Good morning!
The documentary “Navalny” won an Oscar. Yulia Navalnaya received the Academy Award. The best film took the picture “Everything everywhere and at once” – as well as six other “Oscars”. And to non-fiction news:
- The Ukrainian authorities decided not to surrender Bakhmut, but Russian troops captured almost the entire eastern part of the city.
- Russia will start supplying Su-35 fighter jets to Iran.
- In Prague, thousands of people took to the anti-government demonstration demanding an end to military support for Ukraine.
- In Moldova, the pro-Russian opposition organized protests demanding lower prices.
Military reports
Over the past four days, Russian mercenaries have been able to take control of most of East Bakhmut, while the Ukrainian Armed Forces have firmly held the west of the city, divided by the Bakhmutka River. This is stated in the daily summary of British intelligence. British Defense Ministry analysts note that the city has become a kind of “death zone”: the Ukrainian military shoot through the city, preventing the “Wagnerites” from advancing, but at the same time, Ukrainian supply routes remain vulnerable to the west.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba commented on the decision of the Ukrainian authorities not to surrender the city: “When they break into your house, you don’t ask yourself how long you can resist.” He stated that if Russia captured Bakhmut and continued the offensive, then any next city beyond Bakhmut could suffer the same fate.
Wagner PMC founder Yevgeny Prigozhin said in another video that his militants need about $1 billion a month to continue their offensive. Answering the question whether he himself could not buy the necessary ammunition for the mercenaries, he said that then “it becomes not a business, but state administration.”
Meanwhile, the Russian mobilized continue to record complaints to Vladimir Putin – another similar video was published by the mothers and wives of mobilized from the Moscow region. They are dissatisfied with the fact that they are reassigned from the defense to the command of the annexed territories, and then “thrown like meat to storm the fortified areas.” Here’s a breakdown of how and why this happens. In the meantime, British military analyst Philip Ingram has calculated that around 30,000 people from the Russian side died during the assault on Bakhmut.
The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine believes that Russia does not leave attempts to enter the administrative borders of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. Russian troops tried to advance in the Avdeevka, Bakhmut and Liman directions, but these attempts were not crowned with success. Kherson was once again subjected to shelling, as a result of which two people were killed and three were injured. Russian troops launched 12 air and two missile attacks on Zaporozhye.
And here is a brief retelling of the BBC News Ukraine report about what is happening now in Mariupol captured by Russian troops: many residents now say that the city was destroyed by the Armed Forces of Ukraine, praise Putin and are waiting for new apartments from the occupying authorities. And the story of what awaits Ukrainian cities completely destroyed by the war.
War, view from Ukraine
Ukrainian investigators said that the former head of the SBU, Ivan Bakanov, who was removed from office several months ago, does not appear in any criminal case. He was dismissed after discovering the department’s failures in preparing to repel the Russian invasion and the arrests of several counterintelligence generals. Questions to Bakanov arose immediately after his appointment in 2019: before that, he had nothing to do with the special services, but he was a childhood friend and housemate of Vladimir Zelensky, and later his business partner. Previously, Ukrainian society agreed that the time for debriefing would come after the war, but now it may change its mind. Here you can read more about all this.
Last week, the Moscow Patriarchate was ordered to leave the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra by the end of March. Volodymyr Zelensky called this a step towards strengthening the spiritual independence of Ukraine.
International echo of the war
The Iranian government announced the conclusion of an agreement with Moscow, according to which it will supply Tehran with Su-35 fighters. In July last year, Putin met with Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei and spoke about the need for rapprochement between countries due to pressure from the West. Here are the details of this cooperation and how the West is trying to prevent it.
Switzerland disposes of 60 old British-made Rapier anti-aircraft missile systems, although it could transfer them to Ukraine. Swiss laws prohibit the supply of weapons to war zones, but do not prevent them from returning them back to the British, who, in turn, could send these complexes to Ukraine. Since the beginning of the war, Switzerland has refused similar requests from Germany, Spain and Denmark.
In Prague, thousands of people took to the anti-government demonstration demanding an end to military support for Ukraine, because this leads to high inflation. According to protest leaders, people want “the government to take care of the interests of the citizens of the Czech Republic first.” Some of them had the letter Z on their bags and chanted calls to “stop NATO”.
There are also riots in Moldova. There, the pro-Russian opposition organized a rally and tried to bring people to it by bus. The buses were detained by the police, after which they all went on foot to the center of Chisinau. The participants of the action also demanded to reduce prices, and also to repay all citizens’ utility bills for the winter months. They tried to break through to the parliament, but they were stopped by the police.
Six links
Sincerely yours,
Seven forty
