“Ukraine – Russia”

Britain, Canada and Australia have all so far declined to expel Russian diplomats, putting themselves at odds with 15 EU nations that have now evicted more than 200 in response to the pictures of war crimes committed in Ukraine.

A further 100 Russian diplomats had been expelled in the preceding two months.

The British reticence to act came despite an effective warning from the UK foreign secretary, Liz Truss, that the west’s relations with Vladimir Putin’s Russia were over.

Meanwhile the Trudeau Government starts sucking up to Russia’s biggest Ally – Communist China

Canada’s and China’s frigid relationship shows slight sign of thaw with first call between foreign ministers since 2020

Over the course of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the latter has received an outpouring of support from Western nations. Many in the (mostly terminally online) contrarian class, those individuals who are either openly pro-Russia or are anti-anti-Russia have responded to this newfound support for Ukraine in two ways. They have either derided Ukraine as a woke Western satellite led by equally woke puppet comedian Volodymyr Zelensky, or peculiarly, have made the opposite argument: Ukraine is plagued by neo-Nazis. Both dramatically misunderstand the situation, in terms of both how woke Ukraine truly is and why Ukraine is receiving support.

Neo-Nazis and white supremacists from the United States and Europe have traveled to Ukraine to fight on both sides of the war with Russia, providing these extremists with valuable battlefield experience as they seek to increase their violent operations domestically, according to a report from a watchdog group monitoring the situation.

Foreign fighters from at least 35 neo-Nazi, white supremacist, and ultranationalist groups based in the United States, Canada, and Europe “have members fighting on both sides in [the] Russia-Ukraine conflict,” according to an analysis from the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), which has been tracking the flow of extremist groups into the region.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Kyiv was a Russian defeat for the ages. The fight started poorly for the invaders and went downhill from there.

When President Vladimir Putin launched his war on Feb. 24 after months of buildup on Ukraine’s borders, he sent hundreds of helicopter-borne commandos — the best of the best of Russia’s “spetsnaz” special forces soldiers — to assault and seize a lightly defended airfield on Kyiv’s doorstep.

Other Russian forces struck elsewhere across Ukraine, including toward the eastern city of Kharkiv as well as in the contested Donbas region and along the Black Sea coast. But as the seat of national power, Kyiv was the main prize. Thus the thrust by elite airborne forces in the war’s opening hours.

The West has decided the price of countering atrocities is simply too high.

Putting a stop to war crimes is not in the interest of the United States — at least not if it means going to war with Russia, according to White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki.

Preventing atrocities like the murder of civilians in Ukraine is not in the interests of the EU — at least not if it means higher gas prices or colder homes in winter, according to Austrian Finance Minister Magnus Brunner.

The evidence of brutal killings and torture by Russian forces in Bucha, a town on the outskirts of Kyiv, has drawn gasping proclamations of outrage and dismay at the highest levels of government in the world’s most powerful nations — from Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Berlin to President Emmanuel Macron in Paris to Prime Minister Boris Johnson in London and across the ocean to President Joe Biden in Washington.

The Czech Republic has become the first NATO country to send tanks to Ukraine, providing T-72 and armoured infantry vehicles following President Zelensky’s plea for help.

Several BVP-1 infantry fighting vehicles, howitzer artillery pieces and more than a dozen T-72 tanks were yesterday loaded on a train bound for Slovakia where they are expected to head on to Ukraine, footage run by public broadcaster Czech Television showed.

The delivery is understood to be a gift agreed on by NATO allies, raising fears the trans-Atlantic bloc could be dragged into the Russian war in Ukraine despite remaining on the sidelines for more than a month.

#Ukraine: A Russian tank was destroyed by the 34th Separate Motorized Infantry Battalion using, as claimed, a NLAW anti-tank missile. pic.twitter.com/KeWRKoWn7E

— 🇺🇦 Ukraine Weapons Tracker (@UAWeapons) April 6, 2022

The US has imposed sanctions against Russian President Vladimir Putin’s inner circle, including his daughters.

The list also includes the family of Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and major banks.

The measures follow new revelations of atrocities by Russian troops in Ukraine, including images of bodies of civilians scattered on the streets of Bucha, near the capital Kyiv.

Russia says, without evidence, the images are staged by Kyiv officials.

On March 22, Defence Minister Anita Anand received a proposal from a group of industry executives aimed at helping Ukraine defend the Odessa region from a Russian amphibious assault.

The plan, laid out in a briefing note obtained by the National Post, advocated giving Ukraine Harpoon Block 11 anti-ship missiles from the Royal Canadian Navy’s inventory to help with coastal defence. The executives urged the minister to move quickly so the missiles could be sent “in days, not weeks.”

The delay is because the missiles haven’t been programmed for proper pro-noun usage yet.

The EU has given €35bn (£29.1bn) to Vladimir Putin for energy supplies since the start of his war and €1bn to fund Ukraine’s defence, the union’s top diplomat said.

Josep Borrell, the EU’s foreign policy chief, made the comparison in a characteristically blunt speech to the European parliament as he urged Europe to send more arms to Ukraine to help end the war.

“We have to continue arming Ukraine. We need less rounds of applause and more assistance,” he said. The EU had pledged €1bn in military aid for Ukraine, he said, which “might seem a lot” but “€1bn is what we pay Putin every day for the energy he provides us. Since the beginning of the war we have given him €35bn. Compare that to the €1bn we have given to Ukraine in arms and weapons.”

‘Barbarians’: Russian troops leave grisly mark on town of Trostianets

The tanks rolled into Trostianets, a sleepy town 20 miles from the Russia-Ukraine border, in the first hours of the invasion. Russian troops fanned out across the town, occupying a number of buildings: the forestry agency headquarters, the railway station and a chocolate factory.

Their top general set up his office in room 23 at the local administration building, where the council’s accountants used to sit. His bottle of single malt is still on the desk, the butts of his slim cigarettes perched on the edge of an ashtray. He slept on a single bed stolen from a nearby hotel.

His men lived one floor below. They appear to have slept, eaten and defecated in the same rooms, and some of them may have died there too, judging by the bloodied Russian uniforms littering the floor.

#Ukraine: Ukrainian artillery precisely hitting the Russian convoy in #Donetsk Oblast. As can be seen, at least several vehicles were completely destroyed, even more – damaged. pic.twitter.com/FdnPDeF6PH

— 🇺🇦 Ukraine Weapons Tracker (@UAWeapons) April 5, 2022

#Ukraine: Accurate Ukrainian fire damaging 2x T-72B3 tanks as well as hitting pro-Russian positions somewhere in the East. pic.twitter.com/nmTcj6RZkH

— 🇺🇦 Ukraine Weapons Tracker (@UAWeapons) April 3, 2022

LONDON, April 5 (Reuters) – The Kremlin said on Tuesday that Western allegations Russian forces committed war crimes by executing civilians in the Ukrainian town of Bucha were a “monstrous forgery” aimed at denigrating the Russian army.

Since Russian troops withdrew from towns and villages around the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, Ukrainian troops have been showing journalists corpses of what they say are civilians killed by Russian forces, destroyed houses and burnt-out cars.

‘Motorcade of shame’: outrage over pro-Russia displays at Berlin rally

Protest aimed to draw attention to hostility towards Russians but included pro-war elements

A rally in Berlin that was organised to draw attention to growing hostility towards Russians in Germany but included demonstrators supportive of the invasion of Ukraine has drawn sharp criticism from politicians and diplomats.

About 900 protesters in a 400-strong motorcade took part in the demonstration on Sunday that culminated in a gathering at the Olympic Stadium. Cars were draped in the Russian flag, and one bore the symbol “Z”, meant to signify solidarity with the Russian war. Participants reportedly sang patriotic Russian songs.

#Ukraine: A Russian T-72B tank was hit by a top attack munition in #Chernihiv Oblast, and decided to become one with the tarmac. pic.twitter.com/BOD5lFnvPS

— 🇺🇦 Ukraine Weapons Tracker (@UAWeapons) April 5, 2022

#Ukraine: Remarkable footage of a single UA T-64BV tank engaging a Russian convoy, destroying a BTR-82A from an ambush position. Though other shots miss, appears that this held up the convoy enough for UA indirect fire to strike it, taking out other armour & leading to a retreat. pic.twitter.com/Ax8o23htMD

— 🇺🇦 Ukraine Weapons Tracker (@UAWeapons) April 5, 2022

Investigators said on Tuesday that they had shut down the German servers for Hydra, a Russian darknet marketplace that was used to sell drugs, forged documents, intercepted data, and other illegal digital services.

They also seized bitcoin worth €23 million ($25 million).

Unknown individuals are also being investigated for “operating criminal trading platforms on the internet on a commercial basis,” selling narcotics, among other things, federal police said in a statement.

In the 90s, Russia was a spent force. The consensus was that free enterprise had defeated Communism. And it had. Russia isn’t fighting for Communism, but for market dominance.

A generation later we’re watching what may be the largest outsourcing war of a new century.

Russia, like China, rebooted its economy by exploiting the growing desire of western liberalism to accommodate environmentalists and socialists by offshoring their “dirty” industries.

BUCHA, Ukraine (AP) — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday that the Russian military must be brought to justice immediately for war crimes, accusing the Kremlin’s troops of the worst atrocities since World War II.

The Ukrainian leader made his plea via video as grisly evidence continued to emerge of civilian massacres carried out by Russian forces on the outskirts of Kyiv before they pulled back from the capital.

The images, particularly from the town of Bucha, have stirred global revulsion and led to demands for tougher sanctions and war crime charges.

A Kremlin paper justifies erasing the Ukrainian identity, as Russia is accused of war crimes

An editorial in a prominent Kremlin media outlet appears to provide justification for the war with its call to erase the Ukrainian identity — language that geopolitical experts say is especially alarming after the discovery of dozens of dead civilians in a Kyiv suburb.

Written by Timofei Sergeitsev in RIA Novosti, the rhetoric in the editorial — entitled “What Russia should do in Ukraine” — is inflammatory, even by the usual Russian state media standards.

It claims the word “Ukraine” itself is synonymous with Nazism and cannot be allowed to exist.

“Denazification is inevitably also De-Ukrainianization,” Sergeitsev writes, stating that the idea of Ukrainian culture and identity is fake.

Ukraine round-up: Evidence of alleged Russian atrocities mounts near Kyiv

Note: We are all aware that the media blatantly lies. After years of Trump Derangement Syndrome, Hunter Biden’s laptop, Clinton’s Benghazi scandal, Justin Trudeau’s fawning media coverage etc there is no denying that fact.

With regard to the atrocities in the Ukraine both “sides” of the issue are welcome to make a case here provided that comments remain civil.

It’s a war, a war with one front being social media, both sides should be questioned.