Russian Digest

Ukrainian soldiers on Independence Day: ‘We, our families, future still in danger’

As Ukrainians celebrate their country’s 32nd Independence Day on Aug. 24, they are also marking exactly 18 months since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion.

Many understand that the celebration is only possible thanks to the country’s defenders who fight and sacrifice their lives every day on the battlefield.

The Kyiv Independent asked Ukrainian soldiers currently on the front lines of Russia’s war what this Independence Day means to them if they plan to celebrate, and what they think Ukraine and the world should think about on this occasion.

We identify the soldiers by their first name or first name and callsign only due to security concerns.

Mykhailo artilleryman, 23rd Special Battalion, 1st Presidential Brigade

“First and foremost, this is not a holiday where you need to go out and have fun as there is a war going on. This is a day when every citizen should think seriously about the price of independence.

For me, (being able to celebrate) Independence Day is proof of how strong our people are to be able to stand up to such an enemy. But not everyone understands what the soldiers are going through (on the front lines) for the sake of victory.

Everyone should remember those who laid down their lives so that people can feel safe somewhere in the rear (and should) thank those soldiers who have been injured, or who have lost their limbs and are now forced to wear prostheses, or have lost the ability to move without assistance.”

Prigozhin most likely dead, and an explosion may have downed his plane, U.S. officials say

Wagner Group leader Yevgeniy Prigozhin was “likely” killed in a plane crash Wednesday, according to an initial U.S. assessment, Brig. Gen. Patrick S. Ryder, the Pentagon spokesman, told reporters at a news conference. U.S. intelligence officials are considering the possibility that the plane crashed after an explosion aboard, according to U.S. officials familiar with the preliminary assessment.

Here’s what to know

There is no indication thus far that the jet was downed by a missile, according to three U.S. officials, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a preliminary assessment. An explosion was detected along the path of the plane, but there are no signs of a missile launch, two officials said.
In Russian President Vladimir Putin’s first remarks on the plane crash in the Tver region of Russia on Wednesday, he appeared to eulogize Prigozhin, but stopped short of confirming his death. He promised a full investigation, saying it would take “some time.” He said he had known Prigozhin, an ally-turned-rival who led a short-lived mutiny against the Kremlin in June, since the 1990s, calling him a “talented person” who “made serious mistakes.”
The Embraer business jet, which listed the mercenary group chief among its passengers, crashed northwest of Moscow, killing all 10 on board, according to Russia’s civil aviation agency. On Thursday morning, pieces of the jet — including what appeared to be its tail — lay more than a mile from the primary crash site.
Seven passengers and three crew members were onboard the plane traveling from Moscow’s Sheremetyevo International Airport to St. Petersburg. The passenger list included Prigozhin and his second-in-command, Dmitry Utkin, Russian aviation authorities said.
Read More:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/08/24/prigozhin-plane-crash-wagner-russia-live-updates/

Businessman arrested in Germany for supplying weapons to Russia

German law enforcement authorities have detained businessman Ulli Z. on suspicion of selling sniper rifle mounts to Russia in circumvention of sanctions, according to the German prosecutor's office.

According to investigators, as the head of a machine tool company from Baden-Württemberg, the businessman supplied components to a Russian arms manufacturer through third countries using companies in Switzerland and Lithuania.

He signed a contract for 2 million euros back in 2015, that is, during the sanctions for the annexation of Crimea. Restrictions introduced in 2014 prohibit the supply of both weapons and dual-use goods. Then the company Ulli Z. held training in Russia on how to work on these machines. He also bought €22,000 worth of sniper rifles from his partner for testing purposes. At the same time, the entrepreneur forged the date of the agreement in order to overcome the arms embargo.

On August 10 of this year, Willy Z. was detained in France and taken to Germany. German law enforcement agencies met him at Frankfurt am Main airport. The court authorized the arrest of the businessman. The names of the companies belonging to him are not disclosed.

In May, The Insider identified 25 European companies that continue to supply the Russian military with missile chips, cartridge cases, fuses, body armor, warship engines, and other military products. Among others, the list included the German Vansped Logistics, which, on behalf of Reißaus & Baumberg Maschinenbau GmbH, supplied technological equipment for foundry production to the Moscow enterprise Stan LLC (part of Rostec).

According to the public procurement analysis database, Stan LLC concluded 125 contracts for a total amount of more than 14 billion rubles. Among its customers were PJSC "ODK-Kuznetsov", which produces engines for the Tu-160M strategic missile carriers, and JSC "Scientific and Production Corporation "Uralvagonzavod" - the only developer and manufacturer of tanks in Russia.

Among other "assistants" of Russia are companies from France, Switzerland, Hungary, Austria, Italy, Slovakia, Lithuania, Estonia and Poland.

https://www.moscowtimes.ru/2023/08/24/zimbabve-poprosilos-v-briks-a52944

Military intelligence reports successful raid inside Crimea

As Ukraine celebrated its Independence Day, Ukrainian forces landed in Russian-occupied Crimea and raised the Ukrainian flag near the coast, Military Intelligence said on Aug. 24.

Ukraine's Military Intelligence reported that a special watercraft landed on the Crimean coast at the beach near Maiak, a village on the northwestern tip of Crimea, and engaged in combat.

Maiak is located less than five kilometers from Olenivka, where Ukraine destroyed a Russian air defense system the day before.

Intelligence spokesman Andriy Yusov said Ukrainian forces had already returned from Crimea without suffering any losses.

He couldn't specify the details of the operation but said it "had the characteristics of a raid."

Krym.Realii, a Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty news outlet about Crimea, reported explosions near Maiak at 5 a.m. Russian radar base and radio engineering troops are located in the area.

Earlier in August, reports emerged about a Ukrainian raid across the Dnipro River into occupied parts of Kherson Oblast.

The Kyiv Independent's source in Ukraine's Armed Forces confirmed on Aug. 9 that Ukraine had successfully conducted a raid deep into Russian-occupied territory on the east bank.

The source also said that Ukraine's military had taken 16 Russian soldiers as prisoners of war and brought them back to the west bank of the river, controlled by Ukrainian forces.

https://kyivindependent.com/ukraine-war-latest-military-intelligence-reports-raid-into-occupied-crimea-putin-confirms-prigozhin-is-dead/

US Sanctions Russians Involved in Abduction, Deportation of Ukrainian Children

The United States announced new sanctions Thursday against several Russian entities and individuals for their roles in the abduction and deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia and for human rights abuses against minors in Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.

“Children are literally being ripped from their homes. In the year 2023. By a country sitting in this very chamber. By a permanent member of this council,” Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield said at a meeting of the U.N. Security Council. “This is straight out of a dystopian novel. But this is not fiction. Colleagues, this is not fiction. This is real life.”

She said the human rights violations are being orchestrated at all levels of the Russian government and noted that the International Criminal Court at The Hague has issued arrest warrants for President Vladimir Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova, Russia’s presidential commissioner for children’s rights. Those warrants were issued on March 17, for their involvement in the alleged deportation and transfer of children from occupied areas of Ukraine to Russia.

How Russia keeps its fleet of Western jets in the air

A Ural Airlines Airbus landed in the Russian city of Yekaterinburg on Nov. 14 last year. Then it remained grounded on the tarmac.

Three days later, a spare part crucial for navigation systems with a declared value of over a quarter of a million dollars, made by U.S. company Northrop Grumman (NOC.N), arrived for the jet, Russian customs records show.

A week later, on Nov. 24, the A320 took off for Moscow and has been busy ferrying passengers across Russia and Central Asia ever since, according to flight tracking data.

Despite Western sanctions designed to stop Russian carriers from procuring parts for their Airbus and Boeing jets, Ural Airlines has imported over 20 of the U.S.-made devices since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, the customs data show.

All told, at least $1.2 billion worth of aircraft parts flowed to Russian airlines from May last year - when most U.S. and European trade curbs and export bans over Ukraine were in force - to the end of June this year, a Reuters analysis of the customs records shows.

The equipment ranged from essential items needed to keep a jet airworthy - such as the Northrop Grumman devices, cabin pressure valves, cockpit displays and landing gear - to more mundane spares, such as coffee makers, flight attendant telephone handsets and toilet seats.

The customs records showed the parts made their way to Russia through middlemen in countries including Tajikistan, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Turkey, China and Kyrgyzstan – none of which has endorsed Western sanctions on Russia.

The $1.2 billion tally underestimates the total value of aircraft parts imported during the period reviewed by Reuters as it only includes shipments destined directly for Russian airlines or their maintenance units - and not plane parts shipped to other companies in Russia.

Oleg Panteleev, head of the AviaPort aviation think-tank in Moscow, said Russian airlines have "solved the problem" of operating under Western sanctions.

"At first there was a shock, no one knew what to do," he told Reuters. "After two to three months, new supply channels were found and, after six or nine months, quite a lot of alternatives appeared, which allowed for a reduction in prices and delivery times."

Short circuit. How Europe turns a blind eye to Russia smuggling dual-use microchips

Despite export controls and sanctions imposed after Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine last year, The Insider has learned that tens of millions of dollars worth of microchips produced by two U.S. technology giants, Texas Instruments and Analog Devices, were shipped to Russia in a nine-month period in 2022. These microchips are used in Russian missiles and satellite communications integral to the Kremlin’s war effort, not to mention its ongoing attacks on Ukrainian civilian infrastructure.

Between early March and late November 2022, third-party companies supplied Russia with American-manufactured electronics from all over the world. Not only via main clearinghouses in China and Hong Kong, which don’t have sanctions in place against Russia, but also through Western companies in countries that do. They include Germany, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Estonia, and Finland, all EU and NATO allies, which have provided extensive humanitarian and military aid to Ukraine.

According to Russian customs declarations, between March 1 and November 30, 2022, $89 million worth of Analog Devices-manufactured microchips and $50 million worth of Texas Instruments-manufactured ones were imported into Russia from foreign jurisdictions. Many of those microchips have military applications, according to Leonid Dmitriev, a Ukrainian military expert The Insider consulted.

“Thirty to forty percent of the microchips have direct military analogs for encryption and decryption options or precision targeting mechanisms,” Dmitriev said. “Some of the elements uncovered from missile or drone wreckage in Ukraine have been identified according to secondary features, because they fragmented on impact. And Russians also often delete factory marks from the elements.”

Import data is readily accessible to anyone through Import Genius, a fee-for-service website that allows people to examine customs traffic in a host of countries. The data set The Insider examined represents just a small snapshot of what looks like extensive violations of U.S. and EU sanctions in the course of the 18-month conflict.

The scheme was pretty straightforward: a private company registered in a foreign country acquired the Texas Instruments or Analog Devices microchips and then resold them to a private Russian import company. The bills of lading clearly identified the nature of the wares being shipped to Russia. The imports were next logged by the Russian Federal Customs Service. From there, their final destination and end-users remain unknown.

Read More:

https://theins.ru/en/politics/264419

Russian pilot defected to Ukraine in his helicopter, says Ukrainian official

A top Ukrainian official has detailed for the first time how a Russian helicopter pilot defected by flying his Mi-8, along with unsuspecting crew members, to Ukraine.

In an interview with Radio Liberty, which is set to air later this week, the head of the Ukrainian Defense Intelligence, Kyrylo Budanov, described how the incident unfolded.

“We were able to find the right approach to the man,” he told the news outlet.

“We were able to create conditions to get his whole family out undetected, and eventually create the conditions so that he could take over this aircraft with a crew that did not know what was happening.

“Two more people were with him - a full crew of three persons in total. When they realized where they had landed, they tried to escape. Unfortunately, they were eliminated. We would prefer (to take) them alive, but it is what it is.”

Third NATO country hands over F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine

The Norwegian authorities are going to supply Ukraine with F-16 fighter jets, Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre said.

“We have already made a decision to train Ukrainian pilots and announced in the summer that we will provide two Norwegian F-16 aircraft for this purpose. We also plan to donate F-16s to Ukraine,” he said.

How many fighters will be handed over to the Armed Forces of Ukraine and in what time frame, the head of the Cabinet promised to announce later. According to the Norwegian broadcaster NRK, we can talk about five to ten aircraft.

Støre added that this would be done in close cooperation with the Allies. The donation of F-16s to Ukraine was previously announced by Denmark and the Netherlands. This was preceded by official permission from the United States as a manufacturing country.

Norwegian Defense Minister Björn Arild Gram said the country will "continue dialogue with the United States and other allies on the creation of a modern air defense system in Ukraine." “Norway has already made a significant military contribution. <…> With the F-16 fighters, Ukraine will receive an even more powerful military potential,” he said.

In 2022, the Norwegian Air Force stopped using its 57 F-16 fighters. The country's authorities agreed to sell 32 of them to Romania. Another 12 aircraft can be bought by a private company that trains US Air Force pilots.

Earlier it was reported that Denmark will transfer 19 F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine. The first six vehicles will go into service with the Armed Forces of Ukraine by the beginning of 2024. The Netherlands, which has 42 aircraft, has not yet decided how many fighters they can allocate to Ukraine.

The US said the F-16s would only be handed over after the pilots had received the necessary training. On August 22, Denmark announced that it was already preparing the first eight specialists. The Pentagon intends to start training Ukrainian pilots in the United States in September. Greece and Portugal will also join the training.

https://www.moscowtimes.ru/2023/08/24/norvegiya-peredast-ukraine-istrebiteli-f-16-a52941

6 new countries to join BRICS, including Iran and Saudi Arabia

Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have all been invited to become members of BRICS.

Leaders of the BRICS group have decided to invite six more countries to join their alliance.

Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have all been invited to become members of BRICS, said South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, who hosted a three-day summit of the emerging markets group in Johannesburg this week.

Their membership will take effect January 1, 2024.

Ukraine’s Counteroffensive Has Broken Through Robotyne

The Ukrainian army and air-assault force have liberated Robotyne.

Eleven weeks after Ukrainian brigades launched attacks along several major axes in southern and eastern Ukraine—including an axis threading through Robotyne to Russian-occupied Melitopol—troopers from the Ukrainian army’s 47th Brigade hoisted a flag atop a building in Robotyne’s town center.

It’s another 50 miles to Melitopol along the T0408 road, but the Ukrainians have momentum. The next major strongpoint after Robotyne is Tokmak; after that, it’s a straight shot to Melitopol and the Black Sea coast.

If Ukrainian troops are going to reach the coast and sever the overland supply lines into Russian-occupied Crimea, they might do so here, along the fields and narrow treelines on the road to Melitopol.

Two brigades are leading the way: the 47th and 82nd.

The army’s 47th Brigade initiated the assault toward Robotyne back in early June. The 47th and its partner 33rd Brigade suffered heavy casualties in the first few days. A disastrous attempt to breach a minefield north of Robotyne on June 8 cost the brigades two dozen of their best Leopard 2A6 tanks, M-2 infantry fighting vehicles and Leopard 2R mineclearers.

The 47th recovered from the minefield debacle and kept fighting. The brigade took advantage of the excellent night optics on its Leopard 2s and M-2s and attacked at night. When the assaulting battalions ran up against Russian trenches, the M-2s laid down suppressive fire with their 25-millimeter autocannons while the infantry raced forward, hurling grenades.

U.K. Reveals 5 Espionage Arrests After BBC Reports Russia Link

Britain’s counterterrorism unit arrested the five on suspicion of spying on British intelligence, the authorities said following a BBC report that three of the same people had been accused of spying for Russia.

Britain’s counterterrorism unit arrested five people months ago on suspicion of spying on British intelligence, the authorities said on Tuesday after a BBC report on the case earlier in the day identified three of the same people as Bulgarian nationals suspected of spying for Russia’s security services.

A statement from the London Metropolitan Police said that the five people had been arrested in February under the Official Secrets Act 1911, which criminalizes spying against the interests and safety of Britain. Specialist officers from a unit of the force that covers national security policing, carried out the arrests after an investigation, the police statement said, but none of the five have been formally charged with espionage. The statement did not address the BBC report directly.

Three of the people were identified by both the BBC and by the police as Orlin Roussev, 45; Biser Dzambazov, 42; and Katrin Ivanova, 32. The police said they had been separately charged with possessing false identification documents with “improper intention.” The BBC report said they had been charged with possessing false documents, including passports and identity cards for Britain, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, France, Greece, Italy, Spain and Slovenia.

The police said that Mr. Roussev lived in the eastern English county of Norfolk, and that Mr. Dzambazov and Ms. Ivanova lived in the London district of Harrow.

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