Contents tagged with Russia
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Don't Trust Putin on Syria
SEPT. 14, 2015
As written by Andrew Foxall in New York Times:
SYRIA is being destroyed. The civil war, now more than four years old, has left the country in ruins. The implacable Islamic State controls vast areas of the north and east, and the barbaric regime of President Assad maintains its Damascus stronghold.
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EU Extends Sanctions against Russia
The European Union on Monday extended its sanctions against Russia until March of 2016. The sanctions are meant to punish Moscow for its military support for Ukrainian separatists and its annexation of Crimea.
The sanctions include asset freezes and travel bans against 149 people and 37 entities, the European Union announced in a statement. Without the EU action the sanctions would have lifted on Tuesday.
A separate set of European economic sanctions against Russia are in place until the end …
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Is Russia More Bark Than Bite?
As per Sir Andrew Wood, Chatham House
The received wisdom that Russia will always be ready to go further than the West in a confrontation over Ukraine is flawed.
‘The West could never prevail in a military confrontation over Ukraine with Russia, which would always be prepared to go further.’ This line, from a Financial Times editorial last week, reflects a commonly-held view among Western commentators about the crisis in eastern Ukraine. But if taken literally, it would imply that Vladimir …
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Russia is stepping up its military presence in Syria.
Three Russian military cargo jets have landed in Syrian in the recent days.
They have delivered mobile housing units and military equipment.
American officials said that most likely Russian is trying to build its military base and also an air control center in Syria to aid an embattled President Bashar al-Assad.
Previously Bulgaria refused to provide an air space corridor to Russian Syria-bound flights.
Although today Russian officials have confirmed that the airspace has been provided by …
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American hedge funds are betting against the Russian ruble
As reported by the US Futures trading commission starting November 2014 American hedge funds and currency traders have placed a record number of short future contracts against the Russian ruble.
The total number of short positions (betting on collapse of the Russian currency) has reached 6848 contracts (17.2 billion rubles).
Overall the investors were net short 2857 contracts (7.14 billion rubles). This number takes into account long positions – bets on the increase of the value of the …
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Coup in Pro-Kremlin Donetsk Republic
Andrei Purgin, President of the National Council of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic has been ousted from his position and his deputy Denis Pushilin has taken over his seat.The arrest warrant has been issued for a head of the National Council of Donetsk Republic, Mr. Alexandrov. Mr. Purgin and Mr. Alexandrov were initially prevented from entering Donetsk Republic at the Uspenka border crossing with Russia on Friday. After several hours they managed to make their way to Donetsk. …
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Chicago Tribune - Putin's Deceptive Pause
Ukraine: Putin's Deceptive Pause
AS PER MARVIN KALB OF CHICAGO TRIBUNE
A strange, deceptive pause has settled over the Ukraine crisis. The war in the Donbas has slipped off the front page. American diplomats, absorbed with selling the Iran nuclear deal to a reluctant Congress, have been deflected from their long-standing concerns about Vladimir Putin's next steps
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Anniversary of Ilovaysk. Simple tragedy or an act of negligence.
Ilovaysk, is one of the biggest tragedies of the war in Ukraine. This was the first face to face combat between Russians and Ukrainians troops.One year later, the volunteer soldiers paint a picture of incompetence and negligence on the part of army leadership.The soldiers’ plight and their apparent dispatch into battle with little training and inadequate equipment has sparked scorn across Ukraine.Volunteer commanders have denounced what they say is the government’s neglect.
Last August when …
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Vice News - Meet the European Fighters Who Have Gone to War in Ukraine
Meet the European Fighters Who Have Gone to War in Ukraine | VICE | United StatesThere are European soldiers fighting amid the rubble of Shyrokyne in Eastern Ukraine. They shoot from half-destroyed hotels and sleep in the basements of war-ravaged homes.
Artillery fire colors the hill behind the town black, and darkens the sky with gray smoke. Machine guns sputter day and night, and there is occasionally the crack of a sniper rifle as soldiers dart between abandoned houses, hotels,
apartment …
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Russia shelled Ukrainian territory again.
As per the Transcarpathian Regional State Administration Press Centre,Two soldiers of the 128th Brigade were wounded during the last night shelling of the township of Stanytsya Luhanska.Russian heavy weaponry “pulled back” as per the Minsk Treaty was used again last night.This time it was the positions of the Transcarpathian 128th Brigade of the Ukrainian Armed Forces that got hit by the enemy fire from the right bank of Seversky Donets river.Both wounded were hospitalized and are receiving the …