UKRAINE UPDATE:

SUNDAY APRIL 24 2022, 4:30 pm

TWITTER

• Dean Obeidallah: Russia has opened a criminal case against Vladimir Kara-Murza, a pro-democracy advocate, for spreading “false information” about the war in Ukraine. 
• Khodorkovsky: Kara-Murza is being held in pre-trial detention for two months.
• Bill Browder:  Kara Murza was the “most effective advocate for Magnitsky sanctions of any individual in the world.”  Every “judge, prosecutor and police officer involved should be Magnitsky sanctioned.”

Kara-Murza

• “Kara-Murza is a Russian dissident- a writer, political activist, and spokesman for Russia’s beleaguered democrats. He was a close associate of Boris Nemtsov, the Russian opposition leader whom the regime murdered near the Kremlin in 2015. Twice Kara-Murza was poisoned by the regime, nearly killing him.”
• Kara Murza is a politician, author and historian.
• Served as deputy leader of the People’s Freedom Party.
• He played a kay role in the adoption of targeted Magnitsky sanctions on Russian human rights violators.
• He was poisoned in 2015 and 2017 and left in a coma.
• Officers of Russia’s Federal Security Services were behind the poisonings.
• He hosts a weekly show on Echo of Moscow Radio
• Directed three documentary films, “They Chose Freedom, Nemtsov and My Duty to Not Stay Silent.”
• https://www.magnitskyawards.com/bios/vladimir-kara-murza/?msclkid=873b0d35c35111ec926c94bcb3f040bf

THE KYIV INDEPENDENT

• Russian Orthodox Church helps relocated illegally deported Ukrainians.
• An investigative report by Slidstvo.info says about 600,000 civilians were deported to Russia.
• Russian forces fail to advance in Kharkiv.
• About two dozen Russian ships and submarines remain in the Black Sea.
• Rusian troops in the occupied areas of Kherson and Mykolayiv shell civilians to “discredit Ukraine.”  They are shelling under Ukrainian flags.
• Helena Kennedy, UK human rights lawyer: “Russian troops have been given tacit permission to rape civilians during their invasion…”
• Austria opposes Ukraine membership in EU.
• Belgium blocks export of 8,000 luxury cars to Russia.
• The Russian Defense Ministry reports that since the start of the invasion, Russia has deported 951,000 Ukrainians to Russia.  This includes 174,689 children.
• West Virginia to send armored personnel carriers to Ukraine.
• Russia blocks economic data, hiding effect of sanctions.  They have stopped reporting data on government debt, trade statistics and oil production.
• Russia has parked short-range ballistic missiles 60 kilometers from the border with Ukraine.
• Zelensky: Russia fired seven missiles at Odesa on April 23.  Two were intercepted.
• On April 23, Russia’s Defense Ministry accused Ukraine of planning to use ammonia as a chemical weapon as part of a “provocation” at Odesa.  This is being interpreted as a threat to attack Odesa with chemical weapons.

BNO NEWS

• For the first time, a majority of Swedish citizens are in favor of joining NATO.
• Estonia and Latvia adopt statements saying Russia is committing genocide against Ukraine.

EUROMAIDAN PRESS

• “Russian World: The heresy driving Putin’s war.”  Article Euromaidan Press.
• The doctrine of Russian World is “an ideology that is theological at its core.”  It pits “Holy Russia” against the “godless West.”
• World-renowned theologians have condemned the Russia World as heresy.
• Cyril Hovorum, Stockhold School of Theology, interviewed by Euromaidan Press.
• The doctrine was developed under the auspices of the Russian Orthodox Church.
• This doctrine frames the war in Ukraine.
• Putin has supplied the guns and the church has supplied the ideas.
• The “core of the aggression is ideological: it’s a distorted theology..”
• The idea was developed by the Church and taken over by the Kremlin.
• Putin referenced ideas from this doctrine in the speech on the eve of the war.
• “It is a form of exceptionalism, nationalism.”  “a form of exceptionalism that means that belonging to a tribe makes you different and exceptional.”
• Russia is believed to have a special mission from God to save the world from itself.
• “That’s why it’s important to take into consideration religion when we try to understand this war.”
• The Russian belief is that the West has been corrupted by liberal ideas and values which are dangerous.  The “traditional values” they support are conservative and anti-liberal.

CNN, 2:00 pm

• Most people in Belarus do not want Belarus to participate in the war against Ukraine.