a) Europe seems to have weathered the winter energy crisis after sanctioning Russia just fine, Russian propaganda that Europe was a frozen wasteland notwithstanding:
b) What prominent non-European countries distancing themselves on an economic scale from the US? I guess Russia made the great diplomatic victory of no longer having Mali and Burkina Faso condemning them at the UN anymore, but how has this distanced them economically from the US?
c) Ah yes, the West must stop supporting Ukraine because it is clearly leading directly to WWIII! Putin has nukes remember! And China is suddenly involved in this all-out war because - umm, reasons. Yeah, that’s it. Funnily enough here in reality China isn’t doing anything to actually support Russia’s actions in Ukraine, they’ve taken a decidedly neutral stance while taking advantage of cheap Russian oil as a result of the sanctions.
Those who fail to show up at the enlistment office within the 20 days following receipt of the electronic draft notice will not be able to take out loans, register property or work as individual entrepreneurs.
Under the new legislation a draft notice will be considered received as soon as it is sent out to the Gosuslugi portal, an official online platform for state services.
I missed the actual meaning of these two particular sentences until watching Roman’s video on the topic, it’s about 1:00 in. You don’t even have to actually receive the email for you to be consider having received the email. Under the law, the sending of the email counts as successful reception of your draft notice, opening the email is purely optional.
Oh yeah, and you’re also stripped of your basic rights 20 days after ‘receiving’ your conscription email if you haven’t appeared at the draft office. The list of things you won’t be able to do is a lot longer than what’s listed in the article.
I found out from a video by Niki Proshin that after the announced electronic conscription changes, there was a rush of people trying to delete their Gosuslugi accounts (the government app that is going to be used to send the notices) only to be greeted by the message that accounts can no longer be deleted. Funny how they knew ahead of time that people would suddenly want to delete their accounts.
Since the article is from Ukrainian Pravda, I wanted to check the credibility of their source. It’s Russian TASS, which may be incredibly unreliable about many things, but they certainly wouldn’t risk jail time for discrediting the Russian militaryundermine morale by making up this story publishing this is if wasn’t truth.
While there, I noticed a darkly funny juxtaposition of two stories on the side scroll.
“On April 20, 2023, at about 22:15 Moscow time, during the flight of the Su-34 aircraft of the Aerospace Forces over the city of Belgorod, an abnormal descent of aviation ammunition occurred,” the department said.
According to the ministry, as a result of the incident, there is damage to residential buildings, but there are no casualties. An investigation is already underway.
BELGOROD, April 20. /TASS/. Two people, according to preliminary data, were injured in an explosion that occurred on Thursday evening in Belgorod. One of the victims was hospitalized, Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said on his Telegram channel.
“According to preliminary data, there are two victims: a woman with a traumatic brain injury in a state of moderate severity was taken to the city hospital No. 2. The second woman with abrasions refused hospitalization, all the necessary medical care was provided on the spot,” Gladkov wrote.
Gladkov noted that the destruction was revealed in four apartments of an apartment building on Shalandin Street. All residents of damaged apartments are offered temporary accommodation in a hotel. “An examination will be carried out on the house, if the load-bearing wall is damaged, we will resettle the entire entrance. Four cars were also damaged,” Gladkov said.
Two entirely unconnected stories; the abnormal descent of aviation ammunition from the Su-34 in Belgorod caused no casualties, so those devious Ukrainian Nazi bandits obviously must have set off a bomb that coincidentally injured two people and destroyed four apartment building in Belgorod seven minutes later, Komrad.
Dude sounds paranoid as hell, his PhD notwithstanding. Putin isn’t going to attack UK, even in terms of mass sabotage (which, yes - I’m quite certain would provoke a NATO response). Vlad has his hands a little full at the moment.
Yeah, the one bit of his editorial that I agree with is that
Our world is becoming markedly more dangerous. And Britain is not ready.
The UK let its military atrophy since the end of the Cold War, but they are hardly alone in NATO in letting this happen.
Besides, the Torys hardly need the threat of potential Russian sabotage to show overt threats in order call for expanding their armed forces. Last May Russian State TV was threatening to sink Britain with a nuclear tsunami from a 100-megaton nuclear torpedo, complete with flashy graphics. Showing the same oblivious disregard for how their threats and actions might affect neutral nations that led Finland and Sweden to rush to join NATO, the graphic makes no note of the fact that it also depicts all of Ireland being disappearing under the radioactive tidal wave.
Wealthy Russians have used London to invest their money, but that means it is kept safe from Putin and his cronies. So there is little love for London amongst the political leadership (except half of them are probably also using London).
Speaking as a Londoner though I’m not sure I’ve ever met a single Russian here, so it’s all hidden in the property market and other businesses from afar. No doubt if I hung around in Harrods I might encounter some Russian wives or mistresses lavishing themselves with the tacky ostentatious crap they sell there.
I’ve met loads, although the big property owners mostly hang out in circles too exalted for the likes of me. Occasionally I encounter the spoiled offspring though.
I’m of the opinion (unpopular) that anyone in my country on a Russian passport - visitor or business - should be given 3 days to pack their bags and go back.
Unless they apply for refugee status and declare themselves to be opposed to the invasion of Ukraine.
There’s a reason it’s an unpopular opinion. You might want to think about why that is.
That’s not how applying for refugee status works. On what basis are they going to be seeking asylum, residency and citizenship in their new country? Being opposed to the invasion of Ukraine isn’t grounds for seeking asylum in any country on the planet. They can’t claim to be war refugees because they are fleeing being conscripted and sent to fight in Ukraine, that’s not what being a war refugee is or how it works. Ukrainian civilians who fled their country because it was invaded are war refugees. No country on Earth would recognize those fleeing conscription as being war refugees; that’s not what being a war refugee means.
That only leaves seeking political asylum, which again, declaring your opposition to your countries invasion of another country doesn’t qualify you for. To qualify for political asylum, your parent country must have taken concrete, provable action against you personally on the basis of your political beliefs for you to even begin applying for status as a political refugee. Simply declaring your opposition to the war in Ukraine doesn’t cut it. The only Russians who could apply for political asylum on this basis are ironically the ones in jail in Russia, like the father of the girl who drew an anti-war picture for her art class pro-Z artwork assignment.
Seeking political asylum and being rejected is going to leave you permanently fucked over; you aren’t going to be able to travel to the country that rejected you - or all of Europe in the case of the EU - and on top of that, the Russian government is now going to really have a beef with you. Which is likely going to lead to you being persecuted, which would qualify you for political asylum if you hadn’t just been rejected, which caused the persecution. Catch 22.
I watch a number of Russian English speaking Vtubers openly opposed to the war, some since before the war. Almost all of them left Russia in the last year. There is a reason most of them left for Georgia, Turkey, Turkmenistan or Kazakstan, they are pretty much the only places you can travel to visa free with a Russian passport nowadays. Here’s a video of Roman explaining the bind he’s in now, he left Russia for Georgia a year ago; I’ve linked a number of his videos in this thread with his very anti-war views and his feelings about the government of his home country. It bears watching the whole thing, but it is chaptered, the chapter on asylum is at 10:15.
