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☆ Ukraine Indicts Officials Linked to Efforts to Investigate the Bidens
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-14 | by ( Andrew E. Kramer | More About Andrew E. Kramer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Those accused include Kostyantyn Kulyk, a former Ukrainian deputy prosecutor general who had drafted a memo in 2019 suggesting Ukraine investigate Hunter Biden, President Biden’s son, for his role serving on the board of a Ukrainian energy company. Also implicated were a current member of Ukraine’s Parliament, Oleksandr Dubinsky, and a former member, Andriy Derkach, who had publicly advocated for an investigation in Ukraine into Hunter Biden. They had also promoted a spurious theory that it was Ukraine, and not Russia, that had meddled in the 2016 presidential election in the United States. The three were indicted on charges of treason and belonging to a criminal organization. The charges refer to “information-subversive activities” and focus on actions in 2019 before the American presidential election.

Persons: Rudolph W, Giuliani, Biden, Kostyantyn, Hunter Biden, Biden’s, Oleksandr Dubinsky, Andriy Derkach Organizations: Hunter Locations: Russian, Ukraine, Ukrainian, Russia, United States

Ms. Vynokur, 26, the hardware store clerk, turned out for the training with a friend after seeing an advertisement on Instagram. “What attracted me is this is only for women,” she said. “As women, we are all on the same level,” she said. Of serving in the military, she said: “Everybody understands the war won’t be over in a month. It does not draft women, though recently it has required that women with medical training register for the draft.

Persons: Vynokur, ”, “ Locations: Kyiv

The family of Major Serhiy Kuznyev sensed something was wrong. He was not answering his phone. Officers in his unit refused to provide information on him. He had always told his family that he was deployed far from the front. “To us, he always said, ‘all is good,’” Anna said in a telephone interview.

Persons: Serhiy Kuznyev, Anna Kuznyeva, ’ ” Anna, “, Major Locations: Ukraine, Russian

☆ ‘I Am Dreaming It Will Stop’: A Deadlocked War Tests Ukrainian Morale
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-05 | by ( Andrew E. Kramer | More About Andrew E. Kramer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Ukrainians were most hopeful, polls indicated, last winter, in the run-up to the counteroffensive in the south. Trust in government fell from 74 percent in May to 39 percent in October, the period when the Ukrainian offensive began and then petered out, the institute found. Despite months of bloody trench fighting and tens of thousands of casualties, little land has changed hands since. “The boys who are at the front are physically and psychologically tired,” Mr. Tkachyk said. This war will last a long time.”

Persons: Valery Zaluzhny, Andriy Tkachyk, Mr, Tkachyk, “, ” Organizations: Kyiv International Institute of Sociology, Ukrainian Locations: Trust, Kherson city, Tukhlia, Ukraine

The emerging fissure between the general and the president comes as Ukraine is struggling in its war effort, militarily and diplomatically. At the same time, skepticism about Ukraine aid has increased in some European capitals and among members of the Republican Party in the United States. Ukraine’s leadership is also worried that the attention of Western allies has shifted to the conflict between Israel and Hamas, and away from its war with Russia. “The war in the Middle East, this conflict takes away the focus,” Mr. Zelensky said on Saturday. American officials have hinted that Ukraine was to blame for dispersing its forces too widely; Mr. Zelensky said his army did not receive sufficient weaponry to advance.

Persons: “, Mr, Zelensky Organizations: Republican Party, Hamas Locations: Ukraine, United States, Israel, Russia, Kyiv

With the front line in Ukraine having barely shifted despite months of fierce fighting, Ukraine’s top commander has acknowledged that his forces are locked in a “stalemate” with Russia and that no significant breakthrough was imminent, the most candid assessment so far by a leading Ukrainian official of the military’s stalled counteroffensive. “Just like in the First World War we have reached the level of technology that puts us into a stalemate,” the commander, Gen. Valery Zaluzhny, told The Economist in an interview published on Wednesday. He added that Russian forces, too, are incapable of advancing. The general said modern technology and precision weapons on both sides were preventing troops from breaching enemy lines, including the expansive use of drones, and the ability to jam drones. He called for advances in electronic warfare as a way to break the deadlock.

Persons: Valery Zaluzhny, Zaluzhny Locations: Ukraine, Russia, Ukrainian

Countries sent national security advisers to the Ukraine Peace Forum, the third round of talks based on the country’s proposed 10-point settlement for the war, called the Peace Formula, which calls for a complete withdrawal of Russian forces, an end of hostilities and reparations. Russia was not invited to the forum, reflecting the lack of appetite from Moscow or Kyiv for peace talks — the idea is anathema to Ukraine while Russian forces occupy part of its territory. Even as Ukraine battles to regain territory on the backfield, it is also pursuing an international consensus around its cause, and the forum provided an opportunity to advance its diplomatic position. It is a “fundamentally important first goal” to rally international support, Pavlo Klimkin, a former Ukrainian foreign minister, said in an interview from the talks, which are being held behind closed doors. Another goal, he said, is “to prevent possible sliding toward Russia.”President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine said in an overnight speech that 66 countries had attended the forum, which Malta’s foreign ministry said it had organized at Ukraine’s request.

Persons: Pavlo Klimkin, Volodymyr Zelensky, Zelesnky, Maria Zakharova Organizations: Ukraine Peace, ”, European Union, Hamas Locations: Malta, Ukraine, Africa, Latin America, Asia, Russia, Moscow, Kyiv, Ukrainian, United States, Britain, India, Brazil, South Africa, Gaza, Israel

The killing of an enemy admiral in a missile strike would be a coup for any military, but the celebration in Ukraine over the death of Russia’s Black Sea fleet commander may turn out to be short-lived. A day after announcing that the admiral was among 34 officers killed in a strike deep behind enemy lines, Ukrainian officials acknowledged on Tuesday that there might be some uncertainty. The Ukrainian military’s statement that it was now “clarifying” whether the admiral, Viktor Sokolov, had in fact been killed in an audacious strike last week in Russian-held Crimea came after Moscow released a video on Tuesday purporting to show the admiral attending a meeting earlier in the day. Given Moscow’s long history of refusing to acknowledge military setbacks, and the challenges of authenticating its video, it remained uncertain on Tuesday whether Admiral Sokolov was among those killed in the Ukrainian attack on the headquarters of Moscow’s fleet in Sevastopol.

Persons: Viktor Sokolov, Admiral Sokolov Locations: Ukraine, Russian, Crimea, Moscow, Sevastopol

Ukraine’s military claimed on Monday that it had killed the commander of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet in a strike on Crimea — a blow that, if confirmed, would be among the most damaging suffered by the Russian Navy since the sinking of the fleet’s flagship last year. Citing “new information about the losses of the enemy as a result of the special operation,” Ukraine’s special operations forces said in a statement that the strike on Friday killed 34 officers, including the fleet commander, and wounded 105 others. It did not name the naval leader, but the commander of the Black Sea Fleet is Adm. Viktor Sokolov, one of the most senior officers in Russia’s Navy. The attack came during a meeting of Russian commanders, Ukraine’s military said, and badly damaged a headquarters of the Russian fleet in Sevastopol, Crimea. The chief of Ukrainian military intelligence, Kyrylo Budanov, also told Voice of America on Saturday that the strike had badly wounded two senior Russian generals — Col. Gen. Aleksandr Romanchuk and Lieut.

Persons: ”, Viktor Sokolov, Kyrylo Budanov, — Col, Gen, Aleksandr Romanchuk, Oleg Tsekov Organizations: Russian Navy, Black, Russia’s Navy, Russian, America, Russia’s Defense Ministry Locations: Crimea, Sevastopol, Russian

☆ Another Step for Ukraine: Armored Vehicles Breach Some Russian Defenses
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-22 | by ( Andrew E. Kramer | More About Andrew E. Kramer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

For weeks, Ukrainian forces have been probing Russian defenses in the southeast, looking for an opening to push their armored vehicles behind the main Russian line. But artillery fire and Russian counterattacks had been too intense to allow Ukrainian armor to pass. This week, though, Ukrainian armored vehicles advanced past Russia’s main anti-tank defenses at one location on the frontline, according to reconnaissance video and commanders, showing slight progress in Kyiv’s halting counteroffensive. The vehicles, however, are confined to slender routes through minefields and have little room to maneuver, he said. Earlier this summer, Ukrainian tanks had broken through a less formidable layer of defenses, and infantry had pierced a second line, seen as Russia’s main anti-tank barrier.

Persons: Ashot Arutiunian Locations: Russian, Ukrainian, Verbove, Zaporizhzhia

They are made of plastic or plastic foam, weigh only a few pounds and are often launched simply by having a soldier throw them into the air, as if tossing a javelin. In a slow-moving counteroffensive against Russian forces that has been reliant at times on the smallest advantages, a fleet of cheap, mostly off-the-shelf drones is providing one for the Ukrainians. The drones have begun to make a difference in one corner of a stagnant war, soldiers, commanders and pilots said in interviews, because their different materials and variable frequencies can evade enemy jamming systems. That has allowed them to venture farther in searches for enemy artillery positions and multimillion-dollar air defense systems, all while risking aircraft worth only a few thousand dollars apiece.

Organizations: Russian

“Russia believes that the world will grow weary and allow it to brutalize Ukraine without consequence,” Mr. Biden said as President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine watched from the audience. I respectfully suggest the answer is no.”“We have to stand up to this naked aggression today to deter other would-be aggressors tomorrow,” Mr. Biden continued. “Ask Prigozhin if one bets on Putin’s promises.”Both Mr. Biden and Mr. Zelensky received strong applause from some of the delegations in the hall, but many others did not clap. On Tuesday evening, Mr. Biden and Jill Biden were to host a reception for other world leaders at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. “This is clearly a genocide,” Mr. Zelensky said.

Persons: Biden, Mr, Volodymyr Zelensky, Zelensky, Vladimir V, Moscow, ”, Yevgeny Prigozhin, Putin, “, Biden’s, Kevin McCarthy, we’ve, Lloyd J, Austin III, Ukraine’s, Xi Jinping, Jill Biden, Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Netanyahu, “ Slava Ukraini Organizations: appeasing Moscow, United Nations General Assembly, Republicans, United Nations, International Criminal Court, . Security, Mr, White, Pentagon, Capitol, Defense, General, appeasing, United, Soviet Union —, Turkmenistan —, Metropolitan Museum of Art, United Nations ’ Locations: Russia, Ukraine, United States, Washington, New York, Russia’s, Germany, China, Beijing, Libya, “, United Nations, Soviet Union, Soviet Union — Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, China’s, Brazil, Iran, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Moldova, Georgia, Syria, Belarus, Baltic

The entire world has a vested interest in helping defeat the Russian invasion of Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine told the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday, casting his appeal for more allies and aid as a matter of security — even survival — for many other nations. Delivering one of the most anticipated speeches of the annual gathering of world leaders, Mr. Zelensky painted Russia as a habitual aggressor, citing Moscow’s military interventions in Moldova, Georgia and Syria, its increased control over Belarus and its threats against the Baltic States. “The goal of the present war against Ukraine is to turn our land, our people, our lives, our resources, into a weapon against you, against the international rules-based order,” he said. Almost 19 months into a war with no end in sight, U.N. leaders had signaled that they wanted this year’s General Assembly, which began on Tuesday, to center on global warming and the sustainable development of poorer countries. They were hoping for less of a focus on Ukraine than last year, when Mr. Zelensky addressed the gathering by video.

Persons: Volodymyr Zelensky, Zelensky, “, ” Organizations: General, Assembly Locations: Russian, Ukraine, Russia, Moldova, Georgia, Syria, Belarus, Baltic States

☆ In U.S. Visit, Zelensky to Make a Case for More Aid, and Say Thank You
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-18 | by ( Andrew E. Kramer | More About Andrew E. Kramer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

A hero’s welcome awaited President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine on his first trip to the United States after Russia’s full-scale invasion, which came on the heels of two back-to-back military advances that showcased Ukrainian momentum to the West. Mr. Zelensky spoke to a joint session of Congress last December, highlighting the successes and appealing for continued aid. Then he will travel to Washington to meet with congressional leaders and visit the White House. The Ukrainian president is approaching his appearances with a more balanced message. He remains a tireless advocate for military assistance for the Ukrainian Army, but has infused his pleas with deep expressions of gratitude for what the West has already provided.

Persons: Volodymyr Zelensky, Zelensky, Zelensky’s Organizations: Ukrainian Army Locations: Ukraine, United States, New York, Russia, Washington, Ukrainian

Two weeks after replacing its defense minister, Ukraine dismissed all six of its deputy ministers on Monday, deepening the housecleaning at a ministry that had drawn criticism for corruption in procurement as the military budget ballooned during the war. Mr. Zelensky is scheduled to address the United Nations General Assembly in person on Tuesday in New York, and later in the week to meet with President Biden and members of Congress in Washington in his ongoing efforts to shore up support for military aid. He is expected to argue that defending Europe’s borders from an expansionist Russia in Ukraine serves Western interests in preventing a wider war and the destabilization of the European Union. In Ukraine’s fight to take back territory seized by the Russian invasion, the chain of command for battlefield decisions runs directly from Mr. Zelensky to the military’s uniformed general staff, largely bypassing the civilians at the defense ministry, so the turnover is not expected to have an immediate effect on the course of the war. The ministry’s role is primarily not in tactics but logistics — procurement, salaries and benefits — where changes may not be felt right away.

Persons: Volodymyr Zelensky’s, Zelensky, Biden Organizations: United Nations General Assembly, European Union Locations: Ukraine, United States, New York, Washington, Russia, Western, Russian

Elon Musk foiled an attack on Russia’s Black Sea fleet last year by refusing to let Ukraine use his satellite network to guide its drones, Mr. Musk has acknowledged, provoking a furious response from a top official in Kyiv and renewing questions about the global power wielded by a multibillionaire businessman. But Mr. Musk would not allow the network to be used for an attack last September with maritime drones on the Russian naval base at Sevastopol in Crimea, the Ukrainian territory that Russia illegally seized in 2014 and then annexed. At the time of the attempted attack, Mr. Musk spoke with the Russian ambassador to the United States, Anatoly I. Antonov, who had told him an attack on Crimea “could lead to a nuclear response,” according to a biography of Mr. Musk by the historian and journalist Walter Isaacson. The account was included in an excerpt from the book published on Thursday by The Washington Post. Mr. Musk confirmed elements of the story, writing on his social network X, formerly Twitter, “If I had agreed to their request, then SpaceX would be explicitly complicit in a major act of war and conflict escalation.”

Persons: Elon Musk, Musk, Anatoly I, Antonov, Walter Isaacson Organizations: Mr, SpaceX, Russian, The New York Times, The Washington Locations: Ukraine, Kyiv, Russia, Sevastopol, Crimea, Ukrainian, Russian, United States

They said the attack hit an outdoor marketplace at about 2 p.m., when it was busy with vendors and shoppers, while Mr. Blinken was in Kyiv. People who did nothing wrong. Many wounded. Unfortunately, the number of casualties and the injured may rise,” Mr. Zelensky wrote on Telegram. For anyone around the world to continue to deal with Russia, he added, “means turning a blind eye” to atrocities.

Persons: Antony J, Blinken, Voloydmyr Zelensky, “, Mr, Zelensky Locations: Russia, Russian, Kyiv

☆ Russia Bombards Ukraine, Killing at Least 1: Live Updates
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-06 | by ( Andrew E. Kramer | Erin Mendell | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +5 min

Destruction near the village of Robotyne, in the Zaporizhzhia region of Ukraine, late last month. For their part, Ukrainian military officials refrained from making any sweeping claims. Ukrainians forces enjoyed surprising successes earlier in the war by holding Kyiv, the capital, and repelling Russian forces at the end of March last year. The Ukrainian military aims to reclaim land in the south and east of the country. To reach that city, Ukrainian forces would have to fully break through the defenses around Verbove and then breach additional layers.

Persons: Oleksandr Shtupun, Daniel Berehulak, Michael Kofman, Rob Lee, Volodymyr Zelensky, Gen, Oleksandr Syrskyi, Zelensky Organizations: Ukrainian Army, Black Bird Group, The New York Times, Presidential Press Service, Russian Locations: Robotyne, Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, Ukrainian, Verbove, Russian, Moscow, Kyiv, Dmytrivka, Azov, Melitopol, Crimea, Tokmak, Bakhmut, Donetsk

President Volodymyr Zelensky named Rustem Umerov as his choice to be Ukraine’s next defense minister, opting for a prominent member of the Crimean Tatar ethnic group who has played a key role in negotiations with Russia since the start of the war. In announcing his decision on Sunday to replace Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov, Mr. Zelensky was brief. Umerov,” he said, “does not need any additional introductions.”Though a member of an opposition political party, Mr. Umerov, 41, has taken on several critical roles for the government since the Russian invasion last year. He was the chief Ukrainian negotiator of an agreement that allowed Ukraine to export some of its grain, and a prominent negotiator on prisoner exchanges. A former investment banker, Mr. Umerov is a lawmaker with the Holos party, which is in opposition to Mr. Zelensky’s Servant of the People party.

Persons: Volodymyr Zelensky, Umerov, Oleksii Reznikov, Zelensky, Mr, ”, “, Zelensky’s, Roman Abramovich Organizations: Defense, People, Ukraine Locations: Russia, Ukraine, Russian, Istanbul

☆ ‘Where Is the Money?’ Military Graft Becomes a Headache for Ukraine
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-04 | by ( Andrew E. Kramer | More About Andrew E. Kramer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The removal of Ukraine’s minister of defense after a flurry of reports of graft and financial mismanagement in his department underscores a pivotal challenge for President Volodymyr Zelensky’s wartime leadership: stamping out the corruption that had been widespread in Ukraine for years. But Mr. Zelensky’s announcement Sunday night that he was replacing the defense minister, Oleksii Reznikov, elevated the issue to the highest level of Ukrainian politics. It comes at a pivotal moment in the war, as Ukraine prosecutes a counteroffensive in the country’s south and east that relies heavily on Western allies for military assistance. Just last week, the United States’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, met with three high-ranking Ukrainian officials to discuss efforts to stamp out wartime corruption. It comes as some lawmakers in the United States have used graft as an argument for limiting military aid to Ukraine.

Persons: Volodymyr Zelensky’s, Oleksii, Mr, Jake Sullivan Organizations: United Locations: Ukraine, Kyiv, United States

☆ Zelensky Says He’ll Replace Ukraine’s Defense Minister
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-03 | by ( Andrew E. Kramer | More About Andrew E. Kramer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Sunday that he was replacing his minister of defense, in the biggest shake-up in Ukraine’s government since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February last year. Mr. Zelensky said in a statement that he would replace Mr. Reznikov, who has not been personally implicated in the widening investigations into mishandling of military contracts, with Rustem Umerov, the chairman of Ukraine’s State Property Fund. Mr. Zelensky said he expected Ukraine’s Parliament, which must approve the change, to sign off on his request. “Oleksii Reznikov has gone through more than 550 days of full-scale war,” Mr. Zelensky said in a statement announcing his decision on Sunday night. “I believe that the ministry needs new approaches and other formats of interaction with both the military and society at large.”

Persons: Volodymyr Zelensky, Oleksii Reznikov, Zelensky, Reznikov, Rustem Umerov, “ Oleksii Reznikov, Mr, “ Organizations: Mr, Ukraine’s, Property Fund Locations: Ukraine

Around the same time, Russia unleashed an aerial assault on at least three regions of Ukraine, officials in Ukraine said, including one of the most significant barrages the Kyiv region has experienced in months. Ukraine’s air force said it had shot down 43 of 44 incoming missiles and drones. Explosions and the roar of air-defense missiles shook Kyiv, the capital, around 5 a.m. Serhiy Popko, head of the Kyiv regional military administration, said that two people in the city had been killed by falling debris. The assault in Russia came after months of Moscow’s deadly missile and drone strikes on Ukrainian cities, infrastructure and military targets. While Ukrainian officials did not claim responsibility for the overnight strikes on Russian soil, in keeping with standard practice, they have made it increasingly clear that they view taking the war to ordinary Russians as a legitimate tactic against Moscow’s invasion.

Persons: Serhiy Popko Organizations: NATO, Kyiv Locations: Russia, Estonia, Ukraine

☆ A Current War Collides With the Past: How World War II Endures in Ukraine
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-18 | by ( Andrew E. Kramer | More About Andrew E. Kramer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

Clambering over boulders, past old tires and shellfish-encrusted scrap metal, Oleksandr Shkalikov ventured onto the dry bed of a vast reservoir. Out in this wasteland rested a haunting reminder of long-ago battles on this same swath of southern Ukraine: a swastika, chipped into a rock, had emerged from the receding water. The year “1942’’ was written next to it. “History is repeating itself,” Mr. Shkalikov, a tank driver on leave from the Ukrainian army, said of the World War II-era carving. “We are fighting this war on the same landscape and with the same weapons” as those used in World War II, he said, evoking the heavy artillery and tanks that still shape the course of a land war.

Persons: Oleksandr Shkalikov, ’, ” Mr, Shkalikov Locations: Ukraine, Salt Lake, Utah

☆ Small, Hidden and Deadly: Mines Stymie Ukraine’s Counteroffensive
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-16 | by ( Andrew E. Kramer | More About Andrew E. Kramer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

It was a grisly scene of bloody limbs and crumpled vehicles as a series of Russian mines exploded across a field in southern Ukraine. One Ukrainian soldier stepped on a mine and tumbled onto the grass in the buffer zone between the two armies. Nearby lay other Ukrainian troops, their legs in tourniquets, waiting for medical evacuation, according to videos posted online and the accounts of several soldiers involved. A medic jumped out to treat the wounded and knelt on ground he deemed safe — only to trigger another mine with his knee. Five weeks into a counteroffensive that even Ukrainian officials say is off to a halting start, interviews with commanders and soldiers fighting along the front indicate the slow progress comes down to one major problem: land mines.

Locations: Ukraine, Ukrainian, tourniquets

The toll includes some of the formidable Western fighting machines — tanks and armored personnel carriers — the Ukrainians were counting on to beat back the Russians. The startling rate of losses dropped to about 10 percent in the ensuing weeks, the officials said, preserving more of the troops and machines needed for the major offensive push that the Ukrainians say is still to come. Some of the improvement came because Ukraine changed tactics, focusing more on wearing down the Russian forces with artillery and long-range missiles than charging into enemy minefields and fire. The losses have also slowed because the counteroffensive itself has slowed — and even halted in places — as Ukrainian soldiers struggle against Russia’s formidable defenses. And despite the losses, the Ukrainians have so far taken just five of the 60 miles they hope to cover to reach the sea in the south and split the Russian forces in two.

Locations: Ukraine, —, Russian

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