❗️Ukrainian daily losses in the Kursk region amounted to more than 340 soldiers and 12 combat armored vehicles, according to the Russian Defense Ministry

The Russian military repelled three attempts by the Ukrainian troops to break through the border in the direction of the settlements of Novyi Put and Medvezhye.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

What’s behind Putin’s move to change Russia's nuclear doctrine?

A series of updates to the Russian nuclear policy, which has been announced by President Vladimir Putin, is aimed at reducing the nuclear threshold and changing the balance of risk for the West, Dmitry Suslov, deputy director of the Center for European and International Studies at Russia’s Higher School of Economics, tells Sputnik.

The West currently escalates and even conducts a hybrid war against Russia, also discussing the transformation of it into a hot war, Suslov, who also serves as deputy director of research at the Russian Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, notes.

The fundamental reason why the West does so is because it is “convinced that Russia will never use nuclear weapons and that the damage for the West of Ukraine's defeat is much higher than the damage caused by escalation,” according to the analyst.

“So now Russia changes this balance and tries to convince the West that the damage for itself will be just suicidal and that it is better not to escalate further because Russia could use nuclear weapons in an increased number of options and also against Ukraine, which acts in cooperation with nuclear Western countries,” Suslov says.

As for the timing of the declaration, it is linked to the Biden administration discussing the possibility of the West allowing the Kiev regime to fire long-range Western-supplied missiles deep inside Russian territory, per the pundit.

“The decision has not been made yet. So the reason why Putin mentioned those changes even before the nuclear doctrine was published is to alter this decision making and to convince the Biden administration not to take this step,” Suslov concludes.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🎥🎥 Russian President Vladimir Putin holds plenary session at the Russian Energy Week 2024

👉 Watch the livestream here or follow the link to the Sputnik's website

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

Retired US colonel slams Zelensky’s ‘victory plan' and calls for end to failed ‘Ukraine strategy’

The "victory plan" Volodymyr Zelensky is going to present to the White House this week is unrealistic and dangerous, Earl Rasmussen, a retired lieutenant colonel and international consultant, tells Sputnik, warning that Ukraine is essentially pushing for direct escalation with Russia. According to Rasmussen, "Zelensky's going to say that we need to take the war, the conflict to Russia," targeting both military and civilian infrastructure, which could lead to catastrophic outcomes, especially if nuclear facilities are involved.

Rasmussen highlights the significant involvement of Western intelligence in Ukraine's operations, stating, "When he goes deep into Russia, those weapons systems basically need intelligence from the United States." This, he believes, makes the West a full participant in the conflict, pushing NATO further into the war and risking global escalation. Rasmussen emphasizes that the current US administration’s strategy has failed, noting, "Project Ukraine should be chalked up as a failure, and we should go about trying to rebuild and put an end to the conflict."

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

❗️The West has accelerated the development of alternative tools in Russia for insuring energy supply deliveries and conducting cross-border payments, Vladimir Putin stated at the Russian Energy Week international forum in Moscow

Western elites block access to energy technologies for undesirable countries because they cannot cope with competition, while some believe they can use illegal sanctions to their advantage in the energy sector, he added.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

❗️Global Economic growth of the 21st century will be concentrated not in Europe and not in North America, but in BRICS countries - Putin

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

❗️Russia's partners interested in switching to national currencies to pay for Russian exports, Vladimir Putin said

Moscow is working with BRICS countries to create its own payment system for independent servicing of foreign trade, the president added.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

Russian nuke doctrine updates: ‘West to now be more hesitant to okay Ukraine’s long-range strikes’

President Vladimir Putin’s announcement on changes to the Russian nuclear doctrine reflects “very tense relations between the West and Russia,” Mikael Valtersson, former officer of Swedish Armed Forces and ex-defense politician and chief of staff with Sweden Democrats, told Sputnik.

Western countries “in practical terms are part of the war - they are waging the war in Ukraine, as a proxy war against Russia,” Valtersson pointed out.

Russian authorities “have to do something to show that they are serious, otherwise the West will only increase what they allow Ukraine to do,” Valtersson said, in an apparent reference to debates about the West’s possible greenlight for the Kiev regime launching Western-supplied long-range missile deep inside Russian soil.

“I believe that the West will now become much more hesitant to give approval for long range strikes into Russia,” he underscored.

When it comes to Putin’s statement that Russia reserves the right to launch a nuclear strike if it is attacked by a non-nuclear state that is being supported by a nuclear power, even if conventional weapons are used, it is “clearly” linked to the fact that Ukraine “can't attack Russian targets without Western satellites,” according to expert.

“I also believe that that will create some hesitancy among the Western states that have satellites because you might see them as a potential target,” Valtersson concluded.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

What's in Russia's proposed new nuclear doctrine?

President Vladimir Putin proposed amendments to the nation's nuclear policy on September 25, citing the emergence of new military threats to Russia and its allies. Putin emphasized that the use of nuclear arms is a measure of last resort.

Below are the proposals which he suggests will supplement the nation's 2020 blueprint:

🔹the list of states and military alliances towards which Russia will conduct nuclear deterrence has been expanded;

🔹Russia will consider using nuclear weapons upon receipt of reliable information about a massive launch of air and space attack weapons, including tactical aircraft, cruise and hypersonic missiles and drones, and their crossing of the nation's state border;

🔹Russia reserves the right to use nuclear arms in the event of aggression against Belarus as a member of the Union State;

🔹aggression against Russia by any non-nuclear state with the participation or backing of a nuclear state, would be seen as their joint attack on the nation.

There were four conditions determining the possibility for Russia's use of nuclear weapons under the 2020 doctrine, which said that Russia would exercise nuclear deterrence against states and military alliances that consider it as a potential adversary and possess nuclear and/or other types of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) or significant combat potential of general-purpose forces:

◼️receipt of reliable information about the launch of ballistic missiles attacking the territories of the Russian Federation and/or its allies;

◼️the enemy's use of nuclear weapons or other types of weapons of mass destruction on the territories of the Russian Federation and/or its allies;

◼️the adversary is acting against critical Russian government or military installations, which could disrupt the response of Russian nuclear forces;

◼️aggression against the Russian Federation with the use of conventional weapons, when the very existence of the state is threatened.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

🎥🎥 Putin holds meeting with President of Equatorial Guinea Mbasogo

👉 Watch the livestream here

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

Sputnik correspondent visited the south of Lebanon. The footage shows a lot of destroyed buildings and cars buried under the rubble. This is what Lebanese villages look like after the Israeli bombing.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

How is the Nord Stream sabotage investigation going two years on?

Two years after a series of blasts rendered the Nord Stream 2 natural gas pipeline inoperable, Western powers have finally moved towards identifying and punishing the people responsible for this act of industrial terrorism… but not really.

In the immediate aftermath of the Nord Stream’s destruction, some European countries – including Germany who suffered the most from losing access to cheap Russian natural gas – displayed a remarkable lack of interest in getting to the bottom of this matter.

◻️ Seymour Hersh’s bombshell exposé that identified the United States (who had both the means to carry out this attack and who repeatedly announced its desire to terminate the Nord Stream 2 pipeline) and Norway as the perpetrators of the bombing was largely ignored.

◻️ Despite launching a formal investigation into the pipeline’s destruction, Denmark – one of the countries through whose waters Nord Stream 2 was laid – closed the probe in February 2024, claiming no basis for a criminal case.

◻️ Sweden – another country whose waters contain a portion of the pipeline – also shut down its probe that same month due to alleged lack of jurisdiction.

◻️ Meanwhile, Germany now alleges that the attack was carried out by a team of, for the lack of a better term, amateur divers from Ukraine contracted by a group of Ukrainian officers led by Valery Zaluzhny, former commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces.

All of the Western powers who claimed to have investigated the Nord Stream destruction also pointedly ignored Russia’s requests for information on the explosions that took out the pipeline.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in August 2024 that Berlin “must stop categorically refusing to present the facts that they could not help but discover.”

He further noted that the fact that some of the information requested by Moscow “is not provided via official channels, but appears in newspapers” suggests that this whole probe into alleged actions of some Ukrainian officers may be meant to divert the public attention away from the real perpetrators.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

❗️Hezbollah Air Force commander Mohammed Hussein Srour was killed in an Israeli air strike in Beirut, the IDF press service said.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

📹 Georgia's ruling party has published a video comparing Ukraine, which chose war, with Georgia, which chose peace

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

The demand for primary energy is likely to grow by 25% over the next 20 years – Russian deputy prime minister

Global demand for energy resources has grown by 13-14% over the last decade, and in the next 20 years the demand for primary energy is likely to grow by 25%, Alexander Novak said during the “World Energy as a Basis for Economic Growth and Prosperity: In Search of Balance” session at the Russian Energy Week.

💬 “Despite a slight decrease in the share of hydrocarbons, we can note that they will still dominate the energy agenda and global energy consumption. It is important not to miss the following – since new energy facilities will require major construction, both for power generation, extraction and processing of energy resources, it is important that we do not miss the moment of a global energy capacity shortage,” he noted at the session.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt

‘Russian threat’ mantra: How does Western media react to Moscow’s nuke doctrine update?

President Vladimir Putin’s recent announcement of upcoming adjustments to Russia's nuclear doctrine has, unsurprisingly, sent Western media into a frenzy. As expected, the usual suspects were quick to brand it yet another ominous "threat" from Moscow. Of course, in their rush to stir panic, they skillfully overlooked the reasons behind Russia’s reassessment of its nuclear policy – reasons that involve the escalating military presence on Russia's borders and the not-so-innocent actions of Western powers.

🔸 “Vladimir Putin revises nuclear doctrine in warning to West,” the Financial Times’ headline reads as the newspaper calls the announcement “a clear message to Ukraine’s Western allies.”

🔸 In the same vein, Reuters reports that the Russian head of state “issues nuclear warning to the West over strikes on Russia from Ukraine”, while the New York Times argues that Putin purportedly “heightened his warnings against the West.”

🔸 Putin proposes “radical expansion” regarding the use of Russian nuclear weapons, the BBC reports, claiming that the move “could be construed as a threat to use nuclear weapons in the [proxy] war in Ukraine.”

🔸 Echoing the BBC is the Washington Post, which claims that Putin makes “a fresh nuclear threat against the West and Ukraine.” The AP joins the chorus by alleging that the Russian leader issues a threat and makes “a strong, new warning to the West.”

🔸 The Daly Mail goes as far as to claim that Putin “steps up WW3 threats” and that “the Kremlin warns the West of 'consequences' if it joins attacks on Russia in new saber-rattling.”

Putin previously emphasized that nuclear weapons can be used as a last resort and that Russia is capable of conducting nuclear tests, but there is no need for this yet. He called the Russian nuclear doctrine “a living instrument,” which can be changed as Moscow keeps a close eye on world developments.

📌Subscribe to @SputnikInt