Piranha - the drone that kills Western tanks in an instant!

The Russian army is testing the brand-new Piranha kamikaze drone in a special military operation, and thanks to the Kiev regime's Western backers they have plenty of targets to choose from, including main battle tanks and IFVS.

Earlier it was reported that Piranha had been tested against M1 Abrams tanks, costing US taxpayers millions of dollars.

Have a look at the Piranha's superior capabilities.

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❗️Two people were killed and one seriously injured in the village of Rozhdestvenka, Belgorod region, as a result of an attack by three kamikaze drones, Belgorod Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said.

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💥 The crew of the "Zala" reconnaissance drone destroyed two Ukrainian artillery positions and a radar station on the right bank of the Dnepr River.

While flying over the territory controlled by Ukrainian units, the drone operator detected several targets, the coordinates of which were immediately transmitted to the command post.

The drone crew skillfully adjusted the approach of the Lancets and recorded the defeat of two artillery positions of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in a forest plantation. The enemy radar station was hit in a similar way.

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Why are EU and NATO hesitant to give posts to Eastern Europeans?

Eastern European nations’ ongoing underrepresentation in the EU's political institutions is fraught with repercussions, Milan Uhrik, member of European Parliament (MEP) from the Slovak Republic and leader of the REPUBLIKA political movement, tells Sputnik.

He says that “one of the risks is that these countries will feel unheard and unappreciated.”

According to Uhrik, “the very functioning of the EU, the incompetence of the current leadership, the promotion of harmful policies like the [2019] Green Deal or the [2023] New Migration Pact, the taking away of competences and funds from countries due to their disagreement with the center can have a greater impact.”

Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, who expressed interest in taking NATO’s top position last year, earlier minced no words when voicing irritation over the problem. “There is a question [of] whether there are first-rank and second-rank countries in NATO. Are we equals or are we not equals? These questions still remain,” she stressed at the time.

Representatives of Eastern European nations have been “conspicuously absent” from top positions in NATO and other key EU structures for the past 20 years, despite Brussels’ formal stance claiming that all members are equal within the bloc.

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📹 Russian crews of the Tornado-G MLRS destroyed Ukrainian objects and positions in the Kupyansk area.

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🇷🇺 Russia hosts thousands of foreign guests at the World Youth Festival

One of the most significant events of this week was the world's biggest youth gathering — the #WYF2024

The festival was held on March 1-7 in the Russia's federal territory Sirius on the Black Sea coast. More than 300,000 people across all continents and 190 countries have shown their interest in participating. Unfortunately, Russia has "not been able to accept everyone," as the country's president, Vladimir Putin, said.

Join our AI-powered host Joy in her report on this week's main topic to learn more details!

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The leader of France's right-wing party The Patriots, Florian Philippot, accused President Emmanuel Macron and his NATO allies of doing everything to keep the conflict in Ukraine going after the French leader appeared to have acknowledged that Moscow was open to a ceasefire.

On the other side of the spectrum, French Communist Party leader Fabien Roussel cited Macron as saying during Thursday's talks with the opposition that Russia had requested a ceasefire, but the West could not agree to it over concerns that the battlefield situation would be frozen, allowing Russia to rearm.

"This is a real bomb, it proves that Macron and his cabal in NATO are doing everything to protract the conflict in Ukraine. Back in April 2022, they banned Ukraine from negotiating. Let's stop them for the sake of peace!" Philippot wrote on X.

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🇺🇬 Uganda's "son" of Putin tells Sputnik Africa what he wants to learn from Russian leader

At the closing ceremony of the World Youth Festival in Russia, a particularly memorable participant from Uganda asked the Russian president to accept him as his son, to which Vladimir Putin replied with paternal concern: "What can I say, son?"

Sputnik Africa contacted the participant and asked him to explain why he'd chosen Putin as a mentor.

"First of all, I want to say that I told Putin to be my mentor because I believe in him. I feel he's a visionary leader. I feel he's a leader that many people can look up to, especially the young people, those who are still growing. And that's one reason why I thought he should mentor me to be a greater leader, to be a leader for the future," he pointed out.

👉 Read the full story!

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"I didn’t think there would be such a stir, everyone was scared by one photo" - the head of Moldova's autonomous Gagauzia region about the reaction of the Moldovan authorities to her meeting Vladimir Putin.

“We have been going to this meeting for a very long time. Until the last minute we were worried that it would not happen (...) Vladimir Vladimirovich heard about the problems of Gagauzia and promised support. Our goal is for our people to be heard,” said Evgenia Gutsul at a meeting with members of the Executive Committee of Gagauzia.

According to her, she discussed the problem of Gagauzia and its people with Putin, as well as talking about the problem of gas supplies.

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▪️A ballet dancer with a machine gun

▪️Which topics did the Russian and United States' leaders touch upon most during their recent speeches?

▪️Piranha - the drone that kills Western tanks in an instant!

▪️Scott Ritter on Biden’s State of the Union address: ‘America's running away from Ukraine’

▪️Why are EU and NATO hesitant to give posts to Eastern Europeans?

▪️Russian forces may soon strike a crucial blow to Ukrainian defenses near Donetsk

▪️Each fourth US citizen wants their state to secede, Alaska first to leave

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US bears responsibility for torpedoing ceasefire efforts in Gaza Strip and ‘will provoke conflicts in the region’

Washington’s actions related to the Israeli invasion of Gaza, such as supplying weapons to Israel and vetoing UNSC resolutions calling for a ceasefire, reveal that the US is “not the peacemaker in the region,” says Mehmet Rakipoglu, a researcher on international affairs at the UK-based Dimensions for Strategic Studies think tank.

“If US is supplying arms to Israel, it doesn't help to push for the UN to support an immediate ceasefire. So there is a contradiction between policy and rhetoric,” Rakipoglu notes.

He also argues that the United States “will provoke conflicts in the region,” and that radical policymakers in the US may even be trying to “provoke Iran and Israel.”

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The United States is in the process of preparing to deploy forces for the Gaza pier mission to increase the flow of humanitarian aid to the Palestinian enclave, Defense Department spokesperson Pat Ryder said.

"We are in the process of identifying, sourcing, and, in some cases, preparing forces to deploy [to Gaza]," Ryder said during a press briefing.

The Pentagon anticipates it will require more than 1,000 US military personnel to build a temporary port in Gaza.

The effort is expected to take several weeks, likely up to 60 days, Ryder said.

The Gaza pier mission is said to involve presence of US military personnel being on military vessels offshore, and not on the shore in Gaza, the Defense Department claimed.

Meanwhile, the US has reportedly made more than 100 "quiet" weapons sales to Israel, including thousands of bombs, since October 7. Despite half-baked calls from the administration for Israel to spare civilian lives, the US has continued to restock their supply of weapons, helping to create one of the most intense bombing campaigns in military history.

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A full-size van with 34 men of connoscription age who hoped to avoid mobilization was stopped near the Romanian border in Ukraine, the Ukrainian newspaper “Strana” reported on its Telegram channel, citing a local source.

According to media reports, the draft dodgers paid 10,000 euros each for a chance to cross into the neighboring country illegally to avoid fighting for the Kiev regime.

Ukrainian telegram channels later posted a video of the brutal detention where the men are forced to lie down on top of each other after being pulled out of the car and beaten.

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The Canadian Government has decided to lift its temporary pause in funding to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), Canada’s foreign ministry said.

“Today, the Honourable Ahmed Hussen, Minister of International Development, announced that Canada will be lifting its temporary pause on funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA),” Global Affairs Canada (GAC) said.

Canada believes UNRWA plays a vital role in the provision of humanitarian assistance to the over two million inhabitants of Gaza and more than four million in the region, GAC added.

Previously, alongside the United States, Australia, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Finland, Estonia, Japan, Austria, Romania, and the United Kingdom, Canada had suspended its donations to UNRWA following Israel's accusations that some of the agency's staff participated in the Hamas attacks on the Jewish state on October 7.

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Hungary has received 75.2 million euros ($82 million) in EU budget funding that was blocked under rule-of-law disciplinary proceedings, Finance Minister Mihaly Varga said.

"This time, 75.2 million euros (29.8 billion HUF) in funding has been received for green and digital transformation investment," Varga said on social media.

The newest handout brings the total amount of unlocked EU budget funds transferred to Hungary since the end of December to 550 billion forints ($1.5 billion), the minister estimated.

The European Union withheld some 7.5 billion euro worth of payments to Hungary from the shared budget in 2022 over alleged rule-of-law shortcomings, but Budapest's block on EU funding of Ukrainian war efforts made Brussels unlock some of the funds to Hungary in December.

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President Joe Biden used his State of the Union speech to blame the Republicans if Russia wins the war in Ukraine by claiming Kiev could have won or survived if the latest $61 billion arms package had not been blocked in Congress, former State Department official and consultant on US-Russia relations James Carden said.

"The way I heard the speech was Biden setting the ground to blame the Republicans for losing the war should they block further tranches of funding," Carden told Sputnik.

Biden's comments reflected his always primary concern with domestic politics and his obsession with getting reelected to a second term in November even though he is already 81 years old, Carden emphasized.

"I think he's a true believer and actually believes that his status as Warlord-in-Chief helps him politically," Carden explained.

The $61 billion package is being blocked by Republicans in the House of Representatives until Biden changes his policies on illegal immigration and agrees to crack down on it. But because the president is determined not to change course on that, he will not get more aid approved for Kiev, his opponents have clarified.

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US’ V-22 Osprey aircraft returns to the skies while the cause of deadly crash is still unknown

A temporary flight ban on the controversial V-22 Osprey aircraft has been lifted by the US military, but investigators are still working to nail down the cause of last year’s deadly crashes.

“We have high confidence that we understand what component failed and how it failed,” said Col. Brian Taylor of the US Marine Corps, one of three US service branches that operates the complex tilt rotorcraft. “I think what we are still working on is the why, and so that is still in the hands of the investigation.”

US officials hope revamped training and maintenance protocols can prevent a similar incident in the future, but clarified the plane will see no hardware changes before being returned to service. More than 50 US troops have been killed in accidents involving the V-22 Osprey since its initial deployment in 2007, including eight in the November crash off the coast of Japan that led to the most recent grounding.

Another deadly Osprey crash, also in the Pacific region, took place last year in Australia.

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