#:: Azove Store::

[suratan-zir]

I spent the last day of summer just as I spent most of it - swimming in the lovely green waters of the Dnipro river. I thought I wouldn’t be able to, I’ve been very sick for the last month. First, it was covid, then I got re-infected again when my husband got sick, and it messed with my condition pretty badly. It’s still hard to breathe, and my chest bone kind of hurts, dunno what's up with that. I can’t walk long distances, which is a bummer because that’s mostly how I deal with suicidal moods and general feel of hopelessness. But I can walk a little bit! Fortunately, it was enough to get to the “secret” beach.

We’ve lived here for nearly three years now and know this place well. Even on the weekends, in good weather, when campers or fishers are everywhere, we still know a few secluded spots with no people around.

Even though I’m weak, it was worth the struggle of walking. You know when you were a kid, and your mother would tell you, “Time to get out of the water, your lips are turning blue!”? But then later, when you grew up, you learned to appreciate just chilling by the water without being in it all the time? I never did. I never grew out of it. I learned to swim kind of late, at 13, but I love swimming like nothing else. I can swim for hours and still not get bored or tired. It’s like all my problems don’t exist when I’m in the water. I only wish it was my love, the Sea of Azov, but russia stole it.

Anyway, when we were heading back home, it was bee-utiful. We had to walk through the abandoned children’s summer camp (the one where we rescued the turtle last fall - if you remember, you remember), and I accidentally found a wild bee nest in between the bricks. I heard buzzing.

This put me in a bee-searching rush. I remembered that a few months back, we saw crumbled honeycombs on these abandoned campgrounds, so I figured there must be more bees.

In this camp, there are a bunch of small wooden houses, kind of like trailers - some of them already completely ruined, but many still somewhat intact. Somehow, I pointed at the exact house that I was looking for. I said, "It’s a perfect place for bees: weatherproofed, with a lot of entrance points…" Then we saw a bee flying in. So we followed her and saw this - a whole freaking makeshift beehive. Full of bees. And on the other side, there was a boat.

So someone saw an abandoned structure, which still very much has an owner. This territory was bought by someone, and they already started construction there, demolishing some buildings. They also wrote in large letters that they will kick the ass of trespassers and throw them in jail for looting. No one cares. Then, with the beginning of the invasion, construction stopped. But yeah, the audacity of just starting their own little beekeeping thing and storing their stuff there, it’s kind of hilarious.

Overall, it was a great birthday (it wasn’t technically my birthday, but it kind of still counts). My birthdays usually suck, so that’s rare.

Thanks for listening to me rambling about nothing <3

[metalobrukht]

According to the norms of international humanitarian law, taking civilians hostage during an armed conflict is a war crime, and their illegal imprisonment is a crime against humanity. Occupier continues to unlawfully detain Ukrainians in more than 100 places of captivity.

Russian troops entered Kupiansk very quickly. Oleksandr didn't leave because he believed it would be liberated soon. Food prices spiked after occupation. Electricity, mobile communication, and internet disappeared. On April 13, 2023, he set out on his own. In Urazovo, russian border guards ordered him to enter the store where people were questioned.

“I open the door, and in front of me stands a man, a little taller than me, in a balaclava. And immediately – a blow to my nose. I fall back, and another guy pushes me from behind. They took me by the arms and dragged me to the basement.”

He was asked what he did during the occupation. If he mumbled, the russians beat him. They constantly interrogated him, used electroshock, a stun gun, beat him with a baton, hung him upside down. Then they brought pliers and threatened to pull out his teeth.

Later, Oleksandr was transferred to Stary Oskol. During the “welcome” Oleksandr was beaten with a stun gun, batons, feet and fists.

“The russians would enter the cell without any warning and beat the Ukrainians until they hid under the beds. Such 're-education,' as they called it, lasted for a month or two for everyone who was brought in.”

After the solitary confinement for four days, they took Oleksandr for interrogation daily before and after lunch. When leading a prisoner through the corridors, they would make him bend and face the wall and beat him on the legs, kidneys, liver.

In solitary confinement, there was a peephole into the toilet, through which a guard constantly watched to prevent suicide.

In the general cell there were three other people – one civilian and two Azovstal plant defenders.

“They were in Olenivka. And from letter A to letter K, everyone was sent to Stary Oskol. (…) They abused the Azov fighters, tankers, and artillerymen severely. They chose the worst punishments for them.”

Facility representatives constantly used repressive methods: bursting into cells, mercilessly beating people, using a stun gun, setting dogs on them. After the morning roll call, the guards would tap the walls with a stick and inspect the beds.

“When I could not make my first report properly, the shift chief asked me: 'Don’t you know how to report? Step out!' And with my hands cuffed behind my back, the spetsnaz officer began to beat me on the ribs. And then he said, 'Make sure you learn it by tomorrow.' And I learned.”

In addition to beatings, the prison administration would place noncompliant people in the “rubber room.” It was one meter by two, the walls were covered with something soft. There was nothing there.

“They take you there naked for 16 hours. They come in and electroshock you… You can’t even go to the toilet. How long can you sit there? If they see that you don’t want to say anything… They send you there, to the rubber room. For two, three days. Some were there for a week. It’s terrifying…”

All prisoners were allowed to write letters home, but Oleksandrs letters never reached the recipient.

One of the POWs held with Oleksandr had his right hand injured by shrapnel.

“His hand was cold, there was no circulation. Obviously, the nerve endings were affected. Some shrapnel was stuck in his hand, and the russian doctors said they would not remove it. They said, 'Once you get home, let them deal with you'.”

[ultrajaphunter]

The Oil Depot in Azov, Rostov Oblast, RuZZia, that is currently on Fire is at the terminus of a Fuel Pipeline that most likely comes from a Refinery in the Krasnodar Territory.

The Tanks there Store Fuel that is Transferred onto Small Tankers that can then Transport it to Ukraine via Mariupol or Crimea to Support the War Effort or to to Sell Elsewhere.

See below Info-Graphic.

[antifainternational]

are you guys basically just storing Russia in this INVASION due to the Azov Battalion existing and not even acknowledging that Russia is currently a authoritarian state and Putin has openly used blood and soil rhetoric to bolster his claim to invade. like Ukraine has issues with fascism but the open Faccism of the Russian state must be confronted. like how have you guys lost the plot.

Entirely the opposite, Anon. Before we get into this, let's agree what fascism is. Historian Robert O. Paxton defines fascism thusly: ...a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victimhood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy, and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion. (The Anatomy of Fascism, pg 218) Going further, he says that fascist ideology is based on what he calls "mobilizing passions," which are:

A sense of overwhelming crisis beyond the reach of any traditional solutions;

The primacy of the group, toward which one had duties superior to every right, whether individual or universal, and the subordination of the individual to it;

The belief that one’s group is a victim, a sentiment that justifies any action, without legal or moral limits, against its enemies, both internal and external;

Dread of the group’s decline under the corrosive effects of individualistic liberalism, class conflict, and alien influences;

The need for closer integration of a purer community, by consent if possible, or be exclusionary violence if necessary;

The need for authority by natural chiefs (always male), culminating in a national chieftain who alone is capable of incarnating the group’s historical destiny;

The superiority of the leader’s instincts over abstract and universal reason;

The beauty of violence and the efficacy of will, when they are devoted to the group’s success;

The right of the chosen people to dominate others without restraint from any kind of human or divine law, right being decided by the sole criterion of the group’s prowess within a Darwinian struggle (Ibid. pgs. 219-220)

Putin is absolutely and unquestionably an authoritarian dictator, as are Bolsonaro, Modi, Duterte, Erdoğan, Orban, and others. All of them are arguably fascists, although the line between "authoritarian dictator" and "fascist dictator" is a thin one. But none of them are openly fascist, which was the sole point from the video we posted that we're presuming you take issue with. The difference, citing Robert O. Paxton again: Although authoritarian regimes often trample civil liberties and are capable of murderous brutality, they do not share fascism’s urge to reduce the private sphere to nothing. They accept ill-defined though real domains of private space for traditional ‘intermediary bodies’ like local notables, economic cartels and associations, officer corps, families, and churches. These, rather than an official single party, are the main agencies of social control in authoritarian regimes. Authoritarians would rather leave the population demobilized and passive, while fascists want to engage and excite the public. Authoritarians want a strong but limited state. They hesitate to intervene in the economy, as fascism does readily, or to embark on programs of social welfare. They cling to the status quo rather than proclaim a new way. (Ibid., pg. 217) Do we think Russia is a fascist state? We haven't discussed that as a collective but it's likely that several of us do. But truth be told there are organized fascists operating at different levels in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Chechnya, and elsewhere. To be honest, this nit-picking about which authoritarian is a fascist and which isn't misses the point. What matters is what actions people are willing to take. Here's some of what our collective has done to oppose fascism in Russia: -we've commemorated and publicized the murders of Russian antifascists Anastasia Baburova, Stanislav Markelov, Fedor Filatov, Timur Kacharava, Alexey ‘Socrates’ Sutuga, and Ivan “Bonecrusher” Khutorsky annually. -we've publicized and raised money for the "Network" arrestees, who were tortured & railroaded by the FSB in a made-up antifascist "terror case." In fact, we've been supporting and defending Russian antifascists charged by the state since our collective began back in 2013. -we've pointed out links between the Russian establishment & the "alt-right" as far back as 2016 -through the International Anti-Fascist Defence Fund, a project we founded and administer, we'd donated thousands of dollars to Russian antifascists to pay for medical treatments after fascist assaults, emergency relocations, legal defence costs, prison commisssary costs, and taking care of antifascist prisoners' families. We've also done the same for anti-fascists in Ukraine and Belarus who've faced similar dangers. You can read about all of them on the Defence Fund's blog. There's still much to do, of course, but honestly we're very proud of our track record and consistently supporting antifascists in Russia and elsewhere. Thanks for giving us the opportunity to reflect on it.

[justacynicalromantic]

The Last Cell Tower in Mariupol

Mariupol is a city on the north coast of the Sea of Azov. Prior to the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine and its capture by Russia, it was the tenth-largest city in Ukraine and the second-largest in Donetsk Oblast. Mariupol was a strategic target for Russian and Russian proxy forces. The city was under siege from 25 February until 17 May 2022. During this time, as all other connections in the city went down under continuous bombardment, a lone cell tower of the Ukrainian mobile network Kyivstar became the only way of connection that worked due to the resilience of the last four workers that remained in the city - whose names Kyivstar refuses to give due to security reasons. At last, their story was told:

At the beginning of March, the base stations of all telecommunication companies the city stopped working. So four of our engineers (for security reasons we are not releasing their faces and names) assembled the base station by themselves from the equipment stored in the office.

Thus, a working mobile network appeared in the city, which became the only communication channel for Mariupol residents. The Kyivstar office also became a place for them where they could charge their mobile phones every day.

For a week, our engineers were on duty 24 hours a day in the switch center, going out one by one only to find fuel for the diesel generators. Considering the situation in Mariupol at that time, it was very dangerous.

Enemy shells hit our office several times, one of which completely burned a stationary diesel generator. But the engineers were able to find a portable one in the city, and the mobile connection was restored again.

Just then, the Ukrainian authorities managed to organize a humanitarian corridor for the people of Mariupol. Thanks to a working base station, residents of a number of city districts were able to receive SMS about evacuation routes. The station saved thousands of lives.

Unfortunately, on March 19, rockets from the Russian "Grad" system destroyed the walls and ceiling of part of the office. Our colleagues were forced to urgently leave the building, having previously deleted all important data from the switch. The base station operated on the remaining fuel until March 21.

Our heroes are alive and eager to get back to work. We are proud to work with them in the same team 👏 And this story has already become a legend and attracted the attention of foreign media.

[chicago-geniza]

tbd & nisht reblogn but like

just find it unbelievably patronizing when Extremely Online American Leftists act like you're a nazi denier or a wiffle-headed naïf when you say, e.g., *the tryzub is not a far-right symbol* (some far-right symbols are absolutely present at solidarity events but that is literally just. the national emblem of ukraine & it's old as balls, if you forgive the expression)

like. 1) yes ideally i would prefer a world where solidarity could be expressed by metonym-signifiers other than flags of nation-states, however, we do not live in that world, & in this particular case, self-determination IS one of the issues at stake, so it is what it is. i won't carry a flag myself, but i do have a tryzub sweatshirt, which yeah, i impulse-bought in the kyiv metro circa 2015, sometimes you do get emotional around symbols at emotionally-charged moments. 2) you think i am not intimately acquainted with the visual lexicon of eastern european far-right flags & party logos? my buddy, my pal, my ragtime gal, i am a transsexual jew who used to teach *polish culture*, frequent ukrainian village/stores/cultural events, & do slavic-language translation work in a city with vastly overrepresented far-right contingents in all of those diaspora communities. one of my polish students had an NOP sticker on his computer. they're an ultranationalist christian openly neo-nazi party in poland that denies the holocaust, calls for murder of queer people, etc. already mentioned the ukrainian language school run by pravy sektor people that tried to recruit me (their promo materials actually included the words "blood & soil" in addition to "family values," which, you know, i appreciated that they didn't equivocate). i promise that the tryzub & like, the emblem of the ukrainian air force are not inherently fascist. no i'm not fond of military insignias either but it's dishonest & obnoxious to be like "any symbol associated with the military is crypto-azov propaganda & any symbol associated with ukrainian nationionalism(s) is fascist by default." have some people used the symbol that way? yeah. israel also put the magen david on its flag & that doesn't make the magen david (absent the flag), in & of itself, a universal & essential signifier of zionist occupation.

[ukrainenews]

Daily Wrap Up June 12, 2022

Under the cut: Russian forces have destroyed a bridge connecting the embattled city of Sievierodonetsk to Lysychansk; Ukraine has established two routes through Poland and Romania to export grain; Amnesty International has accused Russia of war crimes in Ukraine, saying attacks on Kharkiv - many using banned cluster bombs - had killed hundreds of civilians; The bodies of scores of Ukrainian fighters killed during the siege of the Azovstal steelworks in the southern city of Mariupol are still awaiting retrieval, the former commander of Ukraine's Azov National Guard regiment said on Sunday;  McDonald's has been rebranded and reopened as Vkusno & tochka in Russia.

“Russian forces have destroyed a bridge connecting the embattled city of Sievierodonetsk to its twin city of Lysychansk, cutting off a possible evacuation route for civilians, according to local officials.

Serhiy Gaidai, the governor of Luhansk province, said on Sunday that the Russian military has destroyed a bridge over the Siverskyi River that linked the two cities.

He added that Russian shelling in Lysychansk has killed one woman and destroyed four houses and a shopping centre.

According to the head of the Sievierodonetsk administration, approximately a third of the city remained under the control of Ukrainian forces and about two-thirds were in Russian hands.”-via The Guardian 

~

“Ukraine has established two routes through Poland and Romania to export grain and avert a global food crisis although bottlenecks have slowed the supply chain, Kyiv’s deputy foreign minister said on Sunday.

Dmytro Senik said global food security was at risk because Russia’s invasion of Ukraine had halted Kyiv’s Black Sea grain exports, causing widespread shortages and soaring prices.

Ukraine is the world’s fourth-largest grain exporter and it says there are some 30 million tonnes of grain stored in Ukrainian-held territory which it is trying to export via road, river and rail.

Ukraine was in talks with Baltic states to add a third corridor for food exports, Senik said.”-via CNBC

~

“Amnesty International has accused Russia of war crimes in Ukraine, saying attacks on Kharkiv - many using banned cluster bombs - had killed hundreds of civilians.

The rights group said in a report on Ukraine’s second biggest city published on Monday:

The repeated bombardments of residential neighbourhoods in Kharkiv are indiscriminate attacks which killed and injured hundreds of civilians, and as such constitute war crimes.

This is true both for the strikes carried out using cluster (munitions) as well as those conducted using other types of unguided rockets and unguided artillery shells.

The continued use of such inaccurate explosive weapons in populated civilian areas, in the knowledge that they are repeatedly causing large numbers of civilian casualties, may even amount to directing attacks against the civilian population.”

Amnesty said it had uncovered proof in Kharkiv of the repeated use by Russian forces of 9N210 and 9N235 cluster bombs and scatterable land mines, all of which are banned under international conventions.”-via The Guardian

~

“The bodies of scores of Ukrainian fighters killed during the siege of the Azovstal steelworks in the southern city of Mariupol are still awaiting retrieval, the former commander of Ukraine's Azov National Guard regiment said on Sunday.

Maksym Zhorin said that under the terms of a recent exchange, around 220 bodies of those killed in Azovstal had already been sent to Kyiv but "just as many bodies still remain in Mariupol".

"Talks are continuing about further exchanges, to return home all the bodies. Absolutely all bodies must be returned and this is something we will work on," Zhorin added in a video posted on his Telegram channel.

He said a third of the dead were of the Azov battalion, while the others belonged to border patrol and naval officers as well as the police.”-via Reuters

~

“It might look and smell like McDonald's but now it's Vkusno & tochka. The golden arches are gone, the Filet-O-Fish is simply a fish burger. The Big Mac has left Russia.

A new era for Russia's fast-food and economic scene dawned on Sunday, as McDonald's restaurants flung open their doors in Moscow under new Russian ownership and with the new name, which translates as "Tasty and that's it".

The unveiling of the rebranded outlets, more than three decades after the American burger giant first opened its doors in Moscow in a symbolic thaw between East and West, is once again a stark sign of a new world order. The reopenings took place on Russia Day, a holiday celebrating national pride.

The fortunes of the chain, which McDonald's sold when it exited the country over the conflict in Ukraine, could provide a test of how successfully Russia's economy can become more self-sufficient and withstand Western sanctions.”-via Rueters

[girlactionfigure]

Meet Vanda Semyonovna Obiedkova.

As she lay dying in a Mariupol basement, freezing and pleading for water, Holocaust survivor Vanda Semyonovna Obiedkova wanted to know only one thing: “Why is this happening?” Ill and emaciated during the last two weeks of her life, the 91-year-old could not even stand up. She died on April 4, not peacefully of old age in her own bed, but as a victim of the horrific 21st-century war that has engulfed her hometown. “Mama didn’t deserve such a death,” says Obiedkova’s daughter, Larissa, through tears, just hours after arriving with her family in a safe location. She had watched helplessly as her mother’s life ebbed away, remaining at her side until the last moment. After her mother passed away, Larissa and her husband risked their lives to bury Obiedkova, amid non-stop shelling, in a public park less than a kilometer from the Azov Sea. “The whole Mariupol has turned into a cemetery,” says Rabbi Mendel Cohen, director of Chabad-Lubavitch of Mariupol and the Ukrainian port city’s lone rabbi. Obiedkova and her family had long been active members of Mariupol’s Jewish community, the matriarch regularly receiving medical aid from Cohen’s synagogue. “Vanda Semyonovna lived through unimaginable horrors,” the rabbi says. “She was a kind, joyous woman, a special person who will forever remain in our hearts.” Since the war began, Cohen has been working full-time to evacuate community members from the inferno, working the phones even on Shabbat, and most recently, Passover. Earlier this week he was able to evacuate Larissa and her family. Vanda Obiedkova was born in Mariupol on Dec. 8, 1930. She was 10 years old in October of 1941, when the Nazis entered Mariupol and began rounding up the city’s Jews. When the SS came to the family home and took away Vanda’s mother, Maria (Mindel), the little girl managed to evade arrest by hiding in a basement. “She couldn’t scream; that’s what saved her,” says Larissa. On Oct. 20, 1941, the Germans executed between 9,000 and 16,000 Jews in ditches on the outskirts of Mariupol, including Obiedkova’s mother and her mother’s entire family. The little girl was later detained, but family friends came and convinced the Nazis that she was Greek. Her father, who was not Jewish, then managed to get her checked into a hospital, where she remained until Mariupol was liberated in 1943. Obiedkova gave a full account of her life and Holocaust experience to the USC Shoah Foundation in 1998. “We had a VHS tape of her interview at home,” says Larissa, who notes that her mother retained a measure of Yiddish until the end. “But that’s all burned together with our home.” Obiedkova married in 1954, when Mariupol was known by the Soviet name of Zhdanov, and spent her entire life in the city. In recent years, she lived with Larissa. “Mama loved Mariupol; she never wanted to leave,” she says. Rabbi Mendel Cohen, director of Chabad of Mariupol and the city's only rabbi, speaking at Mariupol's annual Holocaust memorial at the site of the murder of the city's Jews in 1941. Cohen has since the outbreak of war been working to save his entire community. When the shelling and bombings began in the beginning of March, the family moved into the basement of a neighboring heating-supply store. The only assistance the family received throughout that time came from Rabbi Cohen’s synagogue and community center. “There was no water, no electricity, no heat—and it was unbearably cold,” she says. Larissa spent all her time caring for her immobile mother, but “there was nothing we could do for her. We were living like animals!” Two snipers had set up positions near the closest sources of water, making every trip there intensely dangerous aside from the bombs raining down from the skies. “Every time a bomb fell, the entire building shook. My mother kept saying she didn’t remember anything like this during the Great Patriotic War [World War II].” Back in 2014, when war began and Mariupol was hit particularly hard, Larissa and her family joined Mariupol’s Jewish community in evacuating with Rabbi Cohen to a Chabad campground outside of Zhitomir, in western Ukraine. They returned when things quieted down, but Larissa says there’s no going back this time. “I’m so sorry for the people of Mariupol,” she says, as she breaks down once again. “There’s no city, no work, no home—nothing. What is there to return to? For what? It’s all gone. Our parents wanted us to live better than they did, but here we are repeating their lives again.” The one, lonely bright spot, Larissa says, has been Rabbi Cohen and the Chabad of Mariupol Jewish community, which has been a lifeline throughout the last seven weeks of hell. “Thank G‑d, we have our Jewish community,” says Larissa, noting that her mother loved participating in happy festivities over the years, including Passover. “People need community, family, during this time. That’s all we have left.” Support the Jewish Community of Mariupol’s effort to save lives.

Rabbi Yisroel Bernath 

[rissyrawr]

Check them Finger Weapons out! ღ All Information & Credits HERE!

ღ My Facebook ♡♡♡ ღ My Flickr ♡♡♡ ღ My Youtube ♡♡♡ ღ My Metablogger ♡♡♡

[tanadrin]

Things I wish you could do when modding EU4:

1) a way to quickly and easily create the HRE through a scripted effect, rather than having to hide a placeholder country in a corner of the map, for mods that want to use HRE-like mechanics, but not have an HRE at the starting bookmark

2) retrieve arbitrary strings in scripted effects and store them in variables. The new cosmetic country name change effect is great, but I’d like to be able to (say) have certain countries automatically rename themselves after their capital and/or dynasty--I have a Thing about (say) a Crimean Sunni OPM monarchy on the shores of the Sea of Azov that hasn’t controlled territory in Italy in 200 years still being called “Genoa,” or a tag called "Ottomans” whose ruling dynasty is Karamanoglu.

[boeing747]

(Revised) A List of Objects:

I am the kitchen sink that’s been dripping for months, but you haven’t bothered to call your landlord about. I am a spool of white thread and needle that you’d bought at the grocery store, tucked into a drawer and forgotten about. Resting on top of the shirt you’d meant to mend. I am your old car resting curbside next to your Mother’s house; leaky breaks, cracked windshield, blown transmission, key scratch across the drivers-side front door. You keep meaning to fix it, or sell it, or send it to scrap. I am the busted blinds in your bedroom, trailing sunshine across your face in the morning.

A Second, Unrelated List of Objects:

A pile of coins, about fourteen dollars worth if converted to USD at the current exchange rate (16/06/2020). An oyster card, unburdened of its original purpose and expatriated to the metal mesh coffee table. Two separate brands of cigarette papers. A pair of glasses, an empty coffee-stained mug, two mismatched wedding bands, an open pack of NSAID pain-relievers.

The Things that fill the Spaces between us:

The square kilometre area of the Azov sea. Forty five minutes on the subway and fifteen on a bus, other times. Occasionally, well, it’s a question of physics isn’t it? The answer to which, as far as I can tell, is that no two things ever really touch. (Except sometimes they do.) Two years ago you lived next door. We travel through time and space like this. First the Past (which doesn’t exist, as agreed by Philosophers), and then the Present (which surely does). The distance, if I choose so, can also be defined by how long it takes individual neurons to go from impulse to irrational decision. Which I suppose is still traveling in it’s own way, still time and space. The scale is as infinitely small as it is large.

Bathroom Sink Catalogue:

A stick of deodorant. An old mug, inside which: Two plastic toothbrushes, two tubes of toothpaste, grime. A spool of dental floss. Mouthwash for sensitive teeth. Organic liquid soap. Two dried drops of blood.

What I Remember About your Parent’s House:

That time your mother had made us dinner that week-night because I’d stayed over late studying with you and I don’t remember which test we’d been studying for but what I do remember is your mother getting The Call and how even though I barely knew him I felt tears well up in my eyes as we sat there, around the table. I remember sitting there, without any fond memories to remember him by and thought about the tidal wave of re-definition of objects and spaces that runs through the threads of our lives and memories.

What I remember about your Mother’s house:

Grilling in a torrential downpour with your Garage door open. Throwing up in the overgrown rose bushes at the wake that she’d held there for him. Keying Andrews car. Several awkward dinners before your Mother decided to move the TV so it’d be visible from the dining table. The weekend I spent making one thousand little paper cranes for Julia like we’d decided while you laid on the bed and stared up into the ceiling, feeling real damn sorry for yourself.

What You remember about My Parent’s house:

A Short timeline of things that happened to Andrew’s car:

0, as we understand it: Raw Potential? Space Dust? The Holy spirit? 1999: Assembled. 1999: bought by a young mother of three. 2003: sold to Andrew. I asked Andrew one time if he knew what happened to the lady who’d sold him the car for that cheap and he’d shrugged and told me that he’d never really thought about it. Timely oil changes, well kept interior. 2010: The first time I’d sat in it. 2011: Andrew gets rear ended by a teenager. 2012: Fight of the century: My Apartment keys versus Car Paint. 2013: we bought the car but still called it Andrew’s car. I was trying to reclaim what you did as mine, to reinterpret the space and time and context. We keep calling it Andrew’s car. 2019: I throw a rock at the windshield. For the few milliseconds of impact, it’s your car. It’s your car even though I’d paid half. The leaky breaks aren’t my fault, how would I lie about that. 2020: it’s at your Mother’s house. You call it your car, I call it Andrew’s car. I have a hard time breaking habits. It doesn’t go anywhere. The Future:

The Potential Careers we came up with for our Future Child that one night:

Pilot Engineer Painter Astro-physicist Journalist Doctor

The Conclusion I am Choosing to Draw:

Let’s say everything is a fruit. A house can be just akin to an apple. You seek out a home too early and it turns sour, too late and despite a beautiful exterior, it’s rotten to the core. The same goes for rings and people and whatever else you want to think of. Every single thing has a point in time in which it is bitter (usually this point comes either before or after it is sweet. Although some things exhibit all properties at once; those are the special things.)

(Addendum)

A non-comprehensive list of Objects in our Home: Kitchen sink. A needle and a spool white of thread. My button down that I’d accidentally ripped at work. Your car. The busted blinds in our bedroom, the ones you keep telling me figure out how to fix, but I never do. I tell you I enjoy feeling the sunshine trailing across our bodies in the morning.

[mariacallous]

Interview by Shura Gulyaeva. Abridged translation by Sam Breazeale.

In 2014, 27-year-old Victoria Obidina moved from Ukraine's Donetsk region to Mariupol and began working as a paramedic, and in 2021, she signed a contract to become a military physician. At that start of this year, Victoria and her four-year-old daughter, Alisa, were planning to go to Egypt for what would have been their first trip abroad. When Russia launched its full-scale invasion, however, Victoria was sent to work at the Azovstal iron and steel works, and in May, while trying to escape with her daughter to Zaporizhzhia, she was captured by Russian troops and taken to a POW camp in Olenivka. On October 17, Victoria and 107 other women returned to Ukraine as part of a prisoner exchange. She spoke to Meduza about her time in Azovstal, the bonds she developed with the other prisoners in Olenivka, the violence she faced from Russian soldiers, and her release from captivity.

'She'd always wanted to be a doctor like her mom'

On March 10, when the other paramedics and I arrived at Azovstal, it still wasn’t equipped [as a shelter]: we set up sleeping quarters and a kitchen and stocked it with food and medication ourselves. Wounded soldiers started arriving almost immediately. I’d never seen wounds like that in my life; this was my first experience [working as a military doctor]. Until May, I worked around the clock; I never knew if it was day or night outside.

At first, my daughter lived with relatives not far from Azovstal. In late March, though, we started losing contact with the outside world: phones stopped working and stores throughout Mariupol started running out of food. By then, it was already too late to leave the city, so I decided to have Alisa come live with me. A guy from Azov we knew brought her, and literally two days later, he was killed by a sniper. I don’t know his name or his call sign — he was just a guy who helped me. I’ll be grateful to him for the rest of my life.

In Azovstal, Alisa and I studied letters and numbers. One day, she said, “Mom, I’m bored. Can I come help you?” And she started giving out pills [to patients] — which saved me almost an hour of work. She'd always wanted to grow up strong, like her mom, and become a doctor — and now she had experience.

At some point in late April, we were being shelled so intensely that Alisa asked me, “Mom, is this our last day?” It did seem to me that our lives were over, but you can’t tell a child that. So I told her that everything would be okay and that we would get out of Azovstal alive. At that point, the Red Cross had started organizing “green corridors” to [Ukraine-controlled] Zaporizhzhia, and since I had a child, they tried to get me out on my commander’s orders.

On May 5, we were taken through a [humanitarian] corridor through the [self-proclaimed] DNR. When we arrived in the village of Bezimenne, [occupation officials] took me in for questioning in a tent camp. They said I wouldn’t make it through “filtration” [as a military doctor] and that my daughter would be taken to a children’s shelter [in Russia]. I asked them to at least let me look after her for the next two days, until the humanitarian convoy continued on to Zaporizhzhia, [and they agreed]. In the filtration camp, I met a woman who offered to help take Alisa to Zaporizhzhia. From there, Alisa’s uncle was supposed to bring her to my mother in Poland — she had moved there last year, before the war. I wrote the woman a letter of attorney, and on May 7, I walked Alisa to the bus. There was a crowd of people outside the bus, so I discreetly boarded it and left along with her. I had escaped the filtration camp.

Our bus got as far as Manhush (Editor’s note: a village in the Donetsk region) before the convoy was stopped by Russian soldiers. At that point, they already knew who I was: they had figured it out from a video in which Alisa said she was in Azovstal and asked to be evacuated because she wanted to go home. And even though the clip compromised me, I don’t regret that it was filmed and uploaded, because thanks to it, people learned that there were still children, civilians, and wounded people in Azovstal.

The soldiers wanted to take Alisa off the bus along with me, but I insisted that they only needed me, not my child. That’s how she ended up going to Zaporizhzhia without me. Of course, I didn’t reveal [that I was being taken captive] so that she wouldn’t get scared: I told her we’d meet again soon, and that I loved her very much. If Alisa had stayed with me, they would have used her to torture me: if they had her pinned down, squealing, I would immediately have told them a lot of things. But since my child wasn’t with me, I held out.

Life in the Olenivka prison

In Manhush, they took me to the district police station and started beating me, trying to get a confession out of me. Since I was the first service member to come out of Azovstal, the soldiers wanted to know which of the commanders were still there, the names of the people I served with, how many wounded there were in the facility, and how much medicine and food was left. Once they realized I wasn’t going to say anything, they put me in a cell.

A few days later, on May 9, I was taken to the organized crime division in Donetsk. There, they beat me again and took my documents, including my passport. And they didn’t return them. That same day, they ordered me to “put on makeup and dress up nicely” and to say on camera that “everything is fine” in Donetsk, that I planned to stay there, and that I wanted [Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Reintegration of the Temporarily Occupied Territories] Iryna Vereshchuk to “return” my daughter to me. Of course I didn’t want to say it, but I didn’t have a choice.

On May 31, I was transferred to a temporary detention facility, where I spent the next month. There, I was treated a bit better: they fed me three times a day, although sometimes there were cockroaches in the food, but you just get them out and keep eating. [...]

In July, I was taken to Olenivka. I was kept there until October 14. First, there were 11 of us in a two-person cell, then we were transferred to a six-person cell that contained 26 people. [...]

I think I was fortunate compared to the other women: I wasn’t beaten as much. They mostly used a rubber truncheon on our heads and ribs, plus on our necks. I found that the female guards were much meaner than the male ones. When they took me in for interrogations, they blindfolded me and gave me directions: turn left, turn right, step up. And you didn’t know where the step was, so when you turned the wrong way and hit your head on a closed door, they would laugh.

Recipes, Harry Potter, and the Olenivka explosion

At Olenivka, there were women from various other formations — Azov, the National Guard, and the Ukrainian Armed Forces. [...] Those girls and I became like one big, happy family: we tried to comfort each other, we exchanged our favorite recipes and wrote them down — though we weren’t allowed to take our notes with us, of course. We talked about what we would buy first when we were released, and how much money we would spend. The first things we wanted to buy, of course, were phones, so we could call our families.

Some of the women would voluntarily work in the kitchen or cut the grass outside to pass the time. I read books that the guards gave us: Anna Karenina, several of the Harry Potter books, Twilight. They often tried to stick us with books about Russian history.

The other girls and I lived on the first floor, and the men were on the second floor. They were badly abused. We often heard them getting beaten. It was impossible to ignore: you heard it and knew that the man being beaten was with you in Azovstal and defended you, and now there was nothing you could do to help him.

On the evening of July 29, we heard an explosion. We thought we were being shelled, and it turned out that it had hit our boys in the neighboring barracks. Later, it was proven that the explosion came from inside the barracks, but in any case, about 60 guys were killed. [...]

For months, I didn’t know where my child was. The last time I had been able to call her was on May 12, when I was in Donetsk; at that point, I had learned that she had made it to Zaporizhzhia, but I didn’t know if she'd made it to my mother. October 3 was Alisa’s birthday; I spent a long time trying to get the guards to let me make one call so I could tell her happy birthday. The following day, they actually let me make the call. That’s how I learned that Alisa had arrived in Poland, and how my mom learned that I was in Olenivka.

Liberation and rehab

On October 14, [the guards] came into our cell and said, “Pack your things!” There were only four of us left in the cell; they had already removed everyone else in stages. They read out three names, and mine wasn’t one of them. I started sounding the alarm and asking them to call someone in for me. I said, “I want to leave with my girls. Together with them.” They responded, “If we manage to make [temporary] documents for you, you can go.”

In the end, they just wrote something by hand on a piece of paper, and I was able to use it to get out of Olenivka. They blindfolded us, bound our arms, and put us in an Ural truck. [...]

[After we were taken to a distribution point in Taganrog, Russia, and put in another prison cell,] on October 17, they told us, “Get your things and go!” They blindfolded us and tied our hands again, put us in a vehicle, and then put us on a plane. Then it was back into a car, where they finally let us open our eyes.

We realized we were headed towards Zaporizhzhia — but up until the last moment, we didn’t believe that there would be a [prisoner] exchange. We thought, “At some point, we’re going to turn off and go to another penal colony.” Even after we saw the buses from the Ukrainian side [that had come to retrieve the soldiers], we were still worried everything would fall apart somehow. But when we finally got out and breathed the Ukrainian air, we realized: “It’s over! Now we’re free!” Though for the first two days, we didn’t fully realize we were free. Out of habit, we kept our hands behind our backs and ate quickly.

Immediately after the exchange, we were given phones. I called my mom and said, “Mom, they traded me! I’m in Ukraine!” I talked with my daughter, and now we call each other every day. I can hear how she’s matured over these months. She says she misses me and constantly asks, “Mom, will you come in a week?” I tell her, “A little bit later than that.” Until I finish rehab, I can’t go to Poland to be with them. Me and the other liberated women are doing rehab in Dnipro, and it will last about a month. We’ll be examined by all the doctors, do tests, and restore our documents. I can’t wait until I can finally see my mom and Alisa and hug them.

After everything I went through during my 165 days in captivity [beginning with detention in Zaporizhzhia], [free] life feels strange. Even an ordinary shopping trip seems strange to me. But I’m gradually getting used to it. In Dnipro, the first thing the other women and I did was eat sushi. We ordered all kinds and ate it for two days. We’ve already gotten our hair done, and every day, we go shopping and buy clothes and makeup. Along with our salaries, we’re entitled to benefits for the time we spent in captivity. It’s nice to finally be able to get cleaned up.

Unfortunately, my military contract is over. I signed it in 2021 for three years, but I’m going to have to end it early, because the month of vacation I get after rehab is not enough to make up for the time with my daughter that I lost. I need to devote more attention to her right now, because it’s been a long time since I’ve seen her. So at first, I’ll be with Alisa in Poland — I’ll relax a bit and start studying the language. If I have time to work in my profession there, I will, of course, but I hope that the situation in Ukraine stabilizes in six months or a year and my daughter and I can return. But not to Mariupol; while I do miss it, even when it becomes Ukrainian again, I won’t be able to go back there knowing what happened there during the war. I won’t be able to walk through it; to see the destroyed streets where I used to spend my free time, or my old apartment building that’s been burned to the ground. I think we’ll live in Dnipro; I liked it there. And then I’ll sign another contract, because I can’t do without the army — that’s where I found myself.

[mainsllc]

Snowrunner mods xbox one

#Snowrunner mods xbox one install#

#Snowrunner mods xbox one update#

#Snowrunner mods xbox one upgrade#

#Snowrunner mods xbox one full#

#Snowrunner mods xbox one Ps4#

This is a standalone DLC and not part of the Year 1 or Year 2 Passes. For the money you get two Land Rover Defenders, a classic oldie usually seen rusting away on British farms with a sheepdog in the back and the new version, which is usually seen rusting away somewhere near Harrods in London. Tell me about the Land Rover Dual PackĪlso out today we have the Land Rover DLC. New stickers are available for all players, not just those on next-gen consoles and/or those with the Phase 7 Tennessee DLC, and cross-platform play should now work between all consoles including Nintendo Switch. Neither is earth shatteringly useful or that fast, but variety is nice. What about new trucks? Well, we have the cutesy GOY BY-4 scout and the Azov 43-119 “Sprinter”, which appears inspired by the Kamaz 4326 Dakar. Watch out for the big river and tippy hills. The mixture of circuits and harsh natural terrain fits well with the game and the single-track trails make deliveries especially fun. If you are solo and try to do it the latter way it will throw up a message and not let you start. If in co-op, you can do it with the X button or equivalent. Just remember to initiate races within the menu by activating them if solo. For the racing side of things, speed and power will prevail – especially in a multiplayer scenario. The only moderately complicated bit is the use of generators, which I also made a guide about. With that said, Phase 7 Tennessee is straightforward.

#Snowrunner mods xbox one full#

Plus a full review although my first impressions was pretty detailed. So, the wait for Phase 7 Tennessee has been so long that I am running out of things to say, but you can expect the usual best trucks round-up and other guides on A Tribe Called Cars. Nor can you do PC to console.Īs for new achievements being added in the future, Saber Interactive added: “That unfortunately will not be the case and the existing achievements list will be the same on PS5 and Xbox Series X|S.”

#Snowrunner mods xbox one Ps4#

Now if you are wondering about transferrable game saves, Xbox One to Xbox Series X|S is supported and so is PS4 to PS5, but not Xbox to PlayStation. What about game save transfers & achievements? Perhaps it will need to be checked by Microsoft again and that can take a week or two. My source was keen to avoid giving me an estimate to avoid disappointment so I get the feeling it may not be the fastest fix. Speaking to Saber Interactive, I was told that the timeframe is, “unknown,” but that affected players should keep an eye on official social media sources. Thank you for your understanding and your patience.” End of strange voice. “We apologise for the delay and we are working to bring a fix ASAP.

#Snowrunner mods xbox one update#

Speaking on the official Discord, Saber Interactive said: “Due to an issue with Xbox One consoles, the update and its content won’t be available right away on this platform. Now unfortunately the Xbox One Phase 7 update appears to have gone wrong. This is usually what I have to do on Xbox so bear that in mind if it is not working. Then be sure to enable said update and restart SnowRunner. Make sure the Year 2 Pass is installed, too, if you have it.

#Snowrunner mods xbox one install#

If it does not download automatically, search for it in the store and install manually. This is a separate download to the next-gen update and will work like previous phases. The headline change is that 30 frames per second will no longer be the default – expect double that at 60 frames per second for a smoother look if you have a next-gen console.ĤK (3,840×2,160 pixels) detail is also a thing, with even the less powerful Xbox Series S offering 4K 60 frames per second goodness albeit upscaled from 2.5K so it will be slightly less visually impressive.Īs subscribers may also know, SnowRunner Season7: Compete & Conquer launches today. It takes up 22.95GB of storage on this platform. I triggered the update process when I tried to run the game on my Xbox Series X.

#Snowrunner mods xbox one upgrade#

That I wanted to show in this video but slow Internet.Īnyway, I did a detailed video about what the next-gen update includes already, link in the description, but now it is available to download and install.įocus Home tells me that you can get the free upgrade through the digital store of the console you own, which will either be a PlayStation 4 or Xbox One. The next-gen SnowRunner update has been released, bringing with it some big visual changes. Today is a day many of us PS5, Xbox Series X and Series S owners have been waiting for. Here is everything you need to know plus whether there have been any physics changes. Sponsored A Tribe Called Cars merch Sayonara, 30 frames per second! SnowRunner Phase 7 Tennessee has arrived alongside the next-gen update, Nintendo Switch mods, enhanced cross-play and the standalone Land Rover DLC.

[ukr-2022]

The Azovians, at the command of Western curators, killed foreign mercenaries, and then burned their bodies.

In one of the bunkers at the Azovstal plant, we found a crematorium in which more than ten bodies of mercenaries were destroyed. Most likely, realizing that captivity could not be avoided, the Azovians were given the command to destroy foreigners.

Documents and personal belongings were also destroyed, but in a hurry the Nazis did not check the result, or maybe because of their stupidity. Some of the documents were not burned to the ground, and we found the remains of a US citizen's passport and many other interesting proofs.

The bomb shelter itself, where the bodies were destroyed, is located near the locomotive depot. They were specially brought there, since there are large reserves of fuel in this place. At the same time, in the very room where the Nazis made the crematorium, it is clear that there are no traces of a hit, this is a planned arson. At the entrance to the bunker, there are fuel cans everywhere. They were most likely used for the "action".

At the same time, 100 m from this dungeon, we found a kind of morgue. The bodies of the Ukrainian military and Nazis from Azov were stored there in refrigerators to save them for further transfer to relatives, each body is packed in bags and signed. But these people were burned to the ground. Yes, so that it was impossible to identify them.

Moreover, this bunker is the first, but not the only one with such surprises for the world community.

Back in the Soviet era, 41 workshops and 80 huge rooms were built on the territory of Azovstal. The scheme of the plant, if you look at it from above, looks impressive. Only canteens for workers on the territory of the enterprise 22. But the main place, of course, is occupied by giant blast furnaces: there are six of them in total at the plant, some have already been disabled. The workshops and buildings of the metal plant are scattered around the territory so much that special "routes" for heavy trucks and other equipment are laid between them. Regular buses traveled around the plant in order to transport workers. The total area of "Azovstal" is 11 sq. km. It's a city within a city.

And from this industrial giant, the Nazis have been preparing an impregnable fortress for a long time. The factory was divided into squares, and each unit located inside had its own area of responsibility. At the same time, the Nazis from Azov led the military and the National Guard. And the entire territory of the plant was mined.

At the moment, our divisions have examined 70% of the plant. First, sappers work, and then search groups come in. And with each passing meter, more and more interesting details are revealed about the assistance provided to the Nazis by the West.

[deepartnature]

In Russia, as Prices Soar, the Outlook for Its Economy Grows ‘Especially Gloomy’

“LONDON — After sanctions hobbled production at its assembly plant in Kaliningrad, the Russian automaker Avtotor announced a lottery for free 10-acre plots of land — and the chance to buy seed potatoes — so employees could grow their own food in the westernmost fringe of the Russian empire during ‘the difficult economic situation.’ In Moscow, shoppers complained that a kilogram of bananas had shot up to 100 rubles from 60, while in Irkutsk, an industrial city in Siberia, the price of tampons at a store doubled to $7. Banks have shortened receipts in response to a paper shortage. Clothing manufacturers said they were running out of buttons. ...”

NY Times

NY Times: Opinion | We Should Say It. Russia Is Fascist.

Aljazeera: How the capture of Azov fighters affects the Russia-Ukraine war (Video)

Empty shelves in a supermarket in Moscow in March. Food prices have shot up, especially for items like imported fruit.

[ukrainenews]

Daily Wrap Up May 18, 2022

Under the cut: US embassy in Kyiv reopens; Russia’s bombing of Mariupol could cause an extinction event in the Azov Sea; Russia expels 85 embassy staff from various countries; Russian Defense Ministry says nearly 1,000 Ukrainian soldiers have surrendered at the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol since Monday; Germany will help export Ukrainian grain out of Ukraine; US will give $215 million in food aid to Ukraine; Ukrainian forces take back more of Kharkiv oblast.

“The US embassy in Kyiv has reopened after a three-month closure, Reuters reports.

A small number of diplomats will return initially to staff the embassy, according to a spokesperson.

The American embassy in the Ukrainian capital closed on 14 February, 10 days before Russian troops invaded the country.

Several western countries, including Britain, France and Germany, have reopened their embassies in Kyiv over the past month, after Russian troops withdrew from Ukraine’s north.”-via The Guardian

~

“According to Mariupol City Council, Russia’s brutal bombing of the steel mill could severely damage its facilities for storing thousands of tons of hazardous chemicals. Their leakage could kill all marine life in the Azov Sea, threatening an ecological catastrophe in two other seas, the Black Sea and the Mediterranean. The pictures published by the Mariupol City Council are a visualization of possible consequences of Russia’s bombing of Azovstal, not real photos.”-via Kyiv Independent

~

“Russia said on Wednesday it was expelling a total of 85 embassy staff from France, Spain and Italy in response to similar moves by those countries, highlighting the damage to relations with leading European Union members since it launched its war on Ukraine.

The Foreign Ministry said it was ordering out 34 diplomatic staff from France, 27 from Spain and 24 from Italy.

The three countries are among European nations that have collectively thrown out more than 300 Russians since the Feb. 24 invasion. In many cases, they accused Russian diplomats of spying, which Moscow has denied.”-via Reuters

~

“The Russian Defense Ministry says nearly 1,000 Ukrainian soldiers have surrendered at the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol since Monday.

Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov said Wednesday that a total of 959 Ukrainian soldiers, including 80 wounded, had laid down their arms and surrendered since May 16.

He reaffirmed that 51 wounded were sent to the hospital at Novoazovsk, which is in the self-declared region of the Donetsk People's Republic (DPR).

Konashenkov said that in the past day alone 694 Ukrainian "militants" had surrendered at Azovstal.

The DPR gave similar figures, saying that altogether 962 Ukrainian soldiers have surrendered since May 16.

CNN is unable to confirm the Russian tally.

The Ukrainian side has not given an update on the number who have left Azovstal nor on the status of negotiations for their exchange for Russian prisoners.

Most of the Azovstal soldiers appear to have been taken to Olenivka, a town near the front lines but in territory controlled by the DPR.”-via CNN

~

“According to Federal Transport Minister Volker Wissing, rail transports have started with the help of Deutsche Bahn to support grain exports from Ukraine. The freight subsidiary DB Cargo is in the process of enabling a “rail bridge” to be able to transport large quantities of agricultural products to ports on the North Sea and the Adriatic, said the FDP politician on Tuesday in Berlin. The help has begun, DB Cargo is already driving on behalf of private grain exporters from Ukraine. Bahn boss Richard Lutz spoke of two to three trains a day from the Ukraine via Poland and the corresponding terminals to Western Europe.

The background is that the export of grain via the seaports of Ukraine has come to a standstill because of the Russian war against the country. This threatens deliveries to North Africa and Asia in particular, and problems with the food supply are feared. As EU Transport Commissioner Adina Valean recently explained, 20 million tons of grain urgently need to leave Ukraine. The Commission had presented an action plan to bring out exports via so-called "solidarity lanes" overland.”-via Spiegel (German language site)

~

“US Secretary of State Tony Blinken announced that the US would be giving an additional $215 million in new emergency food assistance to the crisis in Ukraine and called on other countries to swiftly aid the growing global food crisis due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.”-via CNN

~

“The Ukrainian armed forces say they have recaptured another settlement in the Kharkiv region, as troops continue their counter-attacks in the area.

They also reported heavy fighting in the Luhansk region, where Russian forces continue attempts to destroy Ukrainian defenses.

In Kharkiv, the general staff said Wednesday that "as a result of the offensive of our troops, the settlement of Dementiivka was liberated."

Dementiivka is about 20 miles (35 kilometers) north of Kharkiv.

The general staff said fighting continued in other parts of the area and Russian forces were advancing around the village of Ternova, close to the border north-east of Kharkiv.

The Russians appear to be trying to block Ukrainian forces from advancing towards their nearby supply lines inside Ukraine.

Elsewhere the Ukrainian National Guard reported that in Luhansk region, its Rapid Reaction Brigade had destroyed bridges to stop the advance of Russian forces towards the cities of Severodonetsk and Lysychansk. Video posted by the National Guard indicates the bridges were destroyed in the past few days.  

It said that blowing up the bridges would help the defense of areas still under Ukrainian control.

In the same area, the general staff reported air strikes against several towns along the front lines, as well as areas around the town of Bakhmut, a key hub for Ukrainian defensive efforts. It said that attempts to break through Ukrainian lines in the Adviivka area had been repelled.

Ukrainian units also continue to hold off Russian forces trying to advance south into Donetsk region, according to the general staff, which said they inflicted losses on the Russians around Dovhenke, north-west of the strategically important city of Sloviansk. The Russians have been trying to break through in that area for more than a month.”-via CNN