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[1/4] A logo is on display in the office of Sberbank, Russia's state-owned dominant lender and one of the country's leading technology players, in Moscow, Russia, March 28, 2023. But it also highlights challenges as Russia's tech development becomes increasingly reliant on one state-owned player. Since 2020 it has cast itself as a technology company as well, and is now seeking a bigger slice of Russia's shrinking technology pie. "There are restrictions on some of them, it is a very complex technology," Belevtsev said. "There is already a lot of cooperation on engineers and technology," Belevtsev said.

☆ Russia digs in as Ukraine prepares to attack
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-27 | by ( Tom Balmforth | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +9 min

And in the case of Polohy, Russia has constructed two distinct defensive lines, one to the north and one to the south. Musiyenko estimated that Ukraine would have a force of between 100,000-110,000 for an attack, including eight assault brigades with a total of 40,000 troops. Russia has not said how many troops it has in Ukraine, or within its borders ready to deploy. A leaked U.S. intelligence document dated Feb. 28 seen by Reuters said the West had committed 200 tanks to Ukraine. Army chief Valeriy Zaluzhnyi said in December he needed 300 to defeat Russia, along with other vehicles and artillery.

[1/5] A local resident leaves after a doctor's visit at a clinic in the liberated village of Vyshneva, near Kharkiv, in eastern Ukraine, April 21, 2023. He can be certain of one thing, however: many patients he meets will be suffering from high blood pressure after living for months under Russian occupation near the frontlines. "Patients who we chat to say there was a considerable number of deaths because of the lack of medical help." The World Health Organization estimates that the overall damage to the system could cost more than $15 billion to repair. But as more people return to liberated areas, a skeleton staff buttressed by volunteers will struggle to meet needs.

Border of Steel is one of eight new storm brigades totalling 40,000 soldiers that Ukraine wants to use during a counter-offensive against Russian occupiers in coming weeks or months. Ukraine beat back Russian forces from Kyiv last year before liberating swathes of the northeast and of the southern Kherson region. But Russian forces still occupy tracts of the east, the strategically important south and the Crimean peninsula. "For them, the objective is to liberate Ukraine," Klymenko said of the recruits during an interview in Kyiv. He gave no clues as to when or where Ukraine would launch its counter-offensive.

[1/7] FILE PHOTO-Dmytro Zilko, a soldier and a patient of the clinic exercises on a new prosthesis with rehabilitation specialist Maria in a prosthetics clinic in Kyiv, Ukraine, March 9, 2023. "Unfortunately, the number of patients has increased significantly," said Andrii Ovcharenko, who works with a team of medics and technicians at the "Without Limits" prosthetics clinic, one of almost 80 now operating in Ukraine. On a recent morning, Ovcharenko's Kyiv clinic assessed two soldiers for artificial legs and adjusted the new limb of a third. U.S. Army General Mark Milley estimated in November at least 100,000 Russian military casualties - killed or wounded, with "probably" the same for Ukraine. It plans to expand, depending on how the war unfolds but is not sure where to open new clinics.

☆ Russia presses along Ukraine front after reports of Bakhmut slowdown
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-24 | by ( Mike Collett-White | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +7 min

As winter turns to spring, the main question in Ukraine is how much longer Russia can sustain its offensive, and when or whether Ukraine can reverse the momentum with a counterassault. [1/5] Anti-aircraft unit serviceman of the 10th Mountain Assault Brigade, call sign "Chub", 34, prepares to pose for a portrait with a portable anti-aircraft missile system, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, near Soledar north of Bakhmut, Ukraine March 23, 2023. The International Committee of the Red Cross said some 10,000 Ukrainian civilians, many elderly and with disabilities, were clinging on in horrific circumstances in Bakhmut and surrounding settlements. Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, saying Ukraine's ties to the West were a security threat. Since then, tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilians as well as soldiers on both sides have been killed.

☆ Inside Ukraine’s scramble for “game-changer” drone fleet
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-24 | by ( Max Hunder | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +10 min

It is hoping that domestic drone makers like AeroDrone will help it meet its ambitious goals. The government is now working with more than 80 Ukraine-based drone manufacturers, Ukraine's Defence Minister Oleksii Reznikov told Reuters. RUSSIAN TERRITORYThe range and potency of Ukraine's drones is a sensitive issue. Danilov, the national security council head, acknowledged Ukraine’s reliance on other countries for more high-tech drone components. "We are trying to fulfil our needs in this sector with domestic production, but we realise that it's unlikely we will be able to fulfil everything," he said.

☆ Ukrainians say Russian drones pose growing threat, more Stingers needed
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-23 | by ( Mike Collett-White | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

In a small hamlet west of Soledar, a town to the north of Bakhmut now under Russian control, troops from an anti-aircraft unit in Ukraine's 10th Mountain Assault Brigade were planning to use drones to attack Russian positions. Kamin, 42, showed Reuters some of the shoulder-held weapons the unit has used to reduce the threat of plane and helicopter attacks on frontline Ukrainian positions. "Now it is a war of drones," Kamin said. "The Russians used reconnaissance drones, but now they are also using more drones that are carrying weapons." Despite the growing focus on UAVs, Kamin urged Western allies to supply more anti-aircraft weapons, including U.S. Stingers, which he said he was running out of.

☆ To stay or go? The dilemma Ukrainians near front face every day
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-21 | by ( Mike Collett-White | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

KALYNIVKA, Ukraine, March 21 (Reuters) - It was finally time for Vasyl Kurlyshchuk to leave. She was going to stay in the settlement and wanted to know if Kurlyshchuk was taking his solar powered battery with him. What is now ordinary for the hundreds who remain in Chasiv Yar out of a pre-war population of some 13,000 would be extraordinary elsewhere. "Vera was evacuated to Poltava but a lot of people have stayed," said the 67-year-old, pointing to pictures on her smartphone of her friend, who had left Chasiv Yar for a safer place. That meant three fewer familiar faces for Olena and her friends as they carried on in Chasiv Yar.

☆ Ukraine war: Russia tightens ties with China as West offers $16 bln lifeline to Kyiv
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-20 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

A joint statement included familiar accusations against the West - that the United States was undermining global stability and NATO barging into the Asia-Pacific region. Putin praised Xi for a peace plan for Ukraine that he proposed last month and blamed Kyiv and the West for rejecting it. But Xi, who was due to depart Moscow on Wednesday, barely mentioned the conflict, saying that China had an "impartial position" on it. The money would help shore up Ukraine, which has suffered extensive damage to its infrastructure and economy during Russia's year-long invasion. [1/16] Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping leave after a reception in honor of the Chinese leader's visit to Moscow, at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia March 21, 2023.

The video showed what the Pentagon said were two Russian Su-27 fighter jets swooping toward the drone and releasing jet fuel on it in harassing behaviour. After a second pass by the jets, the video cuts out then resumes with images of the drone's damaged propeller. WAR CRIMES PROBEInvestigations by an international panel said some of Russia's actions since invading Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022, may be crimes against humanity. "The day will come when those guilty of war crimes against Ukraine will appear in the halls of the International Criminal Court and in national courtrooms," Zelenskiy said. Ukraine and its allies accuse Moscow of an unprovoked war to grab territory from its pro-Western neighbour.

☆ Mortars, artillery and small arms fire as battle for Bakhmut rages
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-16 | by ( Mike Collett-White | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

[1/2] Ukrainian service members fire a mortar towards Russian troops outside the frontline town of Bakhmut, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Donetsk region, Ukraine March 6, 2023. Reuters reporters heard dozens of shells being fired from Ukrainian positions near Chasiv Yar and Bakhmut on Thursday alone. Ihor, a 36-year-old soldier at the mortar position, said they had been targeted by air strikes, mortar fire and tank shelling. In the next door town of Chasiv Yar, a volunteer evacuation team drove a minibus through potholed lanes between small homes, many of them in ruins as artillery shelling shook the ground. On the side of the next street a man prepared a fire to make shashlik while a woman sat nearby chatting.

☆ 'We live in hell': Volunteer bus evacuates wounded Ukrainian troops
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-16 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

[1/8] A wounded Ukrainian soldier is evacuated in a converted bus, operated by Ukrainian volunteer medics, from the eastern frontline near Bakhmut to hospitals in the Dnipropetrovsk region, in Ukraine March 15, 2023. Six medics move up and down the narrow corridor between two rows of three beds that run the length of the bus, which is part of Ukraine's Hospitallers Medical Battalion that evacuates troops across Ukraine. "We had no possibility before in Ukraine to deliver casualties in such numbers between hospitals," he told Reuters. The initiative involves teams of volunteers rotating and spending several weeks on call, ready for when soldiers need moving further from the fighting. Tens of thousands of soldiers have been killed and wounded on both sides of the conflict since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine last February.

☆ North of Bakhmut, another key battle tests Ukraine's defences
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-15 | by ( Mike Collett-White | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +9 min

At the bottom of the attempted encirclement appears to be Soledar, meaning an area far larger than Bakhmut would be vulnerable. "The enemy would need a lot of forces to take this line (Sloviansk-Kramatorsk-Kostiantynivka) and therefore I think it is unlikely, given the losses the Russian troops are already suffering," he added. Russia has made only incremental gains around Bakhmut, which it has been trying to capture for eight months, and further north. He said he took part in both wars in the 1990s between Russian troops and separatists after the breakup of the Soviet Union. For now, artillery appears to hold the key to defending positions and pinning down the enemy for both sides.

☆ Russia, Ukraine battle for Bakhmut as ICC seeks war crime arrest warrants
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-13 | by ( Mike Collett-White | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

[1/4] Ukrainian service members fire a howitzer M119 at a front line, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, near the city of Bakhmut, Ukraine March 10, 2023. Russia says taking Bakhmut would open a path to capture all of Donetsk, a central war aim. Near Kreminna, north of Bakhmut, Ukrainian soldiers said on Monday they were repelling intensified attacks. It was unclear which Russian officials the prosecutor might seek warrants against or when they might come, but they could include the crime of genocide, the source said. Russia denies deliberately targeting civilian infrastructure in Ukraine, saying its attacks are all intended to reduce Kyiv's ability to fight.

But an international war crimes prosecution could deepen Moscow's diplomatic isolation and make it difficult for those accused to travel abroad. Russia denies deliberately targeting civilian infrastructure in Ukraine, saying its attacks are all intended to reduce Kyiv's ability to fight. Kyiv says thousands of deported Ukrainian children are being adopted into Russian families, housed in Russian camps and orphanages, given Russian passports and brought up to reject Ukrainian nationality. Asked if the ICC charges against the Russian officials could include genocide, the source said: "It looks that way." U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters aboard Air Force One that Ukraine had not confirmed a call between Xi and Zelenskiy.

[1/5] An employee works at the Chisinau-1 gas distribution plant of Moldovatransgaz energy company in Chisinau, Moldova March 4, 2023. REUTERS/Vladislav CuliomzaCHISINAU, March 10 (Reuters) - A coup attempt, bomb hoaxes, internet hacks, fake conscription call-ups, mass protests: Moldova says it's had them all in the past year. Moldova hosts the breakaway statelet of Transnistria - a sliver of land running along its eastern border with Ukraine that's controlled by pro-Russian separatists and garrisoned by Russian troops. FAKE CONSCRIPTION NOTICESMounting tensions between Moscow and the West over Ukraine have raised the temperature in Moldova. RUSSIAN TROOPS IN TRANSNISTRIAAn estimated 1,500 Russian troops are stationed in Transnistria, most of them recruited locally from Transnistrians with Russian passports.

☆ Ukraine detains officials over destruction of famous plane at start of war
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-10 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

[1/3] A Ukrainian service member walks in a front of the Antonov An-225 Mriya cargo plane, the world's biggest aircraft, destroyed by Russian troops as Russia's attack on Ukraine continues, at an airfield in the settlement of Hostomel, in Kyiv region, Ukraine April 3, 2022. REUTERS/Gleb GaranichKYIV, March 10 (Reuters) - Ukraine handed suspicion notices on Friday to three former top managers of aircraft manufacturer Antonov for obstructing the country's military and allowing Russia to destroy the iconic giant "Mriya" cargo plane at the start of the full-scale war. The Ukrainian-made "Mriya", which is Ukrainian for "dream", weighs some 705 tonnes and has a wingspan of 290 feet. The cargo plane was originally built in the late 1980s to transport a Soviet space shuttle. "Our state will definitely build a new plane, because the Dream, like Ukraine, cannot be destroyed," Malyuk said.

[1/5] Grain farmer Oleksandr Klepach points at trenches in his field, amid Russia's invasion of Ukraine, in Snihurivka, southeast Ukraine, February 20, 2023. Agricultural companies, which plant most of Ukraine's fields, are short 40 billion hryvnia ($1.08 billion) to carry out spring work, the Agrarian Council said. Grains have traditionally dominated Ukraine's fields, but lower-cost and higher-priced oilseeds are gaining popularity during war. Ukraine was the world's fourth-largest corn exporter before Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022 and the biggest sunflower oil exporter. Companies lacking demining certification are charging farmers up to $3,000 per hectare to clear fields, Ukrainian media reported on Tuesday.

The four members of the Brotherhood Battalion later buried in Kyiv were Yurii Horovets, 34, Taras Karpiuk, 38, Maksym Mykhailov, 32 and Bohdan Liagov, 19. Ukrainian authorities did not comment on the raid then, and have subsequently denied involvement in attacks claimed by Ukrainian-based groups on Russian soil. "Our aim is to bring the war over to Russian territory. "When we are on Russian territory, we act autonomously," he added. Ukraine's defence ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on its relationship with the Brotherhood Battalion, called "Bratstvo" in Ukrainian, and the armed forces.

It was one of the last still providing Ukrainian citizenship for newborns in the southern city of Kherson which was then under Russian occupation. Early in the occupation, Ukrainian parents faced pressure to accept Russian citizenship for their newborns. "When we asked for diapers, the Russians told us, 'If you come without Russian birth certificates, we will not give you diapers'," said Natalia Lukina, 42. The ministry did not respond to a request for comment on the situation in Kherson during Russian occupation. It is unclear how many babies received Russian citizenship, because Russian officials recorded them and Ukrainian registration workers did not cooperate with them, Klimenko said.

☆ ICC's top prosecutor in Ukraine to probe Russian attacks on power grid
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-28 | by ( Mike Collett-White | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

[1/3] Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and ICC Prosecutor Karim A. A. Khan QC meet, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine February 28, 2023. ICC Prosecutor Karim Khan said. Andriy Kostin, Ukraine's Prosecutor General who accompanied Khan to the bomb site, praised the cooperation between his offices and those of the ICC. Kostin's office said that tens of thousands of Russian attacks had been launched on infrastructure and civilians which had no military justification.

☆ Yellen says legal obstacles remain on seizure of Russian assets to aid Ukraine
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-27 | by ( David Lawder | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

Feb 27 (Reuters) - U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said on Monday that Russia should bear the costs of damage caused by its invasion of Ukraine, but there are "significant legal obstacles" to confiscating major frozen Russian assets. Washington has confiscated assets used in criminal activity but central bank and other large pools of assets frozen by sanctions are another matter. "We have on this small scale, seized assets, but there are certainly legal challenges in doing more than that," she said. The United States and Western allies have seized more than $300 billion in Russian central bank foreign currency assets frozen by sanctions. The assets are held abroad, with a significant portion at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, but remain under Russian ownership.

REUTERS/Lisi NiesnerLUCH, Ukraine, Feb 27 (Reuters) - For a Ukrainian village devastated by war, Cold War bunkers built to withstand a nuclear attack that never happened have proven a lifeline for residents who have spent much of the past year living in them. In April, with their village caught between Russian and Ukrainian forces, Gynzhul, her husband Dmytro and their son moved into a warehouse basement, just before their second-storey apartment was shelled. Ukrainian soldiers pushed the Russians south away from Luch last autumn and by early November had recaptured Kherson city. Gynzhul and the others in her bunker live off humanitarian aid and her 4,000 hryvnia ($109) per month salary from her administrative job in the village. Bunker resident Iryna Sichkar said her son was captured early in the war in Mariupol.

"America will stand with Ukraine as long as it takes," Yellen, flanked by sandbags at the cabinet ministers' office, told Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal. Yellen also announced the transfer of the first $1.25 billion from the latest, $9.9 billion tranche of economic and budget assistance from Washington. The latest funds are part of $45 billion in new military, economic and humanitarian approved by Congress in December as part of broad U.S. budget legislation. Yellen said such economic support is keeping Ukraine's government and critical public services running, schools open and pensions paid, providing a "bedrock of stability" that fuels Ukrainian resistance. 168, where the salaries of teachers, administrators and support staff are reimbursed from U.S. budget support funds.

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