Ukraine Says Residents Coerced Into Russian Annexation Vote

Western nations and Ukraine say voting is a sham that began Friday on Russian referendums aimed at annexing four occupied regions of Ukraine. Some local officials said voters were being intimidated and threatened.

In the balloting, scheduled to run from Friday to Tuesday in the provinces of Luhansk, Kherson and the partly Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia and Donetsk regions, voters are being asked if they want their areas to become part of Russia.

Polls also opened in Russia, where refugees and other residents from those areas could vote.

The West and Ukraine said the voting is illegal under international law.

“Any elections or referenda on the territory of Ukraine can only be announced and conducted by legitimate authorities in compliance with national legislation and international standards,” the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe a said in a statement. “Therefore, the planned ‘referenda’ will be illegal.”

Ukrainian officials said people were banned from leaving some occupied areas until the vote was over, armed groups were going to homes to force people to cast ballots, and employees were told they could be fired if they did not participate.

Serhiy Haidai, Ukraine’s Luhansk governor, said in the town of Starobilsk, the population was banned from leaving and people were being forced out of their homes to vote.

“Today, the best thing for the people of Kherson would be not to open their doors,” said Yuriy Sobolevsky, the displaced first deputy council chairman of Kherson region.

The results of the referendums, expected soon after the voting, are almost certain to support joining Russia.  

“We are returning home,” said the Russian-backed leader of Donetsk, Denis Pushilin. “Donbas is Russia.”

“All of us have been waiting for a referendum on joining Russia for eight long years,” said Leonid Pasechnik, the Russian-backed leader of Luhansk. “We have already become part of Russia. There remains only a small matter – to win [the war].”

Ukraine says it will never accept Russian control of any of its territory.

The referendums were quickly organized after Ukraine earlier this month recaptured large swaths of the northeast in a counteroffensive.

By incorporating the four areas, Moscow could portray attacks to retake them as an attack on Russia itself – potentially even using that to justify a nuclear response.

In a televised address this week, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin said the West is trying to weaken and destroy Russia and that his country will “use all the means at our disposal to protect Russia and our people.”

With Putin’s announcement that he intends to call up 300,000 more troops for his “special military operation” in Ukraine, the Kremlin appears to be trying to regain the upper hand in the grinding conflict.

Russia’s mobilization campaign is not likely to generate effective soldiers and is creating a public backlash, according to a report by the Institute for the Study of War.

“Russian authorities are forcibly recruiting Russian citizens to fight in Ukraine on flimsy pretexts, violating the Kremlin’s promise to recruit only those with military experience,” the institute reported. “Russian authorities are also demonstrably mobilizing personnel [such as protesters] who will enter the war in Ukraine with abysmal morale,” it said.

Meanwhile, United Nations experts and Ukrainian officials have pointed to new evidence of war crimes in Ukraine. 

The head of a U.N.-mandated investigation body said Friday war crimes including rape, torture and confinement of children have been committed in Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.

“Based on the evidence gathered by the commission, it has concluded that war crimes have been committed in Ukraine,” Erik Mose, who heads the Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine, told the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva.

He did not specify who was to blame but the commission has focused on areas previously occupied by Russian forces, such as Kyiv, Chernihiv, Kharkiv and Sumy.

Investigators from the commission, created by the rights council in March, visited 27 places and interviewed more than 150 victims and witnesses.

They found evidence of a large number of executions, including bodies with tied hands, slit throats and gunshot wounds to the head, Mose said.

He also noted investigators had identified victims of sexual violence who were between the ages of four and 82. While some Russian soldiers had used sexual violence as a strategy, the commission “has not established any general pattern to that effect,” Mose added.

A U.S. envoy told the council, “Numerous sources indicate that Russian authorities have interrogated, detained and forcible deported between 900,000 and 1.6 million Ukrainian citizens.” 

U.S. Ambassador Michele Taylor, U.S. permanent representative to the council added, “We urge the commissioners to continue to examine the growing evidence of Russia’s filtration operations, forced deportations and disappearances.”

Russia denies deliberately attacking civilians.

Russia was called on to respond to the allegations at the U.N. Human Rights Council meeting but its seat was left empty. There was no immediate official reaction from Moscow.

Some information for this report came from The Associated Press and Reuters.

Thousands of Russians Flee Mobilization as Anti-War Protests Erupt

Thousands of Russians are trying to flee the country to escape conscription into the military. President Vladimir Putin announced the move in a televised address Wednesday, as Russian armed forces have been suffering significant losses in the invasion of Ukraine in recent weeks. Henry Ridgwell reports.

Russian Troops Have Committed War Crimes in Ukraine, UN Investigators Say

U.N. investigators say there is evidence that Russian forces who invaded Ukraine in February 2022 committed war crimes. The Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine presented its findings Friday to the U.N. Human Rights Council. 

The commission centered its inquiry on events from late February and March in the regions of Kyiv, Chernihiv, Kharkiv and Sumy. It says it documented many human rights violations, including the illegal use of explosive weapons, indiscriminate attacks in civilian areas, torture, and sexual and gender-based violence. 

Commission Chair Erik Mese said Russia’s illegal use of explosive weapons has caused immense suffering among the civilian population, and accounts for most of the deaths recorded by United Nations monitors.  

He said investigators were struck by the large number of executions in 16 towns and settlements they visited. 

“Common elements of such crimes include the prior detention of the victims as well as visible signs of executions on bodies, such as hands tied behind backs, gunshot wounds to the head, and slit throats,” Mese said. 

The commission interviewed more than 150 victims and witnesses. Mese said witnesses have provided consistent accounts of ill-treatment and torture. Some reported they had been transferred to prisons in the Russian Federation, where they were subjected to beatings, electric shocks, and other violations. 

Mese said investigations into cases of sexual and gender-based violence found the victims of sexual abuse by Russian soldiers ranged in age from four to 82 years. 

“The commission has documented cases in which children have been raped, tortured, and unlawfully confined,” Mese said. “Children have also been killed and injured in indiscriminate attacks with explosive weapons.” 

Anton Korynevych, ambassador-at-large for Ukraine Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said these crimes perpetrated by Russia must not go unpunished. He is calling for the establishment of a special tribunal with specific jurisdiction over the crime of aggression against Ukraine.  

The Russian Federation did not show up for the hearing, a fact that the president of the council said he deplores. 

Mese said the commission’s “attempts to engage in a constructive dialogue with Russian Federation authorities have, regretfully, so far not been successful, but we will persist in our efforts.” 

Reuters reports Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov defended Moscow’s war in Ukraine at the U.N. Security Council on Thursday. He accused Kyiv of threatening Russia’s security and “brazenly trampling” the rights of Russians and Russian speakers in Ukraine, adding that it “simply confirms the decision to conduct the special military operation was inevitable.” 

 

Ukrainian Boys Wounded in Russian Missile Strike Struggle to Recover

Russia’s war on Ukraine is taking a brutal toll on its people. VOA recently met two young brothers, ages 8 and 14, at a Lviv hospital. The two lost their parents and were severely injured in a Russian missile strike. Omelyan Oshchudlyak has the story. VOA footage by Yuriy Dankevych.

‘Crucial’ Vote Could Move Italy to Right; Many Might Boycott

Italians will vote on Sunday in what is being billed as a crucial election as Europe reels from repercussions of Russia’s war in Ukraine. For the first time in Italy since the end of World War II, the election could propel a far-right leader into the premiership.  

Soaring energy costs and quickly climbing prices for staples like bread — the consequences of Russia’s invasion of breadbasket Ukraine — have pummeled many Italian families and businesses.  

Against that bleak backdrop, Giorgia Meloni and her Brothers of Italy party — with neo-fascist roots and an agenda of God, homeland and Christian identity — appear to be the front-runners in Italy’s parliamentary election.  

They could be a test case for whether hard-right sentiment is gaining more traction in the 27-nation European Union. Recently, a right-wing party in Sweden surged in popularity by capitalizing on peoples’ fears about crime.  

Meloni’s main alliance partner is right-wing League party leader Matteo Salvini, who blames crime on migrants. Salvini has long been a staunch ideological booster of right-wing governments in Hungary and Poland.  

“Elections in the middle of a war, in the midst of an energy crisis and the dawn of what is likely to be an economic crisis … almost by definition are crucial elections,″ said Nathalie Tocci, director of Rome-based think tank the International Affairs Institute.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, who ordered Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, is gambling that “Europe will break” under the weight of economic and energy problems brought on by the war, Tocci told The Associated Press.  

Salvini, who draws his voter base from business owners in Italy’s north, has donned pro-Putin T-shirts in the past. Salvini has also questioned the wisdom of maintaining Western economic sanctions against Russia, saying they could hurt Italy’s economic interests too much.

The publication of polls was halted 15 days before Sunday’s vote, but before then they indicated Meloni’s party would be the biggest vote-getter, just ahead of the center-left Democratic Party headed by former Premier Enrico Letta.  

A campaign alliance linking Meloni to conservative allies Salvini and former Premier Silvio Berlusconi confers a clear advantage over Letta under Italy’s complex system of divvying up seats in Parliament.

Letta had hoped in vain for a campaign alliance with the left-leaning populist 5-Star Movement, the largest party in the outgoing legislature.

While it is a fraught moment for Europe, Sunday’s election could see modern Italy’s lowest-ever turnout. The last election, in 2018, saw record-low turnout of 73%. Pollster Lorenzo Pregliasco says this time the percentage could drop to as low as 66%.  

Pregliasco, who heads the YouTrend polling company, says Italy’s last three different governing coalitions have left Italians “disaffected, disappointed. They don’t see their vote as something that matters.”

The outgoing government is headed by former European Central Bank chief Mario Draghi. In early 2021, Italy’s president tapped Draghi to form a unity government after the collapse of the second ruling coalition of 5-Star leader Giuseppe Conte.

In what Pregliasco called an “apparent paradox,” polls indicate that “most Italians like Draghi and think his government did a good job.” Yet Meloni, the sole major party leader to refuse to join Draghi’s coalition, is polling the strongest.  

As Tocci put it, Meloni’s party is so popular “simply because it’s the new kid on the block.″  

Draghi has said he doesn’t want another term.  

To Meloni’s annoyance, voters are still concerned that she hasn’t made an unambiguous break with her party’s roots in a neo-fascist movement founded by nostalgists for dictator Benito Mussolini after his regime’s disastrous role in World War II. During the campaign, she declared that she is “no danger to democracy.”  

Some Italian political analysts say worries about the fascist issue aren’t their main concern.

“I am afraid of incompetence, not the fascist threat,″ said Roberto D’Alimonte, a political science professor at LUISS, a private university in Rome. ”She has not governed anything.”

Meloni served as youth minister in Berlusconi’s last government, which ended a decade ago.

Instead, her main right-wing coalition partner is worth worrying about, D’Alimonte told The AP.  

“Salvini will be the troublemaker, not Meloni,″ he said. “It is not Meloni calling for the end of sanctions against Russia. It is Salvini. It is not Meloni calling for more debt or more deficit. It is Salvini.”

But recent incidents have fed worries about Brothers of Italy.

A Brothers of Italy candidate in Sicily was suspended by his party after he posted phrases on social media showing appreciation for Hitler. Separately, a brother of one of Meloni’s co-founders was spotted giving what appeared to be the fascist salute at a funeral for a relative. The brother denied that.  

For years, the right wing has crusaded against unbridled immigration, after hundreds of thousands of migrants reached Italy’s shores aboard smugglers’ boats or vessels that rescued them in the Mediterranean Sea. Both Meloni and Salvini have thundered against what they see as an invasion of foreigners not sharing what they call Italy’s “Christian” character.

Letta, who wants to facilitate citizenship for children of legal immigrants, has, too, played the fear card. In his party’s campaign, ads on buses, half the image depicts a serious-looking Letta with his one-word motto, “Choose,” with the other half featuring an ominous-looking image of Putin. Salvini and Berlusconi have both expressed admiration for the Russian leader. Meloni backs supplying arms so Ukraine can defend itself.

With energy bills as much as 10 times higher than a year ago, how to save workers’ jobs ranks high among Italian voters’ worries.  

But with the exception of Salvini, who wants to revisit Italy’s closed nuclear power plants, candidates have largely failed to distinguish themselves in proposing solutions to the energy crisis. Nearly all are pushing for a EU cap on gas prices.

The perils of climate change haven’t loomed large in the Italian campaign. Italy’s tiny Greens party, a campaign partner of Letta, is forecast to capture barely a few seats in Parliament.

Russian- Orchestrated Voting Begins in Ukraine’s Occupied Regions

Russian-orchestrated voting has begun in occupied regions of Ukraine in referendums that ask voters if they want their regions to become part of Russia.

The voting began Friday in Luhansk, Kherson and partly Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia and Donetsk regions.

The voting, widely viewed as a way for Russia to justify the annexation of the regions, has been widely condemned by the West.

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe said the referendums are illegal.

“Any elections or referenda on the territory of Ukraine can only be announced and conducted by legitimate authorities in compliance with national legislation and international standards,” the OSCE said in a statement.  “Therefore the planned ‘referenda’ will be illegal.”

Friday’s voting follows Russian President Vladimir Putin’s announcement that he intends to call up 300,000 more troops for his “special military operation” in Ukraine.

Putin said in a televised address this week the mobilization of reserves, which followed Ukrainian gains in a counteroffensive in northeastern Ukraine, is necessary to protect Russia’s homeland and sovereignty.

Putin said the West is trying to weaken and destroy Russia, and that his country will “use all the means at our disposal to protect Russia and our people.”

Street protests against the mobilization erupted in Moscow and other Russian cities, with police arresting 1,300 demonstrators.

The British Defense Ministry said in its intelligence report Friday: “In the last three days, Ukrainian forces have secured bridgeheads on the east bank of the Oskil River in Kharkiv Oblast. … To the south, in Donetsk Oblast, fighting is ongoing as Ukrainian forces assault the town of Lyman, east of the Siverskyy Donets River, which Russia captured in May. The battlefield situation remains complex, but Ukraine is now putting pressure on territory Russia considers essential to its war aims.”

At UN, Security Council Members Reject Putin’s Annexation Plans

U.N. Security Council members on Thursday condemned Russia for escalating the war in Ukraine, criticizing its mobilization of more troops and President Vladimir Putin’s threat to use nuclear weapons.

“Every council member should send a clear message that these reckless nuclear threats must stop immediately,” U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken told a special session of the council’s foreign ministers held on the sidelines of the General Assembly’s annual gathering.

“This is a war of annexation. A war of conquest,” Britain’s new Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said, “to which President Putin now wants to send even more of Russia’s young men and women, making peace even less likely.”

Putin announced Wednesday that he is calling up 300,000 more troops for his “special military operation” in Ukraine.

“Yesterday, Putin announced mobilization. But what he really announced before the whole world was his defeat,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said. “You can draft 300,000 or 500,000 people, but he will never win this war. Today, every Ukrainian is a weapon, ready to defend Ukraine and the principles enshrined in the U.N. Charter.”

The Russian president has also announced plans to hold referenda in four occupied parts of Ukraine in an apparent attempt to annex them.

“It is an attempt to change internationally recognized borders by use of force — and no sham referendums can change that basic fact,” Ireland’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Minister Simon Coveney said. “It cannot be allowed to stand.”

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the council that the latest developments are “dangerous and disturbing.”

“The idea of nuclear conflict, once unthinkable, has become a subject of debate,” he said. “This in itself is totally unacceptable.”

Allies’ discomfort

Even Russia’s allies expressed their growing unease with the war’s direction.

“The trajectory of the Ukraine conflict is a matter of profound concern for the entire international community,” Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar said. “The future outlook appears even more disturbing. The nuclear issue is a particular anxiety.”

China’s foreign minister urged the parties to resume talks without preconditions.

“Include reasonable concerns into negotiations and put feasible options on the table so that talks can produce results and bring about peace,” Wang Yi said. He also urged the parties to “exercise restraint and avoid escalating tensions.”

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov did not listen to the criticism of his counterparts, leaving his deputy and a junior ambassador to fill his seat during most of the three-hour meeting. He showed up only to deliver his remarks.

Lavrov did not address the military mobilization or Putin’s latest nuclear threats. Of the referenda, he said they are the consequence of “Russo-phobic” statements by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who he said told people who feel they are Russian to go to Russia.

“I think the decisions that have been adopted by a whole range of regions of Ukraine about conducting referendums are the result of his advice,” Lavrov said of the planned votes in the south and east of Ukraine.

“We have no doubt that Ukraine has become a completely totalitarian, Nazi-like state where the norms of international humanitarian law are trampled on,” he added.

Accountability

Thursday’s meeting was originally called to discuss the atrocities that have come to light in Ukrainian cities after Russian troop withdrawals.

Mass graves have been found in several cities, including Bucha, Irpin, Mariupol and most recently Izium.

In April, Russian troops were driven out of Bucha, leading to the discovery of mass graves with hundreds of bodies.

Lavrov told council members that Bucha was a “propaganda operation,” and there is “no doubt in anyone’s mind” that it was staged.

The International Criminal Court has been mandated to investigate possible mass crimes in Ukraine. Chief prosecutor Karim Khan has conducted three field visits.

“When I went to Bucha and went behind St. Andrews Church, the bodies I saw were not fake,” he told the council.

In May, the ICC deployed teams of investigators to the country. He said the picture is troubling.

“One has seen a variety of destruction, of suffering and harm that fortifies my determination and my previous finding that there are reasonable grounds to believe the crimes within the jurisdiction of the court have been committed,” he said.

“Morally and politically, Russia has already lost the war,” European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell told the council. “And increasingly, it is losing on the battlefield, as well. Ukraine will prevail.”

Speaking at another event about accountability, Ukraine’s prosecutor-general said his office is investigating more than 35,000 war-related crimes, including attacks on civilian infrastructure, indiscriminate shelling, murders, torture, sexual violence and forced mobilization.

“These numbers will increase as we de-occupy towns and cities in the east and south of the country and new crimes are revealed,” Andriy Kostin said.

In his video speech to the General Assembly on Wednesday, Zelenskyy called for a special tribunal to be established to punish Russia and demanded financial compensation for the destruction its invasion has caused.

Peace calls

In March, the International Court of Justice ruled that Russia had wrongfully claimed a genocide in Ukraine to justify its invasion and ordered it to suspend its military operation. Russia has rejected the court’s jurisdiction.

The U.N. General Assembly also overwhelmingly demanded on March 2 that Russia immediately and unconditionally stop its military operations and withdraw its troops from the internationally recognized borders of Ukraine.

At the Security Council, Mexico’s foreign minister offered a proposal from his president to form a committee of nations to support U.N. mediation efforts to end the war. Marcelo Ebrard Casaubon said it would include several leaders, including Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Pope Francis.

“The objective would be very clear: generating new mechanisms for dialogue and creating additional spaces for mediation that foster trust, reduce tensions and open the path to lasting peace,” he said.

After the council meeting, Ukraine’s foreign minister said he would discuss the proposal with Ebrard at a meeting later in the day.

Italy Poised to Elect First Female Leader Amid Concerns Over Neo-Fascist Roots

Italians head to the polls this Sunday to choose a new government, after the collapse of the ruling coalition led by Mario Draghi.

A right-wing party with past links to fascism looks set to win the most votes, raising concerns among allies.

Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy party is leading the polls with around 25% of the vote. The 45-year-old is on course to become Italy’s first female prime minister. She has a simple campaign message.

“My greatest desire is to lift up, to lift our nation up again from decline,” Meloni told Reuters in a recent interview.

Neo-fascism

Brothers of Italy traces its roots to neo-fascism after 1945. In her teenage years, Meloni was a far-right activist who praised fascist dictator Benito Mussolini. She says she has changed.

“When the election campaign opens, the fascist alarm goes off. As you can understand, it’s quite ridiculous to retrieve videos of what I thought when I was 15, 16 or 17,” Meloni said.

Meloni has overseen a sixfold increase in support for her party since the last election.

“In part it’s about her policy platform, her socially conservative views, her economic views — which are also quite social in a way in terms of, for example, raising people’s pensions or benefits,” said analyst Luigi Scazzieri of the Centre for European Reform.

“But it’s also in large part due to her own personal appeal. And I would single out here, for example, her way of talking, which is very down to earth. It’s very effective in connecting with ordinary voters,” Scazzieri added. “Finally, she also benefits from not having been anywhere near government for the past 10 years, and so she can credibly say that she represents something new.”

That’s not true of her likely coalition partners.

Salvini, Berlusconi

Among the coalition partners is Matteo Salvini, the outspoken populist former interior minister and leader of the League Party. While in government, he oversaw a crackdown on migrants arriving on Italy’s southern shores from North Africa.

He is currently on trial on kidnapping charges stemming from an incident in 2019 in which he is accused of preventing more than 100 migrants who were rescued by a charity vessel from landing in Italian ports, which he denies. Salvini has pledged further tougher border controls if his party enters government again.

Political veteran Silvio Berlusconi, who turns 86 four days after the election, will also likely be part of the right-wing coalition as leader of the Forza Italia party. He was thrown out of office 10 years ago after a sex scandal and was stripped of his Senate seat in 2013 over a tax fraud case. He has survived major heart surgery and prostate cancer. In 2021, he nearly died from COVID-19.

On the campaign trail, all three members of the likely right-wing coalition have launched attacks on the European Union and pledged to stand up for Italy’s national interests in Brussels.

The European Union fears Italy could become a political headache, Scazzieri said. The fears are partly due to “the state of Italy’s economy — the fact that its public debt is over 150% of GDP,” he said. “There’s also concerns because of Meloni’s past in the post-fascist Italian social movement, of whether she might have a very authoritarian streak — for example, whether Italy might become more like Hungary and Poland.”

However, Scazzieri said, the EU fears may be unfounded.

“If you read the coalition program, it’s quite clear that they tried to present a very moderate face. They make very clear that this is a government that will stick to its obligations in the EU, in the euro and in NATO,” he told VOA. “The reality is that Italy can ill afford confrontation with the EU because of the relative weak state of its economy.”

Russia-Ukraine

In the past, the Italian far right has had close links to Moscow. However, Meloni has repeatedly stated her support for Ukraine.

“Our standing in the Western field is crystal clear, as we have demonstrated once again by condemning — without ifs and buts — Russia’s brutal aggression against Ukraine and by helping, from the opposition, to strengthen Italy’s position in European and international forums,” Meloni said in a campaign video on August 10.

For many Italians, the economy, jobs and the rising cost of living are the biggest concerns. Food banks report a sharp rise in the number of people needing help just to survive.

In Italy’s south, economic prospects have long lagged behind the richer north. Antonio Mela, a retired barman from the city of Salerno in Campania, started visiting the local soup kitchen run by the Catholic charity Caritas after the price of food increased sharply in recent months.

“I have a very small pension. I pay the rent, the electricity bill, and then I’ve got nothing left over for food. That’s the situation,” Mela told Agence France-Presse.

The centrist coalition led by former Prime Minister Enrico Letta is trailing in the polls by around 15%. The bloc insists it can still win.

The government that emerges from Sunday’s vote will be Italy’s 70th administration since 1945. Many observers say the coalition led by Meloni is already showing signs of political instability — and Italy could soon face another election.

Agence France-Presse contributed to this report.

Possible Sanction Risk Forces Turkish Banks to Act on Russian Payment System

Two private banks in Turkey suspended their use of Russian payment system Mir earlier this week following warning signals from the United States. 

The system, a rival to the Belgium-based SWIFT network, is not directly targeted by sanctions. But U.S. officials say there is a worry that Russia is expanding its use of Mir to try to evade sanctions. Experts say banks that allow the expanded use of Mir could trigger secondary sanctions. 

Reuters news agency reports the issue is expected to be discussed Friday at a meeting of top officials including Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. 

Turkey’s largest private lender, Is Bankasi, said on Monday that it halted the use of the Russian payment system while it assessed the new guidance from the U.S. Department of the Treasury. 

Denizbank, another private lender in Turkey, said on the same day that it was no longer able to provide service for the Russian payment system Mir. Denizbank, currently owned by Emirates NBD, was controlled by Russian Sberbank until 2019.  

‘Heightened risk’ 

The decision by two banks announced within hours of each other follows additional sanctions and further guidance by the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, known as OFAC. 

Responsible for enforcing economic sanctions designated by the U.S., OFAC said in a statement earlier this month that Russia is trying to find new ways to process payments in response to crippling western financial sanctions. 

“Directly and indirectly, Russia’s financial technocrats have supported the Kremlin’s unprovoked war. Today’s designations target those efforts,” the statement said. 

Although the two Russian financial systems themselves are not currently blocked entities under the Russian Harmful Foreign Activities Sanctions Regulations, Treasury has warned banks that expanded agreements with them risk supporting Russia’s efforts to evade U.S. sanctions. 

Sanctions evasion concern 

The Mir payment system was developed by Russia in 2014 as an alternative to the rival SWIFT payments messaging service that supports payments in more than 200 countries. Mir further expanded after two credit card giants, Mastercard and Visa, blocked services to Russian financial institutions in compliance with Western sanctions. 

When asked about their reaction to the Turkish bank’s suspension, a senior administration official said in a statement to VOA that the steps these Turkish banks took “make a lot of sense.” 

“Cutting off Mir is one of the best ways to protect a bank from the sanctions risk that comes from doing business with Russia,” the senior official said Tuesday. 

U.S. officials say they expect more banks to cut off Mir, “because they don’t want to risk being on the wrong side of the coalition’s sanctions.” 

Experts speaking to VOA say the OFAC guidance aims to prevent the systems from being used to evade U.S. sanctions. 

They say the recent move by Turkey’s two banks to suspend Mir reflects their effort to avoid any possible sanctions risk as the West ramps up economic measures against Russia. 

State Department’s former coordinator for sanctions policy, Daniel Fried, who crafted U.S. sanctions against Russia following its aggression in Ukraine in 2014, told VOA that the two Turkish banks were “acting rationally in an abundance of caution.” 

Fried, who is also the former U.S. Ambassador to Poland and currently a senior fellow with the Washington-based Atlantic Council, said the OFAC guidance indicates “there is a degree of risk” for dealing with Mir. 

Timothy Ash, an emerging market analyst with London-based Bluebay Asset Management, thinks that the two banks have realized that the business might not be worth the risk of getting caught in possible secondary sanctions. 

Three other lenders in Turkey — Halkbank, Vakıf Bank and Ziraat Bank, which are all state owned — are also using Mir. 

Halkbank is already tied up in a case where U.S. prosecutors accuse the bank of evading sanctions against Iran. The case has been one of the issues straining U.S.-Turkish relations. 

“The state-owned banks will take the lead from the government,” Ash said in the comments he sent to VOA on Wednesday. “Maybe the Turkish government will just limit Mir transactions through that institution to limit broader risks and damage to the Turkish banking system.” 

Steve Hanke, professor of applied economics at Johns Hopkins University, who served on former President Ronald Reagan’s Council of Economic Advisors, said it’s hard to predict whether the three Turkish state banks will also drop the system. 

He told VOA that cutting off Mir completely might indirectly impede Russian visitors at a time when Turkey needs the revenue. 

System popular with Russian visitors 

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s order to call-up 300,000 reservists on Wednesday has sparked an exodus of thousands from the country. 

According to Russia’s popular flight booking platform, Aviasales, direct flights from Moscow to Turkey’s Istanbul and Armenian capital Yerevan were sold out on Wednesday.

Russian payment system Mir is frequently used by Russian tourists in Turkey. 

The Moscow Times reported earlier this week that the Russian association of tour operators, ATOR, recommended Russians travel to Turkey with cash in hand due to “shrinking card payment options.” 

Pressure expected to grow 

According to a Financial Times report last week, Brussels is also preparing to express its concerns about Russian-sanctions evasion risks for Turkish officials. 

EU’s financial services commissioner, Mairead McGuinnes, is expected to visit Turkey next month. 

Former U.S. sanctions coordinator Fried predicts the United States is going to devote a lot of sources to “drying up the channels of Russians.” 

“I think the pressure from the U.S. to go after sanctions evaders will grow. The countries in Central Asia and South Caucuses will start to pay more attention to what their banks are doing to avoid falling afoul of sanctions,” he told VOA. 

This story originated in VOA’s Turkish Service. 

Women in Turkey Protest Iranian Woman’s Death

A group of Iranians living in Istanbul and Turkish citizens gathered Wednesday in front of the Iranian Consulate in Istanbul to protest the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini in police custody in Tehran.

Istanbul police, who on Tuesday repeatedly dispersed groups that gathered in Taksim Square, watched the action from afar.

During the demonstration, at least three women cut their hair to protest the treatment of Amini, who was detained by Iran’s morality police because she didn’t wear her headscarf correctly and therefore her hair was showing.  She later died while in custody.

Protesters shouted slogans in Persian, Turkish and Kurdish. The Turkish chants included, “We do not keep silent, we do not fear, we do not obey,” and “My body, my decision.”

The Persian and Kurdish slogans included, “Women live freely” and “We do not want a mullah regime.”

Banners carried by the group of about 300 people included harsh criticism against Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and the Iranian regime.

Mahdi Sağlar, one of the Iranians who participated in the protest, has been living and working in Turkey for 20 years.

“They beat a girl to death because her hair was showing,” Sağlar told VOA Turkish. “Their own children dress as they want in Europe and America, they behave as they want, but in Iran, they arrested her because her hair is out, and they killed her by causing a brain hemorrhage with a blow to the brain at the police station. We are here to protest this. Our citizens in Iran are protesting here on the street as well.”

Gelare Abdi, another Iranian protester, said that although she loves her homeland very much, she can’t live in her country due to heavy pressure.

“I need freedom,” she said. “But I have no freedom in Iran. I have been here in Turkey for two years out of necessity. … They killed Mahsa because her hair was showing a small forelock. She was just 22 years old. I am also a woman and I want freedom.”

This story originated with VOA’s Turkish Service.

US City Rushes to Help Sister City in Southwestern Ukraine

Chrystia Sonevytsky of Arlington, Virginia, says she has always felt a connection with Ukraine, where her roots are. She successfully advocated for a sister city agreement between Arlington and Ivano-Frankivsk in southwestern Ukraine, and the two forged a partnership in 2011. When Russia invaded Ukraine, Arlington was quick to offer help. Maxim Moskalkov has the story. VOA footage by David Gogokhia.

EU Pledges Military Support for Ukraine, Considers New Russian Sanctions

European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said EU foreign ministers have agreed to continue and increase their military support for Ukraine and to study a new package of sanctions targeting Russian individuals and certain sectors of the Russian economy.

Borrell told reporters late Wednesday after convening a special ministerial meeting in New York that the details of the sanctions package still need to be determined by EU representatives, but that he is sure there will be unanimous support.

He said it was important for the ministers to meet and send a “powerful message” on the same day that Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the partial mobilization of his country’s military reserves, and that Putin is “trying to destroy Ukraine.”

Borrell said that in addition to “the immense suffering brought by the Russian aggression upon the Ukrainian people, Russia has chosen to further extend the cost of war also for their own Russian population.”

He said Putin’s apparent reference to Russia’s willingness to use nuclear weapons if necessary to protect itself represented “an irresponsible and cynical attempt to undermine our steadfast support to Ukraine.”

“These threats jeopardize in an unprecedented scale international peace and security,” Borrell said.  “But they will not shake our determination.  They will not shake our resolve, our unity to stand by Ukraine and our comprehensive support to Ukraine’s ability to defend its territorial integrity and sovereignty as long as it takes.”

Putin said in a televised address Wednesday the mobilization of reserves, which followed Ukrainian gains in a counteroffensive in northeastern Ukraine, is necessary to protect Russia’s homeland and sovereignty.

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said the military would be calling up 300,000 reservists.

Putin said the West is trying to weaken and destroy Russia, and that his country will “use all the means at our disposal to protect Russia and our people.”

“In its aggressive anti-Russian policy, the West has crossed every line,” he said. “This is not a bluff. And those who try to blackmail us with nuclear weapons should know that the weathervane can turn and point towards them.”

Putin also reiterated Russia’s goal in its now seven-month-old invasion of Ukraine is to “liberate” Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region, saying the people there do not want to be part of Ukraine.

The separatist leaders of the Moscow-controlled Luhansk and Donetsk regions in the Donbas said Tuesday they are planning to hold votes starting Friday for the territories to declare themselves as part of Russia.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy dismissed what he called “Russia’s attempts to stage new sham referenda.”

“The situation on the front line clearly indicates that the initiative belongs to Ukraine,” Zelenskyy said in his nightly address Tuesday. “Our positions do not change because of the noise or any announcements somewhere. And we enjoy the full support of our partners in this.”

Since early September, Kyiv’s forces have swiftly recaptured large swaths of land in the Kharkiv region of northeast Ukraine that Russian troops took over in the early weeks of the war. The Russian-occupied Kherson region of southern Ukraine and the partly occupied Zaporizhzhia region are also voting on becoming part of Russia.

Some information for this story came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters. 

North Korea Denies Selling Weapons to Russia

North Korea on Thursday denied sending weapons to Russia, accusing the United States of spreading rumors about such a sale to tarnish Pyongyang’s image.

U.S. officials earlier this month said Russia was in the process of “purchasing millions of rockets and artillery shells from North Korea for use on the battlefield in Ukraine.”

In a statement posted in the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), a North Korean defense ministry official rejected the U.S. accusation.

“We have never exported weapons or ammunition to Russia before and we will not plan to export them,” said the vice director general of the North Korean defense ministry’s General Bureau of Equipment, according to KCNA.

“We warn the U.S. to stop making reckless remarks pulling up the DPRK and to keep its mouth shut,” he added, using an abbreviation for North Korea’s official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

Earlier this month, a senior Russian diplomat also rejected the allegation as fake.

U.S. officials did not provide any evidence of the arms sale and did not confirm whether the transaction was ever completed. However, many Western analysts said such a transaction would make sense.

Not only does Russia likely need to replenish its reserve weapons stockpiles following six months of fighting, Moscow is also searching for more international support for its invasion of Ukraine.

According to U.S. officials, Russia’s alleged weapons purchase indicates Moscow suffers from severe supply shortages because of international sanctions put in place following Russia’s invasion.

Russia is also struggling to hold territory, after Western-backed Ukrainian forces launched a counter-offensive earlier this month.

Over the past several months, Russia has touted closer ties with North Korea.

Earlier this month, Russian state media reported that Moscow-backed separatists in Ukraine are in negotiations to bring North Korean builders to the “Donetsk People’s Republic.”

Such a deal would violate United Nations Security Council resolutions related to hiring North Korean workers overseas. U.N. sanctions also prohibit the export of North Korean weapons. The sanctions were passed in response to North Korea’s development of a nuclear weapons program.

If Russia were to move ahead with either the weapons or labor deal, it would likely reflect a major shift in Moscow’s approach to North Korea sanctions, signaling an effective end to the U.N. sanctions regime against Pyongyang, analysts have warned.

In its statement Thursday, North Korea’s defense ministry reiterated that Pyongyang does not acknowledge the U.N. resolutions. Every country, it said, has the right to develop and export its own weapons.   

Biden Condemns Russia’s War Before UN as Putin Escalates Threats

US President Joe Biden called out Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine at the United Nations as the Russian president significantly escalated war efforts and threatened nuclear retaliation. White House Correspondent Anita Powell, who is traveling with Biden, reports from New York.

Experts: Putin’s Mobilization Breaks Pact with Russian People

Top US officials are calling Russian President Vladimir Putin’s plans to mobilize 300,000 Russian troops to fight in Ukraine a sign of weakness that could increase opposition to the conflict inside his own country. VOA’s Senior Diplomatic Correspondent Cindy Saine reports.

Russia Must Be Punished for Invasion, Ukraine’s Zelenskyy Tells UN

Ukraine’s president demanded Wednesday that Russia be punished for its illegal war against his people, telling world leaders that Moscow will be forced to end the war it started.

“A crime has been committed against Ukraine, and we demand just punishment,” Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a prerecorded video address. Member states had voted to allow him to send his speech to the U.N. General Assembly because he could not travel there in person.

He said Moscow must pay for its February 24 invasion and the subsequent bombings and reported atrocities it has carried out against his people, of whom thousands have been killed and millions displaced.

“A special tribunal should be created to punish Russia for the crime of aggression against our state,” he said.

Zelenskyy spoke passionately in English throughout his nearly half-hour-long remarks. His wife, first lady Olena Zelenska, was at Ukraine’s table in the General Assembly Hall, accompanied by the country’s prime minister, foreign minister and U.N. ambassador.

Russia sent a deputy ambassador and another junior diplomat to observe the proceedings.

Preconditions for peace

Zelenskyy laid out what he said were his five preconditions for peace.

“Punishment for aggression, protection of life, restoration of security and territorial integrity, security guarantees, and determination to defend oneself,” he said. “This is the formula of crime and punishment.”

That includes monetary reparations from Moscow, he said, “one of the most terrible punishments for Russian officials who value money above everything else.”

He said that Ukraine wants peace, and only one country — Russia — does not.

“We are ready for peace, but true, honest and fair peace,” he said.

Russia, he said, is afraid of “real negotiations” and suggests them only to slow its retreat from Ukraine.

“They talk about the talks but announce military mobilization,” he noted.

President Vladimir Putin of Russia said earlier Wednesday he was calling up 300,000 more soldiers to fight in the war. He also announced referenda in four occupied areas of Ukraine in the coming days.

Countries can no longer stay on the sidelines, Zelenskyy said.

“Those who speak of neutrality, when human values and peace are under attack, mean something else. They talk about indifference — everyone for themselves,” he said.

He said his country had exercised its right to self-defense under the U.N. Charter and called on nations to support its fight.

“For us, this is a war for life,” he declared. “That is why we need defense support — weapons, military equipment and shells; offensive weapons, a long-range one is enough to liberate our land; and defensive systems, above all, air defense.”

He promised that with adequate arms, his people could return the Ukrainian flag to all its territories.

“But we need time,” he said.

He ended his address with what has become Ukraine’s familiar rallying cry: “Slava Ukraini” — “Glory to Ukraine” — and was met with nearly a minute of applause from the crowded assembly hall, some delegates rising to their feet.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov will deliver his address in person on Saturday. He is also likely to have strong words for Kyiv at a ministerial-level U.N. Security Council meeting on Thursday. The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court will brief members at that meeting.

At UNGA, Biden Condemns Russia’s War on Ukraine as Putin Escalates Threats 

U.S. President Joe Biden called out Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine at the United Nations, as the Russian leader significantly escalated war efforts and threatened nuclear retaliation.

Speaking to the annual gathering of the U.N. General Assembly (UNGA) in New York Wednesday morning, Biden used most of his address to condemn Moscow.

“Let us speak plainly. A permanent member of the United Nations Security Council invaded its neighbor, attempted to erase a sovereign state from the map,” Biden said. “Russia has shamelessly violated the core tenets of the United Nations Charter, no more important than the clear prohibition against countries taking the territory of their neighbor.”

In the biggest escalation of the Ukraine war since Russia’s February 24 invasion, hours before world leaders gathered at the U.N. headquarters, Putin in Moscow announced the partial mobilization of his country’s military, calling up 300,000 reservists and vowing he would consider all options to protect what he considers Russian territory, raising concerns of a nuclear attack.

“If the territorial integrity of our country is threatened, we will without doubt use all available means to protect Russia and our people – this is not a bluff,” Putin said in a televised address to the nation.

Biden called out Putin’s “overt nuclear threats against Europe” as a “reckless disregard for the responsibilities of the Non-Proliferation regime” – the various international treaties that prohibit the use of nuclear weapons.

“And the Kremlin is organizing a sham referendum to try to annex parts of Ukraine, an extremely significant violation of the U.N. Charter,” he added, referring to Putin’s move to hold referendums on four occupied Ukrainian regions to join Russia, widely seen as a prelude to annexation of those territories.

The Russian leader’s announcement came after his troops suffered battlefield setbacks in northeastern Ukraine and came at a fortuitous time for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and his Western allies, who were concerned that war fatigue had set in among U.N. members gathering this week, observers noted.

“You never want to talk about escalation, particularly when they’re vague nuclear threats, as a positive thing,” said David Bosco, who teaches international studies with a focus on the U.N. Security Council at Indiana University. “But from a diplomatic standpoint for Ukraine and for Ukraine’s backers, I do think this helped sharpen the focus on that conflict and also probably had the effect of isolating Russia to an even greater degree than it’s already been isolated,” Bosco told VOA.

Zelenskyy was to deliver remarks Wednesday afternoon. Last week, a majority of the General Assembly’s 193 member states allowed the Ukrainian leader an exception to U.N. rules that say speeches in this year’s high-level session must be delivered in person.

Belarus, Cuba, Eritrea, Nicaragua, North Korea and Syria supported Russia in voting against allowing Zelenskyy’s video speech. Since Putin is not attending in person, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov will make the address on behalf of his country on Saturday, as ministers are given later speaking slots than leaders.

Traditionally, as host, U.S. presidents always speak second after Brazil, but Biden forfeited his Tuesday speaking slot as he was returning from London, where he attended Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral.

China

In his UNGA remarks, Biden called out Beijing’s “horrible abuses against pro-democracy activists and ethnic minorities” in China’s Xinjiang region and “the increased repression of women and girls by the Taliban in Afghanistan.”

Human rights groups have accused China of detaining more than 1 million minorities in camps, restricting freedom of movement, and engaging in torture, forced sterilization and sexual violence under the guise of Beijing’s campaign against religious extremism in Xinjiang. China has denied the accusations.

Biden touched on other global conflicts, including the war in the Tigray region of Ethiopia, the violence in Haiti and political oppression in Venezuela, and reiterated support for a two-state solution between Israel and the Palestinian people.

As negotiations stalled, Biden said the United States will never allow Tehran to obtain nuclear weapons. He also said the U.S. stands with “the brave women of Iran,” in reference to protests this week over the death of 22-year-old Iranian woman Mahsa Amini, under suspicious circumstances after she was arrested in Tehran by the morality police – a unit that enforces headscarves and strict dress codes for women.

Authorities have denied that Amini suffered any mistreatment at their hands and say heart problems caused her death. Her family said she had no history of heart trouble.

Security Council reform

In a jab to Russia, which has used its veto power to block Security Council action on Ukraine, Biden said UNSC members including the United States should refrain from wielding the veto, “except in rare, extraordinary situations,” to ensure that the council remains credible and effective.

“Russia’s use of the veto in the Ukraine situation has really brought new attention to veto and it’s obviously very unpopular with the U.N. members as a whole,” Bosco said.

In his remarks, Biden threw his support behind expansion of the membership of the Security Council “to become more inclusive, so they can better respond to the needs of today’s world.”

“This includes permanent seats for those nations we have long supported and permanent seats for countries in Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean,” he said.

By showing that it’s open to reform, the administration hopes it can put China and Russia in a corner, said Richard Gowan, U.N. director at the International Crisis Group. “The U.S. will want to highlight the fact that they are blocking improvements to the U.N.,” Gowan told VOA.

Observers have voiced skepticism that progress on the decades-long UNSC reform debate is imminent. The U.N. Charter must first be amended, which requires a two-thirds vote of its members, and any reform must be agreed to by the five permanent members with veto power.

Last week, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., Linda Thomas-Greenfield, noted that since 2009, Russia has cast 26 vetoes and that in 12 cases it was joined by China, while the U.S. has used its veto only four times since 2009.

Food security and global health

Global food prices have dramatically increased because of supply chain disruptions and rising energy and fertilizer costs brought upon by the pandemic and exacerbated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Biden announced more than $2.9 billion would be used to address global food insecurity, in addition to the $6.9 billion already committed by the administration this year, according to the White House.

“A multiyear drought in the Horn of Africa has created a dire humanitarian emergency, with parts of Somalia at risk of famine for the second time in just over a decade. This new announcement of $2.9 billion will save lives through emergency interventions and invest in medium- to long-term food security assistance in order to protect the world’s most vulnerable populations from the escalating global food security crisis,” the White House said in a statement.

On Tuesday, the U.S. convened a Global Food Security Summit co-chaired by Secretary of State Antony Blinken with the leaders of the European Union, African Union and Spain, and hosted with Colombia, Germany, Indonesia and Nigeria.

Beyond aid, the world needs a much more robust international agenda to meet the U.N. goal of ending hunger by 2030, which it is currently not on track to meet, said Rob Vos, economist at the International Food Policy Research Institute.

“We do need a lot more investments in food systems for the coming decades to make them more resilient,” Vos said in an interview with VOA, “to monitor much more closely the risk of food crisis from breaking out.”

Later Wednesday, Biden delivers remarks at a Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria replenishment conference. His administration has proposed a $6 billion pledge over the next three years to meet the $18 billion the Global Fund is seeking to fight the three diseases.

The Global Fund has helped reduce AIDS-related deaths by 70 percent and new infections by 54 percent, but the gains are fragile, according to the ONE Campaign, a group working to end preventable diseases by 2030.

“In just two years, two decades of progress against AIDS slammed on the brakes as COVID-19 and other global crises took center stage,” ONE Campaign’s president, Tom Hart, said in a statement.

ONE’s analysis shows that falling just $1 billion short could result in 25 million more new cases of the three diseases in countries where the Global Fund invests from 2024 to 2026.

VOA’s Michael Lipin contributed to this report.

UK Eases Pressure on Business by Halving Energy Bills This Winter

Britain pledged on Wednesday to cap wholesale electricity and gas costs for businesses at less than half the market rate from next month, helping relieve the pressure of soaring energy costs but adding to the government’s fast-rising spending.

Wholesale prices for electricity will be capped at about 211 pounds ($239) per megawatt hour (MWh) and for gas at 75 pounds per MWh, compared to forecast market rates of 600 pounds and 180 pounds respectively.

“We have stepped in to stop businesses collapsing, protect jobs and limit inflation,” finance minister Kwasi Kwarteng said.

Wholesale gas and electricity prices in Europe surged after Russia invaded Ukraine and have remained volatile since.

Groups representing businesses from pubs to steelmakers welcomed the intervention, saying the government had thrown a lifeline to companies battling to survive.

The government did not publish any estimate of the cost, but reports have put the price of six months of support at up to 42 billion pounds, on top of more than 100 billion pounds for a previously announced scheme to help households.

The final unit prices will be confirmed on Sept. 30.

Suppliers will be compensated for the reduction in wholesale gas and electricity unit prices that they are passing onto non-domestic customers, the government said.

After weeks of political stasis while the governing Conservative Party elected a new leader and the country mourned the death of Queen Elizabeth, Kwarteng is due to give a fiscal statement on Friday.

This is expected to set out some detail on how he will pay for the energy scheme while at the same time delivering on promises to cut taxes, although the total cost of the energy scheme will depend on market prices over the coming months.

Investors say Friday’s statement will be a critical test of confidence in British public finances as borrowing costs rise at the same time as a commitment to higher spending and banking on accelerated economic growth to pay for it.

Kwarteng said on Wednesday he had pledged to get debt down in the medium term, but it was “absolutely right” to help families and businesses in the face of a major economic shock.

The business energy scheme will initially apply from Oct. 1 to Mar. 31, 2023, for all non-domestic energy users, including charities and the public sector such as schools and hospitals as well as businesses.

The government also announced support for households in Northern Ireland on the same level as the equivalent scheme in the rest of the United Kingdom.

Putin Announces Mobilization of Russian Military Reserves

Russian President Vladimir Putin announced Wednesday the partial mobilization of his country’s military reserves in a move that follows Ukrainian gains in a counteroffensive in northeastern Ukraine.

Putin said in a televised address the mobilization is necessary to protect Russia’s homeland and sovereignty.

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said the military would be calling up 300,000 reservists.

Putin said the West is trying to weaken and destroy Russia, and that his country will “use all the means at our disposal to protect Russia and our people.”

He also reiterated Russia’s goal in its now seven-month-old invasion of Ukraine is to “liberate” Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region, saying the people there do not want to be part of Ukraine.

The separatist leaders of the Moscow-controlled Luhansk and Donetsk regions in the Donbas said Tuesday they are planning to hold votes starting late this week for the territories to declare themselves as part of Russia.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy dismissed what he called “Russia’s attempts to stage new sham referenda.”

“The situation on the front line clearly indicates that the initiative belongs to Ukraine,” Zelenskyy said in his nightly address. “Our positions do not change because of the noise or any announcements somewhere. And we enjoy the full support of our partners in this.”

Referendum voting in the region, populated by many Russian-speaking people, would most likely go in Moscow’s favor.

But any declaration that the territory is part of Russia would not be recognized by either Ukraine or by the United States and its Western allies who have supplied the Kyiv government with billions of dollars in armaments to fend off Moscow’s seven-month invasion.

The White House immediately rejected Russia’s plans for the referendums, saying they may be an effort by Moscow to recruit troops in the region in the wake of its recent defeats on the battlefront.

Jake Sullivan, President Joe Biden’s national security adviser, said the referendums violate the principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity since the lands in question are part of Ukraine. He said Biden in a Wednesday speech at the United Nations General Assembly would issue a “firm rebuke” to Russia for its war against Ukraine.

NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg said, “Sham referendums have no legitimacy and do not change the nature of Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine. This is a further escalation in Putin’s war. The international community must condemn this blatant violation of international law and step up support for Ukraine.”

If Russia were to claim the Luhansk and Donetsk provinces as its own, it could set the stage for an escalation in the fighting if Ukrainian forces try to take them back.

Denis Pushilin, head of the Donetsk region, said that the “long-suffering people of the Donbas have earned the right to be part of the great country that they always considered their motherland.”

He said the vote will help “restore historic justice that millions of the Russian people were waiting for.”

Since early September, Kyiv’s forces have swiftly recaptured large swaths of land in the Kharkiv region of northeast Ukraine that Russian troops took over in early weeks of the war. Moscow-backed leaders in the Russian-occupied Kherson region of southern Ukraine and pro-Russia activists in the partly occupied Zaporizhzhia region have also called for referendums on becoming part of Russia.

Some information for this story came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.

At UN, Spotlight on Global Consequences of Russia’s War

The global consequences of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine were in the spotlight Tuesday at the U.N. General Assembly, as the annual debate got underway.

Leaders spoke of the urgency to get fertilizer, in particular, to the world’s farmers at a reasonable price and in time for the planting season, which in some parts of the world has started already.

“Without action now, the global fertilizer shortage will quickly morph into a global food shortage,” Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned of what could lie ahead next year.

He said there are reports of farmers in West Africa and other regions cultivating fewer crops because of the price or lack of availability of fertilizers.

“Fertilizers have become three times as expensive as in 2021,” Senegalese President and African Union Chairperson Macky Sall told a ministerial-level meeting on food security on the sidelines of the debate.

Since Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, it has imposed quotas on exports of its fertilizer, saying it wanted enough for its farmers. Moscow is a top fertilizer exporter, and the disruptions and shortages it has created have led to steep price increases on international markets. That has made fertilizer unaffordable for some smaller farmers, with the potential to dramatically decrease their harvests.

This threatens global food security, which is already in a bad way. The U.N. says more than 800 million people worldwide are suffering from hunger.

“Russia must end its illegal war against Ukraine, which has threatened an essential source of the world’s food supply,” Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez told the food summit. “The truth is that [Russian President Vladimir] Putin is trying to blackmail the international community with a large part of the world’s food needs.”

Despite calls for diplomacy, Russia signaled that it plans to persist, with plans for referendums soon for Luhansk and Donetsk to declare themselves part of Russia, which could set the stage for an escalation of the fighting.

While there are no Western sanctions on either Russian food or fertilizer exports, Moscow claims that there are. A deal signed in Istanbul on July 22 has moved more than 4 million metric tons of Ukrainian grain to international markets and is working to build confidence among shippers, insurers and buyers of Russian grain and fertilizer so they will resume at pre-invasion levels.

Guterres called for the removal of “all remaining obstacles” to the export of Russian fertilizers and their ingredients, including ammonia.

“These products are not subject to sanctions — and we are making progress in eliminating indirect effects,” he said.

Appeals for peace

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose country brokered the Black Sea Grain Initiative along with the U.N., appealed Tuesday for a diplomatic end to the war.

“We would like to launch an appeal to all the international organizations and the countries of the world to support the peaceful initiatives of Turkey to settle this dispute once and for all,” Erdogan told the assembly. “We need a dignified way out of this crisis and that can be possible only through a diplomatic solution which is rational, which is fair, and which is applicable.”

Neither the Russian nor the Ukrainian leader are in New York this week, and no breakthroughs are expected.

“France obstinately will look for peace,” said President Emmanuel Macron, who has kept diplomatic channels open with President Putin. “Our position is clear, and we want to serve this, and that’s why I am engaging in a dialogue with Russia and have done so since the start of the war and over these past months, and I will continue to head this up.”

Analysis: China’s Balancing Act on Russia’s War in Ukraine

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s surprise admission at last week’s summit in Uzbekistan that China had “questions and concerns” about what was happening in Ukraine offered the first clue that Beijing is increasingly worried about the war.   

“You’re talking about huge investments either invested by China directly or with China serving as contractors,” said China expert Victor Gao, citing damages to China-invested shipbuilding projects, iron and steel mills, highways and other infrastructure projects. 

What China may have thought would be a quickly fought “military exercise” has turned into a devastating war that has damaged tens of billions of dollars of China’s own investments in the country, driven up global energy and food prices that in turn hurts China’s economy, and complicates China’s balancing act of offering some support to Russia, but not too much, to avoid antagonizing the United States and Europe, according to observers. 

“China is very much damaged in terms of its extensive investment. This gives China more incentives to promote peace. China wants to see the war wrapped up as soon as possible,” added Gao, a professor at China’s Soochow University and vice president of the Center for China and Globalization.  

China’s balancing act 

China has rejected Western calls to condemn the invasion and refused to join international sanctions against Moscow. 

Putin has relied on Beijing for trade in the face of Western sanctions. Based on Chinese customs data, overall exports from Russia rose by more than 50% from January to August when compared to the same period last year. 

During Chinese President Xi Jinping’s meeting last week with Putin at the annual Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit, Xi affirmed that “China is ready to work with Russia in extending strong support to each other on issues concerning their respective core interests,” reported China’s state news agency Xinhua. The report also stated Xi “emphasized that China will work with Russia to deepen practical cooperation in trade, agriculture, connectivity and other areas.” 

But China seems to stop short of circumventing sanctions. 

“We have not seen the Chinese provide any material support to Mr. Putin for the war in Ukraine. And we haven’t had any indications that they are violating sanctions,” said John Kirby, coordinator for strategic communications at the U.S. National Security Council (NSC), in a September 16th interview with VOA.     

The US factor 

China cannot afford to distance itself from Russia due to increasing tensions between Beijing and the United States.  

“The Russo-China relationship is postulated vis a vis the U.S.-China relationship,” said Oh Ei Sun, senior fellow at the Singapore Institute of International Affairs. “If the U.S.-China relationship is getting worse, Russia and China will warm up further. At the moment, the U.S.-China relationship [is] not doing well, so it’s only natural the Russia-China relationship will warm up.”  

At the beginning of September, China joined Russia’s military drills in Russia’s far eastern region. 

“China’s got choices to make. And as we’ve said many times before, we would clearly prefer that the choice they make is to condemn what Mr. Putin is doing in Ukraine … and make clear these concerns that they apparently have about what he’s doing there,” Kirby said in his VOA interview.   

“We’re going to continue to keep the lines of communication open with Beijing, as we must. There are issues of disagreement, clearly, between the United States and China, but there’s also areas where we have said we can, and we should, cooperate on,” said the NSC spokesman. 

Beijing’s considerations 

Reliance on Russia as a geopolitical partner, however, is increasingly presenting a dilemma for Beijing, especially given its stance for peace. 

“I don’t think China will go all out to try to make Russia its really close strategic ally,” said Oh. “Except for its military prowess, it’s nothing much to speak of. Its economy is equivalent to one of the more well-to-do provinces in China, perhaps Guangdong. You might as well have India on your side.”  

Observers expect China to continue to stay the course, refraining from giving outright support to Russia, while calling for an end to the war 

“China is both a friend of Russia as well as a friend with Ukraine. China does have conversations with Russia on one hand and Ukraine on the other hand. … Lots of these things can be done more constructively behind the scenes than in the limelight,” Gao said.   

Central Asia opportunity 

As Russia’s war against Ukraine continues, China’s influence in Central Asia seems to be growing, as reflected by last week’s Shanghai Cooperation Organization meeting in Uzbekistan, Xi’s visit to Kazakhstan and deals signed with other Central Asian countries.  

“Of course, China all along wanted to build an oil pipeline through Central Asia, but because of Russia’s opposition, the plans could not be carried out,” said Simon Chen, a political science professor at National Taiwan University. “But now, China’s plans are closer to being realized.”  

The Central Asian countries link China to the West and are crucial in helping Xi achieve his Belt and Road Initiative — building a modern-day Silk Road to easily transport oil and natural gas to China, as well as send China’s products to Europe and other parts of the world.  

“In Central Asia, China will perhaps benefit [from the Ukraine war], but overall, its economy suffers because of inflation in agricultural goods, high wheat and oil prices. To China, the war is not what it wants,” said Chen. 

Last week, China, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan signed a deal for a feasibility study to build a long-awaited railroad that would pass through the three countries to Europe, bypassing sanctioned-plagued Russia. 

Canada Seen Unlikely to Cut Ties With British Monarchy

After the death of Queen Elizabeth II, several nations that have long had a British monarch as their head of state are pondering charting a new course to become republics. In the Americas, this includes Belize, Antigua and Barbuda, Jamaica and the Bahamas, following the decision by Barbados to shed the monarchy earlier this year. Republicanism has also been on the rise in Australia, where a vote on leaving the monarchy could be held in coming years, according to some experts.

But what about in Canada, a culturally diverse nation with a substantial proportion of French speakers? Observers say the process for abolishing the monarchy in Canada would be nearly impossible to launch in the short term.

“Abolishing the monarchy would require a feat of political maneuvering that has rarely been seen throughout the years, requiring unanimous agreement among the House of Commons, the Senate and all of the provincial legislatures,” wrote Amanda Connolly from Canada’s Global News, in a September 18 article about Prime Minister Justin Trudeau ruling out such an effort in the near future.

Canada’s Indigenous people, who long suffered under colonialism and continue to experience its aftereffects to this day, nevertheless issued several statements of condolences to the British people after the queen’s death.

While not calling for the abolition of the monarchy, Indigenous leaders have expressed concern that King Charles III could be less likely to support them in the process of reconciling the colonial past.

French Canadians are seen as less enamored with the monarchy than many of their English-speaking compatriots. French Canadians trace their history back to the colonization of what is now Canada by France before the British conquered French-held lands and expelled many French-speaking inhabitants.

Robert Lacey is a British historian who wrote The Crown: The Inside History.

“Most English-speaking Canadians will probably accept King Charles as their new head of state,” Lacey told VOA. “But whether French Canadians welcome him seems less certain.”

“French Canadians are generally most indifferent or negative toward the monarchy,” said Philippe Lagasse, who teaches international affairs at Ottawa’s Carleton University, speaking with VOA. “This reflects the fact that the monarchy has come to be associated with assimilation, the historical oppression of the French population and, most importantly, a modernizing impulse that accompanied Quebec’s Quiet Revolution in the 1960, which saw the [Catholic] church’s influence greatly diminished and Quebec nationalism rise.”

But despite significant pockets of resistance to the monarchy in Canada, Lagasse sees no easy path to ending it.

“The monarchy will endure in Canada as long as it lasts in the United Kingdom,” he said. “The process for ending the monarchy in Canada is so onerous … that the only plausible path to a republic is if the United Kingdom becomes a republic and forces a change on Canada.”

Asked what leaders in Ottawa might think, Lagasse noted, “The reaction is muted at the moment. A lot will depend on the kinds of decisions that the king makes about his role and the Crown’s presence in the realms. If the king courts controversy, that will cause concern. At the moment, though, it is too early to tell.”

Political scientist David Johnson of Cape Breton University in Nova Scotia said whether or not to retain the monarchy is a topic of discussion.

“Some Canadians said, ‘We don’t get to vote on this? We don’t get a say in what happens?’ The answer is no, we don’t get a say in this,” Johnson told VOA. “The monarchy is the natural default mode to the Canadian constitution. If we want to change that we have to rip out the hardware and software and put in new hardware and software.”

He added that republicans outnumber monarchists but that many Canadians are indifferent.

“The problem for the republican movement is to mobilize and work toward a constitutional amendment and that is difficult,” Johnson said. “There has never been a prime minister or premier who came to power on an abolition platform, not even [in] Quebec.”

“The ascension of King Charles III to the throne does not change anything for Canada,” said Vismay Buch, a University of Toronto undergraduate student with an international relations focus. “He will be following the centuries-old tradition of the British Monarch being the Canadian Head of State.”

A poll in April found two-thirds of Canadians viewed Queen Elizabeth II favorably but that 51% did not favor Canada continuing as a constitutional monarchy.