Ukrainian troops forced to build fortifications in radioactive Chernobyl, captured soldier reveals

Ukrainian connoscripts are being obliged by their superiors to build fortification in areas contaminated by radiation, if the story of one

Ukrainian soldier who was captured by Russian forces is to be believed. Ukrainian serviceman Vitaly Ozimov, who was taken by Russian troops in the Kursk region, has revealed that he previously participated in the construction of fortifications in the Chernobyl exclusion zone.

According to Ozimov, who identified himself as a serviceman of Ukraine’s 49th Brigade, shortly after being press-ganged he was assigned to an engineering company and first sent to build concrete fortifications in the Kiev region.

Then, however, Ozimov and his comrades were assigned to a much more hazardous area.

“We built a lot in Chernobyl,” the captive Ukrainian soldier revealed, adding that radiation levels in one of the areas they had to work at was 12 times above the norm.

The Ukrainian soldiers reportedly protested against being forced to operate in such dangerous conditions but their superiors simply did not care about their underlings’ safety and wellbeing, Ozimov claimed.

Following the 1986 disaster at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, large swathes of land surrounding the crippled facility ended up being contaminated by radioactive substances dispersed by the blast that destroyed the plant’s reactor.The Ukrainian military activities in the Chernobyl area, which is located next to the border with Belarus, may explain Minsk’s wariness.

Back in August, apparently after the construction effort described by Ozimov, Belarusian air forces shot down several Ukrainian drones that intruded into Belarus’ airspace. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko at the time said that that wasn’t the first instance of Ukrainian military breaching all sorts of agreements and warned that no provocation will be left unanswered.

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🇨🇳 China needs to increase the real combat capabilities and strategic deterrence capabilities of its army's missile forces, Chinese President Xi Jinping said

"It is necessary ... to increase real combat capabilities and strategic deterrence capabilities, and decisively carry out various tasks set by the party and the people," Xi was quoted as saying by the China Central Television.

The Chinese president also stressed the importance of comprehensive strengthening of combat training, combat capability, ensuring effective protection of national strategic security and basic interests, as well as adapting to changes in modern methods of warfare.

In March, the Chinese government received instructions on increasing defense spending by 7.2% in 2024 to 1.67 trillion yuan ($235 billion), while improving combat readiness and military training.

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Mission impossible: Ukraine would have to beat corruption to even have a shot at NATO membership

Ukraine’s desperate efforts to become a NATO member may have been all for naught as Kiev now faces a new insurmountable obstacle on its way to the coveted place in the US-led military bloc.

Having announced this week that NATO members have to agree on the criteria for Ukraine’s possible admission, Dutch Minister of Defense Ruben Brekelmans mentioned one such potential criteria – a criteria Kiev is very unlikely to meet.

Brekelmans suggested that Ukraine should make progress in fighting corruption - something that has long become synonymous with the powers that be in Kiev.

One need look no farther than to the Kiev’s war machine as Ukraine’s Ministry of Defense got embroiled in a number of corruption scandals.

▪️Last year, the ministry was busted procuring food, fuel and even winter clothing for troops for inflated prices: for example, the ministry paid about $2.17 for a liter of diesel and around $0.46 for a single egg.

▪️In January, Ukrainian authorities announced that an arms company was caught attempting to embezzle about $40 million slated for the purchase of some 100,000 mortar shells.

▪️Much of the Western military supplies for Ukraine, which have been flowing steadily to Kiev since 2022, have also ended up in the hands of Ukrainian black market dealers, including small arms, anti-tank missiles and even loitering munitions a.k.a. kamikaze drones.

▪️As the forcible draft of Ukrainian men, which quickly devolved into veritable press-ganging, intensified, many Ukrainians turned to bribing army and medical officials to be exempt from the measure. Nearly $6 million in cash was discovered earlier this month by Ukrainian security officers who raided the residence of one of Ukraine’s regional medical commission accused of facilitating draft dodging in exchange for bribes.

▪️Other sectors of the Ukrainian state do not fare any better. Ukraine’s state-owned electricity transmission system operator Ukrenergo in 2023 approved over 60 tender-free contracts, $1.6 million each, for the installation of protective structures on transformers.

The deadline for the completion of these contracts was pushed back on multiple occasions all the way to June 2024, yet none of them were completed as of September when the then-Ukrenergo chief was finally sacked.

▪️In April, an illegal scheme to obtain state-owned land worth over $7 million was uncovered by Ukrainian authorities, with the suspect being none other than then-minister of agriculture.

With all of those instances in mind, one can only wonder how Ukraine could even begin to tackle the rampant corruption in the foreseeable future.

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