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WATCH: RFE/RL'S full interview with German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock
German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock says the European Union won't give in to Moscow's "blackmailing" after Gazprom announced another large reduction in gas supplied through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline linking Russia and Germany.
Speaking to RFE/RL in an interview on July 26, Baerbock said Germany and the EU see Russia’s tactic as another attempt to divide the EU, one that will be unsuccessful because Europe is united like never before and understands that it must end its dependence on Russian energy.
“We want to get independent 100 percent -- independence from fossil energy from Russia as fast as we can,” she said, adding that Europe intends to stay on this path.
WATCH: German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said the European Union would not give in to Russian "blackmailing," after Gazprom announced a large reduction in gas supplied via the Nordstream 1 pipeline linking Russia and Germany.
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Baerbock made the comments a day after the Russian state-owned energy giant said it would cut flows through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline to Germany to one-fifth of capacity from July 27.
Gazprom made the announcement just days after resuming gas flows through the pipeline after a 10-day maintenance break, but only at 40 percent of the pipeline's capacity. It said it was forced to lower the volume because of the delayed return of a turbine that was sent to Canada for maintenance.
Gazprom blamed the latest reduction on the need to halt the operation of another turbine at a compressor station on the Russian end of the pipeline.
Both Germany and the EU have said there is no technical justification for slowing the flow of gas. They say Russia’s moves are politically motivated and are linked to EU sanctions over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Baerbock said the turbine maintenance was another example of how Russia tries “every kind of tool and trick” to divide Europe, and Europe has to stick together.
She also said that if Russia cuts off the gas flow completely through Nord Stream 1, there is “no doubt at all” that Germany will continue its sanctions policy toward Russia.
Europe banned Russian coal imports beginning on August 1, and most oil imports are to end by December 31.
Baerbock also discussed Germany's supply of high-powered weapons to Ukraine, saying there is no lack of political will in Berlin to deliver them. She said Germany initially was in a poor position to supply modern arms to Ukraine because it "did the worst you can ever imagine" with keeping its military stocks up to date during peace time.
The criticism Germany faced over being slow to provide military support went to her heart, she said, and "this is why we try to get better."
WATCH: German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said her country's military "did the worst you can ever imagine" with keeping up-to-date, leaving Berlin in a poor position to supply modern arms to Ukraine. She said criticism that Germany had been slow to provide military support went to her heart, and "this is why we try to get better."
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Germany is now delivering artillery, including howitzers, and has helped train Ukrainian forces. She added that Germany hopes to deliver an air-defense system by the beginning of September.
The top German diplomat also commented on Bosnia-Herzegovina's hopes to join the EU after some frustration in the country when Ukraine and Moldova were granted candidate status. She noted that “nationalistic rhetoric is coming up again” in the country, but said she believes young Bosnians want unity among the country’s ethnic groups and a chance to live together and build a future together.
On Afghanistan, she said sending military support to the armed resistance opposing the Taliban “is not on the agenda.” She said the country is suffering a humanitarian disaster and that Germany is one of the largest donors of aid to help alleviate the situation, but there is no contact with the Taliban-led government.
Germany must support the people of Afghanistan and continue bringing out people whose lives are endangered because of their past work for the coalition and Western governments, she said.
She also underscored that women in Afghanistan are experiencing "the biggest violation of women’s rights on Earth" and there must therefore be a special focus on women and girls, whose lives "stopped" when the Taliban took over.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov have spoken by phone to discuss a possible prisoner swap that could involve American basketball star Brittney Griner and Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout.
Blinken described the call on July 29 as “a frank and direct conversation” centered primarily on detained Americans. In addition to Griner, Blinken has said the United States is pressing for the release of former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan.
“I urged Foreign Minister Lavrov to move forward with that proposal," he said. "I can’t give you an assessment of whether that is any more or less likely.”
Blinken on July 28 publicly requested the call and revealed the existence of a “substantial proposal” on a prisoner swap involving Whelan and Griner.
U.S. and Russian media have reported that the United States could seek their release in exchange for Viktor Bout, a Russian arms trader currently serving a 25-year sentence in the United States after being convicted of conspiracy to kill U.S. citizens and providing aid to a terrorist organization.
The Russian Foreign Ministry said Lavrov and Blinken discussed a prisoner swap and other issues, including Ukraine, during the call.
"Concerning possible exchange of prisoners with the United States, the Russian side strongly recommended the sides return to professional dialogue in the regime of quiet diplomacy, without speculations and fakes," the ministry said, according to TASS.
There was no reference in the statement to a news report saying Russia has requested the release of a former colonel from the Federal Security Service (FSB) who has been convicted of murder in Germany.
The Russians communicated the request for the release of Vadim Krasikov to the United States earlier this month through an informal backchannel used by the spy agency, CNN reported on July 29.
Krasikov, aka Vadim Sokolov, was sentenced to life in prison on December 15 for the murder of an ethnic Chechen of Georgian nationality in a Berlin park in August 2019.
Prosecutors had alleged that the gunman was an officer in Russia’s FSB secret service.
Blinken also said he pressed Lavrov on the importance of Russia following through on an agreement to allow Ukrainian grain shipments to leave the Black Sea and warned him of consequences should Moscow move ahead with suspected plans to annex portions of eastern and southern Ukraine.
Blinken said he told Lavrov that the world will “never recognize” any annexation of Ukrainian territory, which he said would “result in significant additional costs for Russia.”
The Russian Foreign Ministry statement said Lavrov repeated Russia's vows to keep fighting until it has achieved its aims in Ukraine. It said that Lavrov also renewed complaints about Western countries supplying arms and military aid.
Lavrov also accused the United States of not keeping up its end of agreements on the grain shipments from Ukraine.
Griner, a star of the Women’s National Basketball Association, is being held on drug-smuggling charges. She faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted. Whelan, a corporate security executive, was sentenced to 16 years in prison on espionage charges in 2020. He denies the charges.
The United States has imposed sanctions on two Russians and four Russian entities in connection with U.S. claims of Russian interference in U.S. elections and indicted one of the sanctioned individuals for allegedly using U.S. citizens and political groups to spread Russian propaganda.
The U.S. Treasury Department said on July 29 that the individuals and entities designated played various roles in Russia’s attempts to manipulate and destabilize the United States and its allies and partners, including Ukraine.
The sanctioned individuals and entities raised funds and spread misinformation to disrupt the American electoral process and were backed by Russian intelligence to "create or heighten divisions within the country," the government said.
Brian Nelson, undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence in the department, said in a statement that the sanctions were in response to the Kremlin's repeated attempts to "threaten and undermine our democratic processes and institutions."
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said it is crucial for democracies to hold free and fair elections without malign outside interference.
He said the Treasury Department's action is separate from the broad range of economic measures the United States and its allies and partners have imposed in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, "which constitutes another clear example of Russia’s disregard for the sovereignty and political independence of other states."
The sanctions announced on July 29 follow a series of designations designed to "expose and disrupt Russia’s persistent election interference and destabilization efforts against Ukraine," he added in a statement.
One of the individuals sanctioned is Aleksandr Ionov and one of the four entities designated is the Anti-Globalization Movement of Russia (AGMR) of which Ionov is the president and founder.
AGMR's English-language website claims it is a sociopolitical movement that opposes “certain aspects of the globalization process” and seeks to stop “manifestations” of the so-called “new world order,” the Treasury Department said.
AGMR has maintained connections with antiestablishment groups in the United States and other countries, holding conferences and protests in opposition to U.S. policy, according to the department. AGMR has received funding from Russia’s National Charity Fund, a trust created by Russian President Vladimir Putin that gathers money from Russia’s state-owned companies and oligarchs.
The criminal charge was filed against Ionov in connection with a foreign malign influence campaign that the United States says lasted from at least December 2014 until March 2022.
“As court documents show, Ionov allegedly orchestrated a brazen influence campaign, turning U.S. political groups and U.S. citizens into instruments of the Russian government,” said Assistant Attorney General Matthew Olsen of the Justice Department’s National Security Division.
According to the indictment unsealed on July 29, Ionov worked under the supervision of the Federal Security Service (FSB) and with the Russian government’s support. He recruited political groups within the United States, including in the U.S. states of Florida, Georgia, and California, "and exercised direction or control over them on behalf of the FSB."
The Justice Department's statement does not identify the U.S. political groups by name but provides details of their alleged engagement with Ionov.
The leader of the political group in Florida, for example, received an all-expenses paid trip to Russia in May 2015, and for at least the next seven years Ionov "exercised direction and control over senior members of the group," the department said.
Ionov "provided financial support to these groups, directed them to publish pro-Russian propaganda, coordinated and funded direct action by these groups within the United States intended to further Russian interests, and coordinated coverage of this activity in Russian media outlets," the indictment says.
The indictment also says Ionov’s relationship with the Florida political group continued until at least March 2022, and in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine the group hosted him in virtual conferences to discuss the war.
Ionov falsely stated during the conferences that anyone who supported Ukraine also supported Nazism and white supremacy. Ionov then reported to the FSB that he had enlisted the group to support Russia in the “information war unleashed” by the West, the indictment says.
Ionov is charged with conspiring to have U.S. citizens act as illegal agents of the Russian government. If convicted, he faces a maximum penalty of five years in prison. It was not immediately clear if he had a lawyer who could speak on his behalf, and he is not currently in custody.
The sanctions imposed on him and the others freeze any assets they hold in the United States and ban people in the United States from dealing with them.
The other individual sanctioned by the Treasury Department is Natalya Valeryevna Burlinova. Her Center for Support and Development of Public Initiative Creative Diplomacy (PICREADI) is one of the four entities designated for its work on behalf of the Russian government.
Iranian rights activist Maryam Akbari Monfared, who has spent 13 years in prison for protesting the execution of her two siblings, faces new charges of "propaganda against the system."
The watchdog Iran Human Rights quoted a source as saying Monfared was to have appeared in court on July 16 but refused as her lawyer had not been informed of the charges.
Hassan Jafari, Monfared’s husband, told RFE/RL's Radio Farda that the content of the new case is still unknown.
Monfared was arrested on December 2009 and was forcibly disappeared for five months.
She was sentenced to 15 years in prison by the Islamic Revolutionary Court in Tehran in May 2010, which condemned her for “acting against national security” and "enmity against God."
Jafari says a judge convicted his wife in a four-minute trial because of her family, who were members of the Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO). Three of her siblings were executed by the state in 1988, while a fourth died while being tortured in 1985.
Monfared has been in prison since her conviction without being granted any leave. She reportedly has been suffering health problems.
Jafari says that the Ministry of Intelligence has stopped any early or temporary release of his wife, even though a bail deposit has been posted. In 2015, after the release of audio from Ayatollah Montazeri, then the country's deputy leader, regarding the mass killing of prisoners, including her siblings, Monfared filed a lawsuit with the Tehran Prosecutor's Office. Jila Bani Yaqoub, a journalist who was in the women's ward of Evin prison with Maryam Akbari Monfared, said in an interview with Radio Farda that after Monfared's complaint and lawsuit, prison officials “specifically told her that they will not let her go on leave, and they have stuck to this."
Security agents halted a music concert in Tehran while the musicians were on stage playing, another sign of the crackdown authorities are waging against events they deem contrary to Islamic values.
According to video published on social media early on July 29, the members of the band Kamakan were performing when a security guard suddenly comes on stage and tells the band's singer: "Stop. We were ordered to stop this."
Despite protests by the singer, band members, and those present at the venue, a security agent insists that the concert end immediately. Following a recent uptick in social protests, several concerts have been canceled, including that of pop singer Sirvan Khosravi in the city of Ahvaz. In response to this crackdown, the director-general of guidance for Khuzestan Province has announced a ban on all music concerts in Ahvaz until further notice. Dozens of concerts and cultural performances have been abruptly called off in Iran following pressure and intimidation by hard-liners who claim such events undermine Islamic values.
Meanwhile, authorities have also increased the enforcement of rules that make it mandatory for women to wear a hijab in public. Female singers are not allowed to perform in Iran, and holding music concerts in the country after the 1979 Islamic Revolution has been accompanied by many obstacles.
An appeals court in Kyiv has reduced the life sentence handed to a Russian soldier for the murder of an unarmed civilian in the early days of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to 15 years.
Vadim Shishimarin, 21, was handed the life sentence in May in the first war crimes trial to arise from Russia's invasion. The reduction of his sentence was issued by a panel of judges on the Kyiv Court of Appeals, the news website Grati reported on July 29 on Telegram.
The Russian sergeant pleaded guilty in the death of a 62-year-old Ukrainian civilian, Oleksandr Shelypov, who was shot on February 28 while riding a bicycle in the village of Chupakhivka in the northeastern region of Sumy.
Shishimarin's lawyer asked the court during his appeal hearing on July 13 to cancel the verdict and acquit his client, saying it violated the rules and customs of war and arguing that Shishimarin had no intent to kill Shelypov.
The lawyer, Viktor Ovsyannikov, also pointed out that the court did not take into account that Shishimarin refused several times to comply with the order to shoot, which was given by his immediate commander and another officer. Also, prior to sentencing, the court did not take into account that Shishimarin voluntarily surrendered and did no more harm.
Ovsyannikov said the punishment was “excessively severe,” noting that Shishimarin did not refuse to testify, described how the events took place, and pleaded guilty to having shot the victim.
Shishimarin, who comes from the Siberian region of Irkutsk, said little at the hearing.
Prosecutors had argued in favor of maintaining the sentence.
Ukrainian officials have called for an investigation after videos appeared on social media that apparently show Russian soldiers castrating, and then killing, a Ukrainian prisoner of war.
Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets said on July 29 that he had requested the Prosecutor-General's Office to launch a probe into the gruesome videos, which appeared on several Russian- and Ukrainian-language channels of the Telegram social media network a day earlier.
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Details of the video, such as where and when it was filmed, have yet to be independently confirmed by official sources. RFE/RL has also been unable to confirm the authenticity of the video and has decided not to publish it.
"I have applied to the Office of the Prosecutor-General of Ukraine to verify the fact and record of a war crime, of a violation of the Geneva Convention," Lubinets said.
"Also, we are preparing a communique for the UN Committee Against Torture to organize an urgent visit to the Russian Federation and the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine, as well as to the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CPT)," he added.
Referring to the videos, Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhaylo Podolyak vowed that Ukraine will identify "everyone" involved in the incident, saying "the fog of war will not help the Russian executioners avoid punishment."
Russian officials have yet to comment officially on the videos.
\Marie Struthers, Amnesty International’s director for Eastern Europe and Central Asia, called it a "horrific assault" and said it was "yet another apparent example of complete disregard for human life and dignity" committed by Russian forces.
International law is clear that prisoners of war must not be subjected to any form of torture or ill-treatment and should have access to the International Committee of the Red Cross, Struthers said in a news release on July 29.
"The relevant authorities must fully respect the rights of prisoners of war in accordance with the Geneva Conventions,” she added.
Since Moscow launched its unprovoked invasion in late February, Ukraine says it has identified thousands of war crimes committed by Russian troops.
Investigators from several countries, as well as the International Criminal Court, also have been gathering and examining evidence to determine whether war crimes have been committed.
Amnesty International said in its July 29 news release that it also has documented crimes under international law such as summary killings of captives by Russia-backed separatist forces in eastern Ukraine and extrajudicial executions of Ukrainian civilians by Russian forces.
Russia says it has not purposely targeted civilians in its military operations despite mounting video and concrete evidence that shows the destruction of apartment buildings, hospitals, cultural venues, and other nonmilitary sites.
It has also accused Ukrainian soldiers of committing war crimes, without providing evidence.
A court in Sarajevo has sentenced Amir Zukic, a former top ruling party official, to three years in prison for corruption.
Zukic, a former secretary-general of the ruling Bosniak Party of Democratic Action, or SDA, was found guilty of bribing and using political connections in 2016 to give jobs in state-run institutions to certain people.
The Sarajevo Municipal Court on July 29 sentenced four other people to prison terms of up to six years, and acquitted two people in the case.
Safet Bibic was sentenced to six years, and Senad Trako was sentenced to 1 1/2 years in prison. Ramiz Karavdic was sentenced to two years in prison, Esad Dzananovic was sentenced to three years, while Nedzad Trako and Asim Sarajlic, who is also on the U.S. list, were acquitted.
The trial was part of Western-backed efforts to curb graft in the Balkan nation, which is struggling to recover economically from a devastating 1990s ethnic war.
The verdicts can be appealed.
The U.S. State Department in 2020 barred Zukic from entering the United States for his alleged involvement in “significant corruption."
The United States and its Western allies have slapped sanctions on individuals who are deemed as undermining the rule of law and stability in the Balkans.
Bosnia remains unstable and ethnically divided more than a quarter of a century after the end of the 1992-95 ethnic war that killed more than 100,000 people. The West wants to counter Russia's efforts to increase its influence in the region.
Romanian President Klaus Iohannis has criticized Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban's recent remarks on race during a visit to Romania and called on the EU member's ethnic Hungarian party, the UDMR, to clarify its position on statements.
Orban triggered a wave of international criticism after a July 23 speech in Romania in which he warned against mixing with "non-Europeans."
His words sparked an immediate outcry, with the United States calling his remarks "inexcusable" and Jewish community representatives voicing alarm. "It is wrong and inadmissible in principle for a high European dignitary to deliver a speech on the public scene built on the race theory that led to the most terrible catastrophe of the 20th century," Iohannis said at a joint news conference on July 29 in Bucharest with visiting Moldovan President Maia Sandu. Speaking at an event at Baile Tusnad, in central Romania, in front of a thousands-strong audience, Orban said: "We move, we work elsewhere, we mix within Europe, but we don't want to be a mixed race," a "multi-ethnic" people who would mix with "non-Europeans." Iohannis said that the venue of Orban's statement -- the Romanian province of Transylvania, home to a sizable ethnic Hungarian minority -- added to the gravity of Orban's remarks. "It is regrettable that a European dignitary delivers a public speech with an anti-European bias. That's valid wherever that would occur. But the fact that this happened in Transylvania is a problem for us," Iohannis added. Iohannis also called on the UDMR, which is a junior partner in Romania's governing coalition, to clarify its position on Orban's statements. UDMR leader Hunor Kelemen, who is also a deputy prime minister, and several other ethnic Hungarian ministers accompanied Orban during his stay in Romania and were seen applauding his statements. "UDMR needs to offer public clarifications since a significant part of its leadership and ministers were present at that event," Iohannis said. "They will have to explain whether they agreed with the contents of that speech which they applauded," he said.
In a first reaction to Iohannis's call for clarification, UDMR spokeswoman Csilla Hegedus said on July 29 that Orban's remarks had been taken out of context, and her party does "not have to give any explanations."
Earlier, Kelemen told Hungarian-language media that Orban doesn't have "an iota of racism in himself" and his remarks have been misunderstood.
Some voices in Romania have called for Kelemen to resign and for the UDMR to leave the coalition.
But senior figures from the main two coalition parties, the Social Democratic Party and the National Liberal Party, poured cold water on the calls and appeared eager to overlook the incident, arguing that UDMR being expelled from the government could provoke another political crisis in the NATO and EU-member country that has a long border with war-torn Ukraine.
Meanwhile, in an unexpected turn of events, Orban's longtime adviser Zsuzsa Hegedus, who on July 26 had slammed the speech as "a pure Nazi text" and had resigned her position, had a complete change of heart on July 29, rescinding her resignation.
Hegedus said in an open letter cited by Hungarian media that she changed her mind after hearing Orban's explanations the previous day in Vienna, where he said that his words had been "misinterpreted."
"It gives me the greatest pleasure to be able to say again...because I still feel it: I am proud of you," Hegedus wrote.
But she later confirmed that despite her change of heart she is out as an adviser to Orban and her assistant has been informed to pack up her office.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy says Ukraine is ready to start shipping millions of tons of grain sitting at its southern ports and is waiting for Turkey and the United Nations, which have agreed to oversee the shipments, to start the operation.
"Our side is fully prepared. We sent all the signals to our partners -- the UN and Turkey -- and our military guarantees the security situation," Zelenskiy's office quoted the president as saying on July 29, noting he had personally visited one of the ports, Chornomorsk, to assess the situation. "The infrastructure minister is in direct contact with the Turkish side and the UN. We are waiting for a signal from them that we can start...It is important for us that Ukraine remains the guarantor of global food security," he added. Kyiv and Moscow signed agreements with Turkey and the UN on July 22 to free up three of Ukraine's ports -- Odesa, Chernomorsk, and Pivdenniy -- which had been blockaded since Russia launched the invasion of its neighbor in late February. The deal cleared the way for millions of tons of grain and fertilizers to be shipped as many parts of the world teeter on the brink of a major food crisis. The UN and Turkey, a NATO member and maritime neighbor to both Russia and Ukraine in the Black Sea, are to oversee the operations through a joint command center set up in Istanbul. Turkish officials said earlier this week the center is now up and ready to function. Ukraine and Russia are two of the world's largest grain exporters.
Ukraine says it is launching an investigation into Russian accusations that it carried out an attack on a prison in the eastern Donetsk region -- which Kyiv denies -- that killed at least 40 Ukrainian prisoners of war captured during the fighting for the port city of Mariupol.
Unconfirmed reports by the Russian Defense Ministry and Moscow-backed separatists in Donetsk early on July 29 claimed that Ukrainian shelling with U.S.-made HIMARS rockets was responsible for the deaths and the wounding of dozens of others at the prison.
The television channel Russia-1 showed what appeared to be destroyed barracks and tangled metal beds, but no casualties could be seen. Ukraine's General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces said in a statement that the Russian claims were a ruse designed to hide the truth about what was happening to Ukrainians captured during the war, which is now in its sixth month, as Ukrainian forces did not fire any missiles in the area. "The armed forces of the Russian Federation carried out targeted artillery shelling of a correctional institution in the town of Olenivka, Donetsk region, where Ukrainian prisoners were also held," the statement said. "The Russian enemy continues its propaganda methods of waging information warfare by accusing the Armed Forces of Ukraine of shelling civilian infrastructure and the population, while hiding its own insidious actions. Consequently, such statements about the alleged shelling of civilian infrastructure and population by the Armed Forces of Ukraine are outright lies and provocation," the statement added. Neither side's claims about the situation could be independently verified, but Ukraine's Prosecutor-General's Office said it was opening an investigation into the incident.
"Prosecutors at the Prosecutor-General's Office have started a pretrial investigation into the fact of violation of the laws and customs of war," it said in a statement.
"According to the investigation, on July 29, 2022, the occupying state [Russia] struck the territory of Correctional Colony No. 120 in the temporarily occupied village of Olenivka, Volnovasky district, Donetsk region. As a result, about 40 people died and 130 were injured," it said. The Ukrainian troops were taken prisoner after the fierce fighting for Ukraine's Azov Sea port of Mariupol, where they holed up at the giant Azovstal steel mill for months. They were then taken to prisons in Russian-controlled areas such as the Donetsk region.
Eight people died in a blaze in a 15-story hostel in Moscow overnight after a fire alarm malfunctioned, officials said July 29.
The fire erupted in the building in a southeastern district, an agency investigating criminal acts said, adding that four people were hospitalized.
Emergency services said the blaze broke out on the ground floor of the building, adding that the flames were doused soon after midnight and that more than 200 people were evacuated. All those who died in the fire were migrants, TASS news agency quoted a senior emergency official as saying. Their citizenship is currently in the process of being established. The senior emergency official told TASS that a fire alarm malfunctioned and that the people inside were trapped as all the windows had metal bars. A criminal negligence case has been opened. Fires occur quite often in Russian buildings because of poor maintenance, infrastructure, or negligence.
Ukrainian forces have stepped up their counteroffensive to regain lost territory in the south, as Russia launched deadly strikes in central Ukraine and near the capital amid reports that Moscow has been increasingly facing a shortage of personnel in the east.
Ukraine's military said its planes struck five Russian strongholds around the city of Kherson and another nearby city in the south, where it is concentrating its biggest counteroffensive since the start of the war, seeking to isolate the Russian troops in the area.
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Ukraine has used Western-supplied long-range missile systems to badly damage three bridges across the Dnieper River in recent weeks, making it more difficult for Russia to supply its forces on the western bank. The Kherson region, which borders Moscow-annexed Crimea, fell to the Russians soon after the the February 24 invasion. Russian strikes on the central Ukrainian region of Kirovograd on July 28 killed five people and wounded 26 in the city of Kropyvnytskiy, officials said. Near Kyiv, 15 people were hurt at a military base. Ukraine's northern and southern regions were also hit. Russian missile strikes also hit the regions of Kyiv, Chernihiv, Mykolayiv, and Kharkiv. The attack on the Kyiv region -- the first in weeks -- hit a military unit in a village on the outskirts of the capital, according to Oleksiy Hromov, a senior official with Ukraine’s General Staff. Fifteen people were wounded in the strikes, five of them civilians, Kyiv regional Governor Oleksiy Kuleba said. Chernihiv regional Governor Vyacheslav Chaus reported that the Russians fired missiles from Belarus at the village of Honcharivska. The Chernihiv region had not been targeted in weeks. There also has been heavy shelling along the entire front line in the eastern Donetsk region as Russian forces targeted Bakhmut and other cities. Three people died in Bakhmut, local officials said.
Britain's Defense Ministry said in its daily intelligence bulletin on July 29 that Moscow has been using mercenaries from the notorious Kremlin-linked Vagner Group in eastern Ukraine from the early days of the invasion alongside regular army units "in coordination with the Russian military." Vagner, which is believed to be controlled by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a close associate of Russian President Vladimir Putin, has been involved in covert operations in Africa and the Middle East since 2015. The use of mercenaries in overt military operations further undermines the Kremlin’s longstanding policy of denying links between private military contractors and the Russian state, British intelligence said in its report. While the use of Vagner mercenaries in regular military operations was probably prompted by a "major shortage of combat infantry," British intel suggested that it is "highly unlikely" they would significantly influence the course of the war. A U.S. lawmaker said on July 28 that more than 75,000 Russian soldiers -- about half the force sent by Moscow to invade Ukraine in February -- are believed to have been killed or wounded.
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Representative Elissa Slotkin (Democrat-Michigan) who spoke to CNN after attending a classified briefing with officials from President Joe Biden's administration, said the figure was "huge." Military casualties are a state secret in Russia even in peace time, and there are no updated official figures available on Moscow's military's death toll. The most recent CIA estimate was that 15,000 Russian forces had been killed in fighting and three times that number wounded. Slotkin, who recently returned from a trip to Ukraine, said the next three to six weeks could be crucial for the direction the conflict would take. "I think that what we heard very firmly from President Zelenskiy and reinforced today is that the Ukrainians really want to hit Russia in the teeth a few times before the winter comes, put them in the best position possible, particularly hitting them down south," Slotkin said. U.S. Ambassador to NATO Julianne Smith told RFE/RL in an interview that the Ukrainian military commanders can determine themselves the next steps in the counteroffensive, but NATO wants to hear which systems would be most useful. “We will continue to do everything we can to support Ukrainian military on the ground and make sure that they have what they need so that they can prevail in this conflict and stop Russian aggression,” she said.
Moldova's parliament voted on July 28 to extend a state of emergency for 60 days after the government said it still needed special powers to deal with the fallout from Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
Prime Minister Natalia Gavrilita told lawmakers that there are continuing risks to energy and border security and the need to manage the flow of refugees from Ukraine.
"The risks for Moldova due to the war in Ukraine remain high. The government needs additional powers," she said. The extension will come into force on August 8 and continue through October 8. Around 500,000 refugees have crossed the border since Russia launched the invasion in February. About 100,000 remain in Moldova. Moldova's parliament voted two days after Russia's invasion to approve a temporary state of emergency and extended the measure in April and again in June. Separately, Moldova’s Public Health Commission on July 28 recommended Moldovans wear masks to protect against the coronavirus not only in medical institutions but also in public transport, shopping centers, and shops. It made the recommendation based on an increase in COVID-19 cases in recent weeks. The commission also recommended people take precautions to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, including vaccination. It said self-isolation in case of infection is also still recommended. According to the data presented by the Health Ministry, 5,793 cases of COVID-19 infection were registered between July 18 and July 27, an increase of 72.7 percent compared to last week.
Ukraine says a cargo ship carrying stolen Ukrainian barley and flour has docked in Lebanon, and its ambassador warned the country against purchasing stolen goods.
Ukrainian Ambassador Ihor Ostash met with Lebanese President Michel Aoun on July 28 about the cargo ship, a Syrian-flagged vessel that has been sanctioned by the United States.
"Lebanese authorities promised to conduct an investigation," the Ukrainian Embassy told the AP. "We hope they will take other legal actions." According to the embassy, the cargo vessel Laodicea docked in the port of Tripoli. It is carrying 5,000 tons of flour and 5,000 tons of barley suspected of having been taken from Ukrainian stocks, the embassy said. The ship traveled from a Crimean port that is closed to international shipping, the embassy said, according to Reuters. Russia has previously denied the allegations that it has stolen Ukrainian grain. An official from the Russian Embassy in Lebanon told Reuters it could not immediately comment. The U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned the Laodicea in 2015 for its affiliation with the Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad.
Ukraine has accused Russia of plundering grain and steel from its territory since Moscow invaded the country in late February. The Ukrainian Embassy in Beirut did not provide details on how the barley was purportedly stolen from Ukraine.
Marine Traffic, a website that monitors the traffic and location of ships at sea, confirmed that the Laodicea docked off Tripoli on July 28. The Laodicea was initially heading to Syria but was rerouted to Lebanon for unknown reasons. It was not clear whether it is offloading the cargo in Tripoli. Ukraine has promised to export wheat to Lebanon, which is currently experiencing a food security and economic crisis that has slowed imports of subsidized wheat. According to the World Food Program, about half the population of Lebanon is food-insecure.
Lebanon used to import about 60 percent of its wheat from Ukraine, but those shipments have been disrupted by Russia's invasion and the blockade of Black Sea ports. Turkish, Russian, and Ukrainian military officials were working on July 28 with a UN team at a Joint Coordination Center in Istanbul under a deal agreed by the four parties last week to begin shipping grain. UN aid chief Martin Griffiths said he was hopeful that the first shipment from a Ukrainian Black Sea port could set sail as early as July 29, but admitted that "crucial" details for the safe passage of vessels were still being worked out.
The United States is offering a reward of up to $10 million for information on Russian interference in U.S. elections.
The U.S. State Department announced the reward on July 28, saying it seeks information leading to the identification or location of any foreign person who knowingly engaged or is engaging in interference in U.S. elections, but it specifically mentions Russia’s Internet Research Agency (IRA), Kremlin-connected businessman Yevgeniy Prigozhin and Russian entities and associates linked to him.
The United States previously identified the St. Petersburg-based IRA as having engaged in political and electoral interference operations and previously sanctioned Prigozhin for the interference.
“Beginning as early as 2014, IRA began operations to interfere with the U.S. political system, including the 2016 U.S. presidential election, with a strategic goal to sow discord,” the department said in a statement.
Donald Trump narrowly defeated former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election.
Prigozhin is a Russian national who provided funding to IRA through the companies Concord Management and Consulting and Concord Catering, companies that he controlled.
“Concord sent funds, recommended personnel, and oversaw IRA’s activities through reporting and interaction with IRA’s management,” the State Department said.
Beyond Prigozhin, the department is seeking information on several other people listed as having worked in various capacities to carry out IRA’s interference operations targeting the United States.
They are accused of conspiring to defraud the United States by obstructing the functions of the government for the purpose of interfering with the U.S. electoral processes, including the presidential election of 2016, the department said.
The department said the reward offer is being made through the Rewards for Justice program and is part of the U.S. government’s wider efforts to ensure the security and integrity of U.S. elections and protect against foreign interference.
The United States denounced as "inexcusable" remarks by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban warning against creating "peoples of mixed race."
U.S. envoy against anti-Semitism Deborah Lipstadt said she was "deeply alarmed" by the right-wing nationalist prime minister's "use of rhetoric that clearly evokes Nazi racial ideology."
Decades after the end of the Holocaust, it is "inexcusable for a leader to make light of Nazi mass murder," Lipstadt said.
State Department spokesman Ned Price read Lipstadt's statement to reporters during a briefing on July 28. Price added that Orban's remarks "are not reflective of the shared values that tether the United States to Hungary."
Orban triggered a wave of scathing criticism after he warned on July 23 against mixing with "non-Europeans" in a speech in Romania's Transylvania region, home to a sizable ethnic Hungarian minority.
He defended his comments earlier on July 28, saying they represented a "cultural, civilizational standpoint."
"It happens sometimes that I speak in a way that can be misunderstood...the position that I represent is a cultural, civilizational standpoint," Orban told a joint press conference with Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer during a one-day visit to neighboring Austria.
In his July 23 speech at Baile Tusnad Summer University, Orban said: "We move, we work elsewhere, we mix within Europe, but we don't want to be a mixed race," a "multi-ethnic" people who would mix with "non-Europeans."
During the same speech, Orban also seemed to allude to the gas chambers used by the Nazis in Germany when criticizing a Brussels plan to reduce European gas demand by 15 percent following Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
“For example, there is the latest proposal from the EU Commission, which says that everyone should be obliged to reduce their gas consumption by 15 percent. I don’t see how that should be enforced, although there is German know-how for this, from the past, I think,” Orban told the thousands-strong audience.
Hungary was the only EU member to oppose the gas-reduction plan, which passed on a majority vote this week.
A longtime adviser to Orban, Zsuzsa Hegedus, resigned on July 26, slamming Orban's speech as "a pure Nazi text," while Jewish community representatives voiced alarm.
Referring to Orban's speech as "stupid and dangerous," the International Auschwitz Committee called on the EU to continue to distance itself from "Orban's racist undertones and to make it clear to the world that a Mr. Orban has no future in Europe."
The speech reminds Holocaust survivors "of the dark times of their own exclusion and persecution," the organization's vice president, Christoph Heubner, said in a statement on July 26.
More than half a million Hungarian Jews were systematically exterminated during the Nazi Holocaust in World War II.
Heubner called on the EU and specifically on Austria's Nehammer to make a stand ahead of Orban's visit and distance themselves from "Orban's racist undertones."
Nehammer said on July 28 that the issue had been "resolved...amicably and in all clarity," adding his country "strongly condemned...any form of racism or anti-Semitism."
Austria is the first EU country to host Orban for talks since he won a fourth straight mandate in an April landslide.
The Hungarian premier has in the past targeted migrants from Africa and the Middle East, as well as NGOs that support them, restricting the right to seek asylum and putting up barriers at borders.
Landslides and flooding triggered by heavy rains in northwestern Tehran have killed seven people, and the Red Crescent says the death toll could go higher.
Morteza Moradipour, the deputy of Iran's Red Crescent, confirmed on July 28 that the number of dead was seven in the region at the foothills of the Alborz Mountains, according to the Fars news agency. Fourteen people were missing and nine were injured.
The state-run IRNA news agency reported that rescue operations were under way at the site.
Heavy rains that fell in the early hours of July 28 caused flash floods and then landslides, state TV reported.
Qadratullah Mohammadi, head of the Tehran Fire Department, said in an interview with ISNA news agency that shops and businesses in the area have suffered heavy losses.
Elsewhere in the country, flash floods killed five people in the southeastern province of Sistan and in Baluchistan, while one person died in the town of Rudehen east of Tehran.
Authorities had warned residents of mountainous areas about heavy rains and possible floods.
Flash floods on July 23 in Iran's drought-stricken southern Fars Province killed at least 21 people and affected about a dozen villages.
A Russian court has set August 19 for a hearing requested by the Justice Ministry, which wants to shut down the offices of the Jewish Agency for Israel, a group that helps maintain Jewish cultural identity in the country, as well as the immigration of Jews to Israel.
The Basmanny district court in the Russian capital on July 28 set the date for the proceedings, which Israel has warned could have a serious impact on bilateral ties.
Moscow has accused the organization of acting in contravention of Russian law, without providing details.
According to Russian media reports, the agency is accused of illegally collecting personal data from Russian citizens. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has denied reports that closing the agency is aimed at preventing a brain drain after many Russians left the country following the invasion of Ukraine.
The Jewish Agency for Israel, established in 1929, began working in Russia in 1989 and has assisted hundreds of thousands of Jews from all over the Soviet Union to immigrate to Israel.
The Israeli Integration Ministry says nearly 17,000 people have left Russia for Israel this year so far, more than twice as many as last year.
Closing the agency's Russian branch would not stop Russian Jews from moving to Israel, but it could slow down the process.
Some Israelis see the threatened shutdown as punishment for Israel's stance on Russia's war on Ukraine.
Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid has taken a tougher stance over the conflict than Israel's former prime minister, Naftali Bennett, who stepped aside on July 1.
Iran says it plans to build a new research reactor at its nuclear site in Isfahan Province, with construction set to start in the next several weeks.
"This is an entirely domestic project that will close the chain of research, evaluation, testing, and production of nuclear energy in Iran," Mohammad Eslami, head of the Iranian Atomic Energy Organization, was quoted as saying by the ISNA news agency on July 28.
Eslami, who is also vice president in Iran, added that research into finding suitable locations for new nuclear sites, especially in the south of the country, has begun. He did not elaborate.
Western concerns over Iran's atomic program led to sanctions against Tehran and eventually a 2015 nuclear deal with world powers to curb the program.
However, then-President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew the United States from the deal in 2018, prompting Tehran to gradually break from compliance with the accord. Talks to restore the deal have been stalled since April.
Iran says its nuclear program is solely for peaceful purposes, but it is now enriching uranium to up to 60 percent purity -- its highest level ever and a short technical step from weapons-grade levels of 90 percent.
The International Atomic Energy Agency announced in June that 90 percent of Iran's most-enriched uranium has been transferred to the Isfahan Atomic Center, where the equipment for converting uranium gas into uranium metal is located. Iran turned off the surveillance cameras at several nuclear facilities last month in response to a resolution from the IAEA board of governors demanding it cooperate with UN inspectors looking into undeclared nuclear sites. The IAEA has warned several times that Iran needed only a few more weeks to produce raw material for a nuclear bomb.
Iran Human Rights Organization says Mohsen Safari, who was convicted on narcotics charges, has been executed despite a doctor's diagnosis that he suffered from a mental disorder.
The rights group quoted Safari's relatives as saying on July 27 that he was executed at the request of the Counterintelligence Organization.
Safari was arrested in 2009 after being caught with heroin and later sentenced to death by the Islamic Revolutionary Court. The family said the execution was carried out even though a doctor had diagnosed Safari as being bipolar and despite the fact that Article 149 of the Islamic Criminal Code states that if someone is "mentally disturbed" at the time of committing a crime "in such a way that they lack willpower or discernment," they are "considered insane and not criminally responsible." Safari was reportedly transferred to solitary confinement ahead of execution twice in May but each time was returned to prison by order of a forensic doctor.
As of June 28, at least 239 executions had been recorded in Iran this year, including more than three a day over the past month, according to the Iran Human Rights Organization. Some human rights sources, including the Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA), say more than 85 percent of executions in Iran are carried out "in secret and without official and public information."
The rise in the number of executions began last September after Ebrahim Raisi, an ex-head of the judiciary, became president and former Intelligence Minister Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei took over the judiciary.
Activists say that Iran is in the throes of a major crackdown as protests continue over living conditions in a severe economic crisis.
Russian TV journalist Marina Ovsyannikova, known for her live on-air anti-war protest, has been convicted of "discrediting" the country's armed forces in social media posts condemning Moscow's actions in Ukraine.
"The evidence confirms Ovsyannikova's guilt. There is no reason to doubt its authenticity," the judge at Moscow's Meshchansky District Court said after a short hearing on July 28, in which Ovsyannikova had described the proceedings as "absurd."
The judge said the court was fining Ovsyannikova 50,000 rubles ($822) for her social media posts.
Earlier this month, Ovsyannikova staged a single picket against the backdrop of the Kremlin, unfurling a poster with the inscription, "Putin is a murderer. His soldiers are fascists," and photos of children killed in Ukraine. She was not detained at the time. However, several days later, on July 17, she was arrested while at home in Moscow. Ovsyannikova gained international recognition on March 14 when she burst onto the set of the Vremya news program on Russia's Channel One holding a poster reading in part “Stop the war. Don’t believe propaganda. They are lying to you” in Russian. She also shouted in Russian, "Stop the war! No to war!" Ovsyannikova was a producer with Channel One at the time of her protest. She was later detained and fined 30,000 rubles (about $500) by a court for calling for illegal protests. Ovsyannikova resigned from Channel One and spent several months abroad, including in Ukraine, repeatedly expressing her condemnation of the war. For three months, she trained at the German edition of Die Welt. In early July, the journalist announced her return to Russia. Russia has stepped up detentions and prosecution of journalists, activists, and others who challenge the Kremlin line on its invasion of Ukraine. The government calls it a “special operation” and not a war.
KYIV -- Ukraine has named a new specialized anti-corruption prosecutor after an almost two-year hiatus, a move Western countries have been pressuring it to make to stem graft many see as endemic to the country.
Andriy Yermak, head of the presidential office, said in a post on his Telegram channel on July 28 that 35-year-old Oleksandr Klymenko will assume the post.
"The fight against corruption is a priority for our state, as our investment attractiveness and business freedom depend on its success," Yermak said.
Klymenko previously worked as an investigator in the national anti-corruption office and was nominated for the position of anti-corruption prosecutor in December.
The Group of Seven (G7) leading industrialized nations had called for the appointment of another specialized anti-corruption official after Klymenko's predecessor, Nazar Kholodnytskiy, resigned in August 2020.
Kholodnytskiy had been embroiled in a scandal over allegations that he helped officials suspected of corruption evade prosecution.
The specialized anti-corruption prosecutor's office was established with Western backing following the Maidan Revolution in 2014 that ousted Viktor Yanukovych as president and led to conflict with Russia.
Transparency International last year rated Ukraine as the second-most corrupt country in Europe after Russia.
The announcement comes a day after President Volodymyr Zelenskiy signed a decree on the appointment of Andriy Kostin as prosecutor general.
In Zelenskiy's presence, Kostin signed the order appointing Klymenko as head of the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office.
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has condemned the arrests of four independent journalists in Tajikistan, accusing the government of the Central Asian nation of stepping up its persecution of the media.
The journalism watchdog said in a statement dated July 27 that the detention of Abdullo Ghurbati, a correspondent for the independent Asia-Plus news agency; Daler Imomali, a freelance investigative reporter; and two journalists who used to work with them, Zavqibek Saidamini and Abdusattor Pirmukhamadzoda, should be released immediately.
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“As a result of the increase in censorship and defamatory practices towards the media, journalists risks imprisonment after every investigative story,” Jeanne Cavelier, the head of RSF’s Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk, said in the statement. “The Tajik authorities must stop using spurious accusations to silence reporters critical of the government, and must release those they have detained,” she added. Last month, police in Dushanbe arrested Imomali and Ghurbati, who focus on social and economic issues in the country. Imomali was charged with having links to banned organizations, tax evasion, and disseminating false information. Ghurbati is accused of assaulting a police officer. Pirmuhammadzoda was detained in his hometown of Vahdat, 15 kilometers east of Dushanbe, on July 9. A day earlier, police in Vahdat arrested independent reporter Saidamini and charged him with participating in an extremist group. According to prosecutors, the charge stems from Saidamini’s links to two banned opposition parties -- the Islamic Renaissance Party and Group 24. He has repeatedly denied supporting any political group. The arrests are seen by some local experts as the authoritarian government’s attempt to control public opinion in the wake of Dushanbe’s bloody crackdown on protests in the restive Gorno-Badakhshan region in the country’s east.
“The authorities are trying to establish total control over public opinion in the country,” Nuriddin Karshiboyev, the head of the National Association of Independent Mass Media in Tajikistan (NANSMIT), an RSF partner, said in the statement. “But there is no guarantee that the authorities will benefit from doing this. These actions will result in a negative reaction from the international community and will ultimately have a very bad effect on Tajikistan’s image,” Karshiboyev added. Tajikistan strictly controls the media in the country and shows little tolerance for any criticism of government policies. In the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, police harassed local journalists for merely questioning health officials who initially insisted there was no coronavirus in Tajikistan, despite abundant suspected cases. The government has also shut down independent media outlets and restricted access to foreign-based Tajik-language online publications. Tajik police routinely target family members of government critics who live abroad. Tajikistan ranked 152 out of 180 countries in RSF's 2022 World Press Freedom Index.
Russia's media regulator Roskomnadzor has filed a lawsuit in a Moscow court to revoke the registration of the independent Novaya gazeta newspaper, less than a year after its editor in chief, Dmitry Muratov, won the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize.
The lawsuit was filed in the Russian capital's Basmanny court on July 26. The judge has three days to make a ruling on the move against the paper, which began publishing in 1993 and was one of the most respected publications in post-Soviet Russia. Novaya gazeta, one of the last of Russia's independent media, suspended operations inside the country in March after being forced to remove material from its website on Russia's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine. Some members of the paper’s staff left Russia after it stopped publishing and launched the newspaper Novaya gazeta.Europe from Latvia's capital, Riga. Russia's media regulator, Roskomnadzor, has blocked that website inside Russia as well. Muratov has remained in Russia despite his vocal opposition to the conflict in Ukraine. Shortly after the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24, Moscow quickly adopted a law criminalizing the dissemination of “false” information that “discredits the armed forces.” The law has been central to a massive crackdown against dissent over the war in Russia. Roskomnadzor's latest move comes days after it blocked the website of the magazine Novaya rasskaz-gazeta -- also produced by Novaya gazeta staff -- for allegedly “discrediting the Russian armed forces.”
Russia has acknowledged that talks with the United States over a prisoner swap likely involving American basketball star Brittney Griner and Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout are ongoing, but no agreement has been reached.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said late on July 27 that Washington has made a “substantial offer” to Russia for the release of former Marine Paul Whelan and Griner, both of whom are being held in Russian jails on charges that the United States says are politically motivated. He did not name Bout, a Russian arms trader currently serving a 25-year sentence in the United States after being convicted of conspiracy to kill U.S. citizens and providing aid to a terrorist organization, but CNN has quoted a source familiar with the situation as saying Bout, 55, could be part of the deal. Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on July 28 that while "a concrete result has yet to be achieved," officials in Moscow hope "the interests of both parties" will be taken into account to allow for an agreement. "The issue of the mutual exchange of Russian and American citizens in detention on the territory of the two countries was at one time discussed by the presidents of Russia and the United States," Zakharova said, a likely reference to talks between the two leaders before Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine on February 24. "They gave instructions to the relevant authorized structures to carry out negotiations. These are being conducted by the competent departments. A concrete result has not yet been achieved," she added. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov echoed that statement, telling reporters on July 28 that "so far there are no agreements in this area." Blinken said he expects to talk with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, about the issue, but gave no time frame for when such a discussion may take place. U.S. officials and prominent athletes say Griner has been wrongly detained on drugs charges and is being used as a political pawn to secure the release of Bout or relief from sanctions imposed by Washington over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The Kremlin has said the case against Griner, a two-time Olympic gold medalist in basketball for the United States, has nothing to do with politics and that she should be tried for violating Russian laws. The 31-year-old Griner was in court on July 27, where she testified that authorities who arrested her at a Moscow airport in February failed to provide an explanation of her rights and did not fully translate all that was said during her arrest after inspectors found cannabis oil in vape cartridges in her luggage. She says it was medicinal cannabis for treatment of pain from injuries sustained during her basketball career. Medical cannabis remains illegal in Russia, and Griner faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted of transporting drugs. Whelan is a former U.S. Marine and private security consultant who was detained in December 2018, accused of espionage. He denied the charges but was sentenced to 16 years in prison in June 2020. Russia has signaled repeatedly its interest in exchanging detained U.S. citizens for Russians held in U.S. prisons.
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