Ukraine: military (Aug '14 to mid-June '15) closed [Archive] - Page 14

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 01:18 PM

http://www.firstthings.com/article/2015/05/orthodox-terrorism

Orthodox Terrorism

by Mykhailo Cherenkov

May 2015

Long before Russia’s annexation of Crimea and unproclaimed war in the Donbass, Ukraine had become a religious battleground. Despite the warning of Yurii Chernomorets, Cyril Hovorun, and other observers, none of the leading Ukrainian and Western politicians foresaw the threat posed by an increasingly aggressive form of Orthodox Christianity being promoted by Moscow. As events in Ukraine have now shown, Orthodox fundamentalism is no less aggressive than Islamic fundamentalism, and the “Russian Spring” is no less bloody than its Arab counterpart.

The facts speak for themselves: Greek Catholics and Kiev-patriarchate Ukrainian Orthodox churches have become de facto #il#legal entities in the annexed Crimea; in the Donbass region, an “Orthodox army” is active; dozens of Protestant #churches have been seized; there have been cases of kidnapping, torture, and killing of pastors; #Moscow-patriarchate priests openly bless terrorists and refuse to pray over deceased Ukrainian soldiers; Patriarch Kirill of Moscow predicts the downfall of Ukraine as a “kingdom divided against itself.”

Russia’s war against Ukraine has exacerbated a series of international, interethnic, and interconfessional conflicts. It is the religious aspect of the conflict that may prove to be the most significant, because Moscow Orthodoxy has been presented as the thing holding the “Russian world” together, and thereby as the main actor in the bloody Russian Spring.

Putin has justified the annexation of Crimea by saying that it has “sacred meaning for Russia, like the Temple Mount in Jerusalem for Jews and Muslims.” He calls it “the #spiritual source of the formation of the #multifaced but monolithic Russian nation. . . . It was on this spiritual soil that our ancestors first and forever recognized their nationhood.”

There is a nineteenth-century saying: “To be Russian is to be Orthodox.” This is becoming the main motive for the consolidation of “Russians” and the defense of the “Orthodox.” The Declaration of Russian Identity, passed at the end of the 2014 Global Russian National Assembly, asserts: “Claims that every Russian must acknowledge Orthodox Christianity as the basis of their national culture are both justified and fair. Rejection of this fact, and even worse, a search for a different religious basis for the national culture, testifies to a weakened Russian identity, to the point of its loss.” In short, Putin has reversed the old principle “Whose realm, his religion” (cuius regio, eius religio) that settled religious loyalties in post-Reformation Europe by allowing the ruler’s Protestant or Catholic commitment to define the religion of the realm. Now Putin seems to presume an expansionist principle: “Whose religion, his realm.”

“The conflict in Ukraine has a clear religious underpinning,” wrote Patriarch Kirill to Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople in a letter published on the website of the Moscow patriarchate. “Uniates, and schismatics that have joined them, are trying to seize the upper hand over canonical Orthodoxy in Ukraine. . . . I ask Your Holiness to do all you can to raise your voice in defense of the Orthodox Christians in eastern Ukraine who, in a situation of increasing violence on the part of Greek Catholics and schismatics, live in daily fear.”

For the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine, there are no other Orthodox churches—they are all impostors and schismatics. Additionally, the patriarch hides the well-known fact that even if one accepts the notion of “canonical territory,” Ukraine is on disputed canonical territory and belongs more rightly to the ecumenical patriarchate than to the Moscow patriarchate.

The identification of Orthodox faith with the Moscow patriarchate is becoming a mighty propaganda tool. The Orthodox militant Igor Druz, adviser to the minister of Defense of the Donetsk People’s Republic, remarked:

On the Ukrainian side there are no Orthodox at all, because not a single churched Orthodox individual would go to fight against New Russia, because they know that the unity of Holy Rus is pleasing to God. All saints who have spoken on this topic are unanimous in saying that Holy Rus must be united. Meanwhile Ukrainian fascists are the real separatists and they want to divide New Russia from Holy Rus and unite it to the decaying warmongering West. Therefore there are no church people on the Ukrainian side at all. Their battalions are made up mainly of uniates, schismatics, neo-pagans, and sectarians.

In July 2014, Metropolitan Onuphrius of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate addressed a personal letter to Ukrainian president Petro #Poroshenko, explaining that he was “forced to draw attention to the violation of the rights and freedoms of believers and interference in the work of the parish of the Donetsk diocese of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church by the Ukrainian military in eastern Ukraine.”He did not mention the problems of other confessions or abuses by the occupying forces and terrorists. Thereby the UOC-MP confirmed not only its spiritual, but also its political dependence on Moscow. In a conflict between an Orthodox empire that swallows Ukraine and a nation, between imperial ideology and civil society, the “Ukrainian” Orthodox Church has chosen its side.

In one sense, it is no longer Russia as a country, but Russian Orthodoxy as a supranational movement, that is becoming a geopolitical factor. Claiming to defend “true” traditional canonical Orthodoxy, Orthodox leaders justify the actions of the “Orthodox army” in the Donbass region.

Through the efforts of Russian Spring ideologues, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, between Moscow Orthodoxy and Ukrainian “Uniates, schismatics, and sectarians,” is portrayed as part of a global conflict, represented as a contest between the “Russian world” and the “decaying West,” between “traditional values” and “gay Europe,” between salvific spirituality and #corrupting secularity.

Moreover, as the main unifying force for the New Russia, the Russian Orthodox Church today is trying to create an alliance with those Protestants, Jews, and Muslims who agree with the Orthodox view of Russian history and accept without a murmur their own subservient position. As the director of external communications for one of the Protestant denominations in Russia told me, “We Protestants understand that all the seats at the government table are taken, but we don’t object to feeding on crumbs that fall from the table.”

These allies of “true Orthodoxy” will soon become the next victims. Indeed, they already are. While Protestant leaders are participating in government councils and receiving presidential awards, their churches are being mercilessly persecuted.

The defense of “purity of faith” is being put forward in order to justify the horrors of the Russian Spring in Ukraine. Only the defense of mythical traditional values can cover up the imperial ambitions of Moscow Orthodoxy. Only a fanatical faith in the faith itself and in its own exclusivity could close its eyes to the commission by Orthodox crusaders of unmentionable crimes against humanity, against Ukraine and the world, against God and their neighbors.

Sooner or later the global community will have to acknowledge the fact of “political Orthodoxy” and the “Orthodox terrorism” connected to it, supported by Russia and destabilizing all of Eurasia. The sooner this happens, the better—for regional and global security, for defense of religious freedoms and civil rights, and for the self-determination of individuals and nations. One of the first steps in this direction should be the recognition that the “Orthodox” people’s republics that have formed in eastern Ukraine (Donetsk and Lugansk) are terrorist organizations. Such honesty would bring clarity to the situation and allow a nonpolitical and nonaggressive Orthodoxy to separate itself from the political and aggressive pretender to the Slavic world’s Christian inheritance.

Mykhailo Cherenkov, a Baptist theologian, is the former provost of Donetsk Christian University, which was seized by pro-Russian terrorists in 2014. He now is associate professor of philosophy at Ukrainian Catholic University.

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 01:20 PM

http://www.firstthings.com/article/2015/05/orthodox-terrorism

Orthodox Terrorism

by Mykhailo Cherenkov

May 2015

Russia's Holy War
http://20committee.com/2015/01/24/russias-emerging-holy-war/

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 03:51 PM

Russia Military Drills 2015: We are Ready for WW3 - Russian Military Pow...https://youtu.be/pvtvSahmdGI

Documents of Russian tankman from Stavropol, Russia who was taken prisoner published on http://24today.net/open/381307 pic.twitter.com/doxxnhFdHf

Vid fr April 9, Title "Column parade of tanks in the #Donetsk Republic! preparation for the May 9". A lot vehicles"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBOE-T_z4_A …

16:41 #Horlivka, Shakhtar @levis_71: A skirmish an hour ago, 1 dead (military), Lenin Ave is cordoned off, shots in the air

16:15 #Donetsk @Buzzing_Rook: Small arms somewhere in the north can be heard in Kuybyshevsky ds, short bursts.

14:38 #Donetsk @ZamGlav: 10 min ago 8 Ural trucks w/howitzers D-30 along Universytetska St tow/airport

Russia says US wants 'complete domination' after it sent troops to Ukraine on training missionhttp://aje.io/5xht pic.twitter.com/b2TKCFMNXF

Militants fire ‘withdrawn weapons’ seven times at Ukrainian army
http://www.unian.info/war/1068466-militants-fire-withdrawn-weapons-seven-times-at-ukrainian-army.html … pic.twitter.com/e2etHEo9XS

Zakharchenko: DPR almost completed the process of forming the army http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/17-april-zakharchenko-dpr-almost-completed-the-process-of … #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/QZGogbBU3K via @RT_russian

This guy from Abkhazia is now the boss of the chain "First Republican Supermarket" in Donetsk http://inforesist.org/naemnik-iz-abxazii-vozglavil-v-donecke-set-otzhatyx-supermarketov/?_utl_t=fb … pic.twitter.com/m6ZPEqBhQ4

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 04:11 PM

There as been heavy fighting in a town close to the Ukrainian city Mariupol Shyrokyne which if taken by Russian forces would allow them immediate attack abilities into Mariupol. It was from this general direction and near Shyrokyne that the Russians launched a massive BM27 MRLS attack on the city that caused over 21 civilian deaths.

Russia failed to take #Shyrokyne with small arms and mortars so far, so they try the 'diplomatic' waynow. https://twitter.com/GorseFires/status/589014519214649344 …

*** Two days ago, Russian Col-Gen Lentsov demanded "demilitarization" of #Shyrokyne. Today, Ukrainian General Staff cave in to his demands.

OSCE wants all armed forces to retreat 5-8kms from #Shyrokyne = Ukraine must give up all buffer zone before Mariupol. pic.twitter.com/Xn8Fa47wFb
pic.twitter.com/5k1W6s7CQb

#OSCE observers decide to stay in #Shyrokyne round the clock – Interfax

Suddenly #OSCE_SMM are DPR militia's "best friends" with promise to "monitor the situation day and night in the village #Shyrokyne"

Azov regiment said "the initiative to demilitarize Shirokino is extremely dangerous and irresponsible" http://ru.tsn.ua/ato/v-azove-ubezhdeny-chto-demilitarizaciya-shirokino-otkroet-boevikam-vorota-v-mariupol-421099.html …

#Shyrokyne or #Shirokino is key strategic point and firing position, from which Russian enemy regularly shelled #Mariupol city. #Azov

IF... Ukraine is so stupid to give in into this, will OSCE stop the Russian tanks when they come in #Shyrokyne? pic.twitter.com/N8giQtVQdj

Once all UA arms are gone, Russians can just walk in overnight and without a fight #Shyrokynehttps://twitter.com/OSCE_SMM/status/589031256618356736 … pic.twitter.com/kXWqlpGoLh

Then the Ukrainian response came concerning the demilitarization today.

Ukraine is ready to ensure the demilitarization of Shyrokyne, Donetsk region, on the condition of full observance of ceasefire for the duration of a set period of time, the press center for the Ukrainian military operation reported on April 17.

Notice---the Ukrainians after four so called ceasefires have learned the Russian game and demand a complete ceasefire ie absolutely not a single shelling, ground attack, small arms attack, tank shellings and or ATM firings
THEN they will demilitarize the town.

After the complete failure four times by Russia and her mercenaries to actually conduct a true ceasefire the Ukraine simply does not trust them any longer.

Then the Russian FM response came almost immediately after the Ukrainian statement.

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
#Lavrov: The #Normandy4 format ministers agreed in Berlin on March 13 to urge the pullout of heavy systems under 100 mm in caliber

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
#Lavrov: The ministers, including Mr Klimkin, who adopted the recommendation in Berlin, thought it would help reduce the risk of incidents

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
#Lavrov: Lugansk and Donetsk have supported the idea. Unfortunately, Kiev has again advanced preconditions

Interestingly Russia FM equates "preconditions" to not wanting to be constantly shelled by Russian troops and her mercenaries.

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 04:18 PM

A series of very astute social media comments by a well known journalist who is working the Ukrainian region.

Edward Lucas ✔ @edwardlucas
Russian TV presents coherent single narrative in a way that democratic countries' media cannot. Need to think assymetrically

Putin may use baltics to test or humiliate NATO -- but biggest danger is misunderstanding. Putin is deluded, thinks west is attacking him

This is a core Putin geo political demand:
Russia likes idea of "new Yalta" (or "new Helsinki") to settle European security. Beware! @FOIresearch

Main explanation of more aggressive russian foreign policy is that west is dramatically weaker than in 1997-2004

This is the serious concern of the entire Baltic region--that Russian troops can actually overrun most of the Baltics in under four hours.
Big danger from Russia is snap attack creating fait accompli. But russia already stretched to limit by 15-20k troop commitment in Ukraine

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 04:23 PM

Russia's army of bots & trolls is getting reinforcements: Moscow plans a special “information ops” military unit. https://meduza.io/en/news/2015/04/17/russia-to-set-up-information-forces-in-crimea …

Russia to set up ‘information forces’ in Crimea

14:49, 17 April 2015 TASS

The Russian Ministry of Defense will set up a special “information operations” military unit in Crimea, according to a source from the Ministry who spoke to information agency TASS.

According to the source, the new unit will be assigned the task of “disrupting the work of the potential enemy’s information networks.” Work will begin in the fall of 2015.

The tasks of the special unit will include “disrupting the work of the potential enemy’s information networks and the subsequent disruption of the functioning of their system of troop command and control,” as well as “enforcement of cyber security in their own information networks.”

Already in the spring of 2014, it was reported that the Ministry of Defense had made plans to establish “information operation forces.” Reports at that time stated that the new division will work with securing Russian military command and communication systems.

In April 2015 Ukraine said it was recruiting an ‘iArmy’ to ‘fight back the Russian occupiers on the information front.’

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 05:17 PM

A very good article on the killing yesterday of a proRussian journalist in Kyiv--should be read.
RFE/RL ✔ @RFERL
Kyiv Alleges Journalist's Slaying Not Only Ordered, But Timed To The Minute http://www.rferl.org/content/kyiv-alleges-journalists-slaying-not-only-ordered-timed-to-the-minute/26963867.html …

Russian Volunteer Fighters from the Urals Return Home from the 'Lugansk People's Republic'
http://www.interpretermag.com/russia-update-april-17-2015/#7956 … pic.twitter.com/bA5Bm24JkX

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 05:31 PM

Was the killing of two proRussians in the Ukraine recently actually Russian "false flag operations".

Why is it a possibility??? Putin was already talking about it in his Q&A telephone session --even before the news broke officially he was critiquing the Ukrainians for calling themselves "democratic".

RFE/RL ✔ @RFERL
Kyiv Alleges Journalist's Slaying Not Only Ordered, But Timed To The Minute http://www.rferl.org/content/kyiv-al.../26963867.html …

Friday, April 17, 2015

Ukraine

Kyiv Alleges Journalist's Slaying Not Only Ordered, But Timed To The Minute

Oles Buzina was killed on April 16

By Daisy Sindelar

April 17, 2015

At 1:55 Moscow time on April 16, the Ukrainian National News agency posted a bulletin announcing that journalist Oles Buzina had been shot dead.

At 2:05, Ukrainian presidential adviser Anton Herashchenko confirmed the slaying on Facebook. And by 2:17, Russian President Vladimir Putin was already using Buzina's killing to attack Ukraine's "democratic" values during his annual call-in show with the Russian public.

"This isn't the first political killing we've seen. We've had an entire series of these kinds of killings in Ukraine," Putin said smoothly, responding to a moderator who interrupted the live television broadcast to announce Buzina's slaying. In all, just 23 minutes had passed from the first bulletin on Buzina's death in Kyiv to Putin's cursory condemnation in Moscow.

It's a turnaround some Ukrainian officials found remarkably rapid for a president who earlier this year took more than four days to comment publicly on the far more resonant assassination of Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov just outside the Kremlin walls.

Kyiv officials now allege that Buzina's killing was not only ordered at Russia's behest, but also purposefully timed to serve as seemingly impromptu anti-Ukrainian fodder for Putin's Q & A.

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko described Buzina's daytime slaying by two masked men on a central Kyiv street as a "deliberate provocation."

Herashchenko spoke more pointedly, describing Buzina as a "sacrificial victim" and noting that the call-in show's announcement about the journalist's death "was so carefully worded I got the impression they could have known about the tragedy in advance."

Later Herashchenko spoke even more bluntly, accusing Russia's special forces of carrying out Buzina's killing "to create an atmosphere of terror in Kyiv."

He added that the nearly simultaneous death of Oleh Kalashnikov -- a crony of ousted leader Viktor Yanukovych -- was an attempt to show that "opposition politicians are also supposedly killed in Ukraine, just as Nemtsov was killed in Russia."

'Absurd' Allegations

Konstantin Dolgov, the human rights representative of Russia's Foreign Ministry, has hotly rejected any suggestion its own special forces were involved, calling Kyiv's accusations "absurd" and "blasphemous."

To be certain, Ukrainian officials have done little to resolve a recent string of suspicious deaths that have targeted, almost exclusively, allies of ousted leader Viktor Yanukovych and other pro-Russian figures.

Kalashnikov is the ninth member of Yanukovych's Party of Regions to die violently in the past three months. The majority of the deaths have been ruled suicides and the cases quietly closed.

The rash of unexplained deaths has prompted critics, including Russia, to accuse Poroshenko's government of tacitly approving the elimination of Yanukovych's clan. Pro-Kremlin observers have also accused the West of turning a blind eye to Ukraine's judicial negligence.

Officials from the OSCE and the European Union have urged an immediate investigation into the killings of Buzina and Kalashnikov. Arsen Avakov, Ukraine's interior minister, says the country's "best criminal search experts" have been put on the case.

Still, some incidents are likely to fuel Ukrainian theories that Buzina -- the former head of Segodnya newspaper and a vocal supporter of Russia's policy towards Ukraine -- had been fingered for a false-flag killing aimed at throwing suspicion on Kyiv officials.

Pravda Ukraine, a marginal online publication, ran an article prematurely announcing Buzina's killing on March 10 -- more than a month before the fact.

Russia's pro-Kremlin LifeNews website wrote on April 16 that Oleksandr Kofman, the "interior minister" of the self-declared Donetsk People's Republic, had warned Buzina -- a Donetsk native -- to flee the Ukrainian capital shortly before his death. And Ukraine's pro-Russian Opposition Bloc party today announced it had received a letter from an unknown nationalist group, the "Ukrainian Rebel Army," claiming responsibility for the recent killings.

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 06:02 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 06:09 PM

Seems that there is more Russian mercenary and Russian troop infighting going on than being reported.

16:41 #Horlivka, Shakhtar @levis_71: A skirmish an hour ago, 1 dead (military), Lenin Ave is cordoned off, shots in the air

18:37 #Horlivka @subwayriwer: 5 hrs long the city center is cordoned off near Shakhtar, SMG fire stopped 3 hrs ago

"they say commandants (yes, plural) are arrested"

20:30 #Horlivka @subwayriwer: As activity at commandant's office has finished, skirmish in Gagarin coal mine area started

20:30 #Horlivka @jackson_villi: ISomething serious in #Mayorsk/6-7 coal mine direction - heavy and small arms for about 1/2hr

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 06:58 PM

http://tass.ru/en/world/790254

Moscow sees US troops in Ukraine as step one to supplies of US weapons

World
April 17, 21:39 UTC+3

The training program includes drilling skills in handling weapons and hardware of Western standards

© EPA/MARCIN BIELECKI

MOSCOW, April 17. /TASS/. The United States’ sending its airborne troops to Ukraine can be seen as the first step towards supplies of state-of-the-art US weapons, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Alexander Lukashevich said on Friday.

"As far as I know, the training program includes drilling skills in handling weapons and hardware of Western standards," he said. "It can be considered as the first step towards supplies of state-of-the-art American weapons the Kiev ‘party of war’ is craving for so much. Washington’s encouraging attitude towards its revanchist plans is fraught with another surge of violence and bloodshed in our neighbouring country."

"Reports about the arrival of 290 servicemen of the US 173 Airborne Brigade (deployed in Italy’s Vicenza) to the Yavorovsky testing ground in Ukraine’s Lvov region cannot but cause serious concern," he said. "It is evident that American soldiers in Ukraine will not bring peace to it."

The diplomat also once again pointed out that US sending its airborne troops to Ukraine runs counter to Minsk agreements.

"These actions run counter to the agreements reached in Minsk on February 12 and signed by the Kiev authorities supported, as far as we understand, by Washington," he said. "So, it is a flagrant violation of liabilities Kiev has undertaken, while the Obama administration, which calls for a peace settlement of the Ukrainian crisis in word, is seeking to frustrate the Minsk agreements in fact."

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 07:01 PM

21:03 #Donetsk @Ykraino4_ka: 'Another average evening in #Donetsk, orcs are trying to shoot down a UAV from an AA gun again'

21:05 #Donetsk @UrriKara4en: Sounds of heavy artillery from the north, not rapid ones yet. Vibration on the ground and air

#OSCE SMM report on #Minsk2 ceasefire violations. #Ukraine, #Russia reps claim a "third party" is provoking fire. http://www.osce.org/node/151791

#Ukraine soldiers hold their positions east of Mariupol
http://www.kyivpost.com/multimedia/photo/ukrainian-servicemen-hold-their-positions-in-lebedynske-village-near-mariupol-386482.html … pic.twitter.com/8o9ZNaOuo4

Greece Defense Minister told Russian newspaper that Ukrainian government is "fascist" http://m.gazeta.ru/politics/2015/04/17_a_6643361.shtml … pic.twitter.com/S8VIkA62v3

#Donetsk 21:45
In #Pisky area serious shooting... Obviously something big caliber, sounds like Uragan? https://twitter.com/alex2015112/status/589138402127323136

#Donetsk
Leninsky district - very loud! https://twitter.com/evergreen_dn/status/589138862095622145 …

20:40 #Donetsk @alex2015112: SMG bursts and strange hissing sounds, 'something new every day'

#Spartak, #Shyrokyne - Wherever Russian Col-Gen Lentsov goes with his #OSCE_SMM fan club, fighting breaks out. pic.twitter.com/2UqCtJxunM

21:13 #Donetsk
@DoneckiiPatriot: Schetinina, AA gun firing at UAV
@98760333: the center, tracer bursts, AA guns.

21:15 #Horlivka, Central City ds @DobryShubin: SPG or D-30 volleys from car-road institute/Vulkan

A lot of shelling and gunfire reports coming in from #Donetsk and surroundings this evening. #Pisky e.g. under serious fire.

#Horlivka
21:15 @levis_71: Heavy rumble in the center
@ukromania There were hits to parking in Olenina St, Stroitel

Also #Avdeevka, #Makeevka and #Horlivka. Some reports including heavy artillery like D-30 or SPG

21:47 #Donetsk @DoneckiiPatriot: Tracer bursts in the sky pic.twitter.com/nSEBFCiAZP

Seems like shells landing in #Horlivka center. In #Donetsk many tracers in the air, separatists firing at UAV's in the sky.

21:13 #Horlivka @sv_inaya: Loud rumble in the center
20:20 till abt 21:10 #Artemivsk: distant cannonade

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 07:14 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 07:16 PM

Referencing the Russian S-300

Al_Khdir @mulcairejack
EW capabilities are notoriously hazy & secretive so I dont really know what that means in concrete terms. Jamming pod or dedicated airframe?

So main effect of #S300 to #Iran is that any hypothetical strike package will require a larger, more advanced EW component.

USAF & IAF got a look at the #S300 by disassembling & testing units they acquired from Slovakia, Cyprus & Greece. EW countermeasures exist

#S300 in #Iran's hands increases the scope of an operation against its nuke facilities somewhat but doesn't stop it

Re: the #S300 for #Iran "controversy", neither USAF or IAF is very worried, S300 was totally compromised long ago, EW assets can handle it

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 07:27 PM

Daniele Monigatti @DMonigatti
#Putin you see this? Docs of Russian tankman from Stavropol, Russia who was taken prisoner published online. PHOTOS http://en.censor.net.ua/n333044

Documents of Russian tankman from Stavropol, Russia who was taken prisoner published on http://24today.net/open/381307 pic.twitter.com/doxxnhFdHf

Remember Putin did state yesterday in Russian TV in front of all of Russia there are no Russian troops in the Ukraine.

VIDEO Another tank on its way to NOT BE IN #Ukraine Acc. to #Putin, falls of trailerhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZ9qU9DP7DE … pic.twitter.com/fBA5rZ3Du0

Russia This Week: After Putin’s Press Conference, ‘Where is Reality?’ http://bit.ly/1CV8dXc pic.twitter.com/RElr6KOPeQ

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 07:56 PM

This evening the war is back into full swing again with the same heavy shellings that Russia was to stop with the Minsk 2 ceasefire and the withdrawal of their heavy weapons--seems as if they no comply with Minsk 2.

#Pisky: Heavy incoming shelling, the sky is glowing, the shockwaves can be fealt
via @Guderian_Xaba

#Donetsk
21:38 Kalinovka @666_mancer: MG fire joined to heavy explosions

21:50 @nixer79:for 30min heavy volleys from Tochmash/Airport/#Spartak area, not less than 3 cannons, 'maybe yday's howitzers'

Seems like GRADs are flying againhttps://twitter.com/loogunda/status/589149230675034114 …

22:14 #Horlivka @DobryShubin:Quiet in the center, small arms fire and explosions sounds fromthe north.

Grad&howitzer volleys were there not far from #Kirovsk
@MeierImpala: It was heard in #Stakhanov

Battle in the area of Donetsk airport http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/17-april-battle-in-the-area-of-donetsk-airport …

22:16 #Horlivka @audrius1977: #Holma can hear MG fire in #Mayorsk/#Mykitivka direction

1> village in #Luhansk Oblast-#Lopaskine (uncontrolled by either party)-raises #Ukrainian flaghttp://zik.ua/ua/news/2015/04/17/shche_odne_selo_na_luganshchyni_pidnyalo_prapor_uk rainy_582061 … pic.twitter.com/S8LIUF3mDm

22:18 @AlfaNubovsky: North outskirts - rumble

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 07:57 PM

22:10 @98760333: Kalinovka, Med.Inst:heavy volleys & flashes in the NW

This is interesting:
"#Debaltsevo. Shooting! Where?"

22:18 #Donetsk @hunab_ku04: heavy impacts on #Pisky, glow from #Smolyanka direction22:19 #Avdeevka @rechnikato: Quiet

A massive Russian MRLS munitions resupply point near Ukrainian border.
pic.twitter.com/yMe8eF3rsM

VIDEO View from frontline at Sanzharovka #Donetsk #Ukraine https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tjmgGOL2vWU … Which #Putin/#Russia now claim? pic.twitter.com/IpZNy5sHEQ

22:22 @DoneckiiPatriot Proletarka: distant explosions

22:28 @maxi_Good Rumble in #Yelenivka direction

Deputy Energy Minister of the #Russian Federation Yanovsky heads rebuilding of railway tracks in #Debaltseve - Deputy ATO Head Col. Fedichev

This month #Russia has supplied by railway to #Donbas 13 railway cars of ammunition, weapons - Col. Fedichevhttp://www.pravda.com.ua/news/2015/04/17/7065082/ …

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 08:06 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-17-2015, 08:32 PM

VIDEO #Russia(ns) generosity to #Ukraine send food,mercenaries,flag & T-72 tanks https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7T6JGIe-_yw … How sweet! pic.twitter.com/D55NDoNyRX

23:10 #Donetsk @funkermanjke: Heavy artillery volleys for about 2 hrs already.

Last Summer/autumn Russians fire Tochka-U (SS-21 Scarab A) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZu4GXS_udQ …

Russian General Lentsov keeps appearing in Shyrokyne 10 km away from Mariupol, like he did before Debaltseve fell pic.twitter.com/NHqXKdZkq8

22:28 @donetsk_ukrop: Rumble from #Yakovlivka/#Spartak, glow over the airport, marking projectiles from Yakovlivka

23:20 #Donetsk, Budenovsky ds @UrriKara4en: RUS artillery continues shelling somewhere in the northwest

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 05:06 AM

Russian SOF Rusish with Milchakov in Bezimenne near Shyrokine http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/18-april-russian-sof--rusish-with-milchakov-in-bezimenne … pic.twitter.com/RbbtXNY5t4

Edward Lucas ✔ @edwardlucas
great response from gutsy @lizwahl to @DanaRohrabacher false equivalence watch it live here http://foreignaffairs.house.gov/live-video-feed

.@edwardlucas: We may have to get used to a world in which rules don’t matter & might is right
http://www.europeanvoice.com/article/write-exactly-600-words-so-they-have-no-excuse-to-edit-it/ … pic.twitter.com/f3FPkzeODp

MASSIVE Russian MRLS munitions depot near Ukrainian border.
"#Putin's supermarket": #Russia,Kamensk-Rostov region,10km to state border-http://bit.ly/1zqQ55X #Ukraina pic.twitter.com/ITkbAmqQX4

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 08:16 AM

What is interesting with this statement by the top Russian mercenary is the simple fact that;

1. Minsk 1 and 2 on the exchange of POWs has never been fulfilled by Russian and her mercenaries with still over 400 Ukrainian civilians and military prisoners known to be alive not exchanged—in fact there are solid hearsay a number have been moved to Russian territory
2. the Russian troops and her mercenaries never did comply wit the verifiable withdrawal of heavy weapons and blamed the Ukrainians constantly
3. Russia has maintained a massive resupply of both troops, weapons, fuel and munitions into the Ukraine strictly against the Minsk agreements
4. with every ceasefire the Russian troops and her mercenaries never did actually “ceasefire” but used them as a cover to position for new offensives that gathered only more Ukrainian territory under their control

BUT what both Russia and her mercenaries are really attempting to sidestep and massively sidestep is the simple fact that the core demand by Russia for a “special zone law for the occupied territories” was in fact passed and signed into law BUT with a significant catch that Russia did not see coming nor anticipated—namely the Ukrainians tied the new law to the single demand ALSO written into Minsk 1 and 2 all elections must be under Ukrainian election laws, be free and independent and transparent AND must conform to Ukrainian overall law---THUS really a de facto recognition by Russia that the occupied territories are actually Ukrainian AND actually this same opinion was echoed by a number of the mercenary sub commanders who had become dissatisfied by Russia allowing Minsk 1 and 2 to occur. and have voiced recently their thoughts on the matter.

MANY social media types--notice no western government representatives ---have stated Russia would never allow the elections to occur which is what this statement below aims at—stopping any such election and law form going into effect.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-32363766

Ukraine rebel leader Zakharchenko asserts claims

A senior rebel leader in eastern Ukraine has claimed the Minsk peace deal will fail unless Kiev recognises the independence of rebel-held territory.

Aleksandr Zakharchenko told the BBC he wanted to expand the self-proclaimed republic he leads in Donetsk.

He said the Minsk ceasefire agreement brokered by the West was not being properly implemented by the government.

"Ukraine doesn't want to resolve all the issues," he said.

"If you agree to resolve something, then you need to act and move forward, and resolve everything that's included.

"If that doesn't happen, then the Minsk Agreement is unfulfilled, and it renders all the meetings in Minsk pointless," he added.

He also accused Kiev of preparing for war - a charge it denies.

"According to the information we've received, Kiev could once again provoke the conflict very soon, attacking Donetsk or any another town of the Donetsk People's Republic."

Under the Minsk agreement, backed by European leaders, Ukraine's government claimed that the rebel-held east would remain part of the country.

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 08:54 AM

There is another single point of failure in the Russian non linear warfare doctrine that is becoming daily more apparent:

What happens when the locals wake up one day and discover you are not really supporting them in their demands that you are declaring to the world are so important. IE defending the rights of ethnic Russians wherever they reside.

1. this week 100 Russian mercenaries returned to St. Petersburg retuned and told Russian news media--the locals were constantly calling them "occupiers and they should leave"

2. then this video in a town being hotly contested by Russian mercenaries an older women made her comments known to one of the top Russian mercenary leaders who was visiting there with Russian JCCC personnel providing them protection

At Shyrokyno, Ukrainian woman asks Russian stooge Basurin a fair question. Full video http://youtu.be/N_DlrQkINeo pic.twitter.com/OjVFboXooo

3. the director of the Crimean Zoo who cheered in local media when the Russian "recused" all ethnic Russians in the Crimea NOW is totally feed up and wants to take the entire Zoo back to the Ukraine

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 08:56 AM

Twitter is the information weapon of choice in reporting on the constant Minsk 2 violations that the West is trying desperately to ignore out of fear they must make to decsions they really do not want to make but must since they are record as stating so.

#Donetsk @Serzzze
10:37 Nizhnia_Gladkovka: very heavy explosions
10:38 Naberezhna heard cannonade
Kalinin market:rolling boom

10:35 #Donetsk @NeilRem: 'What is detonated there?'
@Serzzze:
railway hospital, Gvardeyka: Series of distant heavy explosions

10:35 #Donetsk
@Shimshen: #Grad|s worked.
@ropogckou: 'I didn't hear'
@OldHistoric: #Makeevka: heavy volleys tow/Gvardeyka

10:35 #Donetsk Schetinina
@DoneckiiPatriot: 'Rumble was heard What was it?'
@padresancho1: Heavy volleys from Makeevka, MRLS?

10:17 #Donetsk Budenovsky ds @UrriKara4en: RUS artillery still shells nearby, 2 shots in a row, vibration over the ground&air

08:45 #Donetsk
@DoneckiiPatriot: Schetinina - sounds of 3 explosions were heard
@BylByleva: "2 explosions (west)"
#donbasreports

It has been normal that the Russian mercenaries ALAWYS escort the OSCE vehicles when thye move around—notice nothing with the set of OSCE vehicles—has been in the past a clear indicator that there are Russian mercenaries in the vehicles—which is a clear violation even by OSCE’s poor standard of neutrality in the Ukraine. There is no OSCE freedom of movement inside the occupied mercenary zones.

This apparent neutrality violation by the OSCE would not have been seen by the West without Twitter reporting.

08:40 #Shakhtarsk @olegdon3: 10 #OSCE jeeps fr/#Donetsk direction towards #Torez. No escort. 'Are orcs in their cars w/them?

11:15 #Donetsk, Kalinovka, Med.Inst @98760333: Volley in the southwest
11:21 Rumble from #Krasniy_Pakhar direction
#Donetsk Kalinovka
11:15 @Serzzze Dull heavy booms
@Little_angel_M 'Like giant heart's beat, car alarms went off'
#Donetsk Proletarsky @DoneckiiPatriot:
11:14 Volleys from Budenovsky ds direction one after another
11:16 It's getting louder

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 08:58 AM

When an American conservative is mad about the U.S., he blames Obama. When a Russian conservative is mad about Russia, he blames Obama, too.

Rus-backed militants double number of attacks at Ukr forces: fired 31times from 6pm till midnight - 15 over same time y-day -ATO news center

Extremely important link to understand Russian gangs and Russian gang violence:

OCCRP Launches Killers Inc. Their first investigative doc on Kermlin linked violent fueds and crime https://occrp.org/occrp/en/announcements/3875-occrp-launches-first-investigative-documentary … via @OCCRP

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 08:59 AM

http://zik.com.ua/en/news/2015/04/18/ukraine_has_evidence_of_russian_army_involvement_i n_donbas_582336

Ukraine has evidence of Russian army involvement in Donbas

Ukraine army general staff chief Gen. Viktor Muzhenko says there is a list of all Russian units currently deployed in Donbas along with their deployment sites, weapons and numbers of troops, Radio Svoboda reports Apr. 18.

Muzhenko’s statement came on the heels of Putin’s Apr. 17 assurances that there are no Russian troops in Donbas.

The Russian units were involved in the fighting for Debaltseve, Chornukhino and Lohvinovo, the general said.“Currently, we have reconnaissance confirming that 15th Brigade (Central military district’s 2nd army), the 8th infantry Brigade, the 331st paratrooper regiment from Kostroma-based 98th paratroopers’ division and other units are in Donbas,” the general said.

In January, there were no documents confirming the presence of Russian troops in Donbas because they were deployed in the rear, he noted.

The first direct involvement of the Russian army happened during the battle for Ilovajsk in August, 2014, when the Russians could stop the successful advance of the Ukrainian army on the separatists.

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 09:15 AM

What is interesting with this statement by the top Russian mercenary is the simple fact that;

1. Minsk 1 and 2 on the exchange of POWs has never been fulfilled by Russian and her mercenaries with still over 400 Ukrainian civilians and military prisoners known to be alive not exchanged—in fact there are solid hearsay a number have been moved to Russian territory
2. the Russian troops and her mercenaries never did comply wit the verifiable withdrawal of heavy weapons and blamed the Ukrainians constantly
3. Russia has maintained a massive resupply of both troops, weapons, fuel and munitions into the Ukraine strictly against the Minsk agreements
4. with every ceasefire the Russian troops and her mercenaries never did actually “ceasefire” but used them as a cover to position for new offensives that gathered only more Ukrainian territory under their control

BUT what both Russia and her mercenaries are really attempting to sidestep and massively sidestep is the simple fact that the core demand by Russia for a “special zone law for the occupied territories” was in fact passed and signed into law BUT with a significant catch that Russia did not see coming nor anticipated—namely the Ukrainians tied the new law to the single demand ALSO written into Minsk 1 and 2 all elections must be under Ukrainian election laws, be free and independent and transparent AND must conform to Ukrainian overall law---THUS really a de facto recognition by Russia that the occupied territories are actually Ukrainian AND actually this same opinion was echoed by a number of the mercenary sub commanders who had become dissatisfied by Russia allowing Minsk 1 and 2 to occur. and have voiced recently their thoughts on the matter.

MANY social media types--notice no western government representatives ---have stated Russia would never allow the elections to occur which is what this statement below aims at—stopping any such election and law form going into effect.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-32363766

Ukraine rebel leader Zakharchenko asserts claims

You should tell the whole story: They not just want "Kiev" to accept independence of the now-occupied territory but the entire Donbas that they have not been able to overrun with Russian troop assistance and weapons..

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 09:18 AM

Social media sees the Russian attack patterns but Western leaders are all looking in the opposite direction to avoid making decisions or simply “out for coffee and forgot to check their email”—strange is it not???

If not for social media reporting and a number of rather brave US, Ukrainian and European reporters nothing would be known about what is ongoing in eastern Ukraine as most of the mainstream western media is rather silent on it these days--wonder why????

#Russia's proxies attacked Ukr troops in Tryokhizbenka, combat started at 10.30 and is reportedly on. 3 Ukr are WIA http://informator.lg.ua/?p=85499#more-85499 …

For 1 year: same pattern. Russia makes OSCE-observed "ceasefire". Then, when Russia is ready, all hell breaks loose and they assault/occupy.

Plus, on Russian side of border, west of Taganrog, Russian mechanised divisions finish rotation and concentrate force.

Ceasefire holding in #Shyrokyne is a chimera. Russian ground forces continue to deploy armor to Novoazovsk staging post

AND they have been again reporting the heavy shelling increases and steady ground attacks which are also increasing to the January levels and notice a few comments from the NATO SACEUR BUT nothing out of the entire Western leadership.

#Russia|n forces moved column of artillery towards #Mariupol. #DPR received 13 rail cars weapons and ammo - ATO

In Luhansk area Ukr positions were under RU fire @ Shchastya, Shnyzne, Novotoshkivske, Stanytsia Luhanska, Krymske, Sokolniki

ATO presser: 31 ceasefire violations Apr 17 from 6PM to 12PM.
That's a lot, i think the highest number i've seen since Minsk2.

In 16 April #Russia|n forces moved 15x T-72 tanks, 15x BMP-2, 20x trucks from #Donetsk to #Novoazovsk http://www.mariupol.tv/news/war/mariupol/3452/boeviki_napravili_v_novoazovsk_15_tankov.html

Heavy fighting in #Donetsk all night and ongoing this morning. Many locals write it's now like in January again

Map. Situation in eastern #Ukraine, April 18, 12:00 EET pic.twitter.com/iQW4VKeq3R

#Tryokhizbenka @Karbatovsky Battle at 10-11, attackers & gunning fr/#Krasniy_Liman http://bit.ly/1FUr6KC . 2 injured UKR

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 03:51 PM

Death Toll Rises to 29 in Khakasiya Fires; Amur Situation Worse with 12 New Fires http://bit.ly/1H87zdP pic.twitter.com/a3RnIM724W

http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.de/2015/04/aid-cant-reach-siberian-fire-victims.html

Saturday, April 18, 2015

Aid Can’t Reach Siberian Fire Victims Because All Transport ‘Being Used for the Donbas’

Paul Goble

Staunton, April 18 – In a clearer indication of Moscow’s priorities than Vladimir Putin’s speeches and of Russia’s difficulties at home than Moscow TV, St. Petersburg activists who have collected three tons of humanitarian aid for fire victims in Khakasia have been told by officials that there are no vehicles available because “everything is going for the Donbas.”

In a note posted on Kasparov.ru today, Yury Merezhko reports that the Vesna youth organization in the northern capital has on its own collected “about three tons of humanitarian assistance for those suffering from fires in Khakasia” but there is “no transport” available to get it there (kasparov.ru/material.php?id=5531E95BA111A).
No one in the group has the funds for moving so much aid 5,000 kilometers and so its members turned to the local office of the emergency situations ministry. They responded, he says, with the following words: “there are no machines. None at all. Everything is going for the Donbas. But we of course will think about what could be done.”

Merezhko says that he fully understands that the situation in the Donbas is not an easy one. “But. First of all,Khakasia is in fire right now, it is our country, and the Donbas all the same isn’t, however much some may want it to be.” Once again, history is being “repeated: Russia is helping “everyone except its own citizens.”

And there is a second reason for concern, he continues. If the emergency situations ministry is so strapped when it comes to transportation, what might happen in St. Petersburg if something terrible occurred there. Could the authorities respond? Or would then simply blame things on “opposition arsonists” and then do nothing.

“I don’t know what to do,” the activist says. “I have only one thought: to raise a stink in the media to bring this attention to the very top and perhaps at least the leadership of our city will remember than ‘we don’t sacrifice Russians’” – even if that is what appears to be going on in this and many other cases as well.

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 03:58 PM

BBC's Antelava: "[Due 2 Russian TV] people in Donetsk... think gay Nazi Jews R coming from Europe 2 take their land."http://www.cbc.ca/1.3035515

#BREAKING #Putin says Russia would consider recognizing "#Donetsk/#Luhansk People's Republic"http://www.interfax.ru/russia/437036

‘Hybrid War’ and ‘Little Green Men’: How It Works, and How It Doesn’t. The limits of #Russia|n strategy in #Ukraine
http://www.e-ir.info/2015/04/16/hybrid-war-and-little-green-men-how-it-works-and-how-it-doesnt/#.VTJSuNbciN4.twitter …

Russia's turning Crimea into a gigantic military base: http://www.businessinsider.com.au/russia-projects-power-with-black-sea-fleet-2015-4 … 206 ships by 2020. pic.twitter.com/J9zpo9BUZT

If they're from Luhansk, we're from Mars. Ramzan Kadyrov's boys? #Shyrokyne 15 April. #Kadyrovtsy with Lentsov. pic.twitter.com/s4KSuweUHV

Lentsov makes us think #Shyrokyne is THE objective. Landbridge from Rostov to Crimea is THE Russian Army's objective. pic.twitter.com/z8FsjKYR3m
.
64th Motor Rifle Brigade from Khabarovsk near Ukrainian border https://informnapalm.org/8041-v-rostovskuyu-oblast-perebrosheno-podrazdelenye-64-j-motostrelkovoj-brygady-yz-habarovska …

Since Kelin said 16 Apr that RU "peacekeeping" op in UA is "unnecessary" we hear rumint that RU peacekeepers are prepping for a deployment.

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 04:01 PM

#EU prepares"myth-busters"team to combat #Russia|n disinformation:https://news.vice.com/article/european-union-prepares-myth-busters-team-to-combat-russian-disinformation … pic.twitter.com/6Dnj6x3Bf7

The only doubt/question we have is whether the Russian Army ALSO intends to push down from Kursk, Belgorod regions? pic.twitter.com/8P5BnhF056

Lentsov makes us think #Shyrokyne is THE objective. Landbridge from Rostov to Crimea is THE Russian Army's objective. pic.twitter.com/z8FsjKYR3m

ATO forces repel militants' attack on Triokhizbenka, several Ukrainian soldiers wounded
http://www.unian.info/war/1068720-ato-forces-repel-militants-attack-on-triokhizbenka-several-ukrainian-soldiers-wounded.html … pic.twitter.com/dJCFf6UnJu

This is reference to a Russian Mod journalist who walked into a Russian booby trap and was seriously wounded.
Basurin searched thru Lunev's pockets while pretending to aid him. Then VICE News shows him with a bookhttps://youtu.be/N_DlrQkINeo?t=4m26s …

Is this blue book what DPR cmdr Basurin was looking for in Zvezda/GRU operative Andrei Lunev's pockets? #Shyrokyne pic.twitter.com/DAE06jpGfp

There was quite a battle for the bridgehead over the Seversky Donets this morning, Ukrainian WIA http://interfax.com.ua/news/general/261209.html …

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 04:02 PM

DPR Basurin blames increase in Russian shelling of Ukrainian positions near Donetsk on "drunkeness in Ukraine's National Guard

Also, tanks arrived in Millerovo, 50 kilometers from the ukrainian border. Could be the 64 ОМСБр. @EliotHiggins pic.twitter.com/mbxIKw4JHd

Disappointed Russian volunteer: Rebels are gangsters. It is a Russian aggression. (RUS) http://www.svoboda.mobi/a/26963666.html

BREAKING
Pro-Russian terrorists shelled at residential area using heavy artillery. Detailsat http://lugansk-news.com/pro-russian-terrorists-of-lugansk-peoples-republic-shelled-at-residential-area-using-heavy-artillery/ … pic.twitter.com/8Zl5yasgJb

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 04:04 PM

Another Russian atrocity equal to their shelling of Mariupol.

BREAKING
Pro-Russian terrorists shelled at residential area using heavy artillery. Details at http://lugansk-news.com/pro-russian-...avy-artillery/ … pic.twitter.com/8Zl5yasgJb

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 04:21 PM

http://maidantranslations.com/2015/04/18/the-secret-of-the-rostov-burials/

The secret of the Rostov burials

Posted on April 18, 2015

By Andrew Kaushik (Rostov-on-Don) and Vladimir Dergachov.
04.01.2015

Translated and edited by Voices of Ukraine

Gazeta.ru correspondent investigates whether the military casualties in Donbas are being buried in cemeteries in Rostov-on-Don

Photographs of fresh graves in Rostov-on-Don cemeteries, where Russian volunteer soldiers killed in Donbas were allegedly buried, have been circulating the Internet and were published in the major Ukrainian media. Gazeta.ru’s correspondent went to the Rostov cemetery and investigated the situation on site.

“…I could have gone to prison for this for a long time”

There were rumors of secret burials even three years ago: some civil activists thought that the authorities underreported the number of casualties from the floods in Krymske by several times. Referring to the anonymous statements by “emergency service workers,” they insisted that over a thousand people died, not 171. They looked for their graves in the adjacent Slovyansk district, but no evidence was submitted.

It seems that it is possible to hide anything in the North Cemetery in Rostov-on-Don, one of the biggest [cemeteries] in Europe, even a battalion or a division. The head of the administrative department for city cemetery services, Valeri Zykov, says that the area of the churchyard is more than 400 hectares. Half a million people have been laid to rest here over 40 years. This is the only active cemetery out of eight city cemeteries; the others are only used for very close relatives.

“The unknown ones are buried over there.” Valeri brings us to the rows of fresh piles of red soil, lot “31a.” Judging by the construction scattered around on the horizon, these are the photographs of “suspicious” graves that have found their way onto the Internet. “All is in accord with the documents that the morgue provides.”

We don’t have this here, to bring them and secretly dump and bury them. I could have gone to prison for this for a long time. I will never agree to bury insurgents or anyone who has not been authorized.

Some white stones have the name and dates, others have a featureless “UM” (unknown male) and “UF” (unknown female), with an approximate date of death and age (“40-45 years,” “60-70 years,” “40-50 years”). There is a large range, from 30 to 80 years.

“Can the insurgents really be unknown?” The head of city burial services argues emotionally. “How can a 70-year-old grandfather or 60-year-old pensioner be useful in a fight? That’s nonsense.”

He admits that he has found some photographers here, but they are “just sick,” and when he goes to talk [to them], they run away for some reason.

In another lot, “20b,” the excavators are still buzzing in the trench as workmen stand to one side smoking. Some “unidentified” graves are fenced off, and are even marked with simple wooden crosses. Relatives are found according to last names, they pay their last respects, even if they are late.

One separate part of the cemetery is a memorial to unknown soldiers killed in the first Chechen campaign. Several hundred separate graves with small headstones, like in American films.

The Avenue of Honor

“Then there was a war where the government participated officially. Today we are saying that the army is not fighting, but we do admit that there are volunteers and ‘tourists/ vacationers.’ In my understanding it is uncivilized,” says the head of the historical memorial of the Rostov section of the Russian Society for the Protection of Historical and Cultural Monuments, Aleksandr Kozhin.

“Here we called that war an ‘antiterrorist operation,’ a mirror image of the current situation in Ukraine. There is such a fork [in the road] towards Taganrog, and a mass of refrigerators with human remains coming from the Chechen war piled up on the railroads. We didn’t know what to do with them, the DNA lab could not manage. They probably decided at the government level to bury them here. They should be given their due, not in a mass grave but each separately.”

According to Kozhin, if Rostov volunteers are dying in Donbas, their comrades would not commit them to the earth in secret, but with honor.

“Recently, we looked into a story of a young man. He was a member of a search initiative, he was 25-26 years old. He sincerely believed in the ‘Russian World’ idea. I don’t know how long he fought, but he was killed,” the historian says. “His comrades from the search initiative turned to the administration of the Matveev Kurgan settlement with a request to inter his remains in the Avenue of Honor. I don’t know how they settled the issue.”

4He explained that the Don [area along the river Don] search staff went to Donbas several times. During one of their trips, the insurgents themselves detained another young man. They took him for a Ukrainian spy and almost put him up against the wall. After some other insurgents from the self-proclaimed republics “apologized profusely,” they let him go.

“It is possible to suppose that an insurgent left from Ukraine through Rostov and died here.”

Even the independent organization, “Women of the Don,” who deal with enlisted soldiers and monitor the situation with Donbas, do not know about the mass secret burials of insurgents who have fought in eastern Ukraine. The head of the organization, Valentina Cherevatenko, told Gazeta.ru that she had no information about the “suspicious” graves.

“I would start from what is called the presumption of innocence. In this situation, we immediately try to establish that someone is culpable for something, and we have to rectify it. But guilt must be proven. There is no evidence of mass burials,” Vladimir Artsibashev, the deputy head of Rostov administration, who is in charge of public utility issues, responds to Gazeta.ru. “The North cemetery has exhausted its resources. We are economizing every meter now, we are starting to cut the roads down; before, [the road] was four or five meters wide, now we leave a lane for one car, and carry out burials on the rest of the land. Woodlands are cleared, slopes and hills get leveled out. Rostov does not have its own land, we cannot choose a lot on the city’s territory for a new cemetery.”

The official confirmed that they regularly bury unclaimed bodies. If relatives are not found and the surname is not known, the headstones just show an approximate age and the letters UM or UF. It has always been like that, ever since the North cemetery was opened in 1972. According to him, the morgues themselves carry out tenders and identify a funeral organization. In one year, 436 people whose identity was not established were interred in a city with one million inhabitants.

To look at the situation theoretically, as described in the Ukrainian media, it would be more logical to bury soldiers somewhere near the border in remote areas where no one would see the graves. “It is incredibly difficult to do this in Rostov, there are no closed cemeteries, everything can be freely reached,” the deputy chief of the city continues. “There is a decision [made] by the local parliament and a resolution by the authorities whereby we only bury residents of Rostov or people who die in the city if their bodies are not collected by their relatives. It is possible to suppose that an insurgent left Ukraine through Rostov and died here. Then we have the right to bury him here. Such statistical analysis has not yet been conducted, but if there are instances like this, then you can count them on the palm of your hand, theoretically it is possible.”

The bodies are periodically removed once they accumulate.

The news about the arrival of 500 new graves was like a case of “Chinese whispers.” According to Artsibashev, in 2014 the authorities planned a road through the new Suvorovskiy city district (you can see it behind lot 31a), which went round the edge of the North cemetery. They needed 500 exhumations to do this. They abandoned the project after consulting the law in detail: it is not permitted to build anything on the cemetery, only plant trees.

The field commander of the self-proclaimed DNR, Oleg Melnikov, told Gazeta.ru that Russians who are killed are buried locally if their relatives could not be found, or under extreme circumstances. For example, [like it happened] last summer when Slovyansk was surrounded by the ATO forces.

“Then it was not possible to move the people out, we buried them in a cemetery under the names of their commanders. On my people’s graves, there was the letter ‘M,’ I knew where my men were to ensure their graves wouldn’t get dug up,” Melnikov says.

They take the bodies out of the morgue and transfer them over the Russian border only if they find relatives to whom they can give the deceased for burial, the commander confirms.

“We had one case, when Pavel, a 22-year-old policeman from Moscow, told his relatives that he was going on a work trip. Instead, he took a leave of absence; joined us and got killed. We moved him and gave [his body] to his relatives, the Interior Ministry helped us in every way they could. I very much doubt that they will carry out anonymous burials in Rostov. If I wanted to hide bodies, which we are not doing of course, why not bury them in Donetsk or Luhansk?”

Other insurgents that Gazeta.ru has talked to said that they themselves move their comrades’ bodies out and give them to relatives. Vladislav Brig, the head of the self-proclaimed DNR Ministry of Defense said that the Donetsk Ombudsman negotiates with relatives and controls the dispatch of the bodies of Russian volunteers to their relatives. According to him, the bodies are periodically removed once they accumulate.

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 05:16 PM

http://bne.eu/content/story/stolypin-moscow-disconnect

STOLYPIN: The Moscow Disconnect

Mark Galeotti of New York University

April 16, 2015

In a hold over from Soviet days, the mighty Kutuzovsky Prospect highway leading into Moscow’s city centre still has a special middle lane reserved for emergency vehicles or, more often, the motorcades of senior government officials. Not for them the misery of the capital’s notorious traffic jams. They whisk past, in a wholly separate world of smooth, fast and easy transit, protected by wailing-sirened police cars, incognito behind tinted windows. Russian politics likewise appears to be devolving into two distinct realms, as Vladimir Putin and his closest cohorts retreat from the increasingly problematic realities of the real world, into their privileged and secure haven, apart from the people who actually have to administer Russia for them.

It is hardly unusual for there to be disconnects between the rulers and the ruled, but not only are these are times which require some tough and far-sighted policies, but even within the broad category of the “rulers” there is a distinct gulf. Two of the prevailing themes that emerged from a range of meetings and conversations I’ve had in Moscow these past two weeks are a sense of drift and a lack of connection between even senior figures within business, politics and government, and the small circle who actually define policy. As one unusually forthcoming middle-ranking official put it, albeit wisely off the record: “Government has retreated from view, orders come from a secret court, and we don’t know who is making them, how and why.”

Secret Court

Even those who are still confident in their president and claim optimism about the country’s future become coy when pressed about how far they feel that the channels to transmit their views up the power vertical are working well, and to what extent they feel their individual and collective interests are being represented within that “secret court”.

This is perhaps especially visible when it comes to the economy. An economist who in his day consulted frequently for the government threw up his hands and said: “nothing’s happening, we have no meaningful policy.” The people whose job it is to manage Russian macroeconomics do seem strangely uncertain, perhaps because they often don’t get to do their jobs. Multiple sources claimed that the governor of the central bank, Elvira Nabiullina, tried for over a week to schedule a meeting with Putin before last year’s ruble collapse, and Kremlin aides seem to have had at least as much influence over interest rates.

Meanwhile, there is an on-and-off war being waged in Ukraine, but neither the generals nor the diplomats seem either to know the intended end result – or be consulted about strategy. Both within the military and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, their role seems to be simply to await instructions. These often come through Security Council secretary Nikolai Patrushev, former head of the Federal Security Service (FSB), which generals grumble now seems to be defining policy.

Although there is something of a cult of Foreign Minister Lavrov these days – you can buy We-Heart-Lavrov t-shirts in the Evropeisky shopping mall – even he does not seem to be playing much of a role in advising on policy, merely executing it. Consider, for example, Russia’s recent attempts to play the “nuclear card”, using a forum of generals to threaten a response up to and including atomic weapons should Nato deploy more troops into its own eastern member states. Apart from the fact that this is a hollow threat, it served only to harden resolve in the Nordic regions. Five nations – the very kind of states Moscow presumably hoped to dismay and deter – came together explicitly to characterize Russia as the foremost threat they faced. As one recently retired diplomat sniffed: “Lavrov would not have made that mistake.”

Detached

It is, of course, a disturbing development when not only the foot soldiers of the Russian state, but also its noncoms and field officers feel that their own commanders are out of touch and unwilling to listen to them.

Beyond that, though, this also speaks to a second, even more problematic issue. If the people making the final decisions seem detached from the processes of daily governance, this is not just a problem for the executive: that same distance makes it harder for the executive to really know what is happening, as a basis for effective policy. In other words: we do not know what Putin knows.

I tend to discount the kind of over-heated claims that he is irrational and erratic. However, a rational actor makes decisions based on the evidence and assessments with which he is presented. We have very little hard information about just how well Putin is being briefed, but another leitmotif of conversations in Moscow was scepticism from specialists of every stripe that he was being kept well informed about their particular area. The economists might accept that he is on top of geopolitics, but were anxious that he did not appreciate the real depth of the financial challenges ahead. The cops assumed everything was going to plan in the Donbas, but felt that the president did not understand the practical challenges they were facing – especially in light of the 10% personnel budget cut being imposed on them – and listened too much to the FSB. And so it went.

Sometimes, the problem seems to be that no one wants to be the one to bring Putin bad news. Within the intelligence community, for example, each agency briefs separately and has learned that getting his ear and favor tends to mean telling him what he wants to hear. Likewise, the Presidential Administration, according to some people I spoke to, can be more interested in keeping everyone happy than ensuring the most accurate perspectives get to Putin’s desk. And a president who prides himself on not using the internet, who has housetrained the media, and who rarely now interacts with his people in anything other than carefully-scripted media events, is unlikely to get an independent take on the state of the nation.

Why should Russia’s rulers address traffic jams so long as they have their own lane? Indeed, do they even know how much time ordinary Muscovites waste in traffic, the frustrations and angers generated as a result? Is anyone telling them? When policy is being determined by a small circle of people increasingly detached from the realities of the country’s situation, and whose own advisers appear determined to protect their isolation, then even the smartest and most rational leaders are unlikely to generate smart and rational policies.
Mark Galeotti is Professor of Global Affairs at the Center for Global Affairs, New York University. He writes the blog In Moscow’s Shadows (http://inmoscowsshadows.wordpress.com/)

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 05:46 PM

Heavy fight in #Shyrokine since mid day up to now. The sides are apparently using 120mm mortars and RPGs

Terrorists attacked #Ukrainian positions at #Tryokhizbenka, pushed back after 2 hours fight. http://lugansk-news.com/terrorists-attacked-ukrainian-positions-at-tryokhizbenka-and-were-pushed-back-after-2-hours-fight/ … pic.twitter.com/AcqSuVnfLF

Another very clear example of the importance Russian army invaders attach to river borders and crossing points

We're seeing some reports that fighting intensifies in #Shyrokyne near Mariupol. But we seek further details...

.Moskal: Militants' artillery systems badly damage two private houses in Valuyske
http://www.unian.info/war/1068766-moskal-militants-artillery-systems-badly-damage-two-private-houses-in-valuyske.html … pic.twitter.com/kAVSn46uHJ

#OSCE at lunch
“@shelomovskiy: Heavy fight in #Shyrokine since mid day up to now. The sides are apparently using 120mm mortars and RPGs

Kremlin social media trying to ignite fire over #Shyrokyne. Don't be surprised if Russian Army moves from Novoazovsk to "rescue" #OSCE_SMM!

No surprise. RT_com is spreading the lie that Azov Regiment shelled #OSCE_SMM in #Shyrokyne. Cheap Russian agitprop from the KGB media Dept.

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 06:23 PM

Tonight again heavy fighting that is in fact indicating that the Minsk 2 is for all practical purposes dead.

Use of heavy artillery and MRLSs is a clear violation of Minsk and indicates they were never pulled back.

BREAKING
Heavy fighting in #Shyrokyne goes on for the 4 hours already! @OSCE_SMM left the area as soon as it stared. Reported by @Polk_Azov

AZOV reports about 2 wounded from their side and at least 2 killed from the side of Russian terrorists

16:26 #Donetsk, the eastern outskirts @HU_dojnik: All day sounds of heavy artillery volleys with pauses

Heavy artillery fire in #Donetsk, even GRAD fire reported.
"It's like in winter again" locals say

16:00 #Luhansk @vladicvp: Grenade explosion near the entrance of captured region internal affairs directorate.

15:57 #Donetsk Svobody Sq @vladicvp: 'Endless small arms and high caliber shooting, grenade launchers'

10:37 #Donetsk Kalinovka @Yljano4ka: "#Grad has just worked, very clear sound heard, from Kalinin coalmine or Gvardeyka"

17:43 #Donetsk Kalinovka @Serzzze: 12 Kamaz/Ural trucks column towards #Makeevka

There is heavy fighting in #Shyrokyne. Casualties among #Russia|ns, also WIA on #Ukraine side https://twitter.com/itsector/statu

NATO jets in Lithuania scrambled to accompany Russian plane flying- again- with transponder switched off
http://bit.ly/1DkqGMa

Europe faces a 'real threat' from #Russia, warns #US #Army commander.http://www.bulletinstandard.org/us/europe-faces-a-real-threat-from-russia-warns-us-army-commander-h7784.html … pic.twitter.com/5kr1YRStxP

18:08 #Donetsk Gvardeyka @Palych_18: 'Lokks like #Uragan started to work, 2 volleys - 5 & 13 items'

18:08 #Makeevka @felixsteal: #Grad has just worked.
@nixer79: From #Yakovlevka are Zasyadko coal mine up-cast mine site - Grigoriev ettles.

18:00 #Makeevka @OldHistoric: Sounds like a short #Grad volley from #Yakovlevka area
#Donetsk 20:17

ul. Shekspira - sounds like GRADs https://twitter.com/Serzzze/status/589482733669318657 …

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 06:41 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 07:40 PM

#BreakingNews
Between 18:10 to 18:33 Russian forces fired 2 volleys 7 #GRAD missiles at #Avdeevka, nullifying the entire #Minsk2 treaty.

#News
Another Russian #GRAD volley hit #Vilkhove on N-E #Luhansk oblast around 16.30, destroying one residential building, damaging more.

REPORTS: Large number of clashes occurring tonight across the frontline in #Ukraine. Artillery and Grad MRL systems being used

#News
#Pisky was hit by 30(!!!) 152 mm artillery shells last night between 23:40 and 1:00.
Later until now also by many mortars and snipers.

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 08:18 PM

From social media that is tracking the shellings and attacks tonight---I have a 'reports overflow', a little pause and one more attempt to manage them then

18:20 #Avdeevka @GirkinGirkin: There were impacts behind the railroad, tram stop in Nekrasova St

18:55 #Avdeevka @bamr69: Impacts to private residential houses area, like #Grad.

#Donetsk
18:05 #Spartak @UkraineSuper1: intense small arms fire
18:05 #Makeevka @VasyaMakeevskiy: short distant MRLS volleys

19:08 Gladkovka @Serzzze:'SMG safari'
19:13 @hunab_ku04:Shells tow/#Pisky fr/Gladkovka/Gvardeyka,DurnaBalka shooting

19:14 #Donetsk Kalinovka @Serzzze: Single volleys, like mortars
19:16 BMP from #Makeevka direction westwards

19:08 Gladkovka @Serzzze:'SMG safari'
19:13 @hunab_ku04:Shells tow/#Pisky fr/Gladkovka/Gvardeyka,DurnaBalka shooting

Russian Army staging post at Novoazovsk (east of #Shyrokyne) being resupplied and reinforced with artillery

"Report from #Novoazovsk:
heard a large batch, cannon artillery, aviation (it seems unmanned - UAV)." https://twitter.com/sir_T_Lawrence/status/589500740374306816

19:17 #Donetsk @felixsteal: Howitzers volleys from Durna Balka started.

20:17 #Donetsk, the center @Buzzing_Rook: Howitzer rumbles from a position close to the center, flashes in airport/#Pisky

19:33 #Donetsk
@relictDon:Howitzers were from Smolyanka or even further north, not Durna Balka
@felixsteal: Several positions

20:20 #Donetsk Topaz @edikko: Single 4-5 rockets MRLS shots, impact flashes far in the northwest - Smerch or Uragan

20:34 #Donetsk @AlfaNubovsky: Flare lights in airport hangars area, SMG fire in the airport

OUTLAW 09

04-18-2015, 08:28 PM

Someone recognizes the Russian artillery tactic used before they attack--they have used it over and over in their Ukrainian attacks just before each previous ceasefire has collapsed and then they go straight to offensive operations and yet the West says nothing.

Russian forces continue softening Ukrainian positions near Mariupol & Donetsk via heavy artillery & mortar fire ahead of new large offensive

While the US is so tangled up in the ME ie Yemen -----Russia launches a new offensive as the US cannot dance it seems at two or more weddings.

OUTLAW 09

04-19-2015, 11:09 AM

Russia needs to gain strong foothold in Arctic — Rogozin
Russia

TASS April 19, 8:18 UTC+3

"Someone may like that or not but it’s their problems. The most important thing for us should be that we like it and that it is useful for our country," Rogozin said

Russia should exert every effort to come to the Arctic and conquer the Russia-controlled part, Russian Vice-Premier Dmitry Rogozin said opening the North Pole-2015 drifting Arctic station.

"There are many problems here which have been unsolved for decades. They were not solved in Soviet, the pre-Soviet period or in contemporary Russia," Rogozin said adding that time had come for Russia to come to the Arctic and conquer it. "At least the part which is in our area of responsibility," Rogozin stressed.

I believe after Rogozin's visit The Svalbad Treaty from 1920 is now only a piece of paper

OUTLAW 09

04-19-2015, 11:13 AM

'Documents' the looters are showing to Graham that they are allowed to take #MH17 debris. But it's issued by DNR. pic.twitter.com/eaqVVKlZra

Note: Graham is a UK journalist who first worked for Russian Today in the UK and then as a Russian journalist reporting daily from the mercenary side-was witness to a number of mercenary tortures of Ukrainian POWs which even when the UK was informed they did nothing.

VIDEO 'Looters' removing #MH17 debris with Graham Phillips filming it. Same car as in OSCE-photo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGhqEacyT5Y …
via @sterion75

Gee... Dutch Safety Board asked DNR to REMOVE all #MH17 debris nov 2014!?
http://www.onderzoeksraad.nl/uploads/fm/MH17/Removal-of-wreckage-of-Malaysian-Airlines-flight-MH17_web.pdf …
via @ArnoldGreidanus pic.twitter.com/YMJMBwUizx

Azov regiment repels militants' attack in Shyrokyne after 5-hour fight
http://www.unian.info/politics/1068814-azov-regiment-repels-militants-attack-in-shyrokyne-after-5-hour-fight.html … pic.twitter.com/zoPTZbUXTA

BUT Russian can sell S300s to Iran against Israeli wishes:--typical Russian double standards
Putin warns Israel against selling arms to Ukraine - Middle East - Jerusalem Post" http://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Putin-warns-Israel-against-selling-arms-to-Ukraine-398497 …

Israeli instructors are already training Ukrainian forces & now Putin fears Israel may supply Ukraine with weapons http://sputniknews.com/politics/20150418/1021061545.html …

OUTLAW 09

04-19-2015, 11:14 AM

Rus proxies fired at Ukr forces 8 times in #Mariupol area y-day. Asked Ukr to cease fire 3 times, restarted firing 30-60min after @0629comua

Ukr side at Joint Control Center suggests reinforcing monitoring of ceasefire regime in #Donetsk airport area by - ATO news center

Confirmed by ATO that #Russia|ns used GRAD rockets to fire on #Avdeevka yesterday evening

#Russia-backed militants resumed shelling from Grad: fired 14 rockets at Ukrainian positions in Avdiivka y-day after 6 pm - #ATO news center

#Russia-backed militants shelled Valuyske, #Luhansk region w/ Grad. No casualties are reported http://moskal.in.ua/?categoty=news&news_id=1656 … pic.twitter.com/Oyjgyc1hpt

Valuyske is on the East side of Stanitsa Luhanska. Its new. Possible shelled from Russian territory? pic.twitter.com/AwWrywJJN9

BreakingNews
During the Russian attack on #Trehizbenke, 3 Ukrainian soldiers and 2 civilians were wounded yesterday.
- Reg State Admin

25 Years Ago, Gorbachev’s Economic Blockade Failed to Keep Lithuania in the USSR http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2015/04/25-years-ago-gorbachevs-economic.html …

#OSCE monitors are now in #Shyrokine helping Azov battalion to retrieve a body of the Georgian fighter who was killed there yesterday
NOTE: after they let the area--mercenaries started fighting and shelling again

09:30 #Shakhtarsk @olegdon3: 18 eighteen-wheelers towards #Donetsk, 'fully loaded - they've just crawled'.

US Mission to NATO ✔ @USNATO
Fact check: NATO on Russia's false claims on missile defense, nuclear exercises, presence: http://goo.gl/3hoYCk pic.twitter.com/xn44WOybLf

2014 Dec 12, @Interpreter_Mag: "Putin’s Invasion of Ukraine Will Lead More Countries to Go Nuclear, Portnikov Says"
http://www.interpretermag.com/putins-invasion-of-ukraine-will-lead-more-countries-to-go-nuclear-portnikov-says/ …

Headline on RU state TV channel: "Ukrainians sell their women into sex slavery". http://tvzvezda.ru/news/vstrane_i_mire/content/201504190834-4krm.htm …

NOTE: Seems that the same Russian State TV station forgot that the Russian mafia controls most of the sex trade and porn industry in Europe—far more than the Ukrainian mafia does.

Oleksiy Matsuka: Putin will have to pay minimum $120 mln a month as retirement pensions in Donbas if "DPR" puppets start their advance

OUTLAW 09

04-19-2015, 11:30 AM

Important to keep in mind:

NOTE: When the attack number reaches 60 per day then we are back to the pre Minsk 2 fighting period:

#News
4 Ukrainian soldiers were injured in 50 Russian attacks in Eastern #Ukraine over the last 24 hours

OUTLAW 09

04-19-2015, 11:49 AM

Another form of Russian "non linear warfare" and or what the West calls "hybrid warfare".
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/04/15/putin-uses-s-300s-for-hybrid-warfare-now-iran-can-too.html?via=mobile&source=twitter

Putin Uses the S-300 Missile to Dominate Its Neighbors. Now Iran Can, Too.

Israel isn’t the only country that will be threatened if S-300 missile systems arrive in Iran. The Saudis and Turks had better be worried as well.

TBILISI, Georgia—As the Kremlin lifts its ban on the delivery of S-300 missiles to Iran, and as Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov claims the air defense systems “will not put at risk the security of any state in the region, including Israel,” a palpable irony hangs in the air here. For years, Russia has been using S-300 missiles to dominate the skies and to threaten Georgia within her own territory.

In an interview with The Daily Beast on Monday, a senior U.S. Marine Corps aviator said that if Russia delivered the S-300 missile to Iran, it would fundamentally change U.S. war plans. “I find it almost hilarious that the Russians are saying, ‘It’s an entirely defensive system and cannot attack anyone, including Israel,’” the officer said. And the Georgians definitely aren’t laughing.

Russia is now using airspace as another front in its new brand of so-called hybrid warfare. Airspace violations are nothing new, of course. Yet just as the Kremlin is prone to violating the territorial integrity of its neighbors with “little green men,” it has used the S-300 to begin a campaign of violating its neighbors’ “air sovereignty.”

A hint of what that development can mean came last July when Flight MH17 with 298 people aboard was hit by a Russian-made Buk-M1 surface-to-air missile. The main difference between the Buk-M1 and the S-300 surface-to-air missile is that the S-300 is vastly more powerful and more deadly.

This causes particular concern for NATO countries like the Baltics, which do not have their own sophisticated air defenses or fighter jets. Meanwhile, just south of them in the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad, Russian President Vladimir Putin has deployed a more advanced version of the S-300 missile system, the S-400, threatening Poland as well as the Baltics. Putin has sent S-300 missile systems to Crimea and just about every breakaway Russia region on the map. This is not to protect those regions, of course. The point of the S-300 is to project power and achieve armed tactical control over the airspace of those territories.

First deployed by the Soviets in 1979 with land and sea variants, the S-300 missile system (NATO codename SA-10 Grumble) once again is being used by Russia to test NATO for weaknesses and to undermine the resolve of the alliance. The vehicular mobility of the S-300 system—like its Western counterpart, the MIM-104 Patriot—makes the missiles particularly effective and dangerous for aircraft because the systems don’t remain at fixed locations.

For Georgia, which is not a NATO member despite a decade-plus of trying, Russia takes this air sovereignty violation campaign to a whole new level. The Kremlin has positioned—or maintains the ability to position—S-300 missiles at three locations: Abkhazia and South Ossetia, Georgia’s two Russian-occupied breakaway regions, and Russia’s 102nd Military Base in Gyumri, Armenia.

As Georgian Journal recently reported, “The Russian aerial defense forces have the potential of inflicting paralyzing damage to Georgia’s territorial integrity.” The result is a kind of “reverse Iron Dome” over Georgia, giving Putin almost absolute control of the country’s airspace. This in itself proves that the S-300 systems are not “defensive” weapons, regardless of Putin’s assurances to Israel. Just because they are “anti-aircraft” weapons does not make them “defensive.” Russia uses these missiles for the outright dominance of its neighbors’ skies, which is why Israel, the Gulf states, and Turkey should be worried about Iran receiving them.

Putin has learned quite a lot from the invasions of Georgia and Ukraine. If Russia can achieve the same airspace domination of a NATO country as it has of Georgia, then not only can Russia attack, but it can also impose an aviation embargo or a no-fly zone. It is these new forms of warfare that Putin is most interested in. The ability to take out a NATO country’s entire airspace without entering its territory—without technically attacking it—is his goal here. This way Article 5 of NATO’s Washington Treaty, which states that an armed attack against one or more NATO members is an attack against them all, is not invoked. But Article 5 doesn’t mention “air sovereignty,” and Putin knows that few NATO members will be ready to go to war over something that ambiguous.

Introducing the S-300 missile system into Iran’s arsenal will affect the entire Middle East. It will shake alliances. Putin views the S-300 system as a means for power projection, and that is exactly what he is selling to Iran.

OUTLAW 09

04-19-2015, 12:49 PM

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
Pro-Russian militants violated ceasefire 50 times yesterday; 2/3 of these using 120-mm mortars, 122-mm artillery, tanks

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
Militants fired at UA military positions close to #Syrokyne. @OSCE_SMM monitors were present as well

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
Map. Situation in eastern #Ukraine, April 19, 12:00 EET pic.twitter.com/IFUFYn1f2s

In Pictures: Heavy fighting just outside #Mariupol resumes as @OSCE monitors leave #Shyrokine. http://www.demotix.com/news/7382413/heavy-fighting-resumes-osce-monitors-leave-shyrokine … pic.twitter.com/BqQlg8orzY

#Footage
Meanwhile in Russian-occupied #Donbas, Russian forces practice for using the Msta-B.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vBNvwjAd3Q … pic.twitter.com/Yvb5tbsd4M

Video version based on post "5th Armored Brigade Russian Armed Forces in the battle for Debaltseve" by Om TV:youtu.be/ZS2FsE9oAxo pic.twitter.com/FWwnWDzfI5

OUTLAW 09

04-19-2015, 02:24 PM

Updated #map
#Shyrokyne acc. to my latest geolocations.
Russian forces slowly advance. Ukrainians hold the front. pic.twitter.com/ostp31gfNh

Moscow Lacks Available Forces to Seize and Hold Baltics, Estonian Military Expert Says http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2015/04/moscow-lacks-available-forces-to-seize.html …

RU took most of the buffer zones after Minsk2. They'll take this too and they'll be at #Mariupol gates pic.twitter.com/Cta2ExZ6WH

Pulling back 5-7km" means to move the front lines at least to Pioners'ke, or to leave that village in buffer zone.

After saying that DMZ @ #Shyrokyne will be created ONLY IF ceasefire holds, and after hours of battle yday, guess what Ukr officers did tday

Ukrainian officers from joint monitoring commission visited their russian counterparts today to discuss the creation of DMZ

Seems they got a bloody nose there during the storming attempt on April 17, so they complain about the use of heavy mortars against them.

Same story as always:
"Russification" of the buffer zones, Ukr. troops "hold their position" ... until it's too late.
(Donetsk airport etc.)

Ukraine has many battle-hardened, skilled, intelligent frontline commanders. Problem is, they're not in General Staff pic.twitter.com/up7RvcLYk0

OUTLAW 09

04-19-2015, 02:25 PM

#Analysis #Map
Russian whine, the Ukr army denied them another bridgehead near Tr'okhizbenka.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S86Gs8COyf4 … pic.twitter.com/x69zf1RUZC

Russia Silences Ukrainian TV Channels in Crimea http://www.rferl.org/content/ukraine-media-crimea-tv-russia/26964898.html …

Ukraine suggests OSCE monitors install internet cameras in Avdiyivka
http://www.unian.info/war/1068892-ukraine-suggests-osce-monitors-install-internet-cameras-in-avdiyivka.html … pic.twitter.com/2IEkfd1hoi

More Russian propaganda about Obama-from Russian Today:
Not kidding you: this RT-produced split-screen video is titled "Obama could not withstand Putin's stare" >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYGbOwQYvb4 …

VIDEO: Right Sector in eastern #Ukraine use several AGS-30 against enemy positions.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GpG3siMRLcI … pic.twitter.com/DqkGwBqjZK

#ANALYSIS #MAP
Regiment #Azov fights advancing Russian troops in northern #Shyrokyne
(18.04.)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x5ojipIF4Ug … pic.twitter.com/8JqmefqKK6

OUTLAW 09

04-19-2015, 02:28 PM

http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.de/2015/04/kremlins-five-top-lies-last-week-about.html

Sunday, April 19, 2015

Kremlin’s Five Top Lies Last Week about Ukraine
Paul Goble

Staunton, April 19 – As it has taken to doing, Kyiv’s “Delovaya stolitsa” newspaper publishes today a list of “the top five propagandistic myths, fakes and stupidities of the Kremlin” for the past week. Obviously, given the barrage of Moscow’s lies about Ukraine, these lists are highly selective, but they are also extremely instructive.

This week’s “TOP-5” list, compiled by Dmitry Bukovsky, contains the following items (dsnews.ua/politics/top-5-propagandistskih-mifov-feykov-i-glupostey-kremlya-19042015100000):

1. Aleksandr Zakharchenko, the Moscow-installed leader of the self-proclaimed DNR, repeated his claim that his “’forces’” are about to attack the Ukrainian city of Mariupol and said they would take it “without serious resistance” (bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-04-15/gunfire-in-donetsk-republic-as-leader-refuses-unity-with-ukraine). The DNR head has made this threat before, and his “’forces’” have found it hard to advance anywhere. They would certainly face resistance in Mariupol. The only reason this is a matter of concern is that it was reported by a Western news agency in an uncritical way.

2. The Moscow newspaper “Gazeta” reported that Greece’s defense minister had told journalists that “the Greek population in Crimea had been subject to attacks by the fascist government of Ukraine, and the presence of Russian forces became a defense for Greek families” (gazeta.ru/politics/2015/04/17_a_6643361.shtml). The Greek embassy in Kyiv says the minister never said that and that in any case there were no such problems. What is disturbing is that this made-up statement was carried by a ordinarily much-respected Moscow paper and may be taken on faith by its readers in Russia and elsewhere.

3. Igor Martynov, who heads the Russian occupation office in Donetsk, says that he plans to restore that “’capital of ‘the DNR’ to is former status as ‘the city of a million roses,’” something that he almost certainly cannot afford to do and a step that could only be taken if the regime shifted funds away from the people for this stunt (nahnews.org/206595-vlasti-donecka-zaseyut-gorod-millionami-roz/?utm_source=novoross&utm_medium=vk&utm_campaign=novoross). “The separatists have money,” Bukovsky says, “but not for the support of the poor.”

4. Despite claims by DNR officials, there have been no pitched battles between units of the Armed forces of Ukraine and Ukrainian “’volunteer’ punitive battalions,” a claim pro-Moscow groups have put out in the past in the hopes of provoking them or leading Kyiv to disarm and disband these units (voicesevas.ru/news/yugo-vostok/12286-nacgvardiya-otstrelivaet-ukrainskih-dobrovolcev.html).

5. And in a theme that Soviet and now Russian propagandists have not been able to resist, the ‘Russian Force” website has claimed that “’four American soldiers raped two [Ukrainian] underage girls” (tvzvezda.ru/news/vstrane_i_mire/content/201504170946-hpud.htm). The Russian site despite a complete lack of evidence reported that local people had protested and forced Ukrainian officials to investigate. The latter concluded, the Russian site says, that the Americans were guilty but could do nothing because of the soldiers’ supposed “full diplomatic immunity.”

OUTLAW 09

04-19-2015, 02:55 PM

A day after shelling Ukr towns with #Grad missiles, Russian invaders post "training footage".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33eIyEJnI0Q … pic.twitter.com/H0SRgSwJfB

Putin's former advisor: #Russia will continue attempts to undermine #Baltic countries http://bit.ly/1He2KzP pic.twitter.com/kg4WXuByTy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHbMrdVQK60 … Just listen to this guy. How crazier can the '#Russian World' mindset get? pic.twitter.com/bRnYcrBaq4

OUN battalion commander Kokhanivsky says his battalion is to become a separate unit w/in 93rd brigade of the Armed Forces - National Radio

Militants sustain casualties amid attack on Ukrainian troops near Triokhizbenka – Lysenko
http://www.unian.info/war/1068908-militants-sustain-casualties-amid-attack-on-ukrainian-troops-near-triokhizbenka-lysenko.html … pic.twitter.com/iOp8oyaDkt

OUTLAW 09

04-19-2015, 03:01 PM

http://www.interpretermag.com/moscow-cant-afford-having-donbas-become-a-frozen-conflict-felgengauer-says/

Moscow Can’t Afford Having Donbass Become a Frozen Conflict, Felgengauer Says

Paul Goble April 11, 2015

Staunton, April 11 – Moscow can’t afford having the Donbass become a frozen conflict with an unrecognized state like Transnistria or Nagorno-Karabakh: its economy cannot exist independently and its population is far beyond the capacity of the Russian state to subsidize for very long, according to Pavel Felgengauer.

The implications of the Moscow military analyst’s argument are that Moscow must seize more territory, force Kyiv or someone else to subsidize a population that the Russian government might try to keep under its control, or withdraw.

But Felgengauer himself explicitly says that because Moscow cannot afford to finance a frozen conflict in the Donbass, no one should count on that happening or on Moscow’s fulfillment of the Minsk accords. Instead, he says, it is “almost inevitable” that Moscow will “restart military operations.”

“If you believe Forbes, not long ago, it was proposed to Putin that he take the Donbass, but the Russian president said that he didn’t need it,” the analyst says, adding that he “believes that Putin really doesn’t need the Donbass in any form.”

“Half of the Donbass would not be able to exist independently,” Felgengauer continues. Its economy is in ruins, its agricultural base is too small, its infrastructure is incapable of allowing that to happen, and its population, more than ten times that of Karabakh or Transnistria, is too large for Moscow to finance.

OUTLAW 09

04-19-2015, 03:52 PM

http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.de/2015/04/russian-who-went-to-fight-in-donbas.html

Sunday, April 19, 2015

Russian Who Went to Fight in Donbas Says He was ‘Not in an Army but in a Criminal Band’

pic.twitter.com/fYAMQMrMvW

Paul Goble

Staunton, April 19 – Bondo Dorovskikh, a Russian businessman, volunteered to go to Ukraine to “fight fascism” and defend “the Russian idea;” but he says he rapidly discovered the situation in the Donbas was not as he had been led to expect and that he had been enrolled “not in an army but in a criminal band.”

His testimony on this point, given in a 3,000-word interview with Radio Liberty, provides both a frightening glimpse into the world of the pro-Moscow statelets in southeastern Ukraine and an encouraging indication that ever more Russians are appalled not only by what officials there are doing but also by what Moscow is saying (svoboda.org/content/article/26963666.html).

“I really thought,” Dorovskikh said, “that Russia was in danger, that mercenaries were fighting there and trying to seize our country, that the Donbas is Russia’s advance post where we must stand and defend our interests. Only having crossed the border did we see literally within the first five minutes” that this was not the case.

Russian television exerted a powerful influence on him, the former volunteer says. Had it not presented its version of reality, he would never have thought of going to the Donbas to fight. Now, he said, he recognizes how distorted an account it offered and offers about events in Ukraine.

His recruitment to the Donbas cause was simple; indeed, he said he was shocked that there was no more checking about the people who signed up than there was. “More than that, there were cases when someone with a Xerox copy of documents” but not the real ones crossed the border.” Once in the Donbas itself, no one asked more than one’s name.

The organizers handed out guns without any particular checking of the abilities of those to whom they were given, Dorovskikh continued. They handed out the guns only on Ukrainian territory, but the division of volunteers into the various forces such as the Specter Brigade into which he went took place in Russia, in Rostov oblast.

In that brigade,he said there were “several Russian cadres officers, but most of the band members were local people, with only ten to 30 percent consisting of volunteers from Russia. Some of the band members sold their weapons for cash; others apparently used them for the same end. But still others seemed very interested in learning how to fight.

Neither the hierarchies of the DNR or LNR were especially happy with independent battalions like the one he was in nor were the ordinary people in the areas in which they operated. One woman, for example, told Dorovskikh “We don’t need Putin; [and] we don’t want to be in Russia.”

Most of the people in his band, he continued, were indifferent to politics. Many of them had criminal backgrounds; and those that did devoted a great deal of time to searching out for former militiamen, perhaps for revenge. In all things, “they were far from politics” and were interested only in having an adventure or engaging in violence.

As far as the future is concerned, he said, “if Russia had not gotten involved, [the self-proclaimed republics] wouldn’t have happened. Russia is inclined to support this movement further and therefore the fighters will hold on for a long time yet.”

Dorovskikh said he “would advise people not to go to the Donbas. This is false patriotism. There is no Russia there. Instead, what is going on is real aggression. More than that, if you go, you will simply become part of a band.” Any volunteer would certainly not have anything to do with “defending the Motherland.”

Russians have been shown on television something that looks like the Great Fatherland War,” he said. But in reality, the conflict in Ukraine is “real aggression. We came to this territory, and the Russian authorities are supporting terror. If we hadn’t gone there, if Russia hadn’t gotten involved, there wouldn’t have been thousands of dead.”

“In general,” he concludes, “there wouldn’t have been any of this” in Ukraine.

OUTLAW 09

04-19-2015, 04:06 PM

Apr19 #Alchevsk, militants' joy-riding result @GirkinGirkin pic.twitter.com/pcvntZIkFt

Gen.Hodges:"They use information the way they use infantry and missiles" pic.twitter.com/6BH36hpaHe

OUTLAW 09

04-19-2015, 05:09 PM

Russia needs to gain strong foothold in Arctic — Rogozin
Russia

TASS April 19, 8:18 UTC+3

I believe after Rogozin's visit The Svalbad Treaty from 1920 is now only a piece of paper

There is something surreal in the Russian expansionist policies of Putin these days--everywhere the Czar was and goes Putin.

Following Rus Vice PM Rogozin's illegal visit to Spitsbergen, the Russian parliament questions Norway's full sovereignty over this island.

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 09:37 AM

The senior Russian General assigned to the JCCC is now issuing media releases—something that is not in the mission statement of the JCCC and he is not exactly telling the truth in this particular release.

There are a number of falsehoods—he claims the Azov is an independent BN but in fact it is not and is assigned to the Ukrainian MIA. Secondly, he fails to mention that Russian mercenaries have been pushing attack after attack to expand what they control, and lastly he seems to fail to mention that a Russian MoD journalist accused of POW torture was wounded by a Russian booby trap and that the Russian mercenaries mined a Ukrainian dead soldier—a common tactic out of Chechnya and AFG.

Notice nothing in the press release of the body minin incident where OSCE had to negotiate to get the body demined and released for over 10 hours and that with a Russian General next to them.

He also was at Shirokino and then “claimed he and his OSCE party who are not actually part of OSCE but rather GRU in OSCE windbreakers were recently fired upon by the same force which turned out later to be totally false.

This Russian General does not have a great track record on the “truth”.

NOTICE the press release comes out of Moscow via TASS

JCCC: 410 mines launched from Ukrainian positions explode in Shirokino over 24 hours

April 20, 7:57 UTC+3

MOSCOW, April 20. /TASS/. A total of 410 mines launched from Ukrainian positions have exploded in the village of Shirokino in the Donetsk Region over the past 24 hours, Russia’s representative in the Joint Center for Control and Coordination (JCCC) of the ceasefire regime in Donbass Col. Gen. Alexander Lentsov told the Donetsk News Agency.

"Today we went to Shirokino jointly with representatives of the OSCE and the Defense Ministry of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic," Col. Gen. Lentsov said.

"We registered that 410 mines that came from Ukrainian positions exploded in Shirokino over 24 hours. Yesterday, since the departure of the OSCE, massive machinegun and then mortar fire attacks started, ending with artillery. The key reason is great tensions between the sides," he said.

According to Lentsov, units of Ukrainian volunteer battalion Azov remain in the vicinity of Shirokino, and they destabilize the situation.

"The key fire attacks and clashes come from the southern direction," the general stressed. "On the western direction, where there are units of Ukraine’s armed forces, there are virtually no fire attacks."

Clashes between Ukrainian troops and local militias in the Donetsk and Lugansk regions during Kiev’s military operation, conducted since mid-April 2014, to regain control over parts of the breakaway territories, which call themselves the Donetsk and Lugansk People's republics, have left thousands dead and forced hundreds of thousands of people to flee Ukraine’s embattled east.

The parties to the Ukrainian conflict mediated by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe agreed on a ceasefire at talks in September 2014 in the Belarusian capital Minsk two days after Russian President Vladimir Putin proposed his plan to settle the situation in the east of Ukraine.

The ceasefire has reportedly been numerously violated since. There have been several meetings of the Trilateral Contact Group on east Ukrainian settlement comprising representatives of Russia, Ukraine and the OSCE and of the Normandy Four (Russia, Ukraine, France and Germany) aimed at finding ways to diplomatically and politically settle the intra-Ukrainian conflict..

What is interesting in this Russian press release is that normally mine released munition are fired via Russian heavy caliber weapons and BM27/30 MRLS systems.

This particular Ukrainian unit has had a UA 120mm mortar unit assigned to them after Russian mercenaries kept tanks firing at them and moved to direct infantry style assaults.

Reports are that the 120mm mortar unit has been very effective in hitting Russian units on the move and in fixed positions which indicates targeting drone via a drone.

Seems though from reporting that the use of mines over the last two weeks has been mainly by the Russian mercenaries.

The Russian General is attempting to get a DMZ in place which if one takes his recommended buffer distances it places it exactly next to the city limits of Mariupol--a target they badly want and neither Russian troops and or her mercenaries have any track record in holding to ceasefire contact lines.

The Ukraine pushed back and stated no DMZ UNTIL all ceasefire violations by Russian troops and her mercenaries simply do not occur and all heavy weapons are totally withdrawn per Minsk 2.

Russian FM then complained the Ukraine has setting to high of demands for the DMZ--but it sounds actually quite normal if you are being the one attacked all the time.

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 09:51 AM

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 09:54 AM

Makeevka, 19 April 'Demilitarization' Russian style: howitzers brought to the front.pic.twitter.com/nPlifWjkM7

Militants fire ‘withdrawn weapons’ on Avdiivka and Donetsk area overnight
http://www.unian.info/war/1069094-militants-fire-withdrawn-weapons-on-avdiivka-and-donetsk-area-overnight.html … pic.twitter.com/sPCpsyoDtH

#Ukraine soldiers warn of more encirclements like #Debaltseve in #Luhansk http://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?depth=1&hl=en&prev=search&rurl=translate.google.co.uk&sl=uk&u=http://uapress.info/uk/news/show/72080&usg=ALkJrhjr0Gn3Avxoedwfy1wSXDtYp6mc6Q … #Putin #Russia pic.twitter.com/5YkF0buYjm

VIDEO #Putin created DNR "Militia"at Meteorological Station #Donetsk Airport https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xncp11_K8HU … #Ukraine #Russia pic.twitter.com/gWEpl13ovc

Unofficial information of five #Ukraine soldiers killed near #Donetsk when shell hit ammo depot and exploded
http://m.nv.ua/ukraine/events/volonter-soobshchil-o-gibeli-pyati-ukrainskih-voennosluzhashchih-pod-doneckom-44609.html …

ATO press center: Militants reduce military activity in Donbas conflict zonehttp://www.unian.info/war/1069060-ato-press-center-militants-reduce-military-activity-in-donbas-conflict-zone.html … pic.twitter.com/xn0qaui4vR

Rus-backed militants shelled Ukr positions in Pisky, Avdiivka, #Donetsk area w/ 120mm mortars, AA mount in Avdiivka https://www.facebook.com/ato.news/posts/984028291607977 …

Map. Situation in eastern #Ukraine, April 20, 12:00 EET pic.twitter.com/hF8524h4Mn

#Russia(n) Kilo class sub spotted off #Latvia coast https://twitter.com/Latvijas_armija/status/589705143848939520 … sub info http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kilo-class_submarine … pic.twitter.com/nenSIQzWnb

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 09:55 AM

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 10:18 AM

~6000 #Russia|n troops are locate in #Luhansk city now, turning it into a giant military base. ~3000 in #Donetsk – IR

Tymchuk: Militants turn Luhansk into large military camp
http://www.unian.info/war/1069116-tymchuk-militants-turn-luhansk-into-large-military-camp.html … pic.twitter.com/xK7fLtATKt

Since the Minsk 2 on 15 Feb 2015 Russia and her mercenaries have not adhered to a single point in the agreement--not even fulfilling the POW exchanges and actually stopping them and sending Ukrainian POWs to Russia as well as torturing the POWs.

The heavy weapons were never really pulled back nor recorded by head count, no Russian troops pulled back into Russia and the heavy weapons shipments and troops just keep on coming into the Ukraine.

So if in fact Russia is in total non compliance why do western leaders somehow "believe things will get better" and eventually Russia will comply????

Ukraine NSDC: #Russia delivered 40 train carriages with military equipment to Sverdlovsk, #Luhansk region

#Ukraine NSDC says that 50 trucks & 20 IFVs with military personnel crossed #Russia-#Ukraine border

120-strong Russian forces tactical group deployed to #Shyrokyne (Tymchuk). They have backup from Russian forces staging post at Novoazovsk

Luhansk oblast state adm speaker:Huge amt of #Russia`n regular troops concentrated n #Luhansk pic.twitter.com/1hq9ltHSHZ https://twitter.com/from_diana1/status/590082522761007104 …

After the mini offensive started by the Russian mercenaries this week and stopped by Ukrainian troops it is relatively quiet today but the Russian military shipments just keep on coming and the heavy artillery is now being moved openly back to the contact line also in violation of Minsk as was the use of MRLSs this weekend BUT not a single western leader comment was made.

REMEMBER--the Russian JCCC General is trying to get a DMZ ceasefire AT the same time a Russian Army company sized tactical group has taken up positions in Shyrokyne--AND remember it is always Russian troops that front the major attacks and then hands back to the mercenaries as appearing that the entire offensive was done by mercenaries NOT regular Russian troops --the same tactic used in Debaltseve attacks.

We see this drill now appearing again in Shyrokyne where the mercenaries have been performing badly.

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 11:07 AM

http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.de/2015/04/ukrainian-refugees-in-russia-worse-off.html

Monday, April 20, 2015

Ukrainian Refugees in Russia Worse Off than They Were in Ukraine, Russian Official Says

Paul Goble

Staunton, April 20 – In a statement that undermines Vladimir Putin’s notion that Russians and Ukrainians are one people and that is hardly likely to lead more Ukrainians to view refuge in Russia as an attractive option, a Moscow official says that Ukrainian refugees are much worse off in the Russian capital than they were in their homeland.

In her annual report, Tatyana Potyaeva, the plenipotentiary for human rights in the city of Moscow, says that many Ukrainian refugees came to Russia because of “the absence of any alternative” but their situation has become dire because “despite their cultural closeness and ‘slavic visage,’ [they] often cannot find good work.”

As a result, she said, “they live in Russia in worse conditions than they had in Ukraine” (nazaccent.ru/content/15692-slavyanskaya-vneshnost-ne-pomogaet-bezhencam-iz.html and kommersant.ru/doc/2712838).

But their situation has gotten worse not only because of their inability to find good jobs but also because of the shortcomings of officials who have not come up with the kind of documentation that would allow them to receive even the benefits they are entitled to under Russian law, Potyaeva says.

As a result, many of the Ukrainian refugees have fallen victim to fraud or even descended into criminal activities, a development that if true will do little to win the Ukrainian refugees in Russia support from Russians. The ombudsman says that Russian officials must do more to reach out to them and provide support, including support to return home if the Ukrainians want that.
Between March and July 2014, more than 20,000 Ukrainians appealed to Moscow officials for refugee status, she says, but by January 1, 2015, only 5500 of them had received either the status of refugee or temporary asylum in Russia.

According to Potyaeva, the Ukrainian refugees in Moscow – and presumably this applies to Ukrainian refugees elsewhere in the Russian Federation as well – consist of several groups: those who fled areas where military actions were taking place, those from eastern Ukraine where there was no violence, and those from elsewhere in Ukraine who left “in search of a better life.”

Some of the Ukrainians now in Russia do not qualify for refugee status. Indeed, there were at least a few of them who were already in Russia but simply decided to take advantage of the situation either by registering as refugees or entering into marriage with Russians in order to get the social welfare benefits that could provide.

According to Potyaeva, the earlier “flood” of Ukrainian refugees into Moscow has “stopped,” and Russian officials now are in a position to examine each case in particular and grant temporary asylum “only to those who qualify,” most often by having relatives in the Russian capital.

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 11:09 AM

There is something surreal in the Russian expansionist policies of Putin these days--everywhere the Czar was and goes Putin.

Following Rus Vice PM Rogozin's illegal visit to Spitsbergen, the Russian parliament questions Norway's full sovereignty over this island.

Norway summons Russian ambassador due to illegal Arctic visit by Rogozin http://24today.net/open/383262 pic.twitter.com/pcv7JIEdmb

NICE when the Russian Vice Deputy confirms what many have said is the Russian intent in controlling all of the Artic--seems though he has gone "Islamic" on the West--not sure the KSA would agree with the word "Mecca"??

#Russia Deputy PM Rogozin: "The Arctic is a Russian Mecca" http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/20-apr

Vice PM Rogozin sees Russian focus on Arctic as continuation of annexation of Crimea. http://oborona.gov.ru/media/video/arct1ch … pic.twitter.com/cQjcmScCei

Crimea is "Russia's Jeruselem"
Arctic is "Russia's Mecca"
And Moscow is Russia's & Sodom Donetsk is Gomorrah.

As arctic "Russia's Mecca", @DRogozin can go there for Ramadan 2015 & fast during the daylight hours. FYI, this year it's 18 June – 16 July.

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 11:12 AM

It has been often expressed that Putin and his immediate inner circle reside in "an altered state of reality" but lately there are increasing signs that this "altered state of reality" is rapidly shifting to outspoken "paranoia" about Western and especially US intentions towards Putin and Russia.

It is not a great sign that nuclear decision makers are no longer able to clearly and rationally view reality without their deep biases coming into play. In the case of Putin his biases are ideologically and religiously based not a great combination.

Putin says in upcoming doc film that foreign powers 'decided that Russia will stop existing in its current form'. http://tv.mk.ru/video/2015/04/20/anons-dokumentalnogo-filma-prezident-vladimir-putin-15-let-vo-vlasti.html …

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 11:18 AM

Powerful stuff. Documentary on 1989 and the eastern european dictators trying to stop their power unravelling- http://bit.ly/1F63c2L

#Russia|n General Lentsov talks w/ #Ukraine's General Rozmaznin in Shirokino, #Mariupol region — @AP Photo
pic.twitter.com/v6Sov88qb0

Concerning Israeli complaints about the sale of S-300s to Iran and then the Russian threat against Israel concerning training the UA and providing weapons to the UA.

#Israel flexes its diplomatic muscles against #Putin
http://www.i24news.tv/en/news/israel/diplomacy-defense/68351-150420-israel-flexes-diplomatic-muscle-against-putin …

Humanitarian conditions under the Russian troops and her mercenaries is going from bad to worse daily as most of the so called "Russian humanitarian aid" is in fact weapons, fuel and munitions being smuggled in under no controls.

#Luhansk region: People offered to work for food in separatist-controlled Alchevsk http://belsat.eu/en/articles/people-offered-work-food-separatist-controlled-alchevsk/ … #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/gzqNNNCg49

#Ukraine confirms identity of some #Russia units fighting there. Largely tallies with this excellent @RUSI_org study http://goo.gl/Qjgl5i

13:11 #Dnetsk @felixsteal: "Half-day separ[atist]s are moving vehicles w/cannons. As in a parade. Moreover, circle-wise."

about 13:00 #Avdeevka @666_mancer: Hits to shop and bus-stop area in Nekrasova St, a woman which rode a bycicle wounded.

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 11:31 AM

The Russian Foreign Minister's weekly "rant" against the Ukrainians and they "alleged violations of Minsk 2" notice not a single word at the same time concerning Russia and her mercenaries and their constant non compliance??

#Lavrov speaks against attempts to erode mechanism of contact group on #Ukraine by involving experts from outsideS

Sergey Lavrov: Kyiv harass the residents of Donbas http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/20-april-sergey-lavrov-kyiv-harass-the-residents-of-donbas … #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/BMYjVrFqc8 via @RT_russian

#Kiev is inventing pretexts to disrupt #Minsk agreements to later turn to west for military asisstance - #Lavrov

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 02:53 PM

Norway summons Russian ambassador due to illegal Arctic visit by Rogozin http://24today.net/open/383262 pic.twitter.com/pcv7JIEdmb

NICE when the Russian Vice Deputy confirms what many have said is the Russian intent in controlling all of the Artic--seems though he has gone "Islamic" on the West--not sure the KSA would agree with the word "Mecca"??

#Russia Deputy PM Rogozin: "The Arctic is a Russian Mecca" http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/20-apr

Vice PM Rogozin sees Russian focus on Arctic as continuation of annexation of Crimea. http://oborona.gov.ru/media/video/arct1ch … pic.twitter.com/cQjcmScCei

Crimea is "Russia's Jeruselem"
Arctic is "Russia's Mecca"
And Moscow is Russia's & Sodom Donetsk is Gomorrah.

As arctic "Russia's Mecca", @DRogozin can go there for Ramadan 2015 & fast during the daylight hours. FYI, this year it's 18 June – 16 July.

THEN this "altered state of reality" response from the Russian FM --this knowing that Rogozin did not inform the Norwegian government that he was in fact traveling through Norwegian territory as a diplomat.

Since when it is correct to call another nation' response as absurd???

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
Moscow calls #Norway’s reaction to #Russian deputy PM's @DRogozin visit to #Spitsbergen absurd - http://tass.ru/en/russia/790444
gents. http://kavpolit.com/articles/kadyrov_stavropolskie_siloviki_dopustili_grubye_na-16045/ …

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 03:08 PM

http://globalvoicesonline.org/2015/04/20/russian-siberia-five-years-later-still-neglected-still-burning/

Connection between the fighting in the Ukraine and Siberia—WAY more than you think!!

Russian Siberia, Five Years Later: Still Neglected, Still Burning

Posted 20 April 2015 11:00 GMT

Massive wildfires are burning across Siberia, most notably in the regions of Khakassia, where 23 have perished, and the Zabaikal region further east. It's been almost five years such Russia witnessed this kind of destruction, when summer wildfires in 2010 killed at least 56 people. RuNet Echo covered those fires, as well as the response online, which included impressive efforts to crowdsource volunteer work, and considerable criticism of the government's response to the crisis. In 2015, Russians are reacting to the new wildfires much as they did in 2010, with several important distinctions.

Dissatisfaction

Much like the response from many Russian bloggers in 2010, there has been growing criticism of both the central government’s handling of the wildfires and the national media’s coverage. A central difference between the 2010 and 2015 wildfires is that the earlier crisis included large fires near Moscow (as well as in faraway regions), while the 2015 wildfires are, so far, only in Siberia. As a result of Russia's Moscow-dominated news cycle, the Russian media has devoted far less attention to what remains an eastern problem, leading many locals in Siberia to resent Moscow, and by extension the Kremlin, for distorting the nation's priorities.

The online community “Typical Chita” (Tipichnaya Chita), where members share memes and information about local events, captures some of this popular sentiment. In the group, a public appeal from the residents of Zabaykalsky Krai (where Chita is located) addressed to the federal government is gaining some attention:

Translation In Russian
Original Quote

Yo, federal government! This is Zabaykalsky Krai calling. We didn't secede or anything. This is still Russia and we're on fire! Stop discussing Ukraine, start saving your own people!

Russians affected by the ongoing wildfires in the Zabaykalsky Krai have also launched a petition asking President Putin for additional assistance. More than 10,000 people have signed, leaving hundreds of comments.

Translation In Russian
Original Quote

Yesterday, April 14, 2015, not far from the city of Chita, several housing complexes burned down completely, killing a three-year-old girl. People basically had to put out the fire by themselves. Firefighters arrived on the scene without any water. The power supply was cut off, so locals couldn't even pump the water from their own wells.

All this comes after Zabaykalsky Krai Governor Konstantin Ilkovsky announced earlier that the region is ready for the wildfire season, even telling national television that we have enough men and supplies to fight wildfires, when in reality we've got nothing. Chita is suffocating; ash falls from the sky. We're left with no choice but to keep putting out these fires ourselves, hoping you won't let Ilkovsky's actions go unanswered.

Perhaps the pleas of those in Khakassia and Zabaykal were heard. During Putin's annual call-in show on April 16, he laid out a $100-million aid package that is primarily aimed at assisting those whose property was damaged by the wildfires.

That said, it's not just disgruntled netizens who are unhappy with how the national media has covered the wildfires. Representatives of at least one provincial government—the Twitter account belonging to the Republic of Khakassia's Ministry of Construction Industry, Housing, and Utilities—criticized the news agency Vesti for inaccurate reporting:

Vesti writes, “they succeeded in saving more than 60,000 homes.” We've only got 16,000 homes—and that's including the apartment blocks. Where's [this information] from???

Volunteer efforts

In contrast to the 2010 fires, there has been no real upsurge in technological innovations to crowdsource volunteer efforts for wildfire victims. This is likely due in large part to the brief amount of time that the recent wildfires have burned (the 2010 fires burned for months), and the 2010 fires’ proximity to Moscow, which gave that disaster greater visibility and urgency in Russian society.

Nevertheless, people in Siberia have leveraged social media to facilitate volunteering efforts for victims in Khakassia and Zabaykalsky. Members of the “Typical Chita” online group, for instance, have shared the contact information of people who need assistance in areas affected by the fires, such as individuals and families who are stranded somewhere or need fresh drinking water delivered. Internet users elsewhere on VKontakte, too, are sharing the locations of areas in need of volunteers, along with driving directions and phone numbers for anyone who wishes to help with the relief effort.

Additionally, a VKontakte group for volunteer fire fighters in the Zabaykalsky Krai has been extremely active since the beginning of the fires. The group's volunteers trade information about whom to contact, where to gather humanitarian aid, where to meet to fight the blazes, and more.

The Ukraine connection

The most obvious difference between Russia during the 2010 fires and Russia during its current crisis has nothing to do with the fires, and everything to do with the ongoing war in Ukraine. While the connection between the wildfires and the Ukrainian conflict might not seem obvious at first, the people of Siberia have made the link easily enough. According to an alleged dispatch from pro-Russia separatist forces in eastern Ukraine, some fighters are returning home to Russia, in order to join the understaffed firefighting effort:

Translation In Russian
Original Quote

Siberia and the Fart East are burning. Siberia's militiamen are returning home temporarily to help their countrymen put out the fires. Thousands of hectares of forrest are burning, and hundreds of people are left without a roof over their heads. A veteran of the campaign in Ilovaisk [in eastern Ukraine], visited the where some of the firefighting [in Siberia] is happening, and he said he stepped onto the ashes and was ready to believe the Ukrainian punishers had marched through the village, so devastating was the wildfire.
So far, reports like these of Russian volunteers returning home to Russia to fire wildfires remain unverified. One Russian Twitter user noticed the irony of a recent humanitarian convoy shipment from Khakassia to the war-ravaged Donbass:

Khakassia, which is now on fire, is sending more humanitarian aid to the Donbass, in what is surely part of some masterful game of multi-dimensional chess.

No breaks for Siberia

Even though five years and a far different geopolitical climate separate the two major wildfire outbreaks in Russia, they share common bonds: dissatisfaction with the government's response, as well as inspiring crowdsourcing and volunteer efforts organized through social media. Because the 2015 fires are localized in Siberia, Russia's Moscow-dominated state and media have showed relatively little interest in this crisis.

Indeed, the locals themselves apparently view the fires, at least in part, through the prism of the conflict in Ukraine.

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 03:49 PM

“On eve of May 9 holiday, we expect attempts to destabilize situation in #Ukraine,” says 1st Deputy Speaker Parubiy. “Rallies, even riots

Kadyrov expresses criticism with the killing in Grozny yesterday if one J. Dadaev, at the hands of federal
officers

Re: Kadyrov's criticism of Fed's killing of Dadaev, note law raising MID forces to status of federal military units. http://m.ria.ru/politics/20150416/1059028535.html …

It's not known whether J. Dadaev was a relative of Zaur Dadaev, currently being held in Moscow in relation to Nemtsov murder.

You've seen the "Russian Army Barbie Girl" viral video, now read the backstory on how the hell that came to be. https://meduza.io/en/lion/2015/04/20/the-backstory-of-russian-army-barbie-girl

Azov Report Attacks In Shirokino. http://www.interpretermag.com/ukraine-live-day-427-marked-reduction-in-violence-across-front/#7979 …

Putin's "recent nuclear threats have set a new benchmark for hostility in the conflict he has ignited with the West" http://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/natosource/president-vladimir-putin-s-dangerous-moves …

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 03:51 PM

Russia practicing for Vday Parade includes new Armata series cc @JosephHDempsey #Russia http://mil.ru/files/files/parad2015/1-moscow.html … pic.twitter.com/VcmIseUlqU

First officially released image of #Russia new #Armata platform Main Battle Tank (T-14) http://mil.ru/files/files/parad2015/1-moscow.html … pic.twitter.com/OXOgkW74Cf

Classic propaganda by distortion: #Russia’s map of #NATO “military bases”, and the reality. pic.twitter.com/pIj3nv9dc8

Another look at the particular challenges of #Russia's hybrid warfare model: http://www.icds.ee/publications/article/the-challenges-of-hybrid-warfare/ … pic.twitter.com/UZbLViilkS

Zakharchenko rejects demilitarization of Shyrokyne
http://www.unian.info/war/1069302-zakharchenko-rejects-demilitarization-of-shyrokyne.html … pic.twitter.com/EkG09icIOJ

SBU lieutenant colonel arrested for cooperation with Russian terrorists and is facing 15 years in prison http://en.censor.net.ua/n333314

Ukrainian military report return of OSCE observers to Shyrokyne http://24today.net/open/383517 pic.twitter.com/LqBBye4R1q

#News
Russian forces removed artillery pieces from near #Shyrokyne as the @OSCE_SMM returned to the town.
Snipers keep firing

Militants shoot again in Shirokino: non-stop mortar fire, machine guns http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/20-april-militants-shoot-again-in-shirokino-nonstop-mortar … pic.twitter.com/D0MrETH15f

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 04:17 PM

'Truce' in #Shyrokyne is already over according to Azov tweet. Machine gun fire and mortar fire ongoing. Whats next?
https://twitter.com/Polk_Azov/status/590176408221134848 …

Ukrainian Security Service detained a "Vostok" grouping militant who planned terrorist attacks in #dnipropetrovsk. pic.twitter.com/awaeDtRTDK

#Putin apparently paid some of the #Russia(ns) NOT IN #Ukraine #Donetsk with Rubles. http://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?depth=1&hl=en&prev=search&rurl=translate.google.co.uk&sl=uk&u=http://uapress.info/uk/news/show/72099&usg=ALkJrhiWR5xj0zGaEtahc_SVM7auVh2YLw … #Luhansk pic.twitter.com/9X81FNKSSc

The JCCC reports of a mortar skirmish underway near #Donetsk

Also increasing reports again of fighting around #Donetsk this afternoon. Airport area and #Pisky under fire.

Interesting Russian stats: only 10-12% of the influx of refugees from Donbass chose to stay there.

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 04:21 PM

In Russian:

Considering this site is Kremlin-supported, this story may be a sign of some deescalation plans. Or not. http://politrussia.com/society/vse-unichtozhayushchiy-val-872/ …

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 05:51 PM

Russia ramping up its military presence in the Arcticpic.twitter.com/j66dk3mSIG

Neither side wants to give up the fight for Shirokino. DNR wants Mariupol & many in Ukraine know ithttp://bit.ly/1IxUTvy

#Militants tanks have fired at #Azov positions at #Shyrokyne; 120 mm mortars shelling #Shyrokyne and #Berdyanske

DNR Head Zakharchenko Calls Ukrainian Demilitarisation Proposals 'Schizophrenia' http://bit.ly/1IxUTvy

Russia sends 50 trucks, 20 APCs, and 40 wagons of military equipment into Donbas - read on- http://uatoday.tv http://uatoday.tv/politics/russia-sends-50-trucks-20-apcs-and-40-wagons-of-military-equipment-into-donbas-422419.html …

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 05:52 PM

And the shellings start again today:

20:35 #Horlivka Kurganka @xy_gorlov4an: Sounds of battle for about half hour
20:19 #Horlivka the center @15SVET15: Outgoing mortar fire and grenade launchers for an hour already

#Donetsk @Serzzze
19:55 #Donetsk @HeleneHelene5: 'I heard UAV sound over loosely Azotny/Smolyanka, they started fire at it at once'
19:46 @Newrashkineits: 'Here come #Grad|s'
19:53 @ludkubamailru: 'I thought they seemed to me, we grew unaccustomed'
19:50 @GirkinGirkin: 152mm RUS howitzers started to shell
19:45 #Donetsk the center @98760333: Volleys in the northwest
#Donetsk 19:46
MSTA-B 152mm artillery firing.
- via @felixsteal
19:23 21st CPSU council culture palast: heavy louds
19:23 Smolyanka/Krasny Pakhar: sporadic booms and shots
19:23 @relictDon: various caliber battle distant sounds in the NW
19:11 "Moscow" @Serzzze: distant heavy volleys
19:02 DOK: volleys in NW
19:04 Lavrinka: dull distant volleys in the north
19:06 Azotny:single loud heavies
18:47 City: Singles, heavy
18:56 railway hospital: dull distant booms
18:56 Bakiny: dull distant volleys
18:56 Kyivsky ds @UrriKara4en: Active various battle sounds loosely from NW
18:49 Leninsky ds: A single was heard

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 06:07 PM

During mortar attack on #Pisky this evening, two #Ukraine soldiers of the 93th mechanised brigade killed, one injured.
Via @zaytsev126

GRADs and 152mm howitzers are working around #Donetsk this evening according to reports from locals

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 06:15 PM

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/lawmakers-struggle-for-upper-hand-in-global-information-war/article/2563168#.VTU_fLzQ1Hc.twitter

Lawmakers struggle for upper hand in global information war
By Charles Hoskinson | April 20, 2015 | 5:00 am

Russia's use of information as a weapon of war has helped the Kremlin eat away at Ukraine's territory and undermine the NATO alliance in Eastern Europe.

Now, with China and the Islamic State adopting many of the same tactics, lawmakers say it's time for the United States to up its game to counteract them.

"The United States needs its own strategy to deal with this and we need it now," said Rep. Eliot Engel, D-N.Y. "This can't come soon enough."

Engel, the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and panel Chairman Ed Royce, R-Calif., plan to introduce legislation to counter the Kremlin's global campaign by revitalizing the Cold War-era structure of U.S. international broadcasting, which Royce said is currently just "a thimble of journalistic credibility in an ocean of Russian-driven news distortion."

A previous effort by the two foundered last year on concerns it would turn respected names such as the Voice of America into propaganda outlets, but the problem has become more urgent since then, spreading across the globe.

In the past few years, Russian state media have vastly expanded into the global arm of a campaign of psychological and information warfare that has become an integral part of the Kremlin's military strategy. That became evident last year as Russia began its campaign to seize territory from Ukraine, with Russian media reports playing a major role in building support for Russian-backed rebels there.

"During the war in Ukraine, the Russian-funded television channel RT was mobilized as a weapon," said Liz Wahl, a former RT anchor who famously resigned on the air in March 2014 at the height of the crisis over Russian occupation of Ukraine's Crimea Peninsula.

She said the channel's managers actively seek to spread disinformation and promote conspiracy theories to create confusion in the minds of viewers. RT also actively seeks out extremists and provides a space for them to air their views in the mainstream of political discourse, she said.

"They shape the discussion whether we like it or not," Wahl said.

Russia's information warfare is part of a strategy to defeat Western society by exploiting its openness, since Kremlin military planners have concluded NATO is too strong to confront with force, said Peter Pomerantsev, a British television producer and author of a book about modern Russia, Nothing is True and Everything is Possible.

"The age of information is becoming age of disinformation," Pomerantsev said. "In the 21st century wars might be decided by whose storyline wins, not what happens on the ground."

And not only has Russia's information network gone global, it has become a model for other U.S. adversaries, taking both military and political leaders by surprise. Air Force Gen. Philip Breedlove, NATO's supreme allied commander for Europe, called Russia's efforts in Ukraine "the most amazing information warfare blitzkrieg we have ever seen in the history of information warfare."

China has followed suit, expanding its state-controlled media across the globe, including into the United States, while at the same time keeping a tight rein on what its own citizens can see.

And the Islamic State has a slick Internet propaganda campaign aimed directly at convincing Muslims in the West that the time has come for a global caliphate ruled by Islamic law. The group's social media presence has resisted efforts to defeat it, inspiring like-minded people in the West to commit acts of terrorism and providing a steady stream of recruits, including from the United States and other Western nations.

Meanwhile, a group of retired U.S. military officers found in a report released March 10 that Hamas, the Islamist terror group that controls the Palestinian territory, was able to skillfully use modern technology and sophisticated media tactics to gain the strategic advantage in its 2014 conflict with Israel, in spite of Israeli tactical successes.

The report for the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs recommended that the U.S. military adapt its training and planning to deal with such conflicts, including more sophisticated information operations aimed at preventing attempts to delegitimize its actions in international public opinion.

Royce and Engel's legislation would move U.S. policy in that direction, overhauling the current structure that places the operations of all government-funded international media under the control of a Broadcasting Board of Governors. Instead, their proposal would divide responsibilities, with Voice of America charged with reporting on U.S. policy and other global news, and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty targeting audiences inside Russia and other repressive regimes.

The proposal also would provide dedicated funding and reduce bureaucracy so more money can be spent on disseminating information, which, Royce noted, would be produced in accordance with accepted journalistic practices.

"Our international broadcasting is in disarray," Royce said. "The journalists of the BBG risk their lives reporting from the front lines across the world. They deserve better support. And the American people need much more from this agency if we're going to respond to the rapidly evolving media environment and better secure the long-term security interests of the United States."

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 07:43 PM

The Russian FM Lavrov is on another “rant” again against the Ukraine ALL the while not admitting Russia and her mercenaries have totally failed at implementing anything from Minsk 2.

Seems that he forgot the US stated a number of times the Ukraine can indeed fire back to defend itself—but as usual for Russia it is all the Ukrainians fault BUT it is a Russian Minsk 2 violation tonight when the MRLSs are firing from a zone where they were to be withdrawn from.

AND again he is lying as the OSCE has both confirmed the mercenaries have not pulled back their heavy weapons, have in fact been conducting the most shellings and Lavrov AGAIN fails to mention the constant flow of Russian troops, weapons, fuel and munitions they just keep on sending into the Ukraine.

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
#Lavrov: As the @OSCE observers acknowledge, in a number of cases the #Ukrainian armed forces fire first, and then receive fire in return

Another Russian falsehood muttered by the Russian FM today—seems he thinks the Russian mercenaries are not firing BM21/27s/30s tonight in the Donetsk region?

Seems that he forgot the US stated a number of times the Ukraine can indeed fire back to defend itself—but as usual for Russia it is all the Ukrainians fault BUT it is a Russian Minsk 2 violation tonight when the MRLSs are firing from a zone where they were to be withdrawn from.

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
#Lavrov: The more Kiev tries to derail #Minsk2, the more reasons the West creates to continue its pressure on #Russia

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
#Lavrov: If we look at who's honouring the Minsk Agreements, we'll see that Kiev is responsible for hindering the process more than others

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
#Lavrov: There are many other factors indicating a desire to find a pretext for derailing the Minsk Agreements

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
#Lavrov: Take the laws on “decommunisation” and glorification of #Nazi henchmen. They want people in western #Ukraine to forget about #May9

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
#Lavrov: One only has to read the text of the #Minsk2 agreements to see the commitments made by #Ukraine

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
#Lavrov: So far nothing has been done on the issue of decentralisation #Ukraine

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
#Lavrov: This law was supposed to be introduced in coordination with the representatives of Lugansk and Donetsk, but this was not done

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia

#Lavrov: For example, the law on the status of Donetsk and Lugansk was adopted in Kiev in gross violation of its commitments made in Minsk

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
#Lavrov: The Minsk Agreements are being violated and the #Ukrainian government is predominantly at fault pic.twitter.com/cYEbKp8qbs

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 07:58 PM

Seems the Russian FM Lavrov is having a really hard time with the truth---all of the below comments are violations of Minsk 2 from the Russian side.

Is this the end for #Minsk agreements? Lavrov sounds like he's pulling the plug... Prelude to #Mariupol offensive? https://twitter.com/mfa_russia/status/590236448097497090 …

OSCE confirms that GRAD missiles which hit #Avdiivka on Saturday came from the RU-occupied territoryhttp://inforesist.org/obse-avdeevka-byla-obstrelyana-s-okkupirovannyx-territorij/?_utl_t=tw …

Fighting resumes in #Shyrokyne just outside #Mariupol after 65 hrs of quiet ► http://goo.gl/4817ci pic.twitter.com/2Kc83ROpAN #Ukraine #Russia

Russian tanks joined The battle in #Shyrokyne. Russians are also shelling w 120-mm mortars #Shyrokyne and Berdyanske.

@Guderian_Xaba Azov guys say they are responding to the attack only with light mortars and small arms...

#Ukraine,#Donbas,Russians are still using Grad launchers and are arming from #Russia.http://www.defence24.pl/news_tzw-separatysci-wciaz-uzywaja-wyrzutni-grad-i-sa-dozbrajani-przez-rosje … #Ukraina pic.twitter.com/T9rFGJMKyj

BREAKING: #Russia|ns using GRAD or Uragan MLRS in #Donetsk tonight
http://www.62.ua/news/803841

#Luhansk. More #tanks on the Russian hybrid #army “Transpele” basehttp://nplm.in/ayc pic.twitter.com/Hj8eQETh69

#RussianArmy Collects ‘Scrap’ of #Novorossiya #Ukraine @en_informnapalm https://en.informnapalm.org/russian-army-collects-scrap-of-novorossiya/ … pic.twitter.com/uwtlUSAebP

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
50 trucks & 20 IFVs with military personnel crossed Russia-Ukraine border.

СММ ОБСЄ в Україні @OSCE_SMM
Latest from SMM to Ukraine: Fighting took place in and around Shyrokyne, forcing the SMM to temporarily withdrawhttp://bit.ly/1DEGjkX

The war is just beginning: a "minor" Russian ammunition stockpile right on Ukraine's borderhttps://informnapalm.org/8083-prygoroda-kamensk-shahtynska-rostovskoj-oblasty-v-10-km-ot-gosgranytsy-s-ukraynoj … pic.twitter.com/tL5u7McANg

Ukr sources report that Russia's militants _mined_ the dead body of an Azov volunteer; was de-mined only w/ OSCE help http://zaxid.net/news/showNews.do?teroristi_pochali_minuvati_tila_vbitih _ukrayinskih_voyiniv&objectId=1348551 …

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 08:01 PM

One of LifeNews's most trusted Ukraine-bashers detained with fascist insignia, books and Hitler portraits. pic.twitter.com/VkHke1GAl5

Russian police claim they've raided "Hitler's birthday party" in Moscow. Just what prevented them from raiding the fascist forum in St Pete?

Important remarks by Kyle Parker in DC on how the collapse of rule of law in Russia has led to warhttp://upnorth.eu/how-the-collapse-of-the-rule-of-law-in-russia-led-to-a-war-in-europe/ …

#Russia’s nuclear threats,... are the hallmark of a weak country in economic, demographic & political decline. http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/russia-fear-west-democracy-by-anders-fogh-rasmussen-2015-04#JBeg3XKWw9zYrkem.99 …

#Ukraine has stopped paying for the provision of Russian electricity to the anti-terrorist operation zone. http://www.pravda.com.ua/rus/news/2015/04/20/7065290/ …

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 08:06 PM

The entire Russian Foreign Ministry is having a nervous breakdown today--this is referencing the 173rd training the Ukrainian National Guard.

Mental state of #Russia in four tweets from Ambassador Yakovenko
1.Delusion
2.Victim mentality
3.Lies
4.Projection

pic.twitter.com/n1Cc7jyPau

OUTLAW 09

04-20-2015, 09:17 PM

http://tomnichols.net/blog/2014/09/01/if-putin-goes-nuclear/#ixzz3XszwYY5U

Here's How Putin Might Use The Nuclear Weapons He Keeps Talking About

The War Room

Tom Nichols

Sep. 2, 2014, 11:42 AM

Tom Nichols is a Professor in the National Security Affairs Department at the U.S. Naval War College in Newport, and a senior associate of the Carnegie Council on Ethics and International Affairs.

I don’t miss the Cold War, but apparently Russian President Vladimir Putin does. Either that, or he’s now clinically insane.

There aren’t a lot of other explanations for Putin’s nuclear chest-thumping in the past week or so.

So far, it’s vintage Putin: swaggering braggadocio about Russia’s nuclear status that isn’t actually linked to a specific threat, but with enough dots to connect that any foreign observer can take his meaning.

Like the mobster he is, Putin never directly threatens, but instead talks in circles, sort of the way a loan shark explains the many ways you could have an “accident” if you don’t pay up.

This isn’t as new as it looks. The Soviet and later Russian militaries have always been obsessed with nuclear weapons — yes, even more than the Americans — but mostly, in the last few decades, to compensate for the pitiful state of Russian conventional forces. Apparently, nuclear deterrence has now reverted back to Cold War dice-throwing.

So what, exactly is Putin on about? Let’s look at this seriously for a moment, as if Putin isn’t a gangster or a lunatic. Is there actually a strategic logic to the use of a nuclear weapon anywhere in this current crisis?

Russian commentator Andrei Piontkovsky thinks that Putin, at least, believes there is. As Paul Goble reports:

Clearly, [says Piontkovsky], Putin does not seek “the destruction of the hated United States,” a goal that he could achieve “only at the price of mutual suicide.” Instead, his goals are “significantly more modest: the maximum extension of the Russian World, the destruction of NATO, and the discrediting and humiliation of the US as the guarantor of the security of the West.”

To put it in simplest terms, Piontkovsky continues, Putin’s actions would be “revenge for the defeat of the USSR in the third (cold) world war just as the second world war was for Germany an attempt at revenge for defeat in the first.”

If Putin is the old-school Soviet thug I now think he is, then his notional plan will look something like this:

1. Provoke a crisis within the current crisis. There are rumors, for example, that the shootdown of MH17 was actually supposed to be the shootdown of a Russian airliner that could then be used as a pretext for invasion. That’s a little too clever for me, but imagine a sudden Russian lunge toward, say, Odessa, and the US and UK take the recent advice of Ben Judah in the New York Times and send troops to hold the airport there. Now we have exactly the NATO-Russia standoff for which Putin has been striving for months.

2. Get some Russian soldiers killed. Make sure it looks right on RT, preferably with Ukrainian soldiers using Western weapons. (Or better yet, with NATO soldiers returning fire on innocent Russian “peacekeepers” and “aid convoys” or whatever idiotic ruse Putin uses the next time.)

3. Use a nuclear weapon. NATO shatters as everyone west of Warsaw loses control of their bladders.

I’m not saying this is a good plan, but it might be the one Putin and his cronies are considering.

Of course, this is pure crazy talk on many levels.

The Consequences Of Using Nuclear Weapons

First, I can’t figure out how even Putin thinks he secures the future of Russia by becoming the first nation since 1945 to use nuclear weapons. If the Russian president’s goal is to make the world forget about Hiroshima and Nagasaki, place a permanent stain on the word “Russia” for all time, and unite the entire planet against his still-poor, still-weak country, then he is not only unhinged, he’s just plain stupid.

There are other considerations, of course. Exactly what does Putin think he’s going to hit with nuclear weapons? A NATO base in Poland, perhaps? A UK submarine pen? A US ICBM base in Wyoming? This is one of those ideas that probably sounded good after that fourth vodka at 3 am in the Kremlin, hanging out with the boys and getting a shoulder rub from Alina Kabayeva.

Indeed, you can almost see it: jackets open, ties loosened, cigarette smoke hanging in the air, the clink of glasses, the generals and the spooks sitting around smugly talking about NATO having a collective pants-browning over the display of Russian nuclear might.

Unfortunately (for them) it’s not 1974. It doesn’t work that way. No matter how Putin’s team or his courtiers in the Russian media try to spin the story, the first use of a nuclear weapon is still the first use of a nuclear weapon. Russians, raised on the idea that only the bad guys would ever use nukes first, will know exactly what happened. And then they will wait for the cloud of fallout to hit them — as it will within a few days if the target is in European NATO.

And some of them — especially the smarter ones who are already trying to get the hell out of Russia — will wonder why their lives and futures are being sacrificed for the sake of the memory of a country that ceased to exist while they were still toddlers.

A Russian Pariah State

How any of this helps Russia is beyond me. Even if the exchange stops at one weapon — and I don’t think any U.S. President needs to retaliate by adding yet more poison to the planet, but that’s just me — Russia will forever be contained by the international community as the Worst Country In The World.

Of course, if Putin thinks the exchange will stop with one weapon, then he’s the most confident gambler since Hitler in 1936. (I’d also bet that the Chinese are probably rooting for Putin to get off the leash and go nuts, because it will allow them to finally get the stink of Mao Zedong’s crazy off of them and make it stick forever to Moscow.)

If the exchange doesn’t stop at one weapon, then the rest is irrelevant, and you and I will likely not be sitting here calmly reading and reflecting on international affairs.

Putin isn’t going to live forever, and after using a nuclear bomb his successors will have two choices: either revert to complete Soviet-like isolation and self-sufficiency in world that will forever hate Russia (and live off pickled herring and apple juice for another century) or abjectly throw the Russian Federation on the mercy of international opinion, and engage in prolonged atonement that would almost certainly require demilitarization of the Russian state and war crimes tribunals for the surviving leaders and generals.

I used to think the chance of any of this was about zero. But of course, that’s the problem with “about zero:” it’s not actually “zero.” Anything that’s not impossible has a finite chance of happening. Putin’s provocations might have only a million to one shot of producing a nuclear event, but if he tries those provocations a million times…well, you do the math.

I keep waiting for cooler heads to prevail in Moscow and thought this might have reached some kind of resolution over the summer. But that was 2500 Ukrainian deaths — and one innocent airliner — ago.

Still, I’m used to Soviet…er, sorry….Russian leaders talking about nuclear weapons, and so I’m assuming this is business as usual, circa 1980. But the fact that Putin is willing to throw away Russia’s future for the sake of a Soviet past means that this crisis is not close to being over. It also means that there is no way to deal with this crisis through negotiation: if Putin is so locked in the past that he thinks he can make nuclear threats, he’s not likely to change course now.

I also worry about one more thing, on our side rather than theirs. Putin is taking huge risks based on the idea that Barack Obama is the weakest American president in modern history. The Kremlin has plenty of reason to think so, especially after the graceless powder we took in Syria a year ago. There is no question that President Obama is among the least, uh, decisive leaders the White House has had in a long time, but even weak Presidents can only be pushed so far.

I worry that Putin, like other Soviet — sorry again, Russian, I mean Russian — leaders thinks that America is as leader-centered as Russia is, and will not understand that at some point the American foreign policy establishment will create a response that will totally surprise the Kremlin. That’s how major wars get started, but it’s not clear that Putin knows this, or cares.

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 04:55 AM

Great social media open source analysis on the Russian Army withdrawal back to Russia after invading the Ukraine in August 2014.

After Ilovaisk ambush Russian Army retreated with big smoke screen back to Russia
http://ukraineatwar.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/defeating-ukrainian-volunteer.html …
@finriswolf pic.twitter.com/nodUCWxleA

#Russia|ns gathered a huge amount of ammunition near border #Ukraine.http://www.tvn24.pl/walki-w-donbasie-tysiace-pociskow-przy-granicy-z-ukraina,534938,s.html … via @KuczynskiG pic.twitter.com/D08DXIF0Qt

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 07:40 AM

To understand Putin and the inner circle currently around him one must understand the mindset that is currently in vogue in Russia.

This is a translation taken from a Russian mercenary interrogation of a Ukrainian Army officer captured in the fighting at the Donetsk Airport--to refresh the UA and volunteer BNs were basically surrounded and held out for 242 days beating the Stalingrad record of 181 days.

Then after repeatedly defeating all mercenary attacks the Russian Army sent in their Spetsnaz and GRU units that under the guise of picking up dead Russians basically blew up the remaining defensive position killing over 60 or so and taking over 40 POWs a COL from the 93rd Airmobile Bde was also captured AND has not been returned under the Minsk 2 POW exchanges that the Russians have broken off after not fully exchanging all known POWs--there is a tad of factual reporting that the mercenaries have moved a number of the POWs to Russian soil.

Help #OlegKuzminyh go back home to family
90 days captive
pic.twitter.com/hbV7ftvg1t
NOTE: captured and verified alive but not exchanged as per Minsk 2

USConsulateFrankfurt @usconsfrankfurt
RT @usosce: We once again reiterate our call for #Russia and separatists it backs to release all #Ukraine hostages: http://1.usa.gov/1aDpvjJ

The term "Cyborgs" was given to them for holding out against impossible odds--this term is now locked into Ukrainian military history, gave them a sense of pride after so many defeats and basically tied the Russian mercenaries for months in knots and extremely high loses.

NOTE: Amnesty International has finally started talking about the mercenary executions and torture of Ukrainian POWs--after months of resisting the video footage and photos coming via social media sources and voice intercepts from the Ukrainian State Security SBU.

Well worth the reading ----

Translation of Interview/interrogation with POW Cyborgs.

I'm filming video. If I get permission from the command after approving the video, it will be published, that is, I shall be permitted to publish it. You have an opportunity to make it known to your family that you're alive. Because you [the Ukrainian commanders] never admit casualties, you [soldiers] just disappear, as the phrase goes, if there is no body - there is no case. Where you went, tell me?

- I went for the guys at the airport to pick up the dead and bring them to Konstantinovka, and I did not know where to go next.

Which terminal at the airport?

- The new one, where our guys were.

So, how many stiffs there?

- I was told there were about 80 people there.

Eighty dead?

- No, I was told there were 80 people there.

How many dead?

- More than 60%, I was told.

Sixty percent?

- Yes.

That is, more than a half?

- Yes.

More than 50, then? Of 80 people?

- I did not even know who there actually fought. I was told that there were our guys from the 90th battalion, that they were being shelled, that the airport floors were already occupied, that moskals began to occupy the floors, and that at night they [the guys from the 90th battalion] were going to yield up the airport.

At night we were going to occupy the airport?

- Rather, in the morning, as it was night when we were told this. Then, in the morning, we were lined up and were told to go to pick up the guys, the dead, because there <...> had been killed...

Speak, speak.

- We seated <...> [...into three MT-LB armoured tracked vehicles?], there were nine of us. Everyone just had to come down, bring [the dead] to the car, load them into the ML-LB's, there were also special <...> [devices?] for the dead, the wounded, to pick up them all. We drove, that's what I remember, then the shelling begun, closer, closer, then bullets started to strike at the car armor, then the driver abruptly stopped the car, screamed "Knocked out, all get off!" We jumped down, it was fog, there were some broken frames at the left side. We all rushed into some room, no one knew where were they, where was the terminal, where were those floors, whom to pick up, whom to load.

Now the question to you solely for this recording. Can I call myself a good cop? Well, you see, you're quite shabby, I did not... or it was I who?..

- I've said what I knew <...>

No, I mean did I beat you?

- No.

How am I talking to you?

- Humanly.

Humanly. You see, my goal is not to make fun of a captured ukrop (I've always differentiated you [the Ukrainians] into Bandera's followers, ukrops and Ukrainians), I'm not an invited guest, my mother was from Shakhtersk, my father was of the Dnieper region, and then they went to the Crimea, their parents. I'm here, I know what I'm doing. And you hear my accent, don't you?

- Yes, of course.

Well, I see.

- <...> me too <...> the first time we were brought <...> I do not know where <...> I've never seen the first emplacement, the guys said "Here is your Ukrainian passport". Then they started talking...

I do not conceal anything. I yell at each corner that I'm a volunteer from Russia, it's no secret. I'm explaining to everybody that I have come to defend my historic homeland. My mother asks me, "If you're going to pass by my village, under Shakhtersk, make a picture of my home, I just wonder what happened to him." I'm not on a visit here, and I assure you that a large part, if not the largest, of those who came here from Russia, have their grandparents here. In Russia, for example, according to opinion polls, a third part of Russian citizens - not immigrants, but citizens - claim that they have their grandparents in Ukraine. It means - what? How do you think?

- It's kinda one country ...

Can this mean that a third part of the citizens of Russia are -

- ...the Ukrainians?

Yes.

- Sure it can.

How can a country...

- If you even take the Ukrainians, how many of them are all over Europe, that is the same thing here, more than half, well, a third part for sure.

So, I'll make a pause, I do not want to lose the video track, it does not download well in HD quality.

* * *

INTERROGATORS:
- ...We'll publish it [video], your family will take a look at it.
- You'll be a hero...
- You'll be a hero, known all over the country...
- Well, wait, now in a serious way. From jokes to business. You will be a hero. You're one of the military officers - in my opinion, the only one, the first one - in the history of Ukraine, who has military honor. Every officer, of any army, would consider it an honour when the enemy show mercy to him and allow him to shoot himself. Any country. And the Japanese, how they called it?
- Harakiri?
- Bushido? no, I don't remember.
- Seppuku? it's when he jump...
- Let's go back 70 years ago. Any German officer would take the gun. Yes, it's the Nazism, it's a lousy fascist, but he would take the gun. Any Soviet officer would take the gun. That's time when people had a notion of the officer's honor. And now ...
- Well, give the gun?

POW:
- My country won't appreciate it.

INTERROGATOR:
- But you're at war for it!

POW:
- It sent me to slaughter.

INTERROGATORS:
- But you denied it...
- And what, it's the family who will appreciate. Everybody will admire you, tell to your mom: "Look, what a son you had, a true hero!"
- There will be a street named after you.
- They will meet your coffin on your knees.
- "Right Sector" will...
- Kiss your ass.
- ...set up a monument to you, as a hero of Ukraine.
- Well, give the gun?

POW:
- No.

INTERROGATOR:
- I promise: no one will interfere. OK?

POW:
- No.

INTERROGATORS:
- Why no? Afeared?
- Tell us the reason, why.

POW:
- I don't want to die.

INTERROGATOR:
- "Don't want to die"? or "Don't want to die for..."?

POW:
- Don't want to die for the country that betrayed me.

INTERROGATOR:
- Do you really think you still have the homeland? We all were betrayed in the Maidan Square - both you all and we. When Maidan was taking place, we were working hard at the mines, factories. You were probably also doing something?

POW:
- Yes.

INTERROGATOR:
- Worked, right?

POW:
- Yes.

INTERROGATOR:
- And guys who stood there [in the Maidan square], "Berkut", were burned and beaten with chains, did you see that?

POW:
- In the news.

INTERROGATOR:
- Did see it in the news?

POW:
- Yes.

INTERROGATOR:
- Well, and how? There were guys like you, officers like you. They stood and did not fire a shot. And were beaten. Did not it offend you for the army?

POW:
- It offended me that the authorities allowed them to do so, allowed to do so to them. <...>

INTERROGATOR:
- Well, why you then went to serve to this country? The country that had trampled into mud the officers, the soldiers. They are like you.

POW:
- I had been mobilized.

INTERROGATOR:
- Mobilized... you coward ass. Coward ass, hear? You're a ####, not an officer.

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 08:11 AM

There has been a number of social media comments on the apparent one sided reporting by Russian Forbes magazine to the straight forward accusation they are part and parcel of the Russian informational warfare--there is some truth to that accusation.

Recently Russia Forbes "carried an exclusive report" out of Moscow that turned out to be blatantly false--never published a retraction nor apologized.

Russian Forbes Journalist Orhan Dzhemal Detained, Interrogated at RU Border After Trip to LNR http://www.interpretermag.com/russia-update-april-21-2015/#7990 … pic.twitter.com/qYDP5XWIQc

AND now their reporters turn up inside Russian mercenary held territory without the required Ukrainian entry visa for journalists and he wonders why he was stopped???

So a US media outlet is working with the Russian info war side of the house--their Russian outlet seems to need some "oversight" from the mothership???

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 08:25 AM

Appears we are just about two or so weeks away from the Russian Spring Offensive probably tied to the 9 May celebrations. some had predicted the 15/16 April and in fact a mercenary mini offensive is underway starting in that timeline.

Mercenary shellings using tanks, MRLSs and heavy artillery ALL in violation of Minsk 2 have picked up over the last 4-5 days, ground attacks using infantry and tanks also picked up in the same timeframe and still continue through today ANd heavy Russian resupply runs have massively increased in the same timeline especially more tanks.

AND now the OSCE confirms mercenary pullout of Minsk 2 depot their heavy weapons followed by the Ukrainian side as they are seeing the same indications of an offensive coming at them.

OSCE says withdrawn militant weapons missing from storage, spots Ukrainian weapons moving
http://www.unian.info/war/1069506-osce-says-withdrawn-militant-weapons-missing-from-storage-spots-ukrainian-weapons-moving.html … pic.twitter.com/1AfBsyADZJ

#DPR leader sees increasing frequency of shooting incidents as Ukrainian offensive's prologue - Interfax

NOTE: as is standard Russian propaganda--when they state something it means directly the opposite--here an alleged offense by the Ukrainians YET the mercenaries have been in a mini offensive for now over five days.

#BreakingNews
Russian forces escalates their assault on #Shyrokyne over the morning, now using tanks, trying to storm the Ukrainian front

Video of #Russia|n tanks loaded on train in Kamensk-Shakhtinsky, #Rostov in #Russia, probably moving to #Ukraine
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmJkKS

Tanks being prepared to enter Ukraine from Kamensk-Shakhtinsky, #Rostov #Russia via railroad.https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRMnaLJz27oc1oj4-ZbK2fw … pic.twitter.com/JDasVLnNbj

@ZombieTVonline local Russians in comments say "there are so many tanks" and "To Ukraine

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 08:29 AM

AZOV: Pavlopil & Pyshchevyk (no soldiers there) shelled with mortars last night by Russianshttps://vk.com/batalion.azov?w=wall-72444174_6363

#News
Very interesting announcement by #Azov about #Pavlopil and #Pyshchevyk, which were under Rus mortar fire today

#Russia|ns shelled #Shyrokyne with 120mm mortars this morning & now try to storm it with tanks + infanterie units. At least 2 attackers KIA

All started with 120 mm mortars at 5:15,escalation of mortar attacks around 8:00 and tanks since 8:25.
#Azov reports deaths among the enemy.

Latest from SMM: Summary Table of #Ceasefire Violations, 19 April 2015. Download here:
http://www.osce.org/ukraine-smm/152156 … pic.twitter.com/DxAsmnljQH

Kremlin ‘seeks replacement for Zakharchenko’
http://www.unian.info/war/1069522-kremlin-seeks-replacement-for-zakharchenko.html … pic.twitter.com/IY2JqsG0jN

UNIAN: Kremlin seeks replacement for war-criminal Zakharchenko. Mozgovoy possibly successorhttp://www.unian.info/war/1069522-kremlin-seeks-replacement-for-zakharchenko.html … pic.twitter.com/C3120TgKUT

Ex-Czech Minister for Foreign Affairs declares that Putin will not stop until he controls all of Ukraine. http://www.unian.net/politics/1069517-putin-ne-ostanovitsya-poka-ne-poluchit-vsyu-ukrainu-eks-glava-mid-chehii.html …

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 08:30 AM

Rus proxies keep firing from 120mm weapons. Also fired from BMP at Ukr near Avdiivka, twice from tank near Shyrokynehttps://www.facebook.com/ato.news/posts/984652248212248 …

NATO head says Russian military rhetoric now mentions nuclear weaponshttp://www.unian.info/world/1069509-nato-head-says-russian-military-rhetoric-now-mentions-nuclear-weapons.html … pic.twitter.com/q2HkHjf0Vk

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 08:36 AM

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 08:40 AM

Kremlin ‘seeks replacement for Zakharchenko’

21.04.2015 | 10:42

The days of the leader of the Donetsk People’s Republic militant organization, Oleksandr Zakharchenko, are numbered, and the Kremlin is actively looking for a replacement, with a militant named Mozgovoy a possible contender, Deputy Head of the Anti-Terrorist Operation in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions Colonel Valentyn Fedychev said on Monday, according to the press service of the Donetsk Regional State Administration.

REUTERS

"The fate of the leaders of terrorists that Moscow removes from their militant offices is prison at best. Zakharchenko is afraid of this, and is bending over backwards to prove to his Kremlin masters his endless dedication and his willingness to perform the dirtiest instructions of his handlers," Fedychev said.

"One of such Kremlin tasks is to find and fabricate evidence of gross violations of the Minsk agreements by Ukraine. For this purpose, for more than a week this leader-loser has surprised the world every day with his sensational [claims about] the [coming] storming of Donetsk by Ukrainian armed forces," he said.

Fedychev said Zakharchenko “has tried to do everything to provoke an offensive by the Ukrainian armed forces, but the Ukrainian ‘fascists’ have not moved from their positions and have fired on militants only in extreme cases.”

"Zakharchenko ordered the firing of Grad rockets on the town of Avdiivka from the territory of the town of Yasynuvata. The militants launched [rockets] from two units simultaneously and fired 14 rounds," Fedychev said.

"The militants of Zakharchenko fired 122mm artillery systems directly from Donetsk. They also fired guns and tanks from the territory of the Donetsk airport, and they fired tanks from the village of Zhabunki," he added.

According to Fedychev, Zakharchenko is showing complete unwillingness to take even a few steps to establish peace in the Donbas.

Read more on UNIAN: http://www.unian.info/war/1069522-kremlin-seeks-replacement-for-zakharchenko.html

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 08:58 AM

This unit is exactly one of the reasons the Russian operations have dragged on and on and virtually gained no territory other than when the entire Russian Army of over 12K is thrown into the fight.

They have been in constant fighting from the very beginning first as a volunteer BN along with several other volunteer BNs which carried the fighting through to August this year and now as part of the Ukrainian National Guard.

http://dailysignal.com/2015/04/20/two-weeks-to-make-a-soldier-a-ukrainian-national-guard-unit-trains-to-fight-to-the-death/

Two Weeks to Make a Soldier: A Ukrainian National Guard Unit Trains to ‘Fight to the Death’

Nolan Peterson / @nolanwpeterson / April 20, 2015

KYIV, Ukraine—At its training camp on the outskirts of Kyiv this past weekend, the Ukrainian National Guard Azov Regiment held its Spartan Test—a grueling three-hour rite of passage meant to test the mental and physical strength of both new recruits and battle-hardened veterans.

The ordeal is the capstone to a two-week-long whirlwind military training program, after which many recruits travel to the front lines for the first time. The regiment, which began as a civilian volunteer battalion after the Maidan revolution last year, is stuck balancing the competing interests of building a military unit from scratch while sustaining continued combat operations.

With little time or resources available to mold civilians into soldiers, the Azov Regiment’s training program focuses on developing the most essential skills and traits necessary to keep soldiers alive.

The director of the program is Mikael Skillt, a 38-year-old Swedish sniper who has been fighting in Ukraine for 14 months. Skillt said that pushing a recruit to his mental and physical limit is an effective way to predict how he will react under the pressures of combat.

“We put them through stress tests to induce panic, and we see how they handle themselves,” Skillt said. “We have to see how they react to stress before we send them into combat.”

Along with a small cadre of Azov combat veterans chosen to be instructors, Skillt uses techniques such as burying soldiers alive for up to 20 minutes, pepper spray and water boarding to induce panic in the recruits.

Each class starts with about 50 trainees, and the attrition rate is about 10 percent. The most recent class began with 55 recruits, 50 of whom completed training this past weekend. One of the dropouts was a French paratrooper, Skillt said.

The Spartan Test is a series of physical challenges—including a 10-kilometer run, obstacle course and wrestling match—all of which recruits must complete in under three hours.

Forty soldiers, comprising both recruits and soldiers returned from the front (as well as four Russians) participated in Saturday’s Spartan Test. Only 23 finished.

“All 40 will go to the East,” Skillt said. “But 23 will go a little taller, a little prouder.”

The Spartan Test is a rite of passage for the Azov Regiment. Its completion is not a prerequisite for front-line service, but a source of pride within a unit that eschews traditional military chains of command and calls its organizational structure a “brotherhood.” Those who successfully complete the Spartan Test receive a pin and are eligible for specialized training programs like sniper school.

The Azov Regiment comprises foreign fighters from 19 different countries, including two Americans currently serving in the unit, according to Azov personnel. Because the rules of the most recent cease-fire ban the use of foreign fighters on both sides of the Ukraine conflict, most of Azov’s foreign soldiers have either returned home or left the battlefield to continue serving as trainers.

The Kyiv training camp is in an abandoned industrial park on the city’s outskirts. The owners of the property allow the Azov Regiment to use a section of the facility in exchange for protection against looters. The Azov camp is basic, with instructors living in residential trailers similar in size and shape to the Containerized Housing Units (CHUs) the U.S. military used on bases in Afghanistan and Iraq. And while the camp is within Kyiv’s city limits, the area has been designated a special “tactical area,” allowing for live-fire training under special circumstances.

The makeshift camp was a flurry of activity this past weekend. Girlfriends and other supporters came out to cheer on Spartan Test participants while local volunteers were busy constructing camp facilities. After the event was over, there was a cookout sponsored by civilian supporters of the regiment.

“It helps morale to see this kind of civilian support,” Skillt said.

Skillt is a former sniper in the Swedish military. While he has received media coverage in the past for his alleged far-right political ideology, he said images of Ukrainian protestors being gunned down by snipers in Kyiv during the 2014 Maidan revolution spurred him to fight in Ukraine.

“I don’t hate Russians, only Putin,” he said.

The Azov Regiment has also come under scrutiny due to accusations of promoting Nazi ideology, with many pointing to the similarity of the group’s symbol to the Nazi Wolfsangel.

The regiment has downplayed the claims, calling them Russian propaganda. Skillt acknowledged that some of Azov’s members held far-right political beliefs, but said they were not representative of the group as a whole.

“All of them are willing to die for their country,” Skillt said. “Does their support mean any less if they are nationalistic?”

Skillt joined the Azov Regiment when the unit was still a civilian volunteer battalion with 120 soldiers—only two of whom had any military experience.

“We were a rough bunch,” he added. “At first we just had shotguns and other small arms.”

“In the beginning we only had pistols,” said Ivan Kharkiv, an Azov Regiment soldier in an earlier interview with The Daily Signal. “Now the National Guard gives us all we need.”

“We need weapons,” he added. “But instructors are more important.”

The unit was officially incorporated into the Ukrainian National Guard earlier this year, tightening government oversight on combat operations and training. Soldiers now receive a salary and government benefits for their service, and the government has also begun to equip the Azov Regiment with armored fighting vehicles and tanks.

The unit is still mostly autonomous, however. It retains control of its own training program and still independently plans and executes its combat operations in most circumstances. And unlike regular Ukrainian military units, which are heavily composed of draftees, Azov’s soldiers are volunteers.

Skillt said the volunteer mentality has made Azov more effective than most regular army units, despite its equipment and weapons shortfalls, and reliance on civilian donations for funding.

“I think this is how it was in World War II in America,” Skillt said. “Ordinary people who would never have been in the military under normal circumstances are ready to die for their country. These guys would do anything for their brothers; you will never see them running away from a fight.”

The unit currently has about 1,000 soldiers and is training 50 new personnel every two weeks to achieve its desired force strength of 1,200, which is the benchmark required by the Ukrainian government for additional armored equipment delivery.

The unit’s rapid growth has spurred its ad hoc training program, which Skillt was tapped to organize due to his prior military experience and performance on the battlefield.

“We’re not some fancy military school like West Point,” Skillt said. “It’s all beta testing, basically.”

Despite its manpower goals, Azov remains selective about its recruits. Some are turned away for psychological reasons, and with the help of the SBU (Ukraine’s equivalent of the FBI) background checks are completed to weed out potential Russian spies.

One of the key challenges of creating soldiers from scratch in two weeks is educating them with the discipline and knowledge to operate according to the laws of war, as well as within the terms of the Feb. 12 cease-fire. In the opening months of the war, when Azov was not under formal government oversight, the group’s conduct in battle was self-policed according to a “warrior code.”

But a string of separatist executions of captured Azov soldiers has left many on the Ukrainian side with little faith in their chances of survival if taken prisoner. In one instance, Skillt described, separatists forced a captured Azov soldier to call his grandmother on his cell-phone so that she could listen to his execution.

“Now there is no surrender,” Skillt said. “If we are wounded we fight to the death.”

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 09:04 AM

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 09:17 AM

New Russian Army equipment:

PHOTO: Moscow Victory Day Parade Rehearsals at Alabino
«Tor-M2U»
«S-400»
«Yars»
BTR «Bumerang» pic.twitter.com/3phl5BEMEh

PHOTO: Moscow Victory Day Parade Rehearsals at Alabino
BMP «Kurganets-25»
BMP «Armata»
T-14 «Armata»
«Koalitsiya-SV» pic.twitter.com/FKHlybEcAU

PHOTO Moscow Victory Day Parade Rehearsals @ Alabino
ATGM «Kornet» on «Tigr»
«Tayfun-K»
«Tayfun-U»
BTR-MDM «Rakushka» pic.twitter.com/Lzu6LJkez3

Victory Day Parade Rehearsals:ATGM"Kornet"on"Tigr","Tayfun-K","Tayfun-U",BTR-MDM"Rakushka"@Missilito pic.twitter.com/IVkTHJHbzE

Russian State Communication Relay aircraft Tu-214SR RA-64515 on an interesting mission from Krasnoyarsk this morning pic.twitter.com/F3QH8orxMv

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 09:31 AM

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 09:34 AM

Under the bridge between Severodonetsk and Lisichansk found a large batch of explosives http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/21-april-under-the-bridge-between-severodonetsk-and-lisichansk … via @InfoResist
pic.twitter.com/wYoDyD1HRD

Another “altered state of reality” statements from the Russian mercenaries—what it means is they simply no longer “trust” anything the Russian mercenaries say/do --as well do not “trust” Russian commitments as neither have been complying on any single point of Minsk 2.

So "peacekeeping" is an inherent threat against Russia???

#Poroshenko's peacekeeping idea confirms #Kiev no longer guarantor of #Minsk accords - #DPR

Geeeeez…….Russian “altered state of reality” statements are getting stranger and stranger by the hour………
Authorities Claim Drugs Are Being Manufactured to Cause 'Color Revolutions' in Russia
http://www.interpretermag.com/russia-update-april-21-2015/#7992 … pic.twitter.com/4brN9RUlOg

Interesting……when the Russian FM tweets a false information tweet the Ukrainian FM is now just seconds behind in pointing out it is a false piece of information.
Tweets in close succession pic.twitter.com/pW4fSFCprl

Russia's Military Lacks Direction and is "intellectually poor" by Alexander Golts http://www.themoscowtimes.com/opinion/article/russias-military-lacks-direction/519391.html …

#Ukrainian Border Guards vehicle blown up near #Russian border in #Lugansk Region. Details at http://lugansk-news.com/ukrainian-border-guards-vehicle-blown-up-near-russian-border/ … pic.twitter.com/3jgxh2gOzH

During 6 hours on April 20 from 6 pm to midnight Russian-terroristic forces 17 times violated ceasefire - ATO press. https://www.facebook.com/ctrs.mou/posts/891037797608787 …

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 09:35 AM

Victory Day looms:Separatists’ Grads missing in east #Ukraine - OSCE http://belsat.eu/en/articles/victory-day-looms-separatists-grads-missing-eastern-ukraine-osce/ … #Donetsk #Luhansk #Donbas pic.twitter.com/DqcQqvoAB1

Members of the terrorist organization #DNR were detained in Kharkiv pic.twitter.com/JofpFTTpES http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/21-april-members-of-the-terrorist-organization-dnr-were-detained …

OSCE data: Russian-backed militants most to blame for ceasefire violations http://www.unian.info/war/1069544-osce-data-russian-backed-militants-most-to-blame-for-ceasefire-violatio
Guderian X. @Guderian_Xaba

Aidar battalion shows Grad strike damage in Luhansk region to OSCE monitors http://24today.net/open/384360 pic.twitter.com/ctzRlo9UuG

3 ex-Berkut officers were detained in Kharkiv on suspicion in shooting on Maidan pic.twitter.com/vznvrpieNC http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/21-april-in-kharkov-three-berkut-officers-detained-on-suspicion …

Tymchuk: In #Shyrokyne area terrorists transferred 4 tanks and 4 armored fighting vehicles (3x BMP-2 and 1x BTR-80).

Map. Situation in eastern #Ukraine, April 21, 12:00 EET pic.twitter.com/KlQvx41lIW

Russian forces escalates assault on #Shyrokyne over morning, now using tanks, trying to storm the Ukrainian front http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/21-april-russian-forces-escalates-their-assault-on-shyrokyne …

Here's a rare look at Russian aerial operations over the Baltic — via @TheAviationist http://read.bi/1D8YkoN pic.twitter.com/hJX41oVLU6

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 09:48 AM

This is the first time ever that this particular social media site has written a comment in this form:

Latitude 67N SIGINT @uascan
Very high air activity in baltic sea today

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 09:58 AM

Another in a series of recently released Russian info war studies--worth the read:

New @hcssnl study on #Russia's infowar
- Summary: http://www.hcss.nl/reports/beyond-the-cold-war-of-words/165/ …
- Full report: http://static.hcss.nl/files/uploads/2914.pdf … pic.twitter.com/6jsbVcamgh

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 09:59 AM

Frank assessment from Medvedev of damage to Russian economy resulting from sanctions. http://ru.reuters.com/article/topNews/idRUKBN0NC0VF20150421 … pic.twitter.com/VARyTms1Xf

Paul Goble @PaulGoble1
Putin Needs Both Great Victory and Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, Ikhlov Says http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2015/04/putin-needs-both-great-victory-and.html

Col. Andriy Lysenko: Ukrainian troops fought off pro-RU insurgents attempt of assault near Size village, #Luhansk region.

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
Hotspots: #Shyrokyne – #Mariupol sec; airport area & #Horlivka outskirts – #Donetsk sec; #Shchastya – #Luhansk

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
Pro-RU militants used 120mm mortars 10 times, fired from tanks 4 times. 4 cases of sniper fire: #Avdiivka, #Pisky, #Shchastya

223rd Flight Unit, Tu-154B-2 on http://Flightradar24.com http://fr24.com//60ed62d #flightradar24

US called on #Russia to stop transfer of heavy weapons into #Ukraine, massing troops along border
http://ukraine.usembassy.gov/statements/biden-poroshenko-04202015.html …
via @GeoffPyatt

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 10:06 AM

http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.de/2015/04/putin-needs-both-great-victory-and.html

Tuesday, April 21, 2015

Putin Needs Both Great Victory and Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, Ikhlov Says
Paul Goble

Staunton, April 21 – Vladimir Putin finds himself caught in a variety of paradoxes none more glaring than his simultaneous need to defend the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact by which the USSR became an ally of Nazi Germany and his need to celebrate the Great Victory over the Third Reich, according to Yevgeny Ikhlov.

On the on the one hand, the Moscow commentator says, Putin needs the Great Victory because it completes the shift from a focus on communism as the explanation for the Soviet Union’s win to one on Stalin and his totalitarian system as the source of that triumph (vestnikcivitas.ru/pbls/3741).

And on the other “and at the same time,” the Kremlin leader is prepared to defend with “all the authority of the Russian state” Stalin’s alliance with Hitler which is “delicately called ‘the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact’” because “that pact for the first time legalized zones of Soviet influence” beyond the borders of the USSR and based on “continuity” with the Russian Empire.

This is just one of the insights contained in Ikhlov’s article about the importance of mythologizing the past in a country like Putin’s Russia, one where “the weaker the institutions in the state are, the stronger must be the all-embracing mythology.” Indeed, his system is based on the idea that “the picture propaganda provides of the world is the only reality for the population.”

Up to a point, this approach has served Putin well. It has “rooted Putinism in Russian political history.” But the problems begin when one tries to make that political history consistent, something that is virtually impossible without blatant falsification because various events point in so many contradictory and incompatible directions.

And that in turn means, Ikhlov says, that “the more improvisations are introduced into this renewed cult, the stricter will be the struggle to ‘defend history from distortions and falsifications’ … There are many countries which have introduced punishments for denial of crimes against humanity … but there are only a few which [like Russia today] are criminalizing the unmasking of historic crimes.”

The approaching celebration of Victory Day, of Russia’s attempt to take credit for the defeat of Nazism, highlights this “real schizophrenia” in Moscow’s position: “One should not call oneself the main victor over Hitlerism while being proud of the alliance with this same Hitlerism” at the start of Hitler’s war to “seize Europe.”

There is a logic in each of the narratives, Ikhlov argues, but trying to bring them together into a single narrative is “impossible,” because “to be at one and the same time an anti-fascist, an anti-communist, and an anti-liberal in the contemporary understanding of the ideological spectrum cannot be done.”

The only way it can be done, he suggests, is with “one’s own fascism,” or as Putin would put it “’the Russian world.’”

But there is a deeper paradox and problem for Putin, Ikhlov says. It consists of the fact that Russian history consists of a series of “hermetically sealed periods,” each of which engages in the denial of its predecessor, as the late philosopher Aleksandr Akhizer pointed out a generation ago.

That makes stability very difficult as does “the struggle of two competing directions” in each, “each of which offers mutually exclusively approaches to the overcoming of internal crises.” Typically, the leaders of a country must make a choice; Putin has been trying so far to avoid doing so.

“Putinism’s difficulties began when it ceased to be simply ‘velvet Pinochetism,’ a regime of authoritarian modernization and began to convert itself into ‘an oprichnina,’ into market Stalinism,” Ikhlov says. That violated a chief requirement of myths: a certain consistency in their internal logic.

According to the Moscow commentator, “isolationism and anti-Westernism require support in a messianic legend. But Orthodox fundamentalism remains too much an exotic phenomenon.” Moreover, it is dangerous because it contains within itself “a very strong anti-state attitude.”

Moreover, “all the misfortune of Putinism” is that doctrines like “Moscow is the Third Rome” have the effect of “denying development and transforming life into an uninterrupted waiting for the end of the world.”

That leaves Putin and Putinism with few options, Ikhlov argues. Indeed, the only one really available is the implementation of a 160-year-old tradition that was “aborted by Bolshevism – the development of right-wing fascism.”

During that period, he says, Russia has moved “along a totalitarian arc: from radical-left form in the shape of Bolshevism with a gradual falling away from utopian pseudo-Marxist ideas to the side of right-wing totalitarianism which recognizes and cultivates obscurantism, chauvinism and petty private property.”

This evolution, Ikhlov continues, has included “periods of black hundreds-style post-war Stalinism, the anti-market ‘left fascism’ of stagnation … and up to the current dawn of the Russian conservative revolution, the first conquests of which have already appeared in Crimea and ‘Novorossiya.’”

“The evolution of totalitarianism from communism to fascist was broken off only three times – during the five years of the New Economic Policy, the decade of the thaw, and the ingloriously just concluded liberal-perestroika thirty year period.” It is now resuming with full force and with all its contradictions in play.
Tom Nichols @RadioFreeTom
The behavior of the #Putin regime is almost making me nostalgic for the Soviet Union as an adversary compared to this paranoid mafia family.

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 02:02 PM

Incredible drone footage from #Bezimenne 8kms from #Shyrokyne 55+ units
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKbqJ-xO6PQ …
pic.twitter.com/1q0CECiibB

The enemy preparing to use aviation? In #Horlivka RU fighters began to tag equipment for identification from air http://inforesist.org/kasyanov-boeviki-markiruyut-texniku-dlya-opoznavaniya-s-vozduxa-zhdut-podderzhki-aviaciej-rf/?_utl_t=tw …

Also in occupied Stakhanov UAV spotted white square marks on trucks noticeable from above https://www.facebook.com/groups/armia.sos/permalink/1650018931893373/ … pic.twitter.com/qfN8wWTR3M

If Russia wants to replace proxy criminal Zakharchenko, it is clear who pulls the strings in Donbas :-). pic.twitter.com/Y1Cu2qUEVO

Really really good article on Putin.
Mark Galeotti @MarkGaleotti
Kleptocrat or crusader? It’s time to figure out what #Putin wants
My first piece for @qz
http://qz.com/387514

New Russian Today headline from today:
"#Jewish defense force to protect #Mariupol for the #Kiev 'Nazi regime' against #Russia" unlikely @RT_com headline
https://twitter.com/lubaromanko/status/590277412182589440 …

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 03:14 PM

Russian militants attacked Ukrainian soldiers near Krasnogorivka http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/21-april-russian-militants-attacked-ukrainian-soldiers-near …

"#EU #energy plan puts #Kaliningrad at risk, #Moscow paper says."via|@EuromaidanPress|http://euromaidanpress.com/2015/04/20/eu-energy-plan-puts-kaliningrad-at-risk-moscow-paper-says/ … pic.twitter.com/uJ0zmD1OfB

Title on a hoodie "I'm Russian", #superlatergram with a pro-russian fighter on a front line south of… https://instagram.com/p/1vX1LYhmoh/

#ANALYSIS #MAP
A Russian army BM-21 #Grad column passed #Antratsyt towards #KrasnyiLuch today.pix v @Antratsitukrain pic.twitter.com/kyPUmSMy4C

Reports say, the column entered #Ukraine from #Russia via the occupied #Gukovo border crossing today, also passing #Sverdlovsk.

Sverdlovsk. The convoy of Grads of Russian hybrid army is identified. https://en.informnapalm.org/sverdlovsk-the-convoy-of-grads-of-russian-hybrid-army-is-identified/ … pic.twitter.com/NNvC3Vw2EN

Echo of War: terrorists' explosives found in #Lysychansk. Learn details: http://empr.media/news/echo-of-war-terrorists-explosives-found-in-lysychansk … pic.twitter.com/HcjLQBvGLx

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 04:48 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 05:02 PM

Somewhere along the line Russian mercenaries and the Russian FM Lavrov have truly been smoking something a little stronger:

#Zakharchenko proclaims goal to annex all of #Ukraine into the fake puppet "republic" of the #Kremlin
https://twitter.com/Liveuamap/stat

Zakharchenko: We are ready to take all of Ukraine as a part of the "DPR" pic.twitter.com/EjXUfJ6L3V http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/21-april-zakharchenko-we-are-ready-to-take-all-of-ukraine …

"American military instructors in Ukraine violate Minsk accords" - DNR's Basurin says all foreign troops should leave #Ukraine

AND what about all those Russian mercenaries carrying Russian passports and the Russian army contractors, vacationers and actual Russian regular army personnel which is suppose to be what the Minsk 2 agreement stated should happen--namely leaving the Ukraine..

#AskLavrov What was #Russia's 200th MRB Northern Fleet from Murmansk, M/U 08275, doing in #Debaltseve ? pic.twitter.com/BfPZiyskQj

'Russia has not yet complied with a single paragraph of #Minsk agreement' – Ukraine Foreign Ministry http://uatoday.tv/news/russia-has-not-yet-complied-with-a-single-minsk-agreement-ukraine-foreign-ministry-422701.html …

Zakharchenko really going for de-composition of Ukraine plan. Rhetoric shifting this way. http://tvzvezda.ru/news/vstrane_i_mire/content/201504211914-i3nz.htm …

Both Russia and her mercenaries DO NOT want the elections to take place under Ukrainian law as per Minsk 2--thus they are actually striving to eliminate Minsk 2--THEN they will fight and THEN another Minsk 3 with a new contact line which simply keeps expanding territory under their control--one massive game and the west does what again????--nothing really.

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 05:07 PM

Russian Army trucks, tanks, APCs and ARK-1 artillery locating radar at #Bezimenne, 8km east of #Shyrokyne 20 April https://youtu.be/SKbqJ-xO6PQ?t=3m36s …

Russian ARK-1 mobile H-band incoming artillery locating radar unit 1RL-239 at #Bezimenne 8km from #Shyrokyne 20 April pic.twitter.com/txqd2V8uaq

Shirokine after OSCE team departure, "separatists" laying mortar fire https://www.facebook.com/azov.batalion/posts/1040695325960589:0 … pic.twitter.com/WdajqZtyy2

Russian reporters tell BBC they knowingly broadcast fake report about a young girl's killing in #Ukraine. http://tinyurl.com/m7a7mnj

"Militants block delivery of #Ukrainian and international humanitarian assistance for #Donbas"
http://joinfo.com/world/1002052_Militants-block-delivery-of-Ukrainian-and.html …

#Dudaev's Battalion has asked to be included into #ZolotiVorota Batallion of Interior Ministry http://nv.ua/ukraine/politics/batalon-pogibshego-v-donbasse-isy-munaeva-prosit-avakova-legalizovat-ego-v-sostave-mvd-45029.html … pic.twitter.com/kNCHTgpS4n

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 05:11 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 05:21 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 05:23 PM

Militants open mortar fire at #Azov regiment positions as soon as @OSCE_SMM left #Shyrokyne. @Polk_Azov #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/BdChcUnS76

Again in Jan 2015 at Russian army training area/staging post Golovinka (Vodino) Rostov reg nr Ukr border https://twitter.com/DajeyPetros/status/552420495430545408 …

VIDEO #Ukraine Secret Service SBU found a weapons cache in #Dnipropetrovsk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u3MXle9Iv9k … pic.twitter.com/qiCZzutJAw

VIDEO #Ukraine Border Guards strengthen defensive perimeter around #Mariupol
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHXqi30hm4k … pic.twitter.com/LKLFDDh15L

Russian Minsk 2 violations from Ukrainian FM:
MFA of Ukraine ✔ @MFA_Ukraine
pic.twitter.com/y70HiXdmjC

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 05:34 PM

Russian troops and her mercenaries begin the evening shellings as usual will see the usual mix of heavy artillery and MRLSs all in violation of the Minsk 2 agreement--just an early sampling:

19:36 #Horlivka @LeeZernoganja: 'Paired volleys from Horlivka, UKR responsed a couple of times'
@Katz_741: Maybe 2B9 Vasilek

#Kirovsk
19:47 @thisnameerror: Shooting & rumble is at railway station
20:08 @AngelMorbit: at 8pm it rumbled in the center

19:36 #Izvaryne (invaded #Luhansk rgn border w/Russia) @100007182042214: RUS border patrol doesn't let cars pass since morning in both dir's

19:55 #Donetsk @relictDon: Single volleys in the northwest

20:07 #Horlivka, Kurganka @xy_gorlov4an: Rumble for about an hour in 6-7 coalmine direction.

New #Video source: #Russia's 200th MRB Northern Fleet, Murmansk M/U 08275 #Debaltseve #Ukraine
https://youtu.be/VP6xf_YgJBo?t=1m40s …

RU source saying there is fighting now at #Pisky w small arms.
#Donetsk residents report from many districts they hear shelling in that area

20:30 #Horlivka @LeeZernoganja: "Battle in the area between Horlivka and #Dzerzhynsk

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 05:41 PM

Serious development if an accurate report from the field:

[unconfirmed information]: Tochka-U from Russia arrived to #Sverdlovsk (#Luhansk rgn) via Izvaryne, source - http://informator.lg.ua/?p=86313

OUTLAW 09

04-21-2015, 05:52 PM

Another indicator of the coming Russian spring offensive as the mercenaries currently have no transportation mechanisms for pig iron and or coke via Mariupol and or Odessa.

The mercenary zone as currently occupied is not a viable state in any form nor does it have an viable industrial base and solid transportation infrastructure --all of the existing lines of communication have been basically heavily damaged by them and the Russian artillery.

"DNR" is going to export pig iron and coke abroad pic.twitter.com/Yr8DnIhywZ http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/21-april-dnr-is-going-to-export-pig-iron-and-coke-abroad …

Dishonesty

04-21-2015, 06:33 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 05:17 AM

There are 2 parks of military equipm. in the Kuibyshev and Kiyvsky distr. of #Donetsk, each w 30-35 units of armored vehicles

@Guderian_Xaba In #Donetsk RU actively regroup their forces and equipm. concentrating the bulk of them in the Kuibyshev and Petrovsky distr
Train Station in Russian-occupied Abkhazia since "liberation" pic.twitter.com/aGhe52ylzg

'Russia has not yet complied with a single paragraph of #Minsk agreement' – Ukraine Foreign Ministry http://uatoday.tv/news/russia-has-not-yet-complied-with-a-single-minsk-agreement-ukraine-foreign-ministry-422701.html …

Another oddly "lost" Russian ship in the Gulf of Aden pic.twitter.com/9BH9DzFK4X

#OSCE reports on resumption of heavy fighting in #Donetsk airport and in #Shyrokyne http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/21-april-osce-reports-on-resumption-of-heavy-fighting-in …

mirhond

04-22-2015, 09:35 AM

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 10:49 AM

English-speaking mercenary in "Azov" bat.

watch from 14:20
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsfGH8JXprE#t=884

claimed to be British Leon Swampy

https://thedailyledeblog.wordpress.com/2015/01/26/english-speaking-mercenary-in-mariupol-idd-as-brit-leon-swampy-from-london-england/

comrade mirhond--seems you are not well informed about Azov BN which is a BN under the Ukrainian National Guard pushing towards 1200 men that gets them tanks and armored vehicles.

NOW if you are fully aware of the Minsk 2 actual agreement and all it's sub points IT states that all foreign troops and Russian troops must be pulled back from the line of contact.

NOTE: ABSOLUTLEY no Russian soldier and or Russian mercenary has been verified by OSCE as being pulled off the contact line!!!!

AND in direct violation of Minsk 2.

NOW again if you knew something about Azov there were AND it has been verified TWO only TWO English speakers in the BN--BOTH US Ukrainians fighting for Ukraine.

BOTH were pulled back and are being used as combat trainers in Kyiv AND verified by OSCE.

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 10:56 AM

IMAGES #Russia(n) soldiers who are NOT IN #Ukraine (Acc to #Putin) becoming DNR-Whatever "Miners" #Donetsk #Luhansk pic.twitter.com/DZgG1j2FLx

Russian army T-72B3 can cross country at 35km/h = Less than 2hrs to push past #Shyrokyne North then West of #Mariupol pic.twitter.com/UIXj7Ic3jV

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
Map. Situation in eastern #Ukraine, April 22, 12:00 EET pic.twitter.com/GAp87uKEhg

Epic video of Russian "volunteers" on "vacation" cleaning #Antratsyt controlled by #LPR from local Cossack "militia"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QA31FrHejy0 …

More Russian propaganda trying to show US “Blackwater” types fighting in the Ukraine. This is on top of the Russian propaganda "claiming US contractors had raped Ukrainian girls".

Dear @AcademiElite,
could you please comment on this claim by the "DNR Defense Minister".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LF-7BPaaZoY … pic.twitter.com/JA5Hu4vOaU

Just across the water from #Mariupol lies #Ейск/#Yeysk staging post for a Russian invasion force (via @BuTaJIu4eK) pic.twitter.com/oUm6boErWK

#Shyrokyno - Ukr positions in the morning were under small arms, RPG, sniper fire. Donbass batt today replaced Azov fighters there.

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 10:57 AM

СММ ОБСЄ в Україні @OSCE_SMM
Summary Table of Ceasefire Violations, 21 April 2015: https://www.osce.org/ukraine-smm/152471?download=true … pic.twitter.com/pDH6q1el8h

#Ukraine Military shocked at #Russia(n) General Lentsov lying re shelling #Shyrokyne http://news.liga.net/news/politics/5613906-shtab_ato_ulichil_vo_lzhi_rossiyskogo_generala_len tsova.htm … pic.twitter.com/PhOepnjG1f

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
SBU detained 3 pro-RU insurgents: a turncoat policeman, 1 “DPR” and 1 “LPR” insurgents who gathered intelligence on UA troops

MLRS Grad echelon on the way to Ukraine http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/22-april-mlrs-grad-echelon-on-the-way-to-ukraine … #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/9FPljUexQD via @Katz_741

Heavy Flamethrower System Buratino Tos-1 http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/22-april-heavy-flamethrower-system-buratino-tos1 … #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/7bp9TG6erU via @Katz_741

VIDEO #Putin idiots blew up a chimmney tower in #Makiivka #Donetsk for the fun of it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=954CGo_MD9w … #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/rpE49lIzxI

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 10:59 AM

Research ship Aranda had to give way to a #Russian submarine, first on #Latvia territory & then east of Gotland (SE)

Skipper of RV #Aranda: #Russian ships behaved aggressively, prevented completion of mission on #Baltic sea. In SWE. http://hbl.fi/nyheter/2015-04-22/752499/ryskt-fartyg-korde-bort-aranda …

As we said before, every farm and factory shed in Russian-occupied Donbas could conceal Russian Army equipment... https://twitter.com/GirkinGirkin/status/590811871546056704 …

VIDEO #Putin created Novo-crap whatever "MILITIA" early morning exercises https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L42VQItfOYk … #Donetsk #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/ceDU9Sy3

@NSDC_ua Russian Mi-8's carrying elite spetsnaz have been trespassing Ukraine's border on/off for 12 months. First training, now operations.

Renewed fighting in eastern #Ukraine, fragile truce collapses as militants attack #Shyrokyne http://uatoday.tv/politics/renewed-fighting-in-eastern-ukraine-422866.html … pic.twitter.com/pNpY8oNiKW

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 11:07 AM

First Russian annexed Crimea under the guise of "protecting ethnic Russians" who were being threatened by "Nazi's" and a "Nazi junta" which was supported by the US, AND then the same argument for eastern Ukraine.

THEN this month Russia holds a large Russian/European neo Nazi/radical right wing nationalist conference in St. Petersburg AND THEN this statement from the Russian Cultural Minister:

Seems Russia cannot figure out what it really is ideologically speaking--left, right, or "fascist". NOW it supports Hitler!!

Medinsky: Molotov-Ribbentrop is far from “moral.” But in terms of protecting govt interests, it was an outstanding success.

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 11:26 AM

Last time I checked the Ukraine was a sovereign nation which can do as it wants to do regardless of what Russians assume they think Ukrainians "should be doing".

NOTICE ABSOLUTELY no mention of Russian mercenaries, Russian contract, vacationing or regular troops inside the Ukraine nor the countless rail shipments of weapons, fuel and munitions ALONG with Russian troops into the Ukraine.

Seems Lavrov "simply forgot that small problem"--but wait there are no Russians in the Ukraine they are all miners and truck drivers.

http://tass.ru/en/russia/790950?utm_...urce=ITAR-TASS

TASS
Russia
April 22, 12:40 UTC+3

"We proceed from the understanding that Ukraine is our near neighbor and its people are fraternal," Russian Foreign Minister said

MOSCOW, April 22. /TASS/. Ukraine must remain united, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in a live interview telecast by three radio stations on Wednesday.

"We proceed from the understanding that Ukraine is our near neighbor and its people are fraternal," Lavrov said. "We would like to see people on the other side of the border to whom we have a very friendly attitude live a good life. For that Ukraine must stay united."

"In order to keep Ukraine stable and friendly everybody should by all means avoid tearing it apart", Lavrov noted.

"For this the stubborn intention to preserve unitarianism and to push ahead with ukrainization must be dropped," he said.

"It is in our interests to not tear Ukraine apart, but to make it neutral in military-political terms," Lavrov said. "Its split will mean only one thing: NATO will go ahead with attempts to make Ukraine anti-Russian. We would like to see Ukraine united, but to stay united the commitment to decentralization must be honoured.".

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 11:44 AM

Looks like the EU has completely eliminated a massive economic weapon which is part and parcel of current Russian non linear warfare directed against the Ukraine and the EU.

Either Gazprom accepts the punishment being decided by the EU or it pays an estimated fine of 89B Euros.

The economic weapon is just a piece of the Russian UW strategy.

Margrethe Vestager ✔ @vestager
Statement of Objection against Gazprom activities in 8 countries. Our preliminary view: Gazprom partitioned market and charged unfair prices

BREAKING: European Union opens antitrust case against Gazprom amid worsening EU-Russia relations http://apne.ws/1Gif1og

Took all of about four hours for Gazprom to prove just how it is integrated into the Russian non linear warfare and toss overboard the mantra they are an independent public gas company doing their pricing independently based on market forces.

Notice the not so subtle threat of using Moscow.

In it's just-issued denial to @EU_Commission antitrust charges, #Gazprom seems to want to pull Kremlin into case
pic.twitter.com/jOsGObUZ2X

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 11:46 AM

The US Army plans to transfer 24 attack helicopters from Germany to Alaska over the next two years as part of a larger cost-saving aviation plan.

http://www.defensenews.com/story/defense/land/army-aviation/2015/04/19/us-apaches-to-leave-europe/25882969/

Dishonesty--is this a good and or bad move at this current time in Europe as they are the only available anti tank weapon system next to A-10s that carry a serious threat to armor since that is what they were developed for?

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 12:06 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 12:07 PM

Focus is on #Mariupol. People forget strategic value to Russians of seizing Berdyansk seaport http://en.cfts.org.ua/articles/short_sea_shipping_how_raw_materials_are_delivered _to_iron_and_steel_works_in_mariupol/1219 … pic.twitter.com/0dz8WHNvBe

#ATO press center denies statement of RU Gen. Lentsov on 410 mortar shells fired by Ukrainians at Shyrokine on Apr18 https://www.facebook.com/ato.news/posts/985260138151459 …

Seems now the Ukrainians are slowly catching up with their version of informational warfare:
Russia's http://RT.com Falls for Ukrainian Hoax on Murder Victims' Profiles
http://www.interpretermag.com/russia-update-april-22-2015/#8002 … pic.twitter.com/0g9OuAiTZ1

#BBC on "How #Russian TV misleads viewers about #Ukraine"
http://www.bbc.co.uk/monitoring/how-russian-tv-misleads-viewers-about-ukraine … pic.twitter.com/vRLwQ97g0T

English sub-titles added to our #video report about soldier Volodymyr, 22 years-old 'cyborg' of #Donetsk airport. https://youtu.be/2Ea9uwhuSzc

Russian military on the border of Ukraine in Belgorod region http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/22-april-russian-military-on-the-border-of-ukraine-in-belgorod … #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/sur0mGhQwr via @BuTaJIu4eK

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 12:09 PM

Ukraine Reports 20 Attacks Last Night. http://www.interpretermag.com/ukraine-live-day-429-multiple-attacks-on-ukrainian-positions-despite-minsk-agreement-to-withdrawals/#8003

No one should think Russian pressure on Ukraine is over, nor that Russian lying has ended.
via @WSJ
http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2015/04/21/from-putin-a-new-tune-on-ukraine/ …

Reports of shooting in #Lysychansk http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/22-april-reports-of-shooting-in-lysychansk- …

This brainwashed American mercenary fighting w/ #Russia's DNR in East #Ukraine regurgitates a well-rehearsed script:
https://youtu.be/y64o-KYGvtQ

Rule one of Russian propaganda—if we say you did it we “really mean we did it”
Today, Basurin makes big media offensive to falsely blame Ukrainian forces for attacking DPR militia with mortars/howitzers in #Shyrokyne.

THEN he really gets into the propaganda:
VIDEO #Putin DNR-Whatever BS-70 US Academi Mercs in #Donbas" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LF-7BPaaZoY … & NO 1000s #Russia(ns) #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/1egMk5TqsN

The Russian mercenaries and yes even Russian media have been restating this "fake story" since last May 2014.

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 12:15 PM

Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov is on his third "press conference rant" in under one week--maybe he is getting paid by the press release for his informational warfare efforts--very definitely on a "roll" and cannot seem to stop.

Lavrov: The only threat to Russia is the US missile defence—

NOTE: if this is the case then Russia has got to be one of the safest places from a missile attack in the world.

Lavrov: Ukraine should abandon unitarity position and Ukrainization
http://www.unian.info/politics/10702

#Lavrov: "The union of #Russia & #Germany is needed not to share land, but to shake up the #EU & make it stand for its interests

Lavrov: The US needed the Ukrainian crisis to disrupt Russia's rapprochement with Germany

Lavrov claims the US has demanded that Soviet memorials be removed in "one European capital"

NOTE: typical for Russian disinformation--notice he slides the accusation out but does not "state country or capital"

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 12:24 PM

http://maidantranslations.com/2015/04/22/information-resistance-regarding-the-situation-in-odesa-and-its-region-freesavchenko/

Information Resistance: Regarding the situation in Odesa and its region.

Posted on April 22, 2015 by tilamuse

Dmitry Tymchuk, Head of the Center for Military and Political Research, Coordinator of the Information Resistance group, Member of Parliament (People’s Front)
04.20.2015
Translated and edited by Voices of Ukraine

Due to a developed monitoring system of the terrorist/separatist threat in the South and East of Ukraine, the IR group (project “Traffic Light”) in Odesa, alongside with [the IR] group in Kharkiv, have identified a “zone of special attention” (threat level – not less than 7 points on a 10-point scale). In this regard, the IR group coordinators made a trip to Odesa region to study the situation last week.

We observe the following trends:

In recent weeks, the SBU (including specialists that arrived “as reinforcement” from Kyiv), in cooperation with local law enforcement have developed and conducted a series of successful operations to identify and neutralize terrorist groups in the city. As a result, the level of terrorist threat in Odesa has noticeably decreased.

At the same time, it is necessary to take into account that by the “control” dates (May 2 and 9), Russian intelligence services and pro-Russian forces in the region will predictably exert considerable efforts to destabilize the situation by:

– Attempts to commit acts of terrorism and sabotage;

– Organizing meetings and rallies by ardent pro-Russian forces, as well as actions by separatist “national minorities” inspired by the intelligence services of Russia;

– Attempts of provocations during peaceful mass actions on May 2 and 9.

In this regard, we ask the local authorities to declare the 2nd of May (on the anniversary of the tragic events in Odesa) a day of mourning in the city and the region and to cancel all public events on this day (similar appeal has already been sent to the head of the Odesa Regional State Administration on behalf of the IR group coordinator, D.Tymchuk). According to our data, intelligence and law enforcement agencies will take enhanced measures to ensure the safety of public events on the May 9th – Victory Day.

To supplement these data, the IR group plans to intensify the monitoring of social networks and local media for attempts to organize illegal or provocative actions in Odesa and the region, with prompt relay of relevant information to Ukrainian intelligence services.

2. The probability infiltration of region by sabotage and reconnaissance groups from the territory of Transnistria remains high. At present, the “contingent” that can be used to form the sabotage and reconnaissance groups on the territory of Transnistria (including such staff groups of the Russian GRU) amounts, according to our estimates, to at least 1,000 people.

At the same time, measures to neutralize this threat are currently being actively carried out by the Security Service of Ukraine, the law enforcement agencies, the State Border Service and the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
3.Odesa region has found itself at the forefront of the “information war.”

In particular, the ineffective use of radio frequencies and practically unlimited broadcasting by foreign stations have been observed in the region (from the territory of Transnistria, Moldova and Romania). As for the latter, the radio and television information product received in the region contradicts Ukrainian legislation in the majority of cases. For example, “RTR-Moldova” TV channel includes in its broadcast package [Russian] “RTR-Planeta” channel that is banned in Ukraine. The same situation applies to the “PRIME” channel. Russian TV channels banned in Ukraine (“First Channel. World Network”, “NTV World”, “Russia-24″, “RTR-Planeta”) are being broadcast in Odesa region from the territory of Transnistria.

The situation is aggravated by the fact that, according to preliminary estimates, only 70% of Odesa region receives “Ukrainian” digital signal. In some border areas, residents are unable to receive a Ukrainian TV product with a digital signal and instead watch only a foreign informational product. In particular, this situation is currently present in:

– Reniyskyi district of Odesa region (practically in its entirety).

– Kodymskyi district (in part).

– Tarutinskyi district (in part).

– Velykomykhaylivskyi district (in part).

– Frunze district (in part).

– Bolgradskyi district (in part).

According to the IR group, thanks to the efficient use of the capacities of Ukrainian concern RRT, currently it is possible not only to cover 100% of the Odesa region with a “Ukrainian” digital signal, but also to provide broadcasting of Ukrainian TV channels to the border areas of Transnistria, Moldova, and Romania without engaging budgetary resources. We will submit relevant proposals to the Ministry of Information Politics of Ukraine.

In Odesa, the “information” problem is less pressing. The majority of the local media maintain a pro-Ukrainian orientation, provide objective coverage of events and help normalize the situation in the city and the region. The exception to this rule is a pro-Russian site “Timer” that continues to applaud the activities of a little leader of the anti-Ukrainian party “Motherland,” I. Markov, who escaped to Moscow. Following the format of pro-Russian newspaper “Vesti,” not only does the anti-Ukrainian resource “Timer” directly violate Ukrainian legislation, but it also present a serious threat to the interests of the informational security of Ukraine at the regional level.

4. The bulk of the population in the city and Odesa region reject radical actions by political forces and social movements, regardless of their ideological platform. Therefore, we appeal to pro-Ukrainian forces with a request not to demonstrate their radical sentiments and actions in such a difficult period, especially on May 2nd and 9th.

Odesa urgently needs confidence in peace and stability. Only by demonstrating the ability to provide for them will you be able to earn the full trust of ordinary citizens.

5. To strengthen cooperation with local authorities, law enforcement officers and the media in Odesa and the region, the IR group presented our regional coordinator during a briefing in Odesa (coordinator “IR-South”). This is our colleague and collaborator, a military journalist, editor-in-chief of an Odessa TV channel “Media-inform” Serhiy Bratchuk. He will be responsible for our division in the region, as well as the previously registered southern division of the IR group with headquarters in Mykolayiv.

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 12:25 PM

ATO HQ finally works it out: Russian Col-Gen Lentsov (JCCC) is telling lies about #Shyrokyne! http://www.ukrinform.ua/ukr/news/u_shtabi_ato_z_podivom_diznalisya_shcho_rosiyskiy_ general_zbrehav_2045723 … pic.twitter.com/OMMpzzi5bA

IMAGE #Putin terrorist, war criminal "Motorola" squad now in #Shyrokyne near #Mariupol #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/ktk1mOiKdj

NOTE: He is actively being sought by AI for possible execution of Ukrainian POWs to which he actually admitted via cell that he had killed 15.

10 Russian ships to take part in live fire 'destruction of enemy land and air targets' drill in Black Sea. #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/VCz1MJDNEO

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 12:39 PM

This is a really important point that many in the West tend to overlook and or forget:

Ukraine entered the war almost without an army, and was forced to create it from the scratch. https://youtu.be/etM7VxxCRZk

And in fact it is probably next to the Russian Army now the only combat experienced European military and has to a degree made Russia pay a heavy price in manpower and equipment loses.

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 12:54 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 02:17 PM

#News
#CP29, #Shchastya and #Troitske were attacked by Russian invasion forces in #Luhansk oblast so far today

GOTCHA!
#Analysis #Map
Rus army transports T-72 from Kamensk-Shakhtinsky to the Ukr border.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxcVWOn276Y … pic.twitter.com/4q75h3oB3o

More evidence #Russian troops and heavy weapons inside Ukraine, which according to RUS FM Lavrov are there to "unify" Ukr

Lavrov: "Russia does not want Ukraine split into pieces." Bit rich, considering they annexed part of it last year. http://www.gazeta.ru/social/news/2015/04/22/n_7131513.shtml …

Come back alive". Short, but very clear video about the challenges of the #Ukrainian army https://youtu.be/etM7VxxCRZk pic.twitter.com/FX4KWBBfaF

Interesting article in to that Russia is not in compliance with the INF.
worth reading: "Will We Let Iran, Like Russia, Violate Its Nuclear Pact" http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/04/iran-deal-dangerous-withdraw-russia-nuclear-pact-116872.html#ixzz3Y2oPs2UZ …

Looks like we need a massive troll hunt later - the Kremlin doesn't like us pointing at Yeysk and concentration of Russian forces there.

Missile crashes inside Russia and Russia “claims it does not know what kind”?????Folks from #Suomi, you'd better watch out for the "unidentified" missiles tht RU authorities say "collapse" some 400 km from Finnish border.

And to #Russia: authorities can't yet identify what kind of missile collapsed(!) in a village near Plesetsk,N-West RU
http://www.vedomosti.ru/newsline/top/technology/news/2015/04/22/v-plesetske-ne-mogut-opredelit-prinadlezhnost-upavshei-raketi …

St. Petersburg initiates #referendum on secession from #Russia, perhaps 'Ukrainian Tourists' could help with it.http://joinfo.com/world/1002050_Theater-of-the-Absurd-St-Petersburg-initiates.html …

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 02:26 PM

#Israeli & #US military instructors train #Ukrainian special forces
http://24today.net/open/386220 pic.twitter.com/jrVNeVpAuW

Lithuanian president on #Gazprom antitrust case: "The era of Kremlin backed political and economic blackmail draws to a close."

Ah…the true intent of Russia in the Artic is now coming into focus clearly…..

"#Russian Government to Manage All Access to #Oil on #Arctic Shelf" - #Kremlinhttp://sputniknews.com/russia/20150422/1021216224.html …
via @SputnikInt

According to this report the best way to counter the #Russian misinfo is with online/social media http://www.hcss.nl/reports/beyond

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 05:28 PM

Working from the road tonight and can only post short comments on the running social media as my work computer is not geared for cut and paste due to security reasons.

The Russian mercenaries and the supporting Russian troops have actually over the last 18 hours attacked Ukrainian positions for a total of 38 times a record for the last few weeks.

Russian tanks being carried by long haulers seen shortly before the Ukrainian border--were carrying T-90s the main Russian Army MBT. Eight tanks in the convoy.

Back online

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 05:55 PM

20:08 #Donetsk @felixsteal: "Ural trucks [w/ammo] went towards Putilovka, that means it starts soon"

20:15 #Shakhtarsk @olegdon3: 4 RUS BMP towards #Donetsk.

RUS Navy Tu-154m was orbiting over Azov Sea due S of #Mariupol and north of Dolzanskaya.

#Russian naval aviation out for a spin near #Mariupol: pic.twitter.com/geSXf76KSN
Russian troops and her mercenaries have used extensively themobaric roskets against Ukrainian positions since August 2014

Ukrainian positions shelled with THERMOBARIC rocket called "Cornet"
Russia brutally violates #ceasefire pic.twitter.com/wrINNN4keo

#Russia moves more T-72B3 tanks towards #Ukraine during #ceasefire http://empr.media/video/conflict-zone/russia-moves-more-t-72b3-tanks-towards-ukraine-during-ceasefire … pic.twitter.com/ZCApL3JPPS

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 06:13 PM

So from the tone of this Russian FM statement is Russian "declaring war" on the EU??

THEN this response from the Russian Government who is actually the in the shadows owner of Gazprom via a Russian oligarch.

#Lavrov Calls #EU Charges Against #Russia's Gazprom 'Unacceptable' http://tmt-go.ru/519561 - @MoscowTimes

Gazprom has all but admitted to being the foreign policy arm of the Kremlin
https://foreignpolicy.com/2015/04/22/eu-to-gazprom-play-by-the-rules-vestager-competition-antitrust/ … pic.twitter.com/t103Ee9U8j

NOTE--Gazprom in their response stated they were state owned and under control of the Government--virtually admitted they were in violation of EU anti-trust laws--not a good way to start talks with the EU.

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 06:55 PM

The ceasefire from #Shyrokyne can be heard in #Mariupol. Russians firing w mortars and tanks.

Lentsov presented letters from DPR/LPR militias to #OSCE_SMM stating intention to parade heavy weapons on 9 May http://www.unian.info/war/1070386-osce-smm-heavy-weapon-parade-on-may-9-in-donbas-will-violate-minsk-accords.html …
OSCE-SMM has told him in return that it is a direct violation of the Minsk 2 agreement.

So it begs the question --why is an obviously non neutral Russian General doing in the JCCC?

#Lavrov demands #Poroshenko abandon "compulsory preservation of a unitary Ukraine" and "keep Ukraine neutral" http://www.unian.info/politics/1070203-lavrov-ukraine-should-abandon-unitarity-position-and-ukrainization.html …

IHS4Defense Security @IHS4DefRiskSec
*New video* Russian Land Forces modernisation - Why is 2015 such an important year? http://bit.ly/1GiHlXy pic.twitter.com/6EWymlyVWX

14.00hrs Russian forces/militia started shelling Ukrainian "Donbass" btn positions at #Shyrokyne (via @Mariupol_TV) http://www.mariupol.tv/news/war/mariupol/3539/boeviki_obstrelyali_pozicii_sil_ato_pod_mariupolem .html …

Russian aviation near Ukraine-Russia borderpic.twitter.com/eQ7MnGNHzz http://russia.liveuamap.com/en/2015/22-april-russian-aviation-near-ukrainerussia-border … https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psvIg46GQww …

MFA of Ukraine ✔ @MFA_Ukraine
#UkraineNewsAlert Russia Violates #MinskAgreements pic.twitter.com/Ncnr2TJ6No

Ukrainian Army black humor about Russian ATMs--
What's your view on anti-tank weapons avoidance? Colonel X: "Send the dumbest unit you've got first, then fire at the flash... Keep moving.

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 07:18 PM

NATO claims that Russian bombers carry "Nuke-able" missileshttp://liveuamap.com/en/2015/22-april-nato-claims-that-russian-bombers-carry-nukeable … pic.twitter.com/QY9frXyxf

Military echelon in Shakhty of Rostov region http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/22-april-military-echelon-in-shakhty-of-rostov-region … pic.twitter.com/j9rhnxbyam via @BuTaJIu4eK

Turchynov: Russian leaders attempting to derail peace process
http://www.unian.info/war/1070445-turchynov-russian-leaders-attempting-to-derail-peace-process.html … pic.twitter.com/gG5knks0gh

Some on the Russian social media were carrying this comment today--they seem to be a "tad high" is the only explanation--
#Russia: #Mariupol is occupied by #Ukraine & must be liberated by Russia.

NOTE Mariupol is in the Ukraine so why would it not be "occuppied by Ukrainians"??

Russian air-borne troops pushed to Rostov region http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/22-april-russian-airborne-troops-pushed-to-rostov-region … pic.twitter.com/ybRz51QzM4 via @obozrevatel_ua
Troubling development: Russian army recon units being airlifted to the Ukrainian border (likely destination: Luhansk) pic.twitter.com/a4tfWBPGWR

Russian FSB's AN-148 circling right now over Belgorodhttp://liveuamap.com/en/2015/22-april-russian-fsb--border-guards-an148--registration-ra61707 … via @AlexandruC4 pic.twitter.com/KbYp9tIi3c

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 10:11 PM

For all returning home combat troops regardless of country.

Song Return Alive in Ukrainian was recorded in December. After the battle of #Debaltseve it really touches my heart.

https://youtu.be/t4ZKm89RJIs

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 10:14 PM

#BREAKINGNEWS
Russian forces started another tank assault on #Shyrokyne after sunset.
2 Ukrainian troops WIA
Car alarms in E #Mariupol react

RU terrorists firing, during the work of OSCE, near Chermalykhttp://sprotyv.info/ru/news/terroristy-obstrelivayut-svoi-zhe-pozicii-vo-vremya-raboty-obse-video?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter&_utl_t=tw …

US State Dept: Russia is building up its forces along border with Ukraine, giving Russia its largest presence on the border since Oct 2014

#Ukraine invasion “veterans” are bigger problem for #Russia than ones from its prior two wars: http://euromaidanpress.com/2015/04/22/ukraine-invasion-veterans-are-bigger-problem-for-russia-than-ones-from-prior-two-wars/ … pic.twitter.com/ELQqD8Z0

Lol!
After #they were caught, killing each other, Russian invaders come up with "Right Sector vs. Ukr army" tale. pic.twitter.com/6vBLDX5IQo

Peaceful" and "purely defensive" #Russia trains for the Victory day parade
with brand new T-14 tanks and T-15 apc... pic.twitter.com/8o4y180w7x

#Footage said to be filmed right at the Russian-Ukrainian border...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=frb61WT-r2Y …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psvIg46GQww … pic.twitter.com/h1iC9ZPvnT

Violating #Minsk agreement, Russian military has deployed more air defenses in eastern #Ukraine, including near front lines, State Dept says

AtlanticCouncil ✔ @AtlanticCouncil
As the discussion begins, you can read the first #ACStrategy series paper here: http://buff.ly/1GjhjAG pic.twitter.com/zr7FhjOEDk

The great country that used to be called the #USSR must be brought back"
#Russia's #DNR leader Zakharchenko
#Ukraine pic.twitter.com/T7luqWwKnD

U.S. says Russia adds air defense systems inside Ukrainehttp://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN0ND2J920150422 …

OUTLAW 09

04-22-2015, 10:15 PM

VIDEO #Russia(n) T-50 Stealth fighter undergoing testing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxiohWP4ZF0 … Look familiar YF23 ?

pic.twitter.com/WjTaDhs7Q5

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 05:29 AM

Reports about a truck with (Russian) militants hitting mine in #Debaltseve. But blue buildings are not there! #fake pic.twitter.com/1adEIXJFty

VIDEO Russias Hybrid Army in Ukraine inventing new Mad Max remote controlled armored vehicle.https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=13&v=yFv_fvCJWCE … pic.twitter.com/ieokiE5LdX

'As a Professor, This is What I Believe': Dugin's Call for Armed Uprising, Killing Ukrainians
http://www.interpretermag.com/russia-update-april-22-2015/#8019 … pic.twitter.com/5LhWP832ND

Russia rhetoric confuses Texas Nazis who want to learn from prof who says kill Ukrainians bc they're Nazis. https://twitter.com/catfitz/status/591070623847317506 … @catfitz

Is #Putin's #Russia Fascist?http://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/new-atlanticist/is-putin-s-russia-fascist#.VTg79zqC8dQ.twitter … pic.twitter.com/rl8hyHSf9P

#BBC - #Ukraine truce: #US accuses #Russia of violating dealhttp://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-32425602 …
(image is a toy) pic.twitter.com/uW2cV4urhc

#BreakingNews
A heavy Russian small arms and 120 mm mortar attack on #Pisky injured 4 Ukrainian troops from the 93rd Brigade tonight

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 09:14 AM

Russian troops and her mercenaries started their shelling routine far earlier today and have been moving up heavy artillery, MRLS and armored vehicles to the contact line under the cover of darkness.

From all appearances this is the repeat of Oct 2014 buildup just before the November offensive started which led to Minsk 2.

The so called Russian miners and truck driver mercenary army now has far move heavy weapons, tanks and MRLs together with a strong AD than right now five NATO armies combined and they are sitting within reach of Poland and Moldavia and Georgia as well.

#Donetsk
08:12 @666_mancer: Heavy cannon volleys from Putilovska grove, explosions in #Avdeevka direction. (S)MG bursts

#Donetsk Kalinovka @Serzzze
08:28 Heavy outgoing artillery of tanks
08:29 "Very heavy outgoing as in days gone by

#Donetsk
08:13 @donetsk_ukrop: Rumble in the airport direction
08:18 @UrriKara4en confirm
08:21 Kalinovka @Serzzze Cannonade

08:08 @DedDonetskiy: "Terr's concentrate armoured vehicles in #Donetsk", "my collegues heard track machines in the night

In #Novoazovsk area continues the buildup of terrorist forces and armorhttp://www.mariupol.tv/news/war/mariupol/3540/v_novoazovske_pod_mariupolem_sosredotocheno_5_tank ov_boevikov.html …

Cmdr Azov Regiment: From a military perspective, #Shyrokyne is controlled by Ukraine (via @Mariupol_TV 23 April) http://www.mariupol.tv/news/war/mariupol/3542/s_voennoj_tochki_zreniya_shirokino_kontroliruetsya _ukrainoj_andrej_bileckij.html …

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 09:16 AM

Top Story: Ukraine crisis could blow up
http://uatoday.tv/politics/ukraine-crisis-could-blow-up-423102.html … pic.twitter.com/FbJI5JLrBN

Ukrainian soldiers from the Aidar battalion spending their first day learning to fly drones. pic.twitter.com/CyINoGfDar

OTHODOX DEACON Paul Shulzhenko from #Putin DNR "MILITIA"walks on a US Flag & as A PRIEST HE IS PROUD OF IT #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/OvVgC08mrS

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
Map. Situation in eastern #Ukraine, April 23, 12:00 EET pic.twitter.com/Ijbj4yEfH5

#Pisky was shelled from the area of "Volvo Center" w mortars, 2 soldiers from 93rd brigade woundedhttp://www.donetskie.com/news/incident/boeviki-iz-donetska-obstrelivayut-peski-raneny-dvoe-boytsov-vsu/50835/ …

#Ukraine.In captivity of militants remains 397 Ukrainians -SBU.#Ukraina.В плену боевиков остается 397 украинцев -СБУ pic.twitter.com/VSWLk2cmZo

This alone is a really major violation of the Minsk agreement--Russia was to exchange ALL POWs to include Ukrainian civilians WHICH they have refused to do--rumint states some have been moved to Russia.

US State Department and US Ambassador to Ukraine @GeoffPyatt are warning us of increasing risk from Russian build-up: pic.twitter.com/zOfMLpmKCy

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 09:30 AM

Mercenary shellings are intensifying, and Russian troops in convoys now on the edge of the Ukrainian border moving towards if not already in the Ukraine.

AND Russia keeps blocking the OSCE from monitoring all Russian border check points--wonder why????

Huge #Russian convoy on the move near Ukrainian border, posted yesterday:https://archive.is/Zf6kJ pic.twitter.com/ThB67H1DG0

#Russian military convoy currently on the move on A-260. To #Ukrainehttps://archive.is/iPtpK (photo taken 20 min ago) pic.twitter.com/8axCxkPl1n

#Donetsk #donbasreports
09:15 Kalininsky @DoneckiiPatriot: Sounds of a heavy cannon work from Kalinin coalmine direction

#Donetsk #donbasreports
09:10 @666_mancer: "Battle in #Spartak area, artillery involved"

#Donetsk #donbasreports
09:09 Gvardeyka @Serzzze: Very loud 'thunders' in the airport/#Spartak direction

09:06 @666_mancer: 'Mobile signal is blocked'
09:07 Kalinin coalmine area @Serzzze: Heavy rumble in the northwest

#Donetsk #donbasreports
09:01 Kyivsky @666_mancer: Loud rumble
09:01 Proletarsky @DoneckiiPatriot: Distant heavy cannonade is heard

08:51 Topaz @Serzzze: 'Airport is heard'
08:59 Shakhtarska Sq @Serzzze: Heavy and pretty frequent single volleys

08:49 #Makeevka Vostochny @Serzzze: Heavy artillery volleys in the west

#OSCE_SMM Amb.Apakan reported to #OSCE;Called for full access to border #Ukraine -blocked by #Russia|n.via @danbbaer pic.twitter.com/D7nWLPMD9K

FIRST indicator of regular Russian troops inside Donetsk proper today—we saw this same “uniform in Crimea'.

#Donetsk #donbasreports
08:37 @666_mancer: [rumour] "All of them wear the same uniform and have white ribbon and new green AKs"

09:28 @ADivinorum:Tank gun&small arms fire in #Pisky direction,deep-tone 120mm & like MSTA volleys further in the NW

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 09:54 AM

Yesterday w/ the Ukrainians near Shyrokyne we were caught in shelling. @TomBurridgebbc's reports across the BBC today pic.twitter.com/y6icpahYFO

09:29 @Serzzze: 'Militants said, Ilyicha Ave was blocked due to shooting, nothing but airport rumble was heard'

09:22 Railway hosp @Serzzze: frequent heavy volleys
09:25 Pushkin Blvd @Serzzze: heavy volleys

09:17 Gvardeyka @Serzzze: very loud havy singles, 'windows vibrate'
09:17 Topaz @Serzzze: rumble

Rebels loading what looks like an inert shell into their T-72AV before combat:
https://youtu.be/7Z487WyZcT8?t=4s …
Do they know there's no HE inside

#Putin created DNR-Whatever issues a Call-Up for Military Service http://translate.google.co.uk/translate?hl=en&sl=ru&u=http://www.segodnya.ua/regions/donetsk/v-dnr-obyavili-prizyv-610380.html&prev=search … pic.twitter.com/TE5PwWi8ov

Militants fire heavy artillery on Shyrokyne, one Ukrainian soldier wounded
http://www.unian.info/war/1070625-militants-fire-heavy-artillery-on-shyrokyne-one-ukrainian-soldier-wounded.html … pic.twitter.com/bieOidw6UI

Interesting picture—direct fire by Ukrainian heavy artillery.
Russians asked 5 time for a "ceasefire" yesterday in #Shyrokyno (to collect WIA's?) which they break each time.
http://inforesist.org/boeviki-5-raz-zaprashivali-prekrashhenie-ognya-v-sektore-m/?_utl_t=tw …

Threats from Chechnya against Russian Federal Police—Putin’s closest friend seems intent on establishing his control over Russian Federal Police-mini coup???Chechen Leader Kadyrov Gives Order to Shoot Police from Other Regions if They Don't Coordinate http://www.interpretermag.com/russia-update-april-23-2015/#8023 … pic.twitter.com/abk0m8iScJ
NOTE: Chechens are the highest number of foreign fighters fighting in the Ukraine.

ATO spox: Ukrainian Armed Forces did not incur any lethal casualties, 7 got wounded (mainly in Pisky) in action in the last 24 hours

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
SBU released 24-yrs-old Jr. Sgt. Andriy Balu who spent 3 months in captivity. Was subject to psy pressure & tortures.

#Russia(n) regular forces are actively preparing for an offensive in #Ukrainehttp://uapress.info/ru/news/show/72617 … pic.twitter.com/VYDDT9ZT5V

Militants shelled with automatic grenade launchers thermal power plant in Schast'e pic.twitter.com/Rh49xBfdN9 http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/23-apr

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 10:43 AM

Just what will a Russian reporter do to get attention????
Channel 1 reporter started fire in Siberia to make a background for his stand-up on wildfires https://slon.ru/posts/50790 pic.twitter.com/OJQtZyLa0Z

Rebel justice: a punished fighter is tied to the poll at a checkpoint nr #Donetsk. For stealing from locals they say. pic.twitter.com/R9d9mQTwpC

Ukrainian Armed Forces clashed with RU militants near Shchastya. Attack repelled. http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/23-april-ukrainian-armed-forces-clashed-with-ru-militants …

More invasion forces near #Ukraine border, pics from yesterday: https://archive.is/iJtUK "getting ready for something" pic.twitter.com/aHEq3ljeMx

#Makeevka
13:08
@OldHistoric Heavy explosion in #Donetsk dir'n, air-blast here
@666_mancer 'House vibrated&windows rattled'

Ukraine Live: Ukrainians Claim Russian-Backed Fighters Have Attacked 62 Times Over 24 Hours. http://www.interpretermag.com/ukraine-live-day-430-fighting-returns-to-pre-ceasefire-levels/#8024 … pic.twitter.com/Dwnbk3ziFp

U.S. says highest number of #Russia air defence systems now inside #Ukraine http://uk.reuters.com/article/2015/04/22/uk-ukraine-crisis-usa-idUKKBN0ND2JA20150422 … #Donetsk #Luhansk pic.twitter.com/GOt7t81cn4

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 10:45 AM

#Abroskin:"#Avdeevka bombardment in progress more than 30min, direct hits to residential houses at Nakhimova 108, Turgeneva 96"
@666_mance

Russian militants shells Avdiivka with mortars http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/23-april-russian-militants-shells-avdiivka-with-mortars … #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/Jvp1LhgSEj

In #Shyrokyne near #Mariupol two new #Russia(n) groups arrived with tanks APCs etc http://news.liga.net/news/politics/5614608-v_rayon_shirokino_perebrosheny_dve_gruppirovki_boe vikov_is.htm … #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/CbhdqWOp4G

Only after one hour of heavy fire from the militants the Ukrainian soldiers began to shoot back".
#Shyrokyne

BBC corresp.: So many shells have fallen in the direction of Ukr military @ #Shyrokyne that it was difficult to count http://fb.me/509pBgZbX

Interesting –now we seen the motivation behind the Russian mercenaries stopping the POW exchanges required under Minsk 2—basic good ole Russian corruption at work. Russia must be running out of funds to pay its mercenaries or it is just the Russian mob making money on the side.

SBU: Militants demand from UAH 2,000 to $10,000 to release each Ukrainian captive
http://www.unian.info/society/1070641-sbu-militants-demand-from-uah-2000-to-10000-to-release-each-ukrainian-captive.html … pic.twitter.com/irtNOeSXZ5

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 10:46 AM

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
Chernihiv district court convicted Russian citizen who was spying on UA military for 9 years in prison pic.twitter.com/Aqv6oluW9F

Russia has deployed additional troops near Belgorod, opposite Kharkiv via @GeoffPyatt http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/23-april-russia-has-deployed-additional-troops-near-belgorod?ll=50.40852000000002;36.364749999999965&zoom=8 … pic.twitter.com/tnG6TTVpLV

A Russian FSB aircraft was identified flying over Belgorod yesterday .

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
SBU uncovered “DPR” & “LPR” arms arsenal that contained arms and pieces of Russian military gear

Video of US and Israeli training of Ukrainian forces http://www.kyivpost.com/multimedia/video-2/ukraine-today-us-and-israeli-instructors-train-ukrainian-troops-video-386908.html …

Listen again to @TomBurridgebbc's report on @BBCr4today this morning: BBC team under fire in eastern #Ukraine https://soundcloud.com/will-vernon-3/bbc-team-under-fire-in-eastern-ukraine …

Russian helicopter Mi-8 violated Ukrainian airspace near Crimea http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/23-april-russian-helicopter-mi8-violated-ukrainian-airspace … #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/SvRmHyYUdC

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 10:58 AM

With the crossing of 62 Russian attacks on the contact line in the last 24 hours the Minsk 2 agreement no longer really exists-in name only.

This was the average level (60) of attacks before Minsk 2 was signed.

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 11:15 AM

MOSCOW, April 23. /TASS/. Russia believes that the OSCE monitoring mission is successfully monitoring the implementation of the Minsk agreements, and there is no point in deploying an additional UN peacekeeping mission, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov told a news conference in Moscow on Thursday.

BUT then vetoes today any OSCE-SMM monitoring on the Russian borders where all of the Russian military supplies and troops are crossing –seems to be a Russian double standard at work.

A Chechen on top of a Russian military transport near #Ukraine border
https://archive.is/vzWkl
All markings removed. pic.twitter.com/TBHanh2sSN

#Footage
Looks like #Russia will present new #MRAP at the #May9th parade in #Simferopol.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L27sAKUZ5dQ … pic.twitter.com/vfUwLBLjV5

OCCRP film 'Killers Inc.' investigates attempted assassination of G. Gorbuntsov and possible Kremlin business links. https://occrp.org/occrp/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=3875 …

""SePaRaTiSt"increase the fire:used tanks & anti-aircraft artillery."http://bit.ly/1EuKx1Z pic.twitter.com/dyXGy3EeaP

Where does #Putin in particular seek the legitimization and justification of his actions? http://buff.ly/1DltgSQ

Russian army masses on Ukraine border (video) for 9 May celebrations
http://uatoday.tv/geopolitics/russian-army-masses-on-ukraine-border-423146.html … pic.twitter.com/QnGAe9kIGY

RT @shelomovskiy: Massive tank exercise is carried on by separatist troops around #Enakievo todaypic.twitter.com/p7YHXRFXp4

Enakievo (Yenakievo, Yenakiieve, Yenakiyeve, Yenakiyevo) is in eastern Donetsk region, c. 60km from Donetsk. https://twitter.com/shelomovskiy/status/591199382801883137 …

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 02:32 PM

US State Dept: Current Russian deploy of troops & mil equip on Ukr/Rus border exceeds capacity at any time during heaviest fighting in Oct.

This is the current contact line zones that Minsk 2 was to implement but Russians have pushed far over the line in some areas all the while claiming the Ukrainians are violating Minsk 2.
pic.twitter.com/3f1SQq7BRf

СММ ОБСЄ в Україні @OSCE_SMM
Amb. Apakan in #Vienna: SMM must be provided with unrestricted & secure access throughout the conflict zone pic.twitter.com/vwlUgMlHkx

#Russia's new heavy armour breaks cover ahead of 9 May #military parade. Read my take on it: http://www.janes.com/article/50896/analysis-new-russian-heavy-armour-breaks-cover … pic.twitter.com/SgjtrA48Wy

SBU detained three militants of "Oplot" In Kharkiv http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/23-april-sbu-detained-three-militants-of-oplot-in-kharkiv … #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/77RCNbm7d2

Militant of "KGB" of "LNR" was detained In Dnipropetrovsk http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/23-april-militant-of-kgb-of-lnr-was-detained-in-dnipropetrovsk … https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYphv1dvMbI …

Massive amount of #Russia|n armour on the move yet again #Rostov Oblast pic.twitter.com/8MZhqM6p2Z @Katz_741

Fighting intensifies in Ukraine's #Donetsk and #luhansk regions http://uatoday.tv/politics/fighting-intensifies-in-ukraine-s-donetsk-and-luhansk-regions-423179.html … pic.twitter.com/7L5q9Dnzuo

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 02:38 PM

.@simonostrovsky interviews DNR leader who seems not to have read the Minsk agrement he signed

http://bit.ly/1G8kGry pic.twitter.com/2PWv6gw67m

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 03:35 PM

“DPR": @OSCE tries to derail the May 9 Victory Parade in Donetskhttp://liveuamap.com/en/2015/23-april-dpr-osce-tries-to-derail-the-may-9-victory-parade … pic.twitter.com/6MsMPX7EKZ

Hmm. @mod_russia says US military trainers in Mariupol, Sievierodonetsk, Artemivsk, Volnovakha, writes @interfax_newshttp://www.interfax.ru/world/438123

Russian defense ministry says U.S. troops in east Ukraine: Interfaxhttp://reut.rs/1d4hh62 via @Reuters

@mod_russia hasn't been taking its pills. Result: pyschological projection of its 3k+ Russian troops in Donbas.We think @mod_russia has spent too much time playing World of Tanks and "sees" U.S. servicemen in its sleep, let alone eastern Ukraine! LOL

Gen Ryan: for US, Crimea is small-scale emergency, Ukraine is medium-size danger, Baltics/Europe would be really big trouble. #ElbeDayConf

Emphasis Russian Forces place on "air defence" systems in occupied Donbas indicates they intend to claim air superiority. A serious issue.

"If a“mental war”is raging inside #Russia,internationally #Moscow is waging an #informationwar"http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2015/04/how-the-media-became-putins-most-powerful-weapon/391062/ … pic.twitter.com/LYSFPf0nzM

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 03:36 PM

#Odesa: #Ukraine's Sec. Serv. arrests #antimaidan activist - bomber of Admiralteisky centre http://www.ssu.gov.ua/sbu/control/uk/publish/article?art_id=141144&cat_id=39574 …
pic.twitter.com/lMw5bfCWGc

#Shakhtarsk @olegdon3
15:32 2 MT-LB w/Russian flag [tow/#Donetsk]
16:15 3 Ural trucks w/troops, a field kitchen & water tank

#Footage
A Russian army BTR-82A column on the M4 highway in #Rostov oblast near #Ukraine.
https://youtu.be/k7vWIx4MhU8

Video story about sergeant Victor & his dog who clean eastern #Ukraine from explosive devices (English sub-titles)https://youtu.be/tlzHyLHe7dA

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 04:51 PM

Understanding Foreign Minister Lavrov's role in #Russia's broader information war http://www.rferl.org/A/26974246.html

Poland to bolster Ukraine's army if Russia war escalates http://24today.net/open/387725

#OSCE_SMM UAV observed "many" tanks, artillery and armoured vehicles in DPR-controlled Oktyabr, Zaichenko and Bezimenne NE/E of #Mariupol

Another example of Russia using its migration policy for geopolitical blackmail. This time it's against Moldova http://www.fms.gov.ru/press/news/news_detail.php?ID=131873 …

Russia promises to potentially lift re-entry bans for Gagauzians only http://gagauzinfo.md/index.php?newsid=17823 … but keep them in place for ethnic Moldovans?

You have got to be kidding—banking links through a non recognized Russian enclave?
"The newly-created banking system of the ‘DPR’ is connected to the whole world through South Ossetia”, terrorist...http://fb.me/8nipBaf2B

#Donetsk rebel Zakharchenko tells @SimonOstrovsky he witnessed #MH17 crash, stakes recovery on South Ossetian banks: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6G0AzZk5K4 …

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 04:53 PM

MFA of Ukraine ✔ @MFA_Ukraine
RU proxies prevented free access of SMM to east of #Shyrokyne and abused monitors' presence to redeploy and rotate. pic.twitter.com/u1zn5eMyGW

#Ukraine,Police seized 12 million UAH to finance '"militants"LNR"&"DNR"'.http://bit.ly/1blRk0A pic.twitter.com/Lj68c73SC1

Interior Ministry exposes schemes of state coal sale under leadership of the son of former Donetsk region governor. http://en.censor.net.ua/n333826

Russia's 1/4-century-long quest for acceptance in or by the West is finally over–@DmitriTrenin http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/917209.shtml#.VTFEd9jwM2s.twitter …

Ukraine today: record fighting, US warns of record Russian movement, videos show Russian movement, rhetoric risinghttp://bit.ly/1PoVAvt

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 04:55 PM

“DPR": @OSCE tries to derail the May 9 Victory Parade in Donetsk http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/23-april-dpr-osce-tries-to-derail-the-may-9-victory-parade … pic.twitter.com/6MsMPX7EKZ

Hmm. @mod_russia says US military trainers in Mariupol, Sievierodonetsk, Artemivsk, Volnovakha, writes @interfax_newshttp://www.interfax.ru/world/438123

Russian defense ministry says U.S. troops in east Ukraine: Interfaxhttp://reut.rs/1d4hh62 via @Reuters

@mod_russia hasn't been taking its pills. Result: pyschological projection of its 3k+ Russian troops in Donbas.

We think @mod_russia has spent too much time playing World of Tanks and "sees" U.S. servicemen in its sleep, let alone eastern Ukraine! LOL

Gen Ryan: for US, Crimea is small-scale emergency, Ukraine is medium-size danger, Baltics/Europe would be really big trouble. #ElbeDayConf

Emphasis Russian Forces place on "air defence" systems in occupied Donbas indicates they intend to claim air superiority. A serious issue.

"If a“mental war”is raging inside #Russia,internationally #Moscow is waging an #informationwar"http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2015/04/how-the-media-became-putins-most-powerful-weapon/391062/ … pic.twitter.com/LYSFPf0nzM

Russia says US troops are training Ukrainian soldiers near the front lines. Journalist there doesn't see themhttp://bit.ly/1PoVAvt

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 05:17 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 05:34 PM

Again the Russian mercenary shellings start again--so much for Minsk 2.

At 18:00 russians started firing again at the Ukr positions from #Shyrokyne with mortars, APC, grenade launchers, machine guns.

19:42 #Shakhtarsk @Helgi__UA: 'road police' w/siren horn & BTR & minibus w/blacked-out windows fr/#Donetsk direction eastward

16:21 #Stakhanov @yellowbtr: 'Why do they drive their tanks to and from, got much diesel?'

17:38 #Horlivka, Kurganka @xy_gorlov4an: Rumble

Workers' discontent again, #Chechnya's leader resisting #Moscow again, food prices up again. Ghosts of #Putin's past returning?

Strikes and protests on the rise across #Russia as #Putin chooses military spending over social- http://nyti.ms/1Dnm0Gf

In #Novoazovsk you can hear heavy fighting from #Shyrokyne again, @sir_T_Lawrence reports

Russia’s Information Warfare Targets Washington and NATO | The Jamestown Foundation: http://www.jamestown.org/single/?tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=43816&tx_ttnews%5BbackPid%5D=7&cHash=35a85c155581c54dd607171f6e92c122#.VTktMZkx27 j.twitter …

Chechen Leader Kadyrov Would 'Step Down if Ordered' After Controversy http://bit.ly/1Fhd61E pic.twitter.com/XPucxu1Fvu

Navalny reveals corrupt deals behind Putin's Black Sea palace http://uatoday.tv/society/navalny-reveals-corrupt-deals-behind-putin-s-black-sea-palace-423229.html … pic.twitter.com/0Qq9WPlzIf

Fighting btwn titushki & police(1 injured)at construction site in Kyiv.PoR mob trying to destabilize #Kyiv for V-Dayhttps://twitter.com/HromadskeTV/status/591296841477713920 …

#Shakhtarsk 19:25
4 russian Kamaz trucks with fighters and towing MSTA-B howitzers went towards #Donetsk.
- via @olegdon3

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 05:35 PM

Some Ukrainian units are repositioning themselves in better defense positions to resist any new offensive.

#ANALYSIS #MAP
Looks like Battalion #Aydar was wise enough to break the #Minsk2 treaty & crossed the #Seversky_Donets pic.twitter.com/LPEm6o961H

This way, #Aydar could defend Tr'okhizbenka!
Video source:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hym86GkBNPk …
Another geolocation from the area: https://twitter.com/Conflict_Report/status/589783200865636353

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 05:54 PM

This is a critical statement as it is appearing to now NATO that Russia is heading to a major offensive to take the entire eastern Ukraine.

#NATO Sec Gen @jensstoltenberg on Russian forces/militias: "...capacity to launch big offensive with little warning" https://twitter.com/NATOpress/status/591285584280346624 …

The ability to attack out of a standing position is something this Russian army has been training for over the last five years and intensively the last year with multiple snap exercises.

The West feared this ability in the 80s and they did not have it then they do now.

Kerry told Russia in phone call to pull forces from Ukraine: official http://dlvr.it/9WYPlX

Kerry urges Russia to remove forces from Ukraine and press rebels into abiding by ceasefire. http://apne.ws/1aVDW2I

Now this Russian response:

Notice—this response still alludes to “Ukraine is our sphere of influence” and did Lavrov actually respond to the actual US Kerry voiced concerns ie adherence to Minsk 2, pull back of Russian troops and control over her mercenaries—Lavrov did not respond to any of that.

Lavrov to @JohnKerry:Russia open to constructive coop. w/ US based on equality,respect of Rus interests, stopping attempts to exert pressure

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 05:56 PM

Russia says US troops are training Ukrainian soldiers near the front lines. Journalist there doesn't see them http://bit.ly/1PoVAvt

Pentagon Calls Latest Kremlin Accusation About US Troops In Ukraine "Ridiculous" http://bit.ly/1FhgIRj

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 06:44 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 06:53 PM

U.S. Mission to OSCE ✔ @usosce

#Russia-backed seps systematically block #OSCE monitors as RF forces in & near #Ukraine grow -

http://1.usa.gov/1zQrrMo pic.twitter.com/WzxGnJyxVN

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 09:04 PM

20:49 #Lysychansk @lis_ukrop: battle,tracers in the sky. Small arms&large calibre
22:01 #Severodonetsk @HelenaShukaylo: quiet

Ukrainian forces capture fresh KAMAZ (produced 2014) truck loaded with ATGMs from "poorly equipped" Donbass minerspic.twitter.com/sje1MwcqNf

Around 6PM militants in 3 vehicles entered #Berezove, 1 killed, 1 wounded, 6 captured. https://twitter.com/SPaWN_ua/statu

US Mission to NATO ✔ @USNATO
Russia and media: 'Sometimes information begins to dominate reality, to change the reality' http://goo.gl/V18si3 pic.twitter.com/cDDKCbFuwK

Russias Hybrid Army in Ukraine deceitfully called "defenders of People's Republic of Lugansk" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEHHNd6mOXw … pic.twitter.com/bxQ0EtXC8R

OSCE ✔ @OSCE
Latest Spot Report by OSCE Observer Mission: A Russian convoy of 62 vehicles crossed into Ukraine and returned back http://bit.ly/1GniIJ8

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 09:06 PM

#Shakhtarsk 15:10
10 Ural trucks w fighters, 12x russian BMP, 6x T-75 and 7x MT-LB went towards #Donetsk. https://twitter.com/olegdon3/status/591215021956452352 …

A field camp of the #RussianHybridArmy in Lutuhyne Raion of #Luhansk Oblast @en_informnapalm https://en.informnapalm.org/illiriyskiy-wildlife-refuge-lutuhyne-raion-field-camp-with-a-huge-number-of-vehicles/ … pic.twitter.com/AkAVgdHIYg

Synchronized trolling. The new all-Russian sport. pic.twitter.com/TVsH3sf0Yq

Yesterday in Kamensk-Shakhtinsky (#Russia),today in Heorhiivka (#Ukraine): The #RUSSIAN_ARMY.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8O0q0w2UNT0 … pic.twitter.com/unqjgBGOSQ

Army Recognition @ArmyRecognition
#Russia #T15 #BMP #Armata #AIFV #Armoured Infantry Fighting Vehicle technical data sheethttp://bit.ly/1ySkXBx pic.twitter.com/S4Z7eK8SXR

#Nato chief says #Russian threat must be stood up to and is not new, noting the Russian attack on #Georgia in 2008- http://bit.ly/1Gn2yPY

18:25 #Shakhtarsk @Helgi__UA: 2 tanks towards #Torez.

#BREAKING
Massive #Russian_army drills in Eastern #Ukraine.
They play "LPR" but who cares?!!https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEHHNd6mOXw … pic.twitter.com/kImMfLuJuJ

Alexander Motyl: Is Putin's Russia Fascist? http://buff.ly/1OLDpOk

OUTLAW 09

04-23-2015, 09:07 PM

http://zona.media/news/kadyrov-ischez/ … Chechen state TV called @tvrain & threatened a lawsuit if it doesn’t remove video of Kadyrov threatening Russian cops

Chechen leader Kadyrov ready to resign if Putin orders
http://www.unian.info/world/1070917-chechen-leader-kadyrov-ready-to-resign-if-putin-orders.html … pic.twitter.com/fa9HbutE9q

Russian Interior Ministry calls Kadyrov's comments "unacceptable," a rare rebuke from Moscow for the Chechen leader. http://www.wsj.com/articles/chechen-president-ramzan-kadyrov-gives-shoot-to-kill-order-on-outside-forces-1429812489?mobile=y …

Watch #Kadyrov threaten to kill any #Russia|n cops who comes meddling in #Chechen affairs. http://youtu.be/EZNm1dAr5Y0

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 05:25 AM

ATO presser: 21 ceasefire violations fom 6PM-12PM. #Avdiivka, #Mayorsk, Zaitsevo, Orlovske was under mortar fire.

Organizer of numerous events at @TAMU is a Neo-Nazi. They don't mind a bit. Ponder his words:http://www.examiner.com/article/texas-a-m-university-welcomes-sanctioned-terrorism-supporter-alexander-dugin … pic.twitter.com/bKqvmfpMe0

Just listen to this squeaky-voiced Neo-Nazi... Now he brings us Dugin. Such an embarrassment to America! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJ5YetKiYos …

Moscow University dumps genocide and terrorism aficionado #Dugin, @TAMU welcomes him. http://www.examiner.com/article/texas-a-m-university-welcomes-sanctioned-terrorism-supporter-alexander-dugin … pic.twitter.com/7osBvSt54t

#Texas A&M Univ welcomes sanctioned #terrorism supporter Alexander #Dugin http://exm.nr/1PqZvYE he suppports #genocide

Russia and US engage in new war of words over Ukraine: http://on.ft.com/1zPBaCx #FT

Russia. Motherland. Putin!" Silencing dissent in #Putin's #Russia. Trailer for our latest film for @vicenews: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rm5pE_BDtCc …

Learning Military & Intelligence Lessons: Toward a #Ukrainian Defencive Strategy http://empr.media/opinion/analytics/learning-military-and-intelligence-lessons-part-2-toward-a-ukrainian-defencive-strategy … |EMPR pic.twitter.com/6ZsxlIoBLz

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 09:01 AM

Russian troops and her mercenaries continued the all night and are still shelling --normal Russian Army softening up shelling tactics prior to a general offensive--this has been seen in the previous three offensives.

What is new is the use of a newly Russian military development frag shell only produced for the Russian Army that "seems" to be now in the Ukraine ALTHOUGH Russian FM and Putin claim Russia is not involved.

Russians using their newest developed frag heavy artillery shell now against Ukrainian Army positions AND yet Russia still claims it has nothing to do with the fighting THEN where did the shells come from “Angola”?????

Militants used new Rus-produced high-explosive artillery projectiles (brisant charge) near #Shyrokyne, explode w/ many fragments - Tymchuk

Interesting that when the OSCE is not in Shyrokyne then the mercenaries shell and then claim they did not shell--ONLY a BBC reporter team caught the shellings on audio and video.

#Donetsk
02:11 @rechnikato: Explosions became more intense in #Spartak/#Pisky

#Donetsk @felixsteal
01:26 [Howitzers in Putilovka] went quiet
01:36 Volleys again but coseto the city center

07:28 #Shakhtarsk @Helgi__UA: 10 Ural/Kamaz trucks towards #Torez, towing 5 MSTA-S cannons, field kitchens, generators.

11:11 #Stakhanov @yellowbtr: about 8:30 11 tanks went fr/Romashka tow/#Kirovsk, 'there will be no asphalt at all here soon'

28th brigade officer: in Berezove Ukr troops stopped militants on their way to #Mariupol. Detained 6, 1 was KIA, 1WIA http://www.mariupol.tv/news/war/mariupol/3563/pod_mariupolem_ukrainskie_voennye_vzyali_v_plen_6_ boevikov.html …

#Donetsk
09:51 the center @Serzzze: heavy outgoing volleys
09:54 @KalinaiMalina: artillery works from 8am w/pauses

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 09:03 AM

Ouch. According to Russian Hybrid Army commander in Donbas. Ukraine they're going to establish USSR 2.0. pic.twitter.com/JJtdoV5hoi

Army Recognition @ArmyRecognition
#Russia BTR-MDM #Rakushka #airborne multi-role #armoured vehicle technical data sheet Read http://bit.ly/1d834oO pic.twitter.com/qqNDN9TO5H

VIDEO More proud purchases from local miner/truckdriver salaries.
Georgievka, Lugansk region
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8O0q0w2UNT0 … pic.twitter.com/mGGE0aL58E

Old favorite trick already used against Maidan protesters. Russia damages and destroys cars from Ukraine volunteers. https://twitter.com/loogunda/status/591350009821528064 …

Klimkin: Russia can’t force Ukraine to surrender
http://www.unian.info/politics/1071061-klimkin-russia-cant-force-ukraine-to-surrender.html … pic.twitter.com/hFgvcE0i2K

FINALLY-----
Kyiv wants US to join Normandy format http://24today.net/open/388450 pic.twitter.com/X8br7mDrha

Part of the current Ukrainian reformation movement is reigning in their own oligarchs:
Akhmetov's plan, called 'Fortress', calls for unified assault from all sides on the Ukr. govt for cutting subsidies to his coal monopoly

This particular Ukrainian oligarch has been playing the proRussian card simply because his coal mines are located in the Donbas and he was getting 300 USDs per tin instead of the world market price of 85 USD per ton and the Ukrainian government cut the subsidy.

MP reveals Akhmetov’s involvement in organizing miners’ protests
http://www.unian.info/politics/1071041-mp-reveals-akhmetovs-involvement-in-organizing-miners-protests.html … pic.twitter.com/JK1kehaJAk

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 10:23 AM

Did a main Russian media outlet actually just now "confirm" Russian troops in the Ukraine??? By stating "some me the numbers" in English you are quasi admitting numbers are in fact there BUT you now have to prove the numbers!!!

THIS goes completely against the previous arguments that Russian had absolutely no troops in the Ukraine--NOW it is a game of "show me the numbers" NOT "it ain't us"--BIG difference in the world of politics.

http://sputniknews.com/us/20150424/1021310454.html#ixzz3YDjzkRYO

US Fails to Verify Number of 'Russian Troops' in Ukraine
© RIA Novosti. Maksim Blinov
US
06:53 24.04.2015(updated 10:09 24.04.2015) Get short URL

US State Department spokesperson Marie Harf said that the United States lacks precise figures and is unable to confirm the number of Russian military units reportedly stationed in eastern Ukraine.

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — The United States lacks precise figures and is unable to confirm the number of Russian military units reportedly stationed in eastern Ukraine, US State Department spokesperson Marie Harf stated at a press briefing.

“It is really hard to get precise information about Russian troop numbers specifically, but we know there is a substantial Russian presence,” Harf said on Thursday.

It is difficult for the United States to verify figures, Harf claimed, because Russia deliberately camouflages its involvement in the region.

On Wednesday, the US State Department accused Russia of violating the Minsk agreement by sending weapons and forces and conducting joint training exercises with pro-Russian “separatists” in eastern Ukraine.

Last week, the US Army announced that some 300 US paratroopers arrived in the western Ukraine city of Yavoriv to train Ukrainian troops, which the Russian Foreign Ministry has said is a violation of the Minsk agreement.

On Thursday, the Russian Defense Ministry expressed concern over the training of the Ukrainian National Guard by US military instructors along the separation line between Kiev-led forces and armed militia in eastern Ukraine.

Moreover, Russia’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement on Friday re-iterating that the arrival of US paratroopers could signal a first step toward supplying Ukraine with advanced weapons, and the support of Ukrainian war hawks could lead to new bloodshed.

Kiev is planning to hold three joint exercises with US troops. Besides Fearless Guardian 2015, which is underway in Yavoriv and planned to last for six more months, Ukrainian and US army will have joint drills dubbed Sea Breeze 2015 and Saber Guardian/Rapid Trident 2015 later this year.

The armed conflict in Ukraine began in April 2014 when Kiev launched a military operation against independence supporters in the country's southeast.

Relations between the West and Russia soured amid the Ukrainian crisis as Western countries accused Russia of meddling in Ukraine’s internal affairs. Moscow has repeatedly denied the allegations.

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 10:47 AM

#News
#Shyrokyne was attacked 9 x yesterday.
2 x 152 mm artillery
3 x 120 mm mortars
1 x AGS
1 x tank
2 x small arms

#Ukraine PM- Intelligence reports incredible concentration of #Russia(n) forces in #Donbas http://news.liga.net/news/politics/5626152-razvedka_dokladyvaet_o_neveroyatnoy_kontsentratsii _boevikov_yatsenyuk.htm … pic.twitter.com/iSWxw4kDyq

#Russian armored columns seen in #Luhansk and #Donetskhttp://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?depth=2&hl=en&prev=search&rurl=translate.google.com&sl=uk&u=http://uapress.info/uk/news/show/72829&usg=ALkJrhjUbcATWzObOYBIltGXZtY7txQCEg … & http://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?depth=2&hl=en&prev=search&rurl=translate.google.com&sl=uk&u=http://uapress.info/uk/news/show/72816&usg=ALkJrhjWWdGtA6GqBBaxuHQ4zMXyJpOXRg … pic.twitter.com/nQTcUBLPPj

More Russian heavy equipment not registered with OSCE and near the Minsk 2 contact line in violation of Minsk 2.:
this near Bryanka, Luhansk region (via @BuTaJIu4eK) pic.twitter.com/1Mdw0RmARg

Russian Federation redeploys scouts of the 74th Independent Motorized Rifle Brigade fro http://24today.net/open/388583

Latvian PM - #Russia has launched a hybrid war in #Latvia http://translate.google.co.uk/translate?hl=en&sl=ru&u=http://fakty.ictv.ua/ru/index/read-news/id/1542206&prev=search … pic.twitter.com/F4PbpdSjPC

Polish Foreign Ministry: Germany cancels Russian Night Wolves bikers’ Schengen visas
http://www.unian.info/world/1071128-polish-foreign-ministry-germany-cancels-russian-night-wolves-bikers-schengen-visas.html … pic.twitter.com/AwO1Kkfk5v

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 10:48 AM

Former "DNR" fighter: #Russia will always push us in the back to fight...' http://euromaidanpress.com/2015/04/23/former-dnr-fighter-russia-will-always-push-us-in-the-back-to-fight/ …

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ai1A49k3VoE … #Russian TV goes ear/eyegasmic over 'protests' in #Kyiv, #Ukraine. Not a word on rent-a-mob dynamics paid by proRussian oligarch because his cash subsidies were being cut.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yptnX3qYyTk … https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MgsaTDpAfgc … Real protests:#Kyiv-ans v. corrupt/in-ur-face construction. pic.twitter.com/YqBwdWwydy

With recent activity #Makiivka to #Shyrokyne #Donetsk expect #Russia(ns) will attack. Poss scenario 2-9 May pic.twitter.com/Pe6l8uoEe8

Militants have used against the forces of #ATO Russian ATGM Cornetpic.twitter.com/LEICWg2VUh http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/24-apr

VIDEO #Russia displays some of its new armor on Victory Day rehearsalhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdZ3v7kEbM8 … #Ukraine #Putin pic.twitter.com/JsbsowleKo

Who actually controls Russia—Putin or the Chechnya leader?????
#Chechya's leader #Kadyrov gives shoot-to-kill order on #Russia's forces.#Putin keeps silence? http://belsat.eu/en/articles/chechen-leader-kadyrov-gives-shoot-kill-order-russian-forces/ … pic.twitter.com/VQn48dsSEb

New Ukrainian democracy at work—would not have happened under the previous corrupt proRussian President--we call it transparency in government part and parcel of good governance--something the previous corrupt government certainly did not have:

Ukrainian MP resigns after being caught booking EUR 10,000 holiday during parliament session
http://uatoday.tv/politics/ukrainian-mp-resigns-after-being-caught-booking-eur-10-000-holiday-during-parliament-session-423391.html … pic.twitter.com/7vYrSMzrBw

Study reveals #Russia spending big on military modernization | #France #Germany #Italy #UK
http://www.sipri.org/media/website-photos/milex-media-backgrounder-2015 … pic.twitter.com/8e84H8WHE3

Transportation of Russian soldiers from Sverdlovsk in the Rostov region. Driven like cattle.pic.twitter.com/AAaew6x7ce

Ukrainian MIA has Shoigu, Zhirinovsky and Malofeev on wanted list for supplying armed groups in Donbas. http://svodka.net/poslednie-svodki/svodki/159560 …

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 11:35 AM

Who actually controls Russia—Putin or the Chechnya leader?????
#Chechya's leader #Kadyrov gives shoot-to-kill order on #Russia's forces.#Putin keeps silence? http://belsat.eu/en/articles/chechen-leader-kadyrov-gives-shoot-kill-order-russian-forces/ … pic.twitter.com/VQn48dsSEb

Moscow Federal Police and Chechnya escalation in progress:

Chechen investigators opened a case against the Federal police http://russia.liveuamap.com/en/2015/24-april-chechen-investigators-opened-a-case-against-the …

.@aleksei_Kudrin getting edgier, accusing govt of waging "information war" against own citizens http://top.rbc.ru/politics/24/04/2015/553a241a9a79474eb5ec27bb

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 11:38 AM

Part of the current Ukrainian reformation movement is reigning in their own oligarchs:
Akhmetov's plan, called 'Fortress', calls for unified assault from all sides on the Ukr. govt for cutting subsidies to his coal monopoly

This particular Ukrainian oligarch has been playing the proRussian card simply because his coal mines are located in the Donbas and he was getting 300 USDs per tin instead of the world market price of 85 USD per ton and the Ukrainian government cut the subsidy.

MP reveals Akhmetov’s involvement in organizing miners’ protests
http://www.unian.info/politics/1071041-mp-reveals-akhmetovs-involvement-in-organizing-miners-protests.html … pic.twitter.com/JK1kehaJAk

Ukrainian democracy is taking on this particular oligarch who has a proRussian leaning.

Leading Ukr politician accuses country's richest man of inciting public unrest to skip reforms hurting his business. http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2015/apr/24/leading-ukraine-politician-says-billionaire/ …

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 02:20 PM

Yesterday 6PM #Russia(n) terrorists tried entering #Mariupol in 3 cars.In Battle w #Ukraine troops 1 KIA 1 WIA 6 Held pic.twitter.com/prCSDqKiM7

Luhansk "LPR" training grounds. Rebels say they've been training a lot during the past month pic.twitter.com/plJrqWX0GR

Donbass Battalion raise #Ukraine flag over high building in #Shyrokyne.
Russians try to shoot it down with mortars. pic.twitter.com/GFrtnaAPdW

Donbas has become testing ground for new Russian weaponry: Russian army fires with modified Kornet anti-tank PHOTOShttp://en.censor.net.ua/n333885

Dmytro Tymchuk says Russian-backed fighters just attacked w/ Kornet anti-tank missiles -- Ukraine doesn't have thesehttp://bit.ly/1HzMtW5

Interesting to see they include a tightening of the borders and new roadblocks to "neighboring" DPR too...

Luhansk ‘KGB' militant armed with grenades arrested in Dnipropetrovsk (Video)
http://www.unian.info/politics/1071284-luhansk-kgb-militant-armed-with-grenades-arrested-in-dnipropetrovsk-video.html …

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 02:46 PM

Appears now the Russian General Staff is "complaining" that the US is conducting "hybrid warfare" against them--is that not "calling the kettle black"?????

Russian Federation stated that USA and Allies began phase 1 of a hybrid war against it. FFS! http://inforesist.org/v-rf-zayavili-chto-ssha-i-soyuzniki-nachali-gibridnuyu-vonu-protiv-nee/ … pic.twitter.com/Klyqr3VR70

Kind of a bold statement. Russian general staff:"The US is the mastermind behind all military conflicts in the world" http://lifenews.ru/mobile/news/153028 …

As Russian forces build up against Ukraine's border, the Russian General Staff's paranoia reaches a new height.https://twitter.com/tassagency_en/status/591568567306481664 …

http://www.ria.ru/defense_safety/20150424/1060668652.html …
Cdr of Russia's Southern Military District concerned about US mil actions of hostile character adjacent to his AOR

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 02:49 PM

Ukrainian Military Reports 21 Attacks Last Night. http://www.interpretermag.com/ukraine-live-day-431-renewed-fighting-continues-with-heavy-weapons-reportedly-used/#8036 …

WOW! Massive drills of the so called "#Luhansk People's Republic". Miners bought a lot of military vehicles!https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FEHHNd

"LPR" declared martial law against the backdrop of "Kyiv forces' aggressions" http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/24-april-lpr-declared-martial-law-against-the-backdrop-of …
War coming!

Well worth reading:
A renewed Russian-backed offensive in eastern Ukraine looks imminent — via @TheStudyOfWar http://read.bi/1bAxvDp pic.twitter.com/qjiTZlwTQH

#Ukraine SBU busts another terrorist attempt 2 blow up gas containers in #Kharkiv @serviseSsu
http://goo.gl/MJRCAI pic.twitter.com/TctmAcQPie

Russian FM is again smoking something really strong—it seems they did not get the message that now all Ukrainian volunteer BNs have been formally acquired into either the MoI, the National Guard or the regular UA.
Thought the FSB was a reasonably good intel organization???

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
#Lukashevich:The presence of volunteer battalions not controlled by the #Ukrainian command at the line of contact may become a major problem

They are really smoking dope today in the Russian FM—the Ukrainian Army has recorded on their side a high of 62 attacks and a low of 19 and the Russian Foreign Ministry states the JCCC recorded a far higher number of 100-150 attacks per day—REMEMBER the Russians have two senior Generals (23 Russians are on the OSCE staff) working inside the JCCC—ARE they “bending the numbers” to make a case to invade to stop the alleged "heavy" shellings????

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
#Lukashevich: The Joint Control & Coordination Centre says the intensity of military exchanges more than doubled to 100-150 a day @OSCE_SMM

Russia to equip ‘DNR Guard’ only if Russian military in its ranks, says ATO press chief
http://www.unian.info/war/1071249-russia-to-equip-dnr-guard-only-if-russian-military-in-its-ranks-says-ato-press-chief.html … pic.twitter.com/Mc3tBwjAwi

More of those “non Russian” military flags waving on top of Russian armored vehicles inside Ukraine:
Russian military vehicles in Makiivkahttp://liveuamap.com/en/2015/24-april-russian-military-vehicles-in-makiivka … #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/4XJMaA7ay0 via @BuTaJIu4eK

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 03:04 PM

Ukraine Presents Wreckage Of Advanced Russian Missile Fired In Lugansk Regionhttp://www.interpretermag.com/ukraine-live-day-431-renewed-fighting-continues-with-heavy-weapons-reportedly-used/#8038 … pic.twitter.com/6r1qhq6yL0

Ukrainian MOD Presents Wreckage Of Advanced Russian Missile Fired In Lugansk Region http://bit.ly/1GqM8WM pic.twitter.com/LXKVPywyKp

Here is yesterday's analysis of the rapid buildup of Russian troops & armor in & near Ukraine http://bit.ly/1PoVAvt pic.twitter.com/Tx6C6xYZNl

MORE indicators of S-300 missile failures during testing:
Failed rocket launch in Plesetsk was part of Antey-2500 (S-300VM, export model) missile testing. http://barentsobserver.com/en/security/2015/04/missile-fails-falls-down-village-22-04 …

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 03:38 PM

AND the evening shellings of Ukrainian positions by Russian troops and her mercenaries begins again. A little earlier than is “normal” whatever “normal” is these days?

#Donetsk 2 Urals, 2MTLB, BTR towards #Pisky at 17:30.
RU artillery firing now.

Full version of @TomBurridgebbc's report under fire in #Shyrokyne http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-32447371 …
pic.twitter.com/arCthdjxtI

VIDEO large #Russia(n) military convoy on the move in #Simferopol #Crimea #UKRAINE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwN1HVGqzEg … pic.twitter.com/LkyHNXqP1j

FROM another non linear warfare front—Iran today;
Secret Hizbullah airstrip for drones discovered?http://www.janes.com/article/50922/hizbullah-airstrip-revealed … pic.twitter.com/at2PADUMSu

#Medvedev: "All of you wanted #Crimea, now we're paying the price."
#Russia Paying Steep Price for Annexing Crimeahttp://www.jamestown.org/single/?tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=43824&tx_ttnews%5BbackPid%5D=7&cHash=47262206aa9cc28f8e703fbed0243152#.VTpirQhUDQ X.twitter …

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 03:39 PM

From the Russian General Staff today who are also smoking something as well:

You probably already knew this, but America is responsible for every war on Earth today. https://meduza.io/en/news/2015/04/24/russian-general-says-usa-is-behind-every-war-in-the-world-today … pic.twitter.com/qIgjqgt9pl

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 07:25 PM

RUSSIA ATTEMPTS FALSE FLAG OPERATION

http://tass.ru/en/world/791654

Unlawful use of OSCE markings in Ukraine inadmissible — Russian Foreign Ministry

World
April 24, 20:03 UTC+3

According to the diplomat, the illegal use of OSCE identification signs poses an immediate threat to the security of OSCE monitors

© Mikhail Sokolov/TASS

MOSCOW, April 24. /TASS/. The unlawful use of the OSCE identification signs in Ukraine is unacceptable and poses a threat to the organization’s monitors, Russia’s envoy to the OSCE Andrey Kelin told a meeting of the organization’s Permanent Council.

"We draw attention to the inadmissibility of unlawful use of the OSCE markings," he said. "Photos of white cars with the Ukrainian number plates and the Special Monitoring Mission logo, which don’t belong to the mission, have appeared on the web."

According to the diplomat, the illegal use of OSCE identification signs poses an immediate threat to the security of OSCE monitors. "We demand that Ukraine’s law enforcement agencies take immediate action to identify and punish the provocateurs, whoever is behind them," Kelin said.

Meanwhile, spokesman for the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine Michael Bociurkiw said that a Lexus car bearing the OSCE markings had been spotted in Dnepropetrovsk. Bociurkiw noted that the OSCE didn’t have Lexus cars. This is inadmissible, he added.Upset by increased scrutiny of Russian #OSCE_SMM monitors' relations with Col-Gen Lentsov, Kremlin creates a #falseflag op to blame Ukraine.

The only folks dumb enough to paint 'OSCE' on their car and drive around Dnipropetrovsk are Russian... #pic.twitter.com/vbAEiqDxYF#OSCE_SMM spox @mikeybbq said a Lexus car bearing OSCE markings was spotted in Dnepropetrovsk. SMM doesn't have Lexus cars.

RU envoy Kelin: Illegal use of OSCE signs poses an immediate threat to the security of #OSCE_SMM monitors. @OSCEhttp://tass.ru/en/world/791654

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 07:41 PM

Russia will deploy MiG-31 fighter aircraft in the Arctic Region http://www.airrecognition.com/index.php/archive-world-worldwide-news-air-force-aviation-aerospace-air-military-defence-industry/global-news-2015/april/1695-russia-will-deploy-mig-31-fighter-aircraft-in-the-arctic-region.html

Sputnik ✔ @SputnikInt
#Russia to strengthen military contingent in #Baltic regionhttp://sptnkne.ws/f6N #Fleet #Navy pic.twitter.com/roMmf0q4ou

"More than 1,000 pieces of Russian military equipment have been moved over the past month"- .@jensstoltenberghttp://goo.gl/VkoEMs

#Analysis #Map
Battalion #Donbas proves its readiness to defend #Shyrokyne by extending the #Ukraine-controlled area. pic.twitter.com/ZOEo7UrDP6

#Avdiivka 8:47PM
Firing with large caliber. Artillery shells falling in vineyards-#Optyne area. https://twitter.com/rechnikato/status/591659685314441216 …

Heavy 82 and 120 mm mortar fire since 20.00 in Snyrokinehttp://liveuamap.com/en/2015/24-april-heavy-82-and-120-mm-mortar-fire-since-2000-in-snThis needs to make more headlines | Ukrainian

Military Reports 29 Attacks And Two Engagements So Far Todayhttp://bit.ly/1HACeRnyrokine …

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 07:44 PM

Example of social media open source analysis chase of a Russian convoy headed to the Ukraine.

Can some1 say which direction they drive?
“@el_roosevelt: Rus convoy on the way to #Ukraine?https://archive.is/pmcCh pic.twitter.com/uEwWxZG0L6

From other photos looks like trucker's journey from Volgograd region (past tanks and cossacks) to Krasnodar Krai.

Geotagged Belokalitvinsky District, Rostov Oblast, Russiahttps://vk.com/crc73?w=wall253239968_299 … Click the geotag button at bottom

#News
Another Russian ceasefire ignorance night starting in #Shyrokyne.
Heavy 82 and 120 mm mortar fire since 20.00.

Russian command & radio signal apcs in Shakhty near #Ukrainehttps://instagram.com/p/12fkRCJMwZ/ http://vpk.name/news/120777_oao_ryazanskii_radiozavod_predlagaet_razlic hnyie_variantyi_po_obucheniyu_rabote_s_postavlyaem oi_tehnikoi.html … pic.twitter.com/Eay9eEQpWQ

#Horlivka
From Debaltsevo area hearing drills.
From #Mayorsk - battle. https://twitter.com/062_Region/status/591634338506272768 …

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 07:47 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 08:08 PM

#Horlivka township 6/7, #Mayorsk firing: sounds like mortar (heavy).
10:20PM https://twitter.com/062_Region/status/591683188537294849 …

Russia's Foreign Ministry calls Eastern Partnership summit 'anti-Russian'
http://www.unian.info/world/1071440-russias-foreign-ministry-calls-eastern-partnership-summit-anti-russian.html … pic.twitter.com/3PbnQyN8b3
Is #Putin about to begin a 3rd #Chechen war to escape his #Ukraine impasse? http://euromaidanpress.com/2015/04/24/is-putin-about-to-begin-a-third-chechen-war-to-escape-ukrainian-impasse/ …
pic.twitter.com/mDu7b8Yrto

tass.ru/politika/1930504 … Peskov refuses to comment on rumors that Kadyrov has been offered a position in the federal government

Extremely interesting reaction of the Russian civil society against Russian mercnearies who are returning to Russia from the Ukraine:
Blogger in Taganrog Russia: locals avoid/don't want to help mercenaries returning from Ukrainehttp://skif-tag.livejournal.com/1720344.html pic.twitter.com/BQ6Fg6zB6W

Another large russian military convoy, this time near Belgorod, 24 Aprhttps://youtu.be/UaDI_iX5Ui8

Column of military equipment in Oryol http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/24-april-column-of-military-equipment-in--oryol … https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGlwyx1LTU0 …

SBU probing into financing of miners' protests in Kyiv, including by ex-PM Azarov http://www.kyivpost.com/content/ukraine/sbu-probing-into-financing-of-miners-protests-in-kyiv-including-by-ex-pm-azarov-387076.html …

Russian SledCom "annuls" Chechen prosecution's proceedings against non-Chechen policemen operating in Grozny; giant egg on Kadyrov's face.

Russian propaganda machine has released a sequel to the crucified boy, the crucified and burnt alive POWhttps://twitter.com/vonhenrick1/status/591666370301014017 …

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 08:22 PM

http://maidantranslations.com/2015/04/24/latest-numbers-of-russian-combat-equipment-transferred-to-donbas-freesavchenko/

Latest Numbers of Russian Combat Equipment Transferred to Donbas
Posted on April 24, 2015 by codenamenox

Dmitry Tymchuk, Head of the Center for Military and Political Research, Coordinator of the Information Resistance group, Member of Parliament (People’s Front)
04.21.2015
Translated and edited by Voices of Ukraine

Based on the results of OSINT (open-source intelligence) and by summarizing the data of the IR group’s network, the experts of Information Resistance calculated the approximate numbers of combat equipment and auxiliary supplies which Russia has transferred to Donbas after the signing of the Minsk Agreements, and as of April 20, 2015.

Namely, over the last two months, the following items have been “purchased” in Russian “stores” and delivered to the “peaceful citizens” of Donbas:

– multiple rocket launching systems (including Tornado) – approximately 70 units;

– infantry combat vehicles – approximately 30;

– armored personnel carriers – approximately 45;

– tanks (including T-80) – approximatel 200;

– approximately 900 trucks* with ammunition and other material and technical supplies.

The information about the numbers of artillery units and mortars transferred to Donbas are controversial, therefore, we are not quoting them at this time.

By the most conservative estimates, up to 150 railway tankers with fuel were delivered to Donbas, thanks to the services of Russian Railways**. We lack the exact numbers of fuel dispensing trucks that entered Ukraine, but their arrivals were recorded on multiple occasions.

* – this includes ammunition delivered to Ukraine by railroad. Therefore, Russian Railways is the official sponsor of the terrorists.
** – only confirmed numbers are quoted here; real numbers can be higher.

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 08:32 PM

#Russia's defense minister wants to invade #Poland... b/c #Putin's crime-gang friends didn't get visas for Poland. pic.twitter.com/KpooiXwz1N

Not every day a Minister of Defense of a nuclear power makes threatening joke about Russian tanks going thru Poland! https://twitter.com/s_shoigu/status/591686606727335936 …

#Poland refuses entry to members of the Night Wolves club & others planning unauthorized ride: http://www.msz.gov.pl/en/c/MOBILE/news/information_about_the_ride_of_the_night_wolves_gro up … pic.twitter.com/Hf75yJCVeJ

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 08:44 PM

#Horlivka 11:08PM
"Artillery rumbling across the city, separatists began shelling #Mayorsk" https://twitter.com/vaself66/status/591695303314644992 …

#Horlivka 11:11PM
Kalinovka - something heavy from north-west https://twitter.com/No_fantasi/status/591696014341378048 …

Kamensk-Shakhtinsky as the staging area for weapons deployment to Ukraine: https://en.informnapalm.org/kamensk-shakhtinsky-as-the-staging-area-for-weapons-deployment-to-ukraine/ … pic.twitter.com/2GpPuBDfLt

Large #Russia|n military convoy in #Rostov yesterday
https://youtu.be/fgvNMGl5TUE

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 10:10 PM

Russian attacks were aimed at:#Marinka, #Hranitne, #Opytne #Pisky, #Avdeevka, #Mayorsk, #Lozove, #Kirove, #Shyrokyne, #Popasna & #Sokolniki.

Locals from #Stakhanov reported yesterday and today through the city an incredible amount of russian armor.

#Stakhanov 24.04.2015 - LOTs of russian tanks rollinghttps://youtu.be/85SNtOE8KKA

#News
There were 31 Russian attacks on the #Minsk2 demarcation line between midnight and 6 pm today.

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 10:11 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 10:33 PM

Possible Russian agitprop waiting for video analysis

Video Claims to Show Ukrainian Azov Battalion Crucifying a POW - But Is It Real? http://bit.ly/1GqAvfJ pic.twitter.com/Hw9GMhMg0q

Ukrainian Azov Regiment Denies Report By Russian LifeNews Agency Saying They Have Crucified a POW http://bit.ly/1GqAvfJ

Of course, video is Russian provocation & likely faked
Azov say they had nothing to do w/ it.
https://twitter.com/Polk_Azov/status/591709970623766529 … pic.twitter.com/6JicuuRlli

If memory serves... The "crucified someone" ruse/agitprop often comes before something very bad, like Blitzkrieg or Srebrenica.

Doesn't bode well. Russian agents make up vile story that "Azov" Regt crucified POW. Serb militias used such lies/agitprop in Balkans Wars.

There's a connection. Lentsov knows of this tactic: he was in Bosnia in 1996 with IFOR (Colonel of VDV Russian Brigade

Unfortunately, they were very effective: many civilians were butchered by Serb militias avenging a non-existent "crucifiction

If the "crucifixion fiction" goes mainstream in Russian media (as no doubt the FSB intend) this situation could go "Balkan" very rapidly.

How to spot the fakery:
"Hanging" is done Hollywood style
"Execution" with blanks
"Crucification" by really soft "hammering

As you can see they always fake videos about most recent bogeyman of Russia's propaganda:
First Right Sektor then Donbas Btn. now Azov Rgt

Mikael Skillt @MikaelSkillt
@GrahamWP_UK How can you tell its Ukrainian? If we start at that point.

Litmus test is whether this FSB "crucifixion fiction" goes mainstream in Russian (Kremlin) media to stir up support for war.

Everywhere we turn the Russian propaganda machine is stepping up its lies, false accusations, violent words for domestic audience in Russia.

More Russian lies: militia saying that Ukrainian forces make massive bombardment of Horlivka for 3hrs tonight. Lies! pic.twitter.com/Lt6PxF052d

More fake videos by same Russian "actors" as in tonight's video:
Fake hanging https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=afaspb564JE …
Fake execution https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1lckzAO-f4 …

Russia's "crucifixion fiction" (blatantly staged crucifixion made to blame Ukraine's Azov Regt) is starting to spread via LifeNews

Initial social media open source analysis of the “fake” video----
BLOG GRAPHIC Fake video about Azov crucifying a POW
http://ukraineatwar.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/graphic-fake-video-about-azov.html … pic.twitter.com/RaRkNlOQjB

OUTLAW 09

04-24-2015, 10:46 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 06:53 AM

Moscow Federal Police and Chechnya escalation in progress:

Chechen investigators opened a case against the Federal police http://russia.liveuamap.com/en/2015/24-april-chechen-investigators-opened-a-case-against-the …

.@aleksei_Kudrin getting edgier, accusing govt of waging "information war" against own citizens http://top.rbc.ru/politics/24/04/2015/553a241a9a79474eb5ec27bb

This "dust up among friends" is not going to go away anytime soon. Some say it might lead Chechnya to go independent.

Chechen Leader Kadyrov Demands to Know Why Investigation of Police Abuse Was Cancelled
http://www.interpretermag.com/russia-update-april-24-2015/#8045 … pic.twitter.com/LSDNSe0iRF

Putin's become hostage to Kadyrov. http://echo.msk.ru/blog/yashin/1535932-echo/ … via @IlyaYashin ht @LevShlosberg pic.twitter.com/XaVTbvDVjf

Kadyrov now railing against Alexander Bastrykin, Putin’s enforcer-in-chief, over Grozny shooting. This cd get ugly.https://instagram.com/p/14TJ3ViRvW/?taken-by=kadyrov_95 …

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 06:58 AM

LAVROV: MOSCOW OUTRAGED BY WARSAW'S REFUSAL TO ALLOW 'ROADS OF VICTORY' MOTOR RALLY ON APRIL 27-29 via Interfax

VIDEO #Putin Novo-Crap whatever idiots calling for "partisans" of Mykolaiv, #Ukraine https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCaU9WLw1x8 … pic.twitter.com/mG2SAJHUcZ

VIDEO #Ukraine Security Services discovered terrorists weapons cache in house #Kharkiv https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yaD_FHsSKnQ … #Putin pic.twitter.com/l7JasNndrA

VIDEO #Putin DNR-whatever forces on #Russia(n) MTLB (fr Samara?) wth ZSU-23-2 cannon https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HdRSJfIEGBY … #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/Tb2Y4gYbfR

Russia talks of "de-escalation" but this actually means using tactical nukes to make the other side back down says @sikorskiradek #lmc15

MUST SEE VIDEO "Blood Brothers" - Why #Lithuania feels #Ukraine painhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqfBkJNRyn0 … history #Russia #Putin pic.twitter.com/2HPjmwIIdb

Interesting is the point that somehow Moscow is "outraged" that a criminal biker gang set on provoking Poland, the Czech Republic and Germany is not "allowed" to enter the EU --by the way Russia seems to not understand that the visa free abilities of the EU Schengen free travel allows the visa issuing nation ie Germany to issue and or revoke the visa.

Moscow should know this as they were pushing for a visa free concept for Russia that was stopped by the EU.

#Novorossiya reporter reveals the map used by #Russia's #nightwolves, clearing up the confusion about #Poland. pic.twitter.com/SZaYlx1AL9

Poland, Germany & Czech Republic won't allow Night Wolves to enter their countries. Just who are they?
http://neweasterneurope.eu/articles-and-commentary/1567-night-wolves-putin-s-death-squad …

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 07:05 AM

There is some truth to this online comment from yesterday:
The whole world remembers Holocaust and Armenian Genocide where just 1,5 Mio died. Nobody cares about Holodomor where 10 Mio killed by Stalin

In old days, queens would intermarry royalty from other countries they wanted to trade with. Now leaders buy each other's energy companies

Most striking is how Germany's love for Putin has evaporated. At a conference here in Berlin nobody mentioned Putin. https://twitter.com/vpkivimaki/status/590910161914634240 …

$509bn -'pre-crisis' - to $350 bn today: fall in gold reserves, largely caused by need to support currency. http://m.gordonua.com/news/money/Zolotovalyutnye-rezervy-RF-za-nedelyu-umenshilis-eshche-na-36-mlrd-77604.html …

http://www.rbc.ru/rbcfreenews/553ab8479a79472428c2f575 … Russia’s military begins its $1-billion project to rebuild its southern railroads so they don’t intersect w/ Ukraine

Russia ‘Looks in a Mirror and Sees the USSR’ and Doesn’t Understand that Others Don’t See ItTh http://goo.gl/FE0MXn

Another solid article by this writer who fully understands Russian informational warfare.
"#Russia Uses Fluid Ideology to Undermine the #EU."by @peterpomeranzev|http://www.diplomaatia.ee/en/article/peter-pomerantsov-russia-uses-fluid-ideology-to-undermine-the-eu/ … pic.twitter.com/ymKsRuMlIM

The 30 Millimeter Solution: Army Upgunning Strykers Vs. Russia http://breakingdefense.com/2015/04/the-30-millimeter-solution-army-upgunning-strykers-vs-russia/ …

Fully agree with this because of one looks at the fighting in eastern Ukraine and the sheer amount of Russian troops and her mercenaries and the hundreds of armored vehicles the Ukrainian Army has been killing them at a rate of 1 to 5.3 over the last year and has damaged a lot of Russian heavy weapons and they were at first a rag tag group fighting for survival but have gradually evolved into a first rate combat group--maybe because their civil society fully supports them in any way possible and they are fighting for the Maidan their Lexington Green and the shot heard around the world.

"Russia is winning because it is strong-willed, not because it is strong" @edwardlucas http://www.wsj.com/articlesotable-quotable-edward-lucas-1429659176 …

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 07:20 AM

And the war is back on early this morning--the shellings and attacks if following past Russian tactics will be strong this weekend as it is leading up to their offensive--will only post major events occurring at the "traditional hot spots":

00:51 #Donetsk @HuNeHu 'Something heavy [rocket-launching] for now'
10am #Horlivka @nativesss1: there was shelling this night

#Shyrokyno - at 6:30 russians started shelling w artillery, later tanks joined. Two WIA on Ukr side reported.

Heavy Russian assault on Ukrainian positions continues in several areas, especially near Mariupol (Shyrokyne) where Ukrainians report 2 WIA

#Donetsk, #rumours
@Serzzze: They say Ukraine will advance after May9
@DeeDeeCockrache: 'It won't be surprise if DNR explodes crowd on May9'
#Donetsk #rumours @AlfaNubovsky: "They say in [UA controlled] Kramatorsk and Druzhkivka all women got draft notices and flee to DNR" :)

#Avdeevka, the edge - front line is further after 2 such fields - Opytne, Butivka, "troops body 14/28" pic.twitter.com/XTF9Q6gP4E

Another proof of #Russian weapon ATGM Kornet used in #Ukraine. More details and photos at http://lugansk-news.com/another-proof-of-russian-weapon-atgm-9m133f-1-kornet-used-in-ukraine/ … pic.twitter.com/BWAtSNo40p

.@Poroshenko: #Ukraine's army isn't going to advance yet. But we're ready for martial law if Russia will attack. http://www.pravda.com.ua/news/2015/04/24/7065812/ …

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 07:23 AM

Everywhere we turn the Russian propaganda machine is stepping up its lies, false accusations, violent words for domestic audience in Russia.

More Russian lies: militia saying that Ukrainian forces make massive bombardment of Horlivka for 3hrs tonight. Lies! pic.twitter.com/Lt6PxF052d

More fake videos by same Russian "actors" as in tonight's video:
Fake hanging https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=afaspb564JE …
Fake execution https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1lckzAO-f4 …

Russia's "crucifixion fiction" (blatantly staged crucifixion made to blame Ukraine's Azov Regt) is starting to spread via LifeNews

Initial social media open source analysis of the “fake” video----
BLOG GRAPHIC Fake video about Azov crucifying a POW
http://ukraineatwar.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/graphic-fake-video-about-azov.html … pic.twitter.com/RaRkNlOQjB

After immediate pushback from social media indicating that the "video" was a "fake" and how it was a "fake" Russian agitprop attempts stopped dead in their tracks with only Life News commonly referred to as "Lie News" airing it only once--no other Russian media outlet has carried the "fake video"--will be interesting to track how Moscow tries to get it into the agitprop news cycle.

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 07:24 AM

Actually a well formulated set of comments by the former US Russian Ambassador McFaul:

.@McFaul the former US Ambassador says. "That's why he wants perpetual conflict. No sun. No peace. This is what he wants."

.@McFaul the former US Ambassador to Moscow. "Putin's all in in Ukraine. He's fighting Nazis and evil. And that's us he's fighting."

Turkey to Putin on Armenia genocide: Who's Russia to talk given Holodomor, deportations in Ukraine, Crimea, Caucasus? pic.twitter.com/YrZd52E4lA

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 07:38 AM

Social media open source analysis of the movement of a Russian armored vehicle---

From ~ Dobrynikha near Moscow https://instagram.com/p/1kEF0iFXI1/ to Rostov in a week https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i9_k7LzL39U … Next to #Ukraine? pic.twitter.com/mm7BcCPsxj

Ukrainian activists have found documentation that proved the recent Ukrainian miners demonstration in Kyiv was organized it appeares by proRussian elements==demo was used for a long running Russian agitprop media campaign yesterday and today

In #Kyiv's Tsarske Selo district @Auto_Maidan discovered "miners" and buses, lists of names, notes on sums of money pic.twitter.com/UKkGbMwgDq

Regardless of what the EU or the US thinks--the Ukraine is deadly serious about it's transformation from a former Communist corrupted civil society to a democratic civil society based on the rule of law, transparency in government and good governance.

Have never seen the speed in transformation via reforms sometimes drastic in any other former eastern European country--but they are getting a lot of advice and assistance from Poland and the entire Baltics in this transformation process and money from the EU/US to assist in the transformation of their governmental processes AND far more critical the civil society is watching and participating in the processes.

They are now invested in their own civil society like never before as they fully realize if they want to join the EU they must prove they have the will to prove they are "European". Amazing what "visa free travel inside the EU" can drive for political changes.

AND they are reigning in the old style Soviet created oligarchs along the way--as they are the core of the corruption process.

morning news from #Ukraine:prosecutor started criminal case against biggest oligarch #Akhmentov for alleged financing of terrorists&separts

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 08:39 AM

One can now effectively state as of today the Minsk 2 is formally and officially a piece of paperwork not even worth the words written on it AND yet the two EU powers that supported it France and German say effectively nothing to the massive shellings and ground attacks of the last six days.

And the response out of the US on the pending Russian offensive is nothing but words even though they know from their ISR that the Russian invasion force sitting inside the Ukraine and on the border to the Ukraine is the largest invasion force ready for combat since WW2 AND that is an understatement.

GRAD rockets being fired in large numbers effectively kills the Minsk 2 agreement as it fully indicates Russia does not want a peaceful settlement as they always seem to argue and war is their choice.

Donbass batt reported that one of the WIA's died.
So they have 1 KIA from this morning battle at #Shyrokyne.
Few (at least 4) of the missiles hit civilian homes
Russian military vehicles in Makiivka pic.twitter.com/6T08KZUbYI http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/24-april-russian-military-vehicles-in-makiivka …

Photo seems to indicate that the Russian MRLSs can be fired in direct fire mode:
pic.twitter.com/zdWsQD9l73

Fears of New Offensive as Putin ‘Ramps up Pressure’ on Ukraine http://www.newsweek.com/putin-ramping-pressure-ukraine-border-prompting-fears-new-offensive-324863 …

Convoy of tanks moves along occupied Stakhanov, #Luhansk region. Locals note increased mil activity https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded& …

#Yasynuvataya 10:03
Somewhere from the water reservoirs hearing something like GRAD launch. https://twitter.com/666_mancer/status/591862871908347904 …

#Donetsk 10:22
Shchetinina - hearing sounds similar to the launch of missiles. https://twitter.com/DoneckiiPatriot/status/591865136819863552 …

#Russia|ns used GRADs again, launched 60 rockets at #Ukraine positions in #Hranitne, 20 at Starohnativka https://www.facebook.com/ato.news/posts/986880711322735 …

Ukrainian outpost near #Hranitne was under GRAD fire 2 times in the night at 1AM and 2AM. Russians launched 40 and 20 missiles respectively.

#Donetsk
10:15 Schetinina @DoneckiiPatriot Sporadic rumbles, 'the sound is unusual'
10:22 'Sounds like far rockets'

10:03 #Yasynuvata @666_mancer: "From reservoir direction sound similar to single #Grad volley, heavy arty volley then"@solomazheka: #Grad|s shelled from #Telmanove direction this night, locals from Karan said

10:33 #Starohnativka @Staroignatievca: There was Grad shelling this morning 'the ground vibrated', rumble again for now.

First indication of ACTUAL Russian troops now doing the fighting in Shyrokyne as the mercenaries were not making any headway:
Nothing has changed: Russian Marines in #Ukraine. Shyrokyne pic.twitter.com/koG3Xr8B2y

10:43 #Luhansk @Edward_Lugansk: Heavy explosions heard fr/#Stanytsia_Luhanska/#Schastya
@lugansk_ukraine: No confirm from Stn

Russian-backed militants fire on Ukrainian positions on Friday night http://uatoday.tv/geopolitics/russian-backed-militants-fire-on-ukrainian-positions-on-friday-night-423559.html … #Ukraine #Russia pic.twitter.com/5cMo1PISxl

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 09:13 AM

Comments on the Russian non linear warfare--"information conflict" --coming out of an ongoing conference:

Strategy for info war: stimulate critical thinking; don't try to advance counter-narrative @iponomarev #lennartmeri pic.twitter.com/D3Rab3Jo4U

.@peterpomeranzev argues - "When someone is in a cult you don't work offer them a counter narrative. You help them with critical thinking."

"I come from the world of narratives," says @peterpomeranzev "now I'm having a little holiday in the world of policy.

"Only 2% of Russian TV is on domestic issues," says @peterpomeranzev. "The 98% of the rest is Putin with kittens and chaos in Ukraine."

#lennartmeri @peterpomeranzev ! Kremlin wants endless battle of narratives which is a huge distraction from what's going on.

.@peterpomeranzev argues we need "media literacy" in the population and not Western or European counter-propoganda.
Agitprop on another level --Putin-Jugend called "Nashi" arrived in Donetsk pic.twitter.com/X7O48OEK4Q

Putin wants grand bargain with US: divide Europe into spheres if influence again, says Andrei Illarionov at #lennartmeri

Putin approach is not 19th century -- it is to restore 1945 Yalta-Potsdam world says @AnIllarionov

Illarionov at #lennartmeri: there is no non-military solution to the current situation. There is a need for a grand strategy

Brilliant by @AnIllarionov - sheep led by lion will beat lions led by sheep. West losing because of weak leadership/willpower

It's a mistake to fit Putin into categories "is he a realist" -- he is lots of things at once. He thinks we can all be bought says @McFaul

Foreign policy for Putin is all about staying in power. Bolotnaya much bigger threat than Nato. Paranoia is central says @McFaul

Putin now believes his own propaganda. He thinks he's fighting Nazis and evil. Perpetual struggle, no peace says @McFaul

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 09:36 AM

Social media source for the shellings is signing off for the day until this evening as the shellings are now relentless and to many to keep reporting on until the evening.

A serious question is posed by me now those that read these postings--have any idea why the Ukrainians ARE NOT returning fire?????

Basically they have been "indirectly told by Germany and France as well as the US throttle it back in order to get financial aid and non violent military supplies as they do not want a direct confrontation with the Russian Army".

By trying to prove to the world they are adhering to Minsk 2 they are taking wounded and killed on a daily basis and their positions are now being shelled as well daily and yet they do not fire back.

Does that make sense to any normal thinking individual these days??

This online comment today sums up the Baltic regions view on Putin/Russia:

Sweden to the OSCE @SwedeninATOSCE
@LinkeviciusL on Russian peacekeeping: "best peacekeepers: takes pieces of land and keep it!" #lennartmeri

Perfect example of the dual role Germany is playing first they push for the Minsk 1 and 2 which basically have failed and YET they say nothing, they are against any defensive weapons going to the Ukrainians especially ATMs arguing they could be viewed as "offensive" --they have been blocking the Ukraine on joining NATO and the EU for a long time and now this leaked document confirms these types of actions--ALL in the support of Russia it would appear.

So where does the loyalty of Germany actually lay NATO or as some say Russia??

In Leaked Letter, Steinmeier Urges EU To Ease Russian Concerns On Ukraine Dealhttp://www.rferl.org/content/ukraine-eu-trade-deal-steinmeier-russian-concerns/26976163.html … via @RFERL & @A22523

By mentioning allowing Russia to actually dictate the terms they want Germany is effectively allowing Russia to block the Ukraine/EU agreement thus giving Russia a future toe hold in all discussions within the EU when it comes to Russian "concerns"--actually this is tantamount to recognizing Russian de facto hegemon status over the EU.

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 09:49 AM

More social media open source analysis chasing of Russian military convoy's headed to the Ukraine THAT Putin claims are not there.

Considerable agitation here (Lviv): keep your eyes on Yeysk (Ейск) across Taganrog Bay from Mariupol/Berdyansk. [via Spock]

Russian apc convoy with painted over markings in Rostov. Headed to #Ukraine (where else?) https://instagram.com/p/15AzXLCDRz/ pic.twitter.com/pQCN9YPfDA

@el_roosevelt Backup: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tE7hzFG_-EY … Approximate geo location: 48.709897, 40.345228

The same Russian apc convoy from previous tweet, further down southhttps://archive.is/BMMbG pic.twitter.com/wTWtMuqJZ1

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
Map. Situation in eastern #Ukraine, April 25, 12:00 EET pic.twitter.com/SdTXCB4JpN

#News
An explosion along rail tracks in occupied #Luhansk injured 2 railway workers and damaged the tracks and a labor locomotive.

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 10:03 AM

#lennartmeri Lithuanian Foreign Minister's pun: #Russians are best peacekeepers. Best at taking pieces of land and keeping them.

Edward Lucas ✔ @edwardlucas
James Sherr says panel is underestimating danger. Putin knows he holds all cards in short-term, few in long-term. In a dangerous hurry

Tom Parfitt @parfitt_tom
In latest dispatch @SimonOstrovsky finds out why US is not sending any tank or missile shaped pizzas to Ukraine: https://news.vice.com/video/russian-roulette-dispatch-108 …

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 11:53 AM

New Russian base at 47.519234, 40.228288 - 50 km from #Ukraine. Buildup over time (1/2) pic.twitter.com/aKeLK2Gdmj

Insight into the new Russian base at 47.519234, 40.228288, 50km from #Ukraine https://archive.is/APMRX pic.twitter.com/eUVs2XdQ47

#Russia forces shell an ambulance near #Shyrokyne. A man killed. https://twitter.com/ya_ukrainec/status/591890900827172864 …

April 24th #Makeevka, Russian howitzers.http://youtu.be/dgxmDESChpQ
via @loogunda

Tanks in Stakhanovhttp://liveuamap.com/en/2015/25-april-tanks-in-stakhanov-- … https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=85SNtOE8KKA …

Russian fighters base at the Powders plant in Kirovskhttp://liveuamap.com/en/2015/25-april-russian-fighters-base--at-the--powders-plant-in … pic.twitter.com/dzcGGmpDEt

Top Extremism- and Terrorism-Related Stories in Russia, 18-24 Aprilhttp://extremistrussia.com/2015/04/24/top-extremism-and-terrorism-related-stories-in-russia-18-24-april-2015/ …

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 08:03 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 08:04 PM

Ukrainian ambulance with russian bullet holes. https://twitter.com/luiza_4kalova/status/591991763004366849 …

#Donetsk 19:00PM
RU hammering w self prop art/tanks fr different places: 2 pcs fr Spartak, 2 fr airport, 1 from DMP. https://twitter.com/nixer79/status/592004255277514752 …

Notice the US has been turning down Ukrainian requests for assistance since 2014.
Exclusive: Ukraine Asked U.S. for Tech to Counter Russia's Jet-Killershttp://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/07/23/exclusive-ukraine-asked-u-s-for-tech-to-counter-russia-s-jet-killers.html …

ATO presser: 32 ceasefire violations from 5AM till 7PM. #Avdiivka was shelled by russians several times w 122-mm artillery and tanks.

#Donetsk 7:47PM
From the war area hearing something heavy (self prop art/howitzer) + tanks and a bunch of small arms https://twitter.com/funkermanjke/status/592007118187790336 …

MUST READ Pro-Russian Terrorists controlling the area spent their days looting and drinking.
http://www.rferl.org/content/ukraine-war-russian-volunteer-interview/26976499.html … pic.twitter.com/HVSziCXpTV

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 08:06 PM

NATO's nuclear posture takes into account Russian doctrine of using tactical nukes to "de-escalate" in their favor @NATOdsg #LennartMeri

@OSCE_SMM: Today once again #OSCE_SMM has been prevented by "DPR" from freely accessing eastern part of #Shyrokyne http://goo.gl/wX2DDk

For 2nd day, DPR militia prevent #OSCE_SMM from freely accessing eastern part of #Shyrokyne http://goo.gl/wX2DDk https://twitter.com/OSCE_SMM/status/591984967393095683 …

RUS new Tu-241R SIGINT a/c once again having a test flight earlier today around Kazan pic.twitter.com/JswgpgrpZ1

A shell from a russian self propelled gun hit 5 yards from the soldiers of the Sheikh Mansour battalion. #Shyrokyne https://twitter.com/privvovet/status/591987735520530433 …

"US set to revive propaganda war as #Putin’s PR machine ‘undermines’ Baltic states"
http://gu.com/p/47pvg/stw
pic.twitter.com/41T6gEvldl

Russian military aircraft Tu-154 took off from Millerovo 10 km from #Ukraine border with transponder ON via @belugin pic.twitter.com/gUDN5jVawl

Novoazovsk reports: artillery, outgoing in the direction of Ukrainian forceshttp://liveuamap.com/en/2015/25-april-novoazovsk-reports-artillery-outgoing-in-the-direction …
That's not strictly true, as rocket-assiated 122mm shell can reach 20km (ish). And Ruskies are experimenting.

Militants now claims that North of Horlivka is under Ukrainian shelling, and we have some reports on outgoing fire there

In Crimea, Russian military equipment being moved to the border with Ukraine 25 April https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JdguEPDVKdk

In Zaporozhye SBU detained arms dealers from the area of the ATO. http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/25-april-in-zaporozhye-sbu-detained-arms-dealers-from-the … pic.twitter.com/NqySV27sN3

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 08:08 PM

Interesting is the point that somehow Moscow is "outraged" that a criminal biker gang set on provoking Poland, the Czech Republic and Germany is not "allowed" to enter the EU --by the way Russia seems to not understand that the visa free abilities of the EU Schengen free travel allows the visa issuing nation ie Germany to issue and or revoke the visa.

Moscow should know this as they were pushing for a visa free concept for Russia that was stopped by the EU.

#Novorossiya reporter reveals the map used by #Russia's #nightwolves, clearing up the confusion about #Poland. pic.twitter.com/SZaYlx1AL9

Poland, Germany & Czech Republic won't allow Night Wolves to enter their countries. Just who are they?
http://neweasterneurope.eu/articles-and-commentary/1567-night-wolves-putin-s-death-squad …

So Russia. Biker gang Night Wolves spit on Poland/Czech ban. They're going to Berlin anyway. http://joinfo.ua/inworld/1087119_Nochnie-volki-nachali-svoy-probeg-nesmotrya.html … pic.twitter.com/cEb8ek7G6H

In unusually stern warning, Germany says it is prepared to take all necessary measures to stop Night Wolves. pic.twitter.com/zPalhstBEk

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 08:18 PM

https://en.informnapalm.org/summary-of-informnapalm-team-as-of-23rd-of-april-2015/

Summary of InformNapalm team as of 23rd of April 2015

Russian Military Assessment

Summaries

We have observed the increasing size of the militant forces in Luhansk. According to our insiders, most of the soldiers look like newly recruited conscripts. One could jump to the conclusion that the LNR leadership has started its mobilization. However, noting the arrival of more Russian detachments on the Ukrainian border, this build -up is more likely linked to the rotation of Russian forces.

On the 22nd April we observed in Luhansk the setting up of a mobile communication center consisting of seven units. Regarding recent events, leading to the transfer of Kazak groups to being under the leadership of LNR headed by I; Plotnitskyi, one can speculate that forces are being gathered either for a large scale maneuver or in preparation for a full-scale offensive. Deployment of part of militant forces from Luhansk towards the West, as well as transfer of the part of the second tier forces to the North, in our analysis supports the latter option. Further movements we detected included the movement of militant detachments up to a division-tactical group’s size from Krasnyi Luch towards Stakhanov on the 23rd.

DNR marking of their equipment in Horlivka with tactical insignia also suggests the preparation of the offense in northern direction. In the past few days we have observed a high level of activity among militant detachments, which practice drill combat coherency near the settlement. Unconfirmed information indicated that the commander of one of terrorist detachments obtained the task to scout the direction Horlivka-Dzerzhynsk. This can indicate the intention to break through Konstyantynivka, or, as we mentioned in a previous summary, the preparation to cut the zones of responsibility in sectors Horlivka-Dobropillya.

Regarding the marking of tactical insignia on the tops of trucks and armored vehicles we can speculate that militant forces might be planning on the use aircraft (perhaps light airplanes which were on the DOSAAF bases before the conflict) or for to assist with identification when using armed UAVs. The militants continue to test Ukrainian defenses near the settlement of Mayorsk, focussing their forces in the settlement Golmivskyi. This situation also reinforces the probability of an attack from Horlivka to Artemivsk.

Thus, the most problematic direction is the northern one, namely assaults in the directions of Horlivka-Artemivsk and Pervomaysk-Artemivsk. A breakthrough in these directions will potentially allow the militants to to create a “cauldron” near the settlements Myronivskyi, Svitlodarsk, and develop the attack towards Slavyansk in order to block the ATO headquarters in the settlement Kramatorsk from its transfer to the settlement of Izyum (which previously served as headquarters for the Ukrainian ATO forces).

According to information from Donetsk insiders, the equipment of militants continues to arrive in the city. On 23rd April insiders were able to witness the movement of a convoy consisting of 6 tanks T-72, up to 20 infantry combat vehicles (BMP) and multi-purpose light-armored towing vehicles (MTLB). Noting the `cordon and cleansing’ events in the morning, we can speculate that local militia groups are been replaced by the regular Russian army. According to our information, the most combat ready and experienced militant groups were sent to the settlement Shyrokyne, but without equipment. The equipment to this area was transported directly from Russia. But an attack on Shyrokyne-Mariupol remains questionable. We still believe it will be a diversionary move, and the main offence direction in this sphere will remain Olenivka-Andriivka and Styla-Dokuchajevsk – Volnovakha.

As to the direction Schastya and Stanycia Luhanska, here the probability of an attack from the border of the Russian Federation has been increased. This hypothesis is supported by growing activities of of special operation groups, which undermine the supply routes of the ATO forces. These special forces groups are operating from bases located in the RF (according to the communication of the governor of Luhansk oblast). By doing that, RF army is testing for weak spots in the defense of eastern border of Luhansk oblast.

Consolidation of the military equipment in the area of Pervomaisk-Stakhanov can indicate the preparing of the offensive on Lysychansk, which will allow the militants to cover the right flank of strike force assaulting in the northern direction. However, limited information does not allow for a complete analysis of the situation in that area. It is disturbing to note the beginning of pro-Russian / separatist broadcasting aim at the population within Ukraine controlled Donetsk and Luhansk regions, utilizing powerful FM-radio stations. The enemy initiated a (dis)information campaign in the Pervomaisk area seemingly with the objective of whipping up hysteria; possibly to hide their own maneuvers in taking up positions at the line of contact with the Ukrainian army in this area.

We should admit the increasing activity of the enemy aimed at destabilizing the situation in large cities of Ukraine. Examples of this are the recent explosions in Kharkiv and two unauthorized meetings on 23.04 (people in hoodies blocking the city ring road). Possibly, a provocation will be organized in Kyiv before the offensive, the objective of which will be the physical blocking or elimination of one or more key Ukrainian leaders.

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 08:58 PM

Russian shellings and attacks are really up tonight especially with heavy artillery and MRLs.

The battalion "Ghost" in Kirovsk pic.twitter.com/ZBe8Ay48lp http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/25-april-the-battalion-ghost-in-kirovsk- …

Russian military vehicles on base in #Yasinovataya pic.twitter.com/A7aLBz0h5i http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/25-april-russian-military-vehicles-on-base-in-yasinovataya …

#Horlivka center 8:46PM
Hearing firing coming from all types of weapons, including heavy. https://twitter.com/15SVET15/status/592021934390513665 …

#Horlivka 6/7, #Mayorsk intense battle: small arms, large, mortars, hearing rumblings.
8:14PM https://twitter.com/062_Region/status/592013717451190272 …

Russian fighters base at the Powders plant in #Kirovsk pic.twitter.com/tZopkDH1IY http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/25-april-russian-fighters-base--at-the--powders-plant-in …

East #Ukraine militants to hold video call with international contact group http://uatoday.tv/geopolitics/east-ukraine-militants-to-hold-video-call-with-international-contact-group-423611.html … pic.twitter.com/TegRiUrKRs

Geoffrey Pyatt ✔ @GeoffPyatt
@shelomovskiy: 3 T-72 rebel tanks have entered Donetsk from the east. This might be another indication of buildup pic.twitter.com/v5PcJWZebX

Shellings are getting heavier and the Russian mercenary leader is complaining that they need help because the Ukrainians ARE attacking them???

Ukrainian positions are basically not returning fire in order not to be blamed for violating Minsk 2--does that make any sense to anyone????

#Dzerzhynsk 23:22
"Powerful explosions can be heard in the distance - in interval of 10-15 seconds". https://twitter.com/blessmaster/status/592061314148769794 …

#Avdiivka 11:33PM
Hearing firing from #Optyne area. https://twitter.com/rechnikato/status/592063977737297920 …

#Horlivka 11:23PM
Artillery working again. https://twitter.com/DobryShubin/status/592061341957005312 …

Stanytsia Luhanskaya 10:29
Hearing firing, many guns in full swing. https://twitter.com/UkroSpider/status/592047853855465472 …

They may be hearing the RU artillery from Horlivka

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 09:02 PM

Zakharchenko:we want all #DonetskRegion,our army is 83k,we didn't withdraw weapons as we need fight back.Truth serum? pic.twitter.com/o4
ogXMr82t

NOTICE he basically admits violating Minsk 2 because he did not pull back his heavy weapons--simply because it is the Ukrainians fault.

http://tass.ru/en/world/791797

DPR: volatile situation in Donbass demands interference of world’s community
April 25, 18:55 UTC+3

MOSCOW, April 25. /TASS/. Donbass is facing a rather volatile situation which needs an urgent interference of the international community keen on the conflict de-escalation, the spokesman for the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic’s (DPR) Defence Ministry said on Saturday.

"The Ukrainian side is doing everything possible, on an incredibly regular basis, in order to disrupt the Minsk agreements," Eduard Basurin said. "We call on the international community and all the sides involved in the negotiation process to increase a direct political pressure on Ukraine’s government and to secure fulfilment of the Minsk agreements by official Kiev."

The DPR believes that there is no alternative to a political solution to the conflict and "all the attempts to disrupt the peace process should have an international evaluation," he said.

"We also call on the Ukrainian authorities to launch a full-fledged dialogue with the DPR and to proceed from the fact that the only civilised way out is a political settlement of all contradictions," Basurin said.

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 09:05 PM

And now the US response is what......more silence and press statements from DoS??????

Ru surrounded Ukr from three directions. 100,000 troops & over 500 tanks deployed at border http://en.censor.net.ua/n275708 pic.twitter.com/Es3Dp80o47

These were figures from middle March and in the last six days the convoys have been massive.

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 09:20 PM

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 09:30 PM

A really great article –need to fully understand it
http://www.diplomaatia.ee/en/article/peter-pomerantsov-russia-uses-fluid-ideology-to-undermine-the-eu/

Special Edition • April 2015
Peter Pomerantsov: Russia Uses Fluid Ideology to Undermine the EU

OUTLAW 09

04-25-2015, 09:50 PM

http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.be/2015/04/20-questions-for-those-who-back-putins.html

Saturday, April 25, 2015

20 Questions for Those Who Back Putin’s Aggression in Ukraine

Paul Goble

Staunton, April 25 – Viktor Kadochnikov, a Russian blogger, poses 20 questions that he suggests those who support Vladimir Putin’s aggression in Ukraine should be asking themselves. If they do and if they are honest, they won’t be able to support the Kremlin leader’s policies any more.

Below, in summary form, are the 20 questions he says they should be confronted with. (rufabula.com/author/kado4nikov/467).

1. “Why are Donetsk and Luhansk ‘Novorossiya,’ but when a passenger jet crashes in the this territory is instantly transformed into Ukraine?”

2. “Mercenary activity is a crime in Russia. Why don’t ‘the militia men’ who come from Russia and are paid not fall under this provision of the law?”

3. “The war is costing Ukraine several million dollars a day. It is logical to assume that it isn’t costing its opponent any less. Do you really think that Russia isn’t giving the so-called Novorossiya military and financial help?”

4. “Why is it that everywhere where the militias liberate, there is war? … Why are the so-called punitive operations only where there are ‘militias’?”

5. “Why must Ukraine hand over to band formations territories that legally belong to it? If the Ukrainian military doesn’t want to do this, does that make them punitive detachments?”

6. Given the number of times Vladimir Putin has changed his story on Crimea, “is it possible to believe him now when he asserts that there are no Russian forces in the Donbas? If so, then why?”

7. “How can one explain the fact” that Moscow has brought criminal charges against Russian citizens who are fighting for Ukraine but not against Russians who are fighting in Ukraine against the Ukrainian government?

8. Do you consider the use by the militias of civilians as human shields something deserving of respect?

9. How would you react if some American said as Igor Strelkov has that without an invasion, nothing much would have occurred?

10. The Russian defense ministry has promised to provide five million rubles to the families of soldiers who “have died at the Ukrainian border.” “Are you not interested in why [the details of their deaths] are being hidden from you?”

11. Given that Moscow disperses opposition meetings, how do you think Vladimir Putin would react if some group seized administration buildings and proclaimed the creation of its own statehood on Russian territory? : Would Putin take measures or perhaps sit down with the terrorists to negotiate” as he demands that Kyiv do?

12. “Why does every Ukrainian patriot, who wears Ukrainian symbols, sings the Ukrainian humn, supports the unity of his country and speaks against separatism automatically become a Banderite and fascist? Under what article of the criminal code?”

13. Are all pieces of evidence of the presence of Russian troops in Ukraine, even those offered by Russian soldiers, forgeries produced in the West?

14. “Comrade Putin frequently has declared that Russia is not a side in the conflict and that he personally respects and supports the territorial integrity of Ukraine. If that is really so, then why hasn’t Russia closed the border from its side so that volunteers (and not only they) from the Russian Federation do not have the opportunity to cross it in order to fight against the territorial integrity of Ukraine?”

15. The Russian government last August explained the appearance of Russian troops in Ukraine by saying that they had crossed the border by mistake. “Do you really believe this? What would be your reaction if NATO soldiers ‘accidently became confused’ somewhere near Vladivostok?”

16. “Why has Russia not once condemned the ‘Novorossiya’ militants and not once called ont hem to lay down their arms first? At the same time, officials of the Russian Federation have frequently called on Ukrainian soldiers to lay down their arms and leave the Ukrainian Donbas to the bandits. Why in all federal media is only one side given positive coverage?”

17. How do you explain the fact that the forces of the DNR and LNR, hard-pressed as they were last August, suddenly “opened a new front in the direction of Mariupol and seized Novoazovsk? Who did this in fact: the forces of ‘the militias,’ whom the Ukrainian army had successfully contained or Russian soldiers without uniform markings who supposedly weren’t there?”

18. Why does Belarus, so “close to Russia, support the territorial integrity of Ukraine and not agree with Putin’s imperialist plans? Why does Lukashenka, Putin’s ally in the Customs Union consider that there is no fascism as a mass phenomenon in Ukraine and say that it is necessary to destroy the militants fighting against Ukraine?”

19. Do you believe Russian officials when they say that 12 Pskov soldiers did not die fighting in Ukraine but rather “by chance” died from heart attacks, suicides and accidents all at the same time?

20. “What are the ‘Novorossiya’ militants fighting for and what is the use of what they are doing?”

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 06:41 AM

http://www.rferl.org/content/ukraine-war-russian-volunteer-interview/26976499.html

Ukraine
'Cutthroats And Bandits': Volunteer's Stint With Ukraine Rebels Turns To Nightmare

By Dmitry Volchek and Claire Bigg

April 25, 2015

When he joined the separatist insurgency in eastern Ukraine, Russian businessman Bondo Dorovskikh thought he would be fighting hordes of fascists bent on victimizing the local population.

The reality on the ground turned out to be quite different.

Instead of defending eastern Ukraine, Dorovskikh says he found himself stranded in the town of Alchevsk, where pro-Russian rebels controlling the area spent their days looting and drinking.

"In the morning the commander would get up and line up the insurgents for the roll-call, and in the evening there were another roll-call," he told RFE/RL. "The rest of the time the militants roamed around Alchevsk, pillaging, stealing scrap metal, removing metal gates and selling them to buy alcohol and cigarettes. Some of them would get drunk and fire at each other."

Dorovskikh recently returned from his six-month stint with the insurgents, feeling angry and cheated.

Like many other volunteers, he decided to take up arms after watching Russian television reports that portrayed Ukrainian forces in the country's east as neo-Nazi thugs persecuting and slaughtering Russian-speaking locals.

"Reports from the Rossia 24 channel on the latest news in Ukraine were constantly on my mind," he says. "The media influenced me."

Dorovskikh contacted the insurgency through its recruitment office in Moscow, where he was given a mobile phone number to call when he reached the southern city of Rostov, close to Ukraine's border.

He left his job in Moscow and purchased ammunition, a bulletproof vest, and a one-way ticket to Rostov.

He then called the number he had been given in Moscow and received instructions on how to reach the group that would take him to Ukraine.

He was stunned to find out that recruiters in Rostov did not bother asking about his military experience and failed to conduct even basic identity checks on anybody.

"There were people there who didn't have any documents at all," he says.

Another incident soon confirmed his misgivings about the insurgency.

"The first thing we saw after crossing the border, literally five minutes later, was a brawl between two insurgents," he says. "I immediately understood where I had landed, that this had nothing to do with an army. I was disappointed right from the start."

Dorovskikh was assigned to the "Ghost" battalion and sent to a unit in Alchevsk, where he was immediately handed weapons.

He says the unit was comprised of local militants, Russian volunteers, several Russian army officers, and a handful of foreign recruits from Spain, Italy, and France.

But Dorovskikh never witnessed any combat in Alchevsk. He received no training, either.

According to him, the vast majority of militants have no interest whatsoever in politics and only join the insurgencyto enjoy the salaries and material advantages granted to its members.

He describes them as "bandits" and says some of the local militants in his unit were convicts who were hunting down former police officers ousted when the separatists took over.

He says rebels also routinely turned against their own comrades-in-arms. "Robberies and murders took place there," he says.

Dorovskikh's account also corroborates reports that Russia is supplying the insurgents with weapons. Militants who crossed over from Russia, he says, are particularly well equipped.

"We had everything, we were fully equipped," he says. "We had grenades, machine guns, grenade launchers and ammunition for them, absolutely everything. We even had two cars at our disposal."

Video provided by Bondo Dorovskikh showing him displaying some of the weapons owned by his rebel unit in eastern Ukraine:

http://svobodanews.share.rferl.org/media/video/26961102.html

He also confirms that the tanks spotted in eastern Ukraine come from Russia and describes seeing tanks being sent into Ukraine from the Rostov region.

"They gathered volunteers who had served in armored divisions in the army," he says. "They were trained at a tank training base near Rostov, units were formed, they were also given weapons. These tanks were transported to the border, which they then crossed on their own and headed directly to the hotspots."

After several idle weeks in Alchevsk, Dorovskikh left his unit and headed to the town of Nikishino, on the front line.

Video provided by Bondo Dorovskikh showing him and other rebels camping out in a destroyed house in Nikishino:

http://svobodanews.share.rferl.org/media/video/26957408.html

What he witnessed there only fueled his disillusionment.

He says that the fighters had no clear instructions and that the tank radios did not function, resulting in chaotic battles.

He says the insurgents also took part in shocking acts of cruelty against Ukrainian soldiers. He recalls hearing the screams of Ukrainian soldiers on the radio as rebels torched their tanks with the men still inside.

"I felt sorry for those on the other side who were being slaughtered," he says. "And they were being killed by cutthroats who don't even care against whom they are fighting."

Dorovskikh says he is not an exception. Disenchanted Russian volunteers, he claims, are streaming back home. He is himself so upset that he is mulling enrolling in Ukraine's National Guard to help stamp out the separatists.

But for now, he has a message for all those still tempted to join the insurgency. "Don't go there," he urges them. "We are told on television this is like the Second World War, but in fact it's an act of pure aggression. This is not a war that's worth risking the most precious thing you have."

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 07:40 AM

Just another day in the Ukraine and the shellings, attacks and Russian convoys arriving just keep on happening--and the West remains silent throughout it.

Minsk 2 agreement is dead and buried--exists just in paper form only.

THIS is though a troubling development as it indicates the mercenaries are now changing to a "Holy War" something that has been written often in the Russian media and is being pushed by the Russian Orthodox Church under the concept of "the third Rome".

Large convoy from Russian Orthodox Army thru Stakhanov yesterday 4/25https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPiOOIqhWgw … pic.twitter.com/MFzCoL8oic

Good morning #Ukraine: #Shyrokyne under attack this morning. In #Donetsk many locals report about heavy outgoing fire.

#Donetsk residents from many districts report hearing heavy outgoing fire.

At 6:40 russian artillery started shelling Ukrainian positions at #Shyrokyne http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/26-april-at-640-russian-artillery-started-shelling-ukrainian …

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 07:43 AM

#Ukraine's Prosecutor Gen. officially opened a case against oligarch Rinat #Akhmetov susp. in financing #separatism & #terrorism in #Donbas

ICDS Tallinn @ICDS_Tallinn
"Russ Military" Good News: Russia does not have troops for sustained war. Bad News: Increased reliance on nuclear capacity #lennartmeri

ICDS Tallinn @ICDS_Tallinn
"Russ Military" Russian conventional force more mobile, more flexible, more usable and will continue to improve #lennartmeri

ICDS Tallinn @ICDS_Tallinn
"Info Wars" Strategy of Russian media in Ukraine: amplify so many conspiracy theories that no one knows what is true - See MH17 #lennartmeri

Thus interview will reinforce the current Russian info war messaging that all the current problems and wars are the fault of the US as the "West has changed"--notice nothing mentioned on just how Russia has changed and is basically violating seven different international agreements they themselves have signed.

http://russian.rt.com/article/87832 @VRSoloviev’s new interview with Putin airs tomorrow, where Putin says the West has changed & disappointed everyone

Russia's chip showing? RT propagandist chief @M_Simonyan complains wasn't asked, just got both fish & meat at #WHCDhttps://twitter.com/M_Simonyan/status/592130436647653376 …
BTW--this individual is on the sanctions list and still made it to DC

Interesting article on strategic strategy which the Us does not have either in the ME or the Ukraine:

LTG (R) Mike Flynn @MTPFLYNN
Coach Mike Krzyzewski on U.S. Islamic State strategy and basketball--Coach K nails how to play strategic poker.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/posttv/sports/coach-mike-krzyewski-on-us-islamic-state-strategy-and-basketball/2014/11/04/37fdc6aa-646e-11e4-ab86-46000e1d0035_video.html

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 07:47 AM

Seems that both Putin and his Foreign Minister are not quite up to date with their constant statements “there are no Russian troops and or equipment in the Ukraine”—THEN how did the Russian MoD get there—and “they are not Russians”????

#Russia|n MoD on the ground, supporting operations in eastern #Ukraine
Source video: https://youtu.be/TIVxfxmxGtA?t=2m10s …
w/ Eng subs

#Russia|n Ministry of Defense filmed overseeing a subversive Vostok DNR mission in Krasnogorovka, east #Ukraine.
pic.twitter.com/7iRshU5HcA

BTW--the Vostok unit is from former Ukrainian special police who fled after the Maidan out of fear of being arrested for killing over 100 demonstrators.

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 09:42 AM

First we get the Russian General Staff complaining that the US is conducting phase one hybrid warfare against Russia when they started it and NOW we get the Russian biker gang saying it is Poland who is waging hybrid warfare against them—they can dish it out but seem to complain when it comes back at them???

Poland is waging unofficial hybrid war against Russia! - the Surgeon pic.twitter.com/KP5pXnGnyw

Russian Night Wolves have arrived in the Polish city of Braniewo. No problems at the border

How Russian propaganda works pic.twitter.com/Mba95n4AzW

Numbers-Stations.com @Spy_Stations
7009 kHz S32 the Squeaky wheel active again

Apr25 19:25 #Shakhtarsk @Helgi__UA: 3 SPG Gvozdika, 2 Ural trucks towards #Donetsk

#Uspenka @Helgi__UA "Lots of trucks in queue to Ukraine w/one layer of green boxes in all trailers on Apr24" [source: @Helgi__UA's friend]

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
Map. Situation in eastern #Ukraine, April 26, 12:00 EET pic.twitter.com/4Bwoyzd1zf

Russian ceasefire.
This is the former children's camp in #Shyrokyno.
#Mariupol https://twitter.com/rechnikato/status/592239683192659969

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 09:43 AM

ATO spox: In the night Ukrainian positions near #Mayorsk was shelled with 152-mm artillery.

@Guderian_Xaba Fighting continued near Stanitsya Luhanska and Krymske, shootout w automatic weapons. Shchastya was also shelled by RU.

Gov. Moskal: The russians shelled the village Troitske with mortars at 5AM, hit mostly residential areas. No casualties reported.

ATO reported 59 ceasefire violations from 5AM-12PM yday. Russians copy/paste that and reported that Ukr violated the ceasefire 59 times.

#News
Also this morning (from 6 to 7), Battalion #Donbas and Regiment #Azov were under heavy #Russian artillery fire in #Shyrokyne.

@Guderian_Xaba At 7:05 RU tanks joined the battle. Ukr responded w 82-mm mortars. RU suffered losses and requested a ceasefire

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 09:45 AM

Double-think, double-talk today different from SU. People are lying to themselves. Not willing to face truth: A. Levinson

Levinson: Russians don't want to know truth. Lying is welcomed. Truth of Russian troops in Ukraine is widely known. #lennartmeri

David Patrikarakos @dpatrikarakos
Talking to people in eastern #Ukraine what struck me was people parroting endless mantras about #Novorossiya that they barely understood

David Patrikarakos @dpatrikarakos
namely that #Ukraine is fascist; that #Russia moves only to 'protect' #Russia|n speakers has a far greater global reach & effect.

David Patrikarakos @dpatrikarakos
#Russia|n boots on the ground are devastating #Ukraine but it's info wars: the practise of so-called non-linear war and its narrative

David Patrikarakos @dpatrikarakos
If #Russia's de facto invasion of #Ukraine teaches us one thing it is that the battlefield is no longer the most important arena of warfare

ICDS Tallinn @ICDS_Tallinn
.@mashagessen Lack of confrontation about Soviet past in 90s has paved way to Putin claiming continuity of Russia as superpower #lennartmeri

ICDS Tallinn @ICDS_Tallinn
$10 bln leaves Russia every month & continuing. This is affecting reserves & will put Russia in liquidity crisis @andersaslund #lennartmeri

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 09:50 AM

We have now the second day in a row of 50 and or more attacks at day which indicates now that the full scale fighting is back on.

The Ukrainians still only return fire when the artillery and or ground attacks start to threaten their actual positions--Russian heavy artillery and MRLS is in use in direct violation of Minsk 2 but the entire Western civilian leadership does not seem to care any more--silence out of their capitals.

ATO reported 59 ceasefire violations from 5AM-12PM yday. Russians copy/paste that and reported that Ukr violated the ceasefire 59 times.

Notice now the mercenaries no longer even try to come up with Ukrainian attacks they just copy and paste.

Notice that yesterday the Russian General in the JCCC stated the attacks were 100-150 per day what were they smoking??????

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 11:06 AM

"Donbas" Battalion pltn cmdr: Russan militia regularly fire on Ukrainian positions at #Shyrokyne with 82mm/120mm mortars, tanks & howitzers.

Russian militia want to turn the "Lighthouse" at #Shyrokyne into a second Donetsk Airport http://www.mariupol.tv/news/war/mariupol/3602/boeviki_hotyat_prevratit_mayak_pod_shirokino_vo_vt oroj_doneckij_aeroport_video.html … via @Mariupol_TV

Seems the so call DNR government cannot provide food for “their portion of the Ukraine”
Queue for food in Torez http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/26-april-queue-for-food-in-torez … pic.twitter.com/5PrMRSgKdL

Infowar can be described as Russian massive invasion vs Western trench war. Damaging inconsistency. Damaging for the West. #lennartmeri

12:08 #Rovenki #rumours @olegroven9: "On the May01 [Akhmetov's] DTEK passes Rovenkiantratsit coal enterprise out to Russia

1 #Ukrainian serviceman was killed in action, 7 got wounded in the last day - daily report on situation in #ATO zone http://mediarnbo.org/2015/04/26/zvedeni-dani-shhodo-situatsiyi-u-zoni-ato-na-26-kvitnya/ …

#Russian #propaganda - shopped photo of UKR UPA veterans on the left and the original @Serzzze: pic.twitter.com/a7jNbM073A #ruscism

Will we see a quick take of bridges that connects #Krim to Ukraine for a safe passage of soldiers if RU decide to take #Odessa from W & S

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 06:30 PM

And the evening Russian shelling routine sets in again:

Dnipro-1 battalion reorted on their FB page that with the support of the Army they've destroyed russian terrorists warehouse in #Dzerzhynsk

Dnipro1, army destroyed enemy's depot of artillery, ammo in Dzerzhynske, armour near Sakhanka https://www.facebook.com/1485326845082813/photos/a.1510643419217822.1073741829.1485326845082813/1580007585614738/?type=1 … pic.twitter.com/KTbW1WulmV

ATO presser: Significant increase in the number of attacks, 46 ceasefire violations reported today from midnight till 6PM

think this is the highest numer since Minsk2!
And we keep talking about ceasefire-violations, but there was no ceasefire..
18:25 #Shchastya was heavily shelled by Ru forces for first time since the official cease-fire @AlexRychkoff pic.twitter.com/PUjriXUx29

#Avdiivka 7:34PM
Shelling has started, volleys every 10 seconds. https://twitter.com/rechnikato/status/592366247054020608 …

19:27 @Shimshen: "After today's shellings I'll keep cellar's door open. #Shyrokyne is just 7 km away from here"

#Horlivka 19:40
Heavy shelling has started. https://twitter.com/GirkinGirkin/status/592367082546864130 …

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 06:31 PM

Powerful explosion in #Donetsk right now. Smoke rising from the airport or #Pisky direction. pic.twitter.com/KSiNEKkrBn

#Donetsk Putilovka
18:55 @GirkinGirkin: smoke became heavier pic.twitter.com/Uw5QIL2euU
@DeeDeeCockrache: Looks like fuel tankers

#News
Batt.Donbas & Reg.Azov say their position in #Shyrokyne becomes a 2nd #Donetsk #airport.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRVO0HpnRxw …
And they are right

Column of heavy equipment in Georgievka (#Luhansk region). Uploaded today.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tjA2Il_NUuY …

Yep.It's another #Russian_army column,the same place I geolocated one 3 days ago.Maybe their new sup route.https://twitter.com/Conflict_Report/status/591327816492326912 …

Ukraine Serviceman Killed, Kyiv Claims Truce Violations http://www.rferl.org/content/ukraine-fighting-truce-violations/26979241.html …

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 06:32 PM

20:33 #Avdeevka @bamr69 Shelling fr/#Yasynuvata-#Mineralne
21:00 #Horlivka Holma @GirkinGirkin tanks near the cemetery lulled

20:27 #Avdeevka @bamr69: All day #Pisky was shelled, now #Opytne
20:30 south of #Donetsk @ropogckou: Quiet here

20:11 #Makeevka @OldHistoric: It's got dark and volleys from #Yasynuvata direction started.

Heavy shelling has started again in #Horlivka shortly after sunset http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/26-april-heavy-shelling-has-started-again-in-horlivka-shortly …

@Guderian_Xaba RU were kepping there artillery and weapons. Dnipro-1 also blew up heavy russian armor at #Sakhanka.

Dnipro-1 said that this is not a violation of Minsk agr., bcs Sakhanka is on Ukr side of demarcation line, but occupied by RU

This could be the warehouse Dnipro-1 battalion blow up at Dzerzhynske today

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 06:42 PM

http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2015/04/half-of-russian-army-soldiers-now.html …

Sunday, April 26, 2015

Half of Russian Army Soldiers Now Working on Contract Basis, Defense Ministry Says

Paul Goble

Staunton, April 26 – Yesterday, Deputy Defense Minister Nikolay Pankov said that 50 percent of the uniformed personnel of the Russian Army are working on contract as professionals rather than as draftees, a figure that has been achieved as a result of difficulties in the civilian economy and of new benefits extended to those who sign up.

But precisely for that combination of reasons, the Russian military is unlikely to be able to meet its plans to move toward an all-professional army anytime soon if the country maintains a military of its current size, the economy improves or the government is unable to continue to boost benefits for servicemen and women.

Even if all those things obtain, the declining size of the prime draft age or military service pool will mean that professional military personnel will effectively take people away from jobs in the civilian sector and become a choke point on the future economic development of the Russian Federation.

Moreover, the drive toward professionalism while it almost certainly would lead to a more skilled military is likely to be opposed by senior generals who still place a high value on the kind of massive force structures that is only possible with a draft and one that takes people into the service for relatively short periods.

Nonetheless, Pankov’s statement is an indication of what the defense ministry is currently trying to do. He said that “Today, we have 300,000 contract soldiers who are serving either in the ranks or as sergeants and about 200,000 officers. And, in this way, the deputy minister continued, “50 percent of our army is a contract one” (polit.ru/news/2015/04/25/army/).
According to Pankov, “interest in contract service has grown thanks to the conditions which are being created for military personnel.” More than 50,000 of those serving on contract “have been able to use military-backed mortgages” and thus obtain housing (polit.ru/news/2015/04/25/military_mortgage/).

Three weeks ago, Col.Gen. Viktor Goremykin, the chief of the defense ministry’s manpower administration, said that Moscow plans to have all the junior command staff be professionals rather than draftees and will increase the number of contractors in the ranks by 50,000 more than Pankov says the army has now (polit.ru/news/2015/04/03/contract/).

That will be an enormously expensive undertaking, and the Russian government will have to divert funds from other sectors, including education and public health, if it is to meet that goal, an indication that a professional army does not solve Russia’s military problems and may in fact be beyond its reach unless the economy remains in the doldrums or worse.

But Vladimir Putin may see one great advantage to a professional army, an advantage that he may be willing to beggar the rest of the country to get: Draft-based armies provide a closer check on leaders than do professional ones because the draftees are closer to the rest of the population and more likely to register its objections than are the professionals.

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 06:51 PM

http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.de/2015/04/putin-cant-conquer-ukraine-but-he-can.html

Sunday, April 26, 2015

Putin Can’t Conquer Ukraine But He Can Start a Third World War, Smeshko Says

Paul Goble

Staunton, April 26 – In an address to the Lennart Meri Conference in Tallinn yesterday, Igor Smeshko pointed to one of the most dangerous asymmetries of the situation in Ukraine: Vladimir Putin, he said, cannot occupy Ukraine and subdue a partisan war, but the Kremlin leader can “provoke a global conflict.”

The former head of the SBU and an advisor to Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, says this is the reason that the conflict must be of concern to all of Europe and the West more generally (gordonua.com/news/war/Smeshko-Okkupirovat-Ukrainu-i-vyigrat-partizanskuyu-voynu-s-ney-nevozmozhno-no-vpolne-realno-sprovocirovat-konflikt-globalnogo-masshtaba-77653.html).

“The armed conflict in Ukraine is not simply a local contest between Ukraine and Russia but a clash between two civilizations, the Euro-Atlantic and the so-called ‘Russian world,’” Smeshko said. Were Ukraine to lose, this would be “a threat not only for the post-Soviet space, including the Baltic countries but for all of Europe.”

What is at stake, he argued, is whether Russia will be able to “stop the processes of European integration,” acquire a strong voice in European affairs, and set itself up as a global counterweight to the United States.

Asked why Vladimir Putin decided to engage in this direct confrontation of the West, Smeshko said that Moscow was shocked by the two Maidan protests in Ukraine in 2004 and 2014. “Those protests showed,” he said, “that a developed civil society already exists in Ukraine and that the ideas of democracy are spreading ever closer to Russian borders.”

“The conversion of Ukraine into a flourishing and strong democratic country would be a death sentence for the existing authoritarian regime in Russia and even represent a danger for its disintegration,” the Ukrainian presidential advisor said. Consequently, Putin felt he had to suppress Ukraine in order to protect his personal power.

A second reason Putin has moved in Ukraine, Smeshko says, is that the West has not pursued a sufficiently well-developed security strategy. Instead, “the leadership of the US has been concentrated not on the development of Euro-Atlantic civilization but on the problems of ‘global peace,’ and this could have played a role.”

Putin will pursue his plans to restore a post-Soviet empire “just as far as he is permitted to do so,” the former intelligence agency head said, adding that his listeners should remember what the ancient Romans said: “”Strength restrains; weakness provokes.”” That is true “not only regarding Ukraine,” he argued.

The current conflict may go on for a long time, given the size of the countries involved, but Smeshko suggested that it will not be solved by military means alone. Ukrainians will continue to fight and consequently, it will be “impossible” for Moscow “to occupy Ukraine and win a partisan war” there.

Smeshko said that in addition to the fortitude and bravery of ordinary Ukrainians, Western sanctions on Russia are “working.” Moscow cannot now “repeat the Crimean scenario in the east of Ukraine,” and it faces ever more problems at home. The question now is how long will Russians believe they see on television over what they don’t see in their refrigerators?

The West must remain united regarding sanctions because any break in them will be exploited by Moscow and seen by the Kremlin as an indication that it can win through, especially given the financial help it is providing to “ultra-right and ultra-left” groups in the West who are giving it support.

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 07:00 PM

http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.de/2015/04/kremlins-top-5-misrepresentations-about.html

Sunday, April 26, 2015

Kremlin’s ‘Top 5’ Misrepresentations about Ukraine This Week

Paul Goble

Staunton, April 26 – As he does each Sunday, Dmitry Bukovsky of Kyiv’s “Delovaya stolitsa” chooses from among the flood of Russian coverage about Ukraine “the top 5 propagandistic myths, fakes and stupidities” the Kremlin has committed over the course of the previous week (dsnews.ua/politics/top-5-propagandistskih-mifov-feykov-i-glupostey-kremlya-26042015110000).

His selection for the past seven days includes the following:

1. An effort by “Novorossiya” propagandists to claim that a Ukrainian sportswoman had devoted her victory to the “Donetsk Peoples Republic” fell flat when Kyiv officials point out that Ukraine is not affiliated with the athletic organization involved and that the individual who the Russians claimed had gone over to their side in fact had competed on a Russian team to begin with (novorossia.su/ru/node/17945).

2. Russian propagandists again accused Ukrainian soldiers of having “crucified” a pro-Moscow militant. But on the basis of the video the Russians distributed, Bukovsky says, “even Pontius Pilate would have cried ‘I don’t believe it!’” The whole thing was so clearly staged that the actors had to cut things off at the decisive moment lest one of their number be hurt. The link Bukovsky uses no longer works, possibly an indication that even the authors of this play decided it was too much.

3. Aleksandr Zakharchenko, the head of the self-proclaimed DNR, says that in order to counter what he calls “the methodical and intentional zombification” of Ukrainians, he and his colleagues are preparing “a cycle of broadcasts about what it fact is taking place in the Donbas” – as if, Bukovsky says, “the flood of refugees from the Donbas who have lost their jobs and apartments or had their possessions stolen by local bandits had somehow run out and we had nowhere to learn the truth.” The working title for these broadcasts is “Antidote,” the Kyiv journalist reports. “We are impatiently waiting for it.”

4. The DNR has announced plans to create “a Museum of the Achievements of the Republic” on the basis of one of the exhibition centers of Donetsk. The self-proclaimed republic’s culture ministry says it wants to show all the things that the DNR has achieved in the last year, but there is a problem: many of the things that had been on display before the militants got there have been looted (dan-news.info/ukraine/v-donecke-budet-sozdan-muzej-dostizhenij-dnr-minkult.html and www.ostro.org/general/criminal/news/466558/).

5. Russian outlets in occupied areas put out the story that Ukrainian military commanders were asking the officers of the militias to open fire on groups allied with the Ukrainians. According to pro-Moscow leaders, the reason was simple: the Ukrainians needed evidence that the militias and not Kyiv were violating the ceasefire (dan-news.info/defence/vsu-vyxodyat-po-otkrytym-kanalam-svyazi-na-oficerov-dnr-s-prosboj-otkryt-ogon-po-boevikam-azova-basurin.html).

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 07:20 PM

RU source was saying something ca. 1 hour ago about Ukr UAV activity over #Donetsk (= tracers).
Since about 1 week it's each night. They must be smokin' some serious stuff.

Wannabe funny #Azov troops in #Shyrokyne talk English and Arab. Also #Minsk is history ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_-pZCdEhulk … pic.twitter.com/qbLp9FrzOR

Local Donbas "rebel" is showing proudly that he is a Russian soldier https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=LELTb9sQXVg … pic.twitter.com/XOTjebtsXy

What the heck is the entire Russia smoking these days???
http://m.ria.ru/defense_safety/20150426/1061019925.html … Russian news headline for the win: “Die Welt Says Germany Has No Chance Against Russian Tanks.”

22:24 #Donetsk Roofed market @evgen_ger I can observe tracers in the sky from the bus station or close to for 30min already

#Donetsk Tracers of shots over the city. No sound is heard. Why shoot, is not clear. Maybe learning? pic.twitter.com/UNhYnUPUw3

Russian soldiers took down a Ukrainian border sign, mocking the idea that Ukraine is a sovereign nation pic.twitter.com/fbcLMnMdtd

Apr.26 Mariupol suburbs hear heavy artillery from RU forces attack on Shirokino & Granitne https://youtu.be/hmjTIOh_EnU

BREAKING #Ukraine position near south city of #Mariupol is under #Russia's proxies fire. Don't dream about #ceasefire. It's real #war

#Footage
Huge fire burning in N-W #Donetsk city this evening.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-GAeWUth5s …
pic.twitter.com/z7ggUJjoh8

22:42 #Donetsk Budenovsky ds @UrriKara4en:Quite far short MRLS volleys
22:44 @0954771 ~40min intense fire fr/RozyLuksemburg

#Donetsk 22:35
Proletarsky - firing can be heard (like AA-guns?) https://twitter.com/DoneckiiPatriot/status/592412216210653185 …

#Donetsk 10:49PM
Kalininsky - heard the MRLS launch, and falling far away. https://twitter.com/jackson_villi/status/592415226001231874 …

#Donetsk 22:35
Budonivsk reg. - outgoing MRLS fire? https://twitter.com/UrriKara4en/status/592413368922812416 …

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 08:42 PM

https://en.informnapalm.org/another-proof-of-russian-weapon-atgm-9m133f-1-kornet-used-in-ukraine/

Really good set of photos of all the components including the circuit board

Another Proof of Russian Weapons Used in Ukraine: ATGM 9M133F-1 Kornet with themobaric warhead

Representatives of the Military Cooperation and Peacekeeping Operations Directorate of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine presented another proof of the use of Russian weapons in the territory of Luhansk and Donetsk Oblasts to Kyiv Association of Military Attaches.

Several days ago, a Ukrainian platoon defensive post near Zholobok village (located in Luhansk Oblast) was shelled by Russian aggressors, who used a 9M133 Kornet anti-tank guided missile system (NATO designation AT-14 Spriggan), specifically, the 9M133F-1 variant, armed with a thermobaric warhead. According to its markings, it was manufactured in 2012.

It did not explode due to a malfunction, and it was presented to the public in Kyiv.

According to the markings, the missile was manufactured in 2012 in Russia. These systems are used by the Russian Army. The Ukrainian Army does not possess them.

This report was published by the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine at mil.gov.ua. The original photos of ATGM 9M133F-1 Kornet were posted on April 21 by Igor Gurchik on his Facebook page here.

Ukrainian checkpoint #29, located near Zholobok village, which is controlled by the Russian forces, was attacked on April 18, 2015. Below we post all ten photos that are of a much better quality than the photos posted by the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine.

The photos were taken by a Ukrainian soldier immediately after the attack, when the missile warhead was found.

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 09:03 PM

#Donetsk 11:10
"Topaz" area. From waste heaps continuously shoot the red tracers. Direction - towards the airport. https://twitter.com/ArrowSaturday/status/592420474623238144 …

#BreakingNews
Russian forces started a "chaotic shelling with ZSU-23-2 on #Shchastya" around 22:05 local time.Losses are specified.

Tanks and 122 mm artillery pieces were (both) used vs. #Shyrokyne and #Pisky.

#Donetsk 11:21PM
Periodically hearing powerful firing and heavy volleys in the center. https://twitter.com/Donetsk_Ukraine/status/592423279073370112 …

Comments concerning Putin's over two hour TV documentary from today:

Anne Applebaum @anneapplebaum
Oddest thing about Putin's loopy tv interview is his claim that US sees Russia as its "main geopolitical opponent." Alas, not even close

Anne Applebaum @anneapplebaum
Putin says the US is supporting separatists in Russia. A perfect justification for further action in Ukraine, no? http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/93c8b68c-ec2e-11e4-b428-00144feab7de.html

#Putin: convinced we're not breaking any int'l rules in Ukraine/Crimea. Don't regret anything. Sanctions=attempt 2 hold Russia back, again.

#Putin (from actual interview) West only likes us when we're poor & holding our hands out; when they feel us as competition, start to resist

Remarkable in film #Putin: no Beslan, no personal life, but also no hawks like vice-premier Rogozin, though more liberal men like Kudrin are

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 09:16 PM

This is a massively critical development-might in fact be the indication of the beginning of the Russian offensive.

#BREAKINGNEWS
Heavy fighting in #Novoluhanske,North of #Horlivka,tonight.
Russian could be trying to storm the city.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5RB__PjAX5A …

And this is #Donetsk. Also here, heavy small arms fire audible.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_JECQQnLmM …

OUTLAW 09

04-26-2015, 09:29 PM

The Telegraph Business 20150427: Flood of US gas to break Russian grip over Europe pic.twitter.com/Jd8SriVaxK

OUTLAW 09

04-27-2015, 05:21 AM

War is back on again and absolutely no response from either France or Germany OR the US--over 60 attacks for 24 hours--up 60 is full war in progress.

The @OSCE_SMM reports that "the most intense shelling" since Feb taking place in #Shyrokyne yesterday; says the DNR are "amassing forces".

SPOT REPORT: Today most intense shelling in Shyrokyne since fighting began in area in mid-Feb 2015. Tanks observed http://www.osce.org/ukraine-smm/153501 …

At 22.05 russians randomly fired with anti-aircraft installation ZU-23-2 towards residential areas of #Shchastya.

In Luhansk area RU fired on Ukr positions near Shchastya w AA-guns and AGL's. Also fired from AGL on #Sokolniki.

#Avdiivka & #Shyrokyno also shelled w 122-mm artillery. #Zaitsevo and #Optyne came under 82-mm mortars fire.

ATO presser: 23 ceasefire violations reported from 6PM till midnight. #Pisky & #Avdiivka shelled w 120-mm mortars.

#Avdiivka 4:26AM
Small arms fire heard from #Donetsk https://twitter.com/rechnikato/status/592500069087236097 …

OUTLAW 09

04-27-2015, 05:33 AM

Notice while basically telling the Ukraine to take the manpower loses and to not return fire the Russians are basically increasing the shellings and ground attacks WHILE they know the Ukrainians are seldomly returning fire.

WHY are the Germans and French doing this? Seems the US as well is supporting their moves.

Consistent reports, incl. by @FT: #Merkel & #Hollande R twisting #Ukraine hands 2 make us fulfil #Minsk deal - WHILE RUSSIA'S BREAKING IT.

AND the US, France and Germany increase absolutely no pressure on the Russia side--strange is it not?

OUTLAW 09

04-27-2015, 05:34 AM

Appears the tension between Chechyna and Russia is increasing--

Chechen leader #Kadyrov tells soldiers to fire on unapproved Russian troops in region https://bizcircle.att.com/articles/watch-dogs-go-social-at-cage-free-daycare/?source=EBi6Gu00000InsDoO … pic.twitter.com/Dq5V5NwPwr

OUTLAW 09

04-27-2015, 10:03 AM

AND the shelling attacks just keep on intensifying AND then we get this from the Germans--that the Ukraine needs to implement the Minsk 2 agreement--notice it is not Germany that is getting shelled IN direct violation of Minsk 2 WHICH Germany says nothing about--is in fact Germany shifting to a proRussian stance?????

The first three key points have never been implemented by the Russian troops and her mercenaries;
1. full exchange of all POWs-stopped by Russia
2. full verified pullback of all heavy weapons of more than 100mm--and what is being fired today at the UA positions heavy artillery and MRLSs which are back at the contact line
3. a "true ceasefire" meaning no shooting

"Germany urges Ukraine to fulfil Minsk ceasefire agreement" http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/51a3148a-ec12-11e4-b428-00144feab7de.html?siteedition=intl#axzz3YUeO9Kba …

This is exactly how the Ukraine is holding to Minsk 2--heavy artillery shellings with man sized craters and direct tank fire AND they only respond with 82mm mortars?????

Rus proxies attacked UA troops in #Shyrokyne all day long, used 120,152mm weapons. UA command allowed response w 82mmhttp://www.0629.com.ua/news/810008

BREAKING
The @OSCE_SMM counted 17 main battle tanks, 3 self-propellered howitzers & 60(!!!) armored fighting vehicles 50 km N of #Shyrokyne

Today, after 11AM in Krymske they hear explosions fr the vicinity of Bakhmutka, Zholobok area (RU-occupied) and 29th checkpt.

Details of which residential buildings hit by shelling in #Donetsk yesterday. Near airport and Ukrainian-held #Pesky http://novosti.dn.ua/details/249852/

Today at 11.30 against the Ukr positions near Troits'ke (Popasna area) the enemy lined up a tank platoon in occupied Kalynove

#News
Russian forces attacked Shchastya, Krymske, Troits'ke and CP29 a in #Luhansk oblast yesterday and overnight.

Another #Russian gets lost in #Ukraine: Dead RU officer mobile phone video http://empr.media/video/conflict-zone/dead-russian-officer-mobile-phone-video … | EMPR pic.twitter.com/uzmlyLQ7FA

No #Ceasefire:Battle with #Russian army is likely to be in #Ukraine sooner rather than later - http://empr.media/opinion/analytics/learning-military-and-intelligence-lessons-part-2-toward-a-ukrainian-defencive-strategy …

From the Russian realm of “strangeness” since it is Russian troops and her mercenaries that constantly “do not allow OSCE into their controlled areas” as per Minsk 2. Russia has jot implemented a single point in Minsk 2 yet they “defend OSCE”—wonder why??

MFA Russia ✔ @mfa_russia
#Russia urges #Ukrainian authorities to stop illegal checks of @OSCE_SMM monitors - http://tass.ru/en/world/791912

OUTLAW 09

04-27-2015, 10:04 AM

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
Map. Situation in eastern #Ukraine, April 27, 12:00 EET pic.twitter.com/4gCbMQrwwE

Many Russian army/air force helicopters (gunships, transports) in Rostov region. Russian MoD says "for Victory Parade". Cover for assault?

"Militants started to use heavy artillery in #Shyrokyne. Shell craters are of human height" http://24today.net/open/390937

Ukraine says its positions pounded with shells, rockets by militants http://24today.net/open/390910 pic.twitter.com/j7LdNa1idl

Military and civilian construction companies are reinforcing fortifications around #Mariupol http://news.liga.net/photo/politics/5647663-vokrug_mariupolya_stroyat_novuyu_liniyu_ukrepleniy _foto.htm#1 … pic.twitter.com/220efVKtJ4

Seems that Putin “forgot” that the Russian muslin population as a whole is the faster growing ethnic population inside the Russian Federation.

Russian Islamists needed no outside help to rise up against Russia.

Putin accuses US intelligence services of supporting Caucasus rebels in 2000shttp://www.unian.info/world/1071908-putin-accuses-us-intelligence-services-of-supporting-caucasus-rebels-in-2000s.html … pic.twitter.com/lQlOvto18u

OUTLAW 09

04-27-2015, 10:05 AM

Locals in #Donetsk, Avdiivka, Yasynuvata saw clouds of smoke y-day. Location of fire unknown http://informator.lg.ua/?p=87544 pic.twitter.com/xuBwBoZfPJ

Militants restarted attacks at Ukr troops in #Shyrokyne this am. Y-day asked to cease fire 7times, 7times violated it http://www.0629.com.ua/news/810008

Rus proxies attacked UA troops in #Shyrokyne all day long, used 120,152mm weapons. UA command allowed response w 82mm http://www.0629.com.ua/news/810008

#Russia|ns received reinforcements at #Shyrokyne (manpower, armored vehicles, mortars, anti-tank systems)
http://www.mariupol.tv/news/war/mariupol/3609/boeviki_perebrosili_svezhie_sily_pod_mariupol.html …

#OSCE monitors report large tank movements and intense artillery fire from separatists close to #Mariupol
http://www.osce.org/ukraine-smm/153501 …

OUTLAW 09

04-27-2015, 10:26 AM

Shellings are getting heavier and massive Russia military movements of tanks, artillery and APCs even being seen by OSCE.

Russian businessman blames ‘Putin’s reckless regime’ for crisis in Russia
http://www.unian.info/politics/1071967-russian-businessman-blames-putins-reckless-regime-for-crisis-in-russia.html … pic.twitter.com/ohLw8jUHx9

#Breaking
Another Russian invasion colum of 11 main battle tanks and 4 apc was spotted,.passing #Kulykove, 15 km North of #Shyrokyne.

Massive force, seemingly ready to bypass and besiege #Mariupol in the coming months

BREAKING
The @OSCE_SMM counted 17 main battle tanks, 3 self-propellered howitzers & 60(!!!) armored fighting vehicles 50 km N of #Shyrokyne

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
@OSCE_SMM observation post came under fire in Shyrokyne; their UAVs spotted 17 tanks, 3 howitzers, 60 APC in “DPR”-held areas

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
@OSCE_SMM reported RU-backed militants launched biggest attacks by Shyrokyne since last Feb. Fighting went on for 12 hours

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
Ukrainian servicemen spotted 21 enemy UAVs

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
Hotspot in the Luhansk sector – Shchastya, Krymske and Sokilnyky. No record of armored vehicles & heavy arms use.

NSDC of Ukraine ✔ @NSDC_ua
Hotspots: Intensive fighting by Shyrokyne. Militants attacked from Sakhanka village, 5km away from the frontline.

#Mariupol hearing gunfire from #Shyrokyno. Large caliber artillery.
3:11PM https://twitter.com/sir_T_Lawrence

OUTLAW 09

04-27-2015, 12:01 PM

http://www.unian.info/war/1072016-latvian-rebel-tells-of-banditry-in-the-donbas.html

Latvian ‘rebel’ tells of banditry in the Donbas
27.04.2015 | 14:14

Ukrainian online news Web site LB.ua on April 21 published an interview with a Latvian citizen who claims to have worked as an interpreter for the Donetsk People’s Republic militant organization. Although it is difficult to verify his account, the tale of lawless and banditry in the militant-held parts of Ukraine chimes with other recent reports coming out of the area. Translation of original article in Russian by UNIAN staff.

An interesting read from an alleged interpreter working for the Russian mercenaries in the Donbas.

OUTLAW 09

04-27-2015, 12:03 PM

Russia(ns) shelled #Shyrokyne near #Mariupol 17 times yesterday http://news.liga.net/news/politics/5647863-samoy_goryachey_tochkoy_v_sektore_m_ostaetsya_shir okino_17_obstrelov.htm … #Donetsk #Putin pic.twitter.com/hX5X5c1waP

#Avdiivka
Shelling has begun. Most likely the area again Butovka (mine) - military (positions). Maybe closer. 13:47 https://twitter.com/rechnikato/status/592641175384936448 …

Latvian ‘rebel’ tells of banditry in the Donbas
http://www.unian.info/war/1072016-latvian-rebel-tells-of-banditry-in-the-donbas.html … pic.twitter.com/IfGExCpwWD

#Donetsk 14:00
To north, near the Amstor (shop) 4 GRAD batteries and 2 Howitzers standing. https://twitter.com/GirkinGirkin/status/592645321785610240 …

VIDEO #Ukraine soldiers -#Shyrokyne to be like another #Donetsk Airport defense https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRVO0HpnRxw … #Putin pic.twitter.com/qmAGkyf9vS

VIDEO #Putin created DNR-Whatever (#Russia(n) Military) tanks in #Donetsk #Ukraine https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KP0iUUxt4ok … pic.twitter.com/OLQXGiUXxn

60 Russian APCs 50km north of #Shyrokyne is a fraction of what Russian Army has concentrated in western Rostov region pic.twitter.com/WXRCZBkEbV

OUTLAW 09

04-27-2015, 12:04 PM

Graham is a UK journalist who first worked for Russia today UK and then spent a large amount f time illegally in eastern Ukraine for the Russian military TV and who is alleged to have been near and or involved in torture and executions of Ukrainian POWs and or filmed such events.

Blog starts gathering @GrahamWP_UK crimes in open access
http://gwpcrimes.blogspot.co.uk/ pic.twitter.com/cv1uhvy2Hb

Imbeciles Graham wanst to forcibly gain access to the Bandera Museum in London. Trespassing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=h5GM5hM1WWs … pic.twitter.com/BQXEKxXd3s

Reports of Arrest or Removal of LNR's Plotnitsky Allegedly over Russian Humanitarian Aid Thefthttp://www.interpretermag.com/russia-update-april-27-2015/#8055 …

PGO preparing cases for Hague on crimes of Russia, LPR, DPR against Ukraine
http://www.unian.info/politics/1072025-pgo-preparing-cases-for-hague-on-crimes-of-russia-lpr-dpr-against-ukraine.html … pic.twitter.com/aQ6oIIL9FN

Poland refused entry to all the bikers from the Night wolves http://liveuamap.com/en/2015/27-april-poland-refused-entry-to-all-the-bikers-from-the … pic.twitter.com/vySsv2jO16 via @RT_russian

The Night Wolves (all 14 of them) have been thwarted. Border guard tells press no entry allowed. The welcome party is riding off in a huff

OUTLAW 09

04-27-2015, 12:47 PM

Have been looking for a really good example of the Russian "information conflict" in their non linear warfare or what we call informational warfare/weaponization of information and finally found one that depicts a number of twists and turns.
http://sputniknews.com/us/20150427/1021431612.html#ixzz3YVrWD7Ha

US is No Longer a Democracy – Princeton Study

US
14:38 27.04.2015(updated 14:44 27.04.2015)

A recent study of the University of Princeton came to a stunning result: The US is no longer a democracy, because political decisions don’t serve the needs of citizens, but rather the interests of a small economic elite.

The findings of the recent Princeton research study showed that economic elites and organized groups have a substantial influence on the policy of the US government while groups representing the interests of the mass of Americans as well as ordinary citizens have little or no influence on politics.

The main conclusion of the study is that the US society is far from being a democratic one as the majority of Americans actually have little opportunity to influence policies pursued by the US government.

Obama's Successor Unlikely to Soften US Stance on Russia
“When a majority of citizens disagrees with economic elites and/or with organized interests, they generally lose. Moreover, because of the strong status quo bias built into the US political system, even when fairly large majorities of Americans favor policy change, they generally do not get it,” the study said.

The findings are also important in terms of foreign policy. In case of military conflicts or political confrontation with Russia the US government does not represent the interests of the American people, but those of the business and political elites.

Many Western politicians and experts argue that those who criticize US policy betray one of the oldest and most vibrant democracies in the world, the German magazine “Deutsche Wirtschafts Nachrichten” wrote.

However, when one of the most respected and elite US universities comes to such a stunning conclusion, it is reason to rethink the existing conceptions and don’t take “Western democratic values” for granted.

“Americans do enjoy many features central to democratic governance, such as regular elections, freedom of speech and association and a widespread (if still contested) franchise. But we believe that if policymaking is dominated by powerful business organizations and a small number of affluent Americans, then America's claims to being a democratic society are seriously threatened,” the Princeton research concluded.