Column: Russia Disintegration 

Referendum on the accession of the Russian embassy to Poland (photo taken from the Internet)

#RussiaDisintegration #collapseRussia #РозпадРосії

Materials prepared by Liza Tumanova Ukrainian Women’s Guard for Free Idel-Ural.

As Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said, “Killing people just because they are Ukrainians, as well as encouraging them to do so, is what the Russian media, the Russian authorities and Putin personally do… Putin believes that Ukraine has no right to exist. He stated that Ukrainians are not a nation, and Kremlin media repeat this, calling for a “final solution to this issue.”

The realities of war

The number of Russians killed in the war in Ukraine has exceeded 66,750, and the number is growing every day.

In Kherson region, the Armed Forces of Ukraine liberated 88 settlements. 544 settlements have been liberated in Kharkiv region. 32 settlements remain in temporary occupation.

The new Russian commander expects a major Ukrainian attack on the occupied city of Kherson soon. The Ukrainian army has been slowly advancing in the region for several weeks now and Surovikin called the situation on the ground “tense”. So the Russian army is doing very badly.

In light of the failures at the front, the Russian authorities want to start negotiations with Ukraine on a return to the borders of 2014. A return to the borders of 2014 means Russia’s control over Crimea and part of Donetsk and Luhansk regions, and Ukraine, of course, will not negotiate in this format.

Kyiv has once again been subjected to a massive attack by kamikaze drones. Critical infrastructure facilities and residential buildings were damaged. People died. It is interesting that on the eve of Putin said that “now there is no need for massive strikes, now there are other tasks.” However, new attacks on Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities did not lead to multi-day disruptions in the country’s energy system, as a week ago, and as Moscow had hoped. After the bombings on October 10-11, rolling blackouts in Ukraine continued for four days, until October 13. There have been no blackouts this week.

On the morning of October 17, a Russian drone hit a house in Kyiv where Victoria, six months pregnant, was staying with her husband and cat. Nobody was saved. She died pregnant in the arms of her husband.

The UN Commission of Inquiry into Violations in Ukraine has published its first report. It analyzes the war crimes committed by Russia in February and March. Executions. In all four regions of Ukraine, UN experts found cases of executions. The dead had gunshot wounds to the head, blunt trauma and cuts to the throat. Most of the victims are men, but two women and a 14-year-old boy are also among those killed. Attacks on the civilian population. The commission documented cases of shelling of civilian objects. For example, on March 17, 2022, Russian troops fired cluster munitions at a children’s hospital in Chernihiv. People standing in line for water were under the blow. Several people died, several dozen were injured, including four children. A day earlier, more than 200 residents of Chernihiv, who were standing in line for bread, were subjected to the same shelling. 14 civilians were killed and 26 were injured. At least 1,495 people died due to attacks on civilian infrastructure. This is 70% of civilian deaths in the studied regions. Rape. The report cites cases of rape by the Russian military. In Kyiv region, two Russian soldiers raped a 22-year-old woman and her husband several times, after which they forced the couple to have sexual intercourse in their presence. Then one of the soldiers forced their four-year-old daughter to perform oral sex on him. The commission is investigating three more allegations of rape of women and teenage girls by the Russian military in the same village. In Kyiv region in early March, two Russian servicemen killed a man, after which they repeatedly raped his 33-year-old wife. In two regions, the commission studied cases of rape of women over 80 years of age. Death of children. The commission confirmed the death of 112 children.

As a result of the Armed Forces of Ukraine strikes, ten Iranian instructors were killed, who were training the Russian military to handle the Shahed-136 and Arash-2 drones. Iran advised its citizens to leave Ukraine.

The Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense announced that it would guarantee a payment of $100,000 for the transfer of Russian war criminal Igor Strelkov (Girkin) to Ukrainian captivity. Earlier, a number of Russian “military correspondents” and “patriotic” telegram channels reported that Strelkov went to the front. Strelkov regularly commented on the course of the war in Ukraine, criticizing the actions of the Russian leadership (in particular, from the beginning of a full-scale invasion, he called for mobilization in Russia).

At a military training ground in Belgorod region, where the mobilized people complained of threats, deceit and theft, a massacre took place. The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation claims that 11 people were killed and 15 were injured. The Sota publication, citing an eyewitness to the incident, writes about 22 dead and 16 injured. The Ministry of Defense said that on Saturday, during fire training with the participation of volunteers, two citizens of “one of the CIS countries” opened fire on personnel. The shooters were killed. A Sota source claims that there were three shooters and one of them allegedly managed to escape. The incident may have been part of a conflict on the basis of religion. According to an eyewitness, the conflict began with the fact that three soldiers, a Dagestan, an Azerbaijani and an Adyghe, wanted to “write a report that they do not want to serve anymore”, since this is “not their war.” Upon learning of this, one of the commanders, whom the source calls Lieutenant Colonel Andrey Lapin, allegedly “gathered everyone” and said that “this is a holy war.” After that, servicemen of Tajik origin declared that a holy war is a war of Muslims against infidels; the lieutenant colonel allegedly called Allah a “weakling” or “coward” in response, which “shocked” many of those present. Soon, three contract servicemen from Tajikistan told the other Muslims to stand aside, “turned their machine guns”, killed Lieutenant Colonel Lapin and opened fire indiscriminately, allegedly killing 29 more people.

In Russian city of Yeysk in Krasnodar Territory, a Su-34 military aircraft that was flying to bomb Ukraine fell on a multi-storey residential building. According to the preliminary information, the aircraft was fully armed. A series of explosions occurred at the crash site. 15 people died (three children), 19 were hospitalized.

Russia is likely preparing to damage the dam of Kakhovskaya hydroelectric power station in Kherson region and blame Ukraine, according to a new survey by the American Institute for the Study of War (ISW) on the course of the war in Ukraine. This is indicated by recent statements of the General Sergei Surovikin, the  commander of the so-called “special military operation”, and Vladimir Saldo, the head of the so-called administration of the annexed part of the region that Ukraine is allegedly preparing to destroy the dam and thereby cause flooding of nearby territories. ISW believes that Russia wants to pave the way for information so that after the damage to the dam, they blame Ukraine for the deaths and destruction that will result from this step. “The Russian military may believe that damage to the dam could cover their retreat from the right bank of Dnieper, as well as disrupt or slow down Ukrainian advance across the river. <…> Kremlin can try to use such a “false flag attack” to obscure the news of a third humiliating retreat of Russian forces.” This will be another terrorist act of the terrorist state.

Already more than 20,000 Russian prisoners have been recruited to take part in the fighting in Ukraine. A week ago, the number of prisoners recruited was estimated at about 15,000. So in seven days their number increased by at least 5,000.

The regions of the South of Russia have become leaders among Russian subjects in terms of the number of convicts recruited by Wagner PMC. Since the summer, at least 2,700 prisoners have been sent from there to the war in Ukraine.

The Armed Forces of Ukraine hit Antonovskii bridge in occupied Kherson: the Russians report about victims among civilians, but this is not true. Ukrainian defenders do keep the bridge under fire control, but there could not have been any civilians on it during the strike on the night of October 21. “The fact that there can’t be civilians on the bridge at this time is even claimed by the invaders, because this is a curfew and very strict measures are being taken against those who can violate it. There were no civilians there,” Gumenyuk, a representative of the press center of the South Operational command of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, said on the air of the telethon. According to her, the Russians can prepare a picture that the Armed Forces of Ukraine are shelling the civilian population, although in reality this is another provocation.

In Liman, the exhumation of bodies was completed at the site of the largest mass grave since the occupation by the Russians: 111 civilians and 35 military. More than 600 bodies of dead civilians have already been exhumed in Kharkiv region. Work continues.

Putin announced the introduction of “martial law” in the occupied territories of Kherson, Zaporozhye, Donetsk and Lugansk regions. “Putin’s state of war in the annexed regions is preparation for the mass deportation of Ukrainian population to depressed areas in order to change the ethnic composition of the occupied territory. A crime that should be condemned by the UN and which has already been committed by Russia in Crimea and has gone unpunished,” Alexei Danilov, Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council tweeted.

“Russia explains its failures at the front by the fact that it is at war not with Ukraine, it is at war with NATO. This means that Russia already recognizes that Ukraine is part of NATO, it remains for NATO to put up with this,” Linas Linkevičius, former Lithuanian Foreign Minister said.

Fragments of the Russian economy

The number of people who live in Russia below the poverty line will increase by more than 8.3 million in 2022 due to the war in Ukraine. Nearly 2.9 million of them are children. Such assessments were presented by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in a report on the consequences of the war for 22 countries in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. The number of poor people in these countries, according to UNICEF forecast, will grow by more than 10 million people. 4 million of them are children.

The Central Bank of the Russian Federation recorded an outflow of funds from the accounts of individuals in Russian banks after the so-called “partial” mobilization. Funds of individuals in Russian banks in September decreased by 458 billion rubles, or 1.4%. The outflow occurred in the second half of the month, “when the number of people who left the country and who took cash with them increased.”

For the first time since the existence of the National Wealth Fund, the Russian government was able to independently, without the permission of the State Duma, withdraw funds from the main money box in order to plug a hole in the budget, which is hit by a drop in oil and gas revenues and the general situation in the economy. Taking into account the revaluation of assets, the NWF after the withdrawal of the trillion will be reduced by almost 30% compared to what it was before the full-scale invasion.

Due to sanctions imposed on Russia for invading Ukraine, the share of defective chips in shipments from China increased by 38%. Unofficial suppliers are not responsible for product quality, and Russian customers do not have the experience and technology to test it.

International isolation

Ukrainian parliament adopted a resolution recognizing the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria as a territory temporarily occupied by Russia. The text says that Russia committed genocide of the Chechen population, this action is condemned. 287 out of 351 MPs voted in favor, while 64 MPs abstained.

Russian businesswoman Elena Kaminskas (Shebunova), whom The Insider calls the mother of illegitimate children of Sergei Shoigu, the Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation, (Shebunova, who worked as a flight attendant for the flight squad of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, had an affair with Shoigu in the 2000s and 2010s, who in 1994-2012 headed the Ministry of Emergency Situations), is married to a Lithuanian citizen and is suing the Lithuanian government over the annulment of her residence permit. The State Security Department of Lithuania considered the presence of Kaminskas in the republic a threat to national security. The Insider also writes that her husband Adolfas Kaminskas, who previously owned a small business selling scooters, after marriage to Shebunova, became the owner of a Russian company with an authorized capital of one million rubles, and also became an investor in companies involved in multimillion-dollar development projects in Lithuania. According to journalists, after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Kaminskas, who received Russian citizenship, sold his Lithuanian assets. During her relationship with Shoigu, Shebunova became the owner of companies that received multimillion-dollar contracts from the Ministry of Emergency Situations and the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation.

The District Court of Helgeland (Norway) arrested four Russians for seven days – three men and one woman – for photographing prohibited objects. The police searched the Russians and found a lot of photographic equipment and a “relatively extensive” photo archive. During interrogation, the Russians stated that they had come to Norway for tourism purposes. The police promise to study all the footage and provide an update on the progress of the investigation within a week.

Russian citizens applying for a Schengen visa in Germany must now provide an extract from a bank operating in the European Union as a financial guarantee. An extract is also needed if you are applying for a visa for a private or business visit, a trip for medical treatment or participation in a cultural, scientific or sporting event.

The Estonian Parliament adopted a statement condemning the annexation of Ukrainian territories by Russia and declaring Russia a sponsor of terrorism. The document was approved unanimously and published on the website of the Parliament.

The head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, said that since February 2022, the EU countries have significantly reduced their dependence on Russian gas. She made this statement at a meeting of the European Parliament in Strasbourg. “[In the spring] we assumed that phasing out Russian gas would take seven years. Today the facts are that it took us only eight months to replace two-thirds (of Russian gas supplies). In other words, we have significantly accelerated the transition to other foreign gas suppliers. But there was a high price to pay for it.”

Andrey Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought, established by the European Parliament, is awarded in 2022 to “Ukrainian people, represented by their president, elected leaders and civil society.” “They stand up for what they believe in. They fight for our values. They defend democracy, freedom and the rule of law. They are risking their lives for us. <…> No one is more deserving,” MEP Roberta Metsola, head of the European Parliament, tweeted.

In Italy, at the request of the United States, Artem Uss, the son of the governor of Krasnoyarsk Territory, was detained. He is accused of circumventing sanctions. He and his partner sent electronics of millions of euros worth for the space industry to Russia.

And the Norwegian police arrested the son of Putin’s friend for launching a drone. After the seventh Russian was detained in Norway on October 19 for launching drones, Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store said foreign intelligence services were behind a series of “unacceptable” drone flights in the country. “Norwegian authorities suspect Russian involvement in the operation of unmanned aerial vehicles that can be used for espionage or simply for fear,” added Hedvig Moe, Deputy Chief of Police Security of Norway. 

The main manufacturer of methylprednisolone will leave Russia. The drug is included in the list of essential drugs. Orion Pharma, the Finnish pharmacological company, also plans to leave Russia. Uniqlo began to reduce the network of its stores in Russia.

The European Union has imposed sanctions against the Iranian company that develops Shahed drones. The Russian army uses them against the Ukrainian civilian population.

When issuing bank cards, Turkish banks began to put forward additional requirements for Russian citizens who arrived in the country after the start of mobilization, thereby complicating the process.

In the Church of All Saints in Riga on October 20, a council of the Latvian Orthodox Church (LOC) was held, at which it was decided to send a petition to the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Kirill for granting the LOC the status of the autocephalous church.

Russia’s political and trading partners in the Asia-Pacific region are preparing to issue a condemnation of the war in Ukraine, which will increase Moscow isolation. The draft joint statement of the EU and ASEAN countries calls for an end to the Russian invasion.

“Impunity for this aggressive war and the committed war crimes would be such a huge defeat for the basic idea and effectiveness of international law that we must do everything possible to avoid this,” German Justice Minister Marco Buschmann is confident that representatives of the top Russian government will become accused during the international investigation of war crimes committed in Ukraine.

Actor Mark Hamill, who played Luke Skywalker in the Star Wars saga, previously joined the UNITED 24 initiative and became an ambassador for the Drone Army project, in which he, together with caring people, managed to collect 500 drones for Ukraine. “I am a pretend hero in films, and these heroes are real,” Hamill said earlier about Ukrainians.

Amnesty International has recognized Russian shelling of Ukraine as a war crime. “The targeted destruction of Ukrainian civilian infrastructure by Russia is illegal. Civilian morale is not a legitimate target, and carrying out these attacks for the sole purpose of terrorizing civilians is a war crime. All those responsible for the orders and for carrying out these criminal attacks must be held accountable,” Marie Struthers, director of Amnesty International said.

Canada has imposed sanctions against Russian propagandists and Zvezda TV channel. “These individuals and organizations are helping the Russian regime to undermine the principles of state sovereignty and are responsible for spreading false narratives that serve as a pretext for the Russian regime unjustified war,” the Canadian government said in a statement.

Georgia may introduce a visa regime with Russia. Georgian President Salome Zurabishvili “does not rule out a revision of the visa-free regime with the Russian Federation against the background of the influx of Russians into the republic.”

On October 15, Polish non-governmental organizations staged an action in Warsaw in the form of a “referendum”, where one can vote for the “annexation” of the building of the Russian embassy and its transfer to the ownership of the Polish capital. The action was crowded, people came with flags of Ukraine and posters, and shouted slogans in support of the territorial integrity of Ukraine. Thousands of people lined up for hundreds of meters to vote in favor of “annexing” the building.

Three more banks of Kyrgyzstan stopped servicing Russian Mir cards. These are Doskredobank, Kyrgyzstan and Bakai-bank banks.

UAE banks are tightening checks on clients from Russia. This is especially true of large private banks with connections in the US, UK and EU countries. Now such organizations will more carefully screen potential customers. Banks serving guests from Russia risk falling under sanctions.

Latvia will not accept and shelter Russians who leave their country in an attempt to avoid mobilization for the war in Ukraine. This was stated by Latvian Foreign Minister Edgar Rinkevich. The authorities also said the countries would verify all Russians who live in the country on a permanent or temporary basis. It is likely that some Russians will not be able to extend the residence permit.

Regions of Russia

Roman Malyk, the military commissar of Partizansk seaside town in Partizanskyi and Lazovskyi districts,  died. The body of the military commissar “with signs of suicide” was found “on the fence.” The police are considering two versions: murder and suicide. At the same time, relatives of the deceased do not believe in the version of suicide.

In Belgorod region, the movement of trains was temporarily suspended due to the shelling of a railway station in one of the villages of Belgorod region. As a result of the incident, the contact network of the railway tracks was damaged. There are power outages in Kursk region. Some villages do not have electricity.

At least several dozen wives and mothers in Perm territory are trying to find their relatives, who, according to their information, were sent from penal colonies to fight in Ukraine. This was reported to the Agency by six family members of convicted and a local human rights activist. One interlocutor says that convicts could be forced to agree to be recruited for the front. In another case, the convict had no objective reasons to agree to participate in the war.

This year, the authorities of Kazan (Tatarstan) did not allow the Day of Remembrance, so on October 15, individual pickets were held in different places in Kazan. People hold posters in their hands, on which one text is written, “October 15 is Memorial Day. People who forget their history have no future!” It has been 470 years since Kazan lost its statehood. In Soviet times, the peoples of Volga region did not know their history. It became safe to talk openly about the events of October 1552 only after 1989. Since then, 33 Memorial Days have been held in Kazan. This year, for the first time in the new history of Tatarstan, there was not a single public mass event on this day.

In Yoshkar-Ola (Republic of Mari El), four activists paid tribute to the memory of the defenders of Kazan and the beginning of the first “Cheremis War”. They laid flowers at the memorial of political repressions victims and read prayers in Mari and Tatar languages. At the end of the event, two police officers approached them. They suggested that the activists go to Yoshkar-Ola police department, as they considered the laying of flowers and prayers at the memorial as a mass uncoordinated action. At the police station,  the participants in the commemoration gave the explanations and they were given warnings about the inadmissibility of violating public order. Activists believe that coordination of laying flowers and praying is not required, their action (as the police called it) was not mass, no unlimited number of participants were invited to it, no one violated public order. And freedom of assembly is guaranteed by the Russian Constitution. In fact, it hasn’t been for a long time.

Bashkir nationalists are creating armed resistance under the slogans of separating the republic from Russia. “This is not our war. Ukrainians didn’t do anything bad to us, and the empire always pressed us. They pressed our Bashkir language, they imprisoned our leaders. Why do we have to fight for them now?”, Ruslan Gabbasov, one of the leaders of Bashkir national resistance, a member of the Free Nations League (FNL), says. Bashkir nationalists, after the announcement of mobilization, called for a transition from peaceful protest to armed protest. Activists announced the creation of their own army in the republic, which will help fight for “free Bashkortostan.” In the cities of the republic, leaflets are posted with calls to evade mobilization, to arm and go into hiding. At the same time, the offices of the Russian parties were set on fire. Gabbasov does not comment on the connection with the anonymous partisan community, but does not deny that he is familiar with its creators.

There will be no New Year’s fireworks in Perm, but there will be Christmas trees. 30 million rubles have been allocated for them. The head of Bashkortostan, Radiy Khabirov, banned municipalities from spending money on decorations for the New Year and inviting artists to the holidays. In Chuvashia, the money saved on the cancellation of the New Year holidays will be transferred for the war with Ukraine.

Alexei Korelin, 22-year-old State University (NNSU) student, was placed in a psychiatric hospital for a month after his anti-war statements. According to the student, he was forced to sign an application for voluntary hospitalization by the Federal Security Service. Over the past year, this is the third case in Nizhniy Novgorod, when security forces use a mental hospital as a way to neutralize people with an active anti-war position. Is this a revival of punitive psychiatry?

A resident of Mordovia has been held for the fourth day in the Patriot center in Moscow for refusing to sign a mobilization order.

“Putin has already told us a lot: for example, that there will be no war, that he will not attack Ukraine, but nevertheless we see what is really happening. You should not believe. There is a feeling that our authorities do whatever they want with us. We are completely powerless. Lawlessness and arbitrariness take place in the country, and we, the people, are defenseless against our own state, which, on the contrary, should protect us.” Larisa Zernina from Perm is 60 years old. Now she is retired, she used to work in an international oil company as the head of the sales department. She is married, she has two adult sons, Zernina worries about their future.

Since the beginning of the year, 107 people have died from alcohol poisoning in Bashkortostan. Most deaths from alcohol intoxication were registered in Ufa (28 cases), Neftekamsk (7), as well as in Bakalinskiy and Ufimskiy districts (5 each). In total, 396 people died from poisoning of chemical etiology in Bashkortostan in 9 months of 2022.

High school students at Baksan School No. 6 in Kabardino-Balkaria were forced to take a survey about their “beliefs, worldview, character traits.” Teenagers were also asked whether they consider Nazism “an unacceptable way to achieve any goal” and whether “attacks on law enforcement officials during mass actions” seem unacceptable to them.

In Chechnya, there was a shootout between the mobilized and Kadyrov’s men. There were about 10 people who did not want to fight for Russia. After a shootout with the use of automatic weapons, as well as grenade launchers, the opponents of the Kadyrov’s fled.

“There, every second person is completely drunk. Three hundred people fit in one hangar. Fights are constant. They smoke. They walk around with broken faces. Everyone has knives.” The mobilized from Pskov region were taken to Tver and settled in iron sheds, where cows used to live. There are no normal washbasins and hot water. After a “standing” strike, they were transferred to a semi-abandoned military training ground, now they live in cold tents.

The State Duma deputy from Transbaikalia wants to send military enlistment officers and police officers to nightclubs. He is sure that this is where they need to look for young people who are hiding from the mobilization. At the same time, the Federation Council has already stated that such raids are illegal. In Yakutia, the police decided to look for mobilization evaders among university students enrolled after September 21. The department believes that some institutions could enroll conscripts for bribes.

Mobilized from Tatarstan and their relatives wrote almost 1,000 complaints and appeals to the authorities of the republic. Mainly the mobilized expressed their disagreement with the conscription, and also complained about their health, stated that they could not leave their families, minor children, elderly parents.

The official Bashkortostan media and public figures hush up violations of the law committed during the mobilization. As well as the events taking place now in the training centers. The press publishes only reports of the military about the successful conduct of mobilization and optimistic reports from the camps, where the mobilized are undergoing “combat coordination”.

Schoolchildren in the Kuban are invited to take part in the burial ceremony of the occupiers killed in Ukraine right during classes. Children are given certificates of exemption from classes “for a good reason.” The Hot Key military and patriotic club also sent its pupils to the funeral. The footage from the funeral ceremony published in local public shows the pupils of this club: they are holding a cross with a wreath and medals. Pupils have already attended six funerals, farewell ceremonies for them were held during school lessons.

Since the end of September, companies from Chechnya have begun to invite female applicants for interviews by 11% more often than at the beginning of the month. It is also noteworthy that over the month employers in Chechnya have become less likely to invite job seekers aged 18 to 34 who could potentially fall under mobilization. At the same time, the number of interviews with candidates over 55 years old increased by 2%.

The State Council of Tatarstan voted for the liquidation of the Constitutional Court of the Republic. “Liquidation of the constitutional court, doesn’t it mean that in the future our constitution will also be liquidated? Will the statute remain?”, Rkail Zaydulla, the deputy and head of the Union of Writers of Tatarstan, asked.

In Yakutsk, the families of the mobilized will be given vegetable sets. Such a measure of “support” for families, among others, was announced by the mayor of the city. Earlier in Siberian regions, instead of the promised payments, the families of the mobilized were already offered firewood, coal, sheep, fish and potatoes.

The administration Kamyshin city, Volgograd region, will provide a land plot where veterans, volunteers and military personnel, including those who died in the war in Ukraine, will be buried. In the decree, the object is called “military station No. 1”, its area will be almost 7,000 square meters.

In Kemerovo region, university and college students will be sent to work at industrial enterprises instead of those mobilized for the war in Ukraine. This was announced by Sergey Tsivilev, the governor of Kuzbass, calling it “labor mobilization.”

Kadyrov showed a video of his three sons firing machine guns and a grenade launcher from a small trench. The footage was allegedly filmed in the occupied territories of Ukraine. According to Kadyrov, 16-year-old Akhmat, 15-year-old Eli and 14-year-old Adam have been “visiting the forward positions of the Chechen security forces” already for several days and allegedly managed to “repel another Ukrainian counterattack.” The teenagers are said to provide cover fire for the advancing fighters. At the same time, some details in the video indicate that the footage was filmed in the rear,  Chechen and other opposition telegram channels point this out.

Several Ukrainian prisoners were brought to Chechnya for a conversation with the head of the republic, Ramzan Kadyrov. They were brought under escort after the trip of the official’s children to Ukraine. Kadyrov asks what they fought for, claiming that the authorities in Kyiv used the mobilized Ukrainians as “cannon fodder”. Those in response called their participation in the war meaningless, and also voiced the theses promoted by Russian propaganda. Were the prisoners under pressure? Naturally. Every Ukrainian knows what he is fighting for. According to Ruslan Kutaev, Chechen political scientist, such a propaganda story is needed to demonstrate that things are allegedly going well at the front.

The authorities of Krasnodar territory, Belgorod, Bryansk, Voronezh, Kursk, Rostov regions, as well as the annexed Crimea and Sevastopol, will receive the power to introduce a special regime for entering and leaving the regions, as well as restricting freedom of movement on it. Such measures have also been introduced in territories where martial law has been declared. But Kremlin and the Russian Foreign Ministry assured that there are no plans to close the borders of Russia due to the introduction of martial law.

The madness of the “Russian world”

The Russian president found himself in one of the most difficult situations in his more than two decades in office. So far, nothing threatens Putin in Russia, despite setbacks at the front and disagreements among the president’s entourage, Reuters writes, citing eight well-informed sources among current and former diplomats and officials. However, the interlocutors of the agency note that the situation can quickly change in the event of a complete defeat in Ukraine.

Russia’s special services are allegedly preparing terrorist attacks against their own population. Servicemen in Russia are distributing “memos” for local residents, which accuse the Ukrainian special services of planning and carrying out terrorist acts against the civilian population. It seems that “saboteurs” lay out mined phones, wallets, tablets on the roads, benches and in the bushes. And that even children’s things can be mined in this way. “This “horror story” is a mirror image of the real actions of Russians in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine. Presumably, the Russian special services are thus preparing the basis for carrying out provocations with the subsequent accusation of Ukraine,” the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine warned.

Russia threatens to terminate the “grain agreement” because of the investigation into Iranian drones. Dmitriy Polyanskiy, the First Deputy Permanent Representative of Russia to the UN, said that in response to the UN investigation into Russia’s use of Iranian drones, Moscow may “reconsider cooperation” with the UN, including not extending the “grain agreement”. A terrorist country again threatens the whole world with hunger.

The Russian occupation authorities dismantled the memorial to the victims of Holodomor in Mariupol, erected in 2004. In accordance with the Russian version of the history of the 20th century, there was no Holodomor in Ukraine (Holodomor of 1932-1933 is the genocide of Ukrainian people organized by Kremlin, in which, according to various sources, from 7 to 10 million Ukrainians died). There is no war in Ukraine in Russian official discourse either, but martial law has been declared.

The head of the administration of the Filevskiy Park district demanded that hotels and hostels in Moscow provide information about male guests aged 18 to 55 years. Data on guests is collected “in order to identify citizens who are not performing military duty.”

Russian officials sent to the annexed territories will receive salaries several times higher than the average Russian one. They will receive their double salary and a daily allowance of 8,480 rubles per day, which is about $135. That is, for a month of work in the occupied territories, a Russian official can receive an additional $4,000. This is about four times more than the official average salary in Russia.

On RuNet demand has grown for fake IDs of law enforcement officers – they allegedly help to avoid mobilization.

Navalnyi’s colleagues discovered real estate worth a billion rubles (including a villa in Montenegro) in the family of the new head of Roskosmos, Yuri Borisov.

Maksut Shadayev, Minister of Digital Development of the Russian Federation, said that the military commissariats in the regions of Russia will be finally connected to the Internet in 2023. But the Wi-Fi connection program in Russian schools was “forced” to be suspended by the department. The more ignorant the people, the easier it is to manipulate and send them to war.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is accelerating Russia’s demographic collapse. The population is waiting for a historic reduction due to the declining birth rate. The economy is also threatened by migration outflow and an aging workforce. In addition to thousands of casualties on the battlefield, the recruitment of 300,000 reservists for combat operations and even more people fleeing abroad is undermining Putin’s goals of stabilizing the population this year.

On October 19, at school No. 1 in Gelendzhik, an exercise was held without warning, during which armed men shot at the ceiling and simulated hostage-taking. The mother of one of the students, Zinaida Yakovidi, told about the incident. “They didn’t warn anyone, people with machine guns came in, started shooting, the children got scared, cried, the teachers were in shock! What if someone jumped from the second floor or had an epileptic seizure? Who will be responsible for this?” The woman turned to the education department for clarification, to which she was told, “Everything had to be spontaneous so that they learned how to behave in such situations, or do you want your child to be shot?” And in the municipal control center of Gelendzhik, on the contrary, they said that they brought information about the exercises to all school employees and children.

Since the beginning of the year, more than 26,000 Russian Jews have repatriated to Israel, and another 35,000 are awaiting paperwork. This wave stunned the Israeli authorities. For comparison, in the whole of 2021, 21,000 Jews repatriated from Russia.

In Sweden, more than 100 Canon cameras were stolen from speed control radars installed on highways. Earlier, the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine reported that such equipment was installed in Orlan 10 UAVs used by Russia in Ukraine. Swedish intelligence agencies are checking information about a possible connection between the thefts and Russian drones.

The Government of the Russian Federation has determined the parameters of federal budget expenditures on healthcare in 2023. Thus, the costs directed to the “Fight against oncological diseases” will be reduced by 19%. By 2024, 153.7 billion rubles will be allocated for the construction of 420 outpatient cancer care centers and the re-equipment of 160 hospitals and dispensaries in the regions. At the same time, funding for the re-equipment of oncology clinics in 2023 will be reduced by 510.6 million rubles compared to the plan for 2022. Financing of the federal project “Fight against cardiovascular diseases” will be cut from 25.7 billion rubles this year to 17.5 billion rubles next. In total, the country’s budget expenditures on health care will be reduced next year to 1.469 trillion rubles, or by 4%. The media calculated that in 2023 secret and top-secret items of expenditure will account for 6.58 trillion rubles, or 22.66% of all federal budget expenditures.

Russia ranked 65th out of 70 countries in the world in terms of Internet freedom. According to this criterion, Russia lost seven points in a year, this is the largest decline among other countries and Russia’s worst result since 2009.