⚡ Lukashenko said he met with representatives of Zelensky
The Belarusian leader summarized the dialogue roughly as follows:
“Guys, tell your president that if he thinks he can speak to us like that and try to drag us into the conflict, then the nature of the war will change instantly. This war will be completely different.”
However, in reality, if such a dialogue did take place, Lukashenko would hardly have been that defiant.
Another controversy has erupted in Poland.
This time, the trigger was a Polish historian.
Kazimierz Wójcicki attempted to explain to his fellow citizens why Ukrainians view the UPA differently than Poles do.
The result?
After a single television appearance, the state broadcaster TVP Info reportedly decided to stop inviting him to its programs, while Poland's media regulator demanded an explanation from the channel.
What exactly did the historian say?
During a discussion about the UPA, he stated:
> "The Home Army (AK) and the UPA were two national liberation armies."
In his view, regardless of how particular chapters of history are assessed, both organizations saw themselves as forces fighting for the independence of their respective nations.
Wójcicki also recalled a fact that is rarely mentioned in public debates:
> "Veterans of the 27th Volhynian Division of the Home Army met with UPA veterans and shook hands."
When an opponent raised the issue of the Volhynia tragedy, the historian responded:
> "You are characterized by a shameful lack of knowledge about Ukraine."
After references to UPA crimes against Polish civilians, he added that the victims of the Polish-Ukrainian conflict were not only Poles. Ukrainians also suffered at the hands of Poles, he argued, pointing to the destruction of Orthodox churches and attacks on Ukrainian villages.
The following day, in an interview with Rzeczpospolita, he elaborated on his position:
> "A significant part of the Polish reaction to the UPA is based on a lack of knowledge of Ukrainian history."
According to him, many Poles view the UPA exclusively through the lens of the Volhynia massacres.
For many Ukrainians, however, the memory of the UPA is primarily connected with its long struggle against Soviet rule, political repression, deportations, and resistance to the USSR after World War II.
The historian also observed:
> "Every nation-state creates its own pantheon of heroes."
This, he argued, helps explain the attitude of part of Ukrainian society toward the UPA and the decisions of Ukrainian authorities regarding historical memory.
Another of his remarks provoked particularly strong reactions:
> "The identification of the Bandera movement with Nazism is the result of Russian propaganda."
These comments were received very negatively in Poland.
Agnieszka Głapiak, head of Poland's National Broadcasting Council, stated that historical memory requires special responsibility and demanded explanations from TVP Info.
Meanwhile, deputy channel director Jan Józefowski responded even more sharply:
> "His equating the Home Army with the UPA is not only a historical falsehood and simply nonsense, but a thesis that I oppose as a Polish journalist."
Following the controversy, TVP Info ended its cooperation with the historian.
This story is significant not only because it represents yet another dispute over Volhynia.
It revealed something broader.
Even in Poland, where people have spoken for decades about the need for Polish-Ukrainian reconciliation, an attempt to explain the Ukrainian perspective on the UPA can become politically toxic.
And it increasingly appears that the main problem is no longer that Poles and Ukrainians hold different views of the past.
The problem is that the very attempt to understand the other side's perspective is increasingly perceived as a threat to one's own historical memory.
Russia is opening a drone engineering training center at a university in occupied Donetsk, partnered with Innopolis University
Analyst Andriushchenko called it the "Alabuga model" — the same structure that put teenagers on Shahed assembly lines in Tatarstan
https://t.co/Nqu5gU0CDj
The case against Putin-linked crime boss Ilya Traber was built on testimony from a freed Russian POW
Former inmate Igor Lykov enlisted to fight in Ukraine while in pre-trial detention, was captured, then returned to Russia in a prisoner exchange.
https://t.co/P9z9O5ed6N
Ukrainian President Zelenskyy reports that Belarus is no longer allowing that its signal towers are used as repeaters for Russian drones in Ukraine's north. According to him it has come effect on June 22, only three days after Ukraine's 7-day ultimatum.
Another piece of fading Russian power has been chipped away.
🇬🇧🇺🇦 The UK is considering selling oil seized from a sanctioned Russian shadow fleet tanker, with proceeds potentially supporting Ukraine.
The cargo, around 98,000 tonnes of Russian Urals crude, estimated to be worth around £35 million, was seized after the tanker was boarded by Royal Marines. UK officials reportedly believe the oil now legally belongs to the UK and are exploring options to auction it, with the proceeds potentially funding Ukraine or supplying frontline equipment.
If approved, it would mark one of the most direct examples of Russian assets being repurposed to support Ukraine.
🌍 The Anchor of Empire
Without Ukraine, the return of the Russian Empire is impossible. Even if the Russians occupy all of Asia, the Russians will not have an empire without Ukraine. Throughout its history, Russia has not won a single war without Ukraine.
Employees of TPP, one of the largest fuel companies in occupied Crimea, appealed to Putin for government assistance after Ukrainian strikes destroyed a fuel terminal in Kerch, damaged several gas stations, burned fuel trucks and hit an oil depot. The company warned that 2,500 jobs are at risk and said it may not recover without state support. #Ukraine
ombudswoman of 🇷🇺 yana lantratova at a legal forum in st. petersburg,claimed that 🇺🇦 soldiers, during their retreat in Donbas, allegedly massively kidnapped babies from locals, used them as human shield against 🇷🇺 attacks and then "threw them out on street in baby carriages" 1/5
The roll-out of the Russian government's forced conscription plan continues, as brutality only increases.
With Russia's city of Penza as the epicenter for what is surely planned to go nationwide, men are being grabbed off the streets randomly, then forced to sign military contracts.
The blue-and-yellow flag has been raised on the Kinburn Spit. The Defense Forces of the South have forced the Russian occupiers to retreat from their positions. Currently, the evacuation of surviving personnel is underway, and the occupiers are abandoning their defensive lines.
Gauleiter Aksenov announced the cancellation of trains to and from Crimea
"Because there definitely won't be any tourists this summer, and those who decide to leave Crimea should figure out how to do it themselves," he thought.
During Trump’s rally tonight on the National Mall even his supporters were leaving early because they know that he’s lying to them.They all started heading to the exits while he was still talking. Some said he talks too much,boring & was late starting.
Fuel shortages in Russia are causing chaos:
🔹Gasoline quality is being dropped, which will destroy engines long-term
🔹Aircraft are being grounded due to lack of fuel
🔹Russia is urgently trying to buy gasoline from other countries
And gasoline-fuelled unrest is growing.🔥
🇷🇺 ☢️ Russian nationalist leader and former political prisoner Dmitry Demushkin admits in an interview that Russia, which has tried all kinds of weapons against Ukraine and still has not achieved success, will not use nuclear weapons either:
📌 “A part of our Z-society believes that the authorities still have unused cards hidden up their sleeves. In reality, in the current war we have tried and used everything we could use, except for nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons.”
📌 “There are calls to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine — those people do not understand that nuclear weapons are not a means of waging war, but a tool of deterrence.”
🔻 “Even if we use tactical nuclear weapons, this will not radically change our situation, because there is no such concentration of Ukrainian troops anywhere on the front that a nuclear explosion would cause critical damage.”
🔻 “We will have very big problems after using nuclear weapons. We will finally turn into lepers on the international stage. For example, when China stops selling us drone engines and everything else, what will we do then?”
🔻 “And finally, talking about using nuclear weapons is another manifestation of our weakness. Meaning, we have tried everything else and nothing has worked.”
Video is generated by Grok AI
“It seems to me that the question is no longer whether Ukraine will win the war, but when it will win it”
- French Ambassador to Poland, Etienne de Poncins, who served as ambassador to Ukraine at the time the war broke out.
Etienne de Poncins: “I thought it would go faster, but I have always believed that Ukraine would eventually win this war, and I believe that today it is on the right track. As you said, there are regular drone strikes deep inside Russian territory. Above all, there is a desire to suffocate Crimea, to cut Crimea off from its bases. You have to understand that Crimea is effectively an island, there is very little access. It has no water, it has no electricity, and it has few resources. And so Ukraine, in a very intelligent way, I would say, is isolating it from the rest of Russia and could probably retake Crimea. Perhaps not retake it, but ensure that life can no longer continue, or at any rate, that there are enormous difficulties for the Russian population that has been settled in Crimea. And for vladimir putin that would probably signify defeat, since Crimea is the main achievement of his regime since 2014.”
Host: “Effectively, defeat and the loss of power, you say it so strongly, he has made a symbol of that issue. He has made it a symbol; if he loses Crimea, it’s difficult for [his] power...”
Etienne de Poncins: “I believe that now, it seems to me that the question is no longer whether Ukraine will win the war, but when it will win it. I am quite convinced of that. As for the form that will take and when it will happen, that is much more difficult to say, because Russia, we must acknowledge, has also demonstrated extraordinary resilience. But I think that the situation simply cannot last forever. Russia loses 30,000 men every month, dead and wounded, the figures are confirmed, and it is no longer gaining any territory, even in the Donbas. So, even an authoritarian regime can hardly endure that type of [attrition] in the long term...”
Host: “Does that mean he will wear down his population? Is that also the goal, to wear down the Russian population regarding this war?”
Etienne de Poncins: “First, to make them realise that the war is also in Russia, that is a fact, and all Russians see it. When vladimir putin is forced to hold a May 9th ceremony that lasts only 45 minutes and there are no military forces [on display], all Russians see that, regardless of the propaganda. When they see that the main refinery in the heart of Moscow is struck, all Russians see it, all Russians understand that things are not going in a direction that is about to turn against vladimir putin.
I don't have... Perhaps there will be some sort of palace revolution. That has happened very regularly in Russian history. The Ukrainians, whom I know well, call it the "black swan" theory. That is to say, when in a war, in the progression of a war, an event suddenly occurs that was not foreseen, the black swan, which is not white as usual and which actually signifies a brutal reversal and that things accelerate in a...”
Host: “But has the black swan arrived, or is it yet to come?”
Etienne de Poncins: “It is yet to come. For now, it is yet to come, but it could very well come. There it is, I think, we are waiting for it, we are waiting for it.”
Host: “But what could it be?”
Etienne de Poncins: “Well, it could be the fact that vladimir putin is removed from power in one way or another.”
@EdePoncins
Meanwhile in Russia: state TV host Evgeny Popov acknowledged that Russia is going through the worst time period in the last 80 years. Dmitry Abzalov, Director of the Center for Strategic Communications, predicted the worst summer in recent history.
https://t.co/lQOJgR78GC