❗️ The Russian Sever Battlegroup has improved its tactical position in the areas of Volchansk, Neskuchnoe, Liptsy and Veseloye in the Kharkov region, the Russian Defense Ministry has reported.

Enemy losses in this sector amounted to up to 250 people and two tanks over the day. Four Ukrainian multiple-launch rocket system (MLRS) were destroyed, including a Uragan, a Czech-made Vampire and a Croatian-made RAK-SA-12.

🇷🇺🪖 More statements from the briefing of the Russian Defense Ministry on the progress of the special military operation in Ukraine:

▪️ Russian air defenses shot down a Ukrainian Su-27 jet fighter overnight;

▪️ Units of Russian Vostok Battlegroup took more favorable positions and defeated a brigade of the Ukrainian National Guard;

▪️ Ukrainian forces lost up to 395 in fighting with the Russian Tsentr Battlegroup;

▪️ Russian Armed Forces struck Ukrainian forces' manpower and military equipment in 129 areas;

▪️ Russian air defense forces shot down six Tochka-U missiles, 39 shells of the Alder, Vampire and HIMARS systems, five Hammer bombs, five HARM missiles, four Storm Shadow missiles.

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❗️ Three people were killed and four injured as a result of shelling of Krasnodon in the Lugansk People's Republic, the head of the republic said

‘More lethal than ever’ – western media weeps about Ukrainian inability to intercept Russian missiles

Over the last six months, Ukrainian air defenses were able to intercept only 10 percent of Russian ballistic missiles, the WSJ reports.

Last month Ukraine managed to down only 30 percent of all missiles fired by Russia, the authors of the article say.

Firing large barrages, Russia overwhelms Ukrainian air defenses, rendering them unable to reload quickly.

The WSJ report added that even the most pessimistic Ukrainian statistics should be taken with a grain of salt, since interception data is used by Kiev regime “for propaganda purposes”.

Russia is producing up to 170 missiles per month. Ukrainian air defense systems are ineffective against ballistic missiles, a deficit that becomes even starker with hypersonic missiles.

Russia has carried out precision strikes on Ukrainian infrastructure in response to the terror bombing of the Crimean Bridge in October 2022, exclusively targeting only military and energy assets.

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Russian successes around Kharkov could push Ukraine into ceasefire, Western media reports

In the event of a potential loss of Kharkov, the Ukrainian forces, feeling "outnumbered and exhausted," may opt for truce negotiations, according to a report by the New York Times.

"Ukrainian troops are retreating, and Ukrainian commanders are blaming each other for the defeats. […] As anxiety spreads, some hard questions loom: How far will this go? Is it just a momentary setback for the underdog Ukrainians? Or a turning point?" the outlet writes.

The recent advances by the Russian Armed Forces in the area have greatly demoralized the Ukrainian soldiers, the article stresses.

Over the past week, the Russian forces have regained control of more than a dozen settlements in the Kharkov region, as stated by Russia's Defense Ministry.

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Things to go differently with Belousov as Russia's new defense minister, FT suggests

Andrei Belousov is "absolutely not corrupted. And that’s going to be very different from what we have now in the ministry of defense," an individual who is claimed to have known Russian President Vladimir Putin and the nominee for Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov for decades told the Financial Times.

"He’s a workaholic. He’s a technocrat. He’s very honest, and Putin knows him very well," the person added.

Earlier, Russian war correspondent Yuri Kotenок suggested that Belousov would audit the entire financial and economic block of the defense ministry.

"He is more than well versed in this. A professional economist of the top level," Kotenok wrote in his Telegram channel.

On May 12, Vladimir Putin put forward Andrei Belousov as his pick for Defense Minister.

The official served as the first deputy prime minister in the previous government.

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❗️ Russian parliament's lower house approves Denis Manturov as first deputy prime minister

The European Commission considers statements that the European Union wants a battlefield victory in Ukraine to be disinformation, despite the fact that this phrase was previously written by Josep Borrell, said EU foreign policy spokesman Peter Stano.

Borrell was the first European official to say that the conflict in Ukraine “must be won on the battlefield.” He wrote about it on April 9, 2022, on X (formerly Twitter) after a visit to Ukraine in the company of the head of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen.

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Russian parliament's lower house approves the following as deputy prime ministers:

🔸Dmitry Chernyshenko

🔸Marat Khusnullin

🔸Vitaly Saveliev

🔸Nikolai Patrushev

🔸Aleksey Overchuk

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The Russians just walked in, a Ukrainian officer in Kharkov tells the BBC

A BBC correspondent from Volchansk interviewed a Ukrainian army officer who complained that, most likely due to corruption in Ukraine, no fortifications were erected along the border of Kharkov Region.

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📹 Combat footage of the liberation of the village of Berdychi in the Donetsk People's Republic. The commander of the assault platoon with the call sign “Averik” related how the battle developed.

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As defense minister, Andrei Belousov is going to contol Russia's nuclear briefcase! Who else has access?

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How Putin's new pick for Russian defense minister predicted the 2008 economic meltdown

🔸Andrei Belousov, the incoming Russian Minister of Defense, also possesses a unique talent as an economist. As an economic theorist, he accurately predicted several financial crises.

🔸In 2005, Belousov utilized economic and mathematical models to calculate and forecast the financial crisis of 2008.

🔸In his report outlining various development scenarios for the country over the next 15 years, Belousov foresaw an economic crisis (which indeed transpired in 2008) and an economic recession (which occurred in 2011-2012). He also predicted another crisis in 2015-2017, all of which came to fruition.

🔸In particular, Belousov predicted that there would be an increase in social tension due to inflation and rising housing tariffs, a rise in the deficit of the pension system, and a crisis in the public administration system.

🔸In this instance, Belousov identified himself as a "government analyst" who believed in the competence of the state and advocated for active measures to mitigate economic downturns.

🔸Andrey Belousov has been involved in economic matters within the Russian government since 2006. In crisis years, there was an increase in the Russian GDP. Specifically, in 2008, Russia saw a growth of 5.6% in GDP, followed by 3.5% in 2012, and 3.6% in 2023.

🔸During the APEC summit in November 2022, Andrei Belousov highlighted that the world economy was on the cusp of a significant upheaval, foreseeing a "perfect storm period" in the years to come.

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