Thursday, March 24, 2022

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky delivered an address on Thursday observing one month of full-scale war with Russia by accusing Russian soldiers of a variety of human rights abuses against civilians, including looting, seizing humanitarian aid, and rape.

Ukrainian officials have sporadically mentioned reports of rape in urban areas that Russian soldiers have invaded, but without providing details or evidence. The U.S. State Department, in its formal accusation against Russia of war crimes this week, did not mention any incidents of alleged rape of Ukrainian civilians by Russian soldiers.

The Russian government has denied all allegations of rape against its soldiers, simply referring to them as “lies.”

Russia invaded Ukraine in 2014, escalating an existing eight-year-old war by sending Russian forces into major Ukrainian urban centers, including Kyiv, on February 24. In announcing the military “operation,” Russian leader Vladimir Putin claimed that Ukraine did not have a “tradition” of being a sovereign state and modern Ukraine was “completely created by Russia.” Putin recognized two Russian proxy entities, the Donetsk and Luhansk “People’s Republics,” as sovereign states within what the international community respects as the borders of Ukraine, and claimed these “governments” requested Russian military intervention.

In his address, shared online by the state media outlet Ukrinform, Zelensky accused Russia of attempting to “wipe off the face of the earth” the modern Ukrainian state and declared that the Russians, by failing to end the war quickly, had already lost.

|The original plan of the Russian troops failed already in the first days of the invasion,” Zelensky declared. “They thought Ukrainians would be frightened. They thought Ukrainians would not fight. They were wrong.”

Zelensky then proceeded to list alleged human rights abuses that Russian troops have committed in the country.

“Russian troops destroy our cities. Kill civilians indiscriminately. Rape women. Abduct children. Shoot at refugees. Capture humanitarian convoys. They are engaged in looting,” the president accused. “They burn museums, blow up schools and hospitals. The target for them is universities, residential neighborhoods… Anything! Russian troops do not know the limits of evil.”

Zelensky did not elaborate on where and when these war crimes allegedly occurred, instead turning to the Russian people and urging them to protest against their government and its alleged abuses.

“I want to address the citizens of Russia separately. I am sure that there are many of you who are disgusted by the policy of your state,” Zelensky said. “Who are already just sick of what you see on TV. Of the lies of your propagandists on the Internet. Propagandists who are paid by your taxes. And they lie about the war, which is paid for by your taxes. And which makes all the citizens of Russia poorer. Poorer every day.”

“Isn’t that stupid?” he asked. “Your state collects taxes from you to make you poorer. To isolate you from the world. To make it easier for them to control you. And easier to send you to the war to die.”

Zelensky concluded insisting that “Ukraine has never threatened the security of Russia” and urging Russians to “save your sons from the war.”

Zelensky’s accusation of rape against Russian soldiers are not the first from Ukrainian officials, though the direct accusation from the country’s head of state is an escalation. In early March, Zelensky’s top diplomat Dmytro Kuleba told reporters that Kyiv had documented “numerous cases” of rape during a visit to London, without elaborating.

“We have numerous cases of, unfortunately, when Russian soldiers rape women in the Ukrainian cities,” Kuleba said at the time, according to the Agence-France Presse (AFP).

Last week, four Ukrainian lawmakers sent to London to advocate for their country repeated the accusations of rape, alleging that Russia was using “medieval siege tactics” including sexual violence against the elderly.

“We’re talking about senior citizens of Ukraine,” lawmaker Lesia Vasylenko told the press in the United Kingdom. “Most of these women … have either been executed after the crime of rape, or they have taken their own lives. The main problem is that victims and families do not have the strength or capacity to come forward.”

Vasylenko also alleged that as many as 90 percent of the civilian buildings in the port city of Mariupol, currently under some of the heaviest fire from Russian forces, have been shelled or damaged, according to the U.K. Independent.

The lawmakers did not present any formal evidence for these allegations.

On Tuesday, Parliament member Inna Sovsun announced that Ukraine’s prosecutor general had compiled evidence of one case of rape by a Russian soldier in Kyiv, suggesting that the government would soon formally publish the evidence.

Russian officials have denied all allegations of sexual abuse in Ukraine.

People attend the funeral of Ukrainian serviceman Ihor Fedorchyk killed during Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, at Lychakiv cemetery, in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv on March 24, 2022. (YURIY DYACHYSHYN/AFP via Getty Images)

“We do not believe the Ukrainian Prosecutor-General’s Office. The Russian military personnel do not attack or shoot at civilians. The Russian army helps civilians,” Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Wednesday, according to the Russian news agency Tass. “As for rape charges, we do not believe this at all. It’s a lie.”

Peskov accused Ukrainian fighters of the crimes that Moscow is facing charges of.

“There are ever more eye-witnesses coming out of cities who confirm that civilians are being kept there as a human shield and that nationalist battalions open fire on civilians trying to leave Ukrainian cities,” Peskov alleged. The spokesman also claimed that Russia had put together humanitarian corridors to help civilians out, but the Ukrainian government was keeping civilians “unaware” so as to use them as “human shields.”

On the same day, the Russian “National Defense Management Center” accused Ukrainian “nationalist battalions” of “mass looting” of civilian property.

“In addition to physical extermination of the population in Chernigov, Sumy and Zaporozhye, commanders of the nationalist battalions have organized mass looting of residential buildings, and public and private organizations,” the head of the center, Colonel General Mikhail Mizintsev, claimed, Tass reported. “They use seized ambulances and postal vehicles to take material valuables toward Ukraine’s western borders.”

Mizintsev also claimed Ukrainians are destroying their own critical infrastructure and attacking ambulances, without providing evidence for the claims.

American Secretary of State Antony Blinken accused Russia of “war crimes” in a statement on Wednesday.
“Today, I can announce that, based on information currently available, the U.S. government assesses that members of Russia’s forces have committed war crimes in Ukraine,” the statement read in part.

“We’ve seen numerous credible reports of indiscriminate attacks and attacks deliberately targeting civilians, as well as other atrocities,” Blinken alleged. “Russia’s forces have destroyed apartment buildings, schools, hospitals, critical infrastructure, civilian vehicles, shopping centers, and ambulances, leaving thousands of innocent civilians killed or wounded. Many of the sites Russia’s forces have hit have been clearly identifiable as in-use by civilians.”

Blinken notably did not mention any evidence of rape or other sexual crimes against civilians.

Follow Frances Martel on Facebook and Twitter.

Putin Attacks Petrodollar System, Demands ‘Unfriendly’ Nations Purchase Gas in Rubles

MIKHAIL KLIMENTYEV/Sputnik/AFP via Getty Images

KURT ZINDULKA

24 Mar 20220

5:30

Russian leader Vladimir Putin has issued a demand that “unfriendly” countries purchase natural gas in rubles rather than dollars or euros in an apparent attack against America’s global hegemony through the petrodollar and the international sanctions levied against Russia’s central bank.

Speaking before a cabinet meeting in Moscow on Wednesday, the embattled Russian strongman said that his government will no longer accept “compromised” currencies, such as the dollar or the euro, from countries that have levied sanctions in response to his invasion of Ukraine.

“I made the decision to implement within the shortest possible time the package of measures to transfer payments — we will start with that — for our natural gas supplied to the so-called ‘unfriendly’ states to Russian rubles,” Putin said per the Moscow Times.

“It doesn’t make sense to deliver our goods to the EU or U.S. and receive payments in dollars or euros,” he added.

The move is largely seen as a retaliatory strike in response to sanctions levied against the central bank of Russia, as well as the United States and EU taking the unprecedented move to freeze Russia’s international reserves, an estimated $300 billion mostly in dollars that Moscow had previously seen as an insurance policy should it be cut off from the international financial system.

Should Putin follow through with the threat, it would force European nations to purchase hundreds of millions of euros worth of rubles per day in order to cover the costs of its hefty gas imports from Russia, thereby propping up the struggling currency, which fell substantially after the invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent enactment of Western sanctions.

Russia’s demand for payment in rubles comes amid growing concerns about the fate of the ‘petrodollar’, a system in which oil is only traded on the global market in American currency. Saudi Arabia, for example, has signalled that it may be willing to begin accepting the Chinese RMB in exchange for oil, a move that could potentially upend America’s position as the supreme power in the world.

The petrodollar has been a staple of the global economy since 1973 when U.S. President Richard Nixon — who took America off the gold standard — made a deal with Saudi Arabia to only trade oil in U.S. dollars, a move that was quickly adopted by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).

By forcing the world to trade oil in dollars, the U.S. not only massively increased its sway over other countries but also prevented inflation by forcing other countries to hold dollar reserves and therefore limit the supply of notes in circulation.

Should Saudi Arabia and other major oil producers follow Russia’s lead, it could result in massive dumping of dollars on the world stage, spelling potential doom for the American economy and indeed the possible end of its post-Second World War era of global domination.

While Russia’s decision to demand “unfriendly” nations purchase gas in rubles is not a full-scale attack on the petrodollar, it will put the U.S. and its allies, notably Germany, in a tough position.

In response to Putin’s announcement, German economy minister Robert Habeck accused Russia of a “breach of contract” and said that his country will “discuss with our European partners how we would react to that.”

It remains to be seen, however, what leg Germany will be able to stand on in a contract dispute, given its moves to block the Russian-German Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline and to ship weapons to Ukraine, breaking a longstanding tradition of not sending arms to conflict zones.

Though Russia is heavily dependent on gas sales to Europe, Germany is also heavily dependent on Russian gas. Indeed, prior to the invasion of Ukraine, the European Union’s economic powerhouse imported 55 per cent of its natural gas from Russia.

Prior to the announcement from Putin on Wednesday, Germany’s Chancellor Olaf Scholz told the country’s parliament (Bundestag) that while his government is looking to secure other energy sources, cutting off Russian gas imports immediately would send “our country and all of Europe into a recession”.

“The truth is that the sanctions that have already been decided also hit many citizens hard, and not just at the gas pump,” Scholz said, adding that sanctions “must not hit the European countries harder than the Russian leadership.”

Germany recently agreed to a deal with Qatar to begin importing gas from the Islamic kingdom, however, as there is currently no pipeline infrastructure to expedite this, the gas will likely be needed to be transported by the sea. C

Germany does not currently have the infrastructure at its ports to accept large amounts of natural gas, and the German government has said that such installations won’t be operable until 2026.

The quandary that Germany finds itself in demonstrates the pitfalls of the country’s attempts to transition to a green economy while still dependent on hostile powers to keep the lights on. The situation also renders Germany’s ability to conduct foreign policy somewhat limited.

Ukraine’s foreign affairs Minister Dmytro Kuleba has complained that “If any EU country bows to Putin’s humiliating demands to pay for oil and gas in rubles, it will be like helping Ukraine with one hand and helping Russians kill Ukrainians with the other. I urge relevant countries to make a wise and responsible choice.”

Follow Kurt Zindulka on Twitter here @KurtZindulka

U.S. Government Offers $5 Million Reward for Info on Russian Oligarchs’ Assets

Report: 14,000 Russians Have Fled to Turkey over Ukraine War

Chris McGrath/Getty Images

GABRIELLE REYES

21 Mar 20220

3:12

An estimated 14,000 Russians have fled to Turkey since Moscow launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine last month, Turkey’s Hürriyet Daily News reported on Monday.

“Some 14,000 Russians have fled to Turkey in just three weeks after the conflict in Ukraine broke out because of what they describe as deteriorating conditions in their country,” the publication reported on March 21.

“Russian and Ukrainian citizens are not required to have a visa to enter Turkey and can stay for up to three months in the country,” according to the Hürriyet Daily News.

The newspaper interviewed a 23-year-old Russian citizen named Ana who arrived in Turkey on March 7. She revealed that, in addition to Turkey, the nation of Georgia has likewise become a popular destination for people leaving Russia in recent weeks.

Another Russian national who recently arrived in Turkey named Vladimir Piskunov told the Hürriyet Daily News he originally planned to travel to Slovenia, “but the borders were closed and [his] plane tickets were canceled.” Piskunov then settled on Istanbul as his destination, arriving on February 28.

Uzbekistan has joined Turkey and Georgia as among the group of nations welcoming people fleeing Russia since it launched a war with neighboring Ukraine on February 24.

“At least several thousand Russians are estimated to have come to Uzbekistan, where some 2 percent of the population is ethnic Russian,” Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) reported on March 20.

The U.S. government-funded broadcaster emphasized its report was based on estimations and anecdotal evidence, noting the Uzbek Migration Agency had yet to release any official figures confirming the recent Russian immigration.

Explaining why many Russians have seemingly chosen to leave Russia for Central Asia over the past month, RFE/RL wrote:

Along with Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan are popular destinations in Central Asia for fleeing Russians, as are the cities of Tbilisi, Yerevan, Helsinki, Dubai, Istanbul, and Antalya. They are all places that Russians are still allowed to fly to — many countries are preventing Russian planes from landing or flying over their territory — and places where a Russian passport is accepted without a visa.

Russia has been subjected to a slew of financial sanctions since starting its latest war with Ukraine on February 24. The U.S. government has encouraged the international community to follow its example and levy wide-ranging economic sanctions on Moscow to punish the Kremlin for launching what it describes as a “special military operation” in Ukraine.

The sanctions have precipitated a rapid decline of Russia’s economy in recent days and subsequently contributed to the exodus of its citizens to Central Asia, RFE/RL noted on Monday.

“[M]any Uzbek migrants from Russia who have lost their jobs due to the sanctions [have returned to Uzbekistan],” the U.S government-funded broadcaster observed on March 20.

Biden's weak leadership means complicity in Putin's war crimes

By Ajay Bruno

Joe Biden's weak leadership on the international stage has led to an enormous international crisis. Not only is he inept, but we need to speak plainly and call him out for what he really is: a disgrace. Biden is complicit in the despicable crimes being committed against the Ukrainian people by his lack of action. The United States of America has the military and political power to have already put an end to this, yet he has chosen to do the bare minimum, and as a result, thousands of people are needlessly dying, and mass destruction is being brought to a great and historic nation.

It is made all the worse when you consider that this man has no consistent policies rooted in any sort of logic. He was the Senate sponsor of the failed Kosovo resolution, which still led to the Clinton administration committing war crimes against the Serbian people and murdering hundreds of civilians in the process. He passionately insisted that he was in favor of bombing Belgrade, yet he is too afraid to confront Vladimir Putin, who is mercilessly bombarding the innocent people of Ukraine. This sort of double-standard is unfitting of an American president, and the world is in great peril to have such a man as the de facto leader of the free world.

We must why it is okay to ignore the United States Congress in its refusal to endorse a military campaign against Yugoslavia, but when there is a wide-ranging outcry across the political spectrum to take more action in defense of Ukraine, he remains on the sidelines. The American people have always been willing to step up and sacrifice in defense of freedom and for a just cause and righteous intent. This is one of those moments in history.

This was the same supposed leader who made a campaign promise to hold the Saudi crown prince accountable for the murder of a journalist, which he then shamelessly broke. His rushed, disorganized, and cowardly surrender of Afghanistan to a terrorist organization we had battled for two decades led to the deaths of 13 American service members and to countless friends and allies left behind and showed that the word and commitment of the United States means little in today's world. Now we stand by as a nation that values and yearns for freedom faces a new evil, and we do relatively little.

While there is near-universal consensus on strong sanctions against Russia, and supplying the Ukrainians with whatever aid is required, this needlessly prolongs bloodshed and raises the real risk that an irrational and frustrated Putin could use chemical, biological, or even nuclear weapons. How many more people have to die before America does what it has done so many times throughout history and stands strong as a shield of liberty against evil in the world?

In another sign of cowardice, the Biden administration shot down a Polish proposal to give Ukraine much-needed fighter jets for fear, yet again, of upsetting Putin, and that it could be viewed as "escalatory" in nature. All one has to do is look at the ruins of what was once the city of Mariupol, the schools and shelters with innocents in them that by all accounts have been intentionally targeted, and ask, have things not already escalated to an unacceptable level? The great cities of Kyiv and Kharkiv are being attacked relentlessly, and the brave Ukrainian defenders holding them at bay deserve more from us.

Highlighting the extraordinary gravity of this situation, the president of Poland, Andrzej Duda, recently said:

My countrymen, Poles, are looking today at Mariupol and are saying, "God" — they say it with tears in their eyes — "Mariupol looks like Warsaw did in 1944 when Nazis, Hitler's Germans, were brutally bombing houses, killing people, killing civilians with no mercy at all."

This is not a matter of liberal or conservative, left or right, hawk or dove. It is time we do what is right. The world still waits on the United States to lead. If we stand up against the murderous despotism of Putin's regime by whatever means are necessary to end it as soon as possible, then Americans can once again call themselves the greatest nation on Earth. The stakes are truly incredibly high, and we must face this challenge with valor and boldness, not with meekness and uncertainty. We need real leadership to be shown now.

Ajay Bruno is a media and political strategist who has worked on behalf of a range of clients, including the Indian ambassador to the U.S., the Polish Consulate-General in NYC, FreedomWorks, and The Federalist Society.

Image: SkyNews/MSNBC video screen shot via YouTube.

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Biden's weak leadership means complicity in Putin's war crimes

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