2023-05-27 09:05:00
According to US experts, Russia is once once more putting pressure on the West to urge Ukraine to negotiate. Accordingly, the West should influence the Ukrainian leadership to accept Russia’s conditions for such talks, according to the Institute for War Studies ISW in Washington. As in the past, Russia’s only aim is to demotivate the West in its aid to Ukraine by pretending to be willing to negotiate.
The experts referred to information from the Kremlin on Friday, according to which Russian President Vladimir Putin was open to dialogue. Russia accuses Ukraine and the West of blocking negotiations. At the same time, Moscow is rejecting a peace plan by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy that envisages a Russian troop withdrawal. Ukraine and also Germany are once morest freezing the war with the territories occupied by Russia.
According to the ISW, Russia has not yet created any conditions for such negotiations or said goodbye to its maximum goal of capitulating the Ukrainian government. It is likely that the Kremlin will intensify its false claims that it is ready for talks. At the same time, the ISW experts see further attempts by China, with its special envoy Li Hui, to urge the West to use its influence on Ukraine to achieve a ceasefire.
Ukraine should decide for itself
The EU states and the USA have always emphasized that they will continue to support Ukraine. The country, which has been under attack from Russia for more than 15 months, is relying on Western heavy weapons and ammunition to liberate its occupied territories. The West always emphasizes that Ukraine should decide on its own future.
The commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian army, Valeriy Zalushnyi, published a video showing soldiers praying and preparing for the major offensive. “It’s time to take back what’s ours,” the video reads. Ukraine goes on the offensive to liberate its territories from the occupiers and raise the banner of victory. The president’s office in Kiev had previously said that the offensive had been going on for days.
Former German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer sees Europe’s security as a permanent threat from Russia – even if a ceasefire is reached in the Ukraine war. “If you think regarding the end of this war, then you have to think realistically,” the Green politician told the “Tagesspiegel” (Saturday). “It will be a painful ceasefire that will not satisfy either side. And it will pose a permanent security threat to Europe.”
Truce requires compromise
A ceasefire will require “territorial compromises” that are anything but easy for either side, Fischer explained. “If in the end (Russian President Vladimir) Putin got confirmation in the direction of Crimea and some corrections in the east and he has to present that as a success at home, it will certainly not be easy. Conversely, the Ukrainians will find it very difficult to make territorial compromises. “
The member states of the EU have frozen a total of 200 billion euros from the Russian central bank. This was announced by the EU Commission at the request of “Welt am Sonntag” according to the preliminary report. Overall, the number of fixed foreign assets of the central bank in the G7 industrialized countries and the EU countries is around 300 billion euros. The amount of frozen private assets of Russian oligarchs in Europe has hardly increased in the past six months.
According to the Commission, assets amounting to 24.1 billion euros were determined in the European Union. Thus, 1473 oligarchs and 205 companies were sanctioned. At the end of December, the frozen assets totaled 18.9 billion euros. However, the German authorities have not determined any additional assets in the past three months. According to the newspaper, the German Ministry of Finance announced this on request.
Ukraine, meanwhile, has apparently asked Germany for the delivery of the German Taurus cruise missile. According to the “Frankfurter Allgemeine Sunday newspaper”, the German Ministry of Defense confirmed the request from Ukraine. A spokesman for the German government did not want to comment on whether Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyj personally addressed this request to German Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD), which information from the newspaper suggested.
Taurus cruise missiles have a range of up to 500 kilometers. They are dropped from fighter planes and find their targets on their own. The missile can fly under radar. It is considered an effective weapon once morest protected targets such as command bunkers or ammunition depots.
Explosion in the Pskov region of Russia
In an interview with the “FAS”, the foreign politicians Roderich Kiesewetter (CDU) and Michael Roth (SPD), chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the German Bundestag, advocated that Germany actively supports the deliveries of F-16 fighter jets by the USA to Ukraine, for example through education. According to Kiesewetter, Berlin might contribute to the armament of the F-16 through Taurus. Experts assured him that it was not “rocket science” to adapt the German cruise missile to the American F-16.
Roth and Kiesewetter justified their claim with the significant losses suffered by the Ukrainian air force since the beginning of the Russian invasion. The newspaper cites “US information” that Ukraine had already lost 60 of its 145 combat aircraft earlier this year.
According to Governor Mikhail Vedernikov, an explosion occurred in the Russian region of Pskov near the border with Belarus. It was due to a drone attack, Wedernikow explained. Two drones damaged the administration building, he wrote on the short message service Telegram. Preliminary investigations revealed that. There are no injuries, emergency services are on site. (apa)
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