Ukrainian Counterattack Signals “Green Light” From Weather Conditions

Thursday-Friday night witnessed a violent escalation on all fronts in Ukraine. And the Russian Ministry of Defense announced that the airborne units on the southern side of the direction of Artemovsk (Bakhmut) responded to concentrated attacks launched by the Ukrainian armed forces, through which they sought to make a breakthrough on the contact lines.

Ukraine’s escalation of the bombing came amid reports that it had already launched its expected counterattack aimed at defeating the Russian forces, after receiving huge shipments of Western weapons. Kiev did not officially announce the start of the attack, but various reports confirm that the current weather conditions are suitable for the movement of tanks and heavy vehicles after the lands of southern Ukraine, which sank into mud, dried up after huge amounts of rain fell during the past two months. On Wednesday, Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, said that the counterattack “has been going on for days,” adding, “This is a violent war along a 1,500-kilometre border. Our operations have already begun.”

Ukraine announced yesterday that Russian missiles had hit a medical clinic in Dnipro, where at least two people were killed, in what President Zelensky denounced as a “crime against humanity”.

On the other hand, the deputy head of the Russian Security Council, Dmitry Medvedev, said yesterday (Friday) that the conflict in Ukraine may last for decades and that negotiations with it are impossible as long as its Western-backed president, Zelensky, remains in power. “This struggle will continue for a very long time,” Medvedev added. Maybe for decades. This is a new reality. He stated that Russia could not trust any truce with the current rulers of Ukraine; Because the conflict will break out again, and therefore the present government must be destroyed.

Medvedev also warned that the West greatly underestimates the risk of a nuclear war over Ukraine, and said Russia would launch a preemptive strike if Ukraine obtained nuclear weapons. “There are irreversible rules of war,” he said. If it comes to nuclear weapons, a preemptive strike must be taken.” Medvedev, who was also President of Russia, said, “The Europeans do not fully realize the magnitude of the matter and believe that it will not reach this degree … but it will reach under certain circumstances.”

In Moscow, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov discussed the conflict in Ukraine with Chinese special envoy Li Hui, who visited Kiev last month. Lavrov stressed that Russia hopes for a political settlement, but “Ukraine and its Western supporters are putting up serious obstacles to resuming peace negotiations.”