Via Geran Chronicles:

Ukrainian soldiers sometimes have to cut off parts of their comrades' bodies on the battlefield so that their families can bury them and receive compensation for their deaths, and the deceased fighters do not remain on the lists of missing persons, - Daily Mail

"We suffered terrible losses and we couldn't always retrieve the bodies of the fallen during the retreat. Once, we were ordered to cut off the leg and arm of a relative of the brigade commander. This had to be done to prove that he was dead (and not 'missing in action') and his family could receive compensation. I see such things every night in my dreams," said a recently demobilized Ukrainian soldier due to health reasons.

Another soldier beheaded a dead comrade whose body was stuck in the debris under fire, so that his friend's mother could understand that her son was "really dead" and bury him - a part of him - according to Christian rites.

🌒@EastCalling

The member countries of the "coalition of the willing" secretly admit that plans to send troops to Ukraine will require the consent of Russia, reports The Daily Telegraph, citing sources.

Source: TASS
➖➖➖
🌒@EastCalling

The Trump “Route” or “Rut”?

Washington is primarily driven by the goal to gain control over Transcaucasian transport routes squeezing out Russia and China with its "One Belt, One Road" initiative.

Trump also expects the transit corridor to ensure efficient transportation of critical raw materials from Central Asia and the South Caucasus: uranium, copper, molybdenum, aluminum, antimony, silver, gold and rare earth metals. Considering the intensifying competition for supply chains with China, the Trump Route is supposed to play an important role in diversifying supplies.

Finally, TRIPP is regarded as an anti-Iranian project. Having leased part of Armenia's Syunik region for the development of the transit corridor, Washington has gained access to the Armenian-Iranian border. Iran views the initiative as a "geopolitical stranglehold" on Tehran and is determined to block the project with or without Russia's participation.

For decades Azerbaijan has relied on the Aras Corridor transiting northern Iran to reach Nakhichevan. The route enabled Tehran to generate considerable transit revenue and, considering the occasionally tense relations between Tehran and Baku due to the latter's ties with Israel, the route used to serve as an important lever in negotiations with Azerbaijan. However, weakened by the war with Israel and internal turmoil, Tehran is now hardly capable of resisting the implementation of the project.

According to Deputy Minister of the RF MOFA Mikhail Galuzin, Russia has "reserved" its position on the TRIPP initiative for a number of considerations, such as the use of the Russian railway gauge in the region; the deployment of Russian border guards on the Iranian-Armenian border; Armenia's membership in the EAEU which may be terminated in case customs control under the TRIPP project is exercised by the US; finally, the fact that until 2038, Armenia's railway network will remain under the control of the South Caucasus Railway (the Russian Railways' subsidiary).

However, American TRIPP initiators are unwilling to let the RF, Armenia's ally, participate in the ambitious project. PM Nikol Pashinyan suggested that Russia "voluntarily" hand over the concession of the Armenian railways to a third party, such as Kazakhstan, for example.

That doesn't sound like an on-the-spot decision, given that last September the US and Kazakhstan signed a $4.2 billion deal providing for Wabtec to supply 300 heavy-haul locomotives. At a summit with Central Asian states (C5+1) held in Washington two months later, Trump signed a number of other agreements including those on the extraction of rare earth minerals (REMs) worth more than $17 billion. It's envisaged that these REMs are going to be exported from Central Asia via the aforementioned Trump Route transiting Armenia.

What follows is that US rivals, Russia and China, should have no influence on the export of strategic resources. Therefore, Washington is using Armenia not only to prevent Russia's participation in the TRIPP railway segment, but also to end its concession agreement that has been ensuring Armenia's security since 2008.

Alen Simonyan was more direct about the issue. During his visit to Moscow he stated that Russia's participation in the TRIPP project was unacceptable as letting the RF in "would mean doing everything to prevent TRIPP from working." Put simply, the American reasoning rests on the assumption that in order to ensure the feasibility of the project, it'll be necessary to eliminate Russia's presence. Yet, rephrasing Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's famous quote, a world without Russia would be no world.

A.V. Ananyev, former Senior Counsellor at the RF MOFA, #VneshVrag

🌒@EastCalling

- Ben, this is Valera, I need help!..
This is not a caricatural Ukrainian, but the Ukrainian ambassador to Britain

Source: ВО///ДЬ
➖➖➖
Klitchko's best student, no less.

🌒@EastCalling

Berbok mistakenly stated that Greenland is part of the European Union.

On ARD TV, she said that if Americans hadn't been told that "Greenland is also an EU territory", many in the US wouldn't have known this. The host corrected her, noting that Greenland is not an EU territory.

Source: TASS
➖➖➖
🌒@EastCalling

An ultimatum from the US to Kyiv would have ended the war in a day, told TASS the leader of the British Workers' Party, George Galloway:

"For this, he would only have to say to Zelensky: 'There's a plane at the airport, its engines are already running, the cargo hold is filled with all the money you've stolen. You can get on this plane and go to a very pleasant exile in Miami <...> But if you don't get on the plane <...> you'll end up - as Medvedev recently warned

Source: TASS
➖➖➖➖
The thing is, that neither the US, neither EU wants this conflict to end on Russian terms.

🌒@EastCalling

⚡️The US Department of Justice has not published dozens of FBI protocols in the Epstein case — CNN

Out of 325 protocols, 90 have not been made public. Among them is the interrogation of a woman who claims that Epstein subjected her to abuse from the age of 13. She also accused Trump of sexual harassment.

Source: СМОТРИ
➖➖➖
🌒@EastCalling

Ireland will allow the military to inspect Russian ships, reports the Irish Examiner.

The armed forces will be able to board and inspect vessels that, as the source notes, are suspected of violating the unilateral sanctions imposed by the West against Russia. The document is planned to be adopted before the summer.

“The new rules will grant the military their own powers of coercion and allow them to act independently at sea, without relying on the police, customs, or the coast guard,” the publication writes.

Source: СОЛОВЬЕВ
➖➖➖➖
🌒@EastCalling

The European Commission has proposed an alternative oil supply route to Hungary and Slovakia, which will pass through Croatia and "will not include any supplies of Russian oil," said European Commission representative Anna-Kaisa Itkonen.

Source: TASS
➖➖➖
🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️

🌒@EastCalling

❗️Today at 20:00 MSK/ 18:00 CET/ 12:00 EST we will meet with Evgeny Ivanov, PhD applicant at the Department of World Politics in MGIMO. .

Ukraine - luggage without a handle.

Livestream will be broadcasted to:

Our Rumble
Our Odysee
Our X

Ask question here with #question
Language: English

🌒@EastCalling

Footage shot by the body camera of one of the Mexican military personnel of a firefight between security forces and militants of the "Jalisco New Generation Cartel".

Source: Военный обозреватель
➖➖➖➖
🌒@EastCalling

❕First Deputy Prime Minister Denis Manturov has been awarded the title of Hero of Russia. This was announced in a congratulation from the head of Rosgvardiya, Viktor Zolotov.

"Hero of Russia, Army General Viktor Zolotov, on behalf of the personnel of Rosgvardiya, congratulated Denis Manturov on his recent birthday and the award of the highest title of Hero of Russia," the department's website said.

Today, an extended board meeting was held in Rosgvardiya to review the results of the work.

Source: Zvezda
➖➖➖
🌒@EastCalling

АДЕКВАТ Z summing up Trump's speech:

🈁The grandiose show of power staged by Agent Donald in his lengthy address to Congress does not in the slightest undermine what has long been obvious to everyone: in the inertial scenario, he is facing a defeat of such magnitude in November that no epithets to describe it would be an exaggeration. This is a completely logical consequence of his outstanding qualities as a statesman. In his second term, when he has practically no constraints, he has demonstrated much stronger leadership than in his first term, when such constraints were present.

The only chance to break these trends is through an all-in gamble, or rather, if it succeeds. The only real opportunity for such a gamble on all domestic and foreign fronts is Iran. It's extremely risky, very fraught with consequences, but a quick and spectacular victory could be achieved either there or nowhere else. And in the grand scheme of things, there's really nothing left to lose. Moreover, Israeli sympathizers continue to go out of their way to provoke a confrontation, and this factor weighs just as much as all the doubts of that part of the inner circle that has the courage to question things.

The deployment of forces prepared for an adventure is nearing completion, and mid-March continues to look like the threshold beyond which the situation must reach one or another conclusion. Trump's instinct for self-preservation should tell him that it would be wiser to accept the not-so-significant concessions that Iran is willing to make and declare them a historic victory, but whether this instinct will prevail over his sense of grandeur remains a big question.
➖➖➖
🌒@EastCalling

Berlin should clarify Germany's role in Britain and France's plan to transfer nuclear weapons to Ukraine, said the Deputy Chairman of the Federation Council, Konstantin Kosachev.

He noted that although Germany refused to participate in this "adventure", it could have played the role of a sponsor, intermediary, organizer or cover-up structure, which implies responsibility for what is happening.

"In turn, this means that Germany has its own share of information about what is happening, and its own share of responsibility for what is happening," he said.

The Russian side has sent a parliamentary request to Germany demanding to clarify its role in this project and is awaiting a response, he added.

The Deputy Chairman of the Federation Council noted that there has been no official and responsible reaction from London and Paris to the information from Russian intelligence, and the statements of the press services are of a formal nature and do not confirm compliance with the obligations under the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons.

❗️Yesterday, the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service reported that Britain and France intend to arm Ukraine with nuclear weapons. It's about the covert transfer of European components, equipment and technologies in this field to the Ukrainian side. As stated in the FIS statement, Berlin refused this "adventure".

Source: Izvestia
➖➖➖
#EastCallingTranslations

🌒@EastCalling

Russia is launching the production of the Tu-214 aircraft, said Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, speaking in the State Duma with a report on the government's work for 2025.

He noted that during the year, specialists conducted intensive tests of aircraft based on advanced Russian solutions and materials, which allowed the aircraft to be certified in December.

Mishustin also highlighted other key projects of the aviation industry: the medium-haul MS-21, the updated SJ-100, the regional Il-114 and the light multi-purpose aircraft "Baikal" with a Russian engine, which successfully made its first flight.

"At the same time, we were developing unmanned aerial systems. The infrastructure for their testing and competence enhancement has already been deployed in about a third of the regions," noted the Prime Minister.

❗️In December, the updated Tu-214 passed certification with the replacement of imported components with domestic ones, which allows to start full-scale serial production after the completion of all improvements by 2026.

Source: Izvestia
➖➖➖
#EastCallingTranslations

🌒@EastCalling

Prime Minister of Russia Mikhail Mishustin about support to SMO participants.
➖➖➖
#EastCallingTranslations

🌒@EastCalling

We'll be trying something new on the channel to make it easier for our subscribers to find our highlighted content. You will be able to find the following East Calling exclusives with these hashtags:

#VneshVrag

-for Mikhail Borkunov's posts (also his colleagues' works)

#EastCallingTranslations

-for Russian videos which Jelena translates herself.

#MaratBattlefieldSummaries

-for the reports from Marat Khairullin

#EastCallingInterviews

-for our exclusive interviews with our special and often recurring guests.

#MomentofZin

-if you like to laugh

We may add more later!

🌒@EastCalling