Ukraine Breaking News Today Live on 08-14-2024

David Satter explains why Ukraine is right to be alarmed that Moscow may plot false-flag operations.

As Ukraine fights for its very existence, another not-so-quiet revolution is happening in the country as it embraces equal rights for the LGBTQ community.

Putin’s Russia has become the poster child in the fight against the global LGBTQ movement, labeling any activists “extremists” and criminalizing any associated activities within its borders. As Russia wages this all-out assault against anything remotely queer, Ukraine is instead embracing our community as an indispensable part of their war effort, and moving toward a European standard of human rights. 

While the march toward equality in Ukraine is far from over, the government has made enormous strides through public overtures that bring LGBTQ people, especially in the military, into the mainstream. The ongoing war has presented an opportunity to showcase the self-sacrifice, bravery, and patriotism of queer military members, who are being positioned to become prominent stakeholders in a post-war Ukraine. The rainy June Pride Parade in Kyiv united around 500 service members, many of whom were given permission by their commanders to attend.

Update on the the Ukrainian counter-offensive targeting Russia's Kursk region and the the broader repercussions.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Wednesday his troops were "moving further" into Russia, as Kyiv's biggest ever cross-border attack stretched into a second week.

The Ukrainian army entered Russia's Kursk region on August 6, capturing dozens of settlements in the biggest offensive by a foreign army on Russian soil since World War II.

Overnight, the Ukrainian Air Defense Forces shot down a Russian Su-34 bomber operating in Russian airspace over the Kursk region where Kyiv’s troops were engaged in operations on the ground below.

In the pre-dawn hours Wednesday, the Ukrainian forces shot down a Russian Su-34 bomber in Russia operating over the Kursk region, northeast of the Ukrainian border.

According to the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces (AFU) on Wednesday, Aug 14, “during a combat mission, the Air Defense Forces of the Ukrainian Air Force destroyed a Russian Su-34 bomber.”

A news outlet used military ID reportedly recovered during Ukraine’s advance into Russia’s Kursk region to establish the identity of Chechen fighters killed, wounded and captured in battle.

Reports have surfaced that Chechen fighters – some possibly belonging to the “Kadyrovite” Akhmat special forces – have been killed, injured or captured in Ukraine’s incursion into Russia’s Kursk region that started on Aug. 6.

On Sunday, Aug. 11, a Ukrainian project that provides support to surrendering Russian troops published a video of Russian prisoners of war (POWs), three of which claimed to have come from Grozny, the capital of Russia’s Chechen republic.

Der Spiegel magazine reported that police and the German military's counter-intelligence service were investigating a break-in, with its sources saying a hole in the fence had been discovered.

A German military base was sealed off Wednesday as authorities investigate suspected sabotage, the defence ministry said, with media reports saying the water supply may have been tampered with.

The Cologne-Wahn base "has been locked down because there is a suspicion of an attempted intrusion and a suspicion of sabotage," defence ministry spokesman Colonel Arne Collatz told reporters in Berlin.

The open-source intelligence (OSINT) community has identified several fresh Russian trenches in the Kremlin-controlled areas of the Kursk region using new satellite imagery.

Russia’s armed forces have reportedly been entrenching and fortifying areas in the Kursk region under its control, 45 kilometers (28 miles) from the Ukrainian border, in response to Ukraine’s incursion into the region that began on Tuesday, Aug. 6.

Open-source intelligence (OSINT) sites have identified the trenches through commercially available satellite imagery, which it shared on social media along with the coordinates of the objects.

Reports say that Russian conscripts evacuated from the border areas of the Kursk region ahead of Ukraine’s advance are being forced to sign military contracts and sent to the front line.

Conscripts who escaped from the border as the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) broke through are being forced to sign contracts with the Ministry of Defense and will be sent them back to the front lines, the independent Russian news site Verstka reported on Tuesday, Aug. 13, citing two of the conscripts’ mothers.

According to one of them about 150 conscripts are currently in her son’s military unit in the Kursk region. They have been told that “you will follow the stormtroopers, to clear the territory” and are promised benefits and “combat” pay of up to 4,500 rubles ($50) a day. She said her boy was convinced that they will “be sent anyway,” and if they don’t sign, they would face trial.

Ukraine’s central bank has switched from an anti-shock policy to stabilization and wants to return to inflation-targeting – which role best meet the future need for new budget revenues?

The head of Ukraine’s central bank, Andrii Pyshnyy gave an interview to Ekonomichna Pravda, the country's leading economy based media outlet on Monday, Aug. 12. 

Kyiv Post shares the highlights of the conversation, where this key policymaker talked about internal debt, stabilization of the economy during the uncertainty of Russia’s full-scale invasion, hryvnia depreciation, and loans for business in Ukraine. 

The world in focus, as seen by a Canadian leading global affairs analyst, writer and speaker, in his review of international media.

The Russian border region of Belgorod declared an emergency on Wednesday after new attacks by Ukrainian forces, with Kyiv claiming control of hundreds of square miles of Russian territory after its rare cross-border incursion. “The situation in the Belgorod region continues to be extremely difficult and tense,” Belgorod Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov said in a video message posted on his Telegram account. The declaration came after Belgorod began evacuations on Monday as a result of Ukrainian advances, following Kyiv’s surprise incursion into the neighboring Kursk region last week. It was a notable change in tactics for Ukraine and marked the first time foreign troops had entered Russian territory since World War II. Regional authorities are now appealing to the Russian government to declare a federal emergency, Gladkov said. Two locations in Belgorod, the city of Shebekino and the village of Ustinka, had been attacked by Ukrainian drones, he added. There were no casualties but two residences were damaged. - CNN

China has urged all sides in the Ukraine war to de-escalate as Kyiv’s forces pierced deep into Beijing ally Russia’s Kursk border region. In response to the offensive, Beijing Monday urged all parties to follow “three principles for de-escalating the situation”. Those are “no expansion of the battlefield, no escalation of fighting and no fuelling the flame by any party”, a foreign ministry spokesperson said in a statement. China will continue to maintain communication with the international community and play a constructive role in promoting a political solution to the crisis,” they added. China presents itself as a neutral party in the war and says it is not sending lethal assistance to either side, unlike the United States and other Western nations. - AFP

German media said earlier that prosecutors had issued a warrant for a Ukrainian diver named Volodymyr Z., who they believe helped plant explosive devices on the pipeline.

Poland confirmed on Wednesday that it had received a German arrest warrant for a Ukrainian man who is reportedly a suspect over the sabotage of the Nord Stream gas pipelines in 2022.

German media said earlier that prosecutors had issued a warrant for a Ukrainian diver, named as Volodymyr Z., that they believe helped plant explosive devices on the pipeline.

The Russian Defense Ministry reported the destruction of 118 drones overnight, with 11 downed in the Nizhny Novgorod region. Additional drones were intercepted across several other regions.

Kyiv Post sources from the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) have confirmed the largest attack on Russian airfields. The SBU and Defense Forces targeted four Russian airbases in what is the most significant assault on Russian military airfields in the entire war.

Sources confirm that this was a meticulously planned operation to prevent the enemy from using these airfields to launch guided aerial bombs along the front line and on Ukrainian cities.

Preliminary work on the Polish side of the Hrebenne-Rava-Ruska checkpoint is expected to last until Sept. 12, during which time delays are expected for both passenger and cargo traffic.

Due to repair work on the Polish side of the Hrebenne-Rava-Ruska checkpoint, delays are expected for both passenger and cargo traffic until at least Sept. 12, when preliminary work is planned to end.

Repair work is being carried out at the Ukraine entry point to for passenger traffic, as well as cargo parking lots in both directions, according to the Ukrainian European Pravda news outlet, citing the press service of Ukraine’s State Border Service.

His troops launched on Aug. 6 a large-scale operation across Russia's border in the Kursk region, breaking months of setbacks for the Ukrainian army and catching Russian troops off-guard.

Ukraine's top military commander Oleksandr Syrsky was born in Russia and studied in Moscow and yet he is leading an unprecedented assault on Russian territory.

His troops launched on August 6 a large-scale operation across Russia's border in the Kursk region, breaking months of setbacks for the Ukrainian army and catching Russian troops off-guard.

Data showed that most foreign companies opened in Ukraine after the 2022 invasion were involved in wholesale trade, with Turkish citizens among the top nationals opening companies in Ukraine.

Open-sourced data from Opendatabot, a Ukrainian company that provides open access to public registers, showed that more than 3,000 companies with foreign owners have opened in Ukraine since the 2022 invasion.

Opendatabot said among them were nationals from 101 countries, with Turkey taking the top position with 396 companies, or 12.9 percent of the total number, followed by Uzbekistan taking up 10.1 percent and Poland taking up 7.3 percent.

Belgorod borders Ukraine's Kharkiv region and neighbours Kursk, where Ukraine has launched a surprise offensive in the most significant cross-border attack on Russian soil since World War II.

The head of Russia's Belgorod declared a state of emergency Wednesday, saying the situation was "extremely difficult" in the border region under Ukrainian bombardment.

"The situation in our Belgorod region remains extremely difficult and tense due to shellings from the Ukrainian Armed Forces. Houses are destroyed, civilians died and were injured," governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said on Telegram.

Ukrainian forces entered Russia's Kursk region last Tuesday, taking over two dozen settlements in the biggest attack by a foreign army on Russian soil since World War II.

Ukraine said Tuesday it would not hold on to Russian territory captured in its surprise cross-border incursion and offered to stop raids if Moscow agreed a "just peace".

Ukrainian forces entered Russia's Kursk region last Tuesday, taking over two dozen settlements in the biggest attack by a foreign army on Russian soil since World War II.

The acting governor of the Kursk region announced on Tuesday that an unconfirmed number of residents from the region will be moved to occupied Zaporizhzhia.

Alexey Smirnov, the acting governor of Russia’s Kursk region, told the Russian Current Time TV channel on Aug. 13 that the region’s evacuees will be moved to the occupied Zaporizhzhia territory. He said he had agreed this with his counterpart, the Russian appointed “head” of the southern Ukrainian region, Yevgeny Balitsky.

Smirnov added that flights would be organized to take evacuees the 550 kilometers (341 miles) from Kursk to temporary accommodation centers – including sanatoriums and boarding houses – on the coast of the Azov Sea between Berdyansk and Kirillovka.

Latest from the Institute for the Study of War.

Key Takeaways from the ISW:

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and other senior Ukrainian officials provided updates about the ongoing Ukrainian incursion into Kursk Oblast and outlined several Ukrainian objectives of the operations in the area.
• Russian milbloggers claimed that Ukrainian forces continue to advance in Kursk Oblast amid Russian attempts to stabilize the frontline in the area.
• The Russian military command may be pulling select elements of Russian irregular units from Donetsk Oblast to address the Ukrainian incursion in Kursk Oblast.
• Russian authorities appear to be largely relying on Russian conscripts, and elements of some regular and irregular military units pulled from less critical sectors of the frontline to address the ongoing Ukrainian incursion, however.
• Russian President Vladimir Putin reportedly appointed Russian Presidential Aid Aide Alexei Dyumin to supervise Russia’s “counterterrorism operation” in Kursk Oblast on August 12
• Russian officials continue to undermine a long-standing Kremlin information operation that falsely portrays Ukraine as unwilling to engage in legitimate, good-faith negotiations and places the onus for peace negotiations on Ukraine.
• Russian authorities fined Telegram and WhatsApp four million rubles ($44,000) each for failing to remove "prohibited" content on August 13.
• Russian forces recently advanced near Chasiv Yar and southwest of Donetsk City, and Ukrainian forces recently advanced in the Siversk direction and in western Zaporizhia Oblast.
• The Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD) continues to use the Army-2024 International Military-Technical Forum in Moscow to expand its international defense ties.

Nearly 194,000 people are set to be evacuated from areas in the Kursk and Belgorod regions due to the ongoing Ukrainian military offensive.

Russian authorities have announced the largest evacuation of Russian citizens from a war zone since the Second Chechen War.

Nearly 194,000 people are set to be evacuated from areas in the Kursk and Belgorod regions due to the ongoing Ukrainian military offensive, according to statements from regional governors.

Russia has carried out hundreds of attacks intentionally targeted against Ukraine’s medical infrastructure since the 2022 full-scale invasion.

After two and a half years of all-out war and as a result of Moscow’s deliberate strategy, 1,646 medical facilities were damaged, some severely, a further 215 have been completely destroyed along with 266 destroyed ambulances, 196 damaged, and 125 captured  according to a recent report by Ukraine's Ministry of Health.

Russian bombardment of Ukrainian hospitals, polyclinics, and maternity hospitals occurs almost every day, directly creating an additional burden on the healthcare system by inflicting casualties and depriving them of the means of treatment.