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Morning Headlines
Reuters: Chinese and Russian companies attending a regional conference in northeastern China signed a raft of cooperation deals on Monday in sectors ranging from manufacturing and logistics to e-commerce and agriculture, Chinese state media reported.
Euronews: The Kyiv International Institute of Sociology says there is a growing number of Ukrainians who fear the West could tire of Russia's war and subsequently lose out on aid. However, experts interviewed by Euronews say it is too early to give up hope.
ISW: Russian forces are funneling additional forces to the Avdiivka front despite ongoing challenges with frontal mechanized assaults and the failure of a renewed push on October 19-20.
UK Ministry of Defence: Consistently heightened military spending will highly likely contribute to inflationary pressures within Russia. Furthermore, continued increases in military spending would force the Russian government to make difficult decisions about how to fund the war, likely increasing financial pressures on Russian businesses.
22.10.2023
Euromaidan Press: The West’s response to Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014 was not strong enough, emboldening Moscow in its current war against Ukraine, Markéta Pekarová Adamová, speaker of the Czech lower house, told Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.
The Kyiv Independent: The German government has not yet budgeted enough funds to be able to deliver enough military aid to Ukraine in 2024, German media outlet Bild reported on Oct. 22, citing a confidential Defense Ministry memo.
Reuters: Russian forces aiming to contain a four-month-old Ukrainian counteroffensive maintained unrelenting pressure on Sunday on the shattered town of Avdiivka in the east and intensified shelling in the southern area of Kherson.
Axios: Several GOP lawmakers are expressing support for President Biden's multi-billion dollar package introduced Friday, which combines aid to Israel and Ukraine.
Fox News: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, on Sunday deemed China, Russia and Iran the new "axis of evil" amid wars in Ukraine and Israel, while addressing U.S. funding of allies' responses to those duel conflicts.
Euromaidan Press: With no public mobilization, Russia is nonetheless mobilizing 20,000 people a month for its war in Ukraine through forced conscription of prisoners, debtors and other unreliable populations.
POLITICO: Hungary is set to make increased purchases of Russian gas this winter, Moscow's state-owned energy giant Gazprom said, despite growing criticism in the West that the arrangement is funding the war in Ukraine.
Reuters: Foreign ministers from Iran, Turkey, Russia and Georgia will meet their counterparts from Azerbaijan and Armenia in Tehran on Monday and discuss progress towards a peace agreement between the two South Caucasus neighbours, Iranian state media said.
BBC News: Drones have had a profound effect on the war in Ukraine, used in great quantities by both sides. China's move to place restrictions on exports, however, has led to concerns that there could be a problem with supplies.
UK Ministry of Defence: It is likely that Russia has suffered 150,000-190,000 permanent casualties (killed and permanently wounded) since the conflict began, with the total figure including temporarily wounded (recovered and due to return to the battlefield) in the region of 240,000-290,000. This does not include Wagner Group or their prisoner battalions who fought in Bakhmut.
21.10.2023
Reuters: Six people have been killed and at least 14 injured in a Russian missile attack that hit a postal distribution centre in the war-devastated northeastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, Ukrainian officials said.
Bloomberg: NATO is increasingly concerned about China’s shipping on Russia’s Northern Sea route, and the possibility that its commercial and scientific interests could be a precursor to a Chinese military presence in the Arctic, the alliance’s senior military officer said.
AP News: At least three civilians were killed and others wounded in Ukraine on Friday and Saturday, as Russian forces continued to shell areas across the country and pushed forward near an embattled eastern city, local Ukrainian officials reported Saturday.
Ukrainska Pravda: Current Time TV, a Russian TV channel, and System, a Russian investigative journalism project, found out that the Russian Geographical Society is trying to recruit spies in Norway to gather information about the country’s military bases and energy infrastructure facilities.
AFP: Russia intends to hold another UN Security Council meeting on the humanitarian situation in Gaza and the war between Israel and Hamas, Russia's deputy UN envoy said Saturday.
Novaya-Europe: The Russian Sports Ministry and the members of the State Duma, the lower house of the Russian parliament, will together develop restrictions for young ice hockey players willing to go abroad.
Meduza: Magomed Musaev, the owner of Russian Forbes, claims to have purchased the entire Forbes Media Group, reports The Washington Post, referencing five audio and one video recording of the businessman talking about the deal during private conversations with his business partners.
BBC News: Ukrainian fighters on the frontline say troops have not only crossed into Russian occupied territory but held a position, apparently for the first time, on the fiercely defended east (or left) bank of the Dnipro River in Kherson region.
Reuters: Russia's foreign ministry said on Saturday it had summoned the Czech Republic's temporary charge d'affaires in Russia, protesting against Prague's response to an air strike on Hroza in northeastern Ukraine this month that killed dozens.
The Kyiv Independent: Germany is allocating an additional 200 million euros for the reconstruction of Ukraine, the German Press Agency (DPA) reported on Oct. 21, citing Germany's State Secretary for Development Jochen Flasbarth.
20.10.2023
US-EU Summit Joint Statement: 'We stand together in calling for Russia to end its brutal war and to withdraw its military forces and proxies and military equipment immediately, completely, and unconditionally from the entire internationally recognized territory of Ukraine.'
AP News: Russia named a replacement for the former head of the country's Aerospace Forces, who was dismissed in the wake of this summer's brief rebellion against the military establishment, state news agencies reported Friday.
RBC-Ukraine: The European Union will initiate consultations with its member states in the coming days regarding a new package of sanctions aimed at Russia for the war against Ukraine, according to Bloomberg.
EUobserver: Diamonds are set to star in the EU's 12th round of Russia sanctions, amid concern the Gaza war should not eclipse ongoing aggression against Ukraine. The Group of Seven Western allies are poised to announce a Russia-diamond ban "in the very coming days", a European diplomat told press in Brussels on Friday.
CEPA: If the US removes its support and Russia wins, Ukraine will become a dark space threatening peace and security all along NATO’s border.
Reuters: The United States on Friday released a U.S. intelligence assessment sent to more than 100 countries that found Moscow is using spies, social media and Russian state-run media to erode public faith in the integrity of democratic elections worldwide.
UN: The Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine documented further evidence that Russian authorities have committed indiscriminate attacks and the war crimes of torture, rape and other sexual violence, and deportation of children to Russia.
Bloomberg: Ukraine will press forward with an effort to build support for a peace formula with the so-called Global South as Malta hosts a third gathering of senior officials to discuss the blueprint this month.
Reuters: Russia's government on Friday published a list of domestically-produced cars that state officials should buy, all either Russian or Chinese brands, highlighting Beijing's infiltration of Russia's automobile industry since the Ukraine war.
AFP: Kazakhstan's trade ministry has denied banning the exports of goods to Russia as part of Western sanctions after an official said more than 100 items including drones were prohibited.
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