The results will determine the country’s course for the next five years | The polls have opened across Türkiye in a runoff election that will determine whether conservative President Recep Tayyip Erdogan will retain power, or hand the reins over to his more liberal opponent, Kemal Kilicdaroglu. ● Polling stations opened at 8am local time in all 81 provinces, with more than 60 million people eligible to vote in Sunday’s runoff. Another 3.4 million Turkish citizens were eligible to vote abroad over the past week, but it is unknown how many cast their ballots. In the first round on May 14, turnout was almost 89% within the country, but only 49.4% abroad. ● News, forecasts, and commentary on the elections are not permitted until 6pm local time, one hour after the polls close. The results cannot be reported until 9pm. However, with just two candidates facing off, the Supreme Election Board may unveil preliminary results earlier. The first round was held simultaneously with the parliamentary elections, and the complexity of the ballots caused delays and criticism from the opposition. The two rivals hold opposing views on a range of policies, and the outcome of the election may determine the country’s course for the next five years. ● Erdogan is a social conservative who has served as president since 2014, and was prime minister for 11 years beforehand. Under his leadership, Türkiye has pursued closer trade and diplomatic ties to Russia and China, while positioning itself as a potential peacemaker in regional conflicts, including in Ukraine. ● Kilicdaroglu is a centrist seeking to undo many of Erdogan’s domestic reforms, particularly the post-2016 constitutional changes that strengthened the powers of the presidency. He has vowed to immediately restart EU accession talks if elected, and to resuscitate Türkiye’s economy.

■ LIVE UPDATES: Erdogan Gains Over 54% of Vote in Presidential Runoff - Preliminary Results (Sputnik News)
■ Voting for Erdogan ‘a sin’ – election rival (RT.com)

Elena Panina (Елена Панина) | The second round of presidential elections will be held in Turkey on May 28. They will decide the fate of 83.3 million people, whose lives, if Kilicdaroglu wins, will change, as he himself says, by 180 degrees. Now, what kind of changes will this be?

■ Joining the EU will force Turkey to submit to the bureaucracy of Brussels. For many sectors of the Turkish economy, this will be a shock without therapy and, as a result, a sharp decline in people's living standards. ● Turkey's main industries are agriculture, industry (light, food, chemical, automotive, electronics), energy, tourism, trade and services. If the supporters of European integration win in Turkey, everything here will change. ● EU standards will destroy the Turkish agricultural producer in its current form and impose their own rules. We will have to comply with EU regulations created in order to strangle any competitor to Western European producers — all these requirements for agrosanitary standards, pesticides, calibration of vegetables in shape and size, etc. The rest will be limited to quotas, where the annual rate will be selected in two months. Any other products will be prohibited from sale. ● If this happens, Turkey is destined for the same fate as Greece. If we take the level of agriculture in Greece before joining the EU, now only 5% of it remains. Turkey is still a world leader in the production of many types of agricultural products, ranking from first to tenth place in them. Agriculture accounts for 9% of GDP and generates about $4 billion in export revenues. 25% of the working—age population of the country - 7.55 million people are employed here. If they join the EU, many of these people will join the ranks of the unemployed. ● Tourism is also directly related to agriculture. A belt of suppliers of agricultural products for hotels, shops and catering establishments has formed around all tourist centers. 2/3 of the able-bodied population of Turkey is employed in small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs), providing 62% of the country's GDP and 55% of its exports. About 3 million people are employed in tourism and related industries alone. Logistics workers should also be included here. In total, about half of the working population is employed in the service sector — about 15 million people. In the case of European integration, the fate of these millions will be unenviable.

■ Now — about joining the anti-Russian sanctions, as stated by Kilicdaroglu, and curtailing cooperation with Russia. Many experts, in the Russian Federation, say that it is not economically profitable for Turkey. But we remember well what pressure Brogan was subjected to from the United States to force Turkey to join the anti-Russian sanctions. Brogan resisted, first of all because of his character. It is unlikely that a weaker Kilicdaroglu will stand. Moreover, Americans never take into account the interests of the people of a particular country. Europe is a vivid confirmation of this. ● Now the Russian share of energy carriers in the Turkish economy is 30-40%, and in the case of the implementation of the gas hub project, it will grow to 70-80%. In addition, Turkey supplies clothes, shoes, food, and building materials to the Russian Federation. The tourism industry critically depends on the flow from the Russian Federation. The US and the EU will certainly demand that Turkey join the anti-Russian sanctions, which will have disastrous consequences for its economy. ● Refusal to cooperate with the Russian Federation will lead to a recession, leading to a wave of bankruptcies. If we add to this the curtailment of gas supplies from the Russian Federation, then energy will become expensive, and industry will become unprofitable, as it is now in the EU. ● Of course, inflation will increase. To eliminate budget holes, Turkey, like Greece, will be put on the credit needle of the IMF and the EU. Destabilization will intensify, Kurdish separatism, supported by the United States, will become more active. Considering that only 27% of able-bodied women work in Turkey, more than 20 million people will suffer together with men who have lost their jobs. And this is only in the economic sphere. And given the political destabilization, the entire population of the country is under attack. ● If Turkey takes a course on joining the EU, it will not only lose its independence, but will turn into another poor province of the West. You don't even have to ask the question "who stands to benefit from this?" Certainly not Turkey. (Translation: yandex.ru)

The possible transfer of nuclear weapons to Ukraine from the West will cause a preemptive strike by Russia, said Dmitry Medvedev, deputy chairman of the Russian Security Council. The statement was made during his visit to Vietnam. | As reported by the Hal Turner Radio Show in a Subscribers-Only report on 23 May, debate within NATO over supplying Ukraine with F-16's centers around the United States INISISTENCE the planes be a specially-modified model capable of carrying the U.S. "B-61" free-fall nuclear bomb. The U.S. is also insisting that NATO countries train Ukraine pilots on how to utilize such nuclear bombs. This has caused a gigantic rift within NATO. The United States, Great Britain, Poland, and Germany are in favor of this idea, while Turkey, Greece, and Hungary are against it. "If this happens, they must be prepared for a retaliatory strike with a nuclear charge" said Medvedev. Medvedev emphasized that if the situation comes to the point that nuclear weapons are being transferred to Ukraine, a preventive strike from Russia becomes inevitable.

Putin delivers scathing speech at the West pic.twitter.com/GEXmQmUGmT

— Robert Sepehr (@robertsepehr) May 25, 2023

The “Maidan midwife” confirmed Washington’s role in the conflict at the Kiev Security Forum | The US Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland told an audience in Kiev on Thursday that Washington has been helping plan the Ukrainian ‘counteroffensive’ against Russia for almost half a year. ● “Even as you plan for the counteroffensive, which we have been working on with you for some 4-5 months, we are already beginning our discussions with [the] Ukrainian government and with friends in Kiev – both on the civilian side and on the military side – about Ukraine’s long-term future,” Nuland told the Kiev Security Forum via video-link from the State Department. ● She added that the attack will be “likely starting and moving concurrently” with events such as the NATO summit in Lithuania, scheduled for July 11.

■ US May Announce $300 Million Ukraine Aid Package Friday, Mostly Ammunition (Sputnik News)

Dmitry Medvedev (Дмитрий Медведев) | I recently wrote about why Ukraine will disappear. Now it's time to say how Ukraine will disappear and also what is the risk of a resumption of conflict in Europe and in the world. It will depend on which path the process of disintegration of this dying state will take as a result of the lost military conflict. There are two of them. Or the path of relatively slow erosion of Ukrainian statehood with the gradual loss of the remaining elements of state sovereignty. Or the path of its instant collapse with the simultaneous annihilation of all signs of statehood. In any case, after such a collapse, three possible scenarios are likely.

Firstly: The western regions of Ukraine are coming under the control of a number of EU states with the subsequent "anschluss" of these lands by recipient states. At the same time, a certain "no-man's-land" Ukrainian territory will remain, which is squeezed between Russia and lands that have passed under the sovereignty of a number of European countries. The remaining ownerless territory declares its secession from the former Ukraine, its international legal status, and its intention to return the lost lands by all means. Naturally, referring only to those lands that became part of Russia. At the same time, this "new" Ukraine immediately declares its desire to join the European Union and NATO, which is happening in the medium term. The armed conflict resumes after a short time, turning into a permanent one, but with the threat of its rapid transition into a full-fledged third World War.

Secondly: Ukraine disappears after the completion of the Special Military Operation in the process of its partition between Russia and several European Union states.  The government of Ukraine is being formed in exile in one of the European countries. The conflict ends with reasonable guarantees of its non-renewal in the near future, but with the preservation of the terrorist activity of the Ukrainian Nazis, who will be dispersed on the territory of the EU states that have received Western Ukrainian lands. The risk of the resumption of a full-fledged conflict or its escalation into a world war in this case can be considered moderate.

Thirdly: The same thing happens as in the first case, but with the opposite sign. The western lands of Ukraine are to be joined with a number of EU countries. The people of the central and some other ownerless regions of Ukraine, within the framework of Article 1 of the UN Charter, will immediately declare their self-determination by joining the Russian Federation. This request is granted, and the conflict ends with sufficient guarantees of its non-renewal in the long term.

There are simply no other options. And this is already clear to everyone, even if it is unpleasant for someone out there in the West to admit it. We may be temporarily satisfied with the second option, but we need a third one. (Translation: yandex.ru)

■ Kiev regime must cease to exist – ex-Russian president (RT.com)
■ What matters for Moscow is that 'a guy with dementia' not elected US president — Medvedev (TASS)
■ Ukrainian conflict may continue for decades — Medvedev (TASS)

“Bomber built to nuke Russia” | U.S. Air Force B-1B Lancers returned to RAF Fairford, May 23, for Bomber Task Force Europe 2023-3 to conduct a long-planned bomber rotation in support of U.S. European Command and NATO. ● The highly agile aircraft’s 12-hour mission from North America to Europe demonstrates the U.S. Air Force’s rapid ability to deploy anywhere, anytime, and provide lethal precision and global strike options U.S. and Allied commanders.

■ U.S. EUCOM, NATO to hold air, missile exercise in Balkans (Anti-Bellum)

The Russian Defense Ministry has released footage showing American vehicles used by Ukrainian militants in Belgorod attack | US officials have denied that equipment provided to Ukraine by its western backers was used by militants to stage an incursion into Russia that left multiple civilians injured and one dead. The denials run contrary to the multiple images across social media depicting US-made military vehicles destroyed in Belgorod Region. “We’ve seen some of the reports circulating on social media and elsewhere making claims that US-supplied weapons were used in these attacks,” US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters on Tuesday in Washington. “I will say that we’re skeptical at this time of the veracity of these reports.” Miller suggested that footage of the destroyed vehicles might be fake.

■ Watch Decimated Remains of Ukrainian Terror Group That Attempted Assault on Belgorod Region (VIDEO)
■ Ukraine resorting to terrorism after Artyomovsk defeat – Russian MOD (RT.com)

Elena Panina (Елена Панина) | Belgorod Frontier: WHO is in reality and in social networks | What did Ukraine achieve and what did it achieve with the saboteurs' sortie in the Belgorod region? The first question is well answered by the quasi-Ukrainian TG channel "ZeRada". The tasks in Kiev included:

   1. To switch the attention of the world, but above all the population of Ukraine itself, from the "zrada" of the loss of Artemovsk to the "peremoga" in the form of an operation in the Russian Federation (which, strictly speaking, is strange, because "the APU is about to be almost surrounded by Bakhmut").
   2. To cause panic in Russia by directing the anger of its citizens at its own "inactive" and "incompetent" government.
   3. To show (to the curators, but not only) that the border of the Russian Federation is not at all locked and that Russia is "unable to recapture ITS territory even from a small DRG."

   ● The whole operation was carefully worked out. The best forces of the Armed Forces of Ukraine were pulled up to the penetration site, which in fact was a gray zone. This gave a serious superiority to Ukrainian forces and means in this direction. The key idea of the operation, that is, a demonstration of the "incompetence of the leadership of the Russian Federation", will be given in the wording of the specified TG channel: "For this, we need shots of burning Russian equipment. The goal was not to keep the territory, but to hunt for planes / helicopters / armored vehicles of the Russian Federation, which in a hurry had to be thrown away to solve the problem. Footage of Russian artillery strikes on their villages would also help."

   ● The first task — the distraction of the public's attention — was solved only within the framework of the Ukrainian audience, who instantly fell into fruitless meme about the "BNR" (by the way, such a willingness to recognize people's republics right and left will still affect Kiev). The rest was sewn with white threads and understood in Russia, and throughout the world without translation — there were enough inscriptions "For Bakhmut" on Ukrainian equipment.

   ● The second task — to cause panic among the Russians — was a failure. Including because of the incompetent actions of Ukrainian "bot farms", who too obsessively dispersed the topic of "all-perversion" in RU-public. In many ways, by the way, the background of Ukrobot guides is affected here. Well, there were no Chechen campaigns in their biographies, no house bombings in Moscow, no Budennovsk with Beslan, no Nalchik with Nord-Ost. Generally speaking, the residents of Ukraine are mere children in comparison with the citizens of the Russian Federation in terms of real force majeure and epic power failures in half with defaults. Therefore, Russians have a vaccination against all this, but Ukrainians do not. And there won't be any more.

   ● As for the third task, the result was twofold. In the harsh reality, Russian security forces were able to avoid the traps of Kiev. They did not expose other sections of the front and did not get into trouble with a disorderly crowd, which would have led to loud losses and coveted shots of their burning equipment. Nor did they "bomb Voronezh", that is, shoot their own villages. As a result, by the end of the second day, not only reports arrived, but also photos/ videos of the defeated ukrovoyaks and their mangled equipment. Everything turned out relatively well, with such and such an introduction. Which, however, does not remove the urgent questions about the organization of the Border Service as such, and not only about that. However, in a well-known segment of the domestic media environment, everything turned out somewhat differently. A number of public posts for these two days switched to the mode of resonators of alien hysteria, the true purpose of which was a picture of off-scale Russian losses, an order of magnitude higher than the Bryansk incident. Although, it would seem, the public "only" demanded to immediately eliminate ukroproyv and report to them every minute about all movements and successes.

● As a result, many colleagues have a feeling of a mess at the border. So strong that it's time to see this as a cunning plan for Chinese comrades or a "thorn bush" for the Ukrainian army. Almost like "on the flanks of Wagner." The cherry on the cake were separate calls to distribute weapons to the residents of the border region as soon as possible. That without their clear organization and months of military training would threaten complete chaos. It remains to add to what has been said that the much-anticipated declaration of war on Kiev, with the introduction of martial law in Russia, among other things, will save the Russian public from this stormy response. (Translation: yandex.ru) (Photo © Russian Ministry of Defence)

■ The War in Ukraine Was Provoked—and Why That Matters to Achieve Peace (Jeffrey D. Sachs)

A senior Ukrainian official has admitted that his country has assassinated "quite a few" Russian civilians who support Putin and his war to assert control of the Donbas region. In interviews first reported by The Times of London, Major General Kyrylo Budanov, who heads Ukraine's military intelligence service, also promised more attacks are to come. Budanov isn't merely an unapologetic terrorist, he's a boastful one. ● "These cases have happened and will continue," he said. "Such people will receive a well-deserved punishment, and the appropriate punishment can only be liquidation and I will implement it." ● In a separate interview with a Ukrainian YouTube channel, Budanov said that any country could be witness to his killing of civilians who say or write the wrong things. The head of Ukraine's military intelligence service, Major-General Kyrylo Budanov, admitted that several Kremlin propagandists have been assassinated since the start of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Seymour Hersh (Substack) | Ukraine's neighbors push for Zelensky to pursue peace as millions of displaced people flow into Europe. | Last Saturday the Washington Post published an exposé of classified American intelligence documents showing that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, working behind the back of the Biden White House, pushed hard earlier this year for an expanded series of missile attacks inside Russia. The documents were part of a large cache of classified materials posted online by an Air Force enlisted man now in custody. A senior official of the Biden administration, asked by the Post for comment on the newly revealed intelligence, said that Zelensky has never violated his pledge never to use American weapons to strike inside Russia. In the view of the White House, Zelensky can do no wrong. ● Zelensky’s desire to take the war to Russia may not be clear to the president and senior foreign policy aides in the White House, but it is to those in the American intelligence community who have found it difficult to get their intelligence and their assessments a hearing in the Oval Office. Meanwhile, the slaughter in the city of Bakhmut continues. It is similar in idiocy, if not in numbers, to the slaughter in Verdun and the Somme during World War I. The men in charge of today’s war—in Moscow, Kiev, and Washington—have shown no interest even in temporary ceasefire talks that could serve as a prelude to something permanent. The talk now is only about the possibilities of a late spring or summer offensive by either party. ● But something else is cooking, as some in the American intelligence community know and have reported in secret, at the instigation of government officials at various levels in Poland, Hungary, Lithuania, Estonia, Czechoslovakia, and Latvia. These countries are all allies of Ukraine and declared enemies of Vladimir Putin.

As reported "imminent" on the Hal Turner Radio Show last night (Friday 19 May) Bakhmut, Ukraine has finally and officially been liberated by Russia; the Ukrainian NAZIS are defeated and have fled. | Leader of the Wagner PMC, Prigozhin made the announcement personally, with his Wagner troops inside Bakhmut city. This victory will have severe implications for Ukraine NAZIS, who now will have great difficulty supplying troops in the entire south of Ukraine. All major rail lines previously used to supply Ukraine troops, ran through Bakhmut, as did several major highways. Now, the Russians control the entire city, and those Ukraine military supplies cannot get through. Prigozhin says that his Wagner troops will leave Bakhmut on the 25th, being relieved by the Russian Army. They will get some (well-deserved) rest, then likely be assigned to another city target; rumors suggest Odessa.

Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev warned on Friday that a radioactive cloud was heading towards Western Europe following the destruction of a Ukrainian warehouse storing British-supplied depleted uranium ammunition. | Sputnik News spoke with Dr. Chris Busby, physical chemist and scientific secretary of the European Committee on Radiation Risk, about how the West’s decision to provide depleted uranium (DU) ammunition to Ukraine has potentially caused a continent-wide ecological disaster. Below is his answer in full.[...] Those who provide the weapons, the UK government in this case, are morally bankrupt. Unless it is their intention to destroy the Ukrainian people. Who knows anymore? The world has gone mad.

President Aleksandar Vucic said his intelligence links tipped him off to foreign-funded revolutionaries lurking among protesters | Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said on Friday that his intelligence contacts tipped him off about the presence of foreign-sponsored revolutionaries at so-called anti-violence rallies in Belgrade. The West, he declared, has been “causing problems” for Serbia ever since Belgrade refused “to hand them Kosovo on a platter. Thousands of protesters and a group of opposition politicians marched in Belgrade on Friday, demanding the resignation of Interior Minister Bratislav Gasic and intelligence chief Aleksandar Vulin. Successive demonstrations have been held in the Serbian capital since 17 people – including eight children – were killed in a pair of back-to-back mass shootings earlier this month. ● According to RT Balkan, some of the demonstrators on Friday demanded that Vucic also step down.

■ US involved in assassination of Russian public figures – Moscow (RT.com)

Dmitry Medvedev (Дмитрий Медведев) | Kissinger called for Ukraine's admission to NATO. He is, of course, 100 years old in ten days, and he still met with Brezhnev. However, here he is completely wrong. He called the conflict between the United States and China the main threat to humanity. I have always believed that for a correct assessment of the situation it is important to consider not a hypothetical, but a direct and clear threat. Let's imagine that Ukraine was accepted into the North Atlantic Alliance by its current meager leaders:

   1 ) NATO is already engaged in hybrid warfare with our country;
   2 ) the Ukrainian nationalist regime will not give up trying to regain lost territories;
   3 ) we will have to respond to this harshly by all possible means and...
   4 ) Here is Article 5 of the Washington Treaty.

Subtle reasoning about preventing existential threats does not work in bloody conflicts. This should be clear even to those approaching the centennial. (Translation: DeepL.com)

Discussion on the global military campaign using bio-chemical weapons against the people, advertised by global governments as a public health event and vaccination. We talk about who is doing this and why. There are 4 segments in the show with commercial breaks in between.

■ Sasha's Substack ■ American Domestic Bioterrorism Program (Katherine Watt)

The Ukrainian president reacted angrily when confronted about his own intelligence agents’ supposed “dealings” with Russia’s Wagner Group | The Washington Post has cut a large segment from an interview with Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, in which he pushed the newspaper to reveal alleged traitors in his ranks and angrily accused its reporters of aiding Russia by publishing leaked documents. ● The Post published a transcript of a lengthy interview with Zelensky on Saturday. After a discussion of a Ukrainian counteroffensive against Russian forces, the newspaper asked whether his military intelligence agency – the GUR – had “back-channel contact” with Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the Russian private military company Wagner Group. ● Citing recently leaked Pentagon documents, the Post explained to Zelensky that American spies noted a meeting between the president and GUR chief Kirill Budanov in February in which Budanov told him that he had learned of a Wagner plan to “destabilize Moldova,” but could counter this alleged plan by exposing his own “dealings” with Prigozhin, thus portraying the Wagner boss as “a traitor who has been working with Ukraine.”

■ Here are the Zelensky ‘treason’ quotes the Washington Post deleted

"The Integrity Initiative," a propaganda network linked to Britain’s secret intelligence agency MI6, has demonized Russia in the West and laid the ground for the year-long conflict in Ukraine to rage on, according to a journalist. | Kit Klarenberg, an investigative journalist and Press TV Website contributor, told Press TV's Palestine Declassified program that Integrity Initiative, a British project funded by MI6 and run by British military intelligence, has sought to pin the blame on Russia for all domestic political events in the West. “One of Integrity Initiative’s key objectives as a black propaganda unit, was to try and to fix blame on Russia for almost any and every national domestic political event across the Western world, … it also helped demonize Russia and laid the foundations for what we are seeing now in Ukraine,” Klarenberg said. On February 24, 2022, Russia began what it called a "special military operation" in Ukraine to “de-Nazify” the country over the threat of the former Soviet republic joining the US-led NATO military alliance. Since the outbreak of the war, which recently completed a year, the United States and Ukraine’s other Western allies not only imposed a slew of economic sanctions on Moscow but have sent Kiev tens of billions of dollars worth of weapons. The Kremlin has repeatedly warned that sanctions on Russia and Western military assistance to Ukraine risk prolonging the war.

■ Washington ‘relieved’ UK will cross red line for Kiev (RT.com)
■ US, UK Vow to Keep Supporting Ukraine Regardless of Counteroffensive (Antiwar.com)

VIDEO in Russian (Wartime Media -Telegram)

Marking anything other than “Europe Day” in Latvia is now a crime against democracy | More than two dozen residents of Latvia were arrested on Tuesday for violating a law against celebrating the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany. The EU and NATO member's police even seized a “Russia” jacket from a man in a wheelchair, and arrested another for wearing Soviet medals in public. ● By 11:30 pm local time, Latvian police reported a total of 26 arrests, 38 misdemeanor citations and four criminal cases, according to the news outlet Delfi. ● While most of the cases were recorded in Riga, the capital, multiple arrests also took place in Daugavpils. In one incident, a senior citizen described as “looking too young to be a veteran of WWII” showed up wearing a jacket with Soviet medals. When police told him to take it off, he resisted arrest. ● Five people were arrested for laying flowers with “symbols of military aggression” at the Freedom Monument in the Daugavpils Victory Park. They were charged with “public use of symbols glorifying militaristic aggression and war crimes.” In the same park, police forced a man in a wheelchair to remove his jacket because it said “Russia.” ● Two Russian-speaking men were detained at Dubrovinsky Park in Daugavpils after giving an interview to TV3. Their offense was expressing the opinion that fascists had returned to power in Ukraine, with EU support.

■ EU country arrests 26 people for celebrating Victory Day (05/09/23)

■ Seven Facts and Figures About Wwii You Need to Know (Strategic Culture Foundation)
■ Immortal Regiment Parades Held Across Europe | On May 9, the annual Victory Day parade is taking place in Moscow’s Red Square. The parade marks the 78th anniversary of the Soviet victory over the Nazis in the Great Patriotic War. ● In his speech, President Vladimir Putin congratulated Russians on Victory Day, recalled the heroes of the Great Patriotic War and addressed the key ongoing events. The President emphasized that the civilization is now at a turning point. ● “A real war has once again been unleashed against our Motherland. But we have repulsed international terrorism, we will protect the inhabitants of Donbass, and we will ensure our security,” the president stressed. The Western elites talk about their exclusivity, play off people and provoke bloody conflicts, sow Russophobia and aggressive nationalism, Putin said. The President pointed out that the West is provoking conflicts and upheavals, destroying values in order to continue to dictate its own rules, and in fact a system of robbery and violence. At the same time, Russia’s opponents forgot who defeated the monstrous global evil. ● Desecration of the deeds and victims of the people that won that war is a crime and revanchism of those who were preparing a new campaign against Russia, Putin noted. Putin noted that the Ukrainian people became a hostage of the criminal regime supported by the West, a bargaining chip in their cruel and selfish plans. (kolozeg.org)

With China involved, serious negotiations could begin by the end of the year, "the elder statesman" said | Former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger has told CBS News that the conflict in Ukraine may be approaching a turning point, and that Chinese-brokered peace talks could begin by the end of 2023. ● "Now that China has entered the negotiation, it will come to a head, I think by the end of the year," the 99-year-old diplomat told CBS in an interview broadcast on Sunday. By that time, he continued, "we will be talking about negotiating processes and even actual negotiations." ● With the release of its ‘Position on the Political Settlement of the Ukraine Crisis’ in February, China put itself forward as a potential mediator between Moscow and Kiev. The Chinese plan was rejected outright by the US and EU, while Russian President Vladimir Putin described some of its 12 points as “in tune” with Moscow’s position, and Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky welcomed only a handful of its points, but maintains that Kiev will not compromise with Russia in any way.

A Russian Su-34 frontline bomber has struck at the deployment point of foreign mercenaries in the Kharkov region with guided bombs, a Russian Defense Ministry spokesperson told Sputnik. |  ● "The crew of a Su-34 fighter-bomber, using universal modules for planning and correcting aerial bombs, struck at a temporary deployment point of foreign mercenaries near the village of Ivanovka [Ivanivka]," the spokesperson said. In addition, in the Kupyansk direction, Russia forces have located and destroyed two Ukrainian sabotage reconnaissance groups and have thwarted three attempts of enemy troop rotation, the spokesperson said. ● The spokesperson also told Sputnik that a combat vehicle of the Osa anti-aircraft missile system was destroyed using the Lancet precision loitering munition near the village of Velykyi Burluk. An Akatsiya self-propelled howitzer used by Ukrainian troops was also destroyed by Russian forces. ● Russia launched its special military operation in Ukraine on February 24, 2022, after the Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics appealed for help in defending themselves against Ukrainian provocations. In response to Russia’s operation, Western countries have rolled out a comprehensive sanctions campaign against Moscow and have been supplying weapons to Ukraine.

Prolific Reporter/Journalist/Commentator Gonzalo Lira, whose videos from Ukraine about the ongoing war are viewed by millions, HAS BEEN ARRESTED by Ukrainian NAZI Secret Police. | SECRET POLICE VIDEO: The video above was recorded by Ukrainian Police. IT was released by them; as a warning to other Journalists or even opinion commentators, to keep your mouth shut. THIS is what "Ukraine" is. THIS is what "Ukraine" does. Anyone supporting Ukraine is a NAZI SYMPATHIZER or NAZI COLLABORATOR. Start calling them those things. Publicly.

■ Gonzalo Lira — Again (Gonzalo's You Tube Channel)

SABOTAGE! 18 Gun Powder Warehouses ON FIRE in Russia | At this hour (4:43 PM EDT Saturday) in Pervomaiskoye, Russia, 18 gunpowder warehouses are on fire. An evacuation has been announced. Explosions are heard from the gunpowder depots. There is massive fire. About 400 residents of the area will be evacuated. Further details if they become available . . .