Six Ukrainian drones headed for Moscow downed, mayor says
Sobyanin, writing on the Telegram messaging app, said specialists were examining fragments of the drones near the Russian capital. He made no mention of damage or casualties.
The governor of Leningrad region outside Russia's second largest city, St Petersburg, said two drones had been downed, with no damage or casualties noted.
Rosaviatsiya, Russia's civil aviation authority, reported temporary airport closures in the two cities and other regional centres and said dozens of flights had been delayed.
Russia's Defence Ministry had earlier reported that 39 Ukrainian drones were intercepted and destroyed over a 5-1/2 hour period into the afternoon, mostly in central Russia or near the Ukrainian border.
The ministry said its air defence units had downed 120 Ukrainian drones overnight, mostly in regions bordering Ukraine.
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Daily Mail
an hour ago
- Daily Mail
Could Putin and Xi invade Taiwan and Europe at the same time?
Leading experts have dismissed NATO chief Mark Rutte's claim that World War III could begin with a simultaneous invasion of Taiwan by China and an assault on NATO 's eastern flank by Russia . In a chilling vision laid out to the New York Times this weekend, the former Dutch prime minister said that Xi Jinping, before launching a long-anticipated attack on Taiwan, would first call Vladimir Putin and ask him to open a second front on NATO's eastern flank. Indeed, Western military chiefs have already begun planning for such a scenario. Last month, the former head of the British Army, General Sir Patrick Sanders, revealed the Ministry of Defence has drawn up a response plan for wars breaking out simultaneously on two fronts and added his ex-colleagues were 'really worried' about the prospect. But Sir Lawrence Freedman, Emeritus Professor of War Studies at King's College London , rejected the idea that Putin would ask how high if Xi tells him to jump - even though he is indebted to China's President. 'China has really helped Russia economically and to a degree technologically with its war in Ukraine. But it hasn't gone as far as North Korea , for example, by deploying troops or sending artillery shells' he told MailOnline. 'There is no reason to expect that Russia would do more for China in return. You don't go to major war as a favor, especially not with NATO. You do it for your own strategic interests.' Still, Freedman warned that NATO leaders and defense chiefs cannot afford to overlook the independent threat posed by each powerful military force - nor the increasingly coordinated efforts to challenge Western power in other domains. Other top analysts argue that even if Putin is unwilling to sacrifice his military for Xi's sake, the two powers are now locked in a new Cold War with the West and preparing in tandem to reshape the global order. Russia and China's 'no limits' partnership At the Beijing Winter Olympics in 2022, Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping stood shoulder to shoulder as they unveiled a sweeping joint declaration, proclaiming a 'no limits' partnership and hailing the dawn of a new global order. Though they stopped short of signing a formal military alliance, both leaders made clear their intention to reshape the world's balance of power by undermining and degrading what they perceive to be the West's domination of international political and economic forums and mechanisms. What's more, Xi and Putin appear to have formed a genuine friendship, having met with one another dozens of times over the course of their respective presidencies. While the partnership remains asymmetrical - China is the dominant partner by far - both have a clear incentive to keep it going. Beijing has never formally endorsed Russia's war in Ukraine, but it has provided considerable indirect support, albeit to its own benefit - and China's Foreign Minister is said to have told EU diplomats that China 'cannot accept' a Russian loss in the conflict. China is arguably the primary beneficiary of the West's ruthless sanctions regime against the Kremlin. It has become the principal buyer of Russian oil and gas, importing huge quantities of energy, thereby ploughing funds into Putin's war chest. Though there is no evidence that Beijing has directly supplied Moscow with arms, it is widely believed to have provided raw materials, components and dual-use technologies vital to Russia's defense industry. Freedman said Moscow has little to offer Beijing in the way of defense and military technology in return, but pointed out that Russia has one thing that no amount of investment can buy. 'What China doesn't have is combat experience,' he said. 'Russia's military has spent more than three years fighting an open war in Ukraine, particularly in land and air domains, deploying a range of modern technologies. It also has experience fighting and countering US and Western-made weapons systems. 'Moscow could certainly provide input to Beijing in terms of the challenges it is likely to face in an invasion of Taiwan,' he said. Other analysts believe the Sino-Russian relationship extends far beyond mere economic, technological and limited military support. Velina Tchakarova, a geopolitical strategist and former Director at the Austrian Institute for European and Security Policy (AIES), argues the powers have formed a broad strategic understanding to systematically undermine US and Western influence around the world. Coining the term 'DragonBear' to refer to the Sino-Russian axis, Tchakarova claims the pair are performing division of labour in multiple regions, particularly Eurasia and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). This sees the economic powerhouse that is China lead on finance, trade and infrastructure, engaging emerging powers and fledgling economies as part of its global Belt and Road Initiative, while Russia acts as a security guarantor and energy partner - an arrangement she believes can function provided neither party encroaches too far on the other's spheres of influence. Meanwhile, both parties occupy leading roles in the development of the BRICS group - a global economic alliance seen by many as an alternative to the G7 and a vehicle for major geopolitical upheaval. 'Russia needs a powerful ally after the precarious isolation by the West, while China seeks a partner with regional power projection,' she wrote in a piece for the Observer Research Foundation. 'The 'DragonBear' is not a classic alliance according to Western ideas and concepts. Rather, China and Russia have tactically entered into a rapprochement... without the need to announce a strategic alliance, let alone a military one. 'China is evidently the stronger partner economically and financially, but it treats Russia as an equal rather than a subordinate counterpart... The unequal collaboration is cemented by the shared geopolitical interest in creating a credible counterweight to US influence in international affairs,' she concluded. How could China's invasion of Taiwan unfold? Though the likelihood of Xi and Putin collaborating to deliver a one-two punch to NATO is scant, according to Freedman, the prospect of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan appears to be growing more likely with each passing year. Measuring just 36,000 square kilometers, Taiwan is roughly 1/25th the size of mainland China, or about half the size of Scotland - but it is a territory of immense strategic and economic importance. Its elected Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) presides over a self-governing, democratic society and has sought close ties with the US, hoping its political, military and economic heft will keep Xi's expansionist tendencies at bay. But China continues to conduct huge and increasingly frequent war games around the island, and Xi's Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has openly declared it is willing to reclaim Taiwan by force if necessary. 'These [blockades and military drills] are happening so regularly, it shows that China wishes to maintain psychological pressure on Taiwan and to continue to remind the international community of its claims and its resolve to see them ultimately fulfilled,' Professor Kerry Brown, former First Secretary at the British Embassy in Beijing, told MailOnline. 'Nationalist sentiment in China is high at the moment, but the costs currently of moving against Taiwan are very, very high. Unless provoked, I cannot imagine that China would do this. But we are living in very worrying and uncertain times. Alas, this issue is now more dangerous than it has ever been before.' In one attack scenario, the People's Liberation Army (PLA) would launch a full naval blockade of Taiwan, choking off vital imports of food and minerals and pressuring the island to submit without a shot being fired. Taiwan, which produces only around a third of its own food, would be vulnerable to such a strategy, particularly given China's naval prowess and litany of weaponry designed to make a blockade stick - from cruise missiles and anti-ship weapons to long-range rockets like the DF-26B. A more direct option would see China mount an amphibious invasion of Taiwan in a massive undertaking akin to the D-Day landings. This operation would likely follow a period of extensive missile bombardments designed to cripple Taiwan's air defenses, command centers and logistics hubs. An initial assault could include helicopter-borne special forces and airborne troops equipped with armored vehicles, followed by waves of amphibious forces from China's Eastern Theatre Command. In recent months, analysts have noted the deployment of new 'invasion barges' designed to offload troops and heavy equipment directly onto Taiwan's often rugged coastline. A successful invasion of Taiwan by China would herald the advent of a new world order, Professor Brown said , because such an outcome presupposes one of two seismic events - a total defeat of the US military in the Indo-Pacific theatre, or Washington abruptly abandoning a decades-long security partnership with Taipei. Both scenarios would be catastrophic for America, and by extension, Western interests in the highly strategic region. Dr Philip Shetler-Jones, Senior Research Fellow in Indo‑Pacific Security at the Royal United Services Institute ( RUSI ) think-tank, said: ' If the PRC controls Taiwan, it gains an advantage in controlling air, surface and sub-surface areas astride the main shipping and air routes connecting Japan and South Korea to their sources of critical imports - especially energy - and markets. 'It would be enabled to challenge the US Navy more effectively across the Pacific.' Dr Sean Kenji Starrs, Lecturer in International Development at King's College London, warned that such an outcome 'would probably mean the end of freedom of navigation in the South China Sea and Taiwan Strait.' These waterways account for a vast proportion of the world's electronics trade, including goods bound for Europe and the US. It would also make it much more difficult for the US to blockade the Strait of Malacca - a vital maritime chokepoint linking the Pacific and Indian Oceans that carries much of China's fuel and exports. 'All of this would basically mean that China could become a peer competitor to the United States in East Asia, thus the end of US hegemony in East Asia,' Starrs concluded. How could a Russian attack on NATO unfold? While China looks eastward, Russia is working hard to reconstitute its military capacity amid the ongoing war in Ukraine in preparation for a potential future clash with NATO. Despite the immense costs of its conflict with Kyiv, Moscow has pushed its economy into wartime mobilization and is rapidly rearming. A major study by the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) concluded that Russia could be ready to launch a fresh conflict against NATO's European cohort by 2027 - particularly if the US under Trump scales down its security presence on the continent. 'European allies can no longer assume that the US will provide the necessary military support to defend the continent against Russian aggression,' the IISS warned. 'Were US forces to disengage from the European theatre from mid-2025, Europe's window of vulnerability would open quickly.' In a parallel analysis, the RAND Corporation argued that the Kremlin is likely to maintain its wartime economy and permanent militarization irrespective of how the war in Ukraine ends. 'Once [the Ukraine war] ends, this shift to a wartime economy, and the attendant effects on the defense industrial sector, will be difficult to reverse without provoking a backlash,' RAND noted. Russia is operating 'according to wartime rules' with '24/7 defence production', the report said. As one expert explained: 'If Russia decides to reconstitute, it will... Russia is not worried about the next election and will sacrifice healthcare and other social benefits to divert resources toward military reconstitution... 'In Russia, "the war has become the political system".' Ed Arnold, a Senior Research Fellow for European Security at RUSI, told MailOnline how Russia could seek to destabilize NATO with a targeted and calculated invasion. 'What Moscow would try to do is launch a small-scale operation to take a part of a NATO territory and hold it,' he said. 'That would put NATO in a difficult position as to how to respond, whether this would meet the conditions for Article 5.' He added: 'If you're Putin, you're going to want to do that when you have a US president who is ambivalent to NATO at best.' According to various NATO sources, a potential Russian attack plan could involve landing forces in Finnish Lapland or northern Norway, and amphibious operations to capture the Swedish island of Gotland. The most likely objective, however, remains the Suwalki Gap - a narrow land bridge between Belarus and Russia's exclave of Kaliningrad that borders Lithuania and Poland. Arnold said: 'The Russian scenario could be as small as to enter the Suwalki Gap and seize a few miles of territory, widening the gap by a few miles each side. 'This could sow division and discord in NATO - from one perspective, that's a military incursion on NATO territory that must be defended, but there will be others asking whether we want to risk a war with a nuclear-armed power over such a small bit of land.' Arnold concluded that such an operation was not a highly likely scenario, but one that Western leaders cannot afford to ignore. 'Prior to 2022, many would have said that a full-scale [invasion] of Ukraine is silly, but Putin went ahead and did it anyway. 'I'm worried about policymakers because they are saying Russia wouldn't be ready for another large-scale conflict in Europe for several years. 'But something could happen tomorrow that may be an accident or a miscalculation that triggers a much wider conflict.'
The Guardian
2 hours ago
- The Guardian
Russia's former transport minister dies from gunshot wound hours after sacking
Russia's former transport minister has died from a gunshot wound just hours after he was sacked by Vladimir Putin. The body of Roman Starovoit, the ex-minister, was found in his car in a Moscow suburb. He appeared to have killed himself, Russia's investigative committee said in a statement. The Kremlin published an order signed by Putin to remove Starovoit from his position as transport minister on Monday morning shortly before news of his death was made public. No reason was given for his dismissal in the order, which was dated 7 July at 9:15am. But Russian media, including the local edition of Forbes, have reported that Starovoit may have died as early as Friday evening, before the order to dismiss him was published. The timeline of his death and dismissal has not been confirmed by investigators. A member of the State Duma, Andrei Kartapolov, told Russian journalists that Starovoit had died 'quite long ago'. Starovoit was a prominent official in the Putin government who had previously served from 2018 to 2024 as the governor of the Kursk region, where he oversaw the construction of defensive fortifications for the region on the border with Ukraine after the Russian invasion. The subsequent governor was arrested in a corruption scandal after investigators claimed that more than 1bn roubles (nearly £10m) had been embezzled from federal funds designated to protect the region from a potential incursion by Ukrainian forces. Kommersant, a leading Russian business newspaper, reported that other Kursk officials targeted in the embezzlement case had given testimony against Starovoit, indicating that he may also have faced scrutiny or arrest. Top officials who are dismissed from the Russian government can often face criminal charges as they lose the political backing that previously may have protected them from inquiries into their business or political dealings. Part of the Kursk region was occupied by Ukraine's army last August in a counteroffensive that was deeply embarrassing for the Kremlin, which has sought to keep the war out of Russia and minimise the impact of the conflict on Russian citizens. Kommersant reported that Starovoit was found with a Makarov pistol that he had been awarded in 2003 for his service 'ensuring public safety' in his role as the governor of the Kursk region.
Times
2 hours ago
- Times
Khrushchev's anti-Stalin speech was mistake
When Nikita Khrushchev spoke out against Joseph Stalin's rule of terror at a Communist Party congress in 1956, his words sent shock waves throughout the Soviet Union and ushered in a thaw of Kremlin policies. Almost 70 years on, amid President Putin's ruthless crackdown on domestic dissent, Russia's modern-day Communist Party has declared that Khrushchev's denunciation of Stalin was a mistake. At its own congress, held near Moscow at the weekend, the party described Khrushchev's landmark speech as 'erroneous and politically biased' and alleged it contained 'falsified facts and false accusations' against the man responsible for the deaths of millions of Soviet citizens. Although it has not held power since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the Communist Party remains the country's second biggest political party after Putin's ruling United Russia. It is a vocal supporter of Russia's war in Ukraine. Khrushchev's 'secret' speech, 'On the Cult of Personality and its Consequences', was delivered behind closed doors and caused some Communist Party members who were present to faint with shock. Besides denouncing Stalin's deadly purges, Khrushchev also criticised the dictator who ruled from 1924 to 1953 for seeking to become 'akin to a god'. He also revealed that Vladimir Lenin, the first Soviet leader, had warned against appointing Stalin as his successor. The speech was later read out at party meetings and slowly became public knowledge. Under Khrushchev, the Soviet Union embarked on a campaign of de-Stalinisation, tearing down statues to the Soviet tyrant and renaming streets, squares and cities that had been named in his honour. Stalin's name was almost taboo in Russia until 2000, when Putin, a former KGB officer, took power and orchestrated a revival of his reputation. More than 100 monuments of Stalin have appeared across Russia during Putin's rule, opposition journalists have reported. Most of them have been erected since 2014, when Moscow's relations with the west plunged to a new low after the Kremlin's annexation of Crimea from Ukraine. In May a life-sized replica of a Stalin statue, which was torn down from the Moscow metro in the Sixties, was unveiled at the city's Taganskaya station, less than two miles from the Red Square. Videos showed passers-by laying flowers next to it. One man was even seen praying at the statue, apparently unconcerned by Stalin's anti-religion campaign between 1928 and 1941. Kirill Martynov, the editor of Novaya Gazeta Europe, a Russian opposition website that has been banned by the Kremlin, said the Communist Party's move to denounce Khrushchev was part of a struggle with ultra-Orthodox Christians. 'They are proving to Putin that it is their interpretation of the past that will best contribute to his eternal power,' he wrote. Nina Khrushcheva, an international relations analyst in New York who is the great-granddaughter of Khrushchev, said the Communist Party was trying to curry favour with Putin to maintain its status as a Kremlin-funded pseudo-opposition party. 'The Kremlin is not ready to fully cancel Khrushchev, though they do not like him, but the Communist Party decided to try out those waters,' she told The Times. 'With people being arrested and prosecuted in Russia now with little legal basis, the 'secret speech' could become inconvenient and get banned from the top. Also, the speech questions Stalin's heroic role in the Second World War, which also could become a reason to ban it.'
