Her Majesty’s speech to both Houses of Parliament at the State Opening of Parliament 2015

May 29, 2015   I am very pleased to quote Her Majesty the Queen:
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My government will maintain pressure on Russia to respect the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Ukraine, and will insist on the full implementation of the Minsk agreements. 

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Ukraine crisis: The town where war still rages on

27 May 2015 (BBC News Europe) The conflict in Ukraine is entering its second year and a ceasefire, nominally in place since February, has failed to stop the violence in areas around Donetsk airport. Among the hardest hit is the village of Pisky. It had a population of 3,000 before the war started, but now only a handful of civilians remain. Fergal Keane has been granted exclusive access to the village, which has been sealed off by the Ukrainian army.

Read a full story and see a video at

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-32891906

Reuters takes photos of Russian military vehicles moving to Ukraine border

May 26, 2015 The pictures of the convoy were taken by a Reuters stringer near the Russian southern town of Matveev Kurgan, near the Russian-Ukrainian border in Rostov region in Russia, the TSN TV news program reported. The military vehicles, including Uragan multiple rocket launchers, military trucks without license plates and few armored personnel carriers, crossed the southern Russian town of Matveev Kurgan and turned to the fields from the road near the border with Ukraine, according to a Reuters journalist.

Read more on UNIAN: http://www.unian.info/politics/1081484-reuters-takes-photos-of-russian-military-vehicles-moving-to-ukraine-border.html

One of the top rebel commanders in eastern Ukraine, Alexei Mozgovoi, has been killed in an attack on his car, Russian and Ukrainian media report.

May 25, 2015 (BBC News Europe) Mr Mozgovoi led the "Prizrak" (Ghost) battalion which was based in the Alchevsk area of Luhansk. Reports said a bomb struck his car, which was then targeted by gunfire that killed Mozgovoi and six others. Mr Mozgovoi was a critic of the Russian-backed separatist leadership and the Minsk accord signed with Kiev. He took control of Alchevsk as part of the uprising that began last April in eastern Ukraine's Luhansk and Donetsk regions following Russia's annexation of Crimea. There are no details on who may have carried out the attack, which was said to have taken place on the road from Luhansk to the city of Alchevsk.

Read more and see a video at

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-32861947

President Poroshenko: 'I don't trust Vladimir Putin'

19 May 2015 (BBC News Europe) Ukraine's president has told the BBC his country is now in a "real war" with Russia - and that Ukrainians should prepare for a Russian offensive. President Petro Poroshenko told the BBC's Fergal Keane he did not trust his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin but said he had no option but to negotiate with the Russian president.

You may watch this video at

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-32803458

Those who came from ancient times

May 19, 2015 Kurgan stelae are anthropomorphic stone stelae, images cut from stone, installed atop, within or around an ancient burial mounds. The stelae are also described as "obelisks" or "statue menhirs". Spanning more than three millennia, they are clearly the product of various cultures. The earliest are associated with the Pit Grave culture of the Pontic-Caspian steppe (and therefore with the Proto-Indo-Europeans according to the mainstream Kurgan hypothesis). There are Iron Age specimens are identified with the Scythians and medieval examples with Turkic peoples. Such stelae are found in large numbers in Southern Russia, Ukraine, Prussia, southern Siberia, Central Asia and Mongolia.

Anthropomorphic stelae were probably memorials to the honoured dead. They are found in the context of burials and funeral sanctuaries from the Eneolithic through to the Middle Ages. It was proved by historians that Kalmyks revered kurgan obelisks in their country as images of their ancestors, and that when a bowl was held by the statue, it was to deposit a part of the ashes after the cremation of the deceased, and another part was laid under the base of the statue. When used architecturally, stelae could act as a system of stone fences, frequently surrounded by a moat, with sacrificial hearths, sometimes tiled on the inside.

There are few such stelae in the back yard of Poltava regional museum. They attract many tourists who would like to touch a statue created by our ancestors thousand years ago.

Russian Special Forces' captain and sergeant captured in Ukraine

May 18, 2015 Ukraine's military says its forces have captured Russian captain Evgeniy Erofeev and sergeant Alexander Alexandrov who were fighting with rebels in eastern Ukraine. Both were seized in the town of Shchastya, near the line of separation. A video emerged apparently showing Alexander Alexandrov saying during questioning that he was a sergeant from the 3^rd Special Mission Brigade which home base is located in the central Russian city of Togliatti.

You can see the video mentioned above at 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=JhRUb6JTD50

 

Russian sergeant Alexander Alexandrov

3^rd Special Mission Brigade’s cantonment in Togliatti (Russian Federation)

U.S. House overrides Obama's veto, passes defense policy bill with lethal aid for Ukraine

May 15, 2015 (UNIAN News agency) The vote was 269 to 151 for the legislation, a blueprint for next year's spending on military and other national security programs, the Associated Press reported. The bill calls, among other things, for arming Ukrainian forces fighting Russian-backed separatists, a move the Obama administration has so far resisted. Overall, the House bill authorizes $515 billion for national defense and another $89.2 billion for the emergency war-fighting fund for a total of $604.2 billion. Another $7.7 billion is mandatory defense spending that doesn't get authorized by Congress. The Senate version follows the same approach as the House to funding the military. The Senate Armed Services Committee voted 22-4 on Thursday to authorize $523 billion in base funding for the Defense Department and other national security programs and an additional $90.2 billion for the emergency war-fighting fund.

Read more on UNIAN:  http://www.unian.info/politics/1078587-us-house-overrides-obamas-veto-passes-defense-policy-bill-with-lethal-aid-for-ukraine.html

Boris Nemtsov Report on Russia's war against Ukraine published

May 12, 2015 (Ukrainian Canadian Congress) Colleagues of murdered Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov published a report, Putin. War. , based on research Nemtsov began about Russia's involvement in the Ukraine conflict, the Guardian reported. The 65-page report also details Russia's invasion and illegal occupation of Crimea, and estimates on the economic costs of the war. According to the report, at least 200 Russian military personnel have been killed fighting in eastern Ukraine - at least 150 Russian military personnel were killed in August 2014, and at least 70 at Debaltseve in February 2015. 

One of the contributors to the report, Ilya Yashin, Nemtsov's friend and fellow activist, stated at a press conference presenting the report that the actual total number of Russian military casualties was much higher.

A photo exhibition sponsored by Svenskt Militärhistoriskt Bibliotek has been opened in Poltava

May 7, 2015. A photo exhibition dedicated to Poltava in the time of German occupation has been opened on May 7^th in the cultural center under the city cathedral. The exhibition is dedicated to the 70th anniversary of the Victory in the World War II. Nowadays in connection with the Russian backed aggression against Ukraine our country decided to commemorate Victory Day on 8 May instead of 9 May 1945. Besides, the military parade in Kiev for Victory Day on May 9 was cancelled. May 8, however, will be celebrated as a day of remembrance and reconciliation.

On the exhibition two collections of photographs were shown to visitors. One collection was discovered in Stuttgart (Germany) in the family archives of former railway engineer who was sent to Poltava in 1942. Another collection was discovered in the Visual Archive of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation (Berlin). About 60 unique photographs were purchased and delivered to Poltava under financial support of Swedish Society of Military History (Svenskt Militärhistoriskt Bibliotek). Many German and Soviet Military orders and medals, Soviet wartime newspapers were also represented on the exhibition. May I take this opportunity to thank all SMB stuff members and personally Per-Anders Lundström and Jan Waernberg for their help and support.

You may watch a brief video about this exhibition and my brief interview (sorry for speaking Ukrainian)  at

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Fa1eIZvyqAY

Swedish monument in Poltava has been maimed again and finally lost all iron chains.

May 4, 2015 Unfortunately the monument to fallen soldiers of Charles XII erected by their compatriots close to Poltava battle field in 1909 had been indiscriminately plundered by ferrous metal hunters, with consequent severe damage to the cultural image of Poltava. For the first time it was maimed in 2013 and this year it happened again.

Yesterday while visiting the village of Pobyvanka located close to the Swedish monument I took a few pictures showing to the readers of my blogg how this long-suffering memorial stone looks now. It is obvious that this monument which age exceeds 100 years has to be properly watched, otherwise it will disappear some day. 

Only after that there is a sense to start its repair. Moreover, here in Poltava many hold that there is no sense to replace a stolen iron chains with a new ones under the current economic situation that caused the disastrous decline in living standards. Probably it is worthy to think about replacing an iron chains with made of hard plastic ones. Poltava battle museum employees have succeeded in repairing of two pillars broken by vandals but of cause it could hardly be regarded as the problem solution.

Those who are interested in the history of this unique monument created in Sweden and delivered to Poltava in 1909 due to financial support of Emanuel Nobel are welcome to visit my site:

http://www.battle.poltava.ua/svensk/swedish_monument.htm

Komorowski: units involved in Russian aggression against Ukraine will march on Red Square on V-E Day

May 4, 2015 (UNIAN News Agency) Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski announced this in his speech on the occasion of Constitution Day in Poland on May 3, Radio Poland has reported. He said that the situation behind the eastern border of Poland was tense and noted the Poles have "a special occasion to closely monitor whether any new threat isn't looming."

"We are facing a challenge of how to maintain and strengthen freedom. From the period of Poland's history which goes back to the Constitution of May 3, 1791, we've learnt a lesson that freedom is not given once and for all," Komorowski said.

"Soon, on May 9, Red Square in Moscow will turn into an armored square. There will be those units that have recently attacked neighboring Ukraine in front of us and the whole world, demonstrating their force. It has been a long time since a military conflict was as close to the Polish borders as now," he added.

"One should bear in mind that in this military demonstration, demonstration of force, we are talking not about history, but about the present and future. It is the image of today's unstable and restless world," he added.

 Read more on UNIAN:
 http://www.unian.info/world/1074358-komorowski-units-involved-in-russian-aggression-against-ukraine-will-march-on-red-square-on-v-e-day.html

Fearless Guardian 2015: U.S. instructors completed first phase of training of Ukrainian soldiers

May 1, 2015 (Ministry of Defense of Ukraine) U.S.-Ukrainian exercise “Fearless Guardian 2015” undergoes at the International Peacekeeping and Security Centre of the Land Forces Academy. Ukrainian soldiers enhance their skills in firearms, physical, medical, special training, etc. to perform tasks during armed conflicts. U.S. experts teach them to be efficient leaders, as well. Over 30 Ukrainian officers and sergeants play the role of observers. Their primary task is to accumulate, analyze and generalize the gained experience for further implementation in the training process of the Ukrainian military. According to U.S. instructors, infrastructure and capabilities of the training centre are favorable for good organization and effectiveness of trainings.