2023-04-18 18:52:45
The war in Ukraine He turns 419 days old this Tuesday. continue the clashes in Donbas, between Russian and Ukrainian forces, where Russia advances in the city of Bajmut.
He Russian President Vladimir Putin is paying a surprise visit to the eastern Ukraine regions of Jerson and Lugansk on Tuesday and currently occupied by Russia, to speak with their military leaders and find out the status of the offensive.
He Brazilian Foreign Minister Mauro Vieira refutes US criticism of his country’s position in the war in Ukraine and has stressed that the only thing that interests the Brazilian authorities is promoting peace in the face of the statements of the spokesman for the National Security Council of the United States, John Kirby, who assures that the president of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, would be “parroting the propaganda” of Russia and China.
Lula will visit Portugal officially between April 22 and 25 and his presence there will not only be used by the Ukrainian community to express their discontent with the position adopted by Brazil in the war, but also with the Portuguese ultra-right.
On February 24, 2022, the President of Russia Vladimir Putinordered the Russian offensive in the country in what he called a “special military operation”.
Since then, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) estimates that about 20.5 million people have fled Ukraine, since the beginning of the Russian military offensive, which he considers to be the fastest exodus in Europe since World War II. In other words, almost 50% of the population –estimated at almost 41 million in 2021– would have left Ukrainian territory.
According to him last report of Institute Study of War (ISW) (1) stresses that Russian forces “they make further gains in Bakhmut and continued ground attacks along the Avdiivka-Donetsk axis“.
On the other hand, the ISW also claims that the Russian forces carry out “limited ground attacks northeast of Kupyansk and south of Kreminna“.
Also, the think tank American reports that Russian forces continue “with defensive preparations in southern Ukraine“.
The President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, has visited by surprise on Tuesday the regions of Kherson and Lugansk, in eastern Ukraine and currently occupied by Russia, to speak with their military leaders and find out the status of the offensive.
The Kremlin has pointed out in a statement published on its website that Putin visited the headquarters of the ‘Dnipro’ troop group in Jerson and the Vostok National Guard headquarters in the Lugansk People’s Republic.
Thus, he specified that during the meeting at the headquarters of the ‘Dnipro’ group, the president heard a report on the situation from the commander of the Air Force, Mikhail Teplinski; the commander of the ‘Dnipro’ group of troops, Colonel General Oleg Makarevich; and other military leaders”. During the meeting “the situation in Kherson and Zaporizhia was discussed”, the Kremlin specified.
Putin has addressed the commanders to ensure that he did not want to “distract them from their direct obligations”, although he has stressed that “it is important that he hear your opinion on how the situation is developing, listen to you and exchange information”, as reported the Russian news agency TASS.
Subsequently, he has moved to Lugansk to maintain contacts with the soldiers of the ‘Vostok’ National Guard, visiting their headquarters, where he has received information from Colonel General Alexander Lapin and other senior officials. Putin has also congratulated the soldiers on the recent Orthodox Easter, according to the Kremlin.
After that, the Kremlin spokesman, Dimitri Peskov, has assured that these displacements “were not prepared in advance.” “Putin’s trips to the Kherson region and the Lugansk People’s Republic, as well as the ‘Dnipro’ and ‘Vostok’ headquarters, were not prepared in advance,” he said, as reported by the Russian news agency. news Interfax.
Along the same lines, Peskov explained that President Putin has traveled without the company of the Defense Minister, Sergei Shoigu, or the Chief of the Defense Staff, Valeri Gerasimov, since “it is not advisable” for the main military leadership to concentrate at the same point.
“It is not advisable for the Supreme Chief Commander, the Defense Minister and the Chief of the General Staff to meet in one place and give such a temptation to the enemy. Of course, this would be a great risk,” the Kremlin spokesman said. according to the TASS news agency.
Despite not having traveled with Putin, Minister Shoigu has participated electronically in the military meeting held in Kherson; while Gerasimov has done the same at the meeting in Lugansk.
It is Putin’s first visit to Kherson or Lugansk, after he visited the city of Mariupol and the Crimean peninsula in March – also by surprise. Donetsk and Lugansk have been the epicenter of a conflict since 2014, which spread nationwide after Putin ordered a military offensive against Ukraine.
Putin announced in September the annexation of Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson and Zaporizhia, all partially occupied as part of the invasion, a decision endorsed in early October by the Russian Parliament. The announcement came after a series of referendums criticized by the international community for their lack of guarantees.
Brazilian Foreign Minister Mauro Vieira has refuted US criticism of his country’s position on the war in Ukraine and stressed that the only thing that interests the Brazilian authorities is promoting peace.
“I can’t say anything because I haven’t heard anything and I don’t know what it’s about,” Vieria responded to the spokesman for the National Security Council of the United States, John Kirby, who assured that the president of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, would be “parroting propaganda” Russian and Chinese.
“What I can say is that Brazil and Russia this year complete 195 years of diplomatic relations with resident ambassadors and, in short, they are two countries that have a common history (…) Brazil wants to promote peace,” he said after meet in Brasilia with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov.
Thus, he has stressed that Brazil “is ready to join a group of countries that are willing to talk about peace” and that this has been stated to Lavrov in the meeting that both have held. “The president did not talk about war either, he only reiterated what he already said, that Brazil is willing to cooperate for peace,” he stressed in relation to Lula’s latest statements about the crisis in Ukraine, reports ‘Folha de Sao Paulo’ .
In recent hours, Washington has reacted with criticism of Lula’s words about the war as it passed through China and the United Arab Emirates, from where he accused the United States and the European Union of promoting the war by supplying weapons to Ukraine.
Meanwhile, the Ukrainian community in Portugal -the second largest after the Brazilian one- has called a protest against President Lula on the occasion of his official visit to Portugal, where he is scheduled to speak in a special session on April 25 in the Assembly of the Republic.
“We know that Lula is coming on April 25 and we are going to prepare a statement from our community because his statements do not support the end of the war. They encourage the continuation of the genocide of the Ukrainians,” the president of the Association of Ukrainians accused. in Portugal, Pavlo Sadoja, on the TSF radio station.
“Brazil is a great country, a great economic power, of course Ukraine also needs the support of these countries. We need the support of all the countries that declare themselves democratic,” said Sadoja, who assured that “some” believe that Lula wants to extract “benefits” for Brazil at the cost of Ukrainian lives.
Lula will visit Portugal officially between April 22 and 25, and his presence there will not only be used by the Ukrainian community to express their discontent with the position adopted by Brazil in the war, but also by the Portuguese ultra-right, which has already advance that he will convene his own protests and will be absent from the welcome session that the Assembly has prepared for him.
He United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) estimates that about 20.5 million people have fled Ukraine, since the beginning of the Russian military offensive, which he considers to be the fastest exodus in Europe since World War II. Almost 50% of the population –estimated at almost 41 million in 2021– would have left Ukrainian territory.
According to the latest UNHCR data (2), 20,421,761 people have left the Ukrainian territory as of April 11, 2023. By countries, 10.751.713 Ukrainian refugees have already arrived Poland (April 10th), 2.852.395 a Russia (October 3, 2022), 2.491.388 a Hungary, 2.212.832 a Romania (April 9th), 1.296.661 a Slovakia (April 9th), 800.067 a Moldavia (April 9) and 16.705 a belarus (April 4).
The High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that more than 8.1 million Ukrainian refugees have already been registered on European territory, and that five they would be in a situation of Temporary Protection, due to the Russian invasion of his country.
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