“Russian troops are not retreating, they are repositioning. Russia has repeatedly lied about its intentions,” Atlantic Alliance Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg summed up yesterday, expressing suspicion shared by Kyiv over an alleged military de-escalation in the Kyiv and Chernihiv areas “to instill confidence.” announced the day before yesterday.
Time passes differently in this war. For Ukraine and the West, 36 days of conflict is an eternity, for Moscow it is just the end of the first phase of a war in which its boss is risking his fate. “It has become Putin’s personal war, despite the fact that the bill is being footed by innocent people in Ukraine and increasingly by ordinary Russians,” said Jeremy Fleming, chief of British intelligence from Australia.
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LV_NATO says Russia is not withdrawing troops from Ukraine, but “relocating” them.
In Kyiv, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called for our vigilance not to be lowered, fearing that the “dialogue” tone broadcast by Moscow in Istanbul could slow down military aid and lead international public opinion to believe the war was in its final days . In his opinion, Russia’s aim is to intensify its campaign in eastern Ukraine.
President Zelensky tirelessly addresses foreign parliaments on a daily basis and rarely fails to call for military aid and more sanctions against Russia. Yesterday it was Belgium and the Netherlands’ turn. Zelensky asked Antwerp not to buy diamonds from Russia, the supplier of 20%, to the Belgian Chamber. And as for the Netherlands, he reiterated his initial request that they “adopt” a city from Ukraine to help rebuild.
Ukrainian military commanders warn that the Russians in Gomel, Belarus, are preparing to sack the most severely punished garrisons to return to the outskirts of the capital with new forces and possible strategic changes. In this way, the Ukrainian army could not concentrate on defending its positions in the east.
“Ukraine has become Putin’s personal war,” says the British spy chief
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Ukrainian soldiers on the front lines: “If a tank fires at us, we only have 2 seconds to flee”
In this period of waiting and small gestures, Russian troops surrendered control of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant yesterday and retreated to Belarus, according to Ukraine’s State Agency for Nuclear Energy (Energoatom). The same passage describes other such episodes, indicating that the Russian army is disorganized. According to Energoatom, the Russian troops dug trenches and parked in the most dangerous area of the facility, for which they received “significant doses of radiation,” with the consequent “panic” attack and escape.
The occupation of the Chernobyl plant, one of the first tourist attractions in Ukraine according to the brochures, took place in the early hours of the war on February 24 and had forced Ukrainian workers to remain without the opportunity to change shifts. . The mention of Chernobyl, the greatest nuclear accident in history, which took place in 1986, reinforces this semblance of an “old war” revitalizing the 20th century.
Miracle or not, the armed conflict has sidestepped the risk of a collateral accident at Ukraine’s fifteen nuclear reactors, grouped into four major power plants, one of which, Zaporizhia, is under Russian control. Today, of all days, the Secretary General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Rafael Grossi, will meet those responsible for nuclear energy in Russia after his visit to Kyiv yesterday. The goal: to ensure maximum provision for both counterparties.
The situation in the coastal city of Mariupol remains the main humanitarian concern of this war. Last night, the Russian Defense Ministry announced that it will allow a humanitarian corridor in Mariupol today, April 1, in response to requests from French and German leaders to President Putin.
The International Committee of the Red Cross had already received good pledges from both sides to evacuate a significant number of civilians. Of the 430,000 peacetime residents, an estimated 100,000 live in the ruins of a prosperous city subjected to a ferocious siege that, against all odds, it continues to resist. To this end, the Ukrainian government yesterday organized a convoy of 45 buses that were due to arrive in Mariupol last night with the intention of traveling throughout Friday to Zaporizhia, the main city in the region under Ukrainian control (as opposed to its nuclear one). to depart power station).
Russians exit Chernobyl nuclear power plant with cases of radiation sick soldiers
The evacuation would mean the first full-fledged humanitarian corridor for Mariúpol, a black information hole that only the parties and talk about in contradictory terms. The possible evacuation is also a litmus test to show whether Moscow is “softening” its strategy of ending the resistance in Mariupol at all costs. When the announcement was made last night, Moscow insisted it was an act of Kremlin generosity towards the French and Germans (more discreetly than the French president, who announced last Friday that he was trying to achieve a humanitarian corridor Mariupol). The problem occurs in other cities – like Sumi or Jersón – where the fighting or the distribution of troops make it impossible to ensure the safety of the rescuers and the rescued.
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