during the Russian occupation of the Ukrainian town of Bucha were American propaganda, chosen because of its phonological similarity to "butcher," a word she connects with US President Joe Biden calling Putin a "butcher" on March 29.

^ Maxar satellite photos show no signs of shellings in the plant before Aug 19 11am
https://twitter.com/Maxar/status/156066 ... 15/photo/2
Thus, accusations of repeated shellings appear void.

Hundreds of people have lined up in Moscow to pay tribute to Darya Dugina, the murdered daughter of one of Russia’s most prominent nationalist thinkers, hailing her as a martyr whose death must be avenged with victory in the war in Ukraine.

Dugina, the daughter of ultra-nationalist Alexander Dugin, was killed on Saturday in a car bomb attack outside the capital. Moscow has accused Ukrainian intelligence agencies of masterminding her killing, a claim Kyiv has denied.

Her father, Dugin, 60, who for decades pushed for the creation of a new Russian state that would annex the territory of countries including Ukraine, told mourners his daughter “died for the people, died for Russia”.

“The huge price we have to pay can only be justified by the highest achievement, our victory,” a visibly emotional Dugin said.

If the nuclear power plant is in Russian hands with Russian soldiers walking round it who’s doing the shelling?

Are Russians shooting their own captured power plant & own soldiers or is Ukraine doing it?

I think we need to know and make whoever is doing this stop before much of E Europe turns into an uninhabitable zone for the next 100 years.

Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has said that Russian soldiers who shoot at or from Europe’s largest nuclear power station are “special targets” for Ukrainian forces, amid warnings that the Kremlin may falsely claim Kyiv has directly struck the critical site.

Thesituation at Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant has deteriorated rapidly to the point of becoming “very alarming”, Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Rafael Mariano Grossi warned the Security Council today, in a meeting requested by the Russian Federation and marked by resounding calls to allow the Agency’s technical experts to visit the area to address mounting safety concerns.
...
Providing an overview of events, he said that, on 5 August, the Zaporizhzhia plant — Europe’s largest — was subjected to shelling, resulting in several explosions near the electrical switchboard, and causing a power shutdown. One reactor unit was disconnected from the electrical grid, triggering its emergency protection system and setting generators into operation to ensure power supply. There was also shelling in a nitrogen-oxygen station. While firefighters extinguished the blaze, he said repairs must be assessed and evaluated.

While IAEA experts’ preliminary assessment indicated that there is no immediate threat to nuclear safety as a result of the shelling or other military actions, “this could change at any moment”, he said.
...
Outlining his case, the Russian Federation’s delegate said Ukrainian forces used heavy artillery against Zaporizhzhia on 5 August, shelling the plant during a shift change to intimidate staff — their own citizens. On 6 August, these forces attacked with cluster munitions, and on 7 August, a power surge occurred. He blamed Kyiv for refusing to sign a trilateral document issued by IAEA, stressing that the Russian Federation is strictly complying with the IAEA Director General’s seven principles.

In turn, Ukraine’s representative said the withdrawal of Russian troops and return of the station to the legitimate control of Ukraine is the only way to remove the nuclear threat at Zaporizhzhia. Ukraine has insisted on the need to send a mission to the site and has negotiated modalities with the Agency. “Despite their public declarations, the occupiers have resorted to manipulations and unjustified conditions for the site visit,” he said. Given the militarization of the site by Russian armed forces, such a mission must include qualified experts in military aspects.

Why do you put quotation marks around "Russian"?