Russian prosecutors have blamed Ukrainian secret services (for the assassination of Tartarsky) but other commentators have said that the FSB may have organised Tatarsky’s murderas a warning to Mr Prigozhin (head of the Wagner Group who has recently been critical of the russian military).
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Crimea will never return to Ukraine
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If someone with the power I wield were not meant to accept these heavy burdens, surely we as a court would have adopted a formal ethics code. But there is no need: It is understood that I take no pleasure in any of this. The American people need not worry. The yachts were suffering enough.
— Read on www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/04/06/clarence-thomas-luxury-vacation-walmart-satire/ -
www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/04/06/world/europe/russia-offensive-maps.html
After months of pouring soldiers into eastern Ukraine, Russia’s progress essentially adds up to this: three small settlements and part of the city of Bakhmut, a high-profile battlefield with limited strategic value.
Moscow’s inability to gain substantial ground in the Donbas shows how little its offensive has achieved and how much its military has struggled to efficiently capture urban areas throughout the war.
Russia’s grinding advances in Bakhmut have been led by the Wagner private military company, which recruited tens of thousands of convicts from Russian prisons in exchange for the promise of freedom.
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The secret history and unlearned lessons of the Cuban missile crisis.
— Read on www.foreignaffairs.com/cuba/missile-crisis-secret-history-soviet-union-russia-ukraine-lessons -
www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/04/04/why-the-saudis-are-siding-with-putin-to-drive-up-oil-prices/
During his presidential campaign Joe Biden pledged to make Saudi Arabia an international pariah. Then came sky high inflation and a war. In July, Biden swallowed his words and travelled to Jeddah to meet the Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman.
the Saudi-led Opec cartel of oil producing countries slashed output by two million barrels per day to drive prices higher. Now – heedless of an angry US president who has threatened unspecified “consequences” – it is cutting production again.
As Biden looks on powerlessly, one of the biggest winners is likely to be Vladimir Putin.
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Monday 3 April 2023
BBC News Hour (4/3/23)
Pro-war blogger Vladlen Tartarsky has been killed in a bomb blast in St. Petersburg.
• Darya Trepova has been detained on suspicion of being involved. She is an anti-war activist and a feminist. She is thought to be the woman in a video approaching the venue with a box.
• Trepova had been detained in the past along wither her husband at anti-war activities at the beginning of the war against Ukraine.
• Tartarsky’s blogs are important and followed by many in Russia who have little access to information about the war.
• Prigozhin (associate of Tartarsky) is commemorating Tartarsky with flags of Russia and the Wagner Group and claiming that Bakhmut has been taken (a goal of Wagner).
• Tartarsky (on tape) from the Kremlin September 2022 on the announcement of the annexation of four provinces in eastern Ukraine. “We’ll defeat everyone. We’ll kill everyone. Those who need to be robbed, will be robbed. It will be the way we like it.”
• He is considered a “war blogger.” He is a propaganda blogger. “He was extremely influential.” According to people who are journalists (Financial Times).
• These “war bloggers” (including Tartarsky) were at a ceremony last year at the Kremlin celebrating the annexation of the east provinces of Ukraine. They are allowed to be somewhat critical of the way the war has been conducted by the military.
• The Russian Interior Ministry posted the clip from an interview with Trepova where she admits that she brought the figurine (that exploded) into the room where Tartarsky was giving a lecture.
• These bloggers are also called “war correspondents.” Popular opinion is that they are more of a threat to the Kremlin than political people. They have fought on the front lines. They have access to guns.
• Tartarsky had previously been jailed. He escaped from jail and joined the pro-Russian militants.
BBC Global News Podcast: (4/3/23)
• Trepova is 26.
• Russia is calling it a “terrorist act.”
The Guardian
• Russian police maintain that Trepova is a supporter of Alexei Navalny.
• Police issued a statement maintaining the attack was “planned by the special services of Ukraine” in cooperation with those associated with the Navalny Anti-Corruption Foundation.
• There is reporting that Trepova said she had been “used.” Her husband also said that she had been used.
• Ukrainians maintain that this is an attack planned internally in a dispute between pro-Kremlin groups.
• The location of the attack, Street Food Bar No.1, “has ties to…Yevgeny Prigozhin.”
• Tartarsky once called for a tribunal for the Russian military leadership who he described as “untrained idiots.”
• Prigozhin has said he would not blame Ukraine for the attack. The café previously belonged to him. He blamed “radicals not linked to a government.”
• Prigozhin has openly criticized top generals and the defense minister, Sergei Shoigu.
MSN
• Director of the Anti-Corruption Foundation, Ivan Zhdanov, denied any involvement.
• “They have been trying to accuse of terrorism for a long time.” He stated.
• Zhdanov pointed to Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB)
Other Notes
• Finland will soon be inducted into NATO
• Article about Prigozhin and Wagner https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-64976080
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Opinion | Foreign correspondents in Russia have been forced to develop a very sophisticated early warning system for danger in the two decades since Vladimir Putin came to power.
— Read on www.themoscowtimes.com/2023/03/30/evan-gershkovichs-arrest-means-no-journalist-can-feel-safe-in-russia-today-a80666 -
The Knesset would be able to pass religiously-driven laws that prop up gender separation, allow work discrimination, deny religious services, and harm property rights
— Read on blogs.timesofisrael.com/four-reasons-the-override-clause-should-terrify-women/
Law, Power, and Justice 