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zvaigzdelasas · 8 months

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While most Ukrainians battled against Germany during the war, it’s well known that the western region of the country collaborated with the Third Reich — and that thousands of those involved were allowed to resettle in Canada. [...]

When Anthony Rota, [...] introduced Hunka during Zelenskyy’s Sept. 22 visit, he called him a “veteran from the Second World War who fought for Ukrainian independence against the Russians and continues to support the troops today.”

And Hunka made the argument himself after Russia invaded his homeland last year. “In the last war, I joined the Ukrainian underground to fight Russia, so I was fighting the same people they’re fighting now,” he told a reporter covering a peace vigil in North Bay, Ontario, in March 2022. “Nothing has changed there. The same enemy. First Stalin was there and now this idiot,” he said, referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin. [...]

In a post for the SS Galichina veterans’ blog Combatant News, Hunka wrote that 1941 to 1943 — after Germany invaded Ukraine and before Hunka enlisted — were the happiest years of his life. He also recalled eagerly awaiting “the legendary German knights” to come and attack “the hated Poles,” using a slur for Polish people, in 1939.

Captioned photos from the blog show Hunka during SS artillery training in Munich in December 1943 and in Poland around the time of a visit by Nazi mastermind Heinrich Himmler. “I know that if I ordered you to liquidate the Poles … I would be giving you permission to do what you are eager to do anyway,” Himmler said during that visit, according to several historical accounts. Now, the Polish minister of education is looking into whether Hunka can be extradited and prosecuted for what happened during the war.[...]

[After the war,] Hunka made his living in the aircraft industry, working his way up to inspector at DeHavilland Aircraft in Toronto. After retirement, he visited Ukraine nearly every year, according to a profile of him in a University of Alberta newsletter announcing the donation made in his honor by his sons. The profile said he also served as president of the parish council of St. Volodymyr Ukrainian Catholic Church in Thornhill, Ontario.[...]

In his mea culpa, Rota made it sound like Hunka was a constituent from his district [...] whom he did not know much about. “This initiative was entirely my own,“ Rota said[...]

But Rejean Venne, an independent Canadian journalist, wrote in his Substack newsletter this week that Rota and Hunka family members have had numerous chances to cross paths over the years. Among Venne’s examples:

- One of Hunka’s sons, Martin, was chief financial officer of Redpath Mining, a multinational corporation headquartered in Rota’s district. Redpath has contributed to Rota’s campaigns and Rota has provided government funding for recreational facilities operated by Redpath. (The company did not respond to inquiries from the Forward made Thursday.)

- Martin Hunka has also served as chair of the board of trustees for North Bay Hospital, which is located in Rota’s district and which Rota has supported. Hunka’s name can no longer be found on the hospital’s website and social media posts. (The hospital did not respond to a request for comment emailed Thursday.)

- North Bay Pride, an LGBTQ+ organization, gave an award to Rota nine months after Yaroslav’s granddaughter Leshya Lecappelain joined its board of directors. In 2022 and 2023, North Bay Pride received more than $100,000 in funding from Rota. (Asked about this, a spokesperson for North Bay Pride said Lecappelain had not been on its board for several years.)

“Rota’s response that this was a last-minute request doesn’t add up,” Venne said in an email interview. “The Hunka family appears well connected in Rota’s district.”

The Forward could not determine whether Hunka and Rota met before he was honored at Parliament. Rota and others at the House of Commons did not respond to several requests for comment sent Wednesday and Thursday. Efforts to reach Yaroslav, Martin and Peter Hunka, Lecappelain and other members of the family for comment were also unsuccessful.[...]

On Wednesday, the University of Alberta said it would return the CA$30,000 endowment that Hunka’s sons donated in 2019 in their father’s honor. The money was intended to fund research at the school’s Canadian Institute for Ukrainian Studies. But Per Anders Rudling, a university alumnus and expert on Ukrainian nationalism who teaches at Sweden’s Lund University, said the Hunka fund is just “the top of an iceberg.” In an email to the Forward, Rudling said the University of Alberta has “much larger endowments” honoring other figures connected to the Waffen SS unit. The “most problematic,” he said, is the Volodymyr and Daria Kubijovych Memorial Endowment Fund [Editors note: archive link - also "matched two-to-one by the Government of Alberta"] At CA$450,000 — about $334,000 — it’s 15 times larger than the Hunka fund the university is returning.[...] In a Facebook post Thursday, Rudling also questioned university endowments named for other Galichina Division veterans, including Roman Kolisnyk, Levko Babij and Edward Brodacky. Pointing to research he published in The Journal of Slavic Military Studies [Editors note: 1, 2], Rudling said, “I have tried to raise this issue in the past, to no avail.”

Asked about Rudling’s concerns, Michael Brown, a spokesperson for the University of Alberta, reiterated a statement in which interim provost Verna Yiu said the school is “reviewing its general naming policies and procedures, including those for endowments, to ensure alignment with our values.” Yiu also expressed the school’s “commitment to address anti-Semitism in any of its manifestations, including the ways in which the Holocaust continues to resonate in the present.” The honors given to SS Galichina fighters extend beyond academia. One of the University of Alberta’s endowments is for its former chancellor Peter Savaryn, another SS Galichina member. In 1987, Savaryn was awarded the Order of Canada, among the nation’s highest honors, bestowed by Canada’s governor general, the representative of the British Crown. Mary Simon, the current governor general, has condemned the Hunka scandal as “a shock and an embarrassment.”[...]

When the Hunka endowment was announced in 2020, the university said it would fund research on two “leaders of the underground Ukrainian Catholic Church,” Cardinal Josyf Slipyj and Metropolitan Andrei Sheptytsky. (A metropolitan is akin to a bishop.) Slipyi was a deputy in Ukraine’s 1941 self-proclaimed government, which pledged to work closely with Germany under Hitler’s leadership. Slipyi also assigned chaplains to SS Galichina and celebrated the unit’s inaugural Mass. After the war, the Soviets sent him to gulag prison camps. But Sheptytsky’s legacy is layered [sic]. He helped “dozens of Jews find refuge in his monasteries and even in his own home,” according to Yad Vashem, while also supporting “the German army as the savior of the Ukrainians from the Soviets.”

Harvard University also houses a Ukrainian Research Institute. Asked, after Alberta’s announcement, whether that institute’s funding would be scrutinized for Nazi ties, the university said in a statement that the institute had never received money from the Hunkas, nor had it received donations designated for research related to SS Galichina. Harvard did, however, in 1974 establish a fellowship and faculty position in European studies with money from a foundation named for Alfred Krupp, who was convicted of war crimes for using slave laborers from Auschwitz to build and work in a factory.[...]

In Canada, questions about the Ukrainian immigrants’ past dogged them for decades, and in 1985, the country launched a Commission of Inquiry on War Criminals, known as the Deschênes Commission. Investigators were mostly limited to considering evidence gathered in Canada, and ultimately they came to the controversial conclusion that the Galichina Division “should not be indicted as a group” and that “mere membership” in the division was insufficient to justify prosecution or revoke citizenship.

This week, as Trudeau apologized for the Hunka salute, B’nai Brith Canada called for the full release of the commission’s report, which had been heavily redacted, along with other Holocaust-era records, in order to “restore public trust in our institutions.” “Canadians deserve to know the full extent to which Nazi war criminals were permitted to settle in this country after the war,” the group said Tuesday[...]

Why would Hunka’s family risk his humiliation, at age 98, by putting him under a spotlight? Did they not realize how his military record would be perceived and portrayed? “It’s arrogance. It’s not naiveté,” said Jack Porter, a research associate at Harvard’s Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies and himself a Jewish child survivor of the Holocaust, born in Ukraine. “They know what their father did,” he said. “It’s hubris, it’s chutzpah. They rationalize that these men were fighting communism. If a few Jews were killed, they also were communists.”[...]

More than 2.5 million Ukrainians died fighting against Germany. “There were many good Ukrainians; they should not all be stigmatized,” he said.

But he said veterans who fought under the Nazis like Hunka and his compatriots have been emboldened by the whitewashing of their history, especially since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last year. “They’ve been hiding in plain sight,” he said. “They’ve been there for 60 years and nobody has touched them, so of course they feel OK.”

29 Sep 23

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theculturedmarxist · 9 months

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It has been clear for some time that US corporate news media have explicitly taken a side on the Ukraine War. This role includes suppressing relevant history of the lead-up to the war (FAIR.org, 3/4/22), attacking people who bring up that history as “conspiracy theorists” (FAIR.org, 5/18/22), accepting official government pronouncements at face value (FAIR.org, 12/2/22) and promoting an overly rosy picture of the conflict in order to boost morale.

For most of the war, most of the US coverage has been as pro-Ukrainian as Ukraine’s own media, now consolidated under the Zelenskyy government (FAIR.org, 5/9/23). Dire predictions sporadically appeared, but were drowned out by drumbeat coverage portraying a Ukrainian army on the cusp of victory, and the Russian army as incompetent and on the verge of collapse.

Triumphalist rhetoric soared in early 2023, as optimistic talk of a game-changing “spring offensive” dominated Ukraine coverage. Apparently delayed, the Ukrainian counteroffensive launched in June. While even US officials did not believe that it would amount to much, US media papered over these doubts in the runup to the campaign.

Over the last three months, it has become clear that the Ukrainian military operation will not be the game-changer it was sold as; namely, it will not significantly roll back the Russian occupation and obviate the need for a negotiated settlement. Only after this became undeniable did media report on the true costs of war to the Ukrainian people.

Overwhelming optimism

In the runup to the counteroffensive, US media were full of excited conversation about how it would reshape the nature of the conflict. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg told Radio Free Europe (4/21/23) he was “confident Ukraine will be successful.” Sen. Lindsey Graham assured Politico (5/30/23), “In the coming days, you’re going to see a pretty impressive display of power by the Ukrainians.” Asked for his predictions about Ukraine’s plans, retired Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges told NPR (5/12/23), “I actually expect…they will be quite successful.”

Former CIA Director David Patraeus, author of the overhyped “surge” strategy in Iraq, told CNN (5/23/23):

I personally think that this is going to be really quite successful…. And [the Russians] are going to have to withdraw under pressure of this Ukrainian offensive, the most difficult possible tactical maneuver, and I don’t think they’re going to do well at that.

The Washington Post’s David Ignatius (4/15/23) acknowledged that “hope is not a strategy,” but still insisted that “Ukraine’s will to win—its determination to expel Russian invaders from its territory at whatever cost—might be the X-factor in the decisive season of conflict ahead.”

The New York Times (6/2/23) ran a story praising recruits who signed up for the Ukrainian pushback, even though it “promises to be deadly.” Times columnist Paul Krugman (6/5/23) declared we were witnessing “the moral equivalent of D-Day.” CNN (5/30/23) reported that Ukrainians were “unfazed” as they “gear up for a counteroffensive.”

Cable news was replete with buzz about how the counteroffensive, couched with modifiers like “long-awaited” or “highly anticipated,” could turn the tide in the war. Nightly news shows (e.g., NBC, 6/15/23, 6/16/23) presented audiences with optimistic statements from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and other figures talking about the imminent success.

Downplaying reality

Despite the soaring rhetoric presented to audiences, Western officials understood that the counteroffensive was all but doomed to fail. This had been known long before the above comments were reported, but media failed to include that fact as prominently as the predictions for success.

On April 10, as part of the Discord leaks story, the Washington Post (4/10/23) reported that top secret documents showed that Ukraine’s drive would fall “well short” of its objectives, due to equipment, ammunition and conscription problems. The document predicted “sustainment shortfalls” and only “modest territorial gains.”

The Post additionally cited anonymous officials who claimed that the documents’ conclusions were corroborated by a classified National Intelligence Council assessment, shown only to a select few in Congress. The Post spoke to a Ukrainian official who “did not dispute the revelations,” and acknowledged that it was “partially true.”

While the Post has yet to publish the documents in full, the leaks and the other sources clearly painted a picture of a potentially disastrous counteroffensive. Fear was so palpable that the Biden administration privately worried about how he could keep up support for the war when the widely hyped offensive sputtered. In the midst of this, Blinken continued to dismiss the idea of a ceasefire, opting instead to pursue further escalating the conflict.

Despite the importance of these facts, they were hardly reported on by the rest of corporate media, and dropped from subsequent war coverage. When the Post (6/14/23) published a long article citing Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s cautious optimism about the campaign, it neglected to mention its earlier reporting about the government’s privately gloomier assessments. The documents only started appearing again in the press after thousands were dead, and the campaign’s failure undeniable.

In an honest press, excited comments from politicians and commentators would be published alongside reports about how even our highest-level officials did not believe that the counteroffensive would amount to much. Instead, anticipation was allowed to build while doubts were set to the side.

Too ‘casualty-averse’?

By July, Ukrainian casualties were mounting, and it became clearer and clearer that the counteroffensive would fail to recapture significant amounts of Ukrainian territory. Reporting grew more realistic, and we were given insights into conditions on the ground in Ukraine, as well as what was in the minds of US officials.

According to the Washington Post (8/17/23), US and Ukrainian militaries had conducted war games and had anticipated that an advance would be accompanied by heavy losses. But when the real-world fatalities mounted, the Post reported, “Ukraine chose to stem the losses on the battlefield.”

This caused a rift between the Ukrainians and their Western backers, who were frustrated at Ukrainians’ desire to keep their people alive. A mid-July New York Times article (7/14/23) reported that US officials were privately frustrated that Ukraine had become too afraid of dying to fight effectively. The officials worried that Ukrainian commanders “fear[ed] casualties among their ranks,” and had “reverted to old habits” rather than “pressing harder.” A later Times article (8/18/23) repeated Washington’s worries that Ukrainians were too “casualty-averse.”

Acknowledging failure

After it became undeniable that Ukraine’s military action was going nowhere, a Wall Street Journal report (7/23/23) raised some of the doubts that had been invisible in the press on the offensive’s eve. The report’s opening lines say it all:

When Ukraine launched its big counteroffensive this spring, Western military officials knew Kyiv didn’t have all the training or weapons—from shells to warplanes—that it needed to dislodge Russian forces.

The Journal acknowledged that Western officials simply “hoped Ukrainian courage and resourcefulness would carry the day.”

One Post column (7/26/23) asked, “Was Gen. Mark Milley Right Last Year About the War in Ukraine?” Columnist Jason Willick acknowledged that “Milley’s skepticism about Ukraine’s ability to achieve total victory appears to have been widespread within the Biden administration before the counteroffensive began.”

And when one official told Politico (8/18/23), “Milley had a point,” acknowledging the former military head’s November suggestion for negotiations. The quote was so telling that Politico made it the headline of the article.

Even Rep. Andy Harris (D-Md.), co-chair of the congressional Ukraine Caucus, publicly questioned whether or not the war was “winnable” (Politico, 8/17/23). Speaking on the counteroffensive’s status, he said, “I’ll be blunt, it’s failed.”

Newsweek (8/16/23) reported on a Ukrainian leadership divided over how to handle the “underwhelming” counteroffensive. The Washington Post (8/17/23) reported that the US intelligence community assessed that the offensive would fail to fulfill its key objective of severing the land bridge between Russian-occupied eastern Ukraine and Crimea.

As the triumphalism ebbed, outlets began reporting on scenes that were almost certainly common before the spring push but had gone unpublished. One piece from the Post (8/10/23) outlined a “darken[ed] mood in Ukraine,” in which the nation was “worn out.” The piece acknowledged that “Ukrainian officials and their Western partners hyped up a coming counteroffensive,” but there was “little visible progress.”

The Wall Street Journal (8/1/23) published a devastating piece about the massive number of amputees returning home from the mine-laden battlefield. They reported that between 20,000 and 50,000 Ukrainians had lost one or more limbs as a result of the war—numbers that are comparable to those seen during World War I.

Rather than dwelling on the stalled campaign, the New York Times and other outlets focused on the drone war against Russia, even while acknowledging that the remote strikes were largely an exercise in public relations. The Times (8/25/23) declared that the strikes had “little significant damage to Russia’s overall military might” and were primarily “a message for [Ukraine’s] own people,” citing US officials who noted that they “intended to demonstrate to the Ukrainian public that Kyiv can still strike back.” Looking at the quantity of Times coverage (8/30/23, 8/30/23, 8/23/23, 8/22/23, 8/22/23, 8/21/23, 8/18/23), the drone strikes were apparently aimed at an increasingly war-weary US public as well.

War as desirable outcome

The fact that US officials pushed for a Ukrainian counteroffensive that all but expected would fail raises an important question: Why would they do this? Sending thousands of young people to be maimed and killed does nothing to advance Ukrainian territorial integrity, and actively hinders the war effort.

The answer has been clear since before the war. Despite the high-minded rhetoric about support for democracy, this has never been the goal of pushing for war in Ukraine. Though it often goes unacknowledged in the US press, policymakers saw a war in Ukraine as a desirable outcome. One 2019 study from the RAND Corporation—a think tank with close ties to the Pentagon—suggested that an effective way to overextend and unbalance Russia would be to increase military support for Ukraine, arguing that this could lead to a Russian invasion.

In December 2021, as Russian President Vladimir Putin began to mass troops at Ukraine’s border while demanding negotiations, John Deni of the Atlantic Council published an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal (12/22/21) headlined “The Strategic Case for Risking War in Ukraine,” which laid out the US logic explicitly: Provoking a war would allow the US to impose sanctions and fight a proxy war that would grind Russia down. Additionally, the anti-Russian sentiment that resulted from a war would strengthen NATO’s resolve.

All of this came to pass as Washington’s stance of non-negotiation successfully provoked a Russian invasion. Even as Ukraine and Russia sat at the negotiation table early in the war, the US made it clear that it wanted the war to continue and escalate. The US’s objective was, in the words of Raytheon boardmember–turned–Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, “to see Russia weakened.” Despite stated commitments to Ukrainian democracy, US policies have instead severely damaged it.

NATO’s ‘strategic windfall’

In the wake of the stalled counteroffensive, the US interest in sacrificing Ukraine to bleed Russia was put on display again. In July, the Post‘s Ignatius declared that the West shouldn’t be so “gloomy” about Ukraine, since the war had been a “strategic windfall” for NATO and its allies. Echoing two of Deni’s objectives, Ignatius asserted that “the West’s most reckless antagonist has been rocked,” and “NATO has grown much stronger with the additions of Sweden and Finland.”

In the starkest demonstration of the lack of concern for Ukraine or its people, he also wrote that these strategic successes came “at relatively low cost,” adding, in a parenthetical aside, “(other than for the Ukrainians).”

Ignatius is far from alone. Hawkish Sen. Mitt Romney (R–Utah) explained why US funding for the proxy war was “about the best national defense spending I think we’ve ever done”: “We’re losing no lives in Ukraine, and the Ukrainians, they’re fighting heroically against Russia.” The consensus among policymakers in Washington is to push for endless conflict, no matter how many Ukrainians die in the process. As long as Russia loses men and material, the effect on Ukraine is irrelevant. Ukrainian victory was never the goal.

‘Fears of peace talks’

Polls show that support for increased US involvement in Ukraine is rapidly declining. The recent Republican presidential debate demonstrated clear fractures within the right wing of the US power structure. Politico (8/18/23) reported that some US officials are regretting potential lost opportunities for negotiations. Unfortunately, this minority dissent has yet to affect the dominant consensus.

The failure of the counteroffensive has not caused Washington to rethink its strategy of attempting to bleed Russia. The flow of US military hardware to Ukraine is likely to continue so long as this remains the goal. The Hill (9/5/23) gave the game away about NATO’s commitment to escalation with a piece titled “Fears of Peace Talks With Putin Rise Amid US Squabbling.”

But even within the Biden administration, the Pentagon appears to be at odds with the State Department and National Security Council over the Ukraine conflict. Contrary to what may be expected, the civilian officials like Jake Sullivan, Victoria Nuland and Antony Blinken are taking a harder line on perpetuating this conflict than the professional soldiers in the Pentagon. The media’s sharp change of tone may both signify and fuel the doubts gaining traction within the US political class.

#ukraine conflict #us propaganda #nato

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marykk1990 · 7 months

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My next post in support of Ukraine is:

Next site, we're visiting the city of Chervonohrad in Lviv Oblast. The city was part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth when it was founded in 1692 under the name Krystynopol. In 1772, it became part of the Habsburg Empire. During the interwar period between WWI & WWII, it was part of the Second Polish Republic, and then later, it was part of the Polish People's Republic. In 1951, it became part of the Ukrainian SSR and was renamed Chervonohrad. The founder of the city, Voivode Feliks Kazmirierz Potocki, had named the city after his wife, Krystyna Lubomirska. Voivode is a title for a military leader or warlord. During WWII, in 1942, the Jews of the city were deported to Belzec extermination camp. It was a camp built by the SS explicitly to kill Polish Jews. In August 1990, Chervonohrad became the first city in the soviet union to remove a monument to Vladimir Lenin. Something tells me Chervonohrad doesn't want to be a part of muscovy.

#StandWithUkraine

#SlavaUkraïni 🇺🇦🌻

Here's another pic of Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Olena Zelenska from happier times. I love their smiles in this pic. I hope all Ukrainians can smile like that again soon!

#StandWithUkraine

#SlavaUkraïni 🇺🇦🌻

#Stand With Ukraine #Slava Ukraïni 🇺🇦 🌻

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nicklloydnow · 4 days

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On today’s episode of ‘The March Towards World War 3’:

“The Biden administration has quietly given Ukraine permission to strike inside Russia — solely near the area of Kharkiv — using U.S.-provided weapons, three U.S. officials and two other people familiar with the move said Thursday, a major reversal that will help Ukraine to better defend its second-largest city.

“The president recently directed his team to ensure that Ukraine is able to use U.S. weapons for counter-fire purposes in Kharkiv so Ukraine can hit back at Russian forces hitting them or preparing to hit them,” one of the U.S. officials said, adding that the policy of not allowing long-range strikes inside Russia “has not changed.”

(…)

In effect, Ukraine can now use American-provided weapons, such as rockets and rocket launchers, to shoot down launched Russian missiles heading toward Kharkiv, at troops massing just over the Russian border near the city, or Russian bombers launching bombs toward Ukrainian territory. But the official said Ukraine cannot use those weapons to hit civilian infrastructure or launch long-range missiles, such as the Army Tactical Missile System, to hit military targets deep inside Russia.

It’s a stunning shift the administration initially said would escalate the war by more directly involving the U.S. in the fight. But worsening conditions for Ukraine on the battlefield –– namely Russia’s advances and improved position in Kharkiv –– led the president to change his mind.

(…)

The Biden administration hinted that a decision had either been secretly made or forthcoming in recent days. On Wednesday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who supports a restriction lift, became the first U.S. official to publicly hint that Biden may shift course and allow such strikes, telling reporters that U.S. policy toward Ukraine would evolve as needed. White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby later did not rule out a potential change.

Those messages came after top U.S. allies, such as the United Kingdom and France, said Ukraine should have the right to attack inside Russia using Western weapons. Lawmakers from both parties also supported the move publicly and privately, while top U.S. military officials briefed Congress behind closed doors that relaxing the restriction had “military value,” POLITICO first reported.

(…)

Some officials are concerned that Ukraine, when it attacks inside Russia using its own drones, has hit military targets unrelated to Russia’s invasion. The U.S. has strongly delivered the message that Kyiv must use American weapons only to directly hit Russian military sites used for its invasion of Ukraine, but not civilian infrastructure.

Ukrainian officials, from President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on down, have pushed for the Biden administration to change its policy ever since Russia launched a large assault on Kharkiv. For weeks they’ve said an inability to attack Russian troop positions over the border complicated Ukraine’s defense of Kharkiv and the country writ large.

In a discussion with Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on Wednesday, Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov made a “hard push” to use U.S. weapons in Russia, according to a person with knowledge of the call.”

“Dmitry Suslov, who hosts the program Bolshaya Igra (Big Game) on Russia's First Channel, weighed in on the debate surrounding whether Kyiv should be allowed to use American-supplied weapons to hit targets within Russia. Newsweek has emailed the Russian Foreign Ministry for comment.

The U.S. has stipulated Ukraine not use long-range missile systems such as ATACAMS (Army Tactical Missile System) on Russian territory for fear of escalation. However, Kyiv has said that this leaves it vulnerable, especially in light of a Russian offensive launched on May 10 in the Kharkiv region.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg is among world figures who have said that Ukraine should be able to use the weapons, with others backing the move, including lawmakers in Lithuanian, Germany and the U.S. itself.

Meanwhile, Cezary Tomczyk, Poland's deputy defense secretary, told Polish radio that Warsaw has given Ukraine the green light to use its weapons to strike targets inside Russia and "does not apply any restrictions."

Suslov, a member of the Council for Foreign and Defense Policy (SVOP), considered Russia's leading foreign-policy think tank, wrote an op-ed for Russian publication Profile. It said that, to show Russia was serious about its readiness to escalate, "it is worth thinking about conducting a demonstration (that is, not combat) nuclear explosion."

(…)

In Suslov's view, such a move would "bring the conflict to a fundamentally different level," erasing one of the main "red lines" that have existed since the start of the war, and meaning "the direct entry of the United States and NATO into the war against Russia."

As such, Moscow should conduct exercises not only on the use of tactical nuclear weapons, but also on the use of strategic nuclear forces, said Suslov. He is also a deputy director at Moscow's Higher School of Economics (HSE).

"The political and psychological effect of a mushroom cloud shown live on all global TV channels would I hope focus the minds of Western politicians back to what was the only thing that prevented wars between the great powers after 1945 which they have lost—the fear of nuclear war," said Suslov.

(…)

Another prominent figure in the SVOP, Sergei Karaganov, wrote an article for state agency RIA Novosti titled, "There is no choice: Russia will have to launch a nuclear strike on Europe." However, it prompted a backlash from other SVOP members, who published a statement condemning rhetoric pushed in Russia about nuclear weapons as "the height of irresponsibility."”

“France’s President, Emmanuel Macron, and Germany’s Chancellor, Olaf Scholz, became the latest and most powerful leaders to give at least a conditional green light to Ukraine using military aid for cross-border strikes on the French leader’s visit to Germany this week.

Mr Macron said late on Tuesday that Ukraine should be allowed to “neutralise military sites from which the missiles are fired” – following Ukrainian complaints that Russia is launching attacks from within its borders using assets that Ukraine cannot strike.

(…)

Mr Scholz’s spokesperson said on Wednesday that “defensive action is not limited to one’s own territory, but also includes the territory of the aggressor”, adding that Germany’s terms for use of its weapons were “confidential”.

Ukraine’s allies have also stepped up military aid commitments in the face of Russian advances across the front line. Sweden pledged more than £1bn in new weapons on Wednesday, following major new commitments from Spain, the Netherlands, and Belgium this week.

The shift by two of Europe’s major powers and leading arms suppliers to Kyiv follows a wider trend across the continent. Foreign Secretary Lord David Cameron said earlier this month that Ukraine “has the right” to use British weapons against targets in Russia. Denmark, Sweden, Finland, and Czechia have all made the same commitment.

Dmitry Suslov, deputy director of influential Russian think-tank Council on Foreign and Defence Policy, advocated on Wednesday a “demonstration nuclear explosion” to strengthen deterrence.

It followed President Vladmir Putin’s warning to European governments to “be aware of what they are playing with”, given their smaller land areas and dense populations. “This is a factor that they should keep in mind before talking about striking deep into Russian territory,” he said.

Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said last week that Moscow will retaliate with strikes on British targets in and outside Ukraine if British weapons are used to strike Russian territory.

(…)

Dr Emma Salisbury, associate fellow at the Council on Geostrategy, noted that the Kremlin has issued threats throughout the war to deter support for Ukraine.

“Fears of escalation to a Russia-Nato conflict are understandable, but we should remember that such fears have been expressed during every discussion about an increase of support to Ukraine,” she said. “Ultimately, if Putin wants to attack Nato, he will find an excuse to do so no matter what we do.”

Retired US army commander and military analyst Ben Hodges suggested that Russia would assess a nuclear strike as damaging to its own interests.

“You always have to be concerned that Russia might use a nuclear weapon because they have thousands of them,” he said. “But the likelihood is very low because there are no positive outcomes for Russia once they use a nuclear weapon. The benefit is the threat.

“I think the Chinese are signalling to them that they would not accept that. And I think the Russians also believed President Biden when [he] said that Russia would suffer ‘catastrophic consequences’ if they used a nuclear weapon.”

Russia’s response is likely to focus on the new weapons shipments arriving in Ukraine, suggests Dr Marina Miron of the Defence Studies Department at King’s College London.

“I’m sure we will hear more about tactical nuclear weapons because I don’t see any good options in terms of responding by force, at least not on Nato territory,” she said. “In terms of a covered response, we are seeing it right now in the increased activity of Russian intelligence services in Europe.

(…)

The impact of Ukraine being able to use Western weapons such as French Scalp missiles or British Storm Shadows against targets in Russia would be an “annoyance” to the Russian military, but is unlikely to turn the tide of a war in Ukraine’s favour, Dr Miron added.

Mr Hodges said the decision was important to “build momentum” and that he hoped the Biden Adminstration would soon follow suit and lift restrictions from the use of US weapons.”

“Russia has already begun to more actively prepare covert bombings, arson attacks and damage to infrastructure on European soil, directly and via proxies, with little apparent concern about causing civilian fatalities, intelligence officials believe.

(…)

“We assess the risk of state-controlled acts of sabotage to be significantly increased,” said Thomas Haldenwang, head of German domestic intelligence. Russia now seems comfortable carrying out operations on European soil “[with] a high potential for damage,” he told a security conference last month hosted by his agency, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution.

Haldenwang spoke just days after two German-Russian nationals were arrested in Bayreuth, Bavaria, for allegedly plotting to attack military and logistics sites in Germany on behalf of Russia.

Two men were charged in the UK in late April with having started a fire at a warehouse containing aid shipments for Ukraine. English prosecutors accuse them of working for the Russian government.

In Sweden, security services are meanwhile investigating a series of recent railway derailments, which they suspect may be acts of state-backed sabotage.

Russia has attempted to destroy the signalling systems on Czech railways, the country’s transport minister told the FT last month.

In Estonia, an attack on the interior minister’s car in February and those of journalists were perpetrated by Russian intelligence operatives, the country’s Internal Security Service has said. France’s ministry of defence also warned this year of possible sabotage attacks by Russia on military sites.

“The obvious conclusion is that there has been a real stepping up of Russian activity,” said Keir Giles, senior consulting fellow at Chatham House, the think-tank.

“One cannot tell if that’s a reflection of the fact that the Russians are throwing more resources at it; whether they are being more sloppy and getting caught; or whether western counter-intelligence has simply become better at detecting and stopping it,” he added. “Whatever it is though — there is a lot going on.”

(…)

In the weeks following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, more than 600 Russian intelligence officers operating in Europe with diplomatic cover were ejected, dealing serious damage to the Kremlin’s spy network across the continent.

In a recent report, analysts at the UK’s Royal United Services Institute highlighted the efforts to which Russia had gone to reconstitute its presence in Europe, often using proxies. Those include members of the Russian diaspora as well as organised crime groups with which the Kremlin has long-standing ties.

A key strategic shift has also occurred, with so-called “Committees of Special Influence” coordinating intelligence operations country-by-country for the Kremlin, drawing together what were previously piecemeal efforts by the country’s fractious security services and other Kremlin players.

(…)

Questions have been raised, for instance, over a so-far unexplained explosion at a BAE Systems munitions factory in Wales that supplies shells used by Ukraine. In October 2014 a Czech arms depot where weapons for Kyiv were being stored was destroyed; Russian military intelligence agents were later revealed to have planted explosives at the site.

A huge fire broke out on Friday at a factory in Berlin owned by the arms company Diehl, which also supplies Ukraine. More than 160 specialist firefighters were called to tackle the blaze, with residents in a huge swath of the west of the capital told to keep windows closed due to possible toxic fumes.

“As ever with Russia, it’s wise not to look for a single explanation of why they are doing anything. There’s always a combination of things going on,” said Giles.

“These pinprick attacks we’ve seen so far are of course to create disruption, but they can also be used for disinformation. And then there is what Russia learns from these attacks if they want to immobilise Europe for real . . . They’re practice runs.”

#russia #ukraine #war #invasion #nuclear #world war 3 #wwiii #Biden #putin #macron #scholz #nato #ben hodges #suslov #zelensky #terrorism #tactical #strategic

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stele3 · 8 days

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https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/more-than-4000-likely-impacted-by-papua-new-guinea-landslide-aid-group-says-2024-05-26/

#destiel daily digest

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maximumphilosopheranchor · 9 months

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In the video archive of President Zelenskyy’s press office, there were some extremely interesting clips that hadn’t ever appeared in public. We decided to preserve them: first, because the press office should keep everything, and second, because for us these video clips were filled with pleasant and amusing moments. In one, President Zelenskyy was chatting with two elderly priests when the videographer recording their interaction broke a vase. We couldn’t see the vase in the frame, but we could hear that he knocked something over and the object fell and broke. The old men looked at the videographer with surprise and indignation, but the president walked over to the broken object, bent down, and picked up the fragments. It was one of those moments when we saw the president’s common decency and simplicity – very important aspects of his character. And we laughed because the videographer, whose name was Vova, short of Volodymyr – the same nickname and name as the president’s – was carefully filming the entire time as the president bent down and gathered up all the fragments. Vova, of course, never thought to pick them up himself. There was another video, shot by the same videographer, from the front lines in Donbas. In February 2021, Zelenskyy traveled to Donbas with six foreign diplomats. Anka Feldhusen, the German ambassador to Ukraine, was having trouble fastening her helmet’s chin strap. The president noticed this and began to help her with it. I sent that short, sweet fourteen-second video to Anka. But there are other moments recorded only in our memory: For example, when we set out on one of our first trips to the provinces. It was like accompanying a rock star. So many people rushed over to see Zelenskyy, to join him as he walked, and, even better, to take selfies with him. They surrounded us in a tight circle, now and then shouting out the president’s first name or squealing with joy. Our security team struggled as the crowd pressed in to get a look. In the midst of the crowd was a young mother with a little girl, and she was struggling to lift her up. The crowd, shoving and pushing, was pressing in hard against the child. The frightened mother was at a loss. I was trying to protect the child, who had begun to cry. Zelenskyy heard her cries and turned back. He spotted the little girl, walked over to her, and gestured to the crowd to back off, and his security detail helped out. He squatted next to the crying child and tried to calm her. The crowd stopped shoving, and the mother asked for a selfie to remember the moment. I mention these trivial incidents only because seeing Zelenskyy in action, knowing his values and the way he views the world, made some of the characterizations of him seem ludicrous. They were, in fact, political attacks by his opponents attempting to demean him as a politician, constructing an alternative image of him online – as a coward, an arrogant jerk, or a fool.

Iuliia Mendel, The Fight of Our Lives: My Time with Zelenskyy, Ukraine’s Battle for Democracy, and What It Means for the World

#Iuliia Mendel #Volodymyr Zelenskyy #this man has suffered so much

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mariacallous · 6 months

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Editor's note: This piece is part of a series of policy analyses entitled “The Talbott Papers on Implications of Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine,” named in honor of American statesman and former Brookings Institution President Strobe Talbott. Brookings is grateful to Trustee Phil Knight for his generous support of the Brookings Foreign Policy program.

Executive summary

After gaining independence following the Soviet Union’s 1991 collapse, Ukraine set about building relations with the West, including with institutions such as NATO. In 1994, Ukraine became one of the first states to join the alliance’s Partnership for Peace. Three years later, Ukraine and NATO established a distinctive partnership.

From 2002 to 2008, Kyiv made bids to join NATO or secure a membership action plan, but each time fell short. In 2010, a new Ukrainian president had no interest in drawing his country closer to the alliance. However, government and public interest in NATO began growing in 2014 following the Maidan Revolution, Russia’s illegal seizure of Crimea, and Russia’s instigation of and direct involvement in the fighting in Donbas in eastern Ukraine. The February 2022 large-scale Russian assault locked in President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s desire to bring Ukraine into NATO.

At their July 2023 summit, NATO leaders expressed support for Ukraine’s ultimate membership, though they did not outline a concrete plan for achieving that, stating they would “extend an invitation to Ukraine to join the Alliance when Allies agree and conditions are met.” That language papered over serious differences, with many allies favoring an invitation to join, to which the United States and Germany were reluctant to agree. On the margins of the summit, G7 leaders committed to support Ukraine with arms and other assistance. That provides a sensible waystation, but a Ukraine that stands alone — even if armed by its Western partners — will prove a temptation for Russian aggression. That would mean less security and stability for Europe.

The United States has long defined a stable and secure Europe as a vital national interest, an objective naturally shared by NATO’s European members. It is increasingly apparent that this will not be possible absent a stable and secure Ukraine. The United States and the West have various options before them. They include the “Israeli model” (arming Ukraine to defend itself), individual security commitments (though apparently short of security guarantees that would entail sending their armed forces to Ukraine’s defense), security commitments by the European Union or another institution, and NATO membership. The first two options would leave Ukraine on its own. The third is difficult to see in the near term. An invitation to Ukraine to join now or at the NATO summit scheduled to take place in Washington in July 2024 seems a bridge too far.

Membership entails the protection of Article 5 of NATO’s founding treaty (“an armed attack against one or more” allies “shall be considered an attack against them all”). Were Ukraine at peace and in NATO, Russia’s consideration of renewing hostilities would face the Kremlin with a tough decision: going to war again against Ukraine would mean war with NATO. Were Ukraine to enter the alliance while still in conflict with Russia, the onus for the decision on going to war would lie with NATO members. They thus far have not been prepared to commit their forces to Ukraine’s defense, which is why some oppose offering an invitation to Kyiv to join. While there have been suggestions to modify Article 5’s application to accommodate Ukraine’s situation, those ideas threaten to dilute Article 5 and weaken the significance of NATO membership.

Accounting for these complexities and the desire to avoid a divisive argument over Ukraine in the run-up to the 2024 Washington summit, the United States and its allies should prepare the ground now so that next July they can announce accession talks with Ukraine. The goal of those talks, conducted in the NATO-Ukraine Council, would be to work toward a formal invitation for Ukraine to join at the earliest possible date. This would put Ukraine on a definitive path to membership, signaling NATO’s commitment to Ukraine to both Kyiv and Moscow. It would also enhance Kyiv’s bargaining position in any future negotiations with Moscow.

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apocalypticavolition · 9 months

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Let's (re)Read The Eye of the World! Chapters 52: There Is Neither Beginning Nor End & 53: The Wheel Turns

Spoiler alert: This is the end of the book, so if you haven't finished reading it yet, there's certainly spoilers ahead. I also went ahead and spoiled the rest of the series as a treat.

Chapter 52 has the trefoil leaves chapter icon, a symbol of how winter is over and spring has come at last, here on... May 9th. Yeah that's gonna cause some problems later.

Light. That should mean something. Thought was a new thing. I can think. I means me.

René Descartes doesn't really seem like a potential candidate for a past life of Rand in the same way that Yeshua of Nazareth (the subtext is screamingly obvious), Arthur Wellesley (no seriously, this one is canon, wait for it), or Volodymyr Zelenskyy (improbable leader with a blonde wife named Olena) are, but it's not impossible either and kind of funny! What better reason for headcanons?

With an effort he fumbled his sword from its scabbard. Only a few ashes remained from the red cloth.

This bodes poorly for Morgase - Rand might like a few members of the current world order and respect leaders who ascended lawfully and rule justly, but even they have to be replaced as a part of his embracing his destiny.

Egwene. He broke into a shambling run. Leaves and flower petals showered around him as he blundered through the undergrowth. Have to find her. Who is she?

If I was skilled enough, I could absolutely extract an essay about how these five sentences cover so much of the endgame of the series, but alas I am very rusty. Nonetheless, it's very significant that she is the first name that comes to mind as Rand recovers from his head trauma.

A pretty girl looked up with big eyes from where she knelt beneath the spreading branches, flowers in her hair, and brown oak leaves. She was slender and young, and frightened.

I can't tell if it's the head trauma or the denial he already had, but either way it's very impressive that Rand continuously acknowledges that all three of the women are deeply uncomfortable being around a man who just channeled at a scale unseen in millennia without ever processing why that might be.

In the Age of Legends, Aginor was close behind the Kinslayer and Ishamael in power.

In one of the deepest tragedies of the Breaking, while all the libraries were put to the torch, Buzzfeed's archives survived long enough for Aes Sedai to be able to study articles about Top 10 Channelers Who Might Kill Us All Without Noticing During This New and Horrifying War.

“The Dark One,” the Aes Sedai cut him off. Ill or not, her voice was firm, and her dark eyes commanding. “Best we still call him the Dark One. Or Ba’alzamon, at least.” He shrugged. “As you wish. But he’s dead. The Dark One’s dead. I killed him. I burned him with. . . .” The rest of memory flooded back then, leaving his mouth hanging open. The One Power. I wielded the One Power. No man can. . . .

Lews's fatal flaw of pride comes out most strongly when Rand is channeling or in its afterglow. Shepherd Rand would never have thought, if you'd asked, that anyone could channel enough power to kill the Dark One, even if it looked like it.

“I had suspicions from the first,” Moiraine said.

I dunno Moiraine, I really feel like you're choosing your words carefully to hide the fact that you were pretty up in the air about it the whole damn time.

He shivered. He felt so cold his fingers hurt. “If I never do it again, if I never touch it again, I won’t. . . .” He could not say it. Go mad. Turn the land and people around him to madness. Die, rotting while he still lived. “Perhaps,” Moiraine said.

I mean, she's choosing her words carefully everywhere else. In this case, "perhaps" means, "I can't literally say it's impossible because maybe somewhere in all of human history one person managed to resist channeling, but I so strongly believe it's impossible that I really want to say it anyway."

His throat constricted until he could hardly breathe. Will they turn their faces the way Egwene did? Will they scream and run away like I’m a Fade? Moiraine spoke as if she did not notice the blood draining from his face.

It says a lot about the friendships Rand has that absolutely none of this crew does abandon him. They're a bit distant, but it's Rand who really pushes the others away in the immediate future.

Moiraine continues to be a bad mentor here, ignoring Rand's obvious emotional distress to try and push him along the path of prophecy. For all that she really is one of the best Aes Sedai, the fact that in just a little bit she's going to be describing him as a tool to be used (and not explicitly denying Rand's metaphor of being thrown in the trash afterward) shows a lot of where her headspace is at. Rand needs to fulfill the prophecies, seal the Dark One, break as little of the world as possible along the way, and then bleed out so that the adults can take back over once the Last Battle is done. She isn't malicious in this perspective; she just has spent so long dedicating her whole self to the cause that she's forgotten that once upon a time she herself was just a young woman who didn't know what destiny had in store for her and what she'd be giving up to save the world.

“A tool made for a purpose is not demeaned by being used for that purpose,” Moiraine’s voice was as harsh as his own, “but a man who believes the Father of Lies demeans himself. You say you will not be used, and then you let the Dark One set your path like a hound sent after a rabbit by his master.”

And like, I don't blame her for being harsh here - like Rand, she's just had a hella traumatic experience after two straight months of misery and anyway her argument itself is quite sound - but she is the adult in the room and Rand's being given the worst news imaginable. Her refusal or inability to be kinder in this moment and try to deescalate is really the moment that Rand shifts from seeing Moiraine as a potentially untrustworthy individual who is nonetheless worth putting faith in to being the dangerous trickster figure who only wants to parade him around as her puppet.

“So you’re alive after all.” Mat laughed. His face darkened, and he jerked his head at Moiraine. “She wouldn’t let us look for you. Said we had to find out what the Eye was hiding. I’d have gone anyway, but Nynaeve and Egwene sided with her and almost threw me through the arch.”

Hell, let's look at these three paragraphs in a bit of detail: here's where Mat's testimony shows that Moiraine is manipulating the situation and separating him from his best friends (and that she's won over Nynaeve and Egwene in the process).

“You’re here, now,” Perrin said, “and not too badly beaten about, by the look of you.” His eyes did not glow, but the irises were all yellow, now. “That’s the important thing. You’re here, and we’re done with what we came for, Whatever it was. Moiraine Sedai says we’re done, and we can go. Home, Rand. The Light burn me, but I want to go home.”

Here's where Perrin confirms that Moiraine intends this separation to be permanent: the other two boys aren't channelers so she's willing to let them go if they want - and Rand has no reason to think they won't be leaving soon enough anyway.

“Good to see you alive, sheepherder,” Lan said gruffly. “I see you hung onto your sword. Maybe you’ll learn to use it, now.” Rand felt a sudden burst of affection for the Warder; Lan knew, but on the surface at least, nothing had changed. He thought that perhaps, for Lan, nothing had changed inside either.

Rand's out of allies. The girls are Aes Sedai to be, Mat and Perrin are seemingly out the door. So he imprints on the last human left to him, the dude who is allied with Moiraine but hasn't been relentlessly sketch about it and shown Rand some kindness along the way. Hell, he's even proven his relative humanity in the love Rand knows he has for Nynaeve but can't act upon.

(I'd include Loial's paragraph that comes next but it basically boils down to "If things get scarier, I'm out," which is of no comfort to Rand.)

“Cuendillar,” Moiraine said. “Heartstone. No one has been able to make it since the Age of Legends, and even then it was made only for the greatest purpose. Once made, nothing can break it. Not the One Power itself wielded by the greatest Aes Sedai who ever lived aided by the most powerful sa’angreal ever made. Any power directed against heartstone only makes it stronger.”

I really do wonder what it is that the Dark One managed to do to corrupt these things - and what mechanism will eventually be discovered to turn heartstone back into regular stuff for the next turning of the Wheel. Maybe they just always trade it all to the Finns and magical chemistry is different in such sideways places.

The flattened cube of gold and silver appeared to be solid, but the Aes Sedai’s fingers felt across the intricate work, pressing, and with a sudden click a top flung back as if on springs.

I suspect (as do others!) that the Horn of Valere had been kept in a stasis box. The Tower likely recovered a few over the millennia, letting Moiraine recognize this one and understand how to work out how to open it.

“I begin to wonder,” Moiraine said. “The Eye of the World was made against the greatest need the world would ever face, but was it made for the use to which . . . we . . . put it, or to guard these things? Quickly, the last, show it to me.”

It's both Moiraine. They knew Rand would need to use a lot of untainted saidin (even if they didn't know what for) and they knew that once he showed up he'd need the rest of the crap, so they put it all in the same place. Imagine if Rand had needed to go running around the world to find them all.

The whole thing seemed of a piece, neither woven, nor dyed, nor painted. A figure like a serpent, scaled in scarlet and gold, ran the entire length, but it had scaled legs, and feet with five long, golden claws on each, and a great head with a golden mane and eyes like the sun. The stirring of the banner made it seem to move, scales glittering like precious metals and gems, alive, and he almost thought he could hear it roar defiance.

I wonder if dragons were still remembered in LTT's era or if he just really liked weird biology.

Dead, brown leaves falling from the great oak. Dead leaves rustling thick on the ground in the breeze, brown mixed with petals dropped from thousands of flowers. The Green Man had held back the Blight, but already the Blight was killing what he had made.

But only because no one is taking action, but more on that next chapter.

Rand climbed into the bay’s saddle with a sense of loss. It shouldn’t be this way. Blood and ashes, we won!

We've moved into chapter 53. It has the wheel-and-serpent icon that I don't think we've seen since the Prologue, showing how we're moving into an especially epic part of history. And now we have Rand reflecting on a running theme of Jordan's, that absolutely none of the epic battles end in anything like happiness and that yes dammit losing could be even worse.

Before the oak, Loial knelt, closing his eyes and stretching out his arms. The tufts on his ears stood straight as he lifted his face to the sky. And he sang.

It's not battle that holds back the Blight, as necessary as it might be, but love.

He half expected they would have to fight their way out as they fought their way in, but the Blight was as quiet and still as death. Not a single branch trembled as if to lash at them, nothing screamed or howled, neither nearby nor in the distance. The Blight seemed to crouch, not to pounce, but as if it had been struck a great blow and waited for the next to fall. Even the sun was less red.

The Shadow's been dealt an absolutely humiliating defeat against a bunch of country bumpkins, it's frankly surprising that the entire kingdom of Malkier wasn't freed from the Blight after this - and even as is the ruins seem less forlorn. There's not much to quote for the next little bit because it's all the same: everything is better and everyone is happier for it.

Ingtar’s was the first face Rand saw that was not smiling.

Aww, is the Darkfriend who betrayed everyone he ever loved by giving into despair still sad? Poor baby.

Agelmar was in his study, with his swords and armor back on their racks, and his was the second face that did not smile.

Aww, is the Dar-- wait no that's not it. Agelmar is of course unable to smile because he knows what's coming: a powerful male channeler.

“A miracle,” Agelmar said, shaking his head, “but. . . . Moiraine Sedai, men say many things about what happened in the Gap. That the Light took on flesh and fought for us. That the Creator walked in the Gap to strike at the Shadow. But I saw a man, Moiraine Sedai. I saw a man, and what he did, cannot be, must not be.”

No miracles in this world; to quote Futurama:

(He told Bender so himself.)

Sadly for Agelmar, Rand can and he will and yes, he very much must.

“We won, Lord Agelmar. We won, and the land freed from winter is the proof, but I fear the last battle has not yet been fought.” Rand stirred, but the Aes Sedai gave him a sharp look and he stood still again.

Rand's interior Lews pride is so strong he'd be perfectly happy to out himself as the Dragon Reborn at the worst possible moment if it meant he could shout, "I killed Shai'tan!" at someone.

I did not show it to you to taunt you, but so that you will know that in whatever battles yet come, our might will be as great as that of the Shadow. Its place is not here. The Horn must be carried to Illian. It is there, if fresh battles threaten, that it must rally the forces of the Light.

In many ways, it feels like Illian only got so strongly associated with the Horn so that Moiraine could have a hyperfixation to be hilariously wrong about that wouldn't hinder Rand's actual development too much. The Wheel's a real jerk, you know?

“Good, sheepherder.” Leaning against the railing with his arms folded across his chest, the Warder watched him critically. “You are doing well, but don’t push so hard. You can’t become a blademaster in a few weeks.”

He'll do it in six months, three days - and four months, one week, and three days of that will be completely wasted. Unless maybe his Blademaster skills from those lives rubbed off on him in some sort of Everything Everywhere All at Once style training session.

“Somewhere. I don’t know.” He did not want to meet her eyes, but he could not stop looking at her. She wore fed wild-roses twined in her hair, flowing about her shoulders. She held her cloak close, dark blue and embroidered along the edge with a thin line of white flowers in the Shienaran fashion, and the blossoms made a line straight up to her face. They were no paler than her cheeks; her eyes seemed so large and dark. “Away.”

Egwene is showing her first real signs of one of her ultimate skills: being able to adapt to whatever culture she's visiting so long as they're not treating her worse than a slave. She did this a bit when they were leaving with Moiraine but that was clearly more youthful rebellion and now it's becoming something more.

Rand meanwhile thinks he's getting out of this town and he's just so wrong because he doesn't even want to leave his friends.

“Moiraine does not know I am alive. I have done what she wanted, and that’s an end to it. She doesn’t even speak to me when I go to her. Not that I’ve tried to stay close to her, but she’s avoided me. She won’t care if I go, and I don’t care if she does.”

Yeah, Moiraine's done a great job of torpedoing the relationship she could have had with Rand.

“And wait for some Aes Sedai besides Moiraine to find out what I am and gentle me?” His voice was rough, almost a sneer; he could not change it. “Is that what you want?” “No.” He knew he would never be able to tell her how grateful he was that she had not hesitated before answering.

Something the Egwene haters are blind to is that while she can be remarkably uncharitable towards Rand, she's still fiercely loyal in her own fashion. Rand being gentled is unspeakable in her eyes and the revelation her tests seem to show her that she will inevitably be forced to turn against Rand horrifies her to a degree beyond even Mat's own disgust at his own visions of betrayal. All the alt!Egwenes fail Rand but this one true Egwene only ends up opposing him in a way that saves the world and isn't an abandonment.

The faint blue glow faded from the stone, and a smile touched her lips. It had no power in itself, the stone, but the first use she had ever learned of the One Power, as a girl, in the Royal Palace in Cairhien, was using the stone to listen to people when they thought they were too far off to be overheard.

Moiraine, honey, please stop scheming. It's only making things worse for everyone including you.

“The Prophecies will be fulfilled,” the Aes Sedai whispered. “The Dragon is Reborn.”

This right here is for us the reader: Moiraine might be petty and underhanded in a lot of ways, but she isn't using Rand the way other Aes Sedai seem to have used the false Dragons. She genuinely believes that she's fulfilling the prophecies. We needed this reassurance - frankly Rand does too but he can't have nice things - so that when she gets increasingly sketch in this next book we still know to root for her.

And that's the end of book one! I say it still holds up and is one of the stronger fantasy novels out there - its ending is bizarrely esoteric but honestly it's just the final escalation of the dream sequences that run throughout the novel. Its focus on Rand is a little odd in light of the huge ensemble we end up getting, but honestly in the later novels we cross over to a point where I feel like there's way too many POV characters running around so having too tight a focus is better than the alternative in my book.

I'm gonna take a little break again, maybe do another novel in between, but rest assured I'll be hopping over to The Great Hunt and getting into that madness soon enough.

EDIT: Crap, I know I was forgetting something. @butterflydm Absolutely no references to channeling slowing aging exist in this text, so yes, that probably explains the oddities of Lews' family situation.

#let's read #wheel of time #wot #robert jordan #wheel of time spoilers #wot spoilers #rand al'thor #egwene al'vere #nynaeve al'meara #moiraine damodred #loial #lan mandragoran #mat cauthon #perrin aybara #ingtar shinowa #agelmar jagad

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tomorrowusa · 9 months

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You can tell how insecure Putin is. He apparently told his stooges on Kremlin-run media to stop calling Volodymyr Zelenskyy "president".

Of course you can still get into big trouble in Russia for calling Putin's illegal invasion a "war". Putin's 3-day special military operation is now into Day 574.

The Kremlin has instructed Russian state-run media outlets to stop referring to Volodymyr Zelensky as “president” of Ukraine, the independent news website Holod reported Monday, citing the recipients of the presidential administration’s directive. Television broadcasters and online publications are instead advised to use the phrase “the Zelensky regime” or call the Ukrainian president by name only, according to the instructions circulated last Friday. The instructions are currently limited to news headlines in order for Zelensky’s name to appear without his official status on Russian online news aggregators. Holod analyzed Russian news stories published since Friday and found partial compliance with the Kremlin’s directive.

FYI: The Moscow Times moved to Amsterdam in 2022. That's why they're still able to publish items like this.

Meanwhile, PRESIDENT Zelenskyy was at the United Nations in New York asking why Russia, a country which has violated the UN Charter, is still a UN member.

Zelensky urges unity in dramatic UN address

Hailed with vigorous applause when he took the stage, Zelensky used his 15 minutes to accuse Russian leaders of terrorism and genocide, citing in particular the removal of Ukrainian children from the country. Ukraine has long accused Russia of forcibly deporting Ukrainian children from occupied areas – allegations which form the basis of an international war crimes arrest warrant against Russian President Vladimir Putin. Some Russian officials have admitted the practice, publicly boasting about their efforts to bring children to Russia, place them in Russian families and, in some cases, give them Russian passports.

PRESIDENT Zelenskyy seemed to refer to the folks ignorant about Eastern Europe who preach "compromise" with Russia.

In a warning to other nations over “shady” cooperation with Russia, the Ukrainian president also invoked the death of Russian Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin last month. “I am aware of their attempts to make some shady dealings behind the scenes. Evil cannot be trusted. Ask Prigozhin if one bets on Putin’s promises,” he said.

Occasionally German Chancellor Olaf Scholz nas not always been enthusiastic about the conflict. But in his speech at the UN he seemed fully on board with the PRESIDENT of Ukraine.

Peace without justice is dictatorship, says Germany's Scholz

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz warned of "phony solutions" in the search for peace in Ukraine during his speech at the United Nations General Assembly. "For peace without freedom is called oppression. Peace without justice is called dictatorship. Moscow must finally understand that," Scholz said, calling on Russian President Vladimir Putin to end the war. Ukrainians were "fighting for their lives and their freedom for the independence and territorial integrity of their country, for the preservation of the very principles to which we all committed ourselves in the UN Charter," Scholz said. "And it is Russia's president who can end it (the war) at any time with a single order," he added.

Absolutely, Herr Bundeskanzler. Putin's Russia started this illegal genocidal war on its own and the only negotiations needed to end it is to arrange a ceasefire to allow Russia to withdraw promptly.

Of course Putin was not at the UN. He seldom ventures outside of Russia, except to his satellite Belarus, for fear of being arrested as a war criminal.

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the-jam-to-the-unicorn · 9 months

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https://reddit.com/r/ukraine/s/63fNoC4udD

Vova saying that with time he's getting older and Olena more beautiful 😭💔

That. Moment. 🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹

For anyone who can't watch the video - it's part of the YES conference. Vova says he is a total adequate person and when he looks into the mirror he sees himself getting older why Olena gets more beautiful.

#volodymyr zelenskyy is the definition of a green flag #he is the green flag #he is so green that it's part of his name #and people seriously accuse him of being a toxic male #ARE YOU KIDDING ME #be a vova and have a happy and long relationship #well happy wife happy life totally worked for the last 20 years #and thats everyone is how you keep the fire going and make sure youre still in love and the reason the had their 20th wedding anniversary #find yourself a vova

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zvaigzdelasas · 6 months

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A Ukrainian village councilor set off hand grenades at a meeting in an attack that was captured on video and left 26 people wounded, the country's national police said Friday.

A video posted by the police on Facebook showed a man dressed in black entering a council meeting during a heated discussion. The faces of the man and other people in the meeting are blurred in the clip.

A Ukrainian village councilor set off hand grenades at a meeting, wounding 26 people, national police said Friday, in an attack that was captured on video. The man then pulled three hand grenades from his pockets, released the safety pins and dropped them on the floor, triggering explosions as those in the meeting scream.[...]

Authorities did not name the man but the Ukrainska Pravda newspaper reported that he was identified as Serhiy Batryn, a parliamentarian who is a member of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's Servant of the People party.

15 Dec 23

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thezeinterviews · 11 months

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RBC-Ukraine: Olena Zelenska: We will feel the consequences of the war for another 5-7 years after the victory

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[Note: The following translation is a translation of the transcript of the interview, not the interview video itself. The transcript is an almost 1:1 transcript of the interview, just missing some interjections, unimportant additions, ... .]

Kyiv, Wednesday 28 June 2023

Author: Uliana Bezpalko

In an interview with RBC-Ukraine, First Lady Olena Zelenska spoke about her projects, the consequences of the war for Ukrainians' health, how she sees victory in the war, whether she believes in the Russian uprising, and her role in political processes.

Since the outbreak of full-scale war, Olena Zelenska has faced challenges that are atypical for a First Lady of any country in the world. During her visits abroad, she negotiates military aid and air defence systems instead of focusing exclusively on cultural and humanitarian projects.

Interlocutors in political circles say that few people are aware of Zelenska's real influence. They say that she somehow keeps her finger on the pulse of all domestic political events. The First Lady herself considers this more of a compliment and an exaggeration. She explains that she does not give any advice to Volodymyr Zelenskyy on state processes.

In a long interview with RBC-Ukraine, the First Lady told us what projects she is involved in, whether she sees her future in politics, and what she thinks about Ukraine's victory and a possible revolt in Russia.

- In addition to humanitarian issues, during your meetings in the international arena, you also raise the issue of supplying Ukraine with military equipment and weapons, which is not very typical for First Ladies and Gentlemen. Tell us, how do world leaders react to this? And perhaps you have some interesting cases that you can share in terms of arms negotiations?

- I'll start from the very beginning because it's really an atypical situation for any President's wife, any First Lady in the world, to be inside a country at war and continue to carry out her humanitarian work. Of course, you can't act as if it doesn't concern you.

Because I never talk about offensive weapons. I always talk about weapons only in the context of protecting Ukrainian civilians, protecting our children, mothers. Everyone I speak to is touched by this because it is sincere - I am not making anything up. And, of course, I always consult with our large diplomatic corps and the Presidential Office about what I can say, what I can ask for, and I carry out the tasks that Ukraine gives me. I can only speak on my own behalf.

In fact, all meetings are planned and expected. And there is almost never a topic that your interlocutor does not expect you to talk about. After I spoke in the US Congress and asked for air and missile defence equipment, I think that any of my interlocutors understood that I could address this topic and could talk about it. And I continue to do so.

In fact, I still have more contacts with Presidential wives and other First Ladies. But during every trip abroad, I have certain missions that I have to fulfil, and I meet a lot of people, including heads of state and government, foreign ministers, defence ministers, etc.

I remember my last trip to South Korea. I had a meeting with the President, and yes, there was a really long list of equipment, including military equipment, that we needed. I could not just list the names of weapons, military equipment, etc. So I handed the entire list, translated into Korean, to the President and described in words what I would like them to consider.

Interestingly, during his meeting with the President (of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy - ed.), he also referred to that list, checked it against the one provided by the President, and was satisfied that the lists matched. It turns out that we did such preparatory work with our delegation for the main talks between our Presidents.

But, in fact, there can almost never be any spontaneous things or surprises. Diplomacy, even soft power diplomacy, of which I am a part, perhaps in certain non-humanitarian areas, is a rigorously thought-out process that basically does not give many options for something to go wrong.

- During the large-scale war, Ukraine has become known around the world. Unfortunately, foreigners often associate Ukraine with devastation, with the war caused by Russian aggression. You have launched a cultural diplomacy project that opens Ukrainian bookshelves around the world. Could you tell us if this project is scalable? And perhaps you have data, do you observe whether the popularity of Ukrainian literature has been growing since 24 February?

- It seems to me that it is growing. And this is a growing interest not only in Ukrainian literature but in Ukraine as a whole, in our art and in our history. Because the world is getting to know Ukraine anew. Perhaps it is too late. Unfortunately, perhaps it is indeed too late. But we have to do everything now to give the world the opportunity to know more about us.

Literature is one of the ways. Because books tell everything about us: who we are, what we are, how we live, what we think, our history, culture, art - everything. Indeed, the project is expanding. We have managed to open 39 countries for ourselves for our bookshelves. There are 170 shelves in different libraries. And these are 44,000 books in Ukrainian, as well as in the language of the country where the shelf is located. This is exactly the kind of literature we want to be distributed there.

The bookshelves are not only for foreigners, they are also for Ukrainians who are now living abroad in large numbers. This is a way of coming home in a way, a way of returning, at least in their minds, to their homeland. I see a lot of interest in Ukraine. I can give you an example: recently, there was a large delegation of journalists from South America, including Brazil, Mexico, Chile, Argentina, and they really know very little about us. They were amazed by a lot of things they hadn't heard about us. And it opens up people's understanding of us.

So we will continue. I hope that the number of shelves will grow and more world libraries will join us, such as the London Library, which is one of our latest examples. I saw the eyes of the staff of this library when we showed them Ukrainian publications. It's really beautiful, it's interesting, they are impressed by the quality of Ukrainian publishing, the quality of our publishers, the quality of our writers, what great achievements we have in this area. It was a great pleasure to represent Ukraine from this side.

- Another initiative of yours within the framework of cultural diplomacy is the introduction of Ukrainian-language audio guides in museums and historical monuments around the world. Could you tell us how this idea came about? And do you have any data on how popular this service is?

- I remember exactly how the idea came to me. It was in Berlin. And it was on one of the bus routes that our embassy had introduced a Ukrainian-language audio guide. I thought to myself: how many examples of this have I seen around the world? Almost everywhere I went as a tourist, there were various options, and there was a lot of Russian, but almost nowhere was there Ukrainian.

I began to study this issue and found only a few examples. For example, the Ukrainian Institute has introduced only two, I think, audio guides in Poland. I came across this in Berlin. And I found almost nothing else. I realised that this is a really great opportunity for activity. Firstly, it is the promotion of Ukraine. Where there is the Ukrainian language, there is Ukraine. Where there is our flag in the list of language options, there is Ukraine.

You know, it's just like in the days of the gold rush in the United States: wherever you went, you put your flag, that's your land. We don't want to find land for ourselves - we have our own beautiful land, but we have to put a marker that Ukraine and Ukrainians are here. That's why, as we develop this project, I think it's a success. We already have 65 audio guides, 40 countries (at the time of publication, the project has 67 audio tours in 42 countries - ed.), leading museums, palaces, tourist routes - everything that is interesting to people in each country, we have to open to Ukrainians and those who speak Ukrainian.

Since the full-scale invasion, this has acquired another meaning besides tourism. This is really a helping hand from Ukraine to our displaced people who are now abroad. We have heard from diplomatic missions from different countries that our people want to get involved in art and the history of the countries they are in. And yes, it is better to do this in their native language. That's why it's in demand, and I hope there will be more of it in the future. In general, it seems to me that this is more about positioning Ukraine, that we need to expand our cultural influence, our presence in the world.

Note: As part of the project, Ukrainian-language audio guides are already available in the Colosseum (Italy), Versailles (France), Albertina Gallery and Schönbrunn Palace (Austria), Dolmabahçe Palace (Turkey), the Tower of London, and Charlottenburg Palace (Berlin), The Vasa Museum (Sweden), the National Museum of the Palace of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania (Lithuania), the Uluwatu Temple in Bali (Indonesia), the Qatar National Museum, on Hop-on Hop-off bus tours to Oslo (Norway), Athens and Piraeus, and in the cities of Vilnius, Lisbon, Porto, Sintra, etc.

- You also pay a lot of attention to the deportation of Ukrainian children and generally keep this issue under control. Do we have a chance to return Ukrainian children? And do we have any mechanisms for this at all?

- I am sure that we should not lose hope and do everything to make it happen. Because this is a really big tragedy for us, these are our children, and we have to get them back. According to our social services, Russia has taken 19,500 children. The Russians say the number is higher. For me, it's really a mystery why they are so focused on increasing what they have done wrong to us.

But in reality, it is very difficult to return (children - ed.). At the moment, Ukrainian ombudsmen and human rights activists have managed to return only 371 children. We understand that this is so little and how much work remains to be done. But this is such a delicate moment. These are not even territories or funds - these are small people who cannot make their own decisions. Therefore, the mechanisms must be very flexible and humane.

At the moment, these mechanisms have yet to be found because all that is happening now around this topic is the recording of offences by Russia. And there are many such records and mechanisms in this regard. For example, the OSCE special commission created the so-called "Moscow mechanism". They recorded all the crimes of taking our children. The UN Special Commission has also recorded numerous violations of children's rights during the war waged by Russia. At the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, which took place in May, they also recognised Russia's actions in Ukraine as genocide, which is a big step.

We all know that the International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant for Putin and Lvova-Belova. But, again, this is only a fixation and only a reaction. But the mechanisms are very complex, and we all have to create or find them together with our international partners. Because if the aggressor does not enter into any negotiations, if we cannot even get reliable information from them, then we cannot expect them to cooperate and give us our children back - unfortunately, we may not get that opportunity. I am sure that so many adults are working to get the children back that I think we must all work together to find such mechanisms. But, unfortunately, this path will not be easy and will not be quick.

- As far as I know, your daughter is a student.

- Yes, she is.

- What speciality has she chosen? Why, and was it her own choice?

- She chose law. To be honest, we had been talking about her future speciality for maybe five years, constantly returning to this topic. There were various options from her, some suggestions from us, we discussed all this, and we had such long discussions.

In fact, when the time came to choose, of course, we offered her something, she rejected something, but then she accepted something. This was one of the options we offered her. But she applied to several specialities, then had to choose one of them and chose law.

It seems to me that she chose well because I look at her - she likes it, and it "works" for her, as they say. She does it gently, without tension, and she's good at it. So I hope she will continue on this path. But we didn't put any pressure on her. Because I remember how I had almost no choice when I entered the university. And we wanted her to have the opportunity to spread her wings and make her own choice.

- Nowadays, many educational institutions and schools are forced to provide online education. How do you assess the quality of such education in Ukraine?

- There are many factors at play here. I would like to note that the quality of education in Ukraine is still high. We have something to compare it with. Nowadays, I hear a lot from my colleagues abroad, where our mothers and children have gone, about the quality of education of our children, how capable they are, how quickly they adapt and how great they learn.

Let us recall our experience of "Covid". Compared to other countries, we have also gone through this process with dignity. Our teachers have a high level of skills to teach online. So it's great that we have this experience, and we can use it now. Of course, this is a tool that we use when a child cannot physically go to school.

Of course, it is better when children go (to educational institutions - ed.), when children are socialised, when they see their teachers, their friends, when they can communicate. They lose a lot because of the lack of communication with their peers. We understand that there is digitalisation, and the number of hours that children spend at laptop and smartphone screens is also increasing due to their studies.

So there are a lot of negative influences. But we hope that we will gradually reduce the number of children studying exclusively online. We are currently working with the Ministry of Education and other NGOs on proposals to equip schools with the storage facilities that are necessary for children to return to them. I think that this summer, the Olena Zelenska Foundation will implement a project of shelters for schools as one of its projects.

- Your Foundation works in three areas: education, medicine and humanitarian aid. What else is in the focus of your Foundation now besides the shelter?

- Shelter is something we are really interested in. We are also trying to provide an opportunity to continue online learning in cases where it is impossible to go to school. Now the Foundation has found an opportunity to distribute more than 38,000 laptops for our teachers to continue working.

The project lasted several months, during which we received and delivered laptops to Ukrainian regions in batches. The project is now complete, and the Foundation has already started a series of new negotiations with several countries for new batches of gadgets. We hope that by the beginning of the new school year, we will be able to provide thousands more Ukrainian students and teachers with online learning tools.

Speaking about the healthcare sector, we have an ambitious project and are working to create an opportunity to rebuild the Izyum City Hospital. This is really a huge problem for the region. We know that Izyum was under occupation. And the hospital we are talking about served 150,000 local people before the full-scale invasion. There are still doctors there, but the hospital is dilapidated, with almost no medical equipment, in a terrible state.

In order to implement this project, we need a really large subsidy package. That is why the Foundation is now raising funds from foreign donors, philanthropists and organisations to rebuild this hospital. I hope that this year we will be able to start implementing this project.

As for the rest, we have always been interested in children, and in particular foster families and large foster families - the so-called family-type orphanages. We try to help them with various humanitarian aid and everything they need. And now, we are also working on an ambitious project of the Foundation - we are building the first ten houses for such families in different regions of Ukraine. This project has already been funded by our friends from the United Arab Emirates. The first ten houses will be built by the end of this year. We hope that these families will celebrate the New Year in their new homes.

The complexity of this project is that the house is really big because a family can raise up to ten children. The house has to be barrier-free, one-level, so that children with disabilities, who are also many in these families, can move freely. It must be energy-supplied, meaning that it is completely independent of external circumstances. There must be a shelter. That is why the project is really expensive, but we managed to find the funds for it, and the construction of the first houses will begin in July. We hope that everything goes well and we will continue to expand this project.

And by the way, other partners are interested in it. Our colleagues from Estonia have already come to us and want to join the project. We encourage other foundations, funds, and organisations to join us, with our help, and to help this movement, which should enable children to be brought up in families, in families, and not in boarding schools.

- I have also heard about another initiative of yours, which concerns family-type orphanages. Your Foundation organises holidays for these children's homes. How many family-type orphanages will you be able to send on holiday this year, and where are you planning to go?

- We have chosen the Carpathians. We have children from different regions. It is clear that we want to give the children peace of mind first and foremost. The first shift has already been completed, and our children from Kharkiv region have had a rest there.

We have arranged it in such a way that children come to the camp and communicate with their peers, have fun, etc. And their parents also have the opportunity to relax because foster parents don't really have an official holiday as such. And just imagine that when you are raising five, six, seven, ten children, you have to have a break at some point. That's why we made sure that our parents could also have a rest near the camp and with the younger children.

The next shift is about to start (at the time of the interview, the shift had already started - ed.) It mostly included children from the Kherson region. Unfortunately, the tragedy of the dam (Kakhovka hydroelectric power station - ed.) has caused a lot of disaster. We are also planning to send children from Dnipropetrovska and Zaporizka oblasts to this holiday. We are currently planning to send 1,200 children who are being brought up in family-type orphanages. This means about 150 such families.

- What do you think will be the long-term impact of a full-scale war on the mental health of Ukrainians? Sirens, constant shelling at night - how will this affect the mental health of Ukrainians who stay here and, in particular, the health of our children?

- You yourself have outlined the situation we are in. The whole world is now talking about how resilient Ukrainians are. But unfortunately, endurance also has its limits. According to the World Health Organization's research, for example, one in five Ukrainians will be at risk of developing mental health-related diseases in the coming years.

Indeed, we have to think about what will happen to us in the future. We will definitely survive everything, but unfortunately, the human psyche is designed in such a way that everyone experiences what happens to them differently. And our endurance is different. Therefore, the consequences can be too severe for our economy and for our healthcare sector.

Also, according to the World Health Organisation and many other studies, if there is an increase in mental health problems, it can affect the overall level of the economy and reduce GDP by three to five per cent per year. We know that we have to recover. And such losses for the economy will be very difficult. Among other things, we have to think about how we care about each other, how we take care of each other. And resilience is also about how we stay together. That is why the All-Ukrainian Mental Health Programme, which I initiated last year, is designed to help us anticipate and reduce the risks that we may face in the future.

Children are one of the categories of Ukrainians who also feel, and sometimes even more so, what is happening to us. Fortunately, experts say that children and children's psyche can recover faster than adults. But this does not mean that we should not pay more attention to them than we do to adults now.

That is why we are developing pilot projects to rehabilitate children who have suffered psychological trauma from the actions of the aggressor. Among other things, we have to catch up with what our children did not receive in previous periods in various ways. For example, this is knowledge about their own states, their emotions, and how to manage them. Accordingly, the Ministry of Education has a programme that they will implement. I hope that in September, they will be able to start implementing it in schools. We need to review the system of school psychologists, which is currently ineffective, and there are not enough of them. Psychologists must fulfil their function, not just be a school employee.

It is generally said that we will feel the effects of the war for another 5-7 years after the victory. Of course, during this time, some children will grow up and become adults, who ideally should not carry trauma with them all their lives. I believe in post-traumatic growth, and we are putting a lot of effort into this as well. But for this growth to take place, we need to take the necessary steps at all levels now - not only at the state level but, very importantly, at the community level. And to do this, we must also strengthen and improve the knowledge of Ukrainians about health.

There is a stigma attached to this topic in Ukrainian society. And the communication campaign of the All-Ukrainian Mental Health Programme, called "How are you?" is aimed at overcoming this stigma, overcoming ignorance about yourself and your psyche. I would like to note right away that we, Ukrainians, are not unique in this. Most countries that have been paying attention to mental health and the diversity of mental health services in recent years have faced this problem.

People don't admit to themselves that they need to take care of it, they need to think about it, and they don't know that mental health is just a part of overall health, without it, there will be no physical health. I don't want to scare people with the consequences of "not doing anything", as they say, but we hope that the fact that we are already starting to move so actively will give us the opportunity to get less consequences than they could have.

- Talking to people here in Ukraine, many of them are facing depression, apathy, stress. It seems to me that we have been living in a state of constant stress for over a year now.

- It is true.

- And I see that there really is a problem - the further we go, the more people become pessimistic and give up. Tell me, where do you find the strength to keep going?

- I can't say for sure, I guess. But I know for sure that work helps to keep me going. Because when you get up in the morning and know that you have a lot to do, it stimulates you. The fact that I have the opportunity to talk about Ukraine and Ukrainians outside helps me to keep going. I think it's important, and I try to speak to anyone who can hear. I really hope that my voice adds value. I am really inspired by those around me. I've already mentioned the endurance and resilience of Ukrainians - it's inspiring. When you see such examples around you, you can't keep up. You have to somehow be on a par with our people.

- Is there anything that helps you switch?

- I understand that I need to do something sometimes - I won't say sports, but at least some kind of physical training - it helps me to really switch to some other activity for an hour and keep my focus. Recently, I have found a new activity for myself - I went back to study.

- Why?

- This is a field that touches every person. I won't go into details now. But it's interesting to me that it's a different kind of socialisation, it's other people I meet and spend some time with. It's a huge amount of information that is new to me and work that I haven't done in this way for a long time. And that's why it also helps me. I've always been a fan of the theory that the best rest is a change of activity. That's why I try to change my activities from time to time in order not to stand still.

- Now, since the beginning of the full-scale war, the issue of barrier-free accessibility is becoming even more important. Tell us more about your initiative to create a barrier-free space.

- Barrier-free is a broader issue than such spaces. I believe that this is really a philosophy of barrier-free access. But now this topic is becoming more relevant than ever because we understand that even if we take physical barrier-free access, unfortunately, there are more and more people who will need it.

That is why I think that one of the main issues now is to keep barrier-free accessibility in focus during our recovery and reconstruction. We should not rebuild the way it was. We have to rebuild in a way that is useful and universal for all people, including those who have been affected by this war.

We will have more people in wheelchairs. We will have more people with amputations and prostheses. We will have more people with visual and hearing impairments. Therefore, we need to lay the foundation for the future now, we have to think about it. And it is really important if we can convey these messages to the regional authorities. After all, decisions are made at the state level, but they are implemented at the community level. Every community has to take care of its people. They are different. That is why we cannot turn a blind eye to the fact that someone cannot move around the city, someone cannot get into the city council building, or in the village, a person with a disability cannot leave the house at all. If we want to recover, we have to recover in the right way.

On the other hand, there are many initiatives within the Programme in different areas, all aimed at making us feel less dependent on our circumstances. And there are a lot of such point projects. I hope that they will all be implemented so that we can change gradually, but we cannot go backwards in terms of taking care of all people, regardless of their capabilities.

- After the war is over, when hundreds of thousands of our military return from the front, we will need to work with them, not only in terms of physical recovery but also in terms of mental recovery and employment. Will the state pay due attention to our military after the war is over? And do you have any initiatives in this area under development?

- I can tell you about what I know is already in development. Just recently, we met with representatives of the Ministry of Veterans Affairs, including Yulia Laputina, the Minister. I know that they have projects that will take care of our demobilised soldiers - this is their area of responsibility. Indeed, everyone should have opportunities to resume socialisation. They have projects on rehabilitation, including psychological rehabilitation.

They work with work teams to accept members of these teams who have been at war and returned, perhaps injured or disabled - how to accept them, how to arrange their jobs, how to prepare the team to communicate properly with their employees.

I know that the Ministry of Economy has a project on business for the military and veterans. The Ministry of Youth and Sports also has its own projects on physical activity and physical education for veterans. Each of the departments has priority and pilot projects in development, and let's hope that they will all be implemented. I am sure, as you are, that our soldiers who are now defending our lives deserve to return to peaceful life and to be waited for, to be respected and to have the proper conditions to continue this peaceful life.

- As far as I understand, you receive proposals and requests from international business from foreign philanthropists who would like to help Ukraine in the humanitarian sphere. One example of such cooperation is the creation of a kitchen factory in Bucha with the support of Howard Buffett. Was it his initiative, or was it your idea and he was approached? What was his motivation for participating in this project?

- I'll probably start by telling you who Howard Buffett is. I don't know how it happened, but he is in love with Ukraine. And we are lucky to have such a person as a true supporter of ours, and he just has a fierce desire to help. When we met in Kyiv last year, he had already met with the President and had several humanitarian projects in development. As far as I know, his focus is on humanitarian demining and so on. And he wanted to meet with me because he knew that we had many different ideas. It was his idea to meet. Then we encouraged him to consider our ideas.

We brought him the factory kitchen as an idea, as a project. This is a really interesting option for organising catering for schoolchildren and not only - perhaps for kindergartens and public institutions in general. One factory kitchen, for example, the one in Bucha, will produce 10,000 hot meals a day and can satisfy three surrounding communities.

We presented this project to him. He said that he hadn't thought about it yet, but would think about it. We managed to persuade him, and he is now a very passionate supporter of this project. This project is developing. We already have an agreement with him to build a similar kitchen factory in Lozova, Kharkiv region. This is where we already have his agreement to finance this project. Subsequently, the design stage begins.

I hope that when we have a ready-made, working kitchen factory in Bucha, it will be easier to distribute, and we will have something to show to other investors and our regions. I know that there is a desire to build such enterprises in Lviv, Zaporizhzhia, Odesa, Ternopil regions and Volyn. We are now looking for investors - perhaps not only Mr Howard, perhaps someone else - to finance these projects. Because it is clear that communities will not always be able to implement this on their own.

But it's a great idea, and I think it will work. It saves resources, it saves time, it means trained employees, it means really good standards, which are also much easier to control. Hopefully, the idea will spread. And with Mr Howard, we also have a collaboration on the Superhumans clinic in the Lviv region. This is a rehabilitation and prosthetics clinic for Ukrainians. He has also made a great contribution to making this project a reality. I hope there are more projects ahead - with him and others.

- Are there any other businessmen and philanthropists who are keen to help?

- I can say that, for example, the activities of the Olena Zelenska Foundation are focused on foreign aid for Ukrainians. We cooperate only with foreign patrons, businesses, foundations, etc. We have a great friend of Ukraine, Mr Temerty from Canada, who has already made a fairly large contribution. But he had a specific purpose - he wanted purely humanitarian aid and for one region only. We fulfilled his request, and the humanitarian aid was delivered. It was at a time when there were massive power cuts when people needed generators, everything that provides heat, light, etc. That's why this aid package from him consisted of just such things.

Another example is Mr Andrew Forrest from Australia. I met him in Davos during the World Economic Forum. I shared the Foundation's projects, and now the Foundation is at the stage of agreeing on the details of potential cooperation with his The Minderoo Foundation.

We have contacts among French businesses. There are also people there who are particularly interested in the Izyum hospital. But we will look for more. Because the Izyum Hospital requires large investments. These people are not enough for us. We have made friends, so to speak, with the United Arab Emirates. After all, as I said, ten houses is a large amount of money. They gave it to us in one tranche. It was a really powerful help. But I can say that during each visit, I try to include this component and look for opportunities to meet or continue to meet people who are interested in helping Ukraine.

- Earlier, you initiated the First Ladies and Gentlemen Summit. Can you tell us whether it will be held this year? And if so, will it be held in Ukraine or abroad, and what will be the topic?

- Yes, this year, we are planning to hold the third First Ladies and Gentlemen Summit, and we definitely want to hold it in Ukraine. We have already secured this leadership and do not want to lose it. We hope that it will be held in autumn. We are already inviting experts, First Ladies, Gentlemen, and everyone who can participate.

The theme of the summit will be mental health. This is a topic that concerns not only Ukraine but the whole world. It is a common issue for everyone. But Ukraine really needs to become a leader in this aspect as well because we are now a testing ground for new solutions. No other country has such experience as we do. And I think we will have separate panels on the mental health of adolescents and young people. These are the people who will make decisions in 2-3 years. And this is a really interesting audience that should have the opportunity to speak out, and we should give them that opportunity.

- How do you see Ukraine's victory in this war because it would seem that the answer is very obvious? But looking through the pages of foreign media, statements by foreign leaders, we can see that some in the West interpret the word "victory" to mean not letting Russia win. Some hint that it could be a return to the borders of 23 February. What is victory for you?

- I have to say that this is my opinion: I am sure that it is, first of all, the return of all our territories from '91. Secondly, it is the return of all our people: prisoners, prisoners of war, our children, people who left. We really want our internally displaced people to return, those who want to return, and we really want more of them. We need people in Ukraine.

And the third component is justice. Without the establishment of the International Tribunal, without the work of the International Criminal Court, so that everyone who gave orders and who carried them out receives not only a sentence but also punishment, I will not feel victorious. But I am confident that we will be able to do all this.

- Why do you think Russians do not protest, do not rebel against the war, against their regime? Because there are also many losses and deaths there. There are Russian mothers, Russian women losing their sons and husbands, and we see nothing - zero reaction.

- We don't see anything because, apparently, very little is happening. But I think that there is really fear and powerlessness there. We were also talking about this the other day with my colleagues why this is so. We live in an open society, it's not the 17th year of the last century when you can't get information. Yes, their television is biased, but they have the Internet. Why aren't people interested? Most of them are probably afraid to find out the terrible truth about themselves. Because then you have to tell yourself that you are also a monster, you supported it. But all this is still no excuse for fear and powerlessness. I hear a lot of talk about how soon they will rise up, something will happen soon. I would not hope for that.

- This is just my guess. Probably, if someone does rise up, it will not be ordinary people, but only some elite who will be dissatisfied and only because of some material motives, not because of the loss of people and so on.

- I agree with you.

- Since Volodymyr Zelenskyy became President, your field of activity has also changed. Are you satisfied with your status and role? And if you were given a chance to go back in time to your previous activities, what would you choose?

- Yes, I really did not choose my current status and role. But I can say that I have accepted it, I am following this path and trying to be useful and effective. I don't think about what could have happened if this hadn't happened. I try not to look at the past - it's useless, it distracts from the future. I haven't thought about it.

- From people who know you, I have heard this assessment, this opinion that your influence on state processes is much bigger than that of a First Lady in Ukraine or in any other country in the world and that you are almost the main adviser to your husband. How often do you advise Volodymyr Zelenskyy? What issues do you advise him on, or does he seek your advice?

- I think this is an exaggeration. Someone really wanted to pay me a compliment, I guess. But I definitely do not influence state processes - one hundred per cent. I can initiate some things, I can support them, but this applies only to the humanitarian and social spheres, etc. As President Volodymyr Zelenskyy does not consult me. And I think it's right. Firstly, I could not give him expert advice, there is a huge gap between us in the knowledge that he has now and that I could add to him. And it would be unethical.

I think he has such a big responsibility. A wife cannot advise her husband in matters of public administration. It's not right. We don't even talk to him about such topics. Yes, we discuss something. As part of the discussion, we can discuss issues that concern all Ukrainians, we have many controversial issues in society that we can argue about, we can agree on. But this does not mean that what we say to each other will then become a decision or influence his opinion when making decisions.

- Do you envisage your participation in politics in the future in a capacity other than First Lady?

- No, I don't want to. This is not my area. For some reason, I have been asked this question a lot lately. Someone came up with this idea - I don't know who. But I don't want it, I don't aspire to it. So it will never happen.

- Share your most exciting event, event meeting from 24 February 2022.

- I remember that I didn't know what to expect, and I was worried before meeting my husband, after the first period when we were separated for a month or a month and a half when I had to leave Kyiv, and he stayed here. When I came back, to be honest, I was worried. I had only seen on TV how he was growing a beard and what had happened to him, what he had become, and I was a little worried. Fortunately, nothing extreme happened, but at first, I had a feeling that there was a possibility that we might not meet at all. This is always a possibility during a war. And finally, we met. There was a moment - I won't say it was too emotional. We don't have emotional scenes, tears or anything like that in our family. But I did feel excited.

A very emotional event was the speech in the US Congress when I spoke about weapons for the first time. It was really so responsible that I was very nervous. This is not typical for me, not typical for the role of the First Lady in general. I understood that if I was invited to the Congress, they were giving me carte blanche. But I had to get into the hearts of these people. And I really hope that I did. I was lucky that I spoke (and I always do) from the heart, what I really think, and tried to find the right words for it.

But it was really emotionally difficult because I was also talking about things that were difficult for me. And I gave examples that touched me personally. In particular, the girl Lisa from Vinnytsia who died, whom I personally knew. And this emotional intensity really brought tears to my eyes at some point. I calmed down my state, but it was sensitive, it was difficult.

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