🇺🇸 US trying to recruit mercs willing to fight in Ukrainian ranks amid Kiev's failing counteroffensive

According to Sputnik’s military-diplomatic source in Damascus, the CIA is conducting negotiations in Syria with members of Kurdish self-defense units and the leaders of several local clans.

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❗️Russian MoD briefing on the progress of the special military operation in Ukraine:

▪️In the Donetsk direction, Russian forces destroyed over 160 Ukrainian troops, three armored combat vehicles, one German-made Panzerhaubitze 2000 self-propelled howitzer, and one Gvozdika self-propelled howitzer;

▪️In the Kupyansk direction, the actions of two Ukrainian sabotage and reconnaissance groups were thwarted. Russian forces destroyed up to 50 Ukrainian troops and two armored combat vehicles;

▪️In the Krasny Liman direction, the actions of a Ukrainian sabotage and reconnaissance group were thwarted. Russian forces neutralized up to 50 Ukrainian personnel, two armored combat vehicles, one Gvozdika self-propelled howitzer, as well as one D-30 and one D-20 howitzer;

▪️In the Zaporozhyie direction, the actions of a Ukrainian sabotage and reconnaissance group were thwarted. Russian forces neutralized up to 120 Ukrainian personnel, four armored combat vehicles, a US-made M-777 howitzer, as well as one Msta-B and one D-20 howitzer;

▪️In the Kherson direction, Russian troops neutralized up to 45 Ukrainian soldiers, one US-made M777 artillery system, one Grad MLRS, one Msta-B howitzer;

▪️Russian air defenses shot down one seven HIMARS missiles and nine unmanned aerial vehicles in the LPR, DPR, Kharkov, and Zaporozhye regions.

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📹 Russia's Lancet drone annihilates US-made M777 Ukrainian howitzers

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Russia swipes left on Tinder

The global dating app has announced that it has left Russia for political reasons, but ordinary Russians don't seem too upset

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🇷🇺 Drip check: New all-season Russian military uniform just dropped

The new uniforms are made from ultramodern combined materials, which protect vulnerable parts of the body like joints, and prevents the soldier from freezing or sweating. The set consists of a jacket, pants and a combat shirt, as well as a wind and waterproof suit.

Russian fighters also received new boots – they have a nubuck exterior, mesh on the sides, and a membrane which prevents servicemen from sweating.

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Check out the latest Sputnik Africa's #AfroVerdict podcast's episode to hear what Ethiopia's Ambassador to Russia has to say on pressing global issues and matters of national importance to Addis Ababa

❗️LIVE NOW: Vladimir Putin holds meeting with Roscosmos chief Yuri Borisov in Moscow

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According to a recent survey in Russia conducted with over 1,600 participants, the most popular place to find love was at work, with a percentage of over 20%. Meanwhile dating apps received only 5-8%.

Other popular approaches included meeting potential partners at home/were neighbours, in parks, at parties, in stores, and other locations, totaling 27% of respondents.

Read why Tinder left Russia and where Russians find love on Sputnik’s website

US top General says not surprised Ukrainian counteroffensive going slower than predicted

US Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley said on Friday he does not find it surprising that the Ukrainian counteroffensive is going slower than predicted as he personally said before that it will be very long and difficult.

Milley also said that in his view time is not particularly on either side of the conflict because the latter continues to be very dynamic.

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Former Pentagon analyst: Sweden should reconsider ‘Turmoil’ it would become part of in NATO

A new rift has opened between Muslim-majority Turkiye and Sweden, where a legal protest was allowed to take place involving the public burning of a Quran.

Michael Maloof, a former senior security policy analyst in the US Office of the Secretary of Defense, told Sputnik that both Sweden and NATO should consider what benefit is gained by adding the Scandinavian state to the alliance, especially given the kind of tensions that further NATO expansion to the East is likely to create in the region.

Read the exclusive interview of the analyst on Sputnik's website

Australian ‘garage sale’ APCs pawned off on Kiev worse than useless

A scandal is brewing in Australia over Canberra’s decision to pawn its Vietnam War-vintage military equipment off on Kiev, with local military experts questioning how the aid that has been announced could possibly add up to $110 million AUD.

“You can’t just clear out the garage from Defense of old vehicles that you don’t want anymore. That’s not the response of a developed nation like ours,” the opposition leader Peter Dutton said, dubbing the aid package the equivalent of a “garage sale”.

Other observers said Canberra’s “stingy” “hand-me-down aid” is fueling perceptions of Australia as “using Ukraine as a dumping ground.”

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❗️ Mali made "a sovereign decision on future parameters of ensuring security & protecting civilians in the country," Russian Deputy Permanent Representative at UNSC says

🗣 "Russia supported the draft UNSC resolution (put forward by France) on withdrawal of #MINUSMA. It is important that the Council reacted to the request of #Mali who made a sovereign decision on future parameters of ensuring security & protecting civilians in the country," DPR Anna Evstigneeva stated.

The Russian DPR at UNSC has also pointed out that "Russia will continue providing comprehensive bilateral assistance to Mali with the purpose of ensuring stabilization in the country."

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Pentagon admits Chinese ‘spy’ balloon ‘did not collect’ data during US overflight

Five months after accusing China of dispatching a spy balloon across US airspace and producing another rift in US-China relations, Washington has quietly admitted that the balloon neither collected or transmitted any data during its several-day trip across the US.

Asked a question about what he called a “PRC high altitude balloon,” Pentagon spokesperson Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder told reporters on Thursday that while the US believed the airship had “off the shelf” equipment made in the United States, it did not collect data during its flight over the United States in late January and early February.

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T-80 tank in action (video courtesy of Russian MoD)

The T-80 tank destroyed Ukrainian Army positions using the 125mm cannon

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EU’s new anti-Russian asset grabbing scheme is ‘theft’, ‘act of war’

Belgium plans to collect 3 billion euros a year in windfall profits from Russian assets frozen in the country’s coffers to give to Ukraine for “reconstruction” purposes, Prime Minister Alexander De Croo announced Friday.

Asked to comment on Brussels’ plans, Christopher C Black, an international criminal and human rights lawyer with over 20 years’ experience, said that if realized, they would constitute “theft twice over” - first by seizing the money in the first place, and then preventing Russia from collecting its due interest.

Read full interview on Sputnik’s website