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Russians murder agricultural tycoon Vadaturskyi, his wife in attack on Mykolaiv
July 31st 2022
Early in the morning on July 31, a leading figure in Ukraine’s agribusiness, tycoon Oleksiy Vadaturskyi, and his wife Raisa Vadaturska were killed by a Russian strike on the southern city of Mykolaiv. The 74-year-old businessman was the founder of Nibulon, one of Ukraine’s largest agricultural holdings, specializing in the production and export of a variety of products, including grain, wheat, and corn. In 2021, Vadaturskyi’s net worth was $430 million, according to Forbes Ukraine. Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to President Volodymyr Zelensky’s Office, said Russia had deliberately targeted the businessman. “In my opinion, the death of Oleksiy Vadaturskyi was not an accident, but a thought-out deliberate murder,” he said. According to Podolyak, the Russian missile struck the bedroom of Vadaturskyi’s house, indicating that the attack was a premeditated assassination. Videos from the scene show the strike hit precisely the wing where the couple’s bedroom was. Their house was the only building in the neighborhood hit by a Russian rocket.
Vadaturskyi was a well-established Ukrainian businessman, with Nibulon, founded in 1991, being one of the largest companies in Ukraine. Nibulon holds an estimated 80,000 hectares, ranked first in terms of farmed land. After Russia occupied the southern regional capital Kherson, they ransacked Nibulon’s granaries in the southern region, hit the company’s tug, and fired at its grain elevators. It was a massive setback for the company built by Vadaturskyi, which set a record in 2021 by shipping more than 5 million tonnes of agricultural products to 38 countries. The businessman built Nibulon around the Dnipro River, with the company known for using Ukrainian waterways to transport its products. Vadaturskyi shaped the infrastructure of the Dnipro, reviving river shipments after years of decline. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union river transportation remained at a standstill for decades – there was no dredging, the locks were rarely repaired, and the fleet sailed abroad or was cut into scrap metal.
In the span of ten years, Nibulon increased river transportation fivefold, from less than 1 million tonnes in 2011 to 3.8 million in 2021. Nibulon has by far the largest fleet in Ukraine, which includes 82 barges, tugboats, and floating cranes. The company built 27 transshipment terminals, where more than 2 million tonnes of grain can be stored. Among them, 13 terminals are located on the Dnipro and Southern Buh rivers. Vadaturskyi’s most iconic idea remained the transportation of massive amounts of watermelons in boats from the southern Kherson region to Kyiv.
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Turkey Says First Grain Cargo Could Leave Ukraine Port Monday
July 31st 2022
A spokesman for the Turkish presidency said there was a “high probability” that a first ship carrying Ukrainian grain could leave Ukraine’s port of Odessa on Monday. That is despite Russian missiles hitting the city in the wake of the July 22 agreement on shipping grain between Russia, Turkey, the UN and Ukraine. “There is a strong possibility that a first ship could leave tomorrow morning if everything is sorted out by this evening,” Ibrahim Kalin said in an interview with Kanal 7 television Sunday. But Kalin said there were still “one or two subjects to be settled in the negotiations with the Russians”. “Preparations have reached a point to allow the ships to leave the port of Odessa. The ships have been loaded, they are ready to leave, but we need good logistical coordination,” he said.
The resumption of exports was also discussed in talks between the Turkish and Ukrainian defence ministers, Ankara said Sunday. “It is planned to begin transport as soon as possible,” the Turkish ministry said in a statement. The Joint Coordination Centre, charged with controlling Ukrainian grain exports via the Black Sea, was officially inaugurated Wednesday in Istanbul in line with the deal. The deal to lift the blockade — the first significant text involving both sides since the conflict began — is aimed at easing a global food crisis that has seen prices soar in some of the world’s poorest countries. The coordination centre is responsible for registering and tracking merchant ships taking part in the convoys, monitoring them via the web and satellite, and inspecting the ships as they are loaded at Ukrainian ports and when they arrive at Turkish ports.
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SOURCE = Kyiv Post
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Inside devastated Mykolaiv after worst attack of war kills one of Ukraine’s richest men
July 31st 2022
Witnesses saw torches lighting up the home of Ukraine’s biggest grain trader hours before he was killed by a Russian missile, in what may have been a targeted strike called in by Russian spies. Oleksiy Vadatursky, 74, the founder and owner of the agriculture company Nibulon, and his wife Raisa were killed when a missile hit their house in the southern city of Mykolaiv in the early hours of Sunday morning. Mr Vadatursky, one of the largest farmers in the country, was killed as Ukraine prepared to resume grain exports following a UN and Turkish-brokered deal to ease a Russian maritime blockade, prompting allegations the Kremlin was deliberately trying to sabotage the agreement.
“Vadatursky was one of the largest farmers in the country, a key person in the region and a large employer,” Myhailo Podolyak said. “The accurate missile didn’t just hit the house, but a specific wing – the bedroom – which leaves no doubts about the guidance of the strike.” The claim gained backing from a group of foreign volunteers based in a neighbouring compound who also came under attack. Daniel Burke, a former British paratrooper who leads the Dark Angels, told The Telegraph the group noticed torches being flashed at both compounds before the missiles hit. Asked if he was sure the torches were shone by Russian spies he said: “One hundred per cent. Drones see an aerial view. Boots on the ground work for the Russians. [They] Go to POI’s – a ‘point of interest’. When they see activity from a certain POI they light the place up. The Russian UAV sees and relays to the strike unit. They designate the shot. Last night was our turn.”
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SOURCE = The Telegraph
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Reality of Ukraine war hidden from Fortress Russia
July 31st 2022
In the village of Vybuty, a large crowd has gathered outside a church. People are queuing up to kiss the icon of a saint. An Orthodox priest in a gold embroidered vestment chants a prayer for Russia: “For our blessed country, its rulers and its army.” In the congregation are Russian servicemen. They cross themselves with three fingers according to the Orthodox tradition. Ukraine isn’t mentioned in the mass. But it’s on people’s minds. “In our family, we have a lot of young men who are serving there,” one of the worshippers, Ludmila, tells me. “God won’t abandon them. They will definitely return home.” Many Russian soldiers haven’t. Just a few metres away, in the village cemetery, there are two dozen fresh graves of Russian paratroopers. The burial ground is carpeted with wreaths, while banners of the men’s regiment flutter in the wind. Attached to wooden crosses are plaques with names and dates of death.
All these soldiers were killed after 24 February: the day Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine. The scene is a stark reminder of the “significant losses” the Kremlin admits Russia has suffered in Ukraine. The invasion was President Vladimir Putin’s idea. He ordered it. It is his “special military operation”. Despite the thousands of civilian deaths in Ukraine, the Kremlin leader has displayed no remorse, no hint of regret over his decision to attack a sovereign, independent nation. But what of the Russian public? More than five months on, do Russians believe their president took the right decision? In the big cities, such as Moscow and St Petersburg, it’s not uncommon to hear people criticise the Kremlin’s “special operation”. But I’m a long way from the capital after a nine-hour drive north-west of Moscow. I leave the village and head to the regional capital, Pskov. As I drive past a military base, the slogan on the poster outside catches my eye: “The borders of Russia never end!”
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SOURCE = BBC News
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Citizens of Ukraine were advised not to visit the southern regions of Serbia
July 31st 2022
Also, Ukrainians in Serbia are advised to avoid mass gatherings of people. This was reported by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine. “At the request of the Minister of Foreign Affairs Dmytro Kuleba, an operational headquarters has been established at the Embassy of Ukraine in Serbia, and a 24-hour hotline has been opened to help Ukrainians: +381631113185. In case of an emergency, you can also contact the “hotline” of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine: + 380442381588″, the message says. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine also recommends that Ukrainians use checkpoints on the border with the Republic of North Macedonia in the event of an aggravation of the security situation and blocking roads in the south of Serbia. In the north of the partially recognized Kosovo, the local Serbs, the majority of the population, have started raising barricades. This is how they protested against Prishtina’s decision to re-register vehicles and identification cards. However, this conflict threatens to turn into a serious war.
SOURCE = The Odessa Journal
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Russia ‘Clearly in a Lot of Trouble’ in Ukraine War: Security Expert
July 31st 2022
Russian forces are “clearly in a lot of trouble” in Ukraine as they face mounting losses, according to one security expert. Speaking with GB News on Sunday, British Professor Anthony Glees discussed the state of Russian forces in Ukraine and said that the invading nation could be headed toward a “significant defeat.” Glees is a “nationally and internationally published expert on European affairs… and security,” and currently serves as an emeritus professor at the University of Buckingham. “We and the Americans assess that 75,000 Russian soldiers have either been killed or been wounded,” the professor said. “That’s a hell of a lot. And 80 percent of active Russian forces are now bogged now in the east of Ukraine. Putin had hoped to win this war in a matter of days, and what has actually happened is that it is grinding, not towards a stalemate but a defeat. It seems that if the battle of Kherson ends up in Ukraine’s favor, Russia will have suffered a significant defeat.” The Kherson Oblast region is located in Southern Ukraine, located along the Black Sea and bordering the Crimean peninsula, which Russia annexed in 2014.
Given its strategic value, Kherson was among the first of Ukraine’s provinces to come under Russian occupation after the start of the invasion earlier this year. In recent weeks, however, Ukrainian forces have redoubled their efforts to retake the province from Russia. On Thursday, the United Kingdom’s Ministry of Defence reported that Ukraine was “gathering momentum” in the fight to retake Kherson and used U.S.-provided missiles to take out several bridges that Russian forces had used to bring in supplies. Continuing his talk with GB News, Glees cited another recent report from Richard Moore, the head of the U.K.’s MI6, which claimed that Russia may be “running out of steam.” “The head of MI6 has form in predicting what is going to happen,” Glees added. “He said Russia was going to invade Ukraine when many doubted that. We need to listen very carefully to what he is saying—and the Russians need to listen to what he is saying, and I hope they will do.”
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SOURCE = Newsweek
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Intelligence report: 200 Russian marines defy orders, refuse to redeploy in Ukraine
July 31st 2022
A total of 200 marines with the 810th Marine Brigade of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet have refused to return to combat zones in Ukraine. That’s according to Vadym Skibitskyi, a spokesperson for Ukraine’s defense intelligence, who spoke with RFE/RL’s Crimea.Realities project, Ukrinform reports. “What was bad news for the Russian command? It’s the fact that nearly 200 servicemen with the 810th brigade refused to return to southern Ukraine. This caused a major issue, which, according to our data, delayed the process of refitting and coordinating the battalion-tactical group this May. But despite this, the BTGr was formed anyway, and it is now in the south of our country, running combat operations. But these battalion-tactical groups are now completely different from those that they had at the onset,” said Skibitskyi.
According to the spokesman, these units now lack combat potential and combat experience – the features that are critical for them. “Secondly, the 810th brigade’s main task is to conduct naval, assault offensive operations and simply assault operations. Accordingly, if there are no trained professionals, if there is no clear coordination within the unit, then the combat potential of its BTGr and of the entire brigade will decrease,” said the defense intelligence official. As Ukrinform reported earlier, the Russian military death toll as of July 31 rose to40,830.
SOURCE = UkrinForm
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Ukrainian and UK governments thank public for ‘largest offer of help to people fleeing war since 1945’
July 31st 2022
The Ukrainian and UK governments will send thank you letters to sponsors and families across the UK who have welcomed Ukrainian refugees into their homes and communities. More than 104,000 Ukrainians have arrived in the UK under the Ukraine Family Scheme and Homes for Ukraine Scheme since March. Signed by Ukrainian Ambassador Vadym Prystaiko and Refugees Minister Lord Harrington, the letters will praise sponsors and families for their “continuing efforts…making a difference, and that [they] have our heartfelt thanks and the thanks of the people of Ukraine.” It reads: “Together you and your fellow hosts, and the Ukrainian diaspora community, have given 104,000 people safe refuge across the UK. You have saved lives, given hope, and offered sanctuary to people in desperate need. This represents the UK’s largest offer of help to people fleeing war since 1945.” From day one, Ukrainians have the right to work and to access benefits and public services including education and healthcare.
This will continue to be the case for those who wish to remain in the UK. Ukrainian Ambassador Vadym Prystaiko said: “As Russian tanks started rolling over Ukrainian borders and the first cities were bombarded, tens of thousands of British families have offered their homes to Ukrainians. “I know it is not easy to host displaced people from a different culture, an unfamiliar background, speaking a foreign language and most importantly deeply troubled and hurt. “Yes, we are different in so many ways but we have in common an acute sense of injustice and readiness to stand up against evil. We are fighting fearlessly until our land is free but with the same intensity, we are remembering kindness and friendship. “As Ukrainians return back to rebuild our nation they will cherish this chance to learn about your culture, your way of living, even your cuisine. Although here I guess both sides will be able to enrich each other.
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SOURCE = The evening Standard
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Ukraine provides a bit of good news amidst a global food shortage
July 31st 2022
AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
For the first time since Russia invaded five months ago, Ukraine is loading grain, cooking oil and other goods onto ships in the Black Sea this weekend. These ships are ready to leave at any moment. Ukraine says it’s only waiting for the United Nations, which helped broker a wartime deal to export Ukrainian food, to give the OK. NPR’s Joanna Kakissis spent some time near those Black Sea ports and sent us this report.
JOANNA KAKISSIS, BYLINE: Vyechislav Nevmerzhytskiy (ph) walks through rows of sunflowers on his land, not far from the port of Pivdennyi, one of three Ukrainian ports now opening to export food.
VYECHISLAV NEVMERZHYTSKIY: (Speaking Ukrainian).
KAKISSIS: Nevmerzhytskiy is middle-aged with a buzzcut and a smile as cheerful as his sunflowers. He usually sells seeds to be pressed into cooking oil. He’s also got lots of grain in storage.
NEVMERZHYTSKIY: (Through interpreter) We haven’t sold anything this year for obvious reasons. We can’t pay the rent on our land. I’ve been giving some of my grain away to small farms.
KAKISSIS: He says he was thrilled when the United Nations and Turkey made a deal on July 22 with Ukraine and Russia to reopen ports. But he predicts these wartime exports by sea won’t last long for Ukraine.
NEVMERZHYTSKIY: (Through interpreter) Ships are easy targets for the Russians. And I can see them attacking these commercial vessels and then blaming us. The only way this will work is if NATO guards the ports.
KAKISSIS: Since the deal was signed, Russia has hit the port of Odesa and a nearby coastal town with missiles, rattling everyone.
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SOURCE = NPR
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Russia Claims Ukraine Killed Its Own POWs—Here’s Why Few Believe It
July 31st 2022
In 2014, the town of Olenivka in Eastern Ukraine fell under control of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), a separatist group now controlled by Moscow. That August, the Volnovakha Correctional Colony No. 120 in the town of roughly 4,500 persons became a prison camp for Ukrainians soldiers and political prisoners captured by DPR militants and the Russian military. Eight years later in July 2022, a group of between 193 and 211 Ukrainian soldiers were regrouped into a new barracks in the Volnovakha complex. All were members of the far-right Azov unit which had surrendered on May 16 under a guarantee of protection from the United Nations and International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) after resisting beseiging Russian forces for three months in the city of Mariupol.
Just few days later in the evening of July 28, a blast consumed their new dormitory in flames, killing at least 53 of the interred POWs and injuring at least 75 and up to 130 more. Gruesome video footage released by Russia and other news agencies show numerous scorched bodies, some reduced to carbonized ashes while sleeping in their beds. No other buildings were damaged (as can be seen in satellite photos) and no guards were killed.
The ICRC subsequently requested access to the surviving Ukrainian POWs, the safety of which it had guaranteed, but were refused it. Moscow claimed the Olenivka prison had been struck by a missile fired by a HIMARS rocket artillery system given to Ukraine by the U.S. The HIMARS’s GPS-guided M31 rockets have proven effective in destroying Russian ammo depots and surface-to-air missile batteries, as well as holing bridges Russian logistics depend upon. Russian troops displayed fragments allegedly from the HIMARS strike, though without evidence that they were recovered at the site of the attack.
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SOURCE = Forbes
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Ukrainian offensive forces Russia to bolster troops in occupied south
July 31st 2022
Russia is moving large numbers of troops to Ukraine’s south for battles against the country’s forces through the newly occupied territories and Crimea, according to Ukraine’s deputy head of military intelligence. If Russia won, it would try to capture more territory, said Vadym Skibitsky. “They are increasing their troop numbers, preparing for our counteroffensive [in Ukraine’s south] and perhaps preparing to launch an offensive of their own. The south is key for them, above all because of Crimea,” he said. Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy corroborated these reports in his latest national address, saying Russia was relocating troops from the east to the south of Ukraine in order to push towards Kherson’s regional capital as well as the Zaporizhzhia region.
“Now the Russian army is trying to strengthen its positions in the occupied areas of the south of our country, increasing activity in the relevant areas,” he said, adding that “strategically, Russia has no chance of winning this war”. Russian troop movements come in response to Ukraine’s declared counteroffensive to liberate the southern occupied regions of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia. Ukrainian forces have retaken dozens of villages and towns along the border, according to the region’s military governor, Dmytro Butrii, and are pushing towards Kherson’s regional capital. The Kherson region stretches across Ukraine’s Dnieper river. Earlier this month, Ukraine carried out precision strikes using US-supplied weapons on the Antonovskiy bridge in the Kherson region, damaging a key Russian supply line. Washington’s Institute for the Study of War said Ukrainian forces and partisans also damaged the only two other bridges connecting occupied Kherson.
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SOURCE = The Guardian
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Putin’s Managed to Enrage His Last Supporters in Ukraine
July 31st 2022
ODESA, Ukraine—Russia has been bombarding the seaside city of Odesa since the earliest days of its war in Ukraine—but the critical grain port has become a symbol of ongoing local resistance, where even former pro-Russian stalwarts are now embracing Ukrainian patriotism. “The longer the war goes on, fewer people sympathize with Russia in Ukraine. Those who spoke Russian in everyday life, switch to Ukrainian,” a long-time observer of Ukraine’s politics, Yevgeny Kisilyev, told The Daily Beast on Tuesday. “Even the most openly pro-Russian politicians, including Odesa’s mayor … have turned into passionate enemies of [Russian president Vladimir] Putin’s regime.” Odesa, with its huge grain storage and shipping resources, is a much-desired target for Moscow. Russian missiles have been destroying the city since the first days of the war. In March and April, missiles killed dozens of civilians, including a three-month-old baby girl, Kira Glodan, her mother, and her grandmother. The tragedy angered Odesa but the massacre did not stop. On July 1, one of the missiles hit an apartment block in Bilhorod-Dnistrovskyi, killing 19 people. Weeks later, on July 20, “Russia fired eight missiles that cost millions of dollars, which our forces brought down along with a Russian drone,” Natalya Humeniuk, spokeswoman of the South Defense forces, told The Daily Beast in an interview last week.
The relentless attacks from Russia have hardened local sentiments against Putin. “During the first week of the war, Odesa’s mayor, Gennady Trukhanov—who many believed had a Russian passport—said nothing against Moscow,” local activist Julia Grodetskaya told The Daily Beast. “So concerned citizens consolidated, and patriotic volunteers worked hard on the city’s defense. Their actions, and constant Russian violence, changed the leadership and made local authorities more patriotic,” she said, adding that now, “all former pro-Russian Odesans are ready to defend our city.” This is not how Moscow had planned it. On the eve of the war, one of the Kremlin’s ideologists, Sergei Markov, told The Daily Beast that Russian forces would take Odesa easily. “There will be a quick Marine landing supported by a pro-Russian underground,” Markov predicted of the development of the war on the Black Sea.
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SOURCE = Daily Beast
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