All things Russia Vs. Ukraine for April 22, 2022

1. The Kadyrovski celebrate the fall of mariupol.

(Something so wrong about this whole thing)

Please check back over the course of the day, especially the comments under this post for a wide variety of items on this conflict. Clarity is not guaranteed. But the less clear it is, the closer we likely are to the truth of the matter, since all the disinformation and propaganda most certainly attempts to insert clarity based on fabrications.

About Eeyore

Canadian artist and counter-jihad and freedom of speech activist as well as devout Schrödinger's catholic

12 Replies to “All things Russia Vs. Ukraine for April 22, 2022”

  1. bloomberg – EU Suggests Companies Should Keep Paying for Russia Gas in Euros

    Commission says scope for exemptions in Putin decree not clear
    Benchmark gas prices dip after EU posts guidance on website

    The European Union has suggested that companies could keep paying for gas in euros, as it published guidance that Moscow’s decree calling for payment in rubles would violate sanctions.

    In a document posted on its website and shared with member states, the Commission said that the payment mechanism as outlined in the decree would run against European sanctions imposed on Russia, confirming a preliminary assessment that the procedure demanded by Vladimir Putin would hand total control of the payment process to Moscow.

    But the guidance also states that the decree doesn’t automatically preclude allowing companies to continue paying in euros, and says the scope for exemptions is not yet clear. The commission advised them to seek confirmation from Moscow that this was possible.

    “It would be advisable to seek confirmation from the Russian side that this procedure is possible under the rules of the Decree,” the document says.

    It’s up to Moscow to decide whether this is acceptable, and there was no immediate comment from the Russian government or Gazprom PJSC on Friday.

    The stakes are high: Putin said on March 31 that if payments weren’t made in rubles then gas exports would be halted. Europe depends heavily on Russian gas to heat homes and power industry.

    Benchmark gas prices fell 4% after the guidance was published.

    https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-22/eu-suggests-companies-should-keep-paying-for-russia-gas-in-euros
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    EU admits rouble payments for Putin’s gas might not breach sanctions – live updates

    The EU has admitted countries may be able to comply with Putin’s demand for gas payments in roubles without breaching sanctions against Russia.

    Putin has demanded that so-called “unfriendly” nations open accounts at sanctioned lender Gazprombank, where payments in euros or dollars would be converted into roubles.

    The European Commission has refused to comply with the order and initially said doing so would fall foul of sanctions. It’s now backed down on this claim, although the bloc said it wasn’t clear how such a procedure would work.

    It came as the UK issued a temporary licence allowing payments to Gazprombank for gas used in the EU until the end of May.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2022/04/22/ftse-100-markets-live-news-earth-day-sustainable-development/

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    EU changes tune on ruble gas payments

    The settlement switch may be possible without breaching sanctions, the European Commission says © Getty Images / Henrik Rusi / EyeEm

    European Union companies may be able to comply with Russia’s proposed system to pay for gas in rubles without falling foul of the bloc’s sanctions against Moscow, the European Commission said on Friday.

    At the same time, EU executives say that it is not yet clear how such a scheme would work.

    “The procedure for derogations from the requirements of the decree is not clear yet,” the document issued by the commission said.

    In March, the Russian government issued a decree requiring European energy companies to open accounts at Gazprombank, where payments in euros or dollars would be converted to rubles.

    https://www.azerbaycan24.com/en/eu-changes-tune-on-ruble-gas-payments/

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    EU Reportedly to Allow Payment for Russian Gas in Rubles ‘Under Certain Conditions’

    Moscow previously issued a new decree requiring “unfriendly states” to pay for Russian gas in rubles. Kremlin includes all countries that have imposed sanctions on Russia “unfriendly”.
    European companies will be able to pay for the Russian gas while meeting Moscow’s demands to do so in rubles without violating EU sanctions at the same time.

    The scheme proposed by the European Commission suggests that companies will wire their payments in euros or dollars to a bank account in Russia, where the currency will be converted into rubles. Brussels’ memo said that the European firms’ obligations will be complete once the payment in currency is deposited in the Russian bank. They will therefore not be in breach of the EU’s own sanctions on Russia over its special military operation in Ukraine.

    On the same day, UK Treasury also issued a document that temporarily allowed British companies to wire funds to the Russian Gazprombank to pay for Russian gas — despite London slapping sanctions on the arm of the national gas company. The sanctions waiver lasts until 31 May and will allow the UK companies to meet the new requirements for gas payments issued by Russia in April.

    UK authorities explained the time limit on the waiver as part of the EU’s aim of gradually phase out Russian energy imports in the light of the special operation.

    Moscow issued the new decree early in April in response to the western sanctions, requiring countries that imposed them — dubbed “unfriendly” by Russia — to “pay for Russian gas in rubles”. Technically, the decree required importers to deposit their gas payments in euros and dollars in accounts at Gazprombank, which had already been sanctioned by some of those states. Later, these deposits would be converted into rubles to complete the payments.

    https://sputniknews.com/20220422/eu-reportedly-to-allow-payment-for-russian-gas-in-rubles-under-certain-conditions-1094974769.html

  2. Why Germany is resisting calls to ease energy crunch by restarting nuclear power

    Political, legal and logistical obstacles are in the way of plugging supply gap caused by war in Ukraine

    It sounded like a fair question. With sanctions against Russia likely to disrupt Germany’s energy supply, why, asked MP Marc Bernhard, couldn’t Berlin just restart its mothballed nuclear power stations?

    “If we reactivate the three plants that were switched off last December they could, together with the three that are still operating, replace all the coal we import from Russia or 30 per cent of the Russian gas,” the Alternative for Germany MP told Olaf Scholz, Germany’s chancellor, in the Bundestag earlier this month.

    Scholz gave him short shrift. “If the world were as simple as you make out in your question, we’d have a very good life,” he said.

    Yet Bernhard is far from alone in raising the issue. Germany decided to phase out nuclear power after Japan’s Fukushima disaster in 2011 and the last reactors were due to be shut down at the end of this year. But with EU sanctions now being imposed on Russia’s coal, and some demanding an embargo on its oil and gas, there are growing calls to plug the resulting energy gap with nuclear power.

    The government says it will not change its position. It cites technical reasons but the biggest argument could be political, especially for the Greens, who control the economy ministry.

    “It would be suicide for the Greens to say we were wrong about nuclear power,” said Thomas O’Donnell, a Germany-based energy analyst and nuclear physicist. “So they’re forced to continue with the old battle plan.”

    Attractive as the idea might appear to its advocates, ministers and analysts argue that the reality of a return to nuclear is more complicated.

    Could a nuclear restart solve Germany’s looming energy crunch?

    Germany’s high dependency on Russian gas is particularly great in heat generation and in industry. Yet nuclear power plays no role in either. The three plants that are still in operation — Isar 2, Emsland and Neckarwestheim 2 — don’t make much of a contribution to Germany’s energy balance: they have an installed capacity of just 4.3 gigawatts and supply on average about 30 terawatt hours a year of power — just 5 per cent of Germany’s total electricity production.

    What are the legal difficulties of extending the plants’ lifespans?

    Any decision to prolong their lives would require a new comprehensive risk assessment, and, according to the government, the risks associated with nuclear power have grown — witness the danger posed to critical infrastructure by cyber attacks.

    The war in Ukraine, during which Russian forces fired on the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station and the electricity supply to the inactive Chernobyl plant was interrupted, has also highlighted some of the external risks to which nuclear power is exposed.

    “There are some individual wind farms on the drawing board that have more than 4.3GW capacity,” said one official.

    Do the plants have fuel supplies?

    The three existing plants have no fresh uranium fuel rods that would allow them to continue operating beyond year-end, the government says. New fuel assemblies would, it says, take 12-15 months to produce, and the earliest they would be ready is summer 2023. Russia is the second biggest uranium supplier to EU nuclear plants, according to Eurostat.

    Scholz referred to the issue in his duel with Bernhard, the AfD MP. If the current reactors’ lives were extended “you need new nuclear fuel which just isn’t freely available”, the chancellor said, adding that nuclear reactors were not like cars that you just fill up when they run low on fuel.

    Would the plants require a new operating licence?

    The last time the final three nuclear plants underwent a safety inspection was in 2009, so a new one would have to be carried out which might trigger demands for “massive investments” in safety technology, the government said.

    That would amount to a relicensing of the plants, a highly bureaucratic process: they would be required to meet the latest scientific and technological standards, which could end up being so demanding that they would make no business sense for potential operators.

    What is the operators’ view on extending the plants’ lives?

    The companies have made it clear they have no appetite to keep the plants going. Frank Mastiaux, chief executive of EnBW, which operates Neckarwestheim 2, told the Financial Times a life-extension beyond a few weeks “is not possible with the technical set-up we have today”, adding: “We have no legal framework whatsoever to run it one minute into the year 2023. It’s beyond our control.

    Eon, which operates Isar 2, takes a similar view. “There is no future for nuclear in Germany — period,” said chief executive Leo Birnbaum. “It is too emotional. There will be no change in legislation and opinion.”

    The operators have also made clear that, if an energy emergency arose and the government forced them to restart the plants, they would insist it assumed all risks and costs. “They’re not prepared to encumber their shareholders with the disaster risks,” said one official. But that kind of blank cheque could prove impossible for any chancellor to take on.

    “The problem is that the operators just don’t trust the government,” said O’Donnell. To restart plants they would need “political guarantees that nuclear will continue to be legal in Germany” and the policy would not be reversed again in future — a tall order for any government.

    The arguments against may be persuasive but there are plenty of German politicians eager to offer voters relief from high energy prices who are continuing to plead for a nuclear reprieve.

    “If the federal government says on the one hand that we soon won’t have any more energy and prices are exploding, then it should do everything in its power to curb [prices] and acquire energy,” Markus Söder, the powerful prime minister of Bavaria, said earlier this month. “Letting the nuclear power stations run for longer would at least contribute to that.”

    https://www.ft.com/content/229c21c7-991c-4b44-a2f9-20991670a4ba

  3. Finlland, Ukraine and Germany similarities:
    https://youtu.be/ZM2cUzUJWFs

    When you Socialize a nation into the femaled, they split into Bucks, Cucks and Sucks.

    National Socialists.
    International Socialists and
    Identiterians.

    Then the Communists mop up.

  4. *****FORMER UKRAINIAN PRIME MINISTER – MYKOLA AZAROV: UKRAINE IS A BANANA REPUBLIC – 3:20
    Azarov on the murder of D Kireev, (who was part of the first negotiations with Russia), and other political crimes of Zelenskiy.
    By displaying solidarity with Ukraine on your social media – it is not the democracy you think you are supporting.

  5. *****SECRET US ARMY MANUALS & GUIDELINES WERE FOUND AT THE BASE OF THE NEO-NAZI AZOV BATTALION NEAR MARIUPOL – 1:05
    Proof of “who is responsible for what’s happening” in Ukraine?
    Secret US Army manuals and guidelines, in particular for intelligence units, were found at the base of the neo-Nazi Azov Battalion near Mariupol, a Sputnik correspondent reports from the site. According to the Russian military, such documents must be destroyed if they cannot be retrieved but Azov radicals failed to do so in time.
    https://odysee.com/USBOOKS:ad612de3cd3ecc69693b6fb9671e6ca663c26f17

  6. US supplying Ukraine with multiple launch rocket systems

    United States Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland told the Ukrainian media outlet European Pravda in an interview on Friday that the US has begun supplying Ukraine with multiple launch rocket systems (MLRS).

    “We are now working with other NATO allies so that Ukraine will receive more jet systems,” stated Nuland adding that the US is trying “to adjust the weapons we send to the needs of the Armed Forces of Ukraine” in accordance with how the conflict is evolving.

    Previously, US President Joe Biden confirmed that his administration has authorized additional military support for Ukraine worth $800 million, including heavy artillery, howitzers, drones, and ammunition.

    https://breakingthenews.net/Article/US-supplying-Ukraine-with-multiple-launch-rocket-systems/57730178

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    Ukraine arms depot in Kharkov taken by Russia

    Russian Ministry of Defense told reporters on Friday that its troops managed to take over an area in the Kharkov region where the Ukrainian forces have been storing their arms.

    “Specialists of the engineering troops of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, during a special military operation, took control of an arsenal of the Armed Forces of Ukraine,” the ministry stated.

    They added that the area encompasses ????”several hundred hectares” holding “warehouses with thousands of tons of ammunition.” Earlier, Kharkov Mayor Ihor Terekhov stated that the city has been under “intense bombardment.”

    https://breakingthenews.net/Article/Ukraine-arms-depot-in-Kharkiv-taken-by-Russia/57729755
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    • The Russian military occupied a huge arsenal of the Armed Forces of Ukraine near Balakleya in the Kharkov region.

      Its hangars are filled with thousands of tons of ammunition for tanks, artillery and anti-aircraft missile systems.

      Shells and mines were found from both Soviet stocks and Western production.

      The military arsenal in Balaklei is the oldest and almost the largest ammunition depot in Europe.

  7. If you want to get a look into the Ukraine war from the other side, I recommend the channel “Intel Slava Z” on Telegram. It shows the Russian perspective and of course, is full of propaganda which the Russians are very slick at. There is also a channel with Gonzo in its name that is the war correspondents traveling with the Russian troops. Ukraine is getting absolutely BTFO.

    I would be careful with telegram in Canada though. You have to use your telephone number (I used burner phone) to set it up and it seems like a honeypot for western intelligence services sometimes. But all the right people hate telegram and want to ban it. YMMV.

  8. CBC – Canada in the ‘next phase’ of providing military equipment to Ukraine: defence minister

    Defence Minister Anita Anand says Canada will send Ukraine heavy artillery systems