🎥 Russian President Vladimir Putin met with Pakistani Prime Minister Sharif in Astana. During their bilateral meeting, the Russian leader announced Moscow’s willingness to boost energy supplies to Pakistan and also emphasized the friendly development of bilateral relations between the two countries.

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The Raduga substation in Energodar was attacked by three Ukrainian drones, the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant press service said.

As a result of the attack, the city's power supply network was disrupted, along with the functioning of several facilities at the plant. Measures to ensure nuclear safety are being implemented in full, the plant staff said.

Eight people were injured, said Rosatom head Alexey Likhachev.

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❗️ WATCH: Putin speaks to Erdogan on SCO Summit's sidelines

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No power can force Slovakia to send its military to Ukraine, Defense Minister Robert Kaliniak said

He recalled Slovak Prime Minister Robnert Fico words in February that he would rather resign than allow his nation’s army to participate in the Ukrainian conflict.

Kaliniak noted that journalists laughed at Fico’s words, but time has shown that plans to send NATO troops to Ukraine are real.

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🎥 Russian President Putin and his Turkish counterpart Erdogan hold bilateral talks at Astana-hosted SCO Summit

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Most of Energodar was left without electricity and water, creating a significant threat to life support, the mayor said

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UK general election polls: warmongering Conservative Party set to lose

Brits are due to cast their votes on July 4, with polls suggesting 14 years of Conservative rule will come to end.

What could precipitate the Tories' defeat?

◾️ Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced elections on May 22 despite not having to seek a new mandate until mid-January 2025. The Tories were already trailing the rival Labour Party by double-digit percentages.

◾️ The latest UK general election polls shows the Labour leading on 40%, with the Tories on 21% followed by Reform UK — led by ‘Mr Brexit’ Nigel Farage — then the Liberal Democrats and Greens.

◾️ Some polls suggest the Conservatives might win fewer seats even than the Lib Dems and not even end up as the official opposition party.

◾️ While Labour predictably lead amongst the under-50s, a poll for The Telegraph shows the 50-64 year-old demographic also switching to Labour in the wake of Liz Truss' brief premiership. The Conservative have been been most affected by "scandals and missteps."

◾️ Tory support began to decline in in final stage of Boris Johnson's government and went into free-fall during Liz Truss' stint in Downing Street, amplified by post-Brexit challenges, the energy crisis, blowback from Russian sanctions and the Ukraine conflict.

◾️ Experts say Sunak hoped economic good news would play into the Tories' hands, but inflation remains above the 2% target at 2.3%, while the UK economy achieved just 0.6% growth in the first quarter of 2024 after a brief technical recession.

Sunak's looming electoral defeat mirrors French President Emmanuel Macron's debacle in the first round of legislative elections. Both leaders are outspoken supporters of arming Ukraine for a proxy conflict with Russia.

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❗️WATCH: Putin speaks to Xi on SCO Summit's sidelines

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⚔️ Recent Russian missile strike on strategic Ukrainian airfield exposes F-16’s vulnerability

NATO's promised F-16 jets to Ukraine may be targeted and destroyed by Russia's surgical strikes, similar to the recent attack that took out five Su-27 fighters at Mirgorod airfield, according to Dmitry Kornev, founder of the Military Russia site. Kornev explained to Sputnik that if the airfield where the Western-delivered aircraft are stationed is too far out of reach for Russia's Iskander missiles, they might use their Kinzhal hypersonic air-launched ballistic missile, which has a greater range.

The strike targeting Ukraine’s Su-27s was a triumph owing to several factors, Kornev clarified. There was “successful reconnaissance,” he noted, and the distance to the airfield allowed the Iskander missiles to reach the target.

The expert speculated that some of the jets might be theoretically restored, but for now, they are effectively out of action.

The raid on the Mirgorod airfield was described by Forbes as possibly “one of the costliest single days” for the Kiev regime. The publication mentioned an upsurge of Ukrainian bloggers who rushed to place the blame on the country’s air force officers for allowing crews to park the Su-27s in the open, so close to the front line.

Kornev suggested that the fate of the F-16s that the Netherlands will deliver to Ukraine will be similar to that of the Su-27 jets. He stated that Russia will rely primarily on intelligent reconnaissance and secondly on keeping its strike assets ready

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🇷🇺🇨🇳 We are not creating any blocs or alliances, we are simply acting in the interests of our peoples, Putin emphasized at negotiations with China's Xi Jinping at the SCO summit.

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🇨🇳🇨🇳 In-depth footage from Laos: The China's People's Liberation Army arrives in the South Asian country to participate in the Friendship Shield-2024 exercise, which will be held from July 5 to 18.

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The EU may renew the contract with Russia's Gazprom for gas supplies after 2024

Austria, Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic are concerned that the agreement between Gazprom and Ukraine's Naftogaz for the supply of Russian gas to Europe through Ukraine will expire on December 31 2024. The EU is considering negotiating a new gas transit deal with Gazprom, Germany's Handelsblatt reports.

“Transit through its territory depends on Ukraine. They have their own established rules. It depends on their desire. Russia is ready to supply,” Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said.

In March, Ukrainian Energy Minister German Galushchenko said Ukrainian authorities do not plan to renew the gas transit contract with Gazprom, which expires at the end of 2024.

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US President Joe Biden told a close ally he is wondering whether to stay in the election race, and understands the problems caused by his bumbling debate performance against Donald Trump, according to the New York Times.

The White House has already labelled the report a “lie”.

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During a meeting with Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, Vladimir Putin accepted his invitation to visit Kazakhstan in November.

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Belarus’ accession fortifies SCO's Eurasian element

The Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) is a platform with the potential “to become a strong trading and economic forum,” Dr. Anuradha Chenoy, a retired professor at the Center for Russian and Central Asian Studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University, told Sputnik.

"The SCO is a voluntary platform focusing on common economic and security interests (among its members), along with cultural understanding of one another. These countries do not believe in interference in domestic affairs,” she highlighted.

Belarus’ accession to the SCO “fortifies the undeniable Eurasian nature of the SCO,” Chenoy remarked. She suggested that the organization be seen as "both regional and Eurasian, since Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan straddle Eurasia, while India and China are clearly Asian. Iran is part of West Asia, and shows again the contiguity of geography that connects this region naturally." 

Commenting on how the expansion of the SCO may affect the collective West, Chenoy noted that “the idea of Eurasia, and the assertion of rights by formerly colonized people, do not go down well with them.”

"The collective West is divided by the Atlantic, and their idea of the West is based on being "exceptional", and possessing the right to dominate and set rules for the rest of the world - rules that primarily suit their Western elites.”

“The truth is, the global majority seeks pluralism and neither desires war nor seeks to threaten the West. That is only part of their (West) imagination - that the rise of Eurasia, or that of any other country, threatens them. Therefore, the expansion of the SCO may be challenged by forces in the West," speculated the analyst.

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Is Kamala Harris set to take over from Biden?

US Vice-President Kamala Harris' allies are discussing her possible candidacy if Joe Biden pulls out of the presidential election race, CNBC reports. They are said to be pushing other donors and party officials to reconsider the potential benefits of the current vice-president's "portfolio."

Dozens of US Democratic congress representatives are preparing an appeal to Biden to withdraw from the elections, writes Bloomberg.

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US Senator Laphonza Butler: Biden cannot be accused of being absent-minded because... everyone likes to sleep 🤷‍♂️

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White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre: "President Kamala Harris"

Are they not even hiding it anymore?

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