Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy greets NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, Kyiv, Ukraine, April 20, 2023 (Efrem Lukatsky/AP)

EA on International Media: Biden, the UK, and the NATO Summit

EA on BBC: Biden’s UK Trip and the Not-So-Special-Relationship

Sunday’s Coverage: Russia Has Killed 10,500+ Civilians, Committed 94,000 War Crimes — Prosecutor General

Map: Institute for Study of War

UPDATE 2115 GMT:

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has lifted his blockade of Sweden’s accession to NATO.

On the eve of Tuesday’s NATO Summit in Lithuania, Erdoğan stepped back from his 15-month obstruction after talks in Vilnius with Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg.

Kristersson hailed a “very big step”: “This feels very good, this has been my aim for a long time, and I believe we had a very fine response today and took a very big step towards membership.”

Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbhán has also stood in the way of Sweden’s accession. He and his ruling Fidesz Party have delayed a Parliamentary session for ratification until the autumn.

However, the Orbán Government has said it would not be the last holdout among NATO’s 31 member states.

Stoltenberg did not give a specific commitment on the timing of Swedish accession, saying that Erdoğan had agreed to Turkey’s Parliamentary ratification “as soon as possible”.

In return for lifting his blockade, Erdoğan obtained a joint statement from NATO and Sweden that Ankara and Stockholm will work closely in “counter-terrorism coordination” and boost trade ties.

The statement also alluded to Erdoğan’s declaration earlier in the day that the 24-year process for Turkey’s admission to the European Union would be revived: “Sweden will actively support efforts to reinvigorate Turkey’s EU accession process, including modernization of the EU-Turkey Customs Union and visa liberalization.”

Erdoğan has also reportedly reaped the reward of US provision of F-16 jets.

UPDATE 1309 GMT:

Scholz used the phrase on the eve of the NATO Summit in Lithuania, while Biden issued the statement in a weekend interview with CNN.

UPDATE 1046 GMT:

Vladimir Putin met with the leader of the Wagner Group’s mercenaries, Yevgeny Prigozhin, only days after Wagner’s rebellion on June 23-24.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said the three-hour meeting was on June 29. The 35 attendees included Wagner commanders.

Peskov did not comment on the substance of the discussion, instead giving a general description:

The only thing we can say is that the President gave his assessment of [Wagner’s] actions at the front during the Special Military Operation and also gave his assessment of the events of June 24.

He said Putin listened to Wagner commanders’ explanations of the rebellion and offered them further options for employment and combat.

“[The commanders] emphasized that they are staunch supporters and soldiers of the head of state and the Supreme Commander-in-Chief. They also said that they are ready to continue fighting for the Motherland,” Peskov declared.

The spokesperson was responding to a story, first put out by the French newspaper Libération, that Putin had met Prigozhin on July 1. The report said the head of Russia’s National Guard, Viktor Zolotov, and of the SVR foreign intelligence service, Sergey Naryshkin, were also present.

Under the deal to end Wagner’s 36-hour rebellion, Prigozhin was supposed to move to Belarus. However, reports indicated that he soon returned to Russia — if he ever left the country.

UPDATE 1037 GMT:

En route to the NATO summit in Lithuania, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has struck another pose in his blockade of Sweden’s accession.

Erdoğan said the European Union should accept Turkey as a member before Sweden joins NATO.

Turkey was officially recognized as a candidate for full membership of the EU in 1999, but the process has been stalled for years.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said that as he backs Turkish membership of the European Union, Sweden has already met the necessary conditions for accession.

“It is still possible to have a positive decision on Sweden in Vilnius,” he said.

Germany’s Olaf Scholz said optimistically, “I hope that soon Sweden will be able to become a NATO member. This is what I’m taking as the positive message from the Turkish President’s comments.”

However, he declined to link the two issues:

Sweden meets all the requirements for NATO membership. The other question is one that is not connected with it, and that is why I do not think it should be seen as a connected issue.

A Biden Administration spokesperson said the US continued to support Turkey’s aspiration for EU membership, but stressed that this is a matter between Ankara and the members of the bloc.

UPDATE 0948 GMT:

Ukraine Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba has tweeted that the NATO will lift the requirement for a Membership Action Plan, accelerating Ukraine’s path to accession once the process begins.

The MAP can take years for completion in ordinary circumstances — Montenegro was invited to start the MAP in December 2009 and joined NATO in June 2017.

It was also lifted for Finland and Sweden as they announced their candidacies last year.

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy told US television in an interview over the weekend:

The Vilnius summit is very important. If there is no unity regarding the technical invitation for Ukraine to join the Alliance, it’s all a matter of political will just to find the proper wording and invite Ukraine. It would be an important message to say that NATO is not afraid of Russia.

Ukraine should get clear security guarantees while it is not in NATO. Only under these conditions, our meeting would be meaningful. Otherwise, it’s just another politics.

UPDATE 0856 GMT:

The Russian investigative journalism outlets Meduza and Mediazona estimate that about 47,000 Russian soldiers and mercenaries have been killed during Vladimir Putin’s invasion up to May 27, 2023.

The estimate was generated from inheritance registers and excess mortality rates.

The outlets say that, with their documentation of fatalities, there is 95% probability that the confirmed number is between 40,000 and 55,000.

The Ukraine military says Russia has lost more than 230,000 personnel.

Moscow has not released official figures since last September, when it said 5,937 soldiers had perished in Putin’s “special military operation”.

The 47,000 figure from Mediazona and Meduza is three times the troop fatalities in the Soviet Union’s war in Afghanistan from 1979 to 1989.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov tried to sidestep the investigation, “We stopped monitoring the Meduza publication, so we don’t know what kind of material it is.”

He evaded further questions about casualties: “The figures for losses are given by the Defense Ministry and they are the only ones who have such a prerogative.”

UPDATE 0756 GMT:

Gen. Valery Gerasimov, the Chief of Staff of Russia’s armed forces and overall commander of the Ukraine invasion, has been seen in public for the first time since the Wagner Group rebellion of June 23-24.

Wagner’s head Yevgeny Prigozhin had demanded the dismissal of Gerasimov and Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu. Over the weekend, video of Shoygu inspecting Russian troops was shown on Russian State media.

Some Russian military observers have speculated that Gerasimov had been replaced by Col.-Gen. Mikhail Teplinskiy, the commander of the Russian Airborne Forces.

UPDATE 0733 GMT:

Russia has bombed a humanitarian aid point in Orikhiv in southern Ukraine, killing four people and injuring 11.

The governor of the Zaporizhzhia region, Yuriy Malashko, said the victims are three women and a man, all in their 40s. He noted that Russia carried out 36 targeted strikes on 10 settlements across the region.

UPDATE 0627 GMT:

UK military intelligence notes the high level of Russian troops who have died because of inadequate combat medical care.

Citing “an average of around 400 casualties a day for 17 months”, the analysts note the assessment of Russia’s Kalashnikov company that up to 50% of fatalities could have been prevented with proper first aid.

Very slow casualty evacuation, combined with the inappropriate use of the crude in-service Russian combat tourniquet, is reportedly a leading cause of preventable fatalities and amputations.

The toll has affected civilian medical services, particularly in regions near Ukraine, and military hospitals are reserving space for officer casualties.

UPDATE 0612 GMT:

Poland has now detained 15 suspected members of a Russian spy network, Interior Minister Mariusz Kaminski says.

He posted on Twitter, “The suspect kept surveillance of military facilities and seaports. He was systematically paid by the Russians.”

Polish officials said in March they had broken up a Russian espionage network which was preparing acts of sabotage and monitoring rail routes to Ukraine.

UPDATE 0559 GMT:

Ukrainian military officials are announcing “a definite advance” on the eastern front of their counter-offensive, to the south of the city of Bakhmut in the Donetsk.

Ukraine’s troops are on the outskirt of the village of Klishchiivka. Its capture would enable them to control the heights over Bakhmut, putting pressure on Russian forces who seized the city in May after a year-long offensive.

The commander of Ukraine’s ground forces, Col.-Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi, said on Monday, “Bakhmut. The enemy is trapped. The city is under fire control of the Defense Forces.”

Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Maliar said on Telegram that there was no change on Sunday in positions to the north of Bakhmut, where Ukrainian forces have also been liberating territory.

Maliar said the counter-offensive is “consolidating our gains” on the southern front towards the cities of Melitopol and Berdyansk. “Fierce fighting” continues.

Speaking on US television, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said, “Today, the initiative is on our side. We are advancing, albeit not as fast [as we would like]. But we are advancing.”

ORIGINAL ENTRY: This week’s NATO Summit in Lithuania’s capital will announce “enabling security guarantees” for Ukraine.

However, amid Russia’s 16 1/2-month invasion and the Ukrainian counter-offensive to liberate territory in the east and south of the country, the detail of the guarantees has not been made public.

And there are questions about the path and pace of Ukraine’s accession to NATO after the defeat of Vladimir Putin’s assault.

In the weeks leading up to the Tuesday-Wednesday summit, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg and some of the 31 members have endorsed Ukrainian accession. However, all have made clear that the priority is the success of the counter-offensive, now in its fourth week in the Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia regions.

There have been difference in rhetoric over the political and military course of accession after liberation. Stoltenberg and some countries have indicated that the duration for the Membership Action Plan could be shortened.

However, Germany is reportedly cautious. And US President Joe Biden, noting the need for a “rational path”, said in a recorded interview on Sunday: “NATO is a process that takes some time to meet all the qualifications – from democratization to a whole range of other issues.”

Ukraine Foreign Ministry Dmytro Kuleba said on Saturday that “what is missing” is a decision on the acceleration of the process with “clarity on Ukraine’s accession invitation”. He called for the 31-nation bloc to seize the “unique moment” in Vilnius.

Sweden Tries to Lift Turkey’s Blockade of Accession

Sweden’s Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson will meet Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Monday, hoping to lift the Turkish President’s blockade of Swedish accession.

Since May 2022, when Sweden and Finland announced their candidacies, Erdoğan has used the process for leverage on the “Kurdish issue” in Turkey. He has demanded a crackdown on Kurdish activists in Sweden, claiming that they are linked to the Turkish Kurdish insurgency PKK.

Before his re-election in May, Erdoğan stepped back on Finland. Oslo became NATO’s 31st member on the bloc’s 74th anniversary on April 4.

But, despite Sweden adopting “anti-terrorism” legislation — and convicting the first Kurdish activist under its terms — the Turkish President has maintained his criticism of the Swedish Government.

Erdoğan told US President Biden on Sunday, “Sweden has taken some steps in the right direction. However, he declared that Sweden’s decision permitting pro-Kurdish groups to “hold demonstrations”, claiming that they are “freely praising terrorism”, had “nullified those steps”.

Even if Ankara withdraws its objection, Swedish accession will not occur at Vilnius. Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, a long-time ally of Vladimir Putin, and his ruling Fidesz Party have ensured that no Parliamentary ratification of the Swedish bid can occur before the autumn.