Anti-Terrorist Operation: Liveblog (July 1)

February 24 – 1 Ukrainian military was killed and 7 were injured in the ATO area in the last 24 hours, – informed NSDC spokesman Andriy Lysenko.

February 24 – Prosecutor General of Ukraine is preparing to charge twenty employees of Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) with organizing and participating in mass shootings of protesters during the Revolution of Dignity (in Ukraine) in February 2014.

February 24 – Terrorists are transferring military machinery and manpower closer to Mariupol direction, – said NSDC spokesman Andriy Lysenko.

February 24 – If Mariupol is seized, this could become the last psychological barrier needed by the West to change its policies and would mean the death of armistice agreements, – said Marshal of the Sejm of Poland Radoslaw Sikorski, reports Newsweek Polska.

February 24 – At a meeting of the State Council of Defence of Lithuania it has been decided to initiate a return to compulsory military service. Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite has compulsory military service may be needed due to changes in the region's geopolitical situation.

February 24 – Poland has sent a note to the Russian Foreign Ministry with a request to provide the wreckage of Tu-154 M, which "crashed" near Smolensk in April 2010. Polish President Lech Kaczynski and almost the entire political elite of Poland were killed in this airplane crash.

February 24 – Ukraine believes that it is necessary to reform the UN Security Council considering the fact that a member of the Security Council is now an aggressor, – stated Ukraine's Foreign Ministry spokesman Yevhen Perebiynis at a briefing, when commenting on the situation with Russia frequently blocking decisions on Ukraine.

February 24 – In Paris, foreign ministers of "Normandy Four" have failed to reach an agreement regarding the situation in Debaltseve, – informed Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin after the meeting, reports BBC: "Unfortunately, there was no political decision on how to regard what happened in Debaltseve".

February 24 – "Novaya Gazeta" newspaper has published a summary of the document describing Kremlin's scenario on events in Ukraine. The document contains a phased plan of dismantling Ukraine as a state. The text has been made public on newspaper's website. When planning a war in Ukraine, Putin's entourage hoped to start dismantling Ukraine from Crimea and Kharkiv oblasts, not Donetsk. The document was presented to Putin between February 4 and 12, 2014 – before Yanukovych fled to Russia.

February 24 – Official Kyiv is appealing to the international community to formulate new sanctions against Russia for not fulfilling the Minsk agreements – speaker of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, Yevhen Perebyinis: "By their actions Russia is demonstrating that it has no intentions of fulfilling the Minsk Agreements, in particular, to immediately remove, as it is stipulated by the agreement, their soldiers and artillery from the territory of Ukraine. In this situation we are convinced, that in the world community there remains no other choice than to force Russia towards peace by creating new, more active restrictive efforts."

According to him, "all" "red lines" were once again crossed by Russia, and therefore stopping Kremlin is only possible through immediate consolidated acts of the whole civilized world."

As is known, after the signature of the Minsk Agreement of February 12th, the fighters did not stop the firing and took over Debaltseve, left by the Ukrainian army. Also Russia decided to "exclude from the Minsk Agreement" the release of the captured by it, Nadiya Savchenko, by which it invoked indignation in Ukraine. Nadiaya Savchenko is presently in her 74th day of a hunger strike.

What has happened to Colonel Mamchur

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February 2 – Pro-Russian terrorists have announced "mobilization" and tight after that Russia has started to put together another "humanitarian aid convoy". Will be bringing more tanks in, not doubt.

February 2 – "According to intelligence of Security Service of Ukraine (SSU), a large amnesty is planned in the Russian Federation on the occasion of May 9th celebrations. It will result in the release of prisoners who could join the ranks of militants in the fight against Ukraine", – said the Advisor to the Chief of Security Service Markiyan Lubkivsky.

February 2 – Ukraine has decreased its gas reserves by 44.4%. Existing gas will be enough to survive the winter.

February 2 – In the last year Ukraine decreased offshore exports by 87% – i.e. tax evasion was reduced by 87%.

February 2 – Eight former senior US diplomats and military have issued a statement calling on the US government and NATO leaders to provide support to Ukraine, including in the form of lethal weapons. Document's name is "Preserving Ukraine's Independence, Resisting Russian Aggression: What the United States and NATO Must Do By: Steven Pifer, Strobe Talbott, Ambassador Ivo Daalder, Michele Flournoy, Ambassador John Herbst, Jan Lodal, Admiral James Stavridis and General Charles Wald.

February 2 – Russian Tu-95 bomber, which was intercepted near Great Britain last week, was carrying nuclear weapons, -writes British newspaper Express, citing sources in UK's Ministry of Defence.

Putin must be stopped

Europe's eastern War

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February 11 – The Russian proposal at the Summit in Minsk is unacceptable – president of Ukraine Poroshenko. Russia deliberately disrupts agreements.

February 11 – 19 Ukrainian military were killed and 78 wounded as a result of shelling near the burial mound "Hostra Mogyla" close to Debaltseve and at other locations within ATO area, – informed the spokesman for the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Vladyslav Seleznyov at a briefing on Wednesday morning.

February 11 – In Donbas pro-Russian militants shelled the positions of Ukrainian troops 27 times on the night of February 11th. Most of the attacks occurred in the direction of Luhansk. 87 pro-Russian militants and 42 units of military equipment were destroyed in the last 24 hours (including 12 tanks, 14 multiple rocket launchers and 16 armored vehicles).

February 11 – In Donetsk 6 people were killed and 8 wounded as a result of shelling at the bus station and entrance office of "Donetsk Metallurgical Plant".

February 11 – President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko spoke about a successful military operation at Debaltseve foothold: "Several successful operations were conducted yesterday at Debaltseve foothold. They allowed us to gain control over two municipalities and the contact line", – said Poroshenko.

February 11 – "People's Republic of Luhansk" and "People's Republic of Donetsk" demand that Ukraine stops the ATO and are requesting autonomy and new elections, – as stated in a protocol draft handed over on Tuesday night by the leaders of the terrorists to the contact group in Minsk.

February 11 – Russian Federal TV Station "Channel 5" has broadcast a story describing how quickly and easily Russian troops can enter European capitals and threatened the West with missile attacks. Show's authors vaguely disguised this information as campaign to hold "Victory Day parades" in the EU member-states capitals.

February 11 – Russia implemented a direct military intervention during the battle at the city of Debaltseve, – stated Lieutenant General Ben Hodges, Commander of Allied Land Command (NATO).

February 11 – Russian Foreign Ministry believes that border control issues should be should negotiated upon with the militants, which, in its turn, doesn't provide a solution to the problem, – stated Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

February 11 – Government is ready to establish martial law, should there be esalation of the situation in the east. This was stated by President Petro Poroshenko during a government meeting. Poroshenko emphasized that it is precisely "from the results of the summit that it will depend if we will be successful in stopping the aggressor by diplomatic means, or if we will switch into a very different course." I and the government, and Parliament are ready to make a decision to impose martial law in the entire territory of Ukraine," he noted.

"In no way will I delay this decision, if the the irresponsible acts of the aggressor bring about a serious continued escalation of the conflict," he emphasized. "I am convinced that our country can protect itself and that every person will do whatever posssible in order to demonstrate that victory will be ours. However, I stress, that I am a president of peace, and thatn through army means, the situation in Donbas should not be decided," he added.

Ukraine cannot be a buffer state

Photo report from eastern Ukraine

Help Ukraine seize this chance

Economist Edward Lucas Attacks Russia's RT and Sputnik for "manufacturing lies" and those working there as "freaks and propagandists"

Feature by BBC Monitoring on 9 February

Russian state media have hit back strongly at British journalist Edward Lucas after he criticized them at the recent Munich Security Conference and suggested that journalists working for them should be ostracized. One top TV presenter went as far as to brand Lucas a "village idiot".

At a panel discussion at the annual Munich Security Conference on 6 February, Lucas, a senior editor at The Economist and author of The New Cold War, accused the Kremlin's international media operations, RT (formerly known as Russia Today) and Sputnik (rebranded successor to the Voice of Russia) of "manufacturing lies".

He said the people working for them were "freaks and propagandists", who should be the target of a campaign of ostracism, according to records of the discussion published by RT and Russian state news agency RIA Novosti.[1]

"If anyone puts a CV on my desk and on that CV I see they worked for RT or Sputnik or one of these things, that CV is going into the bin," Lucas said. He added that people in the West were wrong to see working for the Kremlin's international media as a "first stage on the career ladder". "It's not, it's the last stage," he told the Munich conference.

"Journalistic Joe McCarthy"

Russian state media came back, all guns blazing, with Lucas even getting a whole slot to himself on state channel Rossiya 1's weekly current affairs news roundup Vesti Nedeli.[2]

Outspoken host Dmitriy Kiselev, who is also director-general of Sputnik's parent company Rossiya Segodnya (which confusingly translates as Russia Today), hurled a whole fistful of epithets at Lucas – "odious British journalist", "hysterical Londoner" and even "village idiot" – while rubbishing his analysis of Russian politics and accusing The Economist of practising censorship.

RT responded more primly, saying it was "absolutely outraged" by Lucas's "specious attacks", which, it said, were particularly "despicable" as several of its journalists were daily risking their lives to "report on stories nobody else dares to touch".[3]

Sputnik also had Lucas in its sights, describing him in one article as a "journalistic Joe McCarthy" – a reference to the US senator who instigated a witch-hunt against Communist sympathizers in the 1950s.[4]

Lucas himself appeared to revel in the backlash, responding to Kiselev in kind.

"Better than a Pulitzer prize? i get prime-time abuse from vile Kremlin mouthpiece Kiselov," he tweeted.[5]

He could also take comfort from the support of fellow Twitterati, who suggested he had got under RT's skin.

US journalist Michael Weiss observed that Lucas had "figured out RT hacks' Achilles heel", while Times columnist Oliver Kamm said he had "badly wounded them".[6][7]

Writer and Russia watcher Ben Judah also weighed in, saying Lucas had put the wind up RT. "Experts should refuse to appear on RT – or any other? disinformation channel", he added.[8]

"Misinformation"

RT and its supporters also entered the fray on Twitter.

One of its contributors, Robert Bridge, accused Lucas of being "scared to hear another side of the story", while the channel itself suggested his attack on its journalists may have been provoked by recent criticism of The Economist on its show In The Now.[9][10]

In The Now dismissed as "absurd" a claim by The Economist that Russian state TV "conceals" bad economic news from its viewers. It showed excerpts from top TV bulletins talking about the collapse of the rouble to prove the contrary. It also said that the story of the rouble's woes and the looming recession had been well covered in Russian newspapers. To suggest otherwise, it said, was to promote "misinformation".[11]

It called its analysis of The Economist's coverage a "tutorial on how to write a propaganda article".

But RT's criticism of The Economist was itself guilty of omission and distortion.

For example, it made no mention of the fact that on the day in mid December when the rouble tumbled by some 10 per cent, Rossiya 1 main news had ignored this story altogether.

Also, it illustrated its claim about the Russian press's economic coverage with screenshots not from leading newspapers but from news agencies and websites, one of them a little known business portal from the Volga republic of Tatarstan.

The panel discussion at the Munich conference, which also featured NATO commander and US general Philip Breedlove and Norwegian Defence Minister Ine Eriksen Soreide, looked more broadly at the issue of hybrid warfare and the role played in it by different media organizations.

According to a report by Judy Dempsey on the Carnegie Europe website, the participants said that one of the reasons why RT and its ilk have been able to make such an impact is the cutbacks at top Western international media, such as the BBC World Service and the Voice of America.[12]

[1] http://rt.com/op-edge/230315-rt-responds-lucas-munich/

[2] http://vesti7.ru/news?id=45745

[3] See note 1

[4] http://sputniknews.com/columnists/20150208/1017973545.html

[5] https://twitter.com/edwardlucas/status/564531479263600642

[6] https://twitter.com/michaeldweiss/status/564468359048486912

[7] https://twitter.com/OliverKamm/status/564408994853572609

[8] https://twitter.com/b_judah/status/564541740863193091

[9] https://twitter.com/Robert_Bridge/status/564665181549391873

[10] https://twitter.com/INTHENOWRT/status/564758039371472896

[11] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2H5X3WYm_3U

[12] http://carnegieeurope.eu/strategiceurope/?fa=58998

Source: BBC Monitoring research 9 Feb 15

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