Unfazed by the illegal annexation of four areas, the Ukrainian troops have successfully advanced their counter-offensive in recent days. Particular attention was paid to the liberation of the strategically important town of Lyman in the eastern Donetsk region. Meanwhile, the Russian partial mobilization faltered and was accompanied by mistakes, as the Russian side itself has repeatedly admitted.
Washington sends mobile rocket launchers to Kyiv
According to information from US officials, the next package from the US government in support of Ukraine will include four mobile rocket launchers of the Himar type. Ammunition, explosive devices and protected vehicles are also planned for the $ 625 million package, according to the circles. The support will probably be officially announced on Tuesday.
Russian ambassador summoned
On the diplomatic stage, too, the West once again reacted clearly to Russia’s escalation through the annexations and the partial mobilization of at least 300,000 reservists: Russian ambassadors were summoned to numerous European countries, including Austria. Nine NATO members from Central and Eastern Europe jointly condemned Putin’s illegal annexation of the Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhia.
According to a survey, around 83 percent of Ukrainians support NATO membership. This is the highest agreement since the surveys began. Only four percent of the Ukrainian population spoke out against it in a survey by a polling institute in Kyiv. In November 2021 – i.e. before the Russian invasion – only 55 percent of Ukrainians wanted to join NATO. Ukraine submitted an application for accelerated membership of NATO on Friday.
Head of AKW free again
According to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the head of the Ukrainian nuclear power plant in Zaporizhia, who was arrested by Russia, has been released and returned to his family. According to the state Ukrainian nuclear power plant operator Energoatom, the nuclear power plant boss was stopped and taken away by a Russian patrol on Friday on the way from the nuclear power plant to the city of Enerhodar. According to Energoatom, Murashov is responsible for the nuclear safety of the plant in Zaporizhia at his post.
The largest nuclear power plant in Europe has been occupied by Russian troops since March. The facility has come under repeated fire over the past few weeks of Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine, for which Moscow and Kyiv have blamed each other. The shelling and fighting near the nuclear power plant fueled fears of a nuclear catastrophe.
threat of nuclear weapons
Russian threats to use nuclear weapons caused unrest – also against the background of a Russian army that was increasingly coming under pressure. “In view of the internal panic in the Russian Federation and increasing military defeats, the risk of this is increasing,” Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podoliak told German media.
Germany’s Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock expressed concern over Putin’s repeated nuclear bomb threats. But she emphasized that the federal government in Berlin would not allow itself to be blackmailed.
During the partial mobilization, the Kremlin chief said on September 21: “If the territorial integrity of our country is threatened, we will of course use all the means at our disposal to defend Russia and our people. This is not a bluff.”
With the annexations, Putin also sees Donetsk, Luhansk, Cherson and Zaporizhia as Russian territory. The Russian parliament ratified the internationally unrecognized annexations on Monday. More than 400 deputies voted unanimously for the regions to be included in the Russian Federation.
For the time being, there can be no talk of secure Russian dominance in the annexed areas. On the one hand, large parts of the areas were not even under Russian control at the time of incorporation. In addition, the occupiers reported on Monday about numerous attempts by Ukraine to break through front lines. The Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had previously reported new successes in recapturing towns.
In the Luhansk region, Ukrainian soldiers have already established themselves near the city of Lysychansk, a military spokesman for the Moscow-controlled Luhansk separatists wrote in the Telegram news service. The Ukrainian units are under constant fire from the Russian army. The reports from the combat zones cannot be checked independently.
“As soon as the Ukrainian flag has returned, nobody remembers the Russian farce with any papers and any annexations,” said Zelenskyj in his video speech on Monday night.
Significant problems with partial mobilization
According to British secret services, Russia is encountering considerable problems with its partial mobilization. According to the British Ministry of Defence, recruited reservists are currently temporarily gathering in tent camps. This indicates that the military is having trouble training recruits and finding officers to lead new units. The secret services also strongly assume that since partial mobilization was announced on September 21, Russians who do not actually fall under the definition of the recruitment wave have already been conscripted.
The governor of the Khabarovsk region in eastern Russia confirmed this on Monday: According to this, half of the “several thousand” conscripts in this region have now returned. They were therefore confiscated even though they did not meet the criteria. The responsible head of the district military replacement office had been dismissed, wrote Mikhail Degtyarev on the Telegram news channel. The governor did not explain how the mistakes could have happened.
Hundreds of thousands of Russians have fled abroad to avoid being sent into military service. The mobilization, which was rejected by large parts of the population, had also triggered the largest anti-war protests in months. There were also arson attacks on conscription offices. The Russian president himself said last week that all errors in the call-up of reservists must be “corrected”.
Territory gains by Ukraine on the southern front
Ukrainian forces are reportedly gaining ground on the southern front in the Kherson region. While the government in Kyiv initially did not officially comment on the course of the war on Monday, Russian military bloggers described how Ukrainian armored units advanced along the Dnipro River. An adviser to the Kyiv Interior Ministry, Anton Gerashchenko, released a video showing Ukrainian soldiers raising their national flag in the village of Solota Balka. The area lies between the cities of Cherson and Zaporizhia, whose regions Russian President Vladimir Putin declared on Friday as annexed.
The annexation, which has been criticized as a breach of international law, is only complete when numerous laws for the integration of the areas have been passed. The State Duma wanted to pass the laws on Monday. Subsequent approval by the Federation Council is considered a mere formality. Then Putin still has to sign the incorporation laws.
The occupiers assume that a major Russian offensive will then begin in the east and south of Ukraine. The separatist leader Denis Puschilin in Donetsk was confident on state television on Monday that the situation at the front would develop in favor of the occupiers. The partial mobilization brings new personnel and new technology to the combat areas, he said. “That’s why the picture of what’s happening at the front will change. In a positive way,” said Puschilin after numerous defeats by the Russian army, which also gave up the strategically important city of Lyman at the weekend. There are already successes in the Bachmut area, said Puschilin.