Good morning!
The Lefortovo Court of Moscow arrested the sixth person suspected of treason in two months. Only his surname and initials are known: Vzvodnov M.N. The rest is like this:
- A sabotage group of the Freedom of Russia Legion and the Russian Volunteer Corps entered the Belgorod Region from Ukraine. A counter-terrorist operation regime has been introduced in the region.
- Prigozhin announced the withdrawal of his units from Bakhmut by June 1.
- On Monday night, the Russian military launched 16 missiles and 20 Iranian drones into the Dnepropetrovsk region – only a fraction of them were shot down.
- Navalny was sent to the ShIZO for the 16th time (and they are going to declare him a “foreign agent”).
- Navalny’s associates discovered in Sochi the secret villas of the wife of General Surovikin and the mistress of TV propagandist Vladimir Solovyov.
- Pashinyan announced his readiness to recognize Karabakh as part of Azerbaijan, provided that the security of ethnic Armenians living there is ensured.
War, view from the Belgorod region
On Monday morning, units of the Freedom of Russia Legion and the Russian Volunteer Corps entered the Belgorod Region, which the Russian authorities call a “sabotage and reconnaissance group of the Armed Forces of Ukraine”. Russian and Ukrainian telegram channels reported on battles near the settlements of Dronovka, Glotovo, Kozinka and Gora-Podil, and a Ukrainian tank allegedly drove into the territory of the Graivoron checkpoint. The head of the region, Vyacheslav Gladkov, reported eight injured civilians; according to him, the evacuation of the population from the Gaivoronsky district was not carried out, because most of the residents left on their own. By Monday evening, the region entered the counter-terrorist operation regime (here it is explained what this means).
The Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine confirmed that “opposition-minded Russian citizens who are ready for an armed struggle against Putin’s criminal regime” have entered Russia. At the same time, adviser to the head of the office of the President of Ukraine Mykhailo Podolyak ironized on Twitter that “tanks are sold in any Russian military store” – they are supposedly bought by Russian partisans. Advisor to the Minister of Defense of Ukraine Yuriy Sak confirmed to the BBC that Russian citizens were participating in the raid on the Belgorod region, but refused to discuss Ukraine’s involvement in the creation and training of these armed groups. What the Legion “Freedom of Russia” is like, journalist Yevgeny Legalov, who interviewed some members of this unit, tells here. The former State Duma deputy Ilya Ponomarev, who has long lived in Ukraine, now calls himself the political leader of the legion. Russian journalists identified several participants in the invasion. One of them, the nationalist Aleksey Levkin, has been put on the wanted list in Russia.
Against this background, rumors about the urgent removal of Russian tactical nuclear weapons from the Belgorod-22 facility were actively circulating in the telegram. Governor Gladkov reported a drone strike on an administrative building in Borisovka and an attack by drones on private houses in the Gaivoronsky district (of course, there were no casualties). In the evening, telegram channels of various ideological orientations reported about an explosion of some unknown thing in the building of the FBS Directorate for the Belgorod Region.
Commenting on the invasion of the Belgorod region, Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that it was undertaken to divert attention from Bakhmut. Putin didn’t say anything.
War, view from Bakhmut and other Ukrainian cities
On Monday night, the Russian army fired 16 missiles and 20 Shahed kamikaze drones of Iranian production into the Dnipropetrovsk region: four missiles and 15 Shaheds were shot down, the rest hit somewhere. As a result, fires started, private and multi-apartment residential buildings were damaged, cars burned down; at least eight civilians were injured. Odessa and Kharkov region were also attacked.
Regarding Bakhmut, the Ukrainian military continues to insist that Russia does not completely control the city – here the commander of the 1st separate brigade of the Ukrainian special forces Taras Berezovets talks about the situation in its vicinity. He claims that the Ukrainian army “created the conditions” for taking the city into the cauldron, and explains Prigozhin’s announcement of the complete capture of Bakhmut by the desire of the “cook” to withdraw the remnants of his units from there as soon as possible. Indeed, Prigozhin announced that by June 1, there would be no Wagnerites left in Bakhmut (the percentage of lies in his speeches, according to various expert estimates, fluctuates between 80 and 20). The journalists of the edition “Layout” managed to confirm the death of at least 500 Wagnerians in the battle for Bakhmut from open sources – in reality, this number could be several times higher. The US State Department accused Wagner PMC of trying to purchase weapons for the war in Ukraine through Mali, where mercenaries cooperate with local authorities.
According to British military intelligence, Russia is creating a new air group to attack Ukraine. In Ukraine, meanwhile, preparations are underway to receive F-16 combat aircraft – Ukrainian aviation expert Valery Romanenko talks about what these machines are good for and what is needed for their successful use in this war.
Two reports from Ukrainian military units: about “simiks” – people who provide support to the civilian population in front-line cities, and about the training of snipers.
Ukrainian “Energoatom” announced another shutdown of external power supply at the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant, occupied by the Russian military. The IAEA once again expressed its concern.
War, view from Russia
- Another video message to the Russian authorities was recorded by the wives, daughters and mothers of those mobilized from the Tyumen region and the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug. The complaints are the same: men are thrown into the attack without fire support, they are not paid money, and they call them “cannon fodder”. In addition, women complain about the eternal lies of local authorities – here are the details.
- On Monday morning in the east of Moscow there was a fire in the military registration and enlistment office; in Orenburg, a court sent a local resident to a pre-trial detention center, allegedly intending to set fire to the military registration and enlistment office and the local department of the FSB.
- A military court in Yekaterinburg sentenced a contractor to three years in a colony-settlement for refusing to participate in the war in Ukraine.
- A criminal case was opened against a serviceman from the Khabarovsk Territory about “fake news” about the Russian army (it is not known for what). He has been in jail since November.
Peaceful Russian life
- Navalny was sent to the ShIZO for the 16th time and, according to RT, they are going to declare him a “foreign agent”. Alexei’s associates discovered in Sochi the secret villas of the wife of General Surovikin and the mistress of Vladimir Solovyov. The cost of such houses is half a billion rubles; Investigators are particularly indignant at the fact that Solovyov’s mistress, basketball player Svetlana Abrosimova, the happy owner of an American passport and two children together with Solovyov, also born in the United States for the sake of a passport, is actually taken under state protection (the owner of her villa is “Russian Federation”) .
- The head of the Perm “Center for Historical Memory” Alexander Chernyshov was arrested in connection with an attempt to smuggle cultural property. By “cultural values” is meant an archive of documents of recent years on the activities of the “Memorial”, liquidated by the Russian authorities.
- In Volgograd, the author of the video with the burning of the Koran was arrested for two months. The investigation claims that he did this on the instructions of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
- Camellia Slish, a resident of Irkutsk, was sentenced to one and a half years probation in the case of “fakes” about the Russian army. The “fake” was that she signed the repost of the photo with the murder of the inhabitants of Bucha with the word “murderers”.
- The Irkutsk intelligentsia turned to the city authorities with a request to remove the banner with the letter Z from the building of the drama theater, because (a) they throw it with rotten eggs with brilliant green and (b) because “the theater is out of politics.”
- The Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia put the actor Alexei Panin on the wanted list. Earlier, a case was brought against him to justify terrorism for the words published on Telegram that he “could not hide his joy from the strike on the Kerch bridge.”
- There are 300 days left before Putin’s next re-election – here are the results of a poll conducted by a group of independent sociologists Russian Field (spoiler: dear Russians tell pollsters that they would elect dear Vladimir Vladimirovich again, even if it really were elections).
- The biography of Andrei Polosin, who was commissioned by the Kremlin to turn Russian students into “patriotic intelligentsia” through a university course on the foundations of Russian statehood, can be found here.
Around the world
- The trial of Eduard Babariko, the son of the ex-candidate for the presidency of Belarus, began in Minsk – he spent almost three years behind bars. At the same time, it became known about the pardon of the former editor of the telegram channel Nexta Roman Protasevich, for the sake of detaining whom the Belarusian authorities deceived into landing a Ryanair plane in Minsk. Having fallen into the hands of the Belarusian authorities, Protasevich made a deal with the investigation.
- Since the beginning of 2023, Lithuania has refused to issue and renew residence permits to 347 Russians and Belarusians.
- Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said that Yerevan is ready to recognize the territory of the self-proclaimed republic of Nagorno-Karabakh as part of Azerbaijan, provided that Baku ensures the security of ethnic Armenians living in this territory. Here the Armenian-Azerbaijani peace process and Russia’s interests in it are commented by Ilya Kusa, an expert from the analytical center “Ukrainian Institute of the Future”.
- Former Turkish presidential candidate Sinan Ogan called on his supporters to vote for Erdogan in the second round of the presidential elections on May 28.
- The NATO Parliamentary Assembly recognized Russia’s crimes against Ukraine as genocide and supported the creation of an international special tribunal to try Putin.
eight links
- Creators and Power. (1) A long interview with writer, queer artist and one of the most controversial figures of the 1990s Yaroslav Mogutin – including how Dugin drank vodka with his lover. (2) A conversation with writer Artem Mozgov, author of the English-language queer novel Spring in Siberia, including why he flinches when he hears Russian. (3) A conversation with literary critic Mark Lipovetsky about the nature of cynicism inherent in both modern Russian and old Soviet power.
- Race. Three excerpts from Angela Signey’s The Return of Racial Science (Forth Estate): first, on human zoos; the second is about the rise of eugenics in Germany; the third is about how modern genetics can fuel racial prejudice.
- Movie. Conversation with director Malika Musayeva, author of the film “The Cage is looking for a bird” – about tact, Chechnya and Sokurov. Or a conversation with Nana Janelidze about her new film “Walk, Liza!” and about “Repentance” by Tengiz Abuladze (Dzhanelidze is the scriptwriter of this film).
Sincerely yours,
Seven forty
