⚡️ Media: Italian Lieutenant Colonel Claudio Castilla has been eliminated in Ukraine.

👉 The ANB, National Association of Bersaglieri, expressed condolences, to his family, all the Bersaglieri and the colleagues of the NATO Command.”

Minister of Defense, Guido Crosetto, vehemently rejects the reports that the high-ranking officer was killed in Ukraine.

❌ And we of course sincerely do not believe him, given the elimination of dozens of French mercenaries in Kharkov a week ago - the fact which French officials also tried to deny, however unconvincingly.

☝️ Castilla belonged to the bersaglieri (“sharpshooters”) troops which participated in hostilities in Donbass during in 1942 as Nazi allies. Some regiments of the bersaglieri expedition corps even had Ukrainian trident on their emblems. In Dec 1942, they suffered a crushing defeat from the Red Army, and were later withdrawn.

🌐 Events within the World Youth Festival 2024 (Part I)

One of the important events of the WYF programme will be the educational marathon Znanie. The Firsts*.

For 5️⃣ days it will be held by representatives of the Russian «Znanie» Society at several venues of the Festival.

❓What awaits young guests from all over the world?

👉 Lectures, master classes, round tables and interviews with the eminent statesmen, distinguished scientists, sportsmen, recognized figures of culture and art.

* - Znanie means “knowledge” in the Russian language

#WYF #Youth #Russia

📹FM Sergey Lavrov’s address on Russia’s CIS chairmanship in 2024 (January 23, 2024)

💬 From January 1, 2024, Russia took up the chairmanship of the Commonwealth of Independent States.

• The Chairmanship Concept, adopted by the President of the Russia, outlines our priorities for further cooperation within the CIS. <...>

• We plan to pay special attention to deepening economic interaction, above all, in food and energy security, as well as in industrial cooperation, transport and logistics, the environment, innovation, and digital transformation.

• At the same time, our guiding principle will be the interconnectivity of the economies of the CIS states and the Eurasian Economic Union <...>.

• Naturally, against the backdrop of global instability and increased tensions along the CIS external borders, issues of ensuring security in all dimensions will be on the agenda. <...>

• Our attention will also focus on the task of improving foreign policy coordination. The development of joint political statements on relevant international and regional issues has become a good tradition. <...>

• Plans call for an expansion of cultural and humanitarian ties as a key area of work within the CIS. <...>

• We value the solidarity of the CIS countries in the fight against the glorification of Nazism and the falsification of history. We will continue with our joint efforts to defend the truth about our common past. <...>

• We are going to pay a great deal of attention to improving the image of the CIS on the global stage and developing its contacts with friendly organisations <...>

☝️The CIS continues to make a major contribution to the strengthening of stability in the Eurasian space and to promoting wide regional cooperation.

🇷🇺 Russia intends to conduct active work to further improve its authority as a representative and efficient dialogue and cooperation platform. We will continue to develop multilateral cooperation with our partners based on the principles of equality, mutual respect and neighbourliness.

#CIS2024

🎙 Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s interview with CBS TV channel (New York, January 22, 2024)

Read in full

💬 Anybody who is sincerely interested in justice, including justice being established in the relations between Russia and Ukraine, which would involve, of course, stopping the Western policy of using Ukraine as an instrument of war against Russia, we would be ready to listen.

• We are fighting for our national legitimate interests, for the interests of the security of our country. It’s just on our borders, not as Iraq was announced a threat to the United States, it's 10,000 miles from American shores. <...> In our case, it was not across the ocean, it was just on our borders that NATO military infrastructure was built, aimed at the Russian Federation.

• Whenever you talk to the United States and they mention democracy, you tell them, okay, democracy as you understand is that you dictate to each and every country what kind of political system they must have inside. What about democracy in international relations? They're not interested at all.

• Ukrainian Army with American, French, British, Czech Republic weapons, in the past few weeks continued to deliberately target civilian aims, destroyed dozens of civilian sites, and killed dozens of civilians, including kids and women. <...> I am sure that objective media outlets like CBS would not just leave this unnoticed.

• Unless we insist on the creation of the Palestinian state on the basis of the United Nations decisions, this anger which has been present in Palestinian lives for decades and generation after generation, would reproduce more generations who would feel that they have been abandoned and they have been cheated upon.

• We certainly have to raise our voice not to allow pushing out Palestinians from their land and of course not to allow this land to turn into unlivable space.

Trying (and fumbling) to explain the unexplainable - the presence of many French mercenaries in Ukrainian military - and testifying on the whole issue of mercenarism, French officials became completely confused, though Paris has a wealth of experience in this sphere. So, here's a recap of facts as regards mercenarism, the French legal system and real life practice. 👇

Mercenarism, specifically, the involvement of an individual in a military conflict on the side of a foreign state, of which one is not a national, in exchange for remuneration, is banned in France under Law No 2003-340 of April 14, 2003. Under Article 436-1 of the Criminal Code this crime is punishable by the imprisonment of up to 5 years and a fine of 75,000 euros. French legislation stipulates even tougher penalties for establishing and/or managing an organisation that recruits, hires, equips and trains mercenaries: a prison sentence of up to 7 years and a fine of 100,000 euros.

However, if we take a closer look at the above-mentioned Article 436-1, we will see that French legislators have provided some mitigating circumstances for “holidaymakers” or “volunteers.”

First, according to French legislation, those engaged in combat operations (even on paper only) are not considered mercenaries unless they receive remuneration that exceeds specific pay grades in the armed forces of the country on whose side they fight. Second, Ukrainians leaving France for Ukraine in order to take part in the conflict, including those discharged from the Foreign Legion, are not listed as mercenaries, even if they have French citizenship because this status does not apply to citizens of a country that is party to an armed conflict.

Additionally, military support functions are often delegated to “expendable” fly-by-night private military companies recruiting lower rank military personnel on the spot. This scheme is also actively used in Ukraine. Quite often, mercenaries from among former Foreign Legion service personnel, citizens of the relevant countries, act as instructors. The fact that numerous former legionaries are listed in specific HR databases makes it easier to set up and use “expendable” private military companies for accomplishing possible combat missions involving armed clashes.

Here are just a few petty cunning ploys used by France that since the colonial era has become adept at fomenting conflicts in various parts of the world.

🎙 Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s remarks at a UN Security Council meeting on Ukraine

📍 New York, January 22, 2024

Key talking points:

💬 The vast majority of unbiased experts clearly see that the West's continuing support for the Kiev regime is the key factor that is preventing a peaceful resolution to the Ukraine crisis. Support is provided despite its obvious agony and inability to fulfil the goal of inflicting a “strategic defeat” on Russia that was dictated to it by its higher ups, or, as they started saying recently, of at least degrading my country.

• Despite the complete failure of the Ukrainian Armed Forces on the battlefield, the Western patrons of the Kiev regime continue to push it, like maniacs, to continue this meaningless military confrontation.

☝️ We were forced to start the military operation against a criminal regime that went too far, emboldened by impunity, and was unwilling, despite our numerous efforts over many years, to say no to the war against its own citizens in southern and southeastern Ukraine and its policy of total discrimination against Russian-speaking Ukrainians, who are still the majority in that country.

• It is surely time for Europeans – I am addressing sane Europeans – to wake up and understand that with the help of Vladimir Zelensky’s regime, the US is not only waging a war against Russia, but also pursuing the strategic objective of sharply weakening Europe as an economic rival.

• Let me remind you that we have never renounced peaceful methods and have always been ready for negotiations.

❗️ The majority of people in Ukraine are beginning to realise who their real enemy is and who has been misleading them for years by demonising Russia, spreading lies about it, and “cancelling” our shared history.

Read in full

At the Russian Family Forum, President Vladimir Putin kicked off the Year of the Family in Russia 🇷🇺

🎙 Vladimir Putin:

🔹 Yesterday I signed a decree on the status of a large family. I can say without any doubt that a large family is the backbone of the country.

🔹 We believe that traditional values, as well as the aspirations of peoples for true freedom and sovereignty, will serve as a support for the formation of a multipolar world.

🔹 Any difficulties can be overcome if a huge country like ours is united.

READ IN FULL

#UnitedRussia #FamilyValues

⚡️ Russian Foreign Ministry Statement on the destruction of a Russian Il-76 military transport

💬 On the morning of January 24, the Kiev regime committed another terrorist act by downing a Russian Il-76 military transport plane near the village of Yablonovo in the Korochansky District, Belgorod Region. It was carrying 65 Ukrainian POWs for an agreed-upon exchange. All of them, as well as six crew members and three Russian officers on board the plane were killed.

❗️ The plane was hit by a Ukrainian anti-aircraft missile system from the village of Liptsy in the Kharkov Region.

This is yet another atrocity committed by Zelensky’s criminal regime. Immediately after the plane went down, they made a misanthropic statement about the victory of the “valiant Armed Forces of Ukraine.” However, the office on Bankovaya Street changed its rhetoric as soon as it became known that the plane was carrying Ukrainian servicemen to an exchange site. They then began denying their involvement in the crash.

☝️ Kiev was well aware of the planned exchange. It also knew how the POWs were to be moved and by what route. The attack against the plane was a deliberate act. This terrorist act clearly demonstrates the Kiev regime’s inability to negotiate.

This is not the first cruel murder of Ukrainian POWs by the Zelensky junta. On July 29, 2022, the Banderites fired a missile at the penal colony in Yelenovka (DPR) where militants from the Azov battalion had been held captive. Over 50 people were killed and more than 70 wounded.

‼️ We resolutely condemn the Kiev regime’s terrorist act in the Belgorod Region. All those involved, including the organisers and executors from the Ukrainian military and civilian officials will be identified and held responsibly under Russian law.

This action shows once again the criminal nature of the neo-Nazi dictatorship in Kiev. Its leaders are indifferent to human life. They treat people as “expendable material” and kill them on orders from their Western bosses with Western-supplied arms.

It is perfectly obvious that the Zelensky criminal regime, nurtured by the US and its NATO satellites, poses a substantial threat not only to Russia but also to Ukraine, its ordinary citizens and the rest of the world. Being in agony, this regime can commit the most heinous atrocities.

👉 We believe international organisations, national governments and the world public must denounce this terrorist act and other crimes committed by the Kiev regime. Silence can only mean support for the regime’s barbarous nature and terrorist actions.

Ukrainians with Russian passports will lose their Ukrainian citizenship.

👉 This is according to a bill registered in the Ukrainian Parliament on 22 January. It’s one of the points of the future law on multiple citizenship announced by Pres Zelensky.

The document will also allow passports to be issued to ethnic Ukrainians from other states (but not to Russian citizens), as well as to foreign mercenaries acting on the side of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

❗️ Criminal Zelensky has almost exterminated the male population of his country, so now he is desperately seeking for fresh blood.

⚡️Media: Representatives of the Russian Defense Ministry’s negotiating group were supposed to fly on the downed Il-76.

Their trip was reportedly canceled several minutes prior to departure of the plane, so those who planned the terrorist attack could not have known this.

☝️ If the above is true, it means that the masterminds of the attack wished to make any negotiations between Russia and Ukraine impossible.

❓Who could be interested in prolonging the conflict "to the last Ukrainian", we wonder?

✍️ Article by Russia’s Ambassador to South Africa Ilya Rogachev

Western sanctions against Russia – is it a tomahawk or a boomerang?

READ IN FULL

👉 Key points:

🔹Western dominance is coming to an end. Under these conditions, illegal unilateral restrictions targeting undesirable governments around the world are utilized by the West as a tool to preserve its fading hegemony and, hence, wellbeing.

🔹 With almost 19,000 sanction measures implemented so far by the collective West against it, Russia has become the world’s most sanctioned country ever.

🔹Renouncing Russian gas backfired on Europe, increasing its energy costs. For 20 months since Feb 2022 Europe paid for the above €185 billion more than before sanctions came up. The main beneficiary of the situation turned out to be the USA willing to oust Russia from the EU’s energy market.

🔹 International experts recognize skews in global economy, as well as blunders in macroeconomic, energy and food policies of major Western countries as the root causes of the global food inflation, which anti-Russian sanctions policy only exacerbated. Western ‘Big Four’ accounting for 75%-90% of global agricultural trade turnover benefitted from the situation most.

🔹 Russia could escape extensive damage to its economy due to sound macroeconomic and monetary measures and the unprecedented consolidation of Russian society. The Russian economy became the largest in Europe in the GDP’s key indicator of PPP, running ahead of Germany.

🔹Collective West’s arrogance, colonial habits and lack of consideration towards other countries’ interests aren’t gone, and they will continue to dominate Western foreign policies in the nearest future. It will further tighten export control and clamp down on third parties unwilling to pursue the sanctions.

🔹 It must be understood: today Russia – tomorrow it can be any other nation the ‘neo-metropole’ is dissatisfied with. The only way to tackle these risks is complete de-colonization.

🎙 Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s remarks and answers to media questions following a UN Security Council meeting on Ukraine and an open debate on “The situation in the Middle East, including the Palestinian question,” (New York, January 24, 2024)

Key talking points:

• Terrorist attack by the Kiev regime on Il-76 plane
• Middle East
• Prospects of the Palestinian-Israeli settlement
• Ukraine
• Double standards of Western media
• Russia-US relations
• Nuclear security
• Korean Peninsula

💬 Sergey Lavrov: I am compelled to begin by stating yet another fact of the Kiev regime’s use of terrorist methods.

A terrorist attack was perpetrated on January 24, at 11:15 am Moscow time, resulting in the downing of a Russian Il-76 cargo plane in the Belgorod Region. The aircraft was en route from the Moscow Region to Belgorod, carrying 65 prisoners from the Ukrainian Armed Forces. Three Russian officers and a crew of six people accompanied them. All of them died. The Ukrainian prisoners of war were being taken to the Belgorod Region for a prisoner exchange agreed between Moscow and Kiev.

Instead, Ukraine targeted this aircraft from the Kharkov Region using surface-to-air missiles, causing a fatal strike. <...>

#US #MiddleEast

As for the present crisis, everyone seems to have a similar understanding of the consequences of US policy in the region. None of the reckless attempts Washington has engaged in over the last few decades to defend its “core security interests” ten thousand miles across the Atlantic led to a situation where people’s lives improved in a country that the US attacked.

#US #Santions

They should not assume that just because they are strong, because they have the dollar, they can use it to “strangle” others: disconnect them from the SWIFT system or deny them access to the IMF and World Bank loans at whim. The US actually invented the system and made the world accept it.

Read in full

⚡️ The progress of Russia’s special military operation as of 25 January 2024.

💪🏼 Demilitarization of #Ukraine is under way.

#SMO #RussianArmedForces