Pentagon says no Ukrainian dirty bomb or indication of looming Russian nuclear weapon use

Mike Brest

October 24, 01:55 PM October 24, 01:55 PM

Ukraine is not building a dirty bomb to detonate within its borders as Russia has alleged, according to a senior U.S. military official, who also noted that the Pentagon has not seen any indication that the Russians have decided to deploy a nuclear weapon.

Over the weekend, a variety of Russian officials began claiming Ukraine was looking to deploy a dirty bomb, which Western officials have been quick to denounce as false.

A senior U.S. defense official told reporters on Monday that the “world would see through any attempts to use this as a pretext for escalation," while the foreign ministers of the U.S., U.K., and France released a joint statement hours earlier calling the claims "transparently false allegations."

WESTERN LEADERS SAY RUSSIA'S CLAIM ABOUT UKRAINIAN DIRTY BOMB 'TRANSPARENTLY FALSE'

"Ukrainians are not building a dirty bomb," the military official said. "But we also have no indications that the Russians have made a decision to employ nuclear weapons. So we'll continue to monitor closely."

They haven't seen indications Russia is planning to use biological or chemical weapons either.

Russian officials have repeatedly, throughout the eight months of the war, accused Ukraine of preparing to carry out damaging and horrific actions they themselves plan to execute, which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky noted in his latest nightly address.

“If Russia calls and says that Ukraine is allegedly preparing something, it means one thing: Russia has already prepared all this,” he said. “I believe that now the world should react in the toughest possible way.”

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu spoke with his U.S., U.K., and French counterparts on Sunday, just days after he and U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin spoke for the first time in months.

Austin “rejected any pretext for Russian escalation and reaffirmed the value of continued communication amid Russia’s unlawful and unjustified war against Ukraine,” according to a readout of the call by Pentagon spokesman Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder.

Russian President Vladimir Putin's nuclear saber-rattling has spurred frequent condemnations and warnings from Western leaders.

“We’ve been very clear with President Putin directly and privately about the severe consequences that would follow from any, any use of a nuclear weapon. We’re watching this very, very carefully. We have not seen reason at this point to change our own nuclear posture," U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said last week, while President Joe Biden warned earlier this month that the use of a nuclear weapon “could lead to Armageddon.”

'Supporting NATO': Biden defends Ukraine aid as House GOP warns no 'blank check'

Katherine Doyle

October 21, 01:48 PM October 21, 01:48 PM

President Joe Biden said U.S. support for Ukraine is essential to European and trans-Atlantic security against Russia, as some Republicans warn the spending could face hurdles after the midterm elections.

“If we’re supporting Ukraine, we’re supporting all of Europe. We're supporting NATO,” Biden told reporters at the White House Friday. “Do you think that Mr. Putin decides he's just going to deal with Ukraine and that's the end of it?”

Biden said he didn’t “understand the threat that [Republicans are] saying they may have to stop funding the Ukrainians in their war against this brutal dictator.”

MCCARTHY WARNS NO MORE ‘BLANK CHECK TO UKRAINE’ IF GOP CAPTURES HOUSE

Speaking at a political fundraiser in Pennsylvania a day earlier, Biden warned that the issue “is a lot bigger than Ukraine.”

“It’s Eastern Europe. It’s NATO. It’s really serious, serious consequential outcomes,” the president said, charging that Republicans who oppose the support “have no sense of American foreign policy.”

Biden’s comments come as House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) said this week that if Republicans win control of the House next month, lawmakers will not provide a “blank check” to Ukraine.

“I think people are gonna be sitting in a recession and they’re not going to write a blank check to Ukraine,” McCarthy told Punchbowl News. “They just won’t do it.”

Republicans are forecast to take control of the House, recent polls suggest.

Putin enacts martial law in annexed locations of Ukraine

Brady Knox

October 19, 10:35 PM Oct 19, 10:35 PM

Russian President Vladimir Putin declared martial regulation in the just lately annexed regions of Ukraine and partial martial legislation in other spots of Russia as his war in Ukraine rages.

Martial regulation in the Russian context presents the military services sweeping powers, like the suitable of the military to set up roadblocks and look for vehicles, detain individuals who violate curfew or refuse to show documentation, commandeer civilian automobiles and other assets, with proper compensation, and the suspension of some civil liberties, according to RIA Novosti. Partial martial law was instituted in other locations of Russia, largely connected to mobilizing the economic climate to "meet the desires" of the armed forces.

"In the referendums, the inhabitants of the Donetsk and Lugansk people's republics and the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions firmly and unequivocally expressed their will: they want to be with each other with Russia," Putin told his stability council, justifying his final decision, in accordance to TASS. "Shelling continues to assert the lives of civilians. ... The neo-Nazis use brazenly terrorist solutions and sabotage from lifetime support amenities."

UKRAINE Puts $100,000 BOUNTY ON COMMANDER OF 2014 DONBAS Rebellion

The right to conferences, rallies, processions, pickets, and strikes is prohibited or limited, in accordance to RIA Novosti. Censorship will be applied, limiting what data civilians can share. Area authorities are also "allowed to involve citizens in a variety of functions essential to improve safety," RIA Novosti wrote, even though what that involves is just not entirely very clear.

Citizens in specific areas may possibly be forcibly evicted, as was recently declared on the appropriate bank of the Dnieper river in Kherson, masking 60,000 individuals, in accordance to Reuters. People who never comply with a curfew or refuse to demonstrate documentation may perhaps be detained for 30 days greatest. Law enforcement in Russia, even in prewar situations, presently have the proper to halt, request for documentation, and research persons at random.

Secretary of Condition Antony Blinken claims the move is a indication of desperation from the Kremlin as the State Department decries the annexations as illegal.

"I believe it is really yet another indicator of Putin's desperation," Blinken said in an interview with George Stephanopoulos on ABC News. He went on to go over the annexation of eastern Ukrainian territories and partial mobilization decree in the latest months. "Now he is saying that he is declaring martial law in destinations that he claims has folks that someway want to be portion of Russia — that speaks to his desperation," Blinken reported.

Partial martial law was instituted in other regions of Russia as properly, with the extent of steps decreasing the farther away from the border with Ukraine they are positioned. In the locations bordering Ukraine, a stage of medium readiness was introduced, giving authorities broader authority to fulfill the demands of the armed service and mobilize the financial system, TASS noted.

In Crimea, a well-liked vacationer vacation spot for Russians, authorities confident the populace that there would be no constraints on movement regardless of a number of assaults using spot there.

In the central and southern federal districts, which include Moscow and the the vast majority of Russia's population, a stage of significant inform was declared, which predominantly entails the selective inspection of autos. The same decree was applied during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Condition retailers and authorities were sure to saturate the bulletins of the new state of affairs with assurances that really minimal would adjust in each day daily life.

“At the similar time, I have to say that at present, no measures are getting released to limit the ordinary rhythm of the city’s everyday living,” explained Moscow's mayor, Sergey Sobyanin.

Exxon entirely exits Russia following Putin nationalizes assets

Brady Knox

October 17, 08:08 PM Oct 17, 08:08 PM

Exxon announced its entire exit from Russia following President Vladimir Putin nationalized the electricity firm's last belongings in the state.

The exit marks a comprehensive failure of 7 months of negotiations concerning the U.S.-centered oil giant and the Russian governing administration, in search of an orderly transfer of Exxon's 30% stake in the Sakhalin-1 job, in accordance to Reuters. Exxon declared its designs to exit Russia in March in reaction to Russia's invasion of Ukraine but meant to do it in an orderly fashion and recuperate its losses by promoting them to a different shareholder. The seizure marks a decline of $4 billion in belongings, most likely with no any payment.

"With two decrees, the Russian governing administration has unilaterally terminated our pursuits in Sakhalin-1, and the job has been transferred to a Russian operator," an Exxon Mobil spokeswoman advised CBS News.

Trouble FOR Formidable RUSSIAN OIL Price CAP Program

Sakhalin-1 is a joint oil and gasoline drilling venture conducted by a multinational group of oil providers on oil fields in and all over Russia's significantly japanese Sakhalin island, and it has been operated by Exxon considering that 2005. An Exxon subsidiary owned a 30% stake in the venture, Rosneft, a Russian federal government oil and gasoline company, retains a 20% stake, Japan’s Sodeco 30%, and India’s ONGC Videsh 20%, in accordance to TASS.

Explained as a fashionable engineering marvel when opened in 2005, in accordance to Fortune, the challenge holds numerous environment records for the longest-ever drilled wells. Manufacturing has been generally stopped considering that Could, and its projected output for this 12 months has fallen by almost 50 percent, TASS noted.

Putin purchased the seizure of Exxon's remaining belongings through a decree on Oct. 7, saying the creation of a governing administration-operate oil enterprise that will take over from the U.S. oil corporation. OOO Sakhalin-1 was registered in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk previous 7 days, TASS documented.

Exxon said the task has produced an believed $16 billion for the Russian federal government, for every CBS Information. However, the oil huge explained the challenge only represented less than 2% of its overall 2021 creation and 1% of its operational earnings.

Iran could deliver Russia 'more destructive weapons,' White Household implies

Katherine Doyle

Oct 17, 03:47 PM Oct 17, 03:47 PM

The White Property lashed out at Iran more than reviews that Tehran is weighing regardless of whether to present Russia with newly damaging weapons in the war versus Ukraine.

President Joe Biden’s press secretary pointed to reports of what appeared to be Iranian "kamikaze" drones utilised in an attack on Ukraine’s money on Monday and mentioned much better weapons could be on the way.

RUSSIA Carries on Attacks ON KYIV WITH IRANIAN 'KAMIKAZE' DRONES

“Iran carries on to lie about this,” Karine Jean-Pierre said. “Meanwhile, in accordance to these new reports, Iran is thinking about promoting nevertheless extra harmful weapons to aid an invasion they claim to oppose.”

The United States has imposed sanctions on Iran in reaction to the weapons transfers and will proceed implementing these, she extra.

Nationwide protection adviser Jake Sullivan warned in July that Russia was making ready to acquire weapons from Iran, together with drones. In September, he stated the U.S. was seeking for supplemental solutions to slow Iran's ability to manufacture weapons devices for sale to Russia.

The bombing marketing campaign Monday integrated drone and missile assaults aimed at civilian targets, according to a senior U.S. armed service formal.

Ukraine’s Defense Ministry reported Monday that it experienced shot down 37 Iranian-manufactured Shahed-136 drones and a few cruise missiles.

Ukraine places $100,000 bounty on commander of 2014 Donbas uprising

Brady Knox

Oct 16, 05:15 PM Oct 16, 06:16 PM

Ukrainian intelligence introduced a $100,000 bounty on the head of Igor "Strelkov" Girkin, the central leader of the 2014 professional-Russian Donbas uprising.

The Principal Directorate of Intelligence of the Navy Protection of Ukraine (GUR) launched a assertion on its website giving a important payment to any individual who provides Girkin to Ukraine's captivity. The previous Russian navy intelligence officer was long blacklisted from returning to Ukraine, serving as a substitute as a armed service commentator on the "Special Armed service Procedure," turning into one particular of the Russian leadership's fiercest critics for its mishandling of the invasion. His blacklisting was reversed inside the past week, and he has reportedly been presented the submit of deputy battalion commander.

"The Principal Directorate of Intelligence of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine guarantees the payment of $100,000 for the handover of Igor Girkin (Strelkov) to Ukrainian captivity," a statement on the site of the GUR examine. "It is recognised that one particular of the most well-known Russian terrorists has determined to renew his participation in the war towards our state."

PUTIN'S Defense MINISTER IN FIRING LINE FOR UKRAINE Marketing campaign

Girkin began the 2014 war in the Donbas area when he led a group of Russian and Ukrainian militants to seize the Donetsk town of Sloviansk on April 12 that 12 months. When speaking of fight functions in the early days of the war with Zavtra newspaper, he portrayed himself as largely dependable for the actions of the pro-Russian side. He then served as defense minister of the so-termed Donetsk People's Republic right before leaving the position afterwards that calendar year. Girkin reported he was designed to resign around disagreements with the Kremlin, ensuing in threats to slash off his supplies, in accordance to the liberal dissident Boris Nemtsov's report on the war, "Putin. The War."

Girkin has been energetic on social media, managing a Telegram channel with 750,000 followers, loaded with criticism of the Russian management during the war. He went dark on Monday, drawing suspicions that authorities experienced lastly silenced him — until eventually a article from his spouse on Saturday displaying him in beat fatigues and expressing he would "be in touch quickly."

"Operation Z: War Correspondents of the Russian Spring," a well-known Russian nationalist Telegram channel with more than 1.1 million followers, claimed that Girkin was headed to the entrance as a deputy battalion commander, on the problem that he cease his postings on social media.

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Russia's comprehensive-scale invasion of Ukraine will be the sixth war in which he has participated, subsequent those people in Transnistria, Bosnia, two in Chechnya, and now two in Ukraine, in accordance to his interview with Zavtra. Ukrainian and Western officials have accused Girkin of a slew of war crimes, such as, "terrorist actions, torture, murder and violation of condition sovereignty," in accordance to the GUR. He is also needed in the Netherlands for his alleged part in the downing of MH17.

Ukraine puts $100,000 bounty on commander of 2014 Donbas rebellion

Brady Knox

October 16, 05:15 PM Oct 16, 05:15 PM

Ukrainian intelligence declared a $100,000 bounty on the head of Igor "Strelkov" Girkin, the central leader of the 2014 pro-Russian Donbas uprising.

The Main Directorate of Intelligence of the Military services Defense of Ukraine (GUR) released a statement on its web page supplying a assurance for the important payment to anyone who provides Girkin to Ukraine's captivity. The previous Russian armed forces intelligence officer was extensive blacklisted from returning to Ukraine, serving as a substitute as a navy commentator on the "Distinctive Armed forces Operation," getting one particular of the Russian leadership's fiercest critics for its mishandling of the invasion. His blacklisting was reversed inside the last 7 days, and he has reportedly been offered the put up of deputy battalion commander.

"The Main Directorate of Intelligence of the Ministry of Protection of Ukraine assures the payment of $100,000 for the handover of Igor Girkin (Strelkov) to Ukrainian captivity," a assertion on the web page of the GUR study. "It is identified that a person of the most well known Russian terrorists has resolved to renew his participation in the war against our condition."

PUTIN'S Defense MINISTER IN FIRING LINE FOR UKRAINE Marketing campaign

Girkin began the 2014 war in the Donbas area when he led a group of Russian and Ukrainian militants to seize the Donetsk city of Sloviansk on April 12 that 12 months. When talking of combat operations in the early days of the war with Zavtra newspaper, he portrayed himself as mostly liable for the steps of the pro-Russian facet. He then served as protection minister of the so-termed Donetsk People's Republic before leaving the posture later on that yr. Girkin said he was made to resign around disagreements with the Kremlin, ensuing in threats to slash off his provides, in accordance to the liberal dissident Boris Nemtsov's report on the war, "Putin. The War."

Girkin has been lively on social media, running a Telegram channel with 750,000 followers, loaded with criticism of the Russian leadership all over the war. He went darkish on Monday, drawing suspicions that authorities had last but not least silenced him, right until a post from his wife on Saturday, demonstrating him in fight fatigues and saying he would "be in touch shortly."

"Procedure Z: War Correspondents of the Russian Spring," a well-liked Russian nationalist Telegram channel with around 1.1 million followers claimed that Girkin was headed to the entrance as a deputy battalion commander, on the affliction that he ceased his postings on social media.

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His joining of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine will be the sixth war in which he has participated, subsequent those in Transnistria, Bosnia, two in Chechnya, and now two in Ukraine, in accordance to his job interview with Zavtra. Ukrainian and Western officers have accused Girkin of a slew of war crimes, including, "terrorist functions, torture, murder and violation of state sovereignty," according to the GUR. He is also required in the Netherlands for his alleged purpose in the downing of MH17.

Russia military vary shooting in the vicinity of Ukraine leaves 11 dead, 15 wounded

Related Push

Oct 15, 05:36 PM October 15, 07:19 PM

Two males on Saturday fired at troops at a Russian armed service firing variety near Ukraine, killing 11 and wounding 15 other folks, right before finding killed, the Russian Defense Ministry explained.

The ministry mentioned in a statement that the capturing took area in the Belgorod area in southwestern Russia that borders Ukraine. It explained that the two men from an unnamed ex-Soviet country fired on soldiers during focus on practice and were killed by return fireplace.

RUSSIA HAS Launched 'HUNDREDS' OF MISSILES THIS Week, 'MOST' AT CIVILIAN TARGETS: PENTAGON

The ministry identified as the incident a terrorist attack.

The taking pictures will come amid a hasty mobilization requested by President Vladimir Putin to beef up Russian forces in Ukraine — a go that triggered protests and prompted hundreds of thousands to flee Russia.

Putin said on Friday that around 220,000 reservists now had been termed up as element of an energy to recruit 300,000.

Even though the Russian leader declared that only persons who had a short while ago served in the military will be subject matter to the contact-up, activists and legal rights teams reported navy conscription places of work rounding up people today with out any military experience — some of whom have been also unfit for service for health-related motives.

Some of the freshly termed-up reservists posted films of them currently being forced to sleep on the floor or even outdoors and given rusty weapons right before staying sent to the entrance lines.

Authorities have acknowledged that the mobilization was typically inadequately structured and promised to improve the situation.

US expects Russia to carry out annual strategic nuclear workout

Mike Brest

October 13, 02:41 PM October 13, 02:41 PM

The Biden administration is organizing to conduct its once-a-year strategic nuclear physical exercise with NATO and claimed it thinks Russia will do the same matter.

Countrywide Safety Council coordinator John Kirby told reporters on Thursday that the exercising had been “planned nicely ahead of the invasion, and it’s an annual work out,” and he famous, “We be expecting Russia to carry out its yearly strategic nuclear training,” which he stated is also a annually incidence.

BIDEN RIPS ‘UTTER BRUTALITY’ OF PUTIN’S STRIKES ON UKRAINE

“We foresee the [Russians’] exercise will span quite a few days. It will involve actions within just the normal bounds of what Russia has performed in the past to include live missile launchers and the deployment of strategic belongings,” he ongoing. “While Russia probably believes this work out will support it project electrical power, specially in light of current occasions, we know that Russian nuclear units train thoroughly at this time of yr, yet again, plan, and definitely, we're heading to carry on to observe that accordingly.”

NATO Secretary-Standard Jens Stoltenberg opted to move ahead with future week's exam, saying, earlier this week, “Now is the ideal time to be company and to be distinct that NATO is there to secure and protect all allies."

“We want to realize that NATO’s organization, predictable conduct, our armed service toughness, is the ideal way to avoid escalation,” he instructed reporters on Tuesday. "We are there to protect peace, to avoid escalation, and to reduce any assault on NATO ally nations. So, if we now established the grounds for any misunderstanding, miscalculation [in] Moscow about our willingness to safeguard and defend all allies, it would improve the threat of escalation, and which is the very last factor we will do.”

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin delayed an intercontinental ballistic missile test that experienced been scheduled for March, in the 2nd 7 days of the conflict, in purchase “to reveal that we have no intention of engaging in any actions that could be misunderstood or misconstrued,” although Stoltenberg explained he believes canceling the exercising could ship a information of weak point to the Kremlin.

Stoltenberg, on Thursday, reported that the alliance will keep an eye on Russia's work out.

"We have monitored Russian nuclear forces for decades, and, of program, we will carry on to keep an eye on them pretty intently, and we will stay vigilant — also when they now get started a new physical exercise," he said, according to Reuters. "We will observe that as we often do. And, of training course, we will stay vigilant, not the very least in gentle of the veiled nuclear threats and the dangerous rhetoric we have seen from the Russian facet."

This 7 days marks a new flip in the war as Russian forces launched a mass missile start targeting dozens of cities and villages throughout the nation. Kyiv, the cash, has been less than rocket hearth this 7 days, though the city had primarily been spared from the war once it moved west.

Biden doubles down on warning of nuclear 'Armageddon’

Mike Brest

October 11, 11:08 PM Oct 11, 11:19 PM

President Joe Biden reiterated his perception that Russia’s use of a nuclear weapon in opposition to Ukraine could end in "Armageddon.”

The president, who 1st utilized the phrase in this context very last week, argued in an job interview on CNN Tuesday that Russian President Vladimir Putin “cannot keep on with impunity to speak about the use of a tactical nuclear weapon, as if that is a rational thing to do.”

“I do not assume [Putin] will” use a nuclear weapon, Biden said. “The whole position I was earning was it could direct to just a horrible final result. And not due to the fact anyone intends to turn it into a world war or anything at all, but it just — the moment you use a nuclear weapon, the issues that can be built, the miscalculations, who is aware what would take place?”

NATO WARNS RUSSIA: PUTIN WOULD 'REGRET' ANY USE OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS

The president was at a fundraiser last 7 days when he warned that for the "very first time because the Cuban missile crisis, we have the immediate threat of the use of a nuclear weapon if, in simple fact, factors continue down the route that they are going,” incorporating, “I really don't imagine you will find any such factor as the capability to easily [use] a tactical nuclear weapon and not conclude up with Armageddon.”

Inspite of the warning, the White Home has "not found any motive to regulate our own nuclear posture," White Dwelling spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre stated on Friday.

Throughout the interview, Biden declined to specify what America's response would be in the party Russia uses a nuclear weapon.

His reviews abide by Russia's barrage of missile and rocket assaults in additional than 15 cities, together with the cash of Kyiv, on Monday that left roughly a dozen useless and a hundred extra wounded. The Russians launched 84 cruise missiles and 24 drone assaults, about fifty percent of which Ukraine was ready to intercept, the Ukrainian General Employees reported.

It was presumably in retaliation for an explosion harmful the Kerch Bridge that backlinks Russia to the Crimean Peninsula, which the Ukrainian military celebrated but did not officially choose credit history for. Putin has threatened to hold these assaults up in addition to his regular risk to use a nuclear weapon.

The administration is "absolutely interested in expediting" the supply of crucial air protection units to Ukraine, John Kirby, the Nationwide Security Council's communications coordinator, said in a briefing with reporters on Tuesday. Particularly, it is striving to pace up the supply of two Countrywide Advanced Floor-to-Air Missile Units to Ukraine.

"We feel that we are on track to get people first two over there in the pretty around potential," Kirby reported. "We are unquestionably intrigued in expediting the shipping of NASAMS to Ukraine as before long as we can."

The president failed to rule out meeting with Putin at up coming month's G-20 Summit, and while he reported he didn't intend to meet with him, he acknowledged he could, dependent on the matter. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Tuesday that Putin was open up to such a meeting.

Russian troops pour into Belarus ‘by the trainload’

Brady Knox

October 10, 09:32 PM Oct 10, 09:32 PM

Russian troops are pouring into Belarus “by the trainload.”

The information comes along with an announcement from Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko that Russian troops would return to the country, which neighbors equally Russia and Ukraine, in significant figures, in accordance to the Belarusian point out information company Belta. Tens of hundreds of Russian troops utilized Belarus as the staging floor for their original northern offensive into Ukraine in February but mainly withdrew by late March. Considering that then, a several hundred Russian troops have stayed at the rear of, mainly air and missile troops that use the close Russian ally as a launching pad for missile strikes into Ukraine, but that now seems to be modifying.

“Russian soldiers are moving into Belarus by the trainload. They are traveling in cattle vehicles — just a huge amount. Just waves of trains arriving," a Belarusian resource informed Kyiv Article correspondent Jason Jay Sensible.

BELARUSIAN PRESIDENT: TIME HAS Appear FOR EUROPE TO GIVE Alone A 'MORAL CLEANSING'

In early October, shots on social media emerged exhibiting Russian large artillery and armored motor vehicles getting moved into Belarus by prepare.

“This won’t be just a thousand troops,” Lukashenko advised his army superior command in a latest assembly, saying the big-scale arrival of Russian troops. “Be all set to acquire these people today in the near potential and area them exactly where required, in accordance to our approach," he explained, according to the New York Occasions.

The Belarusian leader has also designed strategies that NATO or Ukraine are making ready intense actions versus the country, asserting nearer cooperation with Russia in reaction.

"Specified the worsening of the condition on the western borders of the Union Condition, we agreed to deploy a regional team of forces of the Russian Federation and the Republic of Belarus. This complies with our documents. It claims that if the menace stage reaches the degree as it is now, we start to use the Union Point out group of forces," Lukashenko explained to armed service and security officials, according to Belta, referring to the European Union-design union that binds Russia and Ukraine.

"Strikes on the territory of Belarus are not just becoming talked about in Ukraine right now, but are also being planned," he claimed, in accordance to Reuters. "Their owners are pushing them to commence a war in opposition to Belarus to drag us there. We have been preparing for this for a long time. If required, we will react."

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Though the actions suggest the likelihood that Belarus could join the war, these types of a transfer would very likely be extremely unpopular in the country and even further destabilize the Lukashenko routine.

Putin calls Kerch Bridge attack 'a terrorist act' by Kyiv

Linked Push

October 09, 03:34 PM Oct 09, 03:54 PM

ZAPORIZHZHIA, Ukraine — Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday termed the assault on the sprawling Kerch Bridge to Crimea "a terrorist act" carried out by Ukrainian unique solutions and Russia's investigative chief immediately opened a felony terror investigation into the explosion that broken a well known Russian landmark.

What Russian authorities are calling a truck bomb on Saturday hit the substantial bridge linking Russia with the Crimean Peninsula, which Moscow annexed 8 many years ago from Ukraine. Street and rail website traffic on the bridge was quickly halted, harming an important offer route for the Kremlin's forces and working a sharp blow to Russian status.

"There's no doubt it was a terrorist act directed at the destruction of critically critical civilian infrastructure of the Russian Federation," Putin reported in a movie of a meeting Sunday with the chairman of Russia's Investigative Committee, Alexander Bastrykin. "And the authors, perpetrators, and all those who ordered it are the particular companies of Ukraine."

Bastrykin explained Ukrainian distinctive providers and citizens of Russia and other nations took aspect in the assault.

"We have currently proven the route of the truck," he mentioned, including that it had been to Bulgaria, Georgia, Armenia, North Ossetia and Krasnodar — a area in southern Russia — among the other destinations.

The statements followed overnight Russian missile strikes on the metropolis of Zaporizhzhia that introduced down portion of a significant condominium constructing, leaving at the very least a dozen persons useless.

The six missiles employed in Sunday's right away assault were launched from Russian-occupied areas of the Zaporizhzhia region, the Ukrainian air force mentioned. The area is 1 of four Russia claimed as its possess this month, though its funds of the exact identify continues to be underneath Ukrainian command.

Russia has endured a collection of setbacks practically 8 months just after invading Ukraine in a marketing campaign quite a few assumed would be brief-lived. In the latest months, Ukrainian forces have staged a counteroffensive, retaking areas in the south and east, even though Moscow's conclusion to simply call up extra troops has led to protests and an exodus of tens of thousands of Russians.

Modern preventing has centered on the areas just north of Crimea, which include Zaporizhzhia. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy lamented the most recent assault in a Telegram write-up.

"Once more, Zaporizhzhia. Once again, merciless attacks on civilians, targeting residential buildings, in the center of the night," he wrote. At minimum 19 men and women died in Russian missile strikes on condominium properties in the town on Thursday.

"From the a person who gave this get, to everyone who carried out this get: They will solution," he additional.

Ukrainian International Minister Dmytro Kuleba termed the attacks on civilians a war criminal offense and urged an global investigation.

Stunned citizens watched from driving police tape as emergency crews attempted to get to the upper flooring of a making that took a immediate strike. A chasm at minimum 12 meters (40-toes) huge smoldered where residences experienced the moment stood. In an adjacent apartment making, the missile barrage blew home windows and doorways out of their frames in a radius of hundreds of ft. At least 20 private properties and 50 apartment buildings were being damaged, city council Secretary Anatoliy Kurtev explained.

Regional police claimed Sunday afternoon that 13 experienced been killed and much more than 60 wounded, at the very least 10 of them youngsters.

Tetyana Lazunko, 73, and her husband, Oleksii, took shelter in the hallway of their best-floor condominium just after listening to air raid sirens. The explosion shook the setting up and sent their possessions traveling. Lazunko wept as the couple surveyed the damage to their household of virtually five decades.

"Why are they bombing us? Why?" she claimed.

Some others termed the missile assault relentless.

"There was just one explosion, then one more one particular," 76-12 months-previous Mucola Markovich explained. In a flash, the fourth-flooring condominium he shared with his wife was long gone.

"When it will be rebuilt, I will not know," Markovich reported. "I am left with out an apartment at the conclude of my daily life."

About 3 kilometers (2 miles) absent in one more community ravaged by a missile, three volunteers dug a shallow grave for a German shepherd killed in the strike, the dog's leg blown away by the blast.

Abbas Gallyamov, an impartial Russian political analyst and a previous speechwriter for Putin, explained the Russian president, who shaped a committee Saturday to look into the bridge explosion, experienced not responded forcefully sufficient to fulfill indignant war hawks. The assault and reaction, he reported, has "influenced the opposition, whilst the loyalists are demoralized."

"Due to the fact once all over again, they see that when the authorities say that almost everything is heading in accordance to strategy and we're profitable, that they're lying, and it demoralizes them," he stated.

Putin personally opened the Kerch Bridge in May 2018 by driving a truck throughout it as a image of Moscow's promises on Crimea. The bridge, the longest in Europe, is crucial to sustaining Russia's navy operations in southern Ukraine.

No one has claimed obligation for damaging it.

Targeted visitors more than the bridge was briefly suspended after the blast, but each vehicles and trains had been crossing once more on Sunday. Russia also restarted a automobile ferry assistance.

Crimea is a well known trip vacation resort for Russians. Folks attempting to drive to the bridge and on to the Russian mainland on Sunday encountered several hours-very long site visitors jams.

"We had been a little bit unprepared for this kind of a convert," mentioned a person driver, Kirill Suslov, sitting in website traffic. "That's why the mood is a bit gloomy."

The Institute for the Examine of War mentioned movies of the bridge indicated the problems from the explosion "is likely to raise friction in Russian logistics for some time" but not cripple Russia's ability to equip its troops in Ukraine.

In other news:

— In the devastated Ukrainian metropolis of Lyman, which was a short while ago recaptured after a months-extended Russian occupation, Ukrainian countrywide police explained authorities have exhumed the initially 20 bodies from a mass burial web-site. Original indications are that all around 200 civilians are buried in a person spot and that yet another grave incorporates the bodies of fallen Ukrainian soldiers. The civilians, like children, had been buried in solitary graves, while customers of the armed forces have been buried in a 40-meter-extended trench, according to law enforcement.

— The Ukrainian navy claimed Sunday that intense clashes ended up having place about the cities of Bakhmut and Avdiivka in the eastern Donetsk area, the place Russian forces have claimed some latest territorial gains. The General Personnel of the Armed Forces of Ukraine did not accept any loss of territory but said "the most tense scenario" had been noticed all-around those two towns.

— The head of the Worldwide Atomic Energy Company, meanwhile, reported that the Zaporizhzhia nuclear electric power plant, Europe's greatest, had been reconnected to the grid after shedding its very last external energy source early Saturday following shelling.

US resists 'regime change' chat, but Putin appreciates how previous czar died

Joel Gehrke

Oct 09, 06:00 AM Oct 09, 06:00 AM

Russian President Vladimir Putin could reduce electric power if Ukraine’s counteroffensive continues, exuberant European officers and dismayed Russian imperialists are beginning to suspect, while U.S. officials hesitate to indulge speculation about “regime change” in the Kremlin.

“We are living in an data society and factors are modifying, even as we are speaking, now actually,” a senior European formal explained to the Washington Examiner. “So we will not know what could happen, we just need to have to be prepared, when the ideal second arrives, to consider the correct selection.”

Other Western officers regard Putin’s tumble as a a lot more distant prospect, notably presented honest uncertainty about how a great deal territory Ukrainian forces will liberate right before the freshly mobilized Russian forces can get to a vital mass of helpful troops. Nonetheless the cascade of Ukrainian forces entering after-occupied towns has provoked indignant Russian armed service veterans into dire warnings about the ramifications of continued failure, even as President Joe Biden affirms his intention to depart space for “Putin’s off-ramp” out of the war.

“It’s not practical to just speculate about what comes upcoming,” the White House’s Phil Gordon, nationwide safety adviser to Vice President Kamala Harris, instructed a Warsaw Protection Discussion board abuzz this week with issues about Putin’s opportunity collapse. “No, [it’s] not U.S. plan to produce routine improve in Russia, and we've been quite clear about that.”

PUTIN WILL DIE IF RUSSIA Uses NUCLEAR WEAPONS From UKRAINE: ZELENSKY

Putin created an evident energy to paper more than the military services setbacks very last week by signing files that purport to include four regions of Ukraine into the Russian condition — a territorial claim that exists only on paper, in a lot of locations, for the reason that Russian forces never ever managed to consider management of all the regions. Ukrainian forces have continued to retake villages and cities throughout these locations, laying bare the fragility of the Russian assert and stoking the criticism of Russian veterans who have attributed their struggles to the corruption of Putin’s armed forces staff.

“We require decisive, knowledgeable folks not frightened of obligation — thinking not how to fill their pockets and finish their dacha swiftly, but how to serve the motherland,” previous Russian FSB officer Igor Girkin, who posed as a professional-Russian separatist commander at the outset of the war in 2014, stated this week. “Will men and women like that be uncovered in the president’s circle? Can he place them in destinations?”

Russia can “win this war” if the essential reforms consider place, Girkin taken care of, but he implied that ongoing mismanagement could end result in Putin’s routine likely the way of Czar Nicholas II, the Romanov czar overthrown and killed by Bolshevik revolutionaries through the Very first Globe War.

“If this is not done, then we will unquestionably dance, like we all have been declaring,” Girkin mentioned. “We’ll dance to the new 1917. And we’re dancing in the direction of it pretty quickly.”

Biden’s most current statements suggest that he thinks Putin demands to be allowed to uncover a way out of the war to stay clear of the threat of a devastating escalation of the conflict.

“We’re seeking to determine out: What — what is Putin’s off-ramp?” Biden claimed Thursday for the duration of a Democratic Senatorial Marketing campaign Committee fundraiser. “Where does he uncover a way out? Wherever does he discover himself in a situation that he does not only drop face but reduce important electric power inside of Russia?”

Those musings mirror a change in tone from Biden’s stentorian remarks in March when he urged Russian citizens to “fight the corruption coming from the Kremlin” during a speech in Warsaw.

“For God’s sake, this person can't stay in power,” Biden explained at the time.

Putin’s assertion of sovereignty above the partly occupied territories prompted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to check out to revive that posture. He declared on Tuesday that Ukraine is “ready for a dialogue with Russia — but with another president of Russia” and urged other leaders to observe suit.

“Russia, by its illustration, will display all possible aggressors of the entire world that an aggressive terrorist war in our time is a way to weaken and inevitably wipe out the one who starts off these a war,” he said Friday.

Gordon, the senior U.S. formal, characterized Zelensky’s contact for “another president of Russia” as an emotional outburst of the type, he implied, that Biden manufactured in March.

“That is a organic comment for any one to make wanting at the atrocities that are taking location, brought about by Putin,” he claimed. “And I think which is a completely understandable reaction to have that experience ... and it was what President Biden expressed when he was in this article. But we you should not have a coverage of regime modify. Our coverage, as I mentioned, is to impose serious expenditures on Russia for this aggression and to support the Ukrainian individuals in liberating their territory.”

That won’t stop some Western officers from dreaming of a repetition of (if not the gatherings of 1917, then possibly of) 1991, when an tried military coup versus Mikhail Gorbachev brought on the collapse of the Soviet Union.

“This attempt of [a] coup d'etat in the Soviet Union took place ... and in two times, a nation, with a large overall economy, massive stockpiles of nuclear weapons, collapsed as a property of playing cards,” the senior European official stated. “So we can't essentially create off any probability, you know, due to the fact we are dwelling in a absolutely distinct entire world.”

Putin will die if Russia works by using nuclear weapons in opposition to Ukraine: Zelensky

Joel Gehrke

October 07, 04:36 PM Oct 07, 04:36 PM

Russian President Vladimir Putin will be unable “to protect his individual life” if he makes use of nuclear weapons versus Ukraine, according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who insisted that such an attack would not defeat his state.

A collection of Ukrainian battlefield successes prompted Putin to imply that Russia could use nuclear weapons pursuant to a so-identified as precedent set by the United States at the stop of the Next Earth War. That risk prompted President Joe Biden to recommend that Putin’s use of even a fairly tiny nuclear weapon could “end up with Armageddon,” while Zelensky and other central European leaders shaped a confident chorus in rebuffing Putin’s threats.

“I believe that that this [president] of Russia, I feel he enjoys his individual daily life,” Zelensky informed the Lowy Institute, an Australia-primarily based imagine tank, via an interpreter. “And I assume he clearly understands that just after the use of the weapons, he would be unable any more to preserve, so to say, his lifestyle. And I am self-assured of that.”

The specter of a nuclear strike has hovered more than the war in Ukraine owing to a blend of Kremlin rhetoric and Russia’s progress of an “escalate to de-escalate” doctrine — the concept that a “low-yield” nuclear weapon could allow for Russian forces to gain a nuclear war in Europe with no provoking a big U.S. response. Biden challenged that theory throughout a Democratic fundraiser Thursday night, but his assessment that Putin is “not joking when he talks about the use of tactical nuclear weapons or organic or chemical weapons” gave more credence to Putin’s threats than some European leaders would advise.

PUTIN ALLY URGES RUSSIAN Defense MINISTER TO Eliminate HIMSELF AS LOSSES MOUNT

“Putin needs us to imagine that he is heading to use the tactical nuclear weapon because this is yet another software of blackmail to Ukraine and to the cost-free environment,” Polish Key Minister Mateusz Morawiecki told the Warsaw Safety Discussion board on Tuesday. “It’s a chicken activity.”

The general public statements by heads of state throughout NATO this 7 days have lifted a curtain on the higher-stakes discussion rippling throughout the trans-Atlantic alliance in reaction to the unprecedented predicament posed by Putin’s aggression. U.S. and allied leaders, not only in Europe but the Indo-Pacific, do not want to yield to Putin’s nuclear threats and as a result established a precedent that other nuclear-armed states, this sort of as China, could comply with in attacking their neighbors. And nonetheless, the decision to arm Ukraine has verified a lot more productive than numerous Western leaders dared to hope in the weeks right before the war, boosting the concern about how Putin will answer to a war that has established not only to be highly-priced but potentially disastrous.

“I consider that if you're just worried, just afraid, then you need to sit frozen and kind of tremble and do almost nothing about it,” Lithuanian Primary Minister Ingrida Simonyte said all through an appearance together with Morawiecki. “So I see no a lot value in sitting down and debating what ever takes place in his insane thoughts. I just know that the only way to respond to this is to display a stronger counterpower due to the fact in any other case, we will be just sitting down and trembling somewhere and waiting [for] no matter what he does future.”

Morawiecki argued that Putin is trying to scare Ukraine’s international supporters into a choice to “surrender as swift as possible” by manipulating a presumed Western belief that Russia’s threats should be accommodated. The Polish politician, whilst suggesting that central and Jap European leaders have a additional sophisticated knowledge of how to deal with the risk of a clash with Russia, argued that acquiescence to Putin’s threats could backfire by convincing him that nuclear threats let him to get what he wishes.

“The actuality is unique,” he mentioned. “We central European nations around the world know the historical past extremely, pretty nicely. And Russia [takes a] action back only when it sees that you will find a counter[vailing] power standing in front of Russia.”

Lithuania and Poland have a shared background with Russia due to the fact they shaped a key electrical power recognised as the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth that was weakened and finally erased from the map of Europe as a result of a collection of partitions that parceled out their territory among the neighboring empires. The to start with two partitions, in 1772 and 1793, saw Russia annex some of the territory recognised as Ukraine, together with some of the towns south of Kyiv that have been struck by Russian missiles during the present war.

Putin, after initially saying the war was necessitated by his dread that Biden and other Western leaders would acknowledge Ukraine into NATO, has characterised the war as a repetition of the wrestle that allowed Peter the Great to forge the Russian empire in the early 18th century.

“Peter the Good waged the Terrific Northern War for 21 a long time,” Putin reported in June. “When he set up the new cash [in St. Petersburg], none of the European international locations regarded this territory as Russian. They identified it as section of Sweden. Nevertheless, from time immemorial ... this territory was less than Russia’s control. The same is legitimate of the western direction, Narva and his initial strategies. Why would he go there? He was returning and reinforcing that is what he was doing. Obviously, it fell to our ton to return and fortify as well.”

Zelensky, in his deal with to the Australian feel tank, warned that autocrats like Putin chance “the decline of the history” through unilateral and unwell-encouraged decisions. And when he acknowledged that Russia has the electrical power “to kill a good deal of Ukrainians,” he managed that Russia can’t get the war.

“We are a fantastic country,” he claimed. “We are battling for ourselves. In this very second, we are preventing for our families, and this is what provides [the] toughness to democracy. We are not battling for some czar or the emperor, not for the consolation of a solitary man or woman, but we are battling for our homes and for our rights. And this is what delivers our independence.”

Even the use of nuclear weapons would not alter that elementary element of the war, according to Zelensky, who predicted that entire world leaders would not reply to a nuclear strike by undercutting Ukraine’s resistance against Russia.

“Even if he will make your mind up to launch a nuclear strike, properly, what can I say? I imagine the world will hardly ever forgive this,” he claimed. “I think the entire world will by no means forgive this ... and will never forgive it, [give] this territory to Russia.”

Mass graves found in a short while ago liberated Lyman

Mike Brest

Oct 07, 04:15 PM Oct 07, 04:16 PM

Ukrainian officials have uncovered mass graves in the just lately liberated city of Lyman in the Donetsk area, regional shops mentioned.

There are approximately 200 graves on a person plot, TCH, a Ukrainian-centered news outlet noted, when Hromadske, a different Ukrainian outlet, documented that some of the plots were being marked with title plates even though many others have been simply just numbered.

Pavlo Kyrylenko, the head of Donetsk OVA, claimed: ”Now the law enforcement officers are investigating these locations and will shortly start the exhumation system. I ask absolutely everyone to chorus from commenting on the variety of buried people and the will cause of their demise right up until the remaining conclusions of the specialists.”

NATO WARNS RUSSIA: PUTIN WOULD 'REGRET' ANY USE OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS

Hromadske also documented that pro-Ukrainian residents were compelled to accumulate the bodies from the streets.

"Lyman is cleared entirely," Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky introduced past Sunday, although the Russian defense ministry acknowledged withdrawing its troops to get “more advantageous positions” and to steer clear of the “threat of encirclement” in the area.

“The story of the liberation of Lyman in Donetsk area has now turn into the most preferred in the media. But the successes of our soldiers are not restricted to Lyman,” he added, noting that Ukrainian forces experienced liberated the modest cities of Arkhanhelske and Myrolyubivka in the Kherson area.

Ukrainian officials have uncovered atrocities from civilians following the Russian troops' retreat in numerous Ukrainian cities through the war. Officers in these places have uncovered the horrors of torture, executions, and sexual violence dedicated by Russian forces.

Ukraine’s ongoing counteroffensive successes have place Russian President Vladimir Putin’s back again further more into the corner as he appears to be like for lifelines to support his armed service even with repeated setbacks and issues. Very last thirty day period, he called up 300,000 reservists meant to boost Russia's armed forces in Ukraine, although it also spurred a mass exodus of qualified draftees.

Putin has ongoing to threaten to use a tactical nuclear weapon in the war, though President Joe Biden warned on Thursday about the possibility of a nuclear "Armageddon," although the White Property has preserved as not long ago as Friday that it has not witnessed a purpose to transform its nuclear posture.

Senator reveals why two Russians crossed into Alaska

Jack Birle

Oct 06, 11:11 PM Oct 06, 11:11 PM

Two Russian adult males who had been detained after crossing the Bering Strait into Alaska claimed they were being looking to seek out asylum in the United States to avoid remaining drafted into the Russian navy for the war in Ukraine, in accordance to a senator representing the condition.

Karina Borger, a spokeswoman for Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R), informed the Related Push on Thursday that "the Russian nationals claimed that they fled a single of the coastal communities on the east coast of Russia to steer clear of compulsory armed forces support."

A spokesperson for the Office of Homeland Security instructed CNN that the two had been taken to Anchorage and processed in accordance with immigration guidelines. The two guys landed around the village of Gambell on St. Lawrence Island before this week.

TWO International NATIONALS DETAINED IN ALASKA Immediately after BOATING FROM RUSSIA

“We don’t foresee a continuous stream of men and women or a flotilla of folks," Gov. Mike Dunleavy (R) mentioned in a statement. "We have no indication that is going to come about, so this could be a just one-off.”

Murkowski criticized the deficiency of a federal reaction for immigration enforcement in the Arctic.

“We are actively engaged with federal officials and residents in Gambell to establish who these people today are, but correct now, we previously know that the federal response was lacking. Only area officials and condition regulation enforcement experienced the functionality to immediately react to the asylum seekers, when Customs and Border Safety had to dispatch a Coastline Guard plane from about 750 miles absent to get on scene,” Murkowski explained in a statement. “This situation underscores the will need for a more powerful stability posture in America’s Arctic, which I have championed during my time in the Senate.”

The U.S. is the most current state to see Russians attempting to flee the "partial mobilization" purchased by Russian President Vladimir Putin as the nation continues to shed land in the Ukraine conflict.

International locations encompassing Russia, including Finland and Ga, have viewed an influx of Russians fleeing amid the war.

US announces $625 million support bundle to Ukraine

Mike Brest

October 04, 01:48 PM October 04, 01:51 PM

The United States is supplying Ukraine with another armed service assist offer valued at somewhere around $625 million, Secretary of Condition Antony Blinken introduced on Tuesday.

Tuesday’s help marks the 22nd drawdown of U.S. arms and gear to support Ukraine considering that August of last calendar year. It also brings the complete U.S. military services assistance provided to Ukraine to extra than $16.8 billion given that Russia invaded roughly 7 months in the past.

RUSSIAN Court docket Established GRINER Attractiveness FOR Later on THIS Month

“We will continue to stand with the individuals of Ukraine as they protect their liberty and independence with extraordinary braveness and boundless determination,” he said. “The abilities we are providing are very carefully calibrated to make the most change on the battlefield and improve Ukraine’s hand at the negotiating desk when the time is ideal.”

Almost a week back, the U.S. announced $1.1 billion in help to Ukraine below the Ukraine Safety Aid Initiative.

Over the last few of weeks, Russian President Vladimir Putin has referred to as up around 300,000 reservists and sought to annex Russian-occupied territories in Ukraine in violation of intercontinental legislation. He has also continued to threaten to use tactical nuclear weapons on the battlefield, even as his forces continue on to cede territory.

The administration has continuously condemned Putin’s moves and rhetoric and imposed additional sanctions pursuing the attempted annexation of the Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia areas.