Nobody interested in the Russia-Ukraine conflict?

Post Reply New Topic

What happened to the 2014 data?
Crimea crisis?

President Vladimir Putin said peace talks with Ukraine are “at a dead end” and vowed to continue Russia’s invasion as Kyiv accused Moscow of sabotaging the negotiations.

There’s been no word of progress for days in video-link peace talks after Ukraine accused Russian troops of carrying out war crimes including killing unarmed civilians in Bucha and other towns in the north. Western leaders have called for international investigations of the deaths.

In his first public comments on the alleged atrocities, Putin first compared them to U.S. attacks on cities like Raqqa in Syria and then called the Bucha claims “fake.”

Russia’s almost seven-week offensive is going “according to plan,” Putin said Tuesday at a joint press conference at the Vostochny Cosmodrome in the Russian Far East with Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko.

Ukraine forces holed up in the besieged city of Mariupol announced late on Monday the Russians had used “a poisonous substance of unknown origin” – but in the following 24 hours, evidence to corroborate this was a chemical weapons attack has proved harder to find.

A scant initial report, circulating on social media, described victims as having “respiratory failure” and a rather specific diagnosis of “vestibulo-atactic syndrome”, nominally inner-ear problems leading to dizziness and perhaps vomiting, eye twitching and loss of balance.

Liz Truss, the British foreign secretary, said the UK was urgently investigating while a Pentagon spokesperson said the reports “if true, are deeply concerning”. But some observers have expressed scepticism that the available evidence points towards a chemical weapons attack.

But while Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said overnight the claim was being taken “as seriously as possible” he did not return to it on Tuesday in a speech to the Lithuanian parliament, despite referring to other Russian war crimes.

A video from the Azov battalion, a Ukrainian nationalist group linked to the far right and the group behind the initial social media report, was released on Tuesday on Telegram. It filmed three victims, who did not appear seriously harmed, in an incident that appeared to be limited in scope.

The first, a middle-aged man, described seeing “a white smoke” coming from the factory, most likely the vast Azovstal steel plant in the east of the city and one of two locations where Ukrainian forces are holding out. The smoke or fog, he said later, had “a sweet taste”.

The man said he “at once got sick” and that he had suffered tinnitus, tachycardia (a fast heartbeat) and had fallen over. “Mother lost consciousness and three times she was reanimated,” the man added.

An older woman, filmed afterwards in a makeshift bed, complained she was still unable to walk.

A third victim, lying prone with clearly inflamed eyes, also described a “fog more like a smoke” after an explosion. “It was very difficult to breathe,” he said, and reported feeling dizzy and that his legs were “a kind of cotton”.

It is too soon to say definitively what happened. One chemical weapons expert, Dan Kaszeta, the author of a history of nerve agents, cautioned that remote diagnosis was always difficult and questioned why, in the initial report, such a specific medical phrase as vestibulo-atactic syndrome had been used.

Eliot Higgins, the founder of the Bellingcat investigative journalism agency, said the symptoms described in the video were “inconsistent with any nerve agent I’m familiar with, with no reports of pupil constriction or dilation, convulsions”.

Nevertheless, it was critical for Ukrainian forces to try to recover any munitions used, which may be possible because chemical weapons shells are designed to release their contents rather than explode

Investigations in the UK and the US are continuing. The Pentagon spokesperson, John Kirby, said overnight that the US had concerns about Russia’s ability to use “riot control agents, including teargas mixed with chemical agents”. Teargas is a banned chemical weapon in war, although it is legal for police forces to use it around the world.

Joe Biden did warn after the Nato summit last month that the west would respond to any Russian use of chemical weapons in Ukraine, with “the nature of the response depending on the nature of the use”.

Another piece of space infrastructure for Ukraine is under attack, according to an NBC report.

Jammers from Russian forces besieging the country are targeting global positioning system (GPS) satellites that are used for navigation, mapping and other purposes, the report said, quoting the U.S. Space Force.

"Ukraine may not be able to use GPS because there are jammers around that prevent them from receiving any usable signal," David Thompson, the Space Force's vice chief of space operations, told NBC Nightly News(opens in new tab) Monday (April 11).

Specifically, Russia is targeting the Navstar system of satellites used by the United States and made available openly to many countries around the world, Thompson said.

Ukraine is also suffering from a lack of Internet connectivity as a result of the Russian attacks, which began Feb. 24 and are ongoing. SpaceX, at Ukraine's request, has shipped thousands of Starlink terminals to the country to provide an independent set of infrastructure.

In early March, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk noted that Starlink signals have also been jammed, although his company is adapting. "Some Starlink terminals near conflict areas were being jammed for several hours at a time," Musk wrote via Twitter(opens in new tab) on March 1. "Our latest software update bypasses the jamming."

Vladimir Kara-Murza, a prominent Russian opposition activist and politician who has suffered two suspected poisoning attacks, was detained near his house Monday and sentenced to 15 days in jail for disobeying a police order. Kara-Murza was arrested just a few hours after CNN aired an interview with him in which he called President Vladimir Putin's government a "murderous regime" and suggested Russia's war in Ukraine would lead to Putin's downfall.

The dissident's lawyer, Vadym Prokhorov, ridiculed the arrest, citing police statements claiming Kara-Murza "behaved inadequately at the sight of police officers, changed the trajectory of his movement, accelerated his pace, and tried to hide when asked to stop."

Prokhorov rejected that version of events, saying police officers "were already waiting in the yard of the house in a police bus brought there in advance and [Kara-Murza] was immediately detained after getting out of the car."

Kara-Murza is a vocal opponent of the war in Ukraine and has launched an anti-war committee along with other opposition figures.

"I have absolutely no doubt that the Putin regime will end over this war in Ukraine," he told CNN, adding that it "doesn't mean it's gonna happen tomorrow. The two main questions are time and price. And by price, I do not mean monetary — I mean the price of human blood and human lives, and it has already been horrendous, but the Putin regime will end over this and there will be a democratic Russia after Putin."

Kara-Murza is a long-time Kremlin critic who fell deathly ill on two separate occasions in Moscow — in 2015 and 2017 — with symptoms consistent with poisoning. The activist himself called it a deliberate attack by Putin's government in retaliation for his lobbying efforts to get the U.S. and Europe to impose sanctions against Russian officials.

Kara-Murza barely survived the first indecent, having suffered kidney failure. Samples smuggled out of Russia by Kara-Murza's family were given to the FBI, which investigated the case as "intentional poisoning."

One of his close friends, prominent politician and opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, was shot and killed in 2015 near the Kremlin.

Russia also has stringent laws against anyone "discrediting" authorities, which have prompted many opposition figures to flee the country in recent years.

Colton’s Steak House & Grill, located in Bardstown, previously displayed two Texas flags on the exterior of the restaurant, but switched one to a Ukraine flag shortly after the country was invaded by Russia.
Residents of the rural Kentucky town thought the restaurant had replaced an American flag, not a Texas flag.

The Ukraine flag has special meaning to Ben Ashlock, the general manager of the restaurant. He told WDRB he adopted a son from the eastern European country and has friends there.

“I’ll check on them every day,” Ashlock said, according to WDRB. “I mean, every day and ... they’re so discouraged over there right now.”

"I don’t really know how to end this post. I’m grateful. I’m hurt. I’m hopeful. I’m discouraged," the post written by Ashlock said. "And one thing I’ll always be is honest with you. And honestly, I wish we treated each other better behind keyboards."

From the "Not exactly the best informed percentage of the US population" files: LINK TO ARTICLE 

India In Details Apr 13, 2022

"The Ukraine-Russia conflict will probably end at some point, but what will not easily end is the major refugee crisis and the hardships that millions of refugees from Ukraine are facing. Several countries around the world have come forward to help or host these displaced Ukrainians but as far as Indians are concerned, how do they perceive this whole situation? Are Indians ready to accept them too? So, in this episode, let’s see how Indians would treat a ‘female refugee from Ukraine’ who is displaced...confused, and has no money. "

"Addario recalls the moment as "chaotic" and "traumatic." Having expected a relatively straightforward day of documenting a civilian evacuation route, she and her team were stunned to encounter incoming rounds that kicked up dust and made it difficult to see or even determine if she herself had been injured. She describes herself as being still in "some sort of shock because obviously I had just narrowly escaped death myself" when she encountered the slain family.

"For me as a photographer, I'm thinking many different things because I'm also a mother, I'm a sister, I'm a daughter," Addario, who shares sons Lukas, 10, and Alfred, almost 3, with husband Paul de Bendern. "I have children, and I have a child almost the age of Alisa, the young girl who was killed, who was 9 years old. And I remember seeing their bodies and trying to sort of process everything. ... Seeing the little moon boots on Alisa [and] registering, Oh my God, that's a child.""

RTussian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov on Wednesday said Russia will consider U.S. and NATO vehicles transporting weapons on Ukrainian territory as "legitimate military targets."

Ryabkov made the comments during an interview with the Russian state-owned news agency TASS. Ryabkov also told the outlet that any efforts by Western countries to impede Russia's military will be "harshly suppressed," Reuters reported.

The comments followed reports about the success Ukraine has had using "Switchblade" drones and other security aids sent by the U.S. A White House fact sheet in mid-March detailed that the U.S. would provide Ukraine with millions of rounds of ammunition in addition to air defense systems and more. On Tuesday, Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks told reporters that the Pentagon is considering providing Ukraine with even more advanced weapons.

It is unclear what vehicles are used to deliver the supplies from other countries into Ukraine, but The Conversation wrote in mid-March that there are believed to be secret drop-off spots along Ukraine's border in NATO countries for Ukrainian convoys to collect.

Should there ever be a U.S. or NATO transport vehicle within the country, and Russia strikes it, experts fear the result might be retaliation. Such a scenario could then set forth a fear held since the start of the invasion: If Russia saw an accidental conflict as a direct provocation, it could drag other countries into the war.

Now, Russia has warned that vehicles carrying armaments meant for security in Ukrainian territory could have crossed the line.

"We are warning that U.S.-NATO vehicles with weapons that move across the Ukrainian territory will be viewed by us as legitimate military targets," Ryabkov told TASS.

He added, "We are making the Americans and other Westerners understand that attempts to slow down our special operation, to inflict maximum damage on Russian contingents and formations of the DPR and LPR [Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics] will be harshly suppressed.

Thomas E. Graham, a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, wrote a report published on March 8 that addressed concerns that Russia may try to broaden its war.

Graham argued that one of the "indicators" that Moscow may be trying to spread the conflict is that it "would undoubtedly argue" that it "had been forced by Western actions." He wrote that this would include the Kremlin preparing the public with "official statements" and a "greater media focus on escalating Western 'aggression.'"

"The Russian military intervention in Ukraine could easily escalate into a larger conflict stretching from the Baltic to the Black Sea and further west into Europe," Graham warned. "Anything short of 'victory' will be decried as surrender or appeasement in the West, while Russia will not capitulate on a matter it considers vital to its security and prosperity."

THIS IS AWESOME!

https://god.dailydot.com/moskva-sinks/