Ukraine

Mind your own business and leave people alone.

Americans should heed that admonition, same as anybody else. We've often strayed from it, and we need to get better at not fuckin' with everybody else's bananas.

I like it when people are free to make their own way in the world. But we all have to live here on this shrinking planet, and so we all have to get together and make rules we can all follow - rules that are just - and applicable to everybody in the same way.

So while I love thinking Europe is stepping up and being smarter about things, I have to hope we're not giving up too much of our influence. We have a stake in everything that happens in every part of the world. We all do. So let's try a little harder to drop the imperialist conquest bullshit and figure out how to find the balance between 'I-don't-care-what-you-do-just-don't-do-it-to-me', and getting everybody a seat at the table, with a full plate.

The battle to bring Europe’s biggest military into the EU

Volodymyr Zelensky has the green light for formal membership negotiations – but a long road lies ahead

Ukraine began its long journey out of Russia’s shadow and towards Europe in Kyiv’s historic Maidan square.

More than 100 protesters were killed and over 1,000 injured on the barricades of Maidan Nezalezhnosti (Independence Square) in 2014 as they demanded an end to Moscow’s malign influence.

Some 12 years and an invasion later, more than 100,000 people have died fighting for freedom.

And now, the EU has given Ukraine the green light to start formal membership negotiations with Volodymyr Zelensky’s government.

It is a once-unthinkable step on a long and difficult road of deep reforms and painful scrutiny amid high-stakes diplomacy and an existential war.

Ukrainians at the Maidan, where portraits of fallen protesters stand opposite a vast memorial to the war dead, told The Telegraph it was a fair reward for their sacrifice.

“I was part of the Maidan protests,” Nataliia Kharchenko said at the foot of the Alley of Heroes of the Heavenly Hundred, which was renamed in honour of slain activists.

“Ukraine has earned its membership with blood and tears. I can’t answer for the European community, but I know what we want and what we’re fighting for.”

Oleh Kovalenko, 27, said: “Ukraine belongs to Europe, we have a common character, common culture. But even more than that we have defended the border to Europe. It cost us so many lives, so much blood.”

The programmer added: “I hope the EU will keep our promises to us but I think we need to see some signals to have faith. If there’s a club, we should be part of it, and it shouldn’t be seen as a favour to us, it’s our right.”

Earlier this year, amid hopes that a peace deal could be struck between Ukraine and Russia, the US pressured the EU to fast-track Ukraine’s membership bid.

The putative peace deal was expected to call for Ukraine to join the EU by 2027, which would have been impossible if the usual rules had been followed – the full process can take more than a decade.

The EU could not be seen to block the peace deal, so officials brainstormed possible solutions.

They alighted on “reverse enlargement”, effectively giving Ukraine membership in name only and filling in the rights and obligations afterwards as Ukraine completed the necessary domestic reforms.

This was deeply uncomfortable for member states, which did not want any shortcuts to membership.

One EU diplomat told The Telegraph: “It’s just unacceptable across so many member states because it rips the whole merits-based approach to shreds. We all love [Volodymyr] Zelensky, but he’s going to go at one point.

“And then what? Who comes next? And if we have no guarantees on the rule of law, if we have no guarantees on the oligarchy, on the anti-corruption stuff. The concern is, what are we bringing into the EU?”

The EU had no intention of granting Ukraine EU membership after the Maidan protests, which led to the fall of Viktor Yanukovych, the pro-Kremlin president, in February 2014.

Instead, it signed a treaty and free-trade deal with Kyiv that stopped far short of bloc membership.

Vladimir Putin’s invasion in 2022 changed things. Four days after his tanks crossed the border, Mr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, applied to join the EU.

But EU governments are not prepared to tear up the rule book, even if many in Brussels accept that Ukrainians have died so Europeans do not have to.

Mariia, 31, speaking in the Maidan, said in response: “I understand they don’t give out membership for free. And there there should be some reforms. But I can say our goal is not going to change.

“I can’t say if Ukraine’s sacrifice is appreciated. I can say I have friends, their husbands are at the front, brothers and fathers, and we are fighting for our security and our future. Maybe Europe understands that, maybe it doesn’t.”

EU diplomats point out that any shortcuts given to Kyiv will also be claimed by the six Western Balkan countries that applied to join years before Ukraine.

The European Commission wants Ukraine to undertake reforms to fight corruption, guarantee judicial independence and align with all EU finance, single market and agricultural laws before joining.

Large swathes of EU law must be transposed on to national law books. Finances and budgets must be pored over by Brussels.

‘Clusters’ on road to membership

The formal membership negotiations that have just been green-lit are to be divided into six “clusters”, starting with talks over democracy and the rule of law aimed at safeguarding Ukraine from failing into authoritarianism.

Each cluster has to be closed before Ukraine can take the next step to becoming a member – and all this in war-time.

And Ukraine presents more difficulties than other candidate countries for the EU – for one thing, no one knows where its final borders will be.

Its substantial agriculture sector would be an asset to the EU but also presents a headache for the bloc’s agricultural subsidies, which are based on acreage.

With a population of as many as 39 million, Ukraine would have real influence on EU policymaking, which not all member states would welcome.

Freedom of movement could lead to a “brain drain” of Ukrainians to the bloc, where they could claim welfare and other benefits.

Then there is the substantial cost of post-war reconstruction, estimated at £445bn, and the effect on the EU cohesion funds designed to raise living standards across the bloc.

EU sources suggested such issues could be finessed with the strategic use of transition periods. But they also admitted the EU would have to make reforms of its own to incorporate Ukraine successfully.

Kyiv has much to offer the EU, not least a defensive wall from further Russian aggression. It has a larger military than any of its European allies, a highly developed defence industry and expertise in drones and warfare that is coveted in a Europe racing to rearm.

But the accession process can be delayed or derailed at any moment, as was the case when Viktor Orban, as prime minister of Hungary, vetoed the formal opening of membership negotiations.

During his unsuccessful campaign for Hungary’s election in April, the pro-Putin Mr Orban accused Peter Magyar, his challenger, of being in cahoots with Mr Zelensky to drag Hungary into the war.

Mr Orban also said ethnic Hungarians in Ukraine were being affected by laws making Ukrainian the primary language in schools and public administration.

After Mr Magyar won a landslide victory to end 16 years of Orbán rule in April, he quickly did a deal on language rights with Mr Zelensky and dropped Budapest’s veto on the negotiation clusters.

Rapid progress

Ukraine has made much faster progress towards membership than most candidate countries.

Marta Kos, the EU’s enlargement commissioner, said last week: “No country has ever achieved such progress on the path to accession while fighting Russia’s most brutal atrocities on its territory.”

In part, that is down to the Ukrainians’ determination to complete the domestic reforms required by the EU as quickly as possible, front-loading some of them before the formal talks began.

However, last week’s EU summit in Brussels gave the strongest sign yet of European leaders’ unwillingness to fast-track Ukraine’s membership.

Before the European Council, Friedrich Merz, the German chancellor, wrote that enlargement was a “geopolitical necessity” but would take too long.

He sketched out a vision for “associate membership” for Ukraine. This would involve associate membership of the European Commission, European Parliament and participation in European Council meetings, albeit without voting rights.

These observer roles would go hand in hand with gradual alignment to EU law and common foreign policy. There would also be a “snap-back clause” in case of backsliding on the EU’s democratic values.

But EU leaders moved to slam on the brakes in closed-door discussions in Brussels, removing a reference from the final joint declaration that had called for more progress to be made “as soon as possible”.

Mr Zelensky continued to demand fast-track membership, telling EU leaders: “Ukraine merits it because it has paid more than any other European country for its right to be free, independent and European.”

Hungary the sticking point

Numerous diplomatic sources named Mr Magyar as the reason why further progress was not made during the membership debate, which ran for several hours.

They said he had to manage the resentment of Mr Zelensky and Ukraine among Hungarians who had supported Mr Orban.

The new Hungarian prime minister had consented to the first six negotiating clusters being opened, but the next tranche was said to be “too much for him to swallow”.

Kyiv, backed by a handful of EU states, including Germany, wants to open the remaining five clusters as soon as possible.

But Hungary is not alone. Poland and Slovakia joined a chorus of countries voicing concerns over low public support for enlargement in talks between EU ambassadors before the summit.

Polling by the European Council on Foreign Relations think tank revealed that a majority of voters in Hungary, Bulgaria, Austria, Germany and even Estonia – one of Ukraine’s staunchest allies – believed the EU’s eastward expansion was a bad idea.

Several sources suggested that the final shape of Ukraine’s membership would only become clear when there was a peace deal.

Whenever and however Ukraine completes its accession negotiations, it will not have cleared the final hurdle.

A joining country must have the unanimous backing of all 27 member states. Some, including Hungary, hold referendums on new members, increasing the jeopardy and uncertainty.

In the Maidan, Daria Sydor, a 20-year-old student, laid flowers at the makeshift memorial to fallen soldiers.

She said: “Joining the EU is our return to our home, it’s very hard because you must change your mindset, change your rules, laws, legislation.

“We have this history of war, we had a lot of revolutions, and Ukrainians always wanted this, but… it’s like a long trip to come home.”

For The Most Part

We can all get suckered. We can all swallow a lie that just seems too good to be anything but the truth.

But if I have car trouble, I'm going to call an auto mechanic, not some average computer nerd who thinks a car is no different from the 10-speed he rides to work.

If I have an issue with some weird trauma left over from my childhood, I'll call a therapist who knows how to help me with that stuff, and not some guru who tells me all I have to do is shove some crystals up my ass, and drink some off-the-wall tea made from a few flowers and insect balls.

If I have a terrible headache that's been going on for 5 or 6 days, I'm going to find me a certified neurologist - not a fuckin' plumber who spends lots of time "researching" on YouTube.

Trump led us all over to a red hot stove and insisted on having us jump up on it. And even though there were a few MAGA fuckwads who - even now - tell us everything's fine, we've got blisters on our butts that won't be healed up for a good long goddamned time.

When you've lost Piers Morgan, the jig is up. Call in the dogs, piss on the fire, and strike camp - this hunt is over.

Oops

About the only thing this Trump bunch is good at is lacing up their shoes and stepping on each other's dicks.

And the Kicker? They put Kimberly Guilfoyle out front on this one.

Trump’s erratic trade policy blamed for US gas auction flop in Eastern Europe

Greece’s energy minister said U.S.-EU tensions had scared off potential buyers of American LNG.

ATHENS — Washington's ambition to replace Russia as Eastern Europe's dominant gas supplier has hit a surprise hurdle: European buyers, it seems, don't want it.

Two months ago U.S. government officials descended on Athens to declare themselves the big new energy player in the Mediterranean.

New and revamped terminals in Greece would receive shiploads of American liquefied natural gas, which would then be carried up to neighboring countries from Bulgaria to Ukraine by way of the "Vertical Corridor" network of pipes. The aim, they said, was to replace “every last molecule of Russian gas.”

“What we see for the future of Greece and the United States is Greece being an energy hub and showing this energy dominance that both of our countries can experience and work together cooperatively to achieve tremendous outcomes,” U.S. Ambassador Kimberly Guilfoyle said at the time.

But when the Greek government on Monday asked energy companies to bid for access to these gas pipelines, the auctions were a flop. They attracted almost zero interest from energy companies, prompting warnings from analysts that U.S. President Donald Trump's unpredictable trade policy is undermining his own energy export ambitions.

The scale of the flop was striking. Out of nearly 72 gigawatt-hours of pipeline capacity offered to companies across three different entry routes, a minuscule 48 megawatt-hours — less than 0.1 percent of the total on offer — were eventually booked. A similar auction in December was even more of a flop, attracting no bids at all.

Some blamed the embarrassing result on high transport charges and weak gas demand in countries along the corridor. But others, including the Greek government itself, cited deteriorating EU-U.S. relations, which have reached an historic low in recent weeks.

“The auctions did not go well at all, and this was a result of the conflict that existed and still exists [between the EU and the U.S.],” Greek Energy Minister Stavros Papastavrou told local Open TV on Tuesday.

Had the auctions gone well, gas traders would have been seen as confident both that the U.S. would reliably deliver the LNG, and that there was strong demand for the new source of gas in end markets. The poor result suggests companies weren't willing to take that bet.

“There are all of these uncertainties introduced by Trump's position and his relationship with Europe and everybody seems to be sort of holding back to seeing how things develop,” said Charles Ellinas, a senior fellow at the Global Energy Center of the Atlantic Council.

“The initiative that the U.S. pushed via Greece is important to the U.S., but for that to happen, the relationship between the U.S. and Europe must become clearer. If Trump continues being erratic and continues doing what he did at Davos, nobody will want to invest or take or bring new initiatives until they know where these things are going," said Ellinas.

Analysts warn that in any case, the EU's growing reliance on imports of U.S. LNG create a new potentially high-risk geopolitical dependency.

“One serious challenge for the EU is that it seems to be replacing one dependency (Russia) with another (US),” said Harry Tzimitras, director of the Peace Research Institute Oslo Cyprus Centre.

“Given the unpredictable, or even outright openly threatening stance of the U.S. administration, this could potentially be dangerous. The EU seems to be repeating past mistakes, belatedly looking for alternatives to diversify its energy providers' base,” he said.

The lack of interest was also blamed on the fact that alternative routes remain more competitive with lower transit tariffs. Demand from Ukraine remains low, as it prefers other routes, mainly through Poland and Lithuania. These routes include energy from the U.S. but at a lower cost and without regulatory uncertainties.

Greece is also blaming the ambiguous stance of the EU, which has cut off supplies of Russian natural gas without fixing regulatory issues to open new supply routes.

Papastavrou, the Greek energy minister, noted that the European Commission has yet to fully endorse the design of the products offered via the Vertical Corridor, arguing they don't entirely align with the EU’s regulatory framework.

Iran

Iran supreme leader signals upcoming crackdown on protesters ‘ruining their own streets’ for Trump

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — European leaders urged Iran late Friday to allow its citizens to demonstrate without reprisal after Tehran signaled security forces would crack down on the protesters whom U.S. President Donald Trump has pledged to support.

At least 62 people have been killed in the protests that began in late December over Iran’s ailing economy and have morphed into the most significant challenge to the government in years.

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei dismissed Trump as having hands “stained with the blood of Iranians” as his supporters shouted “Death to America!” in footage aired by Iranian state television. State media later referred to the demonstrators as “terrorists,” setting the stage for a violent crackdown as in other protests in recent years.

Protesters are “ruining their own streets ... in order to please the president of the United States,” the 86-year-old Khamenei said to a crowd at his compound in Tehran. “Because he said that he would come to their aid. He should pay attention to the state of his own country instead.”

Iran’s judiciary chief Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei separately vowed that punishment for protesters “will be decisive, maximum and without any legal leniency.”

Late Friday, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron issued a joint statement condemning reported deadly violence against the protesters, and urged Iran to allow its citizens to express themselves without fear of reprisal. The Associated Press could not independently confirm local media reports that state forces had opened fire on protesters in Tehran on Friday.

There was no immediate response from Washington, though Trump has repeatedly pledged to strike Iran if protesters are killed, a threat that has taken on greater significance after the U.S. military raid that seized Venezuela’s former President Nicolás Maduro.

Internet cut off

Despite Iran’s theocracy cutting off the nation from the internet and international telephone calls, short online videos shared by activists purported to show protesters chanting against Iran’s government around bonfires as debris littered the streets in the capital, Tehran, and other areas into Friday morning.

Iranian state media alleged “terrorist agents” of the U.S. and Israel set fires and sparked violence. It also said there were “casualties,” without elaborating.

The full scope of the demonstrations that began Dec. 28 couldn’t be immediately determined due to the communications blackout.

The protests also represented the first test of whether the Iranian public could be swayed by Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, whose fatally ill father fled Iran just before the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution. Pahlavi, who called for the protests Thursday night, similarly has called for demonstrations at 8 p.m. Friday.

Demonstrations have included cries in support of the shah, something that could bring a death sentence in the past but now underlines the anger fueling the protests that began over Iran’s ailing economy.

So far, violence around the demonstrations has killed at least 62 people while more than 2,300 others have been detained, said the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency.

“What turned the tide of the protests was former Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi’s calls for Iranians to take to the streets at 8 p.m. on Thursday and Friday,” said Holly Dagres, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “Per social media posts, it became clear that Iranians had delivered and were taking the call seriously to protest in order to oust the Islamic Republic.”

“This is exactly why the internet was shut down: to prevent the world from seeing the protests. Unfortunately, it also likely provided cover for security forces to kill protesters.”

Thursday night protests preceded internet shutdown

When the clock struck 8 p.m. Thursday, neighborhoods across Tehran erupted in chanting, witnesses said. The chants included “Death to the dictator!” and “Death to the Islamic Republic!” Others praised the shah, shouting: “This is the last battle! Pahlavi will return!” Thousands could be seen on the streets before all communication to Iran cut out.

On Friday, Pahlavi called on Trump to help the protesters, saying Khamenei “wants to use this blackout to murder these young heroes.”

“You have proven and I know you are a man of peace and a man of your word,” he said in a statement. “Please be prepared to intervene to help the people of Iran.”

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Pahlavi’s appeal to Trump.

Pahlavi had said he would offer further plans depending on the response to his call. His support of and from Israel has drawn criticism in the past — particularly after the 12-day war Israel waged on Iran in June. Demonstrators have shouted in support of the shah in some demonstrations, but it isn’t clear whether that’s support for Pahlavi himself or a desire to return to a time before the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

The internet cut also appears to have taken Iran’s state-run and semiofficial news agencies offline. The state TV acknowledgment at 8 a.m. Friday represented the first official word about the demonstrations.

State TV claimed the protests were violent and caused casualties, but did not offer nationwide figures. It said the protests saw “people’s private cars, motorcycles, public places such as the metro, fire trucks and buses set on fire.” State TV later reported that violence overnight killed six people in Hamedan, some 280 kilometers (175 miles) southwest of Tehran, and two security force members in Qom, 125 kilometers (75 miles) south of the capital.

The European Union and Germany condemned the violence targeting demonstrators as new protests were reported in Zahedan in Iran’s restive southwestern Sistan and Baluchestan province.

Trump renews threat over protester deaths

Iran has faced rounds of nationwide protests in recent years. As sanctions tightened and Iran struggled after the 12-day war, its rial currency collapsed in December, reaching 1.4 million to $1. Protests began soon after, with demonstrators chanting against Iran’s theocracy.

It remains unclear why Iranian officials have yet to crack down harder on the demonstrators. Trump warned last week that if Tehran “violently kills peaceful protesters,” America “will come to their rescue.”

In an interview with talk show host Hugh Hewitt aired Thursday, Trump reiterated his pledge.

Iran has “been told very strongly, even more strongly than I’m speaking to you right now, that if they do that, they’re going to have to pay hell,” Trump said.

He demurred when asked if he’d meet with Pahlavi.

“I’m not sure that it would be appropriate at this point to do that as president,” Trump said. “I think that we should let everybody go out there, and we see who emerges.”

Speaking in an interview with Sean Hannity aired Thursday night on Fox News, Trump went as far as to suggest Khamenei may want to leave Iran.

“He’s looking to go someplace,” Trump said. “It’s getting very bad.”

More Trump Fuckery

There was a "warrant" for Maduro, and there's a "warrant" for the Russian-flagged tanker.

So Trump just gives himself permission to do whatever the fuck he wants to do?

US seizes Venezuela-linked oil tanker

The ship's seizure comes more than a week after it maneuvered through a U.S. Navy blockade of sanctioned tankers leaving port in Venezuela.

The United States seized a Russian-flagged oil tanker in the North Atlantic on Wednesday, after chasing the vessel across the ocean as it headed toward Europe from Venezuela, one U.S. and one European official confirmed to POLITICO.

The seizure of the tanker Wednesday morning, originally known as the Bella-1, comes more than a week after it maneuvered through a U.S. Navy blockade of sanctioned tankers leaving port in Venezuela. The ship switched its registration to a Russian-flagged vessel during the chase, setting up a possible diplomatic row with Moscow.

American helicopters and a Coast Guard vessel were being used to board the tanker under law enforcement authority granted to the Coast Guard, while American and British submarine-hunting P-8 surveillance planes — and at least three smaller American surveillance aircraft — circled the area near British waters, according to plane tracking websites.

The U.S. sanctioned the Bella-1 in 2024 after American officials alleged it was carrying black market Iranian oil.

On Tuesday, the Russian Foreign Ministry told TASS, the Russian state media agency, that “for reasons unknown to us, the Russian vessel is getting excessive attention from the US and NATO militaries, clearly disproportionate to its peaceful status.”

The Trump administration continued to strike a defiant tone after the seizure on Wednesday. “The blockade of sanctioned and illicit Venezuelan oil remains in FULL EFFECT — anywhere in the world,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth posted on social media just as U.S. European Command conducted the operation, which was coordinated with the Justice and Homeland Security departments.

Following the capture of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro in a U.S. military operation last week, the seizure of the Bella is a clear sign that the administration plans to keep the pressure on Venezuela. The administration has been working to impose an embargo on sanctioned vessels as a central part of the pressure campaign since the U.S. Coast Guard boarded the Russian-flagged Skipper last month.

The seizure took place with President Donald Trump taking on a far more active role in South American diplomacy in recent months. The administration’s greatest show of force to date came on Saturday, when the U.S. military apprehended Maduro in his palace in Caracas to stand trial on narco-trafficking and corruption charges.

Trump has since suggested that Colombia could be next on his agenda for regime change. Cuba, too, is on the president’s mind, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio has long pushed for the overthrow of the Communist government in Havana.

The president’s interest in South American affairs comes despite only muted support from the American public, which overwhelmingly opposed military intervention against the country in a December Quinnipiac poll. Just one-third of Americans told a Reuters/Ipsos poll released Monday that they supported the operation to oust Maduro, with a majority concerned that the U.S. would become too entrenched in the affairs of the country in the aftermath of the attack.

Bulwark

Today's Belle

300 US scientists are seeking access to a French program that hires them into various positions in France, and require them to move out of the US.

That's a little thing called "Brain Drain".

The Roads With Belle, episode 87

Ukraine

🇫🇷 Marine Le Pen, the unofficial leader of France’s right-wing populist party National Rally, condemned the White House’s decision to freeze military aid to Ukraine.

“In my opinion, the brutality of this decision deserves condemnation. It is a very cruel move against the Ukrainian soldiers who are patriotically defending their country,” she stated.

He Wants Their Stuff

Trump has floated the idea before, and I think it was him saying we should take - or should've taken - "the oil".

I don't remember the details, but I do remember something about how going after another country to get at their resources is a war-crime-level dick move.

Encouragement

Pro-EU leader wins Moldova election despite alleged Russian meddling

Moldova's pro-EU President Maia Sandu has claimed a second term after a tense election run-off seen as a choice between Europe and Russia.

The Moldovan Central Electoral Commission confirmed Sandu's victory on Monday morning.

Sandu won 55% of the vote, according to preliminary results, and in a late-night speech on Sunday she promised to be president for all Moldovans.

Her rival Alexandr Stoianoglo, who was backed by the pro-Russian Party of Socialists, had called for a closer relationship with Moscow.

During the day the president's national security adviser said there had been "massive interference" from Russia in Moldova's electoral process that had "high potential to distort the outcome".

Russia had already denied meddling in the vote, which came a week after another key Eastern European election in Georgia, whose president said it had been a "Russian special operation".

Stoianoglo, who was fired as prosecutor general by Sandu, has denied being pro-Kremlin.

In a joint statement congratulating Sandu on her re-election, the European Commission and the EU's top diplomat Josep Borrell said there had been "unprecedented interference by Russia".

As polls closed, both Sandu, 52, and her rival thanked voters, with Stoianoglo speaking in Russian as well as Romanian. Although Romanian is Moldova's main language, Russian is widely spoken because of its Soviet past.

Turnout at 54% was high, especially among expat voters at polling stations abroad.

Stoianoglo took an initial lead on the night and was the more successful candidate in Moldova itself with more than 51% of the vote. Sandu won in the capital Chisinau, and she was completely dominant among expat voters.

As she overtook her challenger late on Sunday night, there was cheering at her campaign headquarters and chants of "victory".

In a hoarse voice she praised her compatriots for saving Moldova and giving "a lesson in democracy, worthy of being written in history books".

Then, moving into Russian, she said: "I have heard your voice – both those who supported me and those who voted for Mr. Stoianoglo. In our choice for a dignified future, no-one lost... we need to stand united."

Maia Sandu’s foreign policy adviser, Olga Rosca, told the BBC she was proud of the result.

Asked whether she was surprised that Stoianoglo had won in Moldova itself, she said the vote in Moldova and abroad should be seen as one and the same: “We never divide people into Moldovans at home and expatriates - we see Moldovans as one family.”

With elections coming next year she said the president had “clearly indicated she has heard the mood for change. On several occasions between the [two presidential] votes she said the fight against corruption must be intensified and justice reform must be accelerated – she’s committed to this work”.

The final result will be declared on Monday.

EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen congratulated Sandu, saying "it takes a rare kind of strength to overcome the challenges you've faced in this election.

"I'm glad to continue working with you towards a European future for Moldova and its people," her message on X said.

Casting his ballot, Alexandr Stoianoglo had promised to be an "apolitical president", and that he had voted for "a Moldova that should develop in harmony with both the West and the East".

Stoianoglo polled particularly well in rural areas and the south, while Sandu was ahead in the cities and with young voters.

After casting her ballot, Sandu had warned of "thieves" who sought to buy their vote and their country.

Presidential national security adviser Stanislav Secrieru said Russia had organised buses and large charter flights to bring voters to polling stations.

Bomb scares had briefly disrupted voting in Moldova, at UK polling stations in Liverpool and Northampton and at Frankfurt and Kaiserslautern in Germany, he added.

A Soviet republic for 51 years, Moldova is flanked by Ukraine and Romania and one of Europe's poorest countries. It has a population of 2.5 million and an expat population of 1.2 million.

Moldova's authorities have long warned that a fugitive oligarch called Ilan Shor has spent $39m (£30m) trying to buy the election for Moscow with handouts to 138,000 Moldovans.

Shor, who is based in Moscow, denies wrongdoing but did promise cash payments to anyone prepared to back his call for a "firm No" to the EU.

Commentators and politicians had warned that a Stoianoglo victory could radically change the political landscape in the Danube and Black Sea region, not because he was some kind of "Trojan horse", but rather because Russia has thrown its weight behind him.

There were queues at polling stations in Moscow, Italy and among voters from a mainly Russian-speaking breakaway region of Transnistria, who had to cross the River Dniester into Moldovan-controlled territory to vote. Transnistria is home to a Russian military base and a huge arms depot.

Moldova's election commission said it was aware of reports of organised and illegal transports of voters by air and land in Russia, Belarus, Azerbaijan and Turkey, and appealed to the public to report further violations.

Although Sandu had easily won the first round of the vote, several candidates swung behind Stoianoglo, although the third-placed candidate refused to back either of the two.

The first round coincided with a nail-biting referendum on backing a change to the constitution embracing the commitment to join the EU.

In the end the vote passed by a tiny margin in favour, and Maia Sandu said there had been clear evidence of attempts to buy 300,000 votes.

La Claque

France election: How the far-right lost

• Marine Le Pen's RN comes third in parliamentary election
• She had predicted it would win and form government
• Opponents united to keep far-right out of power
• Party leaders, supporters say its time will come soon

PARIS, July 7 (Reuters) - The champagne was on ice at the far-right National Rally's (RN) headquarters, but the celebratory mood swiftly turned to disbelief when the first projected results from Sunday's parliamentary election appeared on TV screens.

For days, Marine Le Pen had confidently predicted that her party would triumph with an outright majority and her protege Jordan Bardella would be prime minister. Instead, the National Rally was on course to come third, behind a left-wing alliance and President Emmanuel Macron's centrist bloc.

It was undone to a large extent by tactical dealmaking between centrist and leftist opponents, who pulled more than 200 candidates from three-way races to avoid splitting the anti-RN vote.
The projected result brought to a shuddering halt what had appeared to be the far right's relentless rise in France, carefully engineered by Le Pen who had sough to clean up her party's image and tap the grievances of voters angry over living costs, strained public services, and immigration.

To be sure, Le Pen and her party have suffered disappointment before, most recently her 2022 defeat to Macron in the presidential election, and have managed to bounce back more strongly than before.

But for now, the outcome was a bitter pill to swallow.

"The results are disappointing and they don't represent what French people want," said Jocelyn Cousin, 18, who had come to party HQ expecting a victory party.

The RN's momentum had appeared unstoppable after it trounced the centrists in European elections in early June and came first, ahead of the hastily assembled leftist New Popular Front, in the first round of the parliamentary vote on June 30.

Le Pen and Bardella attributed their party's setback on Sunday to the what Bardella called the "disgraceful alliance" the anti-RN forces, who he said had caricatured the party and disrespected its voters.

But IPSOS pollster Brice Teinturier pointed to the RN's own shortcomings, including revelations before the run-off that several of its candidates had expressed xenophobic views, raising questions over whether the party had really ditched its more toxic past.
"What happened is also that RN candidates themselves showed in this campaign that they either were not ready or had in their ranks candidates that are antisemitic, xenophobic or homophobic," Teinturier told France 2 television.

'TIDE IS RISING'

Florent de Kersauson, an RN candidate in Brittany in western France, acknowledged the fallout had been damaging. But he also said voters may have felt the party was arrogant in predicting an absolute majority.

"I thought it was strange that they said that," said Kersauson, who lost his race against a pro-Macron candidate. "It seemed like something that was very hard to achieve."
Bardella and Le Pen strove to put a brave face on their result. The party had increased its share of seats in the National Assembly to a record high, they noted, vowing to keep fighting until they won power.

"The tide is rising, but it didn't rise quite high enough this time," said Le Pen, who is likely to mount her fourth presidential campaign in 2027. "Our victory has merely been delayed."
That was also the feeling among many of the supporters gathered at party HQ in Paris.
"I see our victory coming. People are going to understand that the National Rally is not so horrible. I believe it will happen in 2027. I have a lot of hope and I'll continue to fight," said Elea da Cunha, 17.

Frederic-Pierre Vos, a close associate of Le Pen and former RN party lawyer elected in a constituency north of Paris, said the hung parliament thrown up by the election would mean an ungovernable France, providing fresh opportunities for RN in 2027.

Yet despite the party's fighting talk, Sunday's outcome was a clear setback.

Business newspaper Les Echos ran a front page showing a grim-faced Bardella with the headline "la claque" or "the slap".

Trump's Friend

Kim Jong Un

Robot Zone

About That China Thing

I have to wonder if Xi's general discombobulation is one reason China continues to fuck with Taiwan.

Or maybe it's just that he's eliminated everybody who would advise him not to do stoopid things.

7 Things

Quick little roundup.

1) Abortion rights advocates won big victories in three states yesterday.

• In Ohio: Voters passed a constitutional amendment to guarantee abortion access, making it the latest state to take this step since Roe v. Wade was overturned last year.
• In Virginia: Democrats took control of the General Assembly, meaning they can stop Republicans, led by Gov. Glenn Youngkin, from introducing new abortion limits.
• In Kentucky: Voters reelected a Democratic governor who attacked his Republican opponent for supporting the deep-red state’s near-total ban on abortion.

2) Ivanka Trump will testify in her father’s New York civil fraud case today.

• The details: She is not a defendant in this case. But she will be the state’s last witness following testimony from her father, Donald Trump, and two of her brothers.
• In related news: The former president will skip a Republican primary debate in Miami tonight and host a rally nearby instead. The debate starts at 8 p.m. Eastern on NBC News.

3) Israel’s endgame in the Gaza Strip is unclear after a month of war.

• What to know: Israel’s prime minister said Monday that Israel would control Gaza’s postwar security for an “indefinite period,” which reportedly concerned U.S. officials.
• In the U.S.: The House voted yesterday to censure the only Palestinian American member of Congress, Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), over her comments about the war.

4) The Supreme Court appears likely to allow gun bans for domestic abusers.

• What happened? Justices seemed to agree yesterday that a federal statute preventing people under domestic-violence protective orders from possessing guns is constitutional.
• Why it matters: This case is the first big test of the court’s ruling last year which requires judges to decide challenges to the Second Amendment by finding examples in history.

5) Northern Greenland’s ice sheets are rapidly retreating.

• What to know: The vast floating ice shelves have lost 35% of their total volume since 1978, according to new research.
• Why it’s worrying: The ice shelves hold back glaciers from flowing into the sea. If more are lost to warming oceans, it could lead to significant sea level rise.
• In related news: Last month was the planet’s warmest October on record.

6) Nintendo is making the Legend of Zelda into a live-action movie.

• The details: The creator of the wildly popular video game series, Shigeru Miyamoto, revealed yesterday that he’s working on the film but said it will “take time” to finish.
• It will be tricky to pull off: The series’ main character, Link, doesn’t speak out loud. And the innovative games are famous for letting players choose their own pathways.

7) Cats might be more affectionate and articulate than we thought.

• How we know: Researchers watched 150 hours of cat videos to learn more about how felines express themselves. They found that cats can make nearly 300 facial expressions.
• What’s your cat saying? When cats are happy, they typically move their ears and whiskers forward and outward. When unhappy, they flatten their ears and lick their lips.

China

1980s: The Canadians are buying up all the businesses - we're doomed!

We weren't doomed

1990s: The Japanese are buying up all the commercial real estate - we're doomed!

We weren't doomed

2000s: The Arabs are buying up all the resorts and apartments and condos - we're doomed!

We weren't doomed

2010s: Foreigners are buying up all the US debt bonds - we're doomed!

We weren't doomed

2020: The Chinese are buying up all the farm land - we're doomed!

Jeezus H Fuq, what's wrong with these people?

I'm not saying, "Don't worry, be happy". There's plenty to worry about. But I will say there's always an under-taste of fuckery whenever I hear some "conservative" telling us horrible things are about to happen.

China’s economic woes may leave U.S. and others all but unscathed

The forecast for escaping economic damage could deteriorate if Beijing cheapens the currency to boost exports

Judith Marks, the chief executive of the elevator maker Otis Worldwide, returned in April from a 10-day trip to China saying “all signals look positive” for the country’s recovery from its draconian covid lockdown.

The Chinese rebound that seemed to be gaining momentum in April lost steam in May and reached midsummer in danger of petering out altogether. Suddenly, the world’s second-largest economy, for years a reliable juggernaut, was ailing. The core of the problem: a debt-ridden, overbuilt property sector that threatened to smother growth well short of the government’s 5 percent annual target.

Chinese weakness is bad news for companies such as Otis, based in Farmington, Conn. China is its most profitable market for new equipment sales, accounting last year for roughly one-third of orders. Through the first half of the year, China was the company’s only major market where orders were in decline.

But the elevators that Otis sells in China are made there. So while the property market slump means that fewer are needed, most of the pain will be felt at Otis facilities in China, not in the United States. For all its remarkable progress and prosperity, China is not an important enough customer of goods produced elsewhere for its woes to be contagious. At least for now.

“China has been less of a growth engine than is widely assumed,” said Brad Setser, a former Biden administration trade adviser. “The direct effects of its slowdown are going to be relatively modest. It doesn’t matter to the export side of the U.S. economy if China grows at zero or China grows at 5 percent.”

That could change if China’s slowdown proves worse than anticipated, unnerving global financial markets, or if the government artificially cheapens its currency in a bid to export its way out of the crisis at the expense of its trading partners.

But China’s downshifting economy is likely to clip just a few tenths of a percentage point off global growth, economists have said. One indication of the country’s modest impact can be seen in its trade in manufactured goods, such as industrial equipment, automobiles, furniture and appliances.

China’s imports of manufactured items for its own use, rather than to make products for customers in other countries, amount to just 3.5 percent of gross domestic product, according to Setser. And China’s reliance on foreign factories is about one-third lower than when Xi Jinping became the country’s leader in 2012 and accelerated a self-sufficiency drive.

“That’s unusually low,” said Setser, now a senior fellow with the Council on Foreign Relations. “China makes almost all of the manufactured goods consumed in China.”

Otis, which has plants in Tianjin and near Shanghai, has operated in China since the mid-1990s. Its elevators and escalators are used in infrastructure projects, such as the Tianjin metro, as well as in the residential and commercial developments at the heart of China’s real estate bubble.

Although the property market slowdown is pinching new equipment orders, demand for servicing of installed units remains strong, Marks told investors in July, when Otis reported higher quarterly sales and earnings.

To be sure, a prolonged downturn in China — or one that is deeper than expected — would be felt around the world. First to suffer would be major commodity producers. The Chinese economic miracle for decades has vacuumed up copper from Peru, ore from Australia, soybeans from Brazil and oil from Saudi Arabia and Russia.

Direct financial links between the United States and China have thinned in recent years, amid a trade war and rising geopolitical tensions. But a deeper Chinese slump could set off a “negative feedback loop,” with sinking stock and bond prices, rising volatility and a soaring dollar combining to sap consumer and business confidence in the United States and elsewhere.

Such a scenario, akin to the fallout from the 2015 Chinese stock market crash, could shave half a percentage point off global growth and 0.3 points off U.S. growth, according to Gregory Daco, the chief economist at EY-Parthenon.

“What matters to the U.S. and the rest of the world is if the China shock is translated into a broad-based deterioration in overall financial conditions,” he said.

China’s neighbors are already feeling a chill. But their decline in exports to China is primarily the result of American consumers buying fewer electronics than they did during the work-from-home phase of the pandemic rather than a consequence of Chinese domestic weakness.

China sits at the center of a pan-Asian electronics supply chain, assembling products with components shipped there from South Korea, Malaysia, Thailand and Taiwan.

Multinational corporations that serve the domestic Chinese market also would be hurt. The German automaker BMW depends on China for more than 29 percent of its annual revenue. More than 27 percent of Intel’s sales come from Chinese customers.

“China does matter for the global economy. Germany is a big exporter to it. It matters for commodity markets. It sets the tone for emerging Asia,” said Nathan Sheets, the global chief economist at Citigroup.

But China’s old growth model, which relied on heavy investment in public infrastructure and housing, is exhausted. After decades of frenzied growth, the country has just about all the high-speed rail lines and apartment complexes that it needs.

Chinese leaders have said they intend to pivot to an economy based on more consumer spending and service industries. But “there’s still a long way to go,” Sheets said.

The current slowdown underscores a shift in China’s global image. For years, China’s vast domestic market beckoned multinational corporations with the promise of enormous profits. And it seemed certain to surpass the United States as the world’s largest economy.

Now, the outlook is less rosy. China grew in the second quarter at an annual pace just above 3 percent, a far cry from the roughly 9 percent rate it averaged over its first three decades of economic reform. Its aging labor force is shrinking, and Xi emphasizes loyalty to the Communist Party rather than expanding the economy.

Visiting Beijing last week, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said U.S. business executives have told her that China is “uninvestable” because of the government’s increasingly erratic treatment of foreign businesses.

“China is growing slower and building less. It’s not going to be uniquely central the way it used to be,” said Scott Kennedy, a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).

The International Monetary Fund says China will contribute more than one-third of global growth this year. But that figure overstates China’s impact on its trading partners, some economists have said. Rather, it demonstrates the arithmetic truth that China, even with all its problems, is a large economy that will grow faster than its counterparts. That produces a large output gain, but most of the benefits stay at home.

China runs a sizable trade surplus with the rest of the world, meaning it sells to other countries much more than it buys from them. Chinese exporters dominate global markets for products such as electronics, footwear and aluminum, while consumers in China save much of their income rather than spending it on foreign goods.

As the Federal Reserve and other major central banks tried to cool inflation by raising interest rates over the past year, foreign demand for Chinese goods sagged. Through July, Chinese exports were down 5 percent from the same period in 2022. But imports fell nearly 8 percent, meaning the surplus widened.

“Countries that run a trade surplus basically subtract more from global growth than they contribute,” said George Magnus, an economist at Oxford University’s China Center. “It’s doing more for its own growth than it’s contributing.”

Exports have been a central ingredient in China’s economic strategy for decades. Government officials have repeatedly spoken of promoting domestic consumption. But in the past three years, China’s export sector has delivered more than one-fifth of the country’s annual economic growth, the largest share since the 1997 Asian financial crisis, according to the ChinaPower project at CSIS.

China began the year with hopes for a boom. In December, Xi reluctantly relaxed his strict zero-covid policy after rare public protests. Freed from lockdown, Chinese consumers were expected to drive an economic rebound.

But after a burst of spending, the recovery fizzled. Fresh government data this week showed Chinese factories, consumers and real estate developers all mired in a slump.

“They’re structurally in a deep hole that they’re going to have a lot of difficulty climbing out of,” said Andrew Collier, the managing director of Orient Capital Research in Hong Kong.

Chinese authorities have taken a number of steps to revive growth, including cutting interest rates. But they have made little headway. And with more than 21 percent of young people unemployed, the prospect of social unrest looms.

One lever Beijing has not pulled is manipulating the value of its currency.

The yuan this year has fallen 5 percent against the dollar, reflecting China’s slower growth and lower interest rates. The government could further cheapen the yuan by selling it on global markets. That would effectively discount Chinese goods, making them less expensive for customers paying with dollars and euros.

Swamping foreign markets with made-in-China products would raise export earnings and boost domestic employment. But it would be certain to worsen already fractious relations with the United States and Europe.

There’s no sign yet that the Chinese authorities plan to make such a move. But if the economic deterioration accelerates, they might.

After all, they have done so before. China kept its currency undervalued for years after joining the global trading system in 2001, prompting years of complaints from the U.S. government and American businesses.

The France Thing

I've been wondering about Marie Le Pen's gang - where they might factor in, and how Le Pen would play this thing.

I think I have the beginnings of my answer now.

She probably didn't directly encourage assholes to deface a holocaust memorial, and it's not likely she wrote a memo to any of the French equivalents of Proud Boys and 3%-ers saying they should rush right down to their local protest and amp things up.

But she can point at the "Muslim Problem" and then sit back and carp about "rampant violence" and the need to restore order, and how that weak sister Macron isn't able to do enough because what we really need is a strong leader to clamp down on immigration and stand up to rioters and show 'em who's boss and blah blah blah.  

Rioters in France vandalizing a Holocaust memorial
by u/padmanabhapillai in facepalm

Race riots in France could give far-right the edge Marine Le Pen needs to win in 2027

When Nahel Merzouk, a 17-year-old of North African origin, was shot dead by police at a traffic stop in the Paris suburb of Nanterre on Tuesday morning, it looked like an event that would unite the French in shock and revulsion at the long-known violence and racism in the law enforcement community.

The killing was condemned across the political community, with President Emmanuel Macron calling it “inexplicable” and “inexcusable”, and even police authorities distancing themselves from the incident, which involved a teenager being shot at point-blank range simply because he refused to comply with the officer’s demands.

France’s far-right leader, Marine Le Pen, was initially on the back foot: this case, filmed and posted on the internet, seemed to prove the argument that minorities were systematically targeted by a police force that considers itself above the law. Meanwhile, the left-wing opposition, led by radical firebrand Jean-Luc Mélenchon, said it was the consequence of decades of neglect in the banlieues, the poor, multi-ethnic, high-density suburbs around the big cities.

But that was before the riots. The five nights since the shooting saw Paris and other French cities plunge into chaos as rioters have run rampage. Schools, police stations and city halls have been set torched, while cars, trucks and buses have been set ablaze.

Mr Macron, whose second term has already been disrupted by opposition to his pension reforms, is now facing perhaps the biggest challenge to his presidency yet. Although tens of thousands of police have been deployed to contain the violence, the anger has spread across the country, to Marseille, Lyon and Lille, with fears growing that they could disrupt the Tour de France cycling race. Mr Macron himself was obliged to cut short an EU summit in Brussels on Friday to return to Paris, and to postpone this week’s planned three-day state visit to Germany.

The rioting has also transformed the political discourse. The initial horror over the shooting of a teenager has now turned into a debate about law and order.

This is fertile territory for Ms Le Pen, who has long railed against what she sees as France’s drift into permissiveness and lawlessness. She lambasted the government on Twitter on Sunday as “a power that abandons all constitutional principles for fear of riots, which contributes to aggravating them”, adding, “Our country is getting worse and worse and the French are paying the terrible price for this cowardice and these compromises.”

She did not directly address the shooting but condemned the National Assembly for holding a minute’s silence for Nahel last week, saying, “Unfortunately, there are young people in our country every week…It’s terrible, but I think that the National Assembly should perhaps measure a little the minutes of silence that are carried out.”

And in a video address yesterday she lambasted the “anarchy”, called on authorities to declare a state of emergence or curfew, and attacked Mr Mélenchon for “conniving” and “morally exempting these criminal acts”, promising that they would face a reckoning with “the nation and history”.

This appeal to law and order is in direct contrast with her energetic encouragement of the violent yellow vest or “gilets jaunes” anti-government fuel protests in 2019 and 2020.

Ms Le Pen has detoxified her image in recent years. She changed the name of her party from the National Front to the National Rally, and in last year’s presidential campaign, her posters simply call her “Marine”, handily distancing her from her xenophobic father, Jean-Marie Le Pen.

The 54-year-old put pocketbook issues at the heart of her campaign, pointing to sharply rising fuel and food prices as proof of Mr Macron’s economic mismanagement. Her pivot was aimed at working-class voters struggling with rising costs, as she campaigned in rural France and former industrial towns.

She recast her party as a movement for the forgotten masses, bypassed by globalisation and the Paris elites, and even talked up her struggles as a single mother and her cat breeding. The rebrand has worked: she has neutralised many fears of her and normalised her image, with polls today rating her the nation’s second favourite political personality, behind the former prime minister Édouard Philippe.

The riots put Mr Macron in a bind. He was quick to capture the emotion after the shooting but has so far failed to contain the momentum of the subsequent anger. If he echoes Ms Le Pen’s language, he risks being called a hypocrite over the killing.

However, the longer the violence continues, the more Ms Le Pen will benefit. She can continue to blame the authorities for the chaos, saying this is the inevitable result of the moral laxity she has always warned against. And with Mr Macron term-limited, Ms Le Pen can look to the next presidential election, in 2027, as her moment.

Punching Back

It was a bad idea to fuck with Ukraine, and Putin keeps getting very strong and very loud messages about it.

So I'll say it again - Putin will not survive this. It's likely going to take a good while longer, but this spells the end for Vladimir Putin.

On the other hand, it could happen a lot more quickly than I expect. The cracks have really begun to show, and in spite of his doubling down - and tripling down, and fourpling down, trying to bull his way through - at some point, which we may or may not be able to see coming, the whole thing could easily collapse in a big fuckin' hurry.

Ukraine has been making some very bold moves. This one reminds me of the Doolittle Raid on Tokyo in 1942.

Drones fly deep inside Russia; Putin orders border tightened

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Drones that the Kremlin said were launched by Ukraine flew deep inside Russian territory, including one that got within 100 kilometers (60 miles) of Moscow, signaling breaches in Russian defenses as President Vladimir Putin ordered stepped-up protection at the border.

Officials said the drones caused no injuries and did not inflict any significant damage, but the attacks on Monday night and Tuesday morning raised questions about Russian defense capabilities more than a year after the country’s full-scale invasion of its neighbor.

Ukrainian officials did not immediately take responsibility, but they similarly have avoided directly acknowledging responsibility for past strikes and sabotage while emphasizing Ukraine’s right to hit any target in Russia.

Although Putin did not refer to any specific attacks in a speech in the Russian capital, his comments came hours after the drones targeted several areas in southern and western Russia. Authorities closed the airspace over St. Petersburg in response to what some reports said was a drone.

Also Tuesday, several Russian television stations aired a missile attack warning that officials blamed on a hacking attack.

The drone attacks targeted regions inside Russia along the border with Ukraine and deeper into the country, according to local Russian authorities.

A drone fell near the village of Gubastovo, less than 100 kilometers (60 miles) from Moscow, Andrei Vorobyov, governor of the region surrounding the Russian capital, said in an online statement.

The drone did not cause any damage, Vorobyov said, but it likely targeted “a civilian infrastructure object.”

Pictures of the drone showed it was a small Ukrainian-made model with a reported range of up to 800 kilometers (nearly 500 miles) but no capacity to carry a large load of explosives.

Russian forces early Tuesday shot down another Ukrainian drone over the Bryansk region, local Gov. Aleksandr Bogomaz said in a Telegram post.

Three drones also targeted Russia’s Belgorod region on Monday night, with one flying through an apartment window in the capital, local authorities reported. Regional Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov said the drones caused minor damage to buildings and cars.

The Russian Defense Ministry said Ukraine used drones to attack facilities in the Krasnodar region and neighboring Adygea. It said the drones were brought down by electronic warfare assets, adding that one of them crashed into a field and another diverted from its flight path and missed a facility it was supposed to attack.

Russia’s state RIA Novosti news agency reported a fire at the oil facility, and some other Russian reports said that two drones exploded nearby.

While Ukrainian drone strikes on the Russian border regions of Bryansk and Belgorod have become a regular occurrence, other strikes reflected a more ambitious effort.

Some Russian commentators described the drone attacks as an attempt by Ukraine to showcase its capability to strike deep behind the lines, foment tensions in Russia and rally the Ukrainian public. Some Russian war bloggers described the raids as a possible rehearsal for a bigger, more ambitious attack.

Andrei Medvedev, a commentator with Russian state television who serves as a deputy speaker of Moscow’s city legislature and runs a popular blog about the war, warned that the drone strikes could be a precursor to wider attacks within Russia that could accompany Ukraine’s attempt to launch a counteroffensive.

“The strikes of exploding drones on targets behind our lines will be part of that offensive,” Medvedev said, adding that Ukraine could try to extend the range of its drones.

Russia hawks urged strong retaliation. Igor Korotchenko, a retired Russian army colonel turned military commentator, called for a punishing strike on the Ukrainian presidential office in Kyiv.

Another retired military officer, Viktor Alksnis, noted that the drone attacks marked the expansion of the conflict and criticized Putin for failing to deliver a strong response.

Also on Tuesday, authorities reported that airspace around St. Petersburg, Russia’s second-largest city, was temporarily closed, halting all departures and arrivals at the main airport, Pulkovo. Officials did not give a reason for the move, but some Russian reports claimed that it was triggered by an unidentified drone.

The Russian Defense Ministry said it was conducting air defense drills in western Russia.

Last year, Russian authorities repeatedly reported shooting down Ukrainian drones over annexed Crimea. In December, the Russian military said Ukraine used drones to hit two bases for long-range bombers deep inside Russian territory.

Speaking at Russia’s main security agency, the FSB, Putin urged the service to tighten security on the Ukraine border.

In another development that fueled tensions across Russia on Tuesday, an air raid alarm interrupted the programming of several TV channels and radio stations in several regions. Russia’s Emergency Ministry said in an online statement that the announcement was a hoax “resulting from a hacking of the servers of radio stations and TV channels in some regions of the country.”

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We can't let these people down