Russia-Ukraine war LIVE: Will Russia’s advance on Kharkiv end soon? | WION LIVE
the uh that that $61 billion that was passed most of that gets spent in the United States by America’s Munitions makers and it takes time to do that Biden has just announced a $400 million military aid package and that’s going to be based on his presidential draw down Authority so they will take $400 Million worth of weapons from the US Arsenal and deliver those much more quickly and that’s a variety of offensive and defensive weapons that Ukraine can use but it’s going to take time could take weeks months even longer to to build up that that weapons to to build the weapons to ship over to Ukraine now the Europeans have been providing some but they’re also behind their promises uh the other concerning thing that we shouldn’t lose track of is that macron has been talking about sending uh French and other European ground troops to support the ukrainians we also think that with the f-16s and other Advanced Weaponry arriving it’s possible that NATO forces will be there to help Target and possibly to help use those weapons all of these are a serious escalation Putin has been making a lot of uh saber rattling about tactical nuclear weapons now so we don’t want to if we don’t want I don’t want this to escalate to a much bigger war and that’s also possible the more desperate Ukraine becomes the more possibility that this situation escalates into potentially World War III and that’s what we especially have to make sure it’s prevent all right we’re out of time now Professor thank you very much for talking to us I’ve been talking to Peter kosnik who’s a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University Professor thank you once again thank you thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s harke as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages that Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in har according to the har Governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains on the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against further Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the ground Ukrainian president vadir ziny claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the Border Villages he says disrupting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the K region a Ukrainian Missile hit a MTI story structure taking down a whole section of the building the attack killed at least seven and injured over 17 in the Russian city of belgorod Moscow described the incident as a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using Tor caou vampire and Alam missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggested establishing a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrad Russia defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era conventional ballistic missiles launched overnight over belgorod region a Ukrainian Dro attack also hit a refinery in Russia’s vulgo grad region causing a fire at the complex and for more on this we earlier spoke to Peter kosnik who is a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University and this is what he had to say Ukraine is in a very difficult position now both in terms of Manpower and in terms of weaponry and so Russia is taking advantage of that they had been moving in the East and the South now they’ve added this offensive in the north uh and so the Ukrainian lines were already stretched very thin and Russia was making incremental gains in the South and the East now you Ukraine is forced to move many of those troops to protect in the north around kke which weakens them further in the South and the East and so Russia is exploiting their advantages Russia is taking advantage of the fact that they have more artillery ammunition more weaponry and much more soldiers right now so Ukraine has passed new legislation uh that allows them to draft more Ukrainian citizens but that doesn’t go into effect for another week and that will require months of training so Ukraine is going to be in a weakened position for quite some time nobody has any optimistic assessment of anything that would happen from Ukraine standpoint in this in 2024 some uh forecasters are hoping that conditions will improve in 2025 but I’m afraid that’s also a pipe now Russia launched a surprised ground offensive into Ukraine’s K region reopening a front that had taken center stage in the early stages of the war Moscow is eyeing its biggest land operation in this region Ukraine’s outgun Army rushed in reinforcements President Vladimir zalinski vowed to defend the region Ukraine says it repelled the Russian armored attack and according to khar’s Regional head not a single meter has been lost after moscow’s forces sought to break through defensive lines now there was massive shelling reported in the region overnight killing at least two civilians and injuring five more residential buildings Scot fire during the attack which Ukraine says was carried out with two anticraft guided missiles Moscow denies targeting civilians in what it said are legitimate strikes on Ukraine’s military energy and transport infrastructure meanwhile people in hundreds have been evacuated from the border area in Ukraine’s Ki region after Moscow launched a surprise ground offensive Ukrainian authorities helped with evacuations from the Kari region and the surrounding areas residents were brought to a town where they waited patiently for their turn to leave on the outskirts of the Russian heal city of luhansk in eastern Ukraine the Region’s Russia installed leader says Ukrainian forces attacked an oil storage Depot and sparked a large fire killing at these three and injuring some eight civilians according to reports this is set to be second such assault in 3 days meanwhile as keev struggles to hold off advances by Russian troops in the Northeast Kari region the United States has announced a new $400 million package of military aid for Ukraine this is the third tranch of aid for Ukraine since the Congress passed supplemental funding in late April after months of gridlock now the White House says the latest military aid is intended to help Ukraine fend off a surging Russian effort to capture carke the United States says though it expects Russia will make further advances in the coming weeks after they already launched initial incursions in areas near kave thed insisted it to do not anticipate any major breakthroughs the Pentagon expressed optimism saying that despite Russia’s ensive in Ukraine’s kke region the United States will be delivering needed weapon systems to ke quickly they believe that their uh most urgent need is in the harke area and certainly that’s where uh they’re you know they’re going to begin to put most of uh most of the resources that we’re provided uh so uh we’re in Kasa kak we’re going to try to uh address their needs uh uh in every way way that we can and we’re doing it in an urgent fashion in a pretty big development Ukraine has now said that it expects to get its very first F-16 fighter jets from Western allies in June July months according to a high ranking Ukrainian military Source Ukraine has sought us made F-16 figh Jets to help it counter Russia’s air superiority for a period of 2 years now according to reports The Source has not said as to which country will supply these F Jets so far Denmark the Netherlands Norway and Belgium have committed to sending the americanmade F-16 F Jets to Ukraine remember Russia has time again warned that Ukraine’s acquisition of F-16 figh Jets will be viewed as a nuclear capable threat the Russian foreign Ministry has also describ the deployment of f-16s as a purposeful provocation by the United States and NATO the Ukrainian Pilots are completing their training to fly the war planes and the pilots and ground staff been trained by Ukraine’s Western partners for many months the Ukrainian military has had to rely on a relatively small Fleet of Soviet era Jets as it had fought to hold Park Russia’s fullscale Invasion that started in February 2022 and our earlier spoke with Miss tsana kovich she’s an associate professor in the school of interdisciplinary Global Studies at the University of Florida [Music] lisland well um as I see it it is not a new uh development we we have been hearing about uh potential presence of NATO NATO um NATO Representatives let’s say uh since last year in April 2023 this current uh uh announcement was made actually in March not in we are in May right now and um uh president of Czech Republic Peter pav clarified that this uh NATO Representatives that may may be or raising the Spectre of a wider [Music] conflict the shadow of a protracted Ukraine war is ignit ing Regional fears of a NATO Russia confrontation polish prime minister Donald Tusk admits as much even as he expresses concern over a direct [Music] War there are some troops there I mean soldiers there are some soldiers there observers Engineers they’re helping them out we’ll see how it goes but you know nobody wants a direct War the Kremlin is unequivocal in its warnings stating that any deployment of NATO forces within Ukraine’s borders will be seen as a direct threat to Russia’s national security tensions have been further heightened by Russia cautioning France that any troops to Ukraine will be considered legitimate targets macro has more than once insisted that he has no objections on deploying French boots in Ukraine Lithuania too has joined the koras it says it is prepared to send it soldiers on a training mission to Ukraine the NATO leadership along with us and UK has strongly spoken out against any deployment of troops in Ukraine as it will bring the alliance in direct conflict with Moscow the situation is fraught with Danger [Music] President Vladimir Putin has announced Russia will conduct tactical nuclear weapons drills Moscow calls the Mover a direct response to NATO’s potential troop deployment signaling the gravity of the threat perceived by Russia bu report we on world is one Antarctica the Wild’s southernmost and icest continent holds abundance of hidden minerals and even energy sources according to a report Russia has found vast oil and gas reserves in the Antarctic much of it in areas claimed by the UK the report citing evidence given to the commons environment audit committee says reserves totaling 511 billion barrels of oil which is said to be about 10 times the north Sea’s entire 50-year output has been reported by to Moscow by Russian research ships this follows a series of surveys carried out by the Alexander kinsky vessel operated by Ros Gio the Russian agency charged with finding or with finding mineral reserves for commercial exploitation despite Antartica being protected by the 1959 Antarctic treaty that BS all mineral and oil developments UK’s members of parliament are raising their concerns they say the surveys carried out by Russia are preparations to bring in drilling rig to exploit the pristine region of fossil fuels the UK’s interests in Antarctica are overseen by its foreign office but it has been accused of ignoring the emerging crisis after David rattley last week told the EAC that his department is trusting Russian assurances that they are just conducting scientific research there all right let’s shift our Focus now Vladimir Putin has replaced his defense minister Serge Shu with a civil ion Economist Andre belov and the move comes mid Rising concerns over military spending right him this also marks the first major military shakeup in the country’s security cabinet since its invasion of Ukraine while earlier bosov served as the first Deputy Prime Minister as per Putin he has been chosen over a need for growing Innovations at the war front citing military spendings the Kremlin has revealed that it was approaching levels F recorded during the Cold War era the move is a clear indication that Putin is now seeking to align the economy with war efforts before the beginning of the war just 3% of Russia’s GDP was slated for defense spendings and this figure grew to 3.4% in the initial phases of the war currently 6.7% of the GDP is focused on defense spendings for separately as for the Kremlin shyu has been appointed as the Secretary of Russia Security Council in fact he’s also said to become Putin’s Deputy in the Russian military industrial commission as per experts Putin’s choice of having an economist as a defense minister mirrors the changing priorities of the Kremlin the news follows the arrest of shu’s close Ally and Deputy defense minister timore evanov as for Russian media he had been accused of accepting over $10,000 in bribe the Russia Ukraine front Fierce fighting raged on the second day in Ukraine’s Northeastern region of karv as Russia intensified is offensive in the region intense battle continues in seven border Villages Russian troops say that five Villages are under their control now the Ukrainian Army has refuted the claim saying it is repulsing Russian advancements the battle for control of the settlements in East where moscow’s offensive is focused as stretched Ukrainian forces struggling with shortage of troops and artillery shells Ukrainian president V zinski described the situation in the southern donat region as especially tense amid renewed Russian assault 1700 residents in the city of wans which falls in the contested Gray Zone on the border of Ukraine’s Kar region were forced to flee as fighting intensified [Music] Russian forces pummeled the city with Air Raids and Rockets that set several houses a blaze as they attempted to break through the Ukrainian defensive lines 20 people were evacuated to a nearby Village the town Chief Patrol police officer says that as the Border city is heavily shelled by Russian troops people have fled for their safety the pre-war population of 177,000 has dwindled to a few thousand authorities evacuated more than 2,500 people from the frontier area [Music] the governor of Russia’s belgaro region which borders Ukraine said that one woman was killed and 29 people were wounded including a child in counter shelling by Ukraine’s Armed Forces 22 apartment buildings and four commercial properties were hit by Ukrainian shelling a City Hospital a children’s Regional Hospital a school and two sports facilities have also been destroyed Ukraine’s president zalinsky said that his troops are carrying out counter attacks for a second day to protect Ukrainian thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s harke as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages that Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in harv according to the harv governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains at the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against farther Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the ground Ukraine’s president vadir zelinski claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the Border Villages he says disrupting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the K region a Ukrainian Missile hit a multi-story structure taking down a whole section of the of the building the attack killed at least seven and injured over 20 in the Russian city of belgorod Moscow describ the incident a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using torch U vampire and Al missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling and that’s according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggested establishing a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrad Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era Convention of ballistic missiles launched overnight over belgrod region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a refinery in Russia’s vulgo ground region causing a fire at the complex thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s hardke as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages of Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in harv according to the hardke governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains on the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against farther Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the ground [Music] Ukrainian president vadia zelinski claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the Border Villages he say this rting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the K region a Ukrainian Missile hit a multistory structure taking down a whole section of the building the attack killed at least seven and injured over 17 in the Russian city of belgorod mosus described the incident as a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using torch caou vampire and ala missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling and this according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggested establishing a Buffa Zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrod Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era conventional ballistic missiles launched overnight over belgaro region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a refinery in Russia’s vulgo grad region causing a fire at the complex Peter kosnik is a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University and is now joining us from Washington DC welcome Professor we have seen Russia taking advancements in har what does this say about the war in your view what direction will the war take henceforth very difficult position now both in terms of Manpower and in terms of weaponry and so Russia is taking advantage of that they had been moving in the East and the South now they’ve added this offensive in the north uh and so the Ukrainian lines were already stretched very thin and Russia was making incremental gains in the South and the East now Ukraine is forced to move many of those troops to protect in the north around Kev which weakens them further in the South and the East and so Russia is exploiting their advantages Russia is taking advantage of the fact that they have more artillery ammunition more weaponry and much more soldiers right now so Ukraine has passed new legislation uh that allows them to draft more Ukrainian citizens but that doesn’t go into effect for another week and that will require months of training so Ukraine is going to be in a weakened position for quite some time nobody has any optimistic assessment of anything that would happen from Ukraine standpoint in this in 2024 some uh forecaster are hoping that conditions will improve in 2025 but I’m afraid that’s also pipe dream professor before we move on we are reporting now that seven people have been reported killed in the Russian border adjacent city of belgorod uh after Ukrainian projectiles hit a residential building there and at least 20 other people have been injured Russia has apparently opened a criminal case your view well part there are two theories behind this offensive toward K one is to push the ukrainians six miles back to create a buffer zone so that Ukraine will not be able to hit belgorod and other areas inside of Russia so that’s one Theory just to create a buffer zone other people think that Russia is actually planning to try to seize Kar Kar is Ukraine’s second biggest city before the war a population of 1.3 million people MH so that would be very very difficult but given the state of conditions in Ukraine right now it might not be impossible that would be a major victory for Russia if it can sees Kar but even it can push create a six mile buffer zone which seems much more feasible that would also protect those cities towns like belgrad inside of Russia Professor let’s talk about Ukraine now and the situation there President Biden promised weapons will be delivered as soon as possible what do you think could be causing the delays the uh that that 61 billion dollar that was passed most of that gets spent in the United States by America’s Munitions makers and it takes time to do that Biden has just announced a $400 million military aid package and that’s going to be based on his presidential draw down Authority so they will take $400 Million worth of weapons from the US Arsenal and deliver those much more quickly and that’s a variety of offensive and defensive weapons that Ukraine can use but it’s going to take time can take weeks months even longer to to build up that that weapons to to build the weapons to ship over to Ukraine now the Europeans have been providing some but they’re also behind their promises uh the other concerning thing that we shouldn’t lose track of is that macron has been talking about sending uh French and other European round troops to support the ukrainians we also think that with the f-16s and other Advanced Weaponry arriving it’s possible that NATO forces will be there to help Target and possibly to help use those weapons all of these are a serious escalation Putin has been making a lot of uh saber rattling about tactical nuclear weapons now it so we don’t want to we don’t want I don’t want this to escalate to a much bigger war and that’s also possible the more desperate Ukraine becomes the more Poss possibility that this situation escalates into potentially World War II and that’s what we especially have to make sure it’s prevent all right we’re out of time now Professor thank you very much for talking to us I’ve been talking to Peter kosnik who’s a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University Professor thank you once again thank you thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s hardke as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages that Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in har according to the harv governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains on the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against further Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in Infantry Armory and ammunition on the ground Ukrainian president vadir zalinski claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the Border Villages he says disrupting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the karv region a Ukrainian Missile hit a m two story structure taking down a whole section of the building they attack killed at least seven and injured over 17 in the Russian city of belgorod mosow described the incident as a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using Tor caou vampire and Alam missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggested establishing a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrad Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era conventional ballistic missiles launched overnight over belgorod region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a refinery in Russia’s vulgo grad region causing a fire at the complex and for more on this we earlier spoke to Peter kosnik who is a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University and this is what he had to say Ukraine is in a very difficult position now both in terms of Manpower and in terms of weaponry and so Russia is taking advantage of that they had been moving in the East and the South now they’ve added this offensive in the North uh and so the Ukrainian lines were already stretched very thin and Russia was making incremental gains in the South and the East now Ukraine is forced to move many of those troops to protect in the north around kke which weakens them further in the South and the East and so Russia is exploiting their advantages Russia is taking advantage of the fact that they have more artillery ammunition more weaponry and much more soldiers right now so Ukraine has passed new legislation uh that allows them to draft more Ukrainian citizens but that doesn’t go into effect for another week and that will require months of training so Ukraine is going to be in a weakened position for quite some time nobody has any optimistic assessment of anything that would happen from Ukraine standpoint point in this in 2024 some forecasters are hoping that conditions will improve in 2025 but I’m afraid that’s also a pipe dream now Russia launched a surprise ground offensive into Ukraine’s kiv region reopening a front that had taken center stage in the early stages of the war Moscow is eyeing its biggest land operation in this region Ukraine’s outgunned Army rushed in reinforcements president vadir zinski vowed to defend the region Ukraine says it repelled the Russian armored attack and according to K’s Regional head not a single meter has been lost after moscow’s forces sought to break through defensive lines now there was massive shelling reported in the region overnight killing at least two civilians and injuring five more residential buildings caught fire during the attack which Ukraine says was carried out with two anti craft guided missiles Moscow denies targeting civil I in what it said are legitimate strikes on Ukraine’s military energy and transport infrastructure meanwhile people in hundreds have been evacuated from the border area in Ukraine’s Kari region after Moscow launched a surprise ground offensive Ukrainian authorities helped with evacuations from the Kari region and the surrounding areas residents were brought to a town where they waited patiently for their turn to leave on the outskirts of the Russian city of luhansk in eastern Ukraine the Region’s Russia installed leader says Ukrainian forces attacked an oil storage Depot and sparked a large fire killing at least three and injuring some eight civilians according to reports this is set to be second such assault in 3 days meanwhile as keev struggles to hold off advances by Russian troops in the Northeast Kar region the United States has announced a new $400 million package of military aid for Ukraine this is the third tranch of aid for Ukraine since the Congress passed supplemental funding in late April after months of gridlock now the White House says the latest military aid is intended to help Ukraine fend off a surging Russian effort to capture K ke the United States says though it expects Russia will make further advances in the coming weeks after they already launched initial incursions in areas near K thed insisted it to do not anticipate any major breakthroughs Pentagon expressed optimism saying that despite Russia’s offensive in Ukraine’s khi region the United States will be delivering needed weapon systems to ke quickly they believe that their uh most urgent need is in the harke area and certainly that’s where uh they’re you know they’re going to begin to put most of uh most of the uh resources that we’re providing uh so uh we’re in constant contact we’re going to try to uh address their needs uh uh uh in every way that we can and we’re doing it in an urgent fashion and this pretty big development Ukraine has now said that it expects to get its very first F-16 fighter jets from Western allies in June July months according to a high ranking Ukrainian military Source Ukraine has sought us made F6 F Jets to help it counter Russia’s air superiority for a period of 2 years now according to reports the source is not said as to which country will supply these F Jets so far Denmark the Netherlands Norway and Belgium have committed to sending the americanmade F6 F Jets to Ukraine remember Russia has Tom again warned that Ukraine’s acquisition of F-16 F Jets will be viewed Pilots are completing their training to fly the war planes and the pilots and ground staff being trained by Ukraine’s Western partners for many months the Ukrainian military has had to rely on a relatively small Fleet of Soviet era Jets as it had fought to hold back Russia’s fullscale Invasion that started in February 2022 earlier spoke with Miss tsana kulovich she’s an associate professor in the school of interdisciplinary Global Studies at the University of Florida listland to [Music] watch well um as I see it it is not a new uh development we we have been hearing about uh potential presence of nat NATO um NATO Representatives let’s say uh since last year in April 2023 this current uh uh announcement was made actually in March not in we in May right now and um uh president of Czech Republic Peter pav clarified that this uh uh NATO Representatives that may may be or are located in Ukraine now tensions are rising over the potential for a direct clash between NATO and Russia recent statements by Poland France and Lithuania suggesting NATO troop presence in Ukraine point to a dangerous escalation while NATO denies these claims the krelman has responded with Stark warnings raising the Spectre of a wider conflict [Music] the shadow of a protracted Ukraine war is igniting Regional fears of a NATO Russia confrontation polish prime minister Donald Tusk admits as much even as he expresses concern over a direct War [Music] there are some troops there I mean soldiers there are some soldiers there observers Engineers they’re helping them out we’ll see how it goes but you know nobody wants a direct War the Kremlin is unequivocal in its warnings stating that any deployment of NATO forces within Ukraine’s borders will be seen as a direct threat to Russia’s national security tensions have been further heightened by Russia cautioning France that any troops to Ukraine will be considered legitimate targets macro has more than once insisted that he has no objections on deploying French boots in Ukraine Lithuania too has joined the koras it says it is prepared to send its soldiers on a training mission to Ukraine the NATO leadership along with us and UK has strongly spoken out against any deployment of troops in Ukraine as it will bring the Alli in direct conflict with Moscow the situation is frock with danger President Vladimir Putin has announced Russia will conduct tactical nuclear weapons drills Moscow calls the Mover a direct response to NATO’s potential potential troop deployment signaling the gravity of the threat perceived by Russia bu report we on world is one Antarctica the Wild’s southernmost and iciest continent holds abundance of hidden minerals and even energy sources according to a report Russia has found vast oil and gas reserves in the Antarctic much of it in areas claimed by the UK UK the report citing evidence given to the common environment audit committee says reserves totaling 511 billion barrels of oil which is said to be about 10 times the north Sea’s entire 50-year output has been reported by to Moscow by Russian research ships this follows a series of surveys carried out by the Alexander capinski vessel operated by Ros Gio the Russian agency charged with finding or with finding mineral reserves for commercial exploitation despite Antarctica being protected by the 1959 Antarctic treaty that BNS all mineral and oil developments UK’s members of parliament are raising their concerns they say the surveys carried out by Russia are preparations to bring in drilling rigs to exploit the pristine region of fossil fuels the UK’s interests in Antarctica are overseen by its foreign office but it has been accused of of ignoring the emerging crisis after David rley last week told the EAC that his department is trusting Russian assurances that they are just conducting scientific research there all right let’s shift our Focus now Vladimir Putin has replaced his defense minister Serge Shu With a Civilian Economist Andre belov and the move comes mid Rising concerns over military spending right him this also marks the first major military shakeup in the country’s security cabinet since its invasion of Ukraine well earlier bosov served as the first Deputy Prime Minister as per Putin he has been chosen over a need for growing Innovations at the war front citing military spendings the Kremlin has revealed that it was approaching levels last recorded during the Cold War era the move is a clear indication that Putin is now seeking to align the economy with war efforts before the beginning of the War just 3% of Russia’s GDP was slated for defense spendings and this figure grew to 3.4% in the initial phases of the war currently 6.7% of the GDP is focused on defense spendings separately as for the Kremlin shyu has been appointed as the Secretary of Russia Security Council in fact he’s also said to become Putin’s Deputy in the Russian military industrial commission as experts’s choice of having an economist as a defense minister mirrors the changing priorities of the Kremlin the news follows the arrest of shu’s close Ally and Deputy defense minister timore evanov as for Russian media he had been accused of accepting over $10,000 in bribe the Russia Ukraine front Fierce fighting raged on the second day in Ukraine’s Northeastern region of karv as Russia intensified is offensive in the region intense battle continues in seven border Villages Russian troops say that five Villages are under their control now the Ukrainian Army has refuted the claim saying it is repulsing Russian advancements the battle for control of the settlements in East where moscow’s offensive is focused has stretched Ukrainian forces struggling with shortage of troops and artillery shells Ukrainian president vadir zinski described the situation in the southern donat region as especially tense amid renewed Russian assault 1,700 residents in the city of wans which falls in the contested Gray Zone on the border of Ukraine’s Kar region were forced to flee as fighting [Music] intensified Russian forces pummeled the city with Air Raids and Rockets that set several houses a blaze as they attempted to break through the Ukrainian defensive lines 20 people were evacuated to a nearby Village the town’s Chief Patrol police officer says that as the Border city is heavily shelled by Russian troops people have fled for their safety the pre-war population of 17,000 has dwindled to a few thousand authorities evacuated more than 2,500 people from the frontier area the governor of Russia’s belgaro region which borders Ukraine said that one woman was killed and 29 people were wounded including a child in counter shelling by Ukraine’s Armed Forces 22 apartment buildings and four commercial properties were hit by Ukrainian shelling a City Hospital a children’s Regional Hospital a school and two sports facilities have also been destroyed Ukraine’s president zalinski said that his troops are carrying out counter attacks for a second day to protect Ukrainian territory thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s hard as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages that Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in harv according to the har Governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains of the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against farther Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the ground Ukraine’s president vadir zelinski claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the Border Villages he says disrupting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the kar region a Ukrainian Missile hit a multi-story structure taking down a whole section of the of the building the attack killed at least seven and injured over 20 in the Russian city of belgorod Moscow described the incident a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using Tor cou vampire and ala missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling and that’s according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggest tested establishing a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrad Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era conventional ballistic missiles launched overnight over belgrod region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a refinery in Russia’s vulgo gr region causing a fire at the complex thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s hardke as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages of Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in harv according to the harv governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains on the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against farther Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the [Music] ground Ukrainian president vadir zelinski claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the Border Villages he say this rting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the k reg a Ukrainian Missile hit a multistory structure taking down a whole section of the building the attack killed at least seven and injured over 17 in the Russian city of belgorod mosos described the incident as a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using torch caou vampire and ala missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling and this according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggested establishing a Buffa Zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrod Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era conventional ballistic missiles launched overnight over belgorod region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a refinery in Russia’s vulgo grad region causing a fire at the complex Peter kosnik is a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University and is now joining us from Washington DC welcome Professor we have seen Russia taking advancements in har what does this say about the war in your view what direction will the war take hence forth very difficult position now both in terms of Manpower and in terms of weaponry and so Russia is taking advantage of that they had been moving in the East and the South now they’ve added this offensive in the north uh and so the Ukrainian lines were already stretch very thin and Russia was making incremental gains in the South and the East now Ukraine is forced to move many of those troops to protect in the north around kke which weakens them further in the South and the east and so Russia is exploiting their advantages Russia is taking advantage of the fact that they have more artillery ammunition more weaponry and much more soldiers right now so Ukraine has passed new legislation uh that allows them to draft more Ukrainian citizens but that doesn’t go into effect for another week and that will require months of training so Ukraine is going to be in weakened position for quite some time nobody has any optimistic assessment of anything that would happen from Ukraine standpoint in this in 2024 some uh forecasters are hoping that conditions will improve in 2025 but I’m afraid that’s also a pipe dream professor before we move on we are reporting now that seven people have been reported killed in the Russian border adjacent city of belgorod uh after Ukrainian projectiles hit a residential building there and at least 20 other people have been injured Russia has apparently opened a criminal case your view well part there are two theories behind this offensive toward K one is to push the ukrainians six miles back to create a buffer zone so that Ukraine will not be able to hit belgrad and other areas inside of Russia so that’s one Theory just to create a buffer zone other people think that Russia is actually planning to try to seize Kev carke is Ukraine’s second biggest city before the war it had a population of 1.3 million people so that would be very very difficult but given the state of conditions in Ukraine right now it might not be impossible that would be a major victory for Russia if it can seize Kar but even it can push create a six mile buffer zone which seems much more feasible that would also protect those cities towns like belad inside of Russia Professor let’s talk about Ukraine now and the situation there President Biden promised weapons will be delivered as soon as possible what do you think could be causing the delay the uh that that $61 billion that was passed most of that gets spent in the United States by America’s Munitions makers and it takes time to do that Biden has just announced a $400 million military aid package and that’s going to be based on his presidential draw down Authority so they will take $400 Million worth of weapons from the US Arsenal and deliver those much more quickly and that’s a variety of offensive and defensive weapons that Ukraine can use but it’s going to take time can take weeks months even longer to to build up that that weapons to to build the weapons to ship over to Ukraine now the Europeans have been providing some but they’re also behind their promises uh the other concerning thing that we shouldn’t lose track of is that macron has been talking about sending uh French and other European round troops to support the ukrainians we also think that with the f-16s and other Advanced Weaponry arriving it’s possible that NATO forces will be there to help Target and possibly to help use those weapons all of these are a serious escalation Putin has been making a lot of uh saber rattling about uh tactical nuclear weapons now it so we don’t want to we don’t want I don’t want this to escalate to a much bigger war and that’s also possible the more desperate Ukraine becomes the more possibility that this situation escalates into potentially World War III and that’s what we especially have to make sure it’s prevent all right right we’re out of time now Professor thank you very much for talking to us I’ve been talking to Peter kosnik who’s a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University Professor thank you once again thank you thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s harke as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages that Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in harke according to the harke governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains on the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against further Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the ground Ukrainian president vadir zelinski claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the border of villages he says disrupting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority sure today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the K region a Ukrainian Missile hit a more two story structure taking down a whole section of the building they attack killed at least seven and injured over 17 in the Russian city of belgorod mosco described the incident as a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using T caou vampire and Al missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggested establishing a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belr Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era conventional ballistic missiles launched overnight over belgorod region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a refinery in Russia’s vulgo gr region causing a fire at the complex and for more on this we earlier spoke to Peter kosnik who is a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University and this is what he had to say you Ukraine is in a very difficult position now both in terms of Manpower and in terms of weaponry and so Russia is taking advantage of that they had been moving in the East and the South now they’ve added this offensive in the north uh and so the Ukrainian lines were already stretched very thin and Russia was making incremental gains in the South and the east now the Ukraine is forced to move many of those troops to protect in the north around Kev which weakens them further in the South and the East and so Russia is exploiting their advantages Russia is taking advantage of the fact that they have more artillery ammunition more weaponry and much more soldiers right now so Ukraine has passed new legislation uh that allows them to draft more Ukrainian citizens but that doesn’t go into effect for another week and that will require months of training so Ukraine is going to be in a weakened position for quite some time nobody has any optimistic assessment of anything that would happen from Ukraine standpoint in this in 2024 some uh forecasters are hoping that conditions will improve in 2025 but I’m afraid that’s also a pipe dream now Russia launched a surprise ground offensive into Ukraine’s K region reopening a front that had taken center stage in the early stages of the war Moscow is eyeing its biggest land operation in this region Ukraine’s out gun Army rushed in reinforcements President Vladimir zelinski vowed to defend the region Ukraine says it repelled the Russian armored attack and according to K’s Regional head not a single meter has been lost after after moscow’s forces sought to break through defensive lines now there was massive shelling reported in the region overnight killing at least two civilians and injuring five more residential buildings caught fire during the attack which Ukraine says was carried out with two anticraft guided missiles Moscow denies targeting civilians in what it said are legitimate strikes on Ukraine’s military energy and transport infrastructure meanwhile people in hundreds have been evacuated from the border area in Ukraine’s khari region after Moscow launched a surprise ground offensive Ukrainian authorities helped with evacuations from the Kari region and the surrounding areas residents were brought to a town where they waited patiently for their turn to leave on the outskirts of the Russian H city of luhansk in eastern Ukraine the Region’s Russia installed leader says Ukrainian forces attacked an oil storage Depot and sparked a large fire killing at least three and injuring some eight civilians according to reports this is set to be second such assault in 3 days meanwhile as keev struggles to hold off advances by Russian troops in the Northeast Kari region the United States has announced a new $400 million package of military aid for Ukraine this is the third tranch of aid for Ukraine since the Congress passed supplemental funding in late April after months of gridlock now the White House says the latest military aid is intended to help Ukraine fend off a surging Russian effort to capture kke the United States says though it expects Russia will make further advances in the coming weeks after they already launched initial incursions in areas near K tet insisted it to do not anticipate any major breakthroughs the Pentagon expressed optimism saying that despite Russia’s offensive in Ukraine’s kke region the United States will be delivering needed weapon systems to ke quickly they believe that their uh most urgent need is in the harke area and certainly that’s where uh they’re you know they’re going to begin to put most of uh most of the resources that we’re providing uh so uh we’re in constant contact we’re going to try to uh address their needs uh uh in every way that we can and we’re doing it in an urgent fashion in a pretty big development Ukraine has now said that it expects to get its very first F-16 fighter jets from Western allies in June July months according to a high ranking Ukrainian military Source Ukraine has sought us made F-16 F Jets to help it counter Russia’s air superiority for a period of 2 years now according to reports The Source has not said as to which country will supply these F Jets so far Denmark the Netherlands Norway and Belgium have committed to sending the americanmade F-16 F Jets to Ukraine remember Russia has time again warned that Ukraine’s acquisition of F-16 fighter jets will be viewed as a nuclear capable threat the Russian foreign Ministry has also described the deployment of f-16s as a purposeful provocation by the United States and NATO the Ukrainian Pilots are completing their training to fly the war planes and the pilots and ground staff being trained by Ukraine’s West partners for many months the Ukrainian military has had to rely on a relatively small Fleet of Soviet era Jets as it had fought to hold back Russia’s fullscale Invasion that started in February 2022 and I earlier spoke with Miss tsana kulovich she’s an associate professor in the school of interdisciplinary Global Studies at the University of Florida listening to what she to say well well um as I see it it is not a new uh development we we have been hearing about uh potential presence of NATO NATO um NATO Representatives let’s say uh since last year in April 2023 this current uh uh announcement was made actually in March not in we are in May right now and um uh president of Czech Republic Peter pav clarified that this uh uh NATO Representatives that may may be or are located in Ukraine right now now tensions are rising over the potential for a direct clash between NATO and Russia recent statements by Poland France and Lithuania suggesting NATO troop presence in Ukraine point to a dangerous escalation while NATO denies these claims the krelman has responded with Stark warnings raising the Spectre of a wider conflict [Music] the shadow of a protracted Ukraine war is igniting Regional fears of a NATO Russia confrontation polish prime minister Donald Tusk admits as much even as he expresses concern over a direct [Music] War there are some troops there I mean soldiers there are some soldiers there observers Engineers they’re helping them out we’ll see how it goes but you know nobody wants a direct War the Kremlin is unequivocal in its warnings stating that any deployment of NATO forces within Ukraine’s borders will be seen as a direct threat to Russia’s national security tensions have been further heightened by Russia cautioning France that any troops to Ukraine will be considered legitimate targets macro has more than once insisted that he has no objections on deploying French boots in Ukraine Lithuania too has joined the koras it says it is prepared to send its soldiers on a training mission to Ukraine the NATO leadership along with us and UK has strongly spoken out against any deployment of troops in Ukraine as it will bring the alliance in direct conflict with Moscow the situation is flocked with danger President Vladimir Putin has announced Russia will conduct tactical nuclear weapons drills Moscow calls the Mover a direct response to NATO’s potential troop deployment signaling the gravity of the threat perceived by Russia bu report we on world is one Antarctica the Wild’s southernmost and iest continent holds abundance of hidden minerals and even energy sources according to a report Russia has found vast oil and gas reserves in the Antarctic much of it in areas clear claimed by the UK the report citing evidence given to the common environment audit committee says reserves totaling 511 billion barrels of oil which is said to be about 10 times the north Sea’s entire 50-year output has been reported by to Moscow by Russian research ships this follows a series of surveys carried out by the Alexander kinsky vessel operated by Ros Gio the Russian agency charged with finding or with finding mineral reserves for commercial exploitation despite Antarctica being protected by the 1959 Antarctic treaty that BNS all mineral and oil developments UK’s members of parliament are raising their concerns they say the surveys carried out by Russia are preparations to bring in drilling rigs to exploit the pristine region of fossil fuels the UK’s interests in Antarctica are overseen by its foreign office but it has been accused of ignoring the emerging crisis after David rley last week told the EAC that his department is trusting Russian assurances that they are just conducting scientific research there all right let’s shift our Focus now Vladmir Putin has replaced his defense minister Serge Shu With a Civilian Economist Andre belov and the move comes mid- Rising concerns over military spending right him this also marks the first major milit shake up in the country’s security cabinet since its invasion of Ukraine while earlier bosov served as the first Deputy Prime Minister as per Putin he has been chosen over a need for growing Innovations at the war front citing military spendings the Kremlin has revealed that it was approaching levels last recorded during the Cold War era the move is a clear indication that Putin is now seeking to align the economy with war efforts before the big of the war just 3% of Russia’s GDP was slated for defense spendings and this figure grew to 3.44% in the initial phases of the war currently 6.7% of the GDP is focused on defense spendings separately as for the Kremlin Shu has been appointed as the Secretary of Russia Security Council in fact he’s also said to become Putin’s Deputy in the Russian military industrial commission as Putin’s choice of having an economist as a defense minister mirrors the changing priorities of the Kremlin the news follows the arrest of shu’s close Ally and Deputy defense minister Timor evanov as for Russian media he had been accused of accepting over $110,000 in bribe the Russia Ukraine front Fierce fighting raised on the second day in Ukraine’s Northeastern region of kariv as Russia intensified is offensive in the region intense battle continues in seven border villages Russian troops say that five Villages are under their control now the Ukrainian Army has refuted the claim saying it is repulsing Russian advancements the battle for control of the settlements in East where moscow’s offensive is focused has stretched Ukrainian forces struggling with shortage of troops and artillery shells Ukrainian president vadir zilinski described the situation in the southern donat region as especially tense Aid renewed Russian assault 1700 res residents in the city of wans which falls in the contested Gray Zone on the border of Ukraine’s Kar region were forced to flee as fighting [Music] intensified Russian forces pummeled the city with Air Raids and Rockets that set several houses of blade as they attempted to break through the Ukrainian defensive lines 20 people were evacuated to a nearby Village the town’s Chief Patrol police officer says that as the Border city is heavily shelled by Russian troops people have fled for their safety the pre-war population of 177,000 has dwindled to a few thousand authorities evacuated more than 2,500 people from the frontier [Music] area the governor of Russia’s belgaro region which borders Ukraine said that one woman was killed and 29 people were wounded including a child in counter shelling by Ukraine’s Armed Forces 22 apartment buildings and four commercial properties were hit by Ukrainian shelling a City Hospital a children’s Regional Hospital a school and two sports facilities have also been destroyed Ukraine’s president zalinsky said that his troops are carrying out counter attacks for a second day to protect Ukrainian territory thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s heart as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages that Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in har according to the har Governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains at the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against further Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significant ly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the ground Ukraine’s president vadir zalinski claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the Border Villages he says disrupting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the K region a Ukrainian Missile hit a multi-story structure taking down a whole section of the of the building the attack killed at least seven men injured over 20 in the Russian city of belgaro Moscow described the incident a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using Tor cou vampire and ala missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling and that’s according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggested establishing a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrad Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era conventional ballistic missiles launched overnight over belgorod region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a refinery in Russia’s vulgo ground region causing a fire at the complex thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s hardke as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages of Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in harv according to the harv governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains on the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against farther Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the [Music] ground Ukrainian president vmir zalinsky claims that that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counter attacks in the Border Villages he say this rting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the K region a Ukrainian Missile hit a multistory structure taking down a whole section of the building the attack killed at least seven and injured over 17 in the Russian city of belgorod mosos described the incident as a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using torch caou vampire and ala missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling and this according to officials last month president vadir Putin suggested establishing a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrod Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era conventional ballistic missiles launched overnight over belgorod region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a refinery in Russia’s vrad region causing a fire at the complex Peter k is a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University and is now joining us from Washington DC welcome Professor we have seen Russia taking advancements in har what does this say about the war in your view what direction will the war take hence forth very difficult position now both in terms of Manpower and in terms of weaponry and so Russia is taking taking advantage of that they had been moving in the East and the South now they’ve added this offensive in the north uh and so the Ukrainian lines were already stretched very thin and Russia was making incremental gains in the South and the East now Ukraine is forced to move many of those troops to protect in the north around kke which weakens them further in the South and the east and so Russia is exploiting their advantages Russia is taking advantage of the fact that they have more artillery ammunition more weaponry and much more soldiers right now so Ukraine has passed new legislation uh that allows them to draft more Ukrainian citizens but that doesn’t go into effect for another week and that will require months of training so Ukraine is going to be in a weakened position for quite some time nobody has any optimistic assessment of anything that would happen from Ukraine standpoint in this in 2024 some uh forecasters are hoping that conditions will improve in 2025 but I’m afraid that’s also a pipe dream professor before we move on we are reporting now that seven people have been reported killed in the Russian border adjacent city of belgorod uh after Ukrainian projectiles hit a residential building there and at least 20 other people have been injured Russia has apparently opened a criminal case your view well part there are two theories behind this offensive toward carave one is to push the ukrainians six miles back to create a buffer zone so that Ukraine will not be able to hit belgrad and other areas inside of Russia so that’s one Theory just to create a buffer zone other people think that Russia is actually planning to try to seize karev kke is Ukraine’s second biggest city before the war it had a population of 1.3 million people so that would be very very difficult but given the state of conditions in Ukraine right now it might not be impossible that would be a major victory for Russia if it can seize Kar but even it can push create a sixmile buffer zone which seems much more feasible that would also protect those cities towns like belgrad inside of Russia Professor let’s talk about Ukraine now and the situation there President Biden promised weapons will be delivered as soon as possible what do you think could be causing the delays the uh that that $61 billion that was passed most of that gets spent in the United States by America’s Munitions makers and it takes time to do that Biden has just announced a $400 million military aid package and that’s going to be based on his presidential draw down Authority so they will take $400 Million worth of weapons weapons from the US Arsenal and deliver those much more quickly and that’s a variety of offensive and defensive weapons that Ukraine can use but it’s going to take time to take weeks months even longer to to build up that that weapons to to build the weapons to ship over to Ukraine now the Europeans have been providing some but they’re also behind their promises uh the other concerning thing now we shouldn’t lose track of is that macron has been talking about sending uh French and other European round troops to support the ukrainians we also think that with the f-16s and other Advanced Weaponry arriving it’s possible that NATO forces will be there to help Target and possibly to help use those weapons all of these are a serious escalation Putin has been making a lot of uh saber rattling about tactical nuclear weapons now it so we don’t want to we don’t want I don’t want this to escalate to a much bigger war and that’s also possible the more desperate Ukraine becomes the more possibility that this situation escalates into potentially World War II and that’s what we especially have to make sure it’s prevent all right we’re out of time now Professor thank you very much for talking to us I’ve been talking to Peter kosnik who’s a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University Professor thank you once again thank you thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s hardke as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages that Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in harke according to the harke governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains on the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against further Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the ground Ukrainian president vadir zinsky claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the Border Villages he says disrupting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the kar region a Ukrainian missile h a more two story structure taking down a whole section of the building the attack killed at least seven and injured over 17 in the Russian city of belgorod Moscow described the incident as a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using toru vampire and Al missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggested establishing a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrad Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era conventional ballistic missiles launched overnight over belgrod region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a refinery in Russia’s vulgo grad region causing a fire at the complex and for more this we earlier spoke to Peter kosnik who is a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University and this is what he had to say Ukraine is in a very difficult position now both in terms of Manpower and in terms of weaponry and so Russia is taking advantage of that they had been moving in the East and the South now they’ve added this offensive in the north uh and so the Ukrainian lines were already stretch very thin and Russia was making incremental gains in the South and the east East now Ukraine is forced to move many of those troops to protect in the north around K which weakens them further in the South and the East and so Russia is exploiting their advantages Russia is taking advantage of the fact that they have more artillery ammunition more weaponry and much more soldiers right now so Ukraine has passed new legislation uh that allows them to draft more Ukrainian citizens but that doesn’t go into effect for another week and then we require months of training so Ukraine is going to be in a weakened position for quite some time nobody has any optimistic assessment of anything that would happen from Ukraine standpoint in this in 2024 some uh forecasters are hoping that conditions will improve in 2025 but I’m afraid that’s also a pipe dream now Russia launched a surprise ground offensive into Ukraine’s K region reopening a front that had taken center stage in the early stages of the war Moscow is eyeing its biggest land operation in this region Ukraine’s outgunned Army rushed in reinforcements President Vladimir zinsky vowed to defend the region Ukraine says it repelled the Russian armored attack and according to K’s Regional head not a single meter has been lost after moscow’s forces sought to break through defensive lines now there was massive shelling reported in the region overnight killing at least two civilians and injuring five more residential buildings cot fire during the attack which Ukraine says was carried out with two anticraft guided missiles Moscow denies targeting civilians in what it said are legitimate strikes on Ukraine’s military energy and transport infrastructure meanwhile people in hundreds have been evacuated from the B the area in Ukraine’s Kari region after Moscow launched a surprise ground offensive Ukrainian authorities helped with evacuations from the Kari region and the surrounding areas residents were brought to a town where the waited patiently for their turn to leave on the outskirts of the Russian H city of luhansk in eastern Ukraine the regions Russia installed leader says Ukrainian forces attacked an oil storage Depot and sparked a large fire killing at least three and injuring some eight civilians according to reports this is said to be second such assault in 3 days meanwhile as keev struggles to hold off advances by Russian troops in the Northeast Kar region the United States has announced a new $400 million package of military aid for Ukraine this is the third tranch of aid for Ukraine since the Congress passed supplemental funding in late April after months of grid lock now the White House says the latest military aid is intended to help Ukraine fend off a surging Russian effort to capture K ke the United States says though it expects Russia will make further advances in the coming weeks after they already launched initial incursions in areas near K Ted insisted it to do not anticipate any major breakthroughs the Pentagon expressed optimism saying that despite Russia’s offensive in Ukraine’s KH region the United States will be delivering needed weapon systems to ke quickly they believe that their uh most urgent need is in the harke area and certainly that’s where uh they’re you know they’re going to begin to put most of uh most of the resource uh so uh we’re in constant contact we’re going to try to uh address their needs uh uh in every way that we can and we’re doing it in an urgent fashion in a pretty big development Ukraine has now said that it expects to get its very first F-16 fighter jets from Western allies in June July months according to a high ranking Ukrainian military Source Ukraine has sought us made F-16 F Jets to help it counter Russia’s air superiority for a period of 2 years now according to reports The Source has not said as to which country will supply these F Jets so far Denmark the Netherlands Norway and Belgium have committed to sending the americanmade F-16 F Jets to Ukraine remember Russia has time again warned that Ukraine’s acquisition of F-16 fighter jets will be viewed as a nuclear capable threat the Russian foreign Ministry has also described the deployment of f-16s as a purposeful provocation by the United States and NATO the Ukrainian Pilots are completing their training to fly the war planes and the pilots and ground staff been trained by Ukraine’s Western Partners from many months the Ukrainian military has had to rely on a relatively small Fleet of Soviet era Jets as it had fought to hold back Russia’s fullscale Invasion that started in February 2022 and are earlier spoke with Miss tatana kulovich she’s an associate professor in the school of interdisiplinary Global Studies at the University of Florida listening to [Music] watch well uh as I see it it is not a new uh development we we have been hearing about potential presence of NATO NATO um NATO Representatives let’s say uh since last year in April 2023 this current uh uh announcement was made actually in March not in we in May right now and um uh president of Czech Republic Peter pav CLK clarified that this uh uh NATO Representatives that may may be or are located in Ukraine right now now tensions are rising over the potential for a direct clash between NATO and Russia recent statements by Poland France and Lithuania suggesting NATO troop presence in Ukraine point to a dangerous escalation while NATO denies these claims the krelman has responded with Stark warnings raising the Spectre of a wider conflict [Music] the shadow of a protracted Ukraine war is igniting Regional fears of a NATO Russia confrontation polish prime minister Donald Tusk admits as much even as he expresses concern over a direct War [Music] there are some troops there I mean soldiers there are some soldiers there observers Engineers they’re helping them out we’ll see how it goes but you know nobody wants a direct War the Kremlin is unequivocal in its warnings stating that any deployment of NATO forces within Ukraine’s borders will be seen as a direct threat to Russia’s national security tensions have been further heightened by Russia cautioning France that any troops to Ukraine will be considered legitimate targets macro has more than once insisted that he has no objections on deploying French boots in Ukraine Lithuania to has joined the koras it says it is prepared to send its soldiers on a training mission to Ukraine the NATO leadership along with us and UK has strongly spoken out against any deployment of troops in Ukraine as it will bring the alliance in direct conflict with Moscow the situation is flocked with danger President Vladimir Putin has announced Russia will conduct tactical nuclear weapons drills Moscow calls the Mover a direct response to NATO’s potential IAL troop deployment signaling the gravity of the threat perceived by Russia bu report we on world is one Antarctica the world’s southernmost and icest continent holds abundance of hidden minerals and even energy sources according to a report Russia has found vast oil and gas reserves in the Antarctic much of it in areas claimed by the UK K the report citing evidence given to the commons environment audit committee says reserves totaling 511 billion barrels of oil which is said to be about 10 times the north Sea’s entire 50-year output has been reported by to Moscow by Russian research ships this follows a series of surveys carried out by the Alexander Kapinski vessel operated by Ros Gio the Russian agency charged with a finding or with finding mineral reserves for commercial exploitation despite Antarctica being protected by the 1959 Antarctic treaty that BNS all mineral and oil developments UK’s members of parliament are raising their concerns they say the surveys carried out by Russia are preparations to bring in drilling rigs to exploit the pristine region of fossil fuels the UK’s interests in Antarctica are overseen by its foreign office but it has been accused of ignoring the emerging crisis after David rattley last week told the EAC that his department is trusting Russian assurances that they are just conducting scientific research there all right let’s shift our Focus now Vladimir Putin has replaced his defense minister Serge Shu With a Civilian Economist Andre belov and the move comes mid Rising concerns over military spending right him this also marks the first major military shake up with with the country’s security cabinet since its invasion of Ukraine well earlier bosov served as the first Deputy Prime Minister as per Putin he has been chosen over a need for growing Innovations at the war front citing military spendings the Kremlin has revealed that it was approaching levels last recorded during the Cold War era the move is a clear indication that Putin is now seeking to align the economy with war efforts before the beginning of the war just 3% of Russia’s GDP was slated for defense spendings and this figure grew to 3.4% in the initial phases of the war currently 6.7% of the GDP is focused on defense spendings separately as for the Kremlin Shu has been appointed as the Secretary of Russia Security Council in fact he’s also said to become Putin’s Deputy in the Russian military industrial commission as experts Putin’s choice of having an economist as a defense minister mirrors the changing priorities of the Kremlin the news follows the arrest of shu’s close Ally and Deputy defense minister timore evanov as for Russian media he had been accused of accepting over $10,000 in bribe the Russia Ukraine front Fierce fighting raised on the second day in Ukraine’s Northeastern region of karv as Russia intensified is offensive in the region intense battle continues in seven border Villages Russian troops say that five Villages are under their control now the Ukrainian Army has refuted the claim saying it is repulsing Russian advancements the battle for control of the settlements in East where moscow’s offensive is focused as stretched Ukrainian forces struggling with shortage of troops and artillery shells Ukrainian president vadir zinski described the situation in the southern donat region as especially tense a mid renewed Russian assault 1700 residents in the city of wans which falls in the contested Gray Zone on the border of Ukraine’s Kar region were forced to flee as fighting [Music] intensified Russian forces pummeled the city with Air Raids and Rockets that set several houses a blaze as they attempted to break through the Ukrainian defensive lines 20 people were evacuated to a nearby Village the town’s Chief Patrol police officer says that as the Border city is heavily shelled by Russian troops people have fled for their safety the pre-war population of 177,000 has dwindled to a few thousand authorities evacuated more than 2,500 people from the frontier [Music] area the governor of Russia’s belgaro region which borders Ukraine said that one woman was killed and 29 people were wounded including a child in counter shelling by Ukraine’s Armed Forces 20 22 apartment buildings and four commercial properties were hit by Ukrainian shelling a City Hospital a children’s Regional Hospital a school and two sports facilities have also been destroyed Ukraine’s president zilinsky said that his troops are carrying out counter attacks for a second day to protect Ukrainian territory thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s hardke as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages that Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in har according to the har Governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains at the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against further Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the ground Ukraine’s president vadir zalinski claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the Border Villages he says disrupting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the karv region a Ukrainian Missile hit a multi-story structure taking down a whole section of the of the building the attack killed at least seven and injured over 20 in the Russian city of belgaro Moscow described the incident a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using Tor cou vampire and ala missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling and that’s according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggest at establishing a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrad Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era conventional ballistic missiles launched overnight over belgorod region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a Refinery Russia’s vulgo gr region causing a fire at the complex thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s hardke as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages of Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in harv according to the harv governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains on the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against farther Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the [Music] ground Ukrainian president vadir zelinsky claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the Border Villages he say this rting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the kar reg a Ukrainian Missile hit a multistory structure taking down a whole section of the building the attack killed at least seven and injured over 17 in the Russian city of belgorod rosos described the incident as a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using torch caou vampire and Alam missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling and this according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggested establishing a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrod Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era conventional ballistic missiles launched overnight over belgorod region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a refinery in Russia’s vulo grad region causing a fire at the complex Peter kosnik is a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University and is now joining us from Washington DC welcome Professor we have seen Russia taking advancements in har what does this say about the war in your view what direction will the war take hence forth very difficult position now both in terms of Manpower and in terms of weaponry and so Russia is taking advantage of that they had been moving in the East and the South now they’ve added this offensive in the north uh and so the Ukrainian lines were already stretched very thin and Russia was making incremental gains in the South and the East now Ukraine is forced to move many of those troops to protect in the north around kke which weakens them further in the South and the East and and so Russia is exploiting their advantages Russia is taking advantage of the fact that they have more artillery ammunition more weaponry and much more soldiers right now so Ukraine has passed new legislation uh that allows them to draft more Ukrainian citizens but that doesn’t go into effect for another week and that will require months of training so Ukraine is going to be in a weakened position for quite some time nobody has any optimistic assessment of anything that would happen from Ukraine’s standpoint in this in 2024 some uh forecasters are hoping that conditions will improve in 2025 but I’m afraid that’s also a pipe dream professor before we move on we are reporting now that seven people have been reported killed in the Russian border adjacent city of belgorod uh after Ukrainian projectiles hit a residential building there and at least 20 other people have been injured Russia has apparently opened a criminal case your view well part there are two theories behind this offensive toward carave one is to push the ukrainians six miles back to create a buffer zone so so that Ukraine will not be able to hit belgrad and other areas inside of Russia so that’s one Theory just to create a buffer zone other people think that Russia is actually planning to try to seize karev kke is Ukraine’s second biggest city before the war it had a population of 1.3 million people so that would be very very difficult but given the state of conditions in Ukraine right now it might not be possible that would be a major victory for Russia if it can seize Kar but even it can push create a six mile buffer zone which seems much more feasible that would also protect those cities towns like belad inside of Russia Professor let’s talk about Ukraine now and the situation there President Biden promised weapons will be delivered as soon as possible what do you think shifting Focus to the other warfront the Russia Ukraine war is witnessing a fresh wave of escalation and Ukraine’s Northeastern city of K has become the latest flash point right while keev claims that it sees no risk on a ground assault in KH the visuals from the ground tell a different story altogether Ukrainian National Police are rushing to evacuate hundreds of civilians from hari’s border areas as Russian air strikes continue to P the region some W chance neighborhoods are not easy to get to due to constant shelling however the situation is stable and under control we are evacuating people it is fine the situation is precarious as artillery shells land near police vehicles officials say they do not see an imminent threat yet however they do acknowledge that G’s troops are being stretched here we can say that we don’t see any threat of assault on the city of KV or other problems but the Russians are trying to stretch our troops and if they succeed and have some success they develop them intense skirmishes between the Waring neighbors are also underway Northeastern Ukrainian town of ofans the latest push in the northeastern region it’s opened up a new warfront adding more pressure on the already overstretched Ukrainian forces now according to Moscow in the latest assault by Russian forces which began on Friday last week troops have captured over 40 to 5050 square miles in northeastern Ukraine’s Kar region which includes at least seven Villages meanwhile Ukraine carried out a fresh strike on the Russian Border City of belad on Monday the attack caused a building to collapse partially killing 15 according to Russia’s emergency Ministry 12 including two children were rescued from the rubble and this was one of the deadliest attacks to date on belar Rod launched by Ukrainian troops Al kerson the prime minister of the latest NATO member Sweden has said that he is now open to allowing nuclear weapons on its soil in Wartime in case the country is drawn into a military conflict it could potentially allow the US to station nuclear weapons on its territory well Sweden’s Parliament is set to vote on a defense cooperation agreement with the US in June it will give the US access to military bases in Sweden and allow the storage of military equipment and weapons in the Nordic country Sweden abandoned two centuries of military non-alignment to join nato in March this year unlike other Nordic Nations such as Finland and Norway Sweden has no explicit ban on accepting nuclear arms however it has maintained a long-standing policy against hosting such weapons in peace time critics in Sweden have called to impose a complete ban on nukes on its soil but the government has made it clear that no such ban will be put in place if needed Sweden itself will host nuclear weapons now as the prime minister in Sweden made such statements Russia warned that it is prepared for the battlefield earlier Kremlin said Russia has started preparations for missile drills near Ukraine simulating the use of Tactical nuclear weapons in response to threats by Western officials well in recent days some statements by NATO leaders have raised tensions polish prime minister Donald Tusk admitted that there is some deployment of NATO troops in Ukraine macron has more than once insisted that he has no objections on deploying French boots in Ukraine Lithuania to joined the chorus and says it is prepared to send its soldiers on a training mission to Ukraine as Russia has responded to all these statements concerns of the potential for a direct clash between NATO and Russia it is escalating at the moment first up our top story ladimir Putin has replaced his defense minister Sergey shyu With a Civilian and an economist Andre bosov the move comes amid Rising concerns over military spending Moscow has also dismissed its intelligence Chief Nikolai patev this marks the first major military shakeup in the country’s security cabinet since its invasion of Ukraine earlier bosov served as the first Deputy Prime Minister now as for Putin he has been chosen over a growing need for Innovations at the warf front citing military spending the Kremlin has revealed that it was approaching levels last recorded during the Cold War era the move is a clear indication that Putin is seeking to align the economy with the war efforts before the beginning of the war just 3% of Russia’s GDP was slated for defense spending the figure grew to 3.4% in the initial phases of the war currently 6.7% of the GDP is focused on defense spending and the second important thing is that today on the battlefield those who are more open for Innovations more open towards quick implementation win that is why it’s natural that on the current stage the president has taken the decision for a civilian to be in charge of the military of Defense now as for the Kremlin Shu who has been appointed as the Secretary of Russia’s Security Council in fact he is also said to become Putin’s Deputy in the Russian military industrial commission shu’s Deputy timour iano was arrested last month on prary charges He was ordered to remain in custody pending and official I probe the restr of evanov was widely interpreted as an attack on shyu and a possible precursor for his dismissal despite his close personal ties with Putin the Russian president and serge shyu go back a long way in September 2019 before Putin went into covid isolation he was on a vacation with the defense minister official videos released by The kremin showed the two walking through a Siberian Forest picking mushrooms then driving off uh across the taar now again in September 2021 Putin joined Serge shiku on a hunting and fishing trip to the Siberian Forest Serge kug gich Shu has been released from his role of the Russian defense minister by the president’s decree by another presidential decree he has been appointed as the secretary of the Russian Security Council the Russian intelligence Chief Nikolai patev has also been made to step down from his duties the kremin is yet to elaborate on his outting and has said the details will follow in the coming days however the chief’s son Dimitri patev who was earlier an agriculture Minister has been made the Deputy Prime Minister and we’re now being joined by by Dimitri babich a Russian political analyst at the voice of Russia he’s joining us live from Moscow for the very latest on this Dimitri babich thanks very much indeed for joining us this afternoon now Sergei shyu has been a close Aid of Putin for over a decade why has he being replaced now how much of this has to do with the war in Ukraine and how much of this could be because of the prision Mutiny uh well first I would like to point your attention to the fact that Sergey Shu has been the defense minister for 12 years that’s a lot uh obviously to create a new Army to make a reform you need a fresh view you need a a fresh person and uh believe me I interviewed Shu many times he is a very good administrator but he is not an intellectual uh he usually works on concrete problems solving them you probably know that for many years he was the head of emergency Ministry uh basically dealing with clogs and various technical disasters uh and the Modern War uh it is not just a battle as it used to be in the old times it is a competition of economies and it’s a competition of intellects in that sense uh the person proposed by Putin he has not yet been approved by approved by the parliament but Putin’s proposal is Andre bov an economist and a real intellectual uh the reason why Theo was preferred I think uh as you rightly said it is connected to the Ukrainian war look uh on the Battleground the picture is mixed obviously uh Russia did not manage to win uh in the next few months as it probably hoped in 20 22 uh but economically Russia resisted the Western sanctions very well and uh that was the achievement of belusa he was the Deputy Prime Minister uh basically responsible for preparing Russia for this decoupling from Western economies which unfortunately occurred uh so we didn’t feel the economic impact of Western sanctions at least uh for example lives of most of the people in the big cities did not change that’s a huge achievement so in that sense B was just kind of more successful than shy so Putin is showing that personal friendships aside uh he judges his subordinates by the results the result of Bel is more impressive than the result of sh right so you’re essentially saying that the need at the moment is for an economist as a defense minister given the this cycle of the War uh with sanctions and the economy playing an important role many have also said that there’s been you know a lot of untrained military staff going into this war which has been technically called like a meat grinder um so I go back to the question of how much of this has to do with the recent debacles in the Russian military especially with the pisan war a mutiny as well where they they said pisan himself said that Serge shyu was stopping Advanced weapon systems to be given because of bureaucratic control to the military personnel who were fighting the war and therefore the Russian side had many uh setbacks in the war well let’s uh first make it clear that the defense minister is not someone who actually leads the troops and decides what kind of tactics are going to be used uh defense minister His function is to have all of the system operated you know to provide the link between the military industry and the front and the acting Army and I wouldn’t say that sh was not at all successful uh you probably if you if you even if you read the Western press which is usually very critical Russ still uh uh Russia provided enough uh uh drones uh enough tanks uh certainly enough artillery and missions uh to oppose an army supported by all the Western countries you know that the West spent hundreds hundreds of billions of dolls on making uh Ukrainian Army but already so in that sense I would not call Shu favor uh but you right it’s a mid grinder unfortunately it’s a mid grinder on both sides the Ukrainian side is also sending V experienced soldiers and uh uh I think the losses from that side are certainly bigger because for every Russian short they only for sorry for every seven Russian shorts they only bu one uh so basically uh sh was not a favor but uh but obviously after two years and after 12 after two years of war and after 12 years heading the ministry uh probably you really need someone with a fresh air with fresh view uh on how things should uh should be done and of course there is some resistance from the military people who are usually conservative who usually get used uh to uh someone or their own uh but I must tell you by his education tro was not military he is a construction engineer by education right and he became defense minister as a civilian person so little by little he became very close to the military the military people love him but obviously uh sometimes the wars are gone uh by uh civilian civilian military ministers who are not military themselves right but who can provide that link economy and the front all right Dimitri babich thanks very much indeed for joining us with your thoughts there a top Aid a close Aid of the Russian President Vladimir Putin has now been to place by an economist and as the defense minister the Russian President Vladimir Putin has sacked his long-term Aid Serj shyu as the country’s defense minister and will replace him with an economist Andre bosov Serge shyu has been appointed as the Secretary of Russia’s Security Council instead as for the Kremlin he is also set to become Putin’s Deputy in the Russian military industrial commission so what has led to the shakeup the former Defense Minister has long been Putin’s goto man but has had his sh of controversies the Russian president and Shu go back a long way in 2019 before Putin went into covid isolation he was on a vacation with the defense minister now again in September 2021 Putin joined Ser shyu on a hunting and fishing trip in the Siberian Forest but it isn’t as if shyu has been above controversy completely Ser shyu one squarely uh squeaky clean image had come under a shadow in 2012 with Revelations by the opposition leader Alex noal accusing him of hiding a 9,000 square met $18 million mansion that he registered in the name of his family members shus declared family income for 20102 incidentally was just $2.66 million now Sergi sau’s Deputy timour ianov uh was also arrested last month on briary charges ianov was ordered to remain in custody pending an official probe the arrest was widely interpreted as an attack on shyu and a possible precursor to his dismissal despite his close personal ties with Putin well the Russia Ukraine war is witnessing a fresh wave of escalation and in show of support with Ukraine the US Secretary of State Anthony blinken arrived in cave on Tuesday in an unannounced trip Well the visit comes just weeks after the US Congress approved a $61 billion package of financial aid for Ukraine the visit is meant to reassure ukrainians of continued us support and flow of weapons for c as Russia continues to batter Ukraine’s Northeastern city of kar well K has become the latest flash point while ke claims that it sees no risk of a ground assault in Kar the visuals from Kar that tells a different story Ukrainian National Police are rushing to evacuate hundreds of civilians from K’s border areas as Russian air strikes continue to pound the region [Music] some W chance neighborhoods are not easy to get to due to constant shelling however the situation is stable and under control we are evacuating people it is fine well the situation is precarious as artillery shells land near police vehicles but top officials say they do not see an imminent threat yet however they do acknowledge that that K troops are being stretched there we can say that we don’t see any threat of assault on the city of KV or other problems but the Russians are trying to stretch our troops and if they succeed and have some success they will develop them and skirmishes between the Waring neighbors are also underway in northeastern Ukrainian town of w chonk the latest push in the northeastern region has opened up a Warf front adding more pressure on the already overstretched Ukrainian forces well in the latest assault by Russian forces which began on Friday last week troops have captured over 40 to 50 square miles in northeastern Ukraine KH region which includes at least seven Villages meanwhile Ukraine carried out a fresh strike on the Russian Border City of belga Road on Monday the attack caused a building to collapse partially killing 15 according to Russia’s emergency Ministry 12 including two children were rescued from the rubble this was one of the deadliest attacks to date on belgar road launched by the Ukrainian troops thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s hardke as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages that Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in har according to the harke governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains at the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against farther Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the ground Ukraine’s president vadir zalinsky claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the Border Villages he says disrupting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the K region a Ukrainian Missile hit a multi-story structure taking down a whole section of the of the building the attack killed at least seven and injured over 20 in the Russian city of belgaro Moscow described the incident a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using T cou vampire and Alka missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling and that’s according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggested establishing a Buffa Zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrad Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era conventional ballistic missiles launched overnight over belgrod region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a refinery in Russia’s vulgo gr region causing a fire at the complex thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s hardke as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages that Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in harv according to the harv governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains on the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against farther Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the ground [Music] Ukrainian president vadir zalinski claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the Border Villages he say disrupting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the K region a Ukrainian Missile hit a multistory structure taking down a whole section of the building the attack killed at least seven and injured over 17 in the Russian city of belgorod mosos described the incident as a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using Tor caou vampire and all missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling and this according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggested establishing a Buffa Zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrod Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era conventional ballistic missiles launched overnight over belgaro region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a refinery in Russia’s vulgo grad region causing a fire at the complex Peter kosnik is a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University and is now joining us from Washington DC welcome Professor we have seen Russia taking advancements in har what does this say about the war in your view what direction will the war take hence forth very difficult position now both in terms of Manpower and in terms of weaponry and so Russia is taking advantage of that they had been moving in the East and the South now they’ve added this offensive in the north uh and so the Ukrainian lines were already stretched very thin and Russia was making incremental gains in the South and the East now Ukraine is forced to move many of those troops to protect in the north around kke which weakens them further in the South and the East and so Russia is exploiting their advantages Russia is taking advantage of the fact that they have more artillery ammunition more weaponry and much more soldiers right now so Ukraine has passed new legislation uh that allows them to draft more Ukrainian citizens but that doesn’t go into effect for another week and that will require months of training so Ukraine is going to be in a weakened position for quite some time nobody has any optimistic assessment of anything that would happen from Ukraine standpoint in this in 2024 some uh forecasters are hoping that conditions will improve in 2025 but I’m afraid that’s also a pipe dream professor before we move on we are reporting now that seven people have been reported killed in the Russian border adjacent city of belgorod uh after Ukrainian projectiles hit a residential building there and at least 20 other people have been injured Russia has apparently opened a criminal case your view well part there are two theories behind this offensive toward carave one is to push the ukrainians six miles back to create a buffer zone so that Ukraine will not be able to hit belgorod and other areas inside of Russia so that’s one Theory just to create a buffer zone other people think that Russia is actually planning to try to seize karev kke is Ukraine’s second biggest city before the war it had a population of 1.3 million people mhm so that would be very very difficult but given the state of conditions in Ukraine right now it might not be impossible that would be a major victory for Russia if it can seize Kar but even it can push create a six mile buffer zone which seems much more feasible that would also protect those cities towns like belgar inside of Russia Professor let’s talk about Ukraine now and the situation there President Biden promised weapons will be delivered as soon as possible what do you think could be causing the delays the uh that that $61 billion that was passed most of that gets spent in the United States by America’s Munitions makers and it takes time to do that Biden has just announced a $400 million military aid package and that’s going to be based on his presidential draw down Authority so they will take $400 Million worth of weapons from the US Arsenal and deliver those much more quickly and that’s a variety of offensive and defensive weapons that Ukraine can use but it’s going to take time to take weeks months even longer to to build up that that weapons to to build the weapons to ship over to Ukraine now the Europeans have been providing some but they’re also behind their promises uh the other concerning thing that we shouldn’t lose track of is that macron has been talking about sending uh French and other European round troops to support the ukrainians we also think that with the f-16s and other Advanced Weaponry arriving it’s possible that NATO forces will be there to help Target and possibly to help use those weapons all of these are a serious escalation Putin has been making a lot of uh saber rattling about tactical nuclear weapons now it so we don’t want to we don’t want I don’t want this to escalate to a much bigger war and that’s also possible the more desperate Ukraine becomes the more possibility that this situation escalates into potentially World War II and that’s what we especially have to make sure to prevent all right we’re out of time now Professor thank you very much for talking to us I’ve been talking to Peter kosnik who’s a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University Professor thank you once again thank you barely a week after taking oath for the fifth time President Vladimir Putin replaced his defense minister Serge Shu the longest serving member of his cabinet and more than this it’s the replacement of Serge Shu which has raised many questions it’s 65-year-old Andre belov but he’s an economics expert who has never dealt with the military and now he’ll be the new defense minister of Russia what is Putin thinking what is the purpose of this decision the rare Kremlin shakeup took place as the Russian offensive in northeastern Ukraine has been making gains in the latest Russia pounded over 30 villages in ki forcing 6,000 people to evacuate so Russia is gaining speed it’s gaining momentum inside Ukraine but the shake up within Russian government is Raising questions why was Serge Shu removed just as Russia was making steady gains what will be the implications on the warfront to discuss this further we’re joined by Ben Addis who’s the founder and editor-in chief of b& intell news and also former Moscow bureau chief for the Daily Telegraph Ben always a pleasure speaking with you Serge sho’s removal as defense minister to oversee the national Security Council why was Shu removed has he been demoted um yes and no uh he’s been in trouble and um there was a huge corruption Scandal uh just a few weeks ago his Deputy um Timor Ivanov was sacked who’s stolen masses amounts of money uh but didn’t bother to hide it I mean he’s got houses in niece and Yachts expensive holidays he has a very glamorous wife who posts their lavish lifestyle on Instagram for everyone to see uh and it seems that that was part of a move to ease him out um that Sho himself is not particularly popular with the military because he himself was also not from a military background I mean he was a successful Regional governor and then he went on to head the um emergencies Ministry the MJS uh and there he was popular amongst the people but as the head of the defense Ministry um he he was not popular with with the soldiers but now B bellof has come in who is an economist also without um a military background he’s an economist he’s a very close to Putin as trusted adviser on on uh economic issues but one of the things you have to realize is that the war is not run by the defense minister um the defense Ministry is basically there to make the machine work in order to produce arms weapons bombs bullets clothes uh food for the for the soldiers so it’s more a sort of industrial management job and the actual fighting that’s left this the strategy on the ground that’s left to to the general command and then gimo the top General he’s still in charge of the War uh he’s still running it but so might I’m so sorry about also if might might replace um because gesim is also not popular with the soldiers so um this sh this reshuffle hasn’t finished yet Ben now the previous chief of the National Security Council Nikolai patrushev he was of course removed but if you’ve seen the kind of Gams Russia has made and the counter offensive from Ukraine of course that failed after that we’ve seen Russia making steady gains inside Ukraine what would be the reason behind Nikolai pev’s removal well that one was surprising and patev is is one of Putin’s oldest and most trusted allies um he’s former head of the kgp and fsp uh and the security click the the silv Kei So-Cal silv Kei um is the basis of Putin’s power and patri shev is is the is the guy who’s the doorway to that and Nally uh sh was moving into his seat as the chairman of the uh the Security Council is is on paper of promotion for shyu but also p patf is seen as a fork I mean he subscribes to a lot of crazy conspiracy theories and um he would like to bomb Ukraine flat and attack NATO um and so Shu moving into the security Council which doesn’t have any real power but it’s become extremely influential and important it’s a sort of Shadow cabinet to the president’s Administration um this could suggest that there’s a sort of tempering of the tone and that they they’re pulling back the rhetoric because Russia at the end of the day it doesn’t want to fight NATO because it’s a fight they cannot win and so Sho going there is um I mean Sho is also Patriot and and um he he wants Russia to win this war but it it may be a sort of easing back and the whole thing the whole constellation taken together looks like Putin’s digging in for the long term the boso is going to re-engineer the economy to make it more powerful but more military industrialized and shyo is also there to calm things down and take and play a long game the strategy of basically wearing the West out cu the West is getting is getting tired I mean this is extremely expensive war and they just don’t want to be there at some point probably at the elections when Trump comes in you know the Americans will pull out all together and that will be the end of it and so I think this is Putin’s plan it’s just you know calm things sound a little work for the long term and just wait uh Ben I wanted to ask you about Andre belov next but I just want to go back to something you mentioned that even Russia doesn’t want that war with NATO now if I were just take that statement and you know compare it with or actually just oppose it next to all the nuclear saber rattling that we’ve seen from the Russian side Ever every time there is a mention of NATO troops in Ukraine or european or Western troops in Ukraine is that just an empty rhetoric then when Russia also doesn’t want to go ahead with any kind of a conflict directly with NATO well it’s Putin’s trump card we talked about this before in so much as like you know NATO is threatening to go into the Ukraine uh Estonia just said yesterday that they’re not again sending troops to fight on the ground alongside Ukraine in Ukraine and then then Putin rattles his nuclear saber and it it’s what stops any you know in Israel we had American jets flying alongside Israeli Jets when when their rocket attack happened um that will never happen in Ukraine because everyone’s terrified of a direct NATO Russia Clash which could escalate into a nuclear exchange and the thing about threats you know for them to be effective you have to be willing to go through with it yes and I think on balance that Putin is willing to use nukes how he does that if he actually drops a nuke on Ukraine I think you know the the the first scenario that would make sense would that he he just ignores the um the atomic weapon testband and explodes a nuclear weapon over somewhere in the middle of Siberia in the middle of nowhere and that would be sufficient I think to scare everyone yes you know white in in the in the west if he actually exploded a bomb even if it’s a owning over Russian territory and then that’s the next escalation step up and then you know where do we go from that but I think at that point NATO backs off yes um and he plays this card constantly and it’s it works um NATO will never go into it does work reaction from the West every time there is some kind of nuclear saber rling yeah I it’s just you know rhetoric I mean we’re not going to have a nuclear exchange but you know certainly everyone’s terrified of this and there’s several sort of intermediary steps that Russia could take like exploding a bomb somewhere as a test um that would do the job uh it would make you know I mean NATO hasn’t gone in and it won’t go in and even you know Estonia is talking about it the French talked about it now the Brits talked about it but it’s um So-Cal strategic ambiguity they can’t take that off the table the threat of sending troops in because then you give Putin cart blanch to do what he likes in Ukraine and Ukraine will never be sent I want to now come back to Putin’s decision for his next defense minister what’s the thought behind having a top economic official Andre belov as defense minister of Russia what does it mean for the West it means that Russia has fully militarized its economy it’s on a war footing a full War footing that um Shu said about two weeks ago that they’re now producing more arms than they need and they’re sending the excess to warehouses whereas in the west we haven’t militarized our economies indeed we haven’t even made the Investments necessary to fully Supply Ukraine with something as simple as shells and the those Investments are starting now but they’re not expected to come online until next year um so for the West Russia is now fully armed and it can pound Ukraine shell fire rate is 10 to1 um and Ukraine can’t fire back because it doesn’t have the Munitions and so the the the plan such as it is is to muddle through this year in the hope that there’ll be more arms produced in the west to supply Ukraine next year but I I’m not even sure we’ll get to that that point I mean as you mentioned the Russians are making um advances not very fast and at huge cost but they are making steady advances I don’t think um Ukraine is going to be defeated but it’s losing more and more territory and so when there’s an eventual um ceasefire talks you know it’s not going to get any of that territory back so this is a huge problem at the same time the uh energy infrastructure in Ukraine has been obliterated I mean at least half their capacity has been already dest destroyed and until more air defense ammunition arrives which may happen in the summer you know Russia’s going to continue doing that they they struck 106 energy infrastructure Assets in a single day last week beginning of this week um and and you know that won’t be repaired before winter so I mean things in Ukraine are get worse and worse all right Ben thank you for making the time and talking to us that was Ben Aris founder and editor and chief of b& intell news and also former Moscow bureau chief for the Daily Telegraph always a pleasure speaking with you my pleasure shifting Focus to the other War Front the Russia Ukraine war is witnessing a fresh wave of escalation and Ukraine’s Northeastern city of kar has become the latest flash point right while keev claims that it sees no risk on a ground assault in KH the visuals from the ground tell a different story altogether Ukrainian National Police are rushing to evacuate hundreds of civilians from hari’s border areas as Russian air strikes continue upon the region some W chance neighborhoods are not easy to get to due to constant shelling however the situation is stable and under control we are evacuating people it is fine the situation is precarious as artillery shells land near police vehicles officials say they do not see an imminent threat yet however they do acknowledge that G’s troops are being stretch we can say that we don’t see any threat of assault on the city of karv or other problems but the Russians are trying to our troops and if they succeed and have some success they will develop them intense skirmishes between the Waring neighbors are also underway in northeastern Ukrainian town of shans the latest push in the northeastern region is opened up a new warfront adding more pressure on the already overstretched Ukrainian forces now according to Moscow in the latest assault by Russian forces which began on Friday last week troops have captured over 40 to 50 square miles in northeastern Ukraine’s carave region which includes at least seven Villages meanwhile Ukraine carried out a fresh strike on the Russian Border City of belgrod on Monday the attack caused a building to collapse partially killing 15 according to Russia’s emergency Ministry 12 including two children were rescued from the rubble and this was one of the deadliest attacks to date on belar Rod launched by Ukrainian troops Al kerson the prime minister of the latest NATO member Sweden has said that he is now open to allowing nuclear weapons on its soil in Wartime in case the country is drawn into a military conflict it could potentially allow the US to station nuclear weapons on its territory well Sweden’s Parliament is set to vote on a defense cooperation agreement with the US in June it will give the us access to military bases in Sweden and allow the storage of military equipment and weapons in the Nordic country Sweden abandoned two centuries of military non-alignment to join nato in March this year unlike other Nordic Nations such as Finland and Norway Sweden has no explicit ban on accepting nuclear arms however it has maintained a long-standing policy against hosting such weapons in peace time critics in Sweden have called to impose a complete ban on nukes on its soil but the government has made it clear that no such ban will be put in place if needed Sweden itself will host nuclear weapons now as the prime minister in Sweden made such statements Russia warned that it is prepared for the battlefield earlier Kremlin said Russia has started preparation ations for missile drills near Ukraine simulating the use of tactical nuclear weapons in response to threats by Western officials well in recent days some statements by NATO leaders have raised tensions polish prime minister Donald Tusk admitted that there is some deployment of NATO troops in Ukraine macron has more than once insisted that he has no objections on deploying French boots in Ukraine Lithuania to joined the chorus and says it is prepared to send its soldiers on a training mission to Ukraine as Russia has responded to all these statements concerns of the potential for a direct clash between NATO and Russia it is escalating at the moment first up our top story Vladimir Putin has replaced his defense minister Serge shyu With a Civilian and an economist Andre bosov the move comes amid Rising concerns over military spending Moscow has also dismissed its intelligence Chief Nikolai patev this marks the first major military shakeup in the country’s security cabinet since its invasion of Ukraine earlier bosov served as the first Deputy Prime Minister now as for Putin he has been chosen over a growing need for Innovations at the war front citing military spending the Kremlin has revealed that it was approaching levels last recorded during the Cold War era the move is a clear indication that Putin is seeking to align the economy with the war efforts before the beginning of the war just 3% of Russia’s GDP was slated for defense spending the figure grew to 3.4% in the initial phases of the war currently 6.7% of the GDP is focused on defense spending and the second important thing is that today on the battlefield those who are more open for Innovations more open towards quick implementation win that is why it’s natural that on the current stage the president has taken the decision for a civilian to be in charge of the military of Defense now as for the Kremlin Shu has been appointed as the Secretary of Russia’s Security Council in fact he is also said to become Putin’s Deputy in the Russian military industrial commission shu’s Deputy timour ianov was arrested last month on briber charges He was ordered to remain in custody pending an official probe the arrest of evanov was widely interpreted as an attack on shyu and a possible precursor for his dismissal despite his close personal ties with Putin the Russian president and serge shyu go back a long way in September 2019 before Putin went into covid isolation he was on a vacation with the defense minister official videos released by the Kremlin showed the two walking through a Siberian Forest picking mushrooms then driving off uh across the tiger now again in September 2021 Putin joined Serge shiku on a hunting and fishing trip to the Siberian Forest kich Shu has been released from his role of the Russian defense minister by the president’s decree by by another presidential decree he has been appointed as the secretary of the Russian Security Council the Russian intelligence Chief Nikolai patev has also been made to step down from his duties the Kremlin is yet to elaborate on his Ting and has said the details will follow in the coming days however the chief’s son Dimitri patev who was earlier an agriculture Minister has been made the Deputy Prime Minister and we’re now being joined by Dimitri babich a Russian political analyst at the voice of Russia he’s joining us live from Moscow for the very latest on this Dimitri babich thanks very much indeed for joining us this afternoon now Sergei shyu has been a close Aid of Putin for over a decade why has he been replaced now how much of this has to do with the war in Ukraine and how much of this could be because of the prusan mutiny uh well first I would like to point your attention to the fact that Sergey Shu has been the defense minister for 12 years that’s a lot uh obviously to create a new Army to make a reform you need a fresh view you need a a fresh person and uh believe me I interviewed Shu many times he is a very good administrator but he is not an intellectual uh he usually works on concrete problems solving them you probably know that for many years he was the head of emergency Ministry uh basically dealing with floods and various technical disasters uh and Modern War uh it is not just a battle as it used to be in the old times it is a competition of economies and it’s a competition of intellects in that sense uh the person proposed by Putin he has not yet been approved by approved by the parliament but Putin’s proposal is Andre bov an economist and a real intellectual uh the reason why bov was preferred I think uh as you rightly said it is connected to the Ukrainian war look uh on the Battleground the picture is mixed obviously uh Russia did not manage to win uh in the next few months as it probably hoped in 2022 uh but economically Russia resisted the Western sanctions very well and that was the achievement of belosa he was the Deputy Prime Minister uh basically responsible for preparing Russia for this decoupling from Western Economist which unfortunately occurred uh so we didn’t feel the economic imp Act of Western sanctions at least for example the lives of most of the people in the big cities did not change that’s a huge achievement so in that sense boso was just kind of more successful than sh so Putin is showing that personal friendships aside uh he judges his subordinates by the results the result of belus is more impressive than the result of showing right so you’re essentially saying that the need at the moment is for an economist as a defense minister given the the cycle of the War uh with sanctions and the economy playing an important role many have also said that there’s been you know a lot of untrained military staff going into this war which has been technically called like a meat grinder um so I go back to the question of how much of this has to do with the recent debacles in the Russian military especially with the pisan war a mutiny as well where they they said pisan himself said that Serge shyu was stopping Advanced weapon systems to be given because of bureaucratic control to the military personnel who were fighting the war and therefore the Russian side had many uh setbacks in the war well let’s first make it clear that the defense minister is not some one who actually leads the troops and decides what kind of TAC are going to be used uh defense minister His function is to have all of the uh system operated you know to provide the link between the military industry and the front and the acting Army and I wouldn’t say that sh was not uh at all successful uh you probably if you if you even if you read the Western press which is usually very crial Russia still uh uh Russia provided enough uh uh drones uh enough tanks uh certainly enough artillery and missions uh to oppose an armies supported by all the Western countries you know that the West spent hundreds hundreds of billions of gos on making uh Ukrainian Army battle ready so in that sense I would not go show favor uh but you are right it’s a mid grinder unfortunately it’s a mid grinder on both sides the Ukrainian side is also sending vot of with experienced soldiers and uh I think the losses from that side are certainly bigger because for every Russian short they only for sorry for every seven Russian shorts they only fire one uh so basically uh sh was not a favor but uh but obviously uh after two years and after 12 after two years of war and after 12 as heading the ministry uh probably you really need someone with a fresh air with fresh view uh on how things should uh should be done and of course there is some resistance from the military people who are usually conservative who usually get used uh to uh someone of their own uh but I must tell you by his education was not military he is a construction engineer by education right and he became Minister as a civilian person so little by little he became very close to the military the military people love him but obviously uh sometimes the wars are wone uh by uh civilian civilian military ministers who are not military themselves right but who can provide that link between economy and the front all right Dimitri babich thanks very much indeed for joining us with your thoughts there a top Aid a close Aid of the Russian President Vladimir Putin has now been to place by an economist as the defense minister the Russian President Vladimir Putin has sacked his long-term Aid Serj shyu as the country’s defense minister and will replace him with an economist Andre bosov Sergei shyu has been appointed as the Secretary of Russia’s Security Council instead as for the Kremlin he is also said to become Putin’s Deputy in the Russian military industrial commission so what has led to the shakeup the former Defense Minister has long been Putin’s goto man but has had his share of controversies the Russian president and shoyu go back a long way in 2019 before Putin went into covid isolation he was on a vacation with the defense minister now again in September 2021 Putin joined serg shyu on a hunting and fishing trip in the Siberian Forest but it isn’t as if shyu has been above controversy completely Serge shyu one squarely uh squeaky clean image had come under a shadow in 2012 with Revelations by the opposition leader Alexi Nal accusing him of hiding a 9,000 square met $18 million mansion that he registered in the name of his family members who declared family income for 20102 incidentally was just $2.66 million now serg sau’s Deputy timour ianov uh was also arrested last month on bribery charges ianov was ordered to remain in custody pending an official probe the arrest was widely interpreted as an attack on shyu and a possible precursor to his dismissal despite his close personal ties with Putin well the Russia Ukraine war is witnessing a fresh wave of escalation and in show of support with Ukraine the US Secretary of State Anthony blinkin arrived in cave on Tuesday in an unannounced trip Well the visit comes just weeks after the US Congress approved a $61 billion package of financial aid for Ukraine the visit is meant to reassure ukrainians of continued us support and flow of weapons for K as Russia continues to batter Ukraine’s Northeastern city of kar well K has become the latest flash point while ke claims that it sees no risk of a ground assault in K the visuals from Kar that tells a different story Ukrainian National Police are rushing to evacuate hundreds of civilians from K’s border areas as Russian air strikes continue to pound the region [Music] some W chance neighborhoods are not easy to get to due to constant shelling however the situation is stable and under control we are evacuating people it is fine well the situation is precarious as artillery shells land near police vehicles but top officials say they do not see an imminent threat yet however they do acknowledge that K troops are being stretched there we can say that we don’t see any threat of assault on the city of karv or other problems but the Russians are trying to stretch our troops and if they succeed and have some success they will develop them and skirmishes between the Waring neighbors are also underway in northeastern Ukrainian town of Warf chance the latest push in the northeastern region has opened up a war front adding more pressure on the already overstretch Ukrainian forces well in the latest assault by Russian forces which began on Friday last week troops have captured over 40 to 50 square miles in northeastern Ukraine’s KH region which includes at least seven Villages meanwhile Ukraine carried out a fresh strike on the Russian Border City of belar Road on Monday the attack caused a building to collapse partially killing 15 according to Russia’s emergency Ministry 12 including two children were rescued from the rubble this was one of the deadliest attacks to date on belga road launched by the Ukrainian troops thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s hardke as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages that Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in harv according to the harv governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains at the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against father Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the ground Ukraine’s president vadir zelinski claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the Border Villages he says disrupting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the kariv region a Ukrainian Missile hit a multi-story structure taking down a whole section of the of the building the attack killed at least seven and injured over 20 in the Russian city of belgaro Moscow described the incident a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using Tor cou vampire and ala missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling and that’s according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggested establishing a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrad Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era Convention of ballistic missiles launched overnight of belgrod region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a Refinery Russia’s vulgo GR region causing a fire at the complex thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s hardke as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages that Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in harv according to the harv governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains on the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against farther Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the ground [Music] Ukrainian president vadir zelinski claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the border of villages he say disrupting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the karv region a Ukrainian Missile hit a multistory structure taking down a whole section of the building the attack killed at least seven and injured over 17 in the Russian city of belgorod mosus described the incident as a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using torch caou vampire and ala missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling and this according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggested establishing a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrod Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era conventional ballistic missiles launched overnight over belgorod region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a refinery in Russia vulo grad region causing a fire at the complex Peter kosnik is a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University and is now joining us from Washington DC welcome Professor we have seen Russia taking advancements in har what does this say about the war in your view what direction will the war take henceforth very difficult position now both in terms of Manpower and in terms of weaponry and so Russia is taking advantage of that they had been moving in the East and the South now they’ve added this offensive in the north uh and so the Ukrainian lines were already stretched very thin and Russia was making incremental gains in the south in the East now Ukraine is forced to move many of those troops to protect in the north around K which weakens them further in the South and the East and so Russia is exploiting their advantages Russia is taking advantage of the fact that they have more artillery ammunition more weaponry and much more soldiers right now so Ukraine has passed new legislation that allows them to draft more Ukrainian citizens but that doesn’t go into effect for another week and that will require months of training so Ukraine is going to be in a weakened position for quite some time nobody has any optimistic assessment of anything that would happen from Ukraine standpoint in this in 2024 some uh forecasters are hoping that conditions will improve in 2025 but I’m afraid that’s also a pipe dream professor before we move on we are reporting now that seven people have been reported killed in the Russian border adjacent city of belgorod uh after Ukrainian projectiles hit a residential building there and at least 20 other people have been injured Russia has apparently opened a criminal case your view well a part there are two theories behind this offensive toward K one is to push the ukrainians six miles back to create a buffer zone so that Ukraine will not be able to hit belgorod and other areas inside of Russia so that’s one Theory just to create a buffer zone other people think that Russia is actually planning to try to seize Kev karke is Ukraine’s second biggest city before the war had a population of 1.3 million people M so that would be very very difficult but given the state of conditions in Ukraine right now it might not be impossible that would be a major victory for Russia if it can seize Kar but even it can push create a six mile buffer zone which seems much more feasible that would also protect those cities towns like belgrad inside of Russia Professor let’s talk about Ukraine now and the situation there President Biden promised weapons will be delivered as soon as possible what do you think could be causing the delays the uh that that $61 billion that was passed most of that gets spent in the United States by America’s Munitions makers and it takes time to do that Biden has just announced Ed a $400 million military aid package and that’s going to be based on his presidential draw down Authority so they will take $400 Million worth of weapons from the US Arsenal and deliver those much more quickly and that’s a variety of offensive and defensive weapons that Ukraine can use but it’s going to take time to take weeks months even longer to to build up that that weapons to for to build the weapons to ship over to Ukraine now the Europeans have been providing some but they’re also behind their promises uh the other concerning thing that we shouldn’t lose track of is that macron has been talking about sending uh French and other European ground troops to support the ukrainians we also think that with the f-16s and other Advanced Weaponry arriving it’s possible that NATO forces will be there to help Target and possibly to help use those weapons all of these are a serious escalation Putin has been making a lot of uh saber rattling about tactical nuclear weapons now it so we don’t want to we don’t want I don’t want this to escalate to a much bigger war and that’s also possible the more desperate Ukraine be becomes the more possibility that this situation escalates into potentially World War II and that’s what we especially have to make sure it’s prevent all right we’re out of time now Professor thank you very much for talking to us I’ve been talking to Peter kosnik who’s a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University Professor thank you once again thank you barely a week after taking oath for the fifth time President Vladimir Putin replaced his defense minister Serge shyu the longest serving member of his cabinet and more than this it’s the replacement of Serge Shu which has raised many questions it’s 65-year-old Andre belov but he’s an economics expert who has never dealt with the military and now he’ll be the new defense minister of Russia what is Putin thinking what is the purpose of this decision the rare Kremlin shake up took place as the Russian offensive in northeastern Ukraine has been making gains in the latest Russia rounded over 30 villages in Kari forcing 6,000 people to evacuate so Russia is gaining speed it’s gaining momentum inside Ukraine but the shake up within Russian government is Raising questions why was Serge shyu removed just as Russia was making steady gains what will be the implications on the warfront to discuss this further we’re joined by Ben Addis who’s the founder and editor-in chief of B in Tel news and also former Moscow bureau chief for the Daily Telegraph Ben always a pleasure speaking with you you Serge shu’s removal as defense minister to oversee the National Security Council why was Shu removed has he been demoted um yes and no uh he’s been in trouble and um there was a huge corruption Scandal uh just a few weeks ago his Deputy um timour ianov was sacked who’s stolen masses amounts of money uh but didn’t bother to hide it I mean he’s got houses in niece and Yachts expensive holid he has a very glamorous wife who posts their lavish Lifestyle on Instagram for everyone to see uh and it seems that that was part of a move to ease him out um that shyo himself is not particularly popular with the military because he himself was also not from a military background I mean he was a successful Regional governor and then he went on to head the um emergencies Ministry the MJS uh and there he was popular amongst the people but as the head of the defense Ministry um he he was not popular with with the soldiers but now B bof has come in who is an economist also without um a military background he’s an economist he’s a very close to Putin as trusted advisor on on uh economic issues but one of the things you have to realize is that the war is not run by the defense minister um the defense Ministry is basically there to make the machine work in order to produce arms weapons bombs bullets clothes uh food for the for the soldiers so it’s more a sort of industrial management job and the actual fighting that’s left this the strategy on the ground that’s left to to the general command and then gim the top General he’s still in charge of the war yes uh he’s still running it but sh might I’m so sorry about also of might might replace um because G gimo is also not popular with the soldiers so um this shut this reshuffle hasn’t finished yet Ben now the previous chief of the National Security Council Nikolai patrushev he was of course removed but if you’ve seen the kind of games Russia has made and the counter offensive from Ukraine of course that failed after that we’ve seen Russia making steady gains inside Ukraine what would be the reason behind Nikolai pev’s removal well that one was surprising and patev is is one of Putin’s oldest and most trusted um he’s former head of the kgp and fsp uh and the security click the the silvi soal silv Kei um is the basis of Putin’s power and patri shev is is the is the guy who is the doorway to that and Nally uh shu is moving into his seat as the chairman of the uh the Security Council is is on paper of promotion for shyu but also P PF is seen as a fork I mean he subscribes to a lot of crazy conspiracy theories and um he would like to bomb Ukraine flat and attack NATO um and so Shu moving into the security Council which doesn’t have any real power but it’s become extremely influential and important it’s a sort of Shadow cabinet to the president’s Administration um this could suggest that there’s a sort of tempering of the tone and that they’re they’re pulling back the rhetoric because Russia at the end of the day it doesn’t want to fight NATO because it’s a fight you cannot win and so Sho going there is um I mean Sho is also a patriot and and um he he wants Russia to win this war but it it may be a sort of easing back and the whole thing the whole constellation taken together looks like Putin’s digging in for the long term the but alsoo is going to re-engineer the economy to make it more powerful but more military industrialized and shyo is also there to calm things down and take and play a long game the strategy of basically wearing the West out cuz the West is getting is getting tired I mean this is extremely expensive war and they just don’t want to be there at some point probably at the elections when Trump comes in you know the Americans will pull out all together and that will be the end of it and so I think this is Putin’s plan it’s just you know calm things sound a little work for the long term and just wait uh Ben I wanted to ask you about Andre belov next but I just want to go back to something you mentioned that even Russia doesn’t want that war with NATO now if I would just take that statement and you know compare it with or actually just justos it next to all the nuclear saber rattling that we’ve seen from the Russian side Ever every time there is a mention of NATO troops in Ukraine or european or Western troops in Ukraine is that just an empty rhetoric then when Russia also doesn’t want to go ahead with any kind of conflict directly with NATO well it’s Putin’s trump card we talked about this before in much is that you know NATO is threatening to go into the Ukraine uh Estonia just said yesterday that they’re not again sending troops to fight on the ground alongside Ukraine in Ukraine and then then Putin rattles his nuclear saber and it it’s what stops any you know in Israel we had American jets flying alongside Israeli Jets when when their rocket attack happened um that will never happen in Ukraine because everyone’s terrified of a direct NATO Russia Clash which could escalate into a nuclear exchange and the thing about threats you know for them to be effective you have to be willing to go through with it yes and I think on balance that Putin is willing to use nukes how he does that if he actually drops a nuke on Ukraine I think you know the the the first scenario that would make sense would that he he just ignores the um the atomic weapon Test Ban and explodes a nuclear weapon over somewhere in the middle of Siberia in the middle of nowhere and that would be sufficient I think to scare everyone yes you know white in in the in the west if he actually exploded a bomb even if it’s only over Russian territory and then that’s next escalation step up and then you know where do we go from that but I think at that point NATO backs off yes um and he plays this card constantly and it’s it works um NATO will never go into it does work see a reaction from the West every time there is some kind of nuclear saber rling yeah it’s just you know rhetoric I mean we’re not going to have a nuclear exchange but you know certainly everyone’s terrified of this and there’s several sort of intermediary steps that Russia could take like exploding a bomb somewhere as a test um that would do the job uh it would make you know I mean NATO hasn’t gone in and it won’t go in and even you know Estonia is talking about it the French talked about it now the Brits have talked about it but it’s um So-Cal strategic ambiguity they can’t take that off the table the threat of sending troops in because then you give put C blanch to do what he likes in Ukraine and Ukraine will never be saved I want to not come back to Putin’s decision for his next defense minister what’s the thought behind having a top economic official Andre belov as defense minister of Russia what does it mean for the West it means that Russia has fully militarized its economy it’s on a war footing a full War footing that um Sho said about two weeks ago that they’re now producing more arms than they need and they’re sending the excess to warehouses whereas in the west we haven’t militarized our economies indeed we haven’t even made the Investments necessary to fully Supply Ukraine with something as simple as shells and the those Investments are starting now but they’re not expected to come online until next year um so for the West Russia is now fully armed and it can pound Ukraine shell fire rate is 10 to1 um and Ukraine can’t fire back because it doesn’t have the Munitions and so the the the plan such as it is is to muddle through this year in the hope that there’ll be more arms produced in the West to supply Ukraine next year but I’m not even sure we’ll get to that point I mean as you mentioned the Russians are making um advances not very fast and at huge cost but they are making steady advances I don’t think um Ukraine is going to be defeated but it’s losing more and more territory and so when there’s an eventual um ceasefire talks you know it’s not going to get any of that territory back so this is a huge problem at the same time the energy infrastructure in Ukraine has been obliterated I mean at least half their capacity has been already destroyed and until more air defense ammunition arrives which may happen in the summer you know Russia’s going to continue doing that they they struck 106 energy infrastructure Assets in a single day last week beginning of this week um and and you know that won’t be repaired before winter so I mean things in Ukraine are worse and worse all right Ben thank you for making the time and talking to us that was Ben haris founder and editor and chief of b& intell news and also former Moscow bureau chief for the Daily Telegraph always a pleasure speaking with you my pleasure shifting Focus to the other Warf front the Russia Ukraine war is witnessing a fresh wave of escalation and Ukraine’s Northeastern city of K has become the latest flash point right while keev claims that it sees no risk on a ground assault in Kar the visuals from the ground tell a different story altogether Ukrainian National Police are rushing to evacuate hundreds of civilians from hares border areas as Russian air strikes continue to P the region some W chance neighborhoods are not easy to get to due to constant shelling however the situation is stable and under control we are evacuating people it is fine the situation is precarious as artillery shells land near police vehicles officials say they do not see an imminent threat yet however they do acknowledge that G’s troops are being stretched here we can say that we don’t see any thread of assault on the city of KV or other problems but the Russians are trying to stretch our troops and if they succeed and have some success they will develop them intense skirmishes between the Waring neighbors are also underway in northeastern Ukrainian town of shans the latest push in the northeastern region it’s opened up a new warfront adding more pressure on the already overstretched Ukrainian forces now according to Moscow in the latest assault by Russia forces which began on Friday last week troops have captured over 40 to 50 square miles in northeastern Ukraine’s K region which includes at least seven Villages meanwhile Ukraine carried out a fresh strike on the Russian Border City of belgaro on Monday the attack caused a building to collapse partially killing 15 according to Russia’s emergency Ministry 12 including two children were rescued from the rubble and this was one of the deadliest attacks to date on belad launched by Ukrainian troops Al Kesterson the prime minister of the latest NATO member Sweden has said that he is now open to allowing nuclear weapons on its soil in Wartime in case the country is drawn into a military conflict it could potentially allow the US to station nuclear weapons on its territory while Sweden’s Parliament is set to vote on a defense cooperation agreement with the US in June it will give the us access to military bases in Sweden and allow the storage of military equipment and weapons in the Nordic country Sweden abandoned two centuries of military non-alignment to join nato in March this year unlike other Nordic Nations such as Finland and Norway Sweden has no explicit plan on accepting nuclear arms however it has maintained a longstanding policy against hosting such weapons in peace time critics in Sweden have called to impose a complete ban on nukes on its soil but the government has made it clear that no such ban will be put in place if needed Sweden itself will host nuclear weapons now as the prime minister in Sweden made such statements Russia warned that it is prepared for for the battlefield earlier Kremlin said Russia has started preparations for missile drills near Ukraine simulating the use of tactical nuclear weapons in response to threats by Western officials well in recent days some statements by NATO leaders have rais tensions polish prime minister Donald Tusk admitted that there is some deployment of NATO troops in Ukraine macron has more than once insisted that he has no objections on deploying French boots in Ukraine lethania 2 joined the chorus and says it is prepared to send its soldiers on a training mission to Ukraine as Russia has responded to all these statements concerns of the potential for a direct clash between NATO and Russia it is escalating at the moment first up our top story Vladimir Putin has replaced his defense minister Serge shyu With a Civilian and an economist Andre bosov the move comes amid Rising concerns over military spending Moscow has also dismissed its intelligence Chief Nikolai patev this marks the first major military shakeup in the country’s security cabinet since its invasion of Ukraine earlier bosov served as the first Deputy Prime Minister now as for Putin he has been chosen over a growing need for Innovations at the war front citing military spending the Kremlin has revealed that it was approaching levels last recorded during the Cold War era the move is a clear indication that Putin is seeking to align the economy with the war efforts before the beginning of the war just 3% of Russia’s GDP was slated for defense spending the figure grew to 3.4% in the initial phases of the war currently 6.7% of the GDP is focused on defense spending and the second important thing is that today on the battlefield those who are more open for Innovations more open towards quick implementation win that is why it’s natural that on the current stage the president has taken the decision for a civilian to be in charge of the military of Defense now as for the Kremlin Shu has been appointed as the Secretary of Russia’s Security Council in fact he is also said to become Putin’s Deputy in the Russian military industrial commission shu’s uh Deputy timour ianov uh was arrested last month on prary charges He was ordered to remain in custody pending an official probe the arrest of evanov was widely interpreted as an attack on shyu and a possible precursor for his dismissal despite his close personal ties with Putin the Russian president and serge shyu go back a long way in September 2019 before Putin went into covid isolation he was on a vacation with the defense Minister official videos released by the Kremlin showed the two walking through a Siberian Forest picking mushrooms then driving off uh across the taar now again in September 2021 Putin joined Sergei Shu on a hunting and fishing trip to the Siberian Forest Serge kovich Shu has been released from his role of the Russian defense minister by the president’s decree by another presidential decree he has been appointed as the secretary of the Russian Security Council the Russian intelligence Chief Nikolai patev has also been made to step down from his duties the Kremlin is yet to elaborate on his outting and has said the details will follow in the coming days however the chief’s son Dimitri patev who was earlier an agriculture Minister has been made the Deputy Prime Minister and we’re now being joined by Dimitri babich a Russian political analyst at the voice of Russia he’s joining us live from Moscow for the very latest on this Dimitri babich thanks very much indeed for joining us this afternoon now Sergei shyu has been a close Aid of Putin for over a decade why has he been replaced now how much of this has to do with the war in Ukraine and how much of this could be because of the pisan Mutiny uh well first I would like to point your attention to the fact that Sergey Shu has been the defense minister for 12 years that’s a lot uh obviously to create a new Army to make a reform you need a fresh view you need a a fresh person and uh believe me I interviewed Shu many times he is a a very good administrator but he is not an intellectual uh he usually works on concrete problems solving them you probably know that for many years he was the head of emergency Ministry uh basically dealing with clogs and various technical disasters uh and the Modern War uh it is not just a battle as it used to be in the old times it is a competition of economies and it’s a competition of intellects in that sense uh the person proposed by Putin he has not yet been approved by approved by the parliament but Putin’s proposal is Andre bov an economist and a real intellectual uh the reason why Belo was preferred I think as you rightly said it is connected to the Ukrainian war look uh on the Battleground the picture is mixed obvious ly uh Russia did not manage to win uh in the next few months as it probably hoped in 20122 uh but economically Russia resisted the Western sanctions very well and that was the achievement of Bela he was the Deputy Prime Minister uh basically responsible for prepare in Russia for this decoupling from Western Economist which unfortunately occurred uh so we didn’t feel the economic impact of Western sanctions at least uh for example the lives of most of the people in the big cities did not change that’s a huge achievement so in that sense Bosa was just kind of more successful than sh so Putin is showing that personal friendships aside uh he judges his subordinates by the results the result of B is more impressive than the result of right so you’re essentially saying that the need at the moment is for an economist as a defense minister given the the cycle of the War uh with sanctions and the economy playing an important role many have also said that there’s been you know a lot of untrained military staff going into this war which has been technically called like a meat grinder um so I go back to the question of how much of this has to do with the recent debacles in the Russian military especially with the pisan war Mutiny as well where they they said pisan himself said that Serge shyu was stopping Advanced weapon systems to be given because of bureaucratic control to the military personnel who were fighting the war and therefore the Russian side had many uh setbacks in the war well let’s uh first make it clear that the defense minister is not someone who actually leads the troops and decides what kind of tactics are going to be used uh defense minister His function is to have all of the uh system operated you know to provide the link between the military industry and the front and the Eon Army and I wouldn’t say that sh was not at all successful uh you probably if you if you even if you read the Western press which is usually very critical Rush still uh uh Russia provided enough uh uh drones uh enough tanks certainly enough artillery and missions uh to oppose an army supported by all the Western countries you know that the West spent hundreds hundreds of billions of dolls on making uh Ukrainian Army batt already so in that sense I would not call sh favor uh but you are right it’s a mid grinder unfortunately it’s a mid grinder on both sides the Ukrainian side is also sending V of experienced soldiers and uh uh I think the losses on that side are certainly bigger because for every Russian short they only for sorry for every seven Russian shorts they only fire one uh so basically uh sh was not a favor but uh but obviously uh after two years and after 12 after two years of war and after 12 years heading the ministry uh probably you really need someone with a fresh air with fresh view uh on how things should uh should be done and of course there is some resistance from the military people who are usually conservative who usually get used uh to uh someone of their own uh but I must tell you by his education tro was not military he is a construction engineer by education and he became def Minister as a civilian person so little by little he became very close to the military the military people love him but obviously uh sometimes the wars are gone uh by uh civilian civilian military ministers who are not military themselves right but who can provide that link between economy and the front all right Dimitri babich thanks very much indeed for joining us with your thoughts there a top Aid a close Aid of the Russian President Vladimir Putin has now been to place by an economist as the defense minister the Russian President Vladimir Putin has sacked his long-term Aid Serj shyu as the country’s defense minister and will replace him with an economist Andre bosov Serge shyu has been appointed as the Secretary of Russia’s Security Council instead as for the Kremlin he is also set to become Putin’s Deputy in the Russian military industrial commission so what has led to the shakeup the former Defense Minister has long been Putin’s goto man but has had his share of controversies the Russian president and shoyu go back a long way in 2019 before Putin went into covid isolation he was on a vacation with the defense minister now again in September 2021 Putin joined Serj shyu on a hunting and fishing trip in the Siberian Forest but it isn’t as if shyu has been above controversy completely Serge shyu one squarely uh squeaky clean image had come under a shadow in 2012 with Revelations by the opposition leader Alexi Nal accusing him of hiding a 9,000 square met $8 million mansion that he registered in the name of his family members chaus declared family income for 20102 incidentally was just $2.66 million now serg sau’s Deputy Timur ianov uh was also arrested last month on briber charges ianov was ordered to remain in custody pending an official probe the arrest was widely interpreted as an attack on shyu and a possible precursor to his dismissal despite his close personal ties with Putin well the Russia Ukraine war is witnessing a fresh wave of escalation and in show of support with Ukraine the US Secretary of State Anthony blinkin arrived in cave on Tuesday in an unannounced trip Well the visit comes just weeks after the US Congress approved a $61 billion package of financial aid for Ukraine the visit is meant to reassure ukrainians of continued us support and flow of weapons for kave as Russia continues to batter Ukraine’s Northeastern city of K well Kar has become the latest flash point while ke claims that it sees no risk of a ground assault in Kar the visuals from Kar that tells a different story Ukrainian National Police are rushing to evacuate hundreds of civilians from K’s border areas as Russian air strikes continue to pound the [Music] region some chance neighborhoods are not easy to get to due to constant shelling however the situation is stable and under control we are evacuating people it is fine well the situation is precarious as artillery shells land near police vehicles but top officials say they do not see an imminent threat yet however they do acknowledge that K troops are being stretched there we can say that we don’t see any threat of assault on the city of karv or other problems but the Russian are trying to stretch our troops and if they succeed and have some success they will develop them and skirmishes between the Waring neighbors are also underway in northeastern Ukrainian town of w chonk the latest push in the northeastern region has opened up a warfront adding more pressure on the already overstretched Ukrainian forces well in the latest assault by Russian forces which began on Friday last week troops have captured over 40 to 50 square miles in northeastern Ukraine’s KH region which includes at least seven Villages meanwhile Ukraine carried out a fresh strike on the Russian Border City of belga Road on Monday the attack caused a building to collapse partially killing 15 according to Russia’s emergency Ministry 12 including two children were rescued from the rubble this was one of the the deadliest attacks to date on belga road launched by the Ukrainian troops thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s hardke as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages that Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in harv according to the harv governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains at the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against further Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the ground Ukraine’s president vadir zelinski claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the border of es he says disrupting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the K region a Ukrainian Missile hit a multi-story structure taking down a whole section of the of the building the attack killed at least seven and injured over 20 in the Russian city of belgaro mosc described the incident a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using Tor cou vampire and Al missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling and that’s according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggested establishing a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrad Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era conventional ballistic missiles launched overnight over belgrod region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a refinery in Russia’s vulgo ground region causing a fire at the complex thousands have been evacuated from the border areas near Ukraine’s hardke as Russia claims it has captured four more villages in the country’s Northeast this is in addition to the five Villages that Russia claimed to have captured on Saturday in harv according to the harv governor over 4,000 people have been evacuated and several have been killed as Russian troops reported gains on the battlefield the region has come under 32 drone strikes in the past 24 hours Ukraine says its troops are holding out against farther Russian advances however the situation has deteriorated significantly Ukrainian forces continue to be outnumbered in infantry Armory and ammunition on the ground [Music] Ukrainian president vadir zalinski claims that Ukrainian troops have been carrying out counterattacks in the border of villages he say this erupting Russian offensive plans is now their number one priority today the focus is primarily on the front line on the situation in our areas where there is the highest risk of Russian offensive our defensive operations continue in the K region a Ukrainian Missile hit a multistory structure taking down a whole section of the building the attack killed at least seven and injured over 17 in the Russian city of belgorod moscos described the incident as a terrorist attack on residential areas the attack was carried out using torch caou vampire and Al missiles and Rockets the city has been subjected to massive Ukrainian shelling and this according to officials last month President Vladimir Putin suggested establishing a buffer zone inside Ukrainian territory due to the attacks on belgrod Russian defense Ministry said on Sunday it destroyed two Soviet era conventional ballistic missiles launched overnight over Belo rodri region a Ukrainian drone attack also hit a refinery in Russia’s vulgo grad region causing a fire at the complex Peter kosnik is a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University and is now joining us from Washington DC welcome Professor we have seen Russia taking advancements in har what does this say about the war in your view what direction will the war take hence forth very difficult position now both in terms of Manpower and in terms of weaponry and so Russia is taking advantage of that they had been moving in the East and the South now they’ve added this offensive in the north uh and so the Ukrainian lines were already stretched very thin and Russia was making incremental gains in the South and the East now Ukraine is forced to move many of those troops to protect in the north around kke which weakens them further in the South and the East and so Russia is exploiting their advantages Russia is taking advantage of the fact that they have more artillary ammunition more weaponry and much more soldiers right now mhm so Ukraine has passed new legislation uh that allows them to draft more Ukrainian citizens but that doesn’t go into effect for another week and that will require months of training so Ukraine is going to be in a weakened position for quite some time nobody has any optimistic assessment of anything that would happen from Ukraine standpoint in this in 2024 some uh forecast ERS are hoping that conditions will improve in 2025 but I’m afraid that’s also a pipe dream professor before we move on we are reporting now that seven people have been reported killed in the Russian border adjacent city of belgorod uh after Ukrainian projectiles hit a residential building there and at least 20 other people have been injured Russia has apparently opened a criminal case your view well part there are two theories behind this offensive toward carave one is to push the ukrainians six miles back to create a buffer zone so that Ukraine will not be able to hit belgrad and other areas inside of Russia so that’s one Theory just to create a buffer zone other people think that Russia is actually planning to try seiz K Kar is Ukraine’s second biggest city before the war had a population of 1.3 million people so that would be very very difficult but given the state of conditions in Ukraine right now it might not be impossible that would be a major victory for Russia if it can seiz Kar but even it can push create a six mile buffer zone which seems much more feasible that would also protect those cities towns like belgrad inside of Russia Professor let’s talk about Ukraine now and the situation there President Biden promised weapons will be delivered as soon as possible what do you think could be causing the delays the uh that that $61 billion that was passed most of that gets spent in the United States by America’s Munitions makers and it takes time to do that Biden has just announced a $400 million military aid package and that’s going to be based on his presidential draw down Authority so they will take $400 Million worth of weapons from the US Arsenal and deliver those much more quickly and that’s a variety of offensive and defensive weapons that Ukraine can use but it’s going to take time can take weeks months even longer to to build up that that weapons to to build the weapons to ship over to Ukraine now the Europeans have been providing some but they’re also behind their promises uh the other concerning thing that we shouldn’t lose track of is that macron has been talking about sending uh French and other European round troops to support the ukrainians we also think that with the f-16s and other Advanced Weaponry arriving it’s possible that NATO forces will be there to help Target and possibly to help use those weapons all of these are a serious escalation Putin has been making a lot of uh saber rattling about tactical nuclear weapons now it so we don’t want to we don’t want I don’t want this to escalate to a much bigger war and that’s also possible the more desperate Ukraine becomes the more possibility that this situation escalates into potentially World War III and that’s what we especially have to make sure to prevent all right we’re out of time now Professor thank you very much for talking to us I’ve been talking to Peter kosnik who’s a professor of history and director of the nuclear Studies Institute at American University Professor thank you once again thank you ear a week after taking oath for the fifth time President Vladimir Putin replaced his defense minister Serge shyu the longest serving member of his cabinet and more than this it’s the replacement of Serge shyu which has raised many questions it’s 65-year-old Andre belov but he’s an economics expert who has never dealt with the military and now he’ll be the new defense minister of Russia what is Putin thinking what is the purpose of this decision the rare Kremlin shakeup took place as the Russian offensive in Northeastern Ukraine has been making gains in the latest Russia pounded over 30 villages in Kar forcing 6,000 people to evacuate so Russia is gaining speed it’s gaining momentum inside Ukraine but the shake up within Russian government is Raising questions why was Serge shyu removed just as Russia was making steady gains what will be the implications on the warfront to discuss this further we’re joined by Ben Addis who’s the founder and editor and chief of B intell news and also former Moscow bureau chief for the Daily Telegraph Ben always a pleasure speaking with you Serge shu’s removal as defense minister to oversee the National Security Council why was Shu removed has he been demoted um yes and no uh he’s been in trouble and um there was a huge corruption Scandal uh just a few weeks ago his Deputy um timour ianov was sacked who’s stolen masses amounts of money uh but didn’t bother to hide it I mean he’s got houses in niece and Yachts expensive holidays he has a very glamorous wife who posts their lavish Life Style on Instagram for everyone to see uh and it seems that that was part of a move to ease him out um that Sho himself is not particularly popular with the military because he himself was also not from a military background I mean he was a successful Regional governor and then he went on to head the um emergencies Ministry the chair uh and there he was popular amongst the people but as the head of the uh defense Ministry um he he was not popular with with the soldiers but now B bof has come in who is an economist also without um a military background he’s an economist he’s a very close to Putin as trusted adviser on on uh economic issues but one of the things you have to realize is that the war is not run by the defense minister um the defense Ministry is basically there to make the machine work in order to produce arms weapons bombs bullets clothes uh food for the for the soldiers so it’s more a sort of industrial management job and the actual fighting that’s left this the strategy on the ground that’s left to to the general command and then gim the top General he’s still in charge of the War uh he’s still running it but so might I’m so sorry but also of might might replace um because G G is also not popular with the soldiers so um this sh this reshuffle hasn’t finished yet Ben now the previous chief of the National Security Council Nikolai patrushev he was of course removed but if you’ve seen the kind of Gams Russia has made and the counter offensive from Ukraine of course that failed after that we’ve seen Russia making steady gains inside Ukraine what would be the reason behind Nikolai pev’s removal well that one was surprising and patev is is one of Putin’s oldest and most trusted allies um he’s former head of the kgp and fsp uh and the security click the the siki So-Cal siki um is the basis of Putin’s power and patev is is the is the guy who’s the doorway to that and nominally uh sh was moving into his seat as the chairman of the uh the Security Council is is on paper of promotion for shyu but also p p Chef is seen as a fork I mean he subscribes to a lot of crazy conspiracy theories and um he would like to bomb Ukraine flat and attack NATO um and so Shu moving into the security Council which doesn’t have any real power but it’s become extremely influential and important it’s a sort of Shadow cabinet to the president’s Administration um this could suggest that there’s a sort of tempering of the tone and that they they’re pulling back the rhetoric because Russ at the end of the day it doesn’t want to fight NATO because it’s a fight it cannot win and so Sho going there is um I mean Sho is also Patriot and and um he he wants Russia to win this war but it it may be a sort of easing back and the whole thing the whole constellation taken together looks like Putin’s digging in for the long term the boso is going to re-engineer the economy to make it more powerful but more military industrialized and shyo is also there to calm things down and take and play a long game the strategy of basically wearing the West out cuz the West is getting is getting tired I mean this is extremely expensive war and they just don’t want to be there at some point probably at the elections when Trump comes in you know the Americans will pull out all together and that will be the end of it and so I think this is Putin’s plan it’s just you know calm things down a little work for the long term and just wait uh Ben I wanted to ask you about Andre belov next but I just wanted to go back to something you mentioned that even Russia doesn’t want that war with NATO now if I were just take that statement and you know compare it with or actually just oppose it next to all the nuclear saber rattling that we’ve seen from the Russian side Ever every time there is a mention of NATO troops in Ukraine or european or Western troops in Ukraine is that just an empty rhetoric then when Russia also doesn’t want to go ahead with any kind of conflict directly with NATO well it’s Putin’s trump card we talked about this before in so much as like you know NATO is threatening to go into the Ukraine uh Estonia just said yesterday that they’re not again sending troops to fight on the ground alongside Ukraine in Ukraine and then then Putin rattles his nuclear saber and it it’s what stops any you know in Israel we had American jets flying alongside Israeli Jets when when their rocket attack happened um that will never happen in Ukraine because everyone’s terrified of a direct NATO Russia Clash which could escalate into a nuclear exchange and the thing about threats you know for them to be effective you have to be willing to go through with it yes and I think on balance that Putin is willing to use nukes how he does that if he actually drops a nuke on Ukraine I think you know the the the first scenario that would make sense would that he he just ignores the um the atomic weapon test band and explodes a nuclear weapon over somewhere in the middle of Siberia in the middle of nowhere and that would be sufficient I think to scare everyone yes you know white if in in the in the west if he actually exploded a bomb even if it’s own over Russian territory and then that’s the next escalation step up and then you know where do we go from that but I think at that point NATO backs off yes um and he plays this card constantly and it’s it works um NATO will never go into it does what reaction from the West every time there is some kind of nuclear saber rling yeah and it’s just you know rhetoric I mean we’re not going to have a nuclear exchange but you know certainly everyone’s terrified of this and there’s several sort of intermediary steps that Russia could take like exploding a bomb somewhere as a test um that would do the job uh it would make you know I mean NATO hasn’t gone in and it won’t go in and even you know Estonia is talking about it the French talked about it now the Brits talked about it but it’s um So-Cal strategic ambiguity they can’t take that off the table the threat of sending troops in because then you give Putin cart blanch to do what he likes in Ukraine and Ukraine will never be saved I want to now come back to Putin’s decision for his next defense minister what’s the thought behind having a top economic official Andre belov as defense minister of Russia what does it mean for the West it means that Russia has fully militarized its economy it’s on a war footing a full War footing that um Shu said about two weeks ago that they’re now producing more arms than they need and they’re sending the excess to warehouses whereas in the west we haven’t militarized our economies indeed we haven’t even made the Investments necessary to fully Supply Ukraine with something as simple as shells and the those Investments are starting now but they’re not expected to plan such as it is is to muddle through this year in the hope that there’ll be more arms produced in the west to supply Ukraine next year but I’m not even sure we’ll get to that point I mean as you mentioned the Russians are making um advances not very very fast and at huge cost but they are making steady advances I don’t think um Ukraine is going to be defeated but it’s losing more and more territory and so when there’s an eventual um ceasefire talks you know it’s not going to get any of that territory back so this is a huge problem at the same time the uh energy infrastructure in Ukraine has been obliterated I mean at least half their capacity has been already destroyed and until more air defense ammunition arrives which may happen in summer you know Russia’s going to continue doing that they they struck 106 energy infrastructure Assets in a single day last week beginning of this week um and and you know that won’t be repaired before winter so I mean things in Ukraine are being worse and worse all right Ben thank you for making the time and talking to us that was Ben Aris founder and editor and chief of b& intell news and also former mosow bureau chief for the Daily Telegraph always a pleasure speaking with you my pleasure shifting Focus to the other Warf front the Russia Ukraine war is witnessing a fresh wave of escalation and Ukraine’s Northeastern city of karv has become the latest flash point right while keev claims that it sees no risk on a ground assault in KH the visuals from the ground tell a different story altogether Ukrainian National Police are rushing to evacuate hundreds of civilians from hari’s border areas as Russian air strikes continue to P the region some W chance neighborhoods are not easy to get to due to constant shelling however the situation is stable and under control we are evacuating people it is fine the situation is precarious as artillery shells land near police vehicles officials say they do not see an imminent threat yet however they do acknowledge that gf’s troops are being stretched here we can say that we don’t see any threat of assault on the city of karv or other problems but the Russians are trying to stretch our troops and if they succeed and have some success they will develop them Nisa intense skirmishes between the Waring neighbors are also underway in northeastern Ukrainian town of of shans the latest push in the northeastern region it’s opened up a new warfront adding more pressure on the already overstretched Ukrainian forces now according to Moscow in the latest assault by Russian forces which began on Friday last week troops have captured over 40 to 50 square miles in northeastern Ukraine’s kave region which includes at least atast seven Villages meanwhile Ukraine carried out a fresh strike on the Russian Border City of belgaro on Monday the attack caused a building to collaps partially killing 15 according to Russia’s emergency Ministry 12 including two children were rescued from the rubble and this was one of the deadliest attacks to date on belar Rod launched by Ukrainian troops Al kerson the prime minister of the latest NATO member Sweden has said that he is now open to allowing nuclear weapons on its soil in Wartime in case the country is drawn into a military conflict it could potentially allow the US to station nuclear weapons on its territory well Sweden’s Parliament is said to vote on a defense cooperation agreement with the US in June it will give the us access to military bases in Sweden and allow the storage of military equipment and weapons in the Nordic country Sweden abandoned two centuries of military non-alignment to join nato in March this year unlike other Nordic Nations such as Finland and Norway Sweden has no explicit ban on accepting nuclear arms however it has maintained a long-standing policy against hosting such weapons in peace time critics in Sweden have called to impose a complete ban on nukes on its soil but the government has made it clear that no such ban will be put in place if needed Sweden itself will host nuclear weapons now as the prime minister in Sweden made such statements Russia warned that it is prepared for the
Russian forces attacking Ukraine’s northeastern Kharkiv region were engaged in fighting on the outskirts of the border town of Vovchansk, Kyiv’s troops said on Sunday, as President Volodymyr Zelenskiy described heavy fighting there and in the east.
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4 comments
Belgorod — not true..
Just send another 100 billion and make America broke and vulnerable
Yeah Russia is jesus biblical army that he created now in the future it all make since because they dont worship Jesus and there could of been a war this big the same week after Jesus died so i know Jesus made Russia
Where are nato ? This is your job