International
Desertions in the Russian Army in Ukraine are growing, according to Kiev’s military intelligence
The number of desertions is growing in the ranks of the Russian Army in occupied Ukraine, according to information published on Monday by Ukrainian military intelligence (GUR).
“The desertions increase among the armed formations of the southern military district of the Russian occupation army,” reads the GUR note. “In total, more than 18,000 Russian soldiers have voluntarily left their military units in this district,” the text adds.
The territories occupied by Russia in the Ukrainian regions of Crimea, Lugansk, Donetsk, Zaporiyia and Kherson are included in the Southern Military District of Russia.
According to Kiev’s military intelligence, about 12,000 of these deserters belonged to the 8th Combined Arms Army of the Russian Armed Forces, which participates in hostilities in eastern Ukraine.
Information recently published by the Russian dissident media Mediazona estimated the total number of convictions for desertion handed down by Russian courts at 7,400, since the partial mobilization decreed by the Kremlin in September 2022.
They also alluded to the “record” number of Russians who evade military service and are asking for asylum in Western countries.
Meanwhile, the Ukrainian General Staff today reported massive Russian casualties and losses in the last 24 hours, after a week of Russian advances in Donetsk that has led the Army to recognize that the situation has worsened on the east front.
According to the last military report, Russia suffered more than 1,300 casualties during the last day, a figure substantially higher than those reported in previous days.
In addition, Kiev claims to have destroyed 37 Russian artillery systems in the last 24 hours.
Today, the “most complicated situation” for Ukraine occurs in the areas of Pokrovsk and Kurajiv, northwest and southwest respectively of Avdivka, which was occupied by Russia last February.
Ukrainian troops in this area have delayed their defensive line in the face of constant Russian attacks.
The head of the Army, Oleksandr Sirski, has highlighted the intensity of the fighting in the Khasiv Yar area, a town located about ten kilometers west of the occupied Bajmut, which is, according to Kiev, a Russian priority objective.
Despite these advances, the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, assured on Monday from Riyadh that the war against Ukraine launched two years ago by Russian President Vladimir Putin is a “strategic debacle” for Russia.
“The last thing I’m going to say about it is that if you take a step back and analyze it, I think this aggression by Russia has been a strategic debacle for Russia,” said the head of American diplomacy at the special session of the World Economic Forum (WEF), which ends today in Riyadh.
For Blinken, “as a whole, Russia is weaker economically. He is weaker militarily, given the destruction of so many of his forces. And it is weaker diplomatically in much of the world, not in everything, but in a large part.”
In this sense, the Secretary of State pointed to China as a country that is not supplying weapons and ammunition to Russia, but is providing “incalculable support” to its defense industry, through the sale of microelectronic products, machine tools and optics.
Blinken acknowledged that the increase in Russia’s production capacities is something that Europe is “deeply concerned about turning against it” once the war in Ukraine is over.
International
Geert Wilders reaches a provisional agreement to form a government in the Netherlands
The leader of the Dutch extreme right, Geert Wilders, reached a “provisional” agreement on Wednesday to form a government with three other center-right parties, which he will now send to the Dutch Parliament for debate, although they have not yet agreed on behalf of the candidate for prime minister.
As announced by Wilders, leader of the Freedom Party (PVV), there is already a “provisional” agreement with the other three center-right parties: the liberal VVD, the Christian Democrat NSC and the BBB farmers’ party, although there are still disagreements about pensions and “the discussion about who will lead that government will be resumed at a later date” because they have not yet decided on this point.
Wilders won the general elections on November 22, but had to resign his aspiration to the position of prime minister to unblock the dialogue with the other parties.
International
Diana Boluarte goes to a new interrogation of the Attorney General for the ‘Rolex case’
The president of Peru, Dina Boluarte, arrived this Wednesday unexpectedly at the headquarters of the Public Ministry to be interrogated by the interim Attorney General, Juan Carlos Villena, as part of the preliminary investigation opened for the crimes of corruption and bribery by the so-called ‘Rolex case’.
Boluarte arrived at the tax headquarters, in the historic center of Lima, at 9:20 a.m. (14.20 GMT) sheltered by a large police security display and entered aboard an official van with dark moons.
As has happened on previous occasions, the ruler is not expected to offer subsequent statements about this interrogation.
International
The filmmaker Rasoulof will go to the Cannes Film Festival after fleeing Iran, according to his lawyer
Iranian filmmaker Mohamad Rasoulof, who fled his country after being sentenced to eight years in prison, will go to the Cannes Film Festival to present his film ‘The seed of the sacred fig’, his lawyer Babak Paknia told EFE.
“He (Rasoulof) will participate in Cannes,” Paknia said on Wednesday.
Rasoulof will present his film ‘The seed of the sacred fig’ at the French festival, which is about a judge who deals with the protests unleashed by the death of the young Iranian Mahsa Amini in 2022 after being arrested for not wearing the Islamic veil well.
Some actors of the film, however, will not be able to attend since the Iranian authorities do not allow them to leave the country, according to Paknia, who also stated that they have opened a new judicial case against the director for the film.
“They have opened a new case for this new film,” said Paknia, who did not explain the charges.
Rasoulof announced two days ago that he had fled his country to Europe after being sentenced to eight years in prison, lashes and the confiscation of property for the crime of “collusion with the intention of committing crimes against the security of the country.”
The filmmaker, winner of the Golden Bear of the Berlinale with ‘The Life of Others’ in 2020, a film that deals with the death penalty in the country, has had numerous problems with the country’s authorities and has been sentenced to prison on three occasions.
He was last arrested in July 2022 for criticizing the repression of protests unleashed by the collapse of a building that caused dozens of deaths two years ago and eight months later he was released.
In recent weeks, Iranian courts have multiplied convictions against artists and academics who are critical of the Islamic Republic.
In one of the most noted cases, a revolutionary court sentenced rapper Tomaj Salehi to death for sedition, propaganda against the system and incitement to riots for supporting the protests unleashed by Amini’s death.
In those protests, young Iranians and women called for the end of the Islamic Republic and only disappeared after a repression that caused 500 deaths and the arrest of at least 22,000 people and in which eight demonstrators were executed, one of them in public.
Geert Wilders reaches a provisional agreement to form a government in the Netherlands
Diana Boluarte goes to a new interrogation of the Attorney General for the ‘Rolex case’
The filmmaker Rasoulof will go to the Cannes Film Festival after fleeing Iran, according to his lawyer
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