Russian troops at the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Station in the Kherson region of southern Ukraine, May 20, 2022 (AP)

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Thursday’s Coverage: Zelenskiy — Heavy Weapons from West Now Deployed at “Full Capacity”

Source: Institute for the Study of War

UPDATE 1405 GMT:

A US diplomat says American officials have identified at least 18 “filtration sites” set up by Russian forces to detain and forcibly deport Ukrainian civilians to Russia.

Courtney Austrian, the deputy head of the US mission to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, noted that preparations for the camps were made before Vladimir Putin’s invasion.

She told an OSCE conference that Russian officials — with the help of proxy groups — set up the “filtration camps” in schools, sports centers and cultural institutions in recently-occupied parts of Ukraine.

People who have been in the “filtration centers” have testified about interrogations, beatings, torture, and disappearances. Some Ukrainians have been sent on to cities across Russia, including to regions near China or Japan

Austrian said of the pre-invasion preparations, “Russian officials likely created lists of Ukrainian civilians deemed threatening to Russia’s control of Ukraine, including anyone with pro-Ukraine views, such as political figures and activists, as well as security personnel, for detention and filtration.

The Ukraine Government says about 1.6 million people have been forcibly relocated to Russia — including about 250,000 children.

Austrian said, “Let me be clear: All those responsible for forced transfers of Ukrainian civilians to Russia will be identified and held to account for violations of international law.”

UPDATE 1146 GMT:

An opposition councillor in Moscow has been sentenced to seven years in prison for criticising Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Lawyer Alexei Gorinov was arrested in April on charges of spreading “knowingly false information” about the Russian army.

His is the first long-term prison sentence imposed under a new law authorizing terms of up to 15 years for dissent over Vladimir Putin’s “special military operation”.

The Kremlin Widens Its Net of Arrests Over Putin’s Invasion

Officials said Gorinov’s “crime” was to speak out against the Moscow’s council’s proposal to hold a children’s drawing contest and a dancing festival. He and fellow councllor Elena Kotenochkina noted that the events would be held as “children were dying” in Ukraine.

UPDATE 1001 GMT:

NASA has criticized the Russian space agency Roscosmos after it published a photographs of three cosmonauts, aboard the International Space Station, posing with flags of the Russian proxy “Donetsk People’s Republic” and “Luhansk People’s Republic”.

NASA said it “strongly rebukes using the International Space Station for political purposes to support its [Russia’s] war against Ukraine”.

UPDATE 0950 GMT:

Despite limiting its ground operations so forces can rest and recover, Russia is continuing the deadly shelling of the Donetsk region in eastern Ukraine.

Governor Pavlo Kyrylenko said Russian attacs killed 6 civilians on Thursday, with fatalities in Kramatorsk, Sloviansk, Avdiivka, Siversk, Pokrovsk, and Orlivka. Another 21 civilians were injured.

UPDATE 0938 GMT:

The Chief Rabbi of Moscow has confirmed that he has left his role and Russia for good.

Pinchas Goldschmidt, who was in the post for 33 years, said:

As the terrible war against Ukraine unfolded over the last few months, I could not remain silent, viewing so much human suffering, I went to assist the refugees in Eastern Europe and spoke out against the war. As time progressed, despite re-electing me to the position of Chief Rabbi last month, it became clear that the Jewish community of Moscow would be endangered by me remaining in my position.

He noted that he and his wife were grateful to have been part of “the historic renaissance of Russian Jewry”: “We did our best to navigate and build the community through the tumultuous 1990s and in the increasingly authoritarian Russia under the current president.”

Goldschmidt said in early May that he was in Israel because of his father’s hospitalization and did not know when he would return to Russia. Journalist Avital Chizhik-Goldschmidt, related by marriage to the Chief Rabbi, later confirmed that Goldschmidt and his wife left after they were “put under pressure by authorities to publicly support the ‘special operation’ in Ukraine — and refused”.

Earlier this week the Russian Government ordered the Jewish Agency to cease all operations inside the country.

UPDATE 0849 GMT:

Ukraine has asked Canada not to return a turbine for the Nord Stream gas pipeline to Russia.

Moscow has used the Siemens turbine as the pretext for reducing gas supplies to European countries.

Ukrainian energy official Serhiy Makogon said Europe can cover the reduced volume of gas with flows through Ukraine and Poland.

We ask Canada to transfer the Gazprom turbine not to Germany, but to Ukraine. We will pass it on to the Russian Federation. Maybe. After victory.

UPDATE 0806 GMT:

At the meeting of G20 Foreign Ministers in Indonesia, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has told Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov that Moscow must lift its blockade of Ukraine’s ports and allow grain to be exported.

A US official summarized Blinken’s words: “To our Russian colleagues: Ukraine is not your country. Its grain is not your grain. Why are you blocking the ports? You should let the grain out.”

Lavrov complained, “‘Aggressors’, ‘invaders’, ‘occupiers’ – we heard a lot of things today.” He was not present for Blinken’s statement, walked out as Germany’s counterpart Annalena Baerbock was speaking, and left a session before a virtual address by Ukraine Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba.

Kuleba told the Foreign Ministers:

The Russian naval blockade of Ukrainian ports has already shredded global chains of food supply and has a detrimental effect on global food security. Adding insult to injury, Russia steals Ukrainian grain and bombs Ukrainian granaries. Russia is essentially playing hunger games with the world.

The Ukraine Defense Ministry noted that Russia, repeating a tactic it used during the Syrian conflict to keep Bashar al-Assad in power, is using munitions to set farmland on fire during harvest season. A video showed combine harvesters in southern Ukraine trying to gather grain as blazes burn through the fields.

About 2/3rd of Ukraine’s grain exports have been halted because of Russia’s blockade. The invasion has added about 45 million people around the world to those who are “food insecure”, with UN Secretary General António Guterres warning:

Millions of people may starve if the Russian blockade of the Black Sea continues….

While we are looking for ways to protect freedom, another person is destroying it. Another person continues to blackmail the world with hunger.

See also Ukraine War, Day 106: Russia Invasion Threatens “Unprecedented Wave of Hunger and Destitution”

UN World Food Programme Director Patrick Beasley said that “50 million people in 45 countries are now just one step from famine”, as he called for a lifting of the blockade on 25 million tons of Ukrainian grain.

UPDATE 0800 GMT:

Russian shelling killed four people and injured nine in the Kharkiv region in northeast Ukraine on Thursday.

However, Governor Oleh Synyehubov noted a pause in the attacks overnight:

Last night, for the first time in several weeks, there was no night shelling of Kharkiv. But we have no right to lose our vigilance.

UPDATE 0747 GMT:

In his nightly video address to the nation, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has hailed the raising of the Ukrainian flag on Zmiinyi (Snake) Island in the Black Sea, recaptured from Russia this week.

Let every Russian captain, aboard a ship or a plane, see the Ukrainian flag on Snake Island and let him know that our country will not be broken.

Snake Island become a symbol of Ukrainian resistance when, on the first day of Vladimir Putin’s invasion, defenders refused to surrender to Russian forces: “Go fuck yourself, warship.”

Russia sought to hold the island to control access to the coast of southern Ukraine, including the port city of Odesa, but were forced to withdraw after weeks of Ukrainian bombardment which damaged or destroyed landing ships, a helicopter, and most of the facilities.

ORIGINAL ENTRY: Russian leaders have paused their invasion of Ukraine, seeking rest and recovery of their forces after initial failures and then costly gains in the east of the country.

Earlier this week, after the Russians completed the occupation of the Luhansk region, Vladimir Putin said troops should “rest and develop their combat capabilities”.

Defense Ministry spokesperson Igor Konashenkov confirmed the message on Thursday, declaring the pause but not giving a duration.

Pulling out of the last cities they held in Luhansk — Sievierodonetsk and Lysychansk — Ukrainian forces have established new defense lines in their areas of the neighboring Donetsk oblast.

Russian forces are shelling and firing missiles on cities such as Slovyansk and Kramatorsk, killing dozens of civilians, but their ground attacks have been limited. The US-based Institute for the Study of War assesses:

Russian forces will likely continue to confine themselves to small-scale offensive actions as they rebuild forces and set conditions for a more significant offensive in the coming weeks or months.

Zelenskiy’s Confidence Provokes Putin’s Bluster

Putin did not mention the pause on Thursday. Instead, he tried to cover up the failure of his initial objectives — seizing most of Ukraine’s city, including the capital Kyiv, and detaining or killing Ukrainian leaders — and the cost of Russia’s limited gains with a defiant speech pointing to a protracted invasion.

Putin’s declaration appeared to be a response to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, who told the nation on Wednesday that heavy weapons from western countries are now deployed at “full capacity” on frontlines.

Our defenders inflict very noticeable strikes on depots and other spots that are important for the logistics of the occupiers. And this significantly reduces the offensive potential of the Russian army. The losses of the occupiers will only increase every week, as will the difficulty of supplying them.

Putin thundered:

Today we hear that they want to defeat us on the battlefield. What can you say? Let them try. We have heard many times that the West wants to fight us to the last Ukrainian….

Everyone should know that, by and large, we haven’t started anything yet in earnest. At the same time, we don’t reject peace talks. But those who reject them should know that the further it goes, the harder it will be for them to negotiate with us.

He made no reference to the toll among Russia’s forces. The Ukrainian military claims about 36,000 Russian troops have been killed, with the destruction of thousands of armored vehicles and artillery piece, hundreds of warplanes and helicopters, and more than a dozen warships. Western military analysts assess that Russia has lost 1/3 of its initial invasion strength.

Ukraine Presidential advisor Mykhailo Podolyak responded to Putin: