TIME Person of the Year ~ Zelenskyy and the Spirit of Ukraine

Ukraine develops their own long range technology to defend itself

• Day 287 (7 December)

  

  • TIME magazine has named Zelenskyy and the Spirit of Ukraine as the Person of the Year. The democratic world is on the side of Ukraine without a doubt, and this reaffirms this, and to choose anyone else would have been a grave error.

  

  • The Supreme Court in France has upheld a decision from the International Court of arbitration to recover $1.1 billion from Russia and to the Oschadbank (state owned Ukrainians bank) due to lost assets in Crimea.

    

  • The US has made several statements on the Ukrainian long range missiles that hit two Russian airbases inside of Russia. They have reiterated that they support Ukraine by providing weapons to defend themselves to be used on their sovereign territory, and are not enabling or encouraging them to carry out strikes in Russia.

    We are not working to prevent Ukraine from developing their own capability. (US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin, 6 December 2022)

    We are not enabling Ukraine to strike beyond its borders. US State Department, Ned Price

    

    We have neither encouraged nor enable the Ukrainians to strike inside of Russia, but the important thing is to understand what Ukrainians are living through every day with ongoing Russian aggression against the country. Antony Blinken, Secretary of State.

    

  Day 288 (8 December)

  

  • A one-to-one prisoner swap was made, Brittney Griner (a basketball player caught with cannabis vapes in Russia) was swapped for Viktor Bout, a notorious arms dealer. Biden approved the swap, where negotiations have been ongoing for months. There has been no mention of Paul Whelan, the other US prisoner who had been put forward for the swap.

    

  • Netflix will release a special interview 12 December 2022, where David Letterman interviews Zelenskyy for ‘My Next Guest’.

    

  • The President of Lithuania, Gitanas Nauseda has stated again that negotiations will not work with Russia, and the battle can only be won on the battlefield. Estonia also agrees, and both countries have previously tried to negotiate with what was the Soviet Union and know that Russia cannot be trusted, and that they will not stop until they get what they want or are defeated.

    

  • The International Committee of the Red Cross has finally gained access to Ukrainian prisoners of war, and also Russian prisoners of war. They had been trying to gain access for months since the Olenivka bombing in July 2022. They plan to carry out more visits, but what powers do they have except to make observations, how can they ensure prisoners are well treated after they have gone? It is still progress, but this highlights the weak power of the International organisations that are supposed to act in times of need as they inspect the conditions, which is small consolation for those who have since died.

    

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  • Reports claim that former convicts that were hired by the Wagner group have deserted their unit and are on the run in Donetsk when they were sent to the front line. Other claims say that Ukrainian soldiers had shot them. Either way, there seem to be more Russian soldiers who don’t want to fight.

  

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• Rati Ionatamashvili, an MP in Georgia has proposed a law denying Gerogian citizenship to any nationals who carry out military activities for another country.

• Neutrality is being challenged, as Switzerland bans the export of ammunition for the Gepard anti-aircraft systems used by Ukrainians, that were donated by the Germans. They have been effective against the recent drone attacks that originated from Iran. The problem is that Switzerland cannot supply weapons to a country that is at war, but is this a war when Ukraine isn’t fighting but defending itself against the special military operation? If Switzerland opts to look at the Russian terminology, then it’s not a war

  

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• Conflicts within NATO resurface as Turkey becomes an issue again (and Hungary will too), as they support Ukraine with some weapons, but they also support Russian tourism and have built ties with Russia. In addition, there is the Syria issue where Turkey supports the regime, which technically could endanger US troops.As NATO is reluctant to do anything, will they wait until something tragic happens, but then Turkey will say it’s not against the rules. The alliance needs to preempt things and to avoid such situations if they are to retain any credibility.

• Land has been stolen in temporarily occupied regions of Ukraine. A Putin ally, Alexander Tkachov who owns Agrocomplex was a former agriculture minister and a governor of Krasnodar Krai, and has stolen 400,000 acres of farmland from three Ukrainian businesses. This is how Russia seizes occupied territory so that the Ukrainians will struggle to reclaim it. Similar has happened in Crimea and Kherson, where Russian military officers were given homes and land in the area to prevent the Ukrainians returning and claiming their land.

• Reports from Luhansk claim that patients in hospitals are being discharged before they are ready to leave to make way for injured Russian soldiers

  

• Ukraine has used their own old Soviet drones and modified them so that they could be used to strike Russian airbases. The Tu-141 drones were domestically modified, and answers the questions as to how the missiles were used over a 600km distance. It also answers the questions as to whether the US provided long range systems to Ukraine, and they have not, therefore, there has not been any escalation as far as the US is concerned.

  

• Politico named Zelenskyy as the most powerful person in Europe. In a short statement, he humbly stated he was carrying out the will of the people and that makes Ukraine strong. A leader is only strong with the people behind them, and when they listen to the people and carry out what they want.