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Negotiations Russia "does not reject" negotiations with Ukraine, but there are some "delays that complicate the process" of negotiations. This was said by Foreign Minister Serghei Lavrov quoted by Tass. In an interview with Rossiya-1 television, Lavrov reported that Vladimir Putin convened a meeting with the Duma, the lower house of parliament, and leaders of the different factions. "The president told the participants that we do not reject negotiations," Lavrov stressed, but he accused the Ukrainians of delaying the process of negotiations. Kiev, Putin said again according to Lavrov's account, "should understand that the longer it delays the process, the...

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday that Russia had not lost anything as a result of its military campaign in Ukraine. Speaking at an economic forum in the far eastern Russian city of Vladivostok, he said all Russia's actions were designed to strengthen the country's sovereignty and were aimed at "helping people" living in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine. "We have not lost anything and will not lose anything," Putin said. "In terms of what we have gained, I can say that the main gain has been the strengthening of our sovereignty." Putin conceded, however, that Moscow's decision...

On episode 3 of the show we are joined by Alexander Khodakovsky, commander of the Donetsk People's Republic's «Vostok» Battalion. Former commander of Ukraine's Alpha special unit of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU).

It was supposed to be the bright spot in a grim day. Of a dozen unclaimed bodies set for burial recently at Bucha City Cemetery, one had just been identified. The dead man’s family was present and would be able to bury him with full ceremony. His grave would be marked with his name instead of just a number. But there was a hitch. No one could find the body. (snip)When Russian troops retreated at the end of March from the region around Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, they left behind a trail of more than 1,200 bodies. At least 458 dead...

Vladimir Putin has approved a 31-page "humanitarian policy" which says Russia should "protect, safeguard and advance the traditions and ideals of the Russian World". The foreign policy concept of a "Russian World" is a notion that hardliners have used to justify intervening abroad to support Russian speakers, such as in parts of Ukraine. It means that the idea is now enshrined in official policy, though it was presented as a soft power strategy. The new policy stated that Moscow should further deepen its ties with the self-styled Donetsk People's Republic and the Luhansk People's Republic - two breakaway entities in...

Mansur was 13 when Russian soldiers destroyed his village of Samashki during Chechnya's first war for independence against Russia. Wielding flamethrowers, the Russians burned Mansur's neighbors alive in their homes, threw grenades into basements and executed men. Four years later, a truce disintegrated, and Mansur was back at war. He says he was never the same after. "Russia ruined everything I had. I grew up with war, and the war shaped me in all respects," Mansur, 40, says matter-of-factly. Mansur is one of more than 200,000 Chechens who fled to Turkey and Europe throughout the 2000s during a second war...

The UK is significantly expanding a training programme in Britain to turn potentially tens of thousands of Ukrainian recruits into frontline soldiers to fight Russia, Sky News has learnt. The combat course is being extended in length to five weeks from three weeks, keeping more of the training in the UK, away from the threat of Russian missile strikes - a hazard for anyone learning how to become a soldier at sites inside Ukraine, it is understood. Some 4,700 personnel have already been through the training at military bases in the north, southwest and southeast of England since it began...

The Biden administration is arming Ukraine with weapons that can do serious damage to Russian forces, and, unlike early in the war, U.S. officials don’t appear worried about Moscow’s reaction. In the past several months, Washington has detailed tranches of new drones, harder-hitting missiles and deadly rocket systems as part of billions of dollars pledged to the former Soviet country. The clear support is a far cry from the early days of the war, when the U.S. government seemed hesitant to list exactly what was being sent into Ukraine so as not to tip off or draw the ire of...

Kiev's silence about the outcome of its much-anticipated counter offensive is raising questions whether President Volodymyr Zelensky and his team have overplayed their hand in trying to take on entrenched Russian forces too early. Especially with some unverified reports on social media suggesting the Ukrainians have taken heavy losses.

Russia won’t immediately resume exports of natural gas to Europe through its Nord Stream 1 pipeline, worsening a shortage that threatens to tip the continent into an energy crisis this winter. On Friday, Russian state energy giant Gazprom said it would not resume flows through the pipeline on Saturday as planned because it had detected an oil leak at its Portovaya compressor station. The pipeline has been shut since Wednesday for maintenance. It didn’t give a timeline of when exports might resume.

President Joe Biden wants to spend $13.7 billion more in aid to Ukraine as his massive slush fund already approved by Congress earlier this year is running dry. Biden’s request to Congress is part of an overall $47.1 billion emergency spending package of more funds to fight the coronavirus and monkeypox, according to the Associated Press, citing anonymous sources.

He wrote a book describing a Russian military so ill-prepared when it invaded Ukraine that he didn’t know his unit had entered the country until he awoke to the sound of artillery fire. Pavel Filatiev, a former Russian soldier, arrived in France on Sunday, after writing a tell-all book detailing his time in Ukraine as a paratrooper in the Russian army. Now 34-year-old Pavel Filatiev, who says he was a paratrooper in Russia’s military, is seeking political asylum in France after arriving there last weekend. He has been greeted as a hero by some in the West, his book embraced...

"Demilitarization" continues: OK " Yug " told about the situation in Kherson region Ukrainian soldiers in the Kherson region continue to inflict losses on the Russian invaders. On August 31, the Armed Forces of Ukraine again hit the Antonovsky automobile and Antonovsky railway bridges in Kherson and launched targeted strikes on several locations of the Russian invaders. Video of the day Advertisement: 0:09 The day is not over yet, but the elimination of at least 65 Russian invaders has already been confirmed. This was stated by the speaker of the Operational Command "south" Colonel Vladislav Nazarov. As of 14: 50,...

When Viktor Zolotov, director of the Russian National Guard, briefed his boss, President Vladimir Putin, on Tuesday on the status of military operations in Ukraine, one remark in particular stood out. “I especially want to emphasize that we feel the support of the population in the liberated territories,” Zolotov told a stone-faced Putin. In reality, Russia has been struggling to rally the support of its own troops, according to internal government documents obtained exclusively by Yahoo News that detail drunken acts of insubordination six months into Putin’s invasion. The documents include an incident and homicide report by the Russian Investigative...

According to Yanushevich, Ukrainian strikes have completely decommissioned almost all the major bridges in the region - Antonivskyi (road and railway), as well as the Nova Kakhovka Dam Bridge. “As a result of these actions, the Russian army was cut off from the supply of weapons and personnel from the territory of Crimea and the left-bank part of Kherson Oblast,” Yanushevich explained. He also confirmed that the Armed Forces of Ukraine have launched an offensive in all directions in southern Ukraine, but added that the authorities can only provide official information from the military. “We must remain calm and not...

The Biden administration announced that Ukraine would receive $3 billion in military assistance — the largest amount it has sent since Russia began its invasion in February. The Department of Defense said that it was meeting both Ukraine’s “immediate and longer-term security assistance needs.” Among the 245,000 rounds of artillery ammunition and the laser-guided rocket systems listed in the Pentagon’s security assistance for Ukraine under the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative (USAI) were the VAMPIRE Counter-Unmanned Aerial Systems. VAMPIRE is an acronym for “Vehicle-Agnostic Modular Palletized ISR Rocket Equipment.” In short, the system transforms pickup trucks and other vehicles into mobile...

Ukraine’s counteroffensive in the south of the country continues to gather pace with its forces again striking bridges leading to the occupied city of Kherson in a bid to choke off supply routes for Russia’s forces there. In other news, an International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) convoy is believed to have left the Ukrainian capital on a mission to the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in southeastern Ukraine on Wednesday morning. Europe’s largest nuclear power station has become a fighting ground for the conflict, with both sides blaming each other for attacks on and around the complex. Fighting around the...

The U.S. State Department said the Kremlin is preparing to hold "sham" referenda to annex Russia-controlled areas of Ukraine, warning that Moscow will employ propaganda and disinformation campaigns, falsify voter turnout and exaggerate the percentage of Ukrainians who want to join Russia to conduct its illegal land grab. The United States has previously warned that Moscow was moving forward to hold elections to disguise its annexation of Ukrainian regions, but State Department Principal Deputy spokesman Vedant Patel told reporters for first time Tuesday that the effort was being overseen by Sergey Kiriyenko, the first deputy head of Russia's presidential administration....

At the outset of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, most experts expected that Kyiv would fall quickly. Ukrainian forces were fighting against a military that was bigger and better armed. Russia’s troops had more combat experience and funding. The question was not if Moscow’s forces would depose the Ukrainian government but when regime change would happen. Of course, Kyiv didn’t fall. Instead, the Ukrainian military stopped Russia’s assault on the capital and forced a retreat. Russia downsized its initial mission from wholesale conquest, and the war now mostly consists of grinding offensives and counteroffensives in Ukraine’s east and south. The question...

Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu is being 'side-lined' by Vladimir Putin and is constantly mocked by his own soldiers, the British ministry of defence has revealed. In its daily briefing, the MoD said the veteran politician who has held the defence post for 10 years is no longer the confidant and ally he previously was to the leader. Russia's failures in Ukraine after sustaining huge losses to personnel and equipment without making major inroads into the country have led to his ousting from Putin's inner circle. The head of the Russian military is no longer briefing Putin directly, with the...