Ukraine reacts to fears of Russian invasion as troops build up at the border

[EnterpriseSovereign]

Gotta wonder if that includes the German anti-nuclear lobby.

[Lord Revan]

Well used to call those people "useful idiots" for a reason, I'd suspect that most fanatical anti-nuclear people don't really know what they're objecting to as they're so deep in a web of misinformation and wishful thinking.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

https://www.itv.com/news/2022-08-09/large-explosions-rock-russian-airbase-in-annexed-crimea.

At least one person was killed and several others injured, after powerful explosions rocked a Russian air base in Crimea on Tuesday, Russian authorities said.

Towering clouds of smoke were pictured above the base, but Russia's Defence Ministry denied the Saki base, on the Black Sea, had been shelled and said instead that munitions had blown up at the site.

Russian warplanes have used the Saki base to strike areas in Ukraine’s south on short notice.

But Ukrainian social networks were abuzz with speculation that it was hit by long-range missiles fired by their own forces.

Videos posted online showed sunbathers fleeing a nearby beach as huge flames and pillars of smoke rose over the horizon from multiple points, accompanied by loud booms.

Russia’s state news agency Tass quoted an unidentified ministry source as saying the explosions’ primary cause appeared to be a “violation of fire safety requirements”. No warplanes were damaged, according to the ministry.

Ukraine’s own Defence Ministry posted on social media: “The Ministry of Defence of Ukraine cannot establish the cause of the fire, but once again recalls the rules of fire safety and the prohibition of smoking in unspecified places.”

In another post, alongside a picture showing a tower of smoke rising in the background as a man in swimming trunks sunbathed, it said: "The Ministry of Defence of Ukraine would like to remind everyone that the presence of occupying troops on the territory of Ukrainian Crimea is not compatible with the high tourist season."

Despite the cause of the explosions, damage to one of Russia's key bases will be viewed as an embarrassment to Vladimir Putin.

Sergey Aksyonov, head of Russian-annexed Crimea, said ambulances and medical helicopters were scrambled to the Saki air base and authorities sealed off the area within a radius of five kilometres (about three miles) from the base.

He said one person was killed while health authorities confirmed six people were injured, one of whom remains hospitalised. Others were treated for cuts from shards of glass and were released.

During the war, Russia has reported numerous fires and explosions at munitions storage sites on its territory near the Ukrainian border, blaming some of them on Ukrainian strikes.

Ukrainian authorities have mostly remained silent about the incidents, maintaining an ambiguous stand.

If Kyiv's forces were, in fact, responsible for the blasts, it would mark the first known major attack at a Russian military site, on the Crimean Peninsula, which the Kremlin annexed in 2014.

Last month, a smaller explosion at the headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, in the Crimean port of Sevastopol, was blamed on Ukrainian saboteurs using a makeshift drone.

Officials in Moscow have long warned Ukraine that any attack on Crimea would trigger massive retaliation, including strikes on “decision-making centres” in Kyiv.

Earlier on Tuesday, Ukrainian officials reported at least three Ukrainian civilians were killed and 23 wounded by Russian shelling in the last 24 hours, including an attack not far from the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant.

More than 120 Russian rockets were fired at the town of Nikopol, across the Dnieper River from the plant, Dnipropetrovsk Governor Valentyn Reznichenko said.

Several apartment buildings and industrial sites were damaged, he added.

Ukraine and Russia have accused each other of shelling the power station - Europe’s biggest nuclear plant - stoking international fears of a catastrophe.

In his nightly video address on Monday, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskky invoked the 1986 disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear plant in Ukraine.

He called for new sanctions against Russia, accusing it of risking another nuclear disaster.

“We are actively informing the world about Russian nuclear blackmail,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Kremlin claimed that Ukraine’s military is attacking the plant and urged Western powers to force Kyiv to stop.

Funeral held for four-year-old Liza Dmytrieva killed in Russian missile strike
A Russian-installed official, in the partially occupied Zaporizhzhia region, said an air defence system at the plant would be reinforced in the aftermath of last week’s shelling.

Evgeny Balitsky, head of the Kremlin backed administration, told Russian state TV that power lines and other damaged portions of the plant were restored.

“The plant is operating normally but, of course, with an increased degree of security,” Mr Balitsky said.

During recent weeks Ukraine has been mounting counter-attacks in Russian-occupied areas of the south of the country, while trying to hold off the Kremlin’s forces in the eastern Donbas region.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

Zelenskyy accuses Russia of 'nuclear blackmail' after shelling at Europe's largest power plant.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has accused Russia of "nuclear blackmail" warning its troops are continuing to shell a nuclear power plant as a cover for their attacks on nearby towns.

In an evening video address, the Ukrainian president called on the international community to impose new sanctions on Moscow in response to its troops' actions on the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, in the Russian-controlled city of Enerhodar, in southern Ukraine.

Both Russian and Ukrainian officials traded accusations about renewed shelling of the plant, with each side alleging the other was responsible for the attacks that have raised fears of a potential radiation leak due to the fighting.

Mr Zelenskyy warned that the presence of Russian forces around Europe's largest nuclear power plant threatened a catastrophe for the entire continent and beyond.

"All Russian forces must immediately withdraw from the station and neighbouring areas without any conditions," Mr Zelenskyy said in his address.

"Any radiation incident at the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant could be a blow to the countries of the European Union, and to Turkey, and to Georgia, and countries from more distant regions," he added.

"Everything depends only on the direction and strength of the wind. If Russia's actions lead to a catastrophe, the consequences may hit those who remain silent so far."

The president called on the international community to protect the plant and if it lacks the "strength and determination" to do so, the "world will lose".

"It loses to terrorists, yielding to nuclear blackmail. And this may be a precedent that other terrorists will see. There is still a chance to prevent this loss," he said.

The press office of the Kremlin-backed administration in Enerhodar told Russian Interfax news agency that Ukrainian forces were carrying out “massive shelling” on the facility, as well as on Enerhodar’s residential and industrial areas.

It claimed the shelling came from nearby Nikopol, a Ukrainian-held city which faces the plant across the Dnieper River.

But the mayor of Nikopol later said the Russians themselves were the ones shelling Enerhodar.

Mayor Yevhen Yevtushenko and other municipal authorities in Nikopol have repeatedly accused Russian troops stationed at the plant of shelling the city, knowing that Ukrainian forces there were unlikely to fire back.

Might have something to do with the presence of Russian units on site.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

Ukraine mocks Moscow with parade of destroyed Russian tanks.

Aparade of destroyed Russian military vehicles is snaking its way through Kyiv in an apparent dig at Vladimir Putin’s forces that failed in their attempt to do the same.

Ukraine is said to be “trolling” the Russian president – who allegedly intended to hold his own victory parade in the capital – with the procession of rusting tanks.

The Kremlin reportedly had firm plans in place for the parade and some Russian officers had even prepared formal uniforms to be worn. However, Russian troops had to abandon their assault on Kyiv and refocus their efforts in east of Ukraine in March.


On Saturday, locals flocked to the centre of the capital to watch the procession of vehicles abandoned during the Russian retreat. It comes ahead of Ukraine’s independence day on Aug 24.

Locals were seen examining and photographing the tanks, as children climbed on them.

The parade follows other morale-boosting displays of Russia’s destroyed and abandoned military equipment.

In May, Kyiv’s residents gathered in Saint Michael’s Square to catch a glimpse of tanks as a sense of normality returned to the capital.

Other displays have seen tanks paraded through towns and cities across Ukraine, as well as abroad.

In July, two tanks were showcased in Warsaw’s historic Castle Square. The T-72 tank and 2S-19 self-propelled howitzer still had grass and mud trapped in their tracks.

Those vehicles had been captured by Ukrainian forces near Kyiv and the northern city of Kharkiv before being put on display in the Polish capital.

The event was a joint initiative between the Ukrainian and Polish governments entitled “For Your Freedom and Ours ”.

There are plans for the tanks to travel to Lisbon and Madrid at later dates.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

Russians vow to strike Ukraine after daughter of Vladimir Putin's ally dies in car bomb.

Kremlin-linked officials have vowed to strike Ukraine as Russia blamed Kyiv for a car bomb attack in Moscow that killed a prominent pro-war ideologue - the first attack in the Russian capital since the start of the war.

Ukrainian officials denied they had any links to the murder of Darya Durgina, but have still warned of increased Russian attacks around Ukraine's Independence Day on August 24, which also marks six months since the start of the war.

"We should be aware that this week Russia may try to do something particularly nasty, something particularly cruel. Such is our enemy," Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine's president, said in his regular video address.

Ukraine’s Southern Military Command said it had seen several new Russian missile-carrying warships arrive in the Black Sea in the past week.

The city authorities in Kharkiv, northern Ukraine, also ordered a 36-hour curfew, and in Kyiv mass gatherings have been banned.

Ms Dugina was killed as she drove back to central Moscow in a Toyota Land Cruiser from a literary and arts festival on the outskirts of the city where her father, the prominent ultra-nationalist philosopher Alexander Dugin, had been speaking.

It is likely that Mr Dugin, who has been called "Putin’s brain" and has been close to the Kremlin, was the intended target. He was supposed to drive into Moscow with his daughter, but decided at the last minute to travel back in another car.

A video shot immediately after the bomb had exploded showed Mr Dugin holding his hands to his head in shock as he stares at the burning wreck. Rubble is strewn across the road.

Russian investigators said that Ms Dugina, 29, had died immediately "from an explosive device which had been placed under the bottom of the car on the driver’s side"”.

Ms Dugina was a journalist who had shot to prominence since the Kremlin’s invasion of Ukraine. She had reported from Mariupol in southern Ukraine, where Ukrainian soldiers in the city’s steelworks had fought off Russian attacks for weeks.

She was also a regular on trips organised by the Russian government to rebel-held Donbas in eastern Ukraine.

Last month, the British government sanctioned Ms Dugina because she "is a frequent and high-profile contributor of disinformation in relation to Ukraine".

Ms Dugina was a vocal supporter of her father, who is perhaps the most prominent ultra-nationalist thinker in Russia. He advocates the Kremlin’s rule over a greater Eurasian state, and has called for the destruction of Ukraine.

After Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, Mr Dugin had encouraged the Kremlin to "kill, kill, kill" Ukrainians, and he celebrated Mr Putin’s full-scale invasion in February.

Analysts have questioned how influential Mr Dugin has been over the Kremlin's aggressive foreign policy, but he is nevertheless an important figurehead for hardcore Slavic nationalism.

Echoing her father’s aggressive tones during her appearances on Russian state TV, Ms Dugina also regularly advocated the destruction of Ukraine.

"We started this special operation very delicately and carefully, but we need to be tougher and less forgiving. We need to create more tribunals that will investigate the crimes of these sub-humans," she said.

The Russian government has not commented on the incident, but Kremlin-linked propagandists were accusing Ukraine of the attack even before investigators could finish picking through the debris.

Margarita Simonyan, one of Vladimir Putin’s favourite pro-war TV pundits, said that missile strikes should target Ukraine’s "decision-making centres".

Meanwhile, Tsargrad TV, the Russian orthodox and nationalist TV network where Mr Dugin is the editor and Ms Dugina had been a commentator, said that "Kyiv should shake" from missiles strikes.

But in Kyiv, the Ukrainian government denied that it had anything to do with Ms Dugina’s murder. "We are not a criminal state, like the Russian Federation, and moreover we are not a terrorist state," said Mykhailo Podolyak, a top presidential adviser.

Ukrainians have been celebrating in the lead-up to Independence Day by inspecting dozens of rusting and broken captured Russian tanks that the Ukrainian military towed into central Kyiv - a scene that is likely to irritate Mr Putin who had expected to capture the city within days.

On Sunday, Russian missiles also hit Odesa, the Ukrainian port city on the Black Sea which is vital to the UN-organised plan to export grain from Ukraine.

Ukraine’s Southern Military Command said that five cruise missiles were fired from the Black Sea region. It said that its air defence systems shot down two missiles, but that three had hit grain infrastructure. Russia said it had hit ammunition sites. There were no casualties.

International concern is still focused on the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, the largest in Europe, which has been controlled by Russian forces since the start of the war.


Both sides have accused each other of shelling the power plant and Ukrainian officials have warned that Russia could be planning a false flag attack to justify intensifying its own attacks.

The Ukrainian governor of the town of Nikopol said that on Sunday that at least 25 Russian shells had hit the town, which lies across the Dnipro River from the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, cutting power to 3,000 people.

[LadyTevar]

We'll probably never find out who set the bomb. Russian dissents, Ukrainian spies, NATO operatives... it's all possible

[Lord Revan]

We'll probably never find out who set the bomb. Russian dissents, Ukrainian spies, NATO operatives... it's all possible

Honestly I wouldn't count out "FSB in an effort to frame one of the previously mentioned" either, it wouldn't be the first time Russia/Soviet Union used a manufactured incident in such a way.

[His Divine Shadow]

Well better luck next time

[Zaune]

Honestly I wouldn't count out "FSB in an effort to frame one of the previously mentioned" either, it wouldn't be the first time Russia/Soviet Union used a manufactured incident in such a way.

Could even be a genuine anti-Putin faction within the FSB itself, or at least an anti-Dugin faction. Given that he's apparently set himself up as Tsar Vlad the 1st's answer to Rasputin it's not hard to believe that the more pragmatic and reality-based officials in the military and security service are quite unhappy with him right now.

What the man's daughter did to deserve being targeted I have no idea, mind you.

[His Divine Shadow]

The daughter held the same political views as her father and was also a vocal supporter of the ukrainan invasion, so no tears shed at any rate.

Not that she was targeted, it was him they where after, but he changed his mind last minute about getting in the car.

[Zwinmar]

Honestly, it sounds like both are legitimate military targets anyways.

[Lord Revan]

Honestly I wouldn't count out "FSB in an effort to frame one of the previously mentioned" either, it wouldn't be the first time Russia/Soviet Union used a manufactured incident in such a way.

Could even be a genuine anti-Putin faction within the FSB itself, or at least an anti-Dugin faction. Given that he's apparently set himself up as Tsar Vlad the 1st's answer to Rasputin it's not hard to believe that the more pragmatic and reality-based officials in the military and security service are quite unhappy with him right now.

What the man's daughter did to deserve being targeted I have no idea, mind you.

It would actually be Vladimir III (ordinals are counted starting from the Rurik Dynasty), though I had forgotten that possibility that FSB might have factions that would commit such actions without orders from Putin (the car bomb that is not how Czars of Russia count their ordinals).

If true it doesn't say good things about the state of Russian leadership as outside of crackpot theories the idea that CIA would choose to assassinate a important US political figure so openly does seem insane to even think same for most European intelligence agencies.

[LadyTevar]

The daughter held the same political views as her father and was also a vocal supporter of the ukrainan invasion, so no tears shed at any rate.

Not that she was targeted, it was him they where after, but he changed his mind last minute about getting in the car.

I do wonder why he changed his mind. Did someone tip him off?

[wautd]

We'll probably never find out who set the bomb. Russian dissents, Ukrainian spies, NATO operatives... it's all possible

Doesn't matter. Her Nazi corpse isn't cold yet and the Kremlin already claims that Ukraine was behind it. Because who needs evidence when you know how trustworthy the Kremlin's reputation is

[EnterpriseSovereign]

Ukraine claims major gains as forces advance against Russia in the country's north east.

Ukrainian officials say their country's forces has made major gains in a counteroffensive against Russian troops in the country's northeast.

They say their troops have cut off vital supplies from reaching the Russian frontline. The reports follow several days of apparent advances by Ukraine south of the second largest city of Kharkiv.

Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesman Oleh Nikolenko suggested that troops had retaken Kupiansk, a town along the main supply route to Izyum, long a focus on the Russian front line and the site of heavy artillery and other fighting.

The Security Service of Ukraine later posted a message which it said showed its forces in Kupiansk, further suggesting it had been seized by Ukrainian troops.

The Ukrainian military didn't immediately confirm entering the town, a railway hub which Russia seized in February, when its mayor surrendered to avoid civilian casualties.

The Ukrainian Defence Forces also claimed they had captured much of the town of Balakliya, posting a video of the Ukrainian flag flying in the town centre.

Later today more videos on social media began to circulate, appearing to show Ukrainian forces on the rural outskirts of Izyum at a roadside checkpoint.

In its daily update, the UK's Ministry of Defence said that over the past four days Ukrainian forces had advanced up to 50km into previously Russian occupied territory.

They added that Russian forces were "likely taken by surprise."

Most recently, Russia's defence ministry announced troops would be pulled back from key areas in the Kharkiv region.

The Ukrainian military claimed in its regular update today to have taken “more than 1,000 square kilometers” from pro-Kremlin forces this week. It said “in some areas, units of the Defense Forces have penetrated the enemy’s defenses to a depth of 50 kilometers."

On Friday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address that Ukrainian troops had reclaimed more than 30 settlements in the Kharkiv region since the start of the counteroffensive.

“We are gradually taking control over more settlements, returning the Ukrainian flag and protection for our people,” he said.

[LadyTevar]

As of this morning Ukraine seems to have taken 3000km.

[The Infidel]

As of this morning Ukraine seems to have taken 3000km.

Imagine if Zelensky had accepted the ride instead of asking for ammunition back in February. Imagine if the west hadn't given them any weapons. I hope Ukraine manages to throw every Russian soldier out of its land, and by land owned by Ukraine, I also mean Crimea and I hope NATO continues to give them whatever they need. We are in a proxy war.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

As of this morning Ukraine seems to have taken 3000km.

Imagine if Zelensky had accepted the ride instead of asking for ammunition back in February. Imagine if the west hadn't given them any weapons. I hope Ukraine manages to throw every Russian soldier out of its land, and by land owned by Ukraine, I also mean Crimea and I hope NATO continues to give them whatever they need. We are in a proxy war.

3,000km? Ukraine is big but it's not that big.

[Broomstick]

3,000km? Ukraine is big but it's not that big.

Maybe it is now?

[Crazedwraith]

3,000 square kilometres of territory. Not advanced 3,000 km.

[Zaune]

Quite. If they'd advanced that far they'd be pretty deep into Russian territory, and I am... mostly certain they don't plan to pursue the retreating Russians across the border.

[LadyTevar]

3,000 square kilometres of territory. Not advanced 3,000 km.

THANK YOU!
I screwed it up.

[His Divine Shadow]

I'm no strategist but I think this whole counter offensive is just a ploy to win the war.

[Lord Revan]

I'm no strategist but I think this whole counter offensive is just a ploy to win the war.

From whom though the Russians or the Ukrainians?