It seems that media coverage of Ukraine has slowed due to the Hamas/Israeli coverage….
Russia Psych Ops ARE in full force while Ukraine troops wait for resupplies of weapons, ammo and combat vehicles and F-16’s….
Fighting
At least one person was killed and 24 injured in Russian drone and bomb attacks on Ukraine’s northeastern city of Kharkiv and the surrounding region. Power cuts were also reported.
Ukraine’s Air Force said that Russia had launched 24 Shahed attack drones and 23 were shot down.
Russia’s Ministry of Defence said its forces had captured the village of Ocheretyne, in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region. The village had a population of about 3,000 people before Russia began its full-scale invasion. There was no comment from Ukrainian officials and no mention of Ocheretyne in the evening report of the Armed Forces General Staff.
Drone footage obtained by The Associated Press news agency showed the village battered by fighting and not a single person in the street. No building in Ocheretyne appeared to have been left untouched by the fighting.
Politics and diplomacy
Chinese President Xi Jinping arrived in France for a state visit during which French President Emmanuel Macron is expected to press him over the war in Ukraine.
In a video to mark Orthodox Easter, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on his fellow Ukrainians to unite in prayer for each other and the country’s soldiers on the front line. God, he said, has a “Ukrainian flag on his shoulder” and with “such an ally… life will definitely win over death”…..
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Under the rich, leafy cover of the Ukrainian spring, an artillery unit awaits.
Only a fraction of their job is firing rockets from their 50-year-old launcher. Most of their time is spent digging a new bunker into the hillside.
They’re outgunned and outmanned by the Russian invaders, 5km (3 miles) away in the eastern Donetsk region, who are inching closer.
Incoming American ammunition is expected to help, but how the Ukrainian government is addressing its need to recruit is controversial.
A new mobilisation bill passed earlier in April was criticised for not including a limit on time served. A clause aimed at demobilising soldiers after three years was dropped at the army’s request.
Now, war-weary troops have told the BBC the military needs to “rethink” how it recruits.
Despite Kyiv lowering the conscription age to find replacements, it’s not just a numbers game.
Thousands of trained troops like Oleksandr, a radio operator in the 21st separate Mechanised Brigade, have been fighting for the best part of two years without a proper rest.
“If we go home,” he says, “inexperienced soldiers might be able to hold the line against the Russians, but a lot of them will die.”…
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While Russia’s army isn’t a model of modern warfare, it is advancing on multiple parts of the eastern front line. It’s why we’re seeing new Ukrainian trenches being dug 30km (19 miles) back.
The invading forces have learnt tactical lessons and enjoy air superiority. Moscow has also drastically increased weapons production and is mobilising men at a faster rate than Ukraine can.
The sentiment in our wooded trench mirrors the Ukrainian government’s mantra of “fighting for as long as it takes”.
While the soldiers we meet might not have felt they could speak entirely freely, it’s not an issue for Illia, whom I meet in the relative privacy of the main square of Kramatorsk, in eastern Ukraine.
Illia, a combat medic, thinks the military has been dishonest about what signing up means….
May 6, 2024 – ISW Press
The Kremlin appears to be re-intensifying a reflexive control campaign targeting Western decision-making using nuclear threats and diplomatic manipulation. Reflexive control is a key element of Russia’s hybrid warfare toolkit — it is a tactic that relies on shaping an adversary with targeted rhetoric and information operations in such a way that the adversary voluntarily takes actions that are advantageous to Russia.