Category Archives: Ukraine

The turmoil caused by Russias invasion of Ukraine has underlined the need for a free Indo-Pacific region, Joe Biden has said at a meeting with regional partners that Beijing has condemned as part of a US-led attempt to contain China.

Biden and the leaders of a loose alliance known as the Quad India, Japan and Australia reaffirmed their commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific during talks in Tokyo on Tuesday. The comments came one day after the US president said Washington would be ready to intervene militarily to defend Taiwan, prompting China to accuse him of playing with fire.

Biden later appeared to attempt to play down his remarks, saying the US policy of strategic ambiguity on Taiwan remained unchanged, according to media reports.

Washington is required by law to provide Taiwan with weapons for self-defence, but under a decades-long policy of strategic ambiguity, it has never explicitly committed itself to intervening militarily to protect the island in the event of a Chinese attack a stance that Biden appeared to have contradicted.

But on Tuesday, Biden, asked if there had been any change to the US policy on Taiwan, responded: No.

The policy has not changed at all, he said. I stated that when I made my statement yesterday, he said after a round of talks with his Quad colleagues.

The four leaders Biden, Japans prime minister, Fumio Kishida, the Indian prime minister, Narendra Modi, and Australias new prime minister, Anthony Albanese were eager to present a united front. But Indias refusal to condemn Russias invasion of Ukraine or impose sanctions forced the Quad to issue an ambiguous condemnation of the Kremlin.

Their joint statement a stopped short of explicit criticism of Russias actions in Ukraine, saying only that they opposed all attempts to change the status quo by force, particularly in the Indo-Pacific.

They also opposed the militarisation of disputed features, the dangerous use of coastguard vessels and maritime militia and efforts to disrupt other countries offshore resource exploitation activities an apparent reference to Chinese activity in the South and East China Seas.

The statement avoided explicit condemnation of either China or Russia, despite Bidens earlier warning that like-minded countries had to make sure we deliver in what he described as a battle of democracies versus autocracies.

With Modi sitting nearby, Biden said the leaders were navigating through a dark hour in our shared history due to Russias war on Ukraine. He added that it was more than just a European issue, its a global issue. Modi did not address it in his public remarks as the summit got under way.

The US strategy was for a free, open, connected, secure and resilient Indo-Pacific, Biden said. Russias assault on Ukraine only heightens the importance of those goals, the fundamental principles of the international order.

Kishida said the Russian invasion shakes the foundation of international order and was a direct challenge to the principles of the United Nations.

We should not allow similar things to happen in the Indo-Pacific region, he said.

While Japan and Australia have joined the US in condemning the Russian invasion and imposing sanctions, India, which buys most of its military hardware from Russia, has so far refused to do either.

The divisions over Russia highlight the political limits of the Quad, whose focus is on practical cooperation in areas such as coronavirus vaccines, infrastructure, climate change, space, cybersecurity and critical and emerging technologies.

China will have closely followed Tuesdays summit, only the second in-person meeting since the Quads first formal summit last year.

China has described the Quad as an attempt to form an Asian version of Nato, although the four members have not agreed a mutual defence pact.

Quad members say the group is meant to deepen economic, diplomatic and military ties among the four countries. Biden said the grouping was of growing importance, calling it a central partnership. In a short time, weve shown the Quad isnt just a passing fad. We mean business, he said.

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Joe Biden: invasion of Ukraine shows need for free and open Indo-Pacific - The Guardian US

The International Space Station depends on a mix of U.S. and Russian parts. "I hope we can hold it together as long as we can," says former NASA astronaut Scott Kelly. NASA hide caption

The International Space Station depends on a mix of U.S. and Russian parts. "I hope we can hold it together as long as we can," says former NASA astronaut Scott Kelly.

On the ground, tensions between the U.S. and Russia are running high.

Russian President Vladimir Putin falsely claims the U.S. is working with Nazis in Ukraine, while President Biden calls Putin a "war criminal."

Aboard the jointly controlled International Space Station (ISS), however, the tone is very different: American astronauts live side-by-side with Russian cosmonauts; they regularly check in with mission control centers in both countries; and supplies arrive aboard Russian and U.S. spacecraft alike.

NASA administrator Bill Nelson expects all that to continue for the foreseeable future: "I see nothing that has interrupted that professional relationship," Nelson said at a Senate hearing earlier this month. "No matter how awful Putin is conducting a war with such disastrous results in Ukraine."

But as the decades-old station nears the end of its physical lifespan, some experts worry that the long-standing relationship may come to an end.

"I hope we can hold it together as long as we can," says Scott Kelly, a former astronaut who lived alongside Russian cosmonauts for nearly a year.

But he adds, NASA should prepare for the possibility that Russia might soon end its participation: "I think what they've shown us is they're capable of anything," he says.

For 23 years, the space station has floated above the politics of planet earth as a symbol of unity between several nations around the globe.

It launched largely as a U.S.-Russian project in 1998, when it seemed possible the two foes could make a new start. The station was designed so that each side literally needed the other to survive: The U.S. provides power, while Russia keeps the station at the correct altitude and orientation.

At the time "it was in the U.S. national interest to engage with Russia," says Mariel Borowitz, an associate professor at the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs at the Georgia Institute of Technology. The joint program kept Russian rocket scientists employed during a moment when Russia faced political and economic instability, she says.

Kelly notes that by depending solely on Russia systems for certain functions, NASA was able to save money.

In 2011, the interdependency grew even stronger. NASA retired the space shuttle, which regularly carried astronauts and supplies to the station. Without the shuttle, the space agency relied on Russia's space program to get its astronauts to the station. Kelly says the Russian program excelled at launching humans into orbit. "They can reliably put three people into space and bring them home," he says. "That's what they do very, very well."

For nearly a decade, the U.S. relied on Russia's Soyuz rockets to get its astronauts to the space station. NASA/Bill Ingalls/(NASA/Bill Ingalls) hide caption

For nearly a decade, the U.S. relied on Russia's Soyuz rockets to get its astronauts to the space station.

The U.S. may have needed a ride, but they also had plenty of what Russia's space agency required money.

NASA paid billions over the years for its seats aboard the Soyuz rocket, helping keep the venerable Russian space program financially afloat.

The symbiotic relationship has endured even as things on the Earth have deteriorated: Wars, assassination attempts and allegations of political meddling have not been enough to send the space station off course. But a mix of geopolitical and technical factors are now bringing rapid change to the collaboration.

In 2020, SpaceX officially began transporting NASA astronauts to the station, ending America's reliance on Russian rockets.

The end of that vital tie was big at the time, but it pales in comparison to Russia's decision to invade Ukraine. The war has strained almost every aspect of U.S. and Russian relations, and it has already ruptured another long-standing Russian collaboration with the European Space Agency, or ESA.

"There was ongoing cooperation between Europe and Russia on different things, and it's being severed," says Tomas Hrozensky, a research fellow at the European Space Policy Institute in Vienna, Austria. ESA has kicked Russia out of its lunar program, and a long-awaited European mission to Mars is suspended, because it was set to go to space later this year aboard a Russian rocket.

"As a consequence of the war in Ukraine, the member states of ESA have put significant sanctions on Russia," ESA's director general, Josef Aschbacher, said at a recent NASA press conference. The decision to suspend the rover mission "is painful" he conceded.

Russia's interest in Western collaboration has also cooled as the war has heated up.

In response to European sanctions, the country suspended Soyuz launches from ESA's spaceport in French Guiana. And late last month, the head of Russia's space agency, a prickly politician named Dmitry Rogozin, hinted that Russia may soon announce it will pull out of the space station.

"The decision has already been made," Rogozin said during an interview on Russian state television. "We aren't obligated to talk about it publicly. I can only say one thing: that in accordance with our obligations we will notify our partners a year in advance about the end of our work on the ISS."

NASA would like to keep the station running until 2030, but the Russian components are among the oldest parts and are only certified to operate until 2024, says Anatoly Zak, publisher of Russianspaceweb.com, a site that has long tracked the Russian space program. "Beyond that [date], Russia will need to make some additional investments and some political commitments," he says.

Both Zak and Borowitz say they're not sure how seriously to take Rogozin's threats of withdrawal. He has made similar statements in the past, Borowitz notes, but without the space station, or some kind of replacement, "they're going to be in a situation where their cosmonauts don't have a clear mission."

"It would be politically very costly for Russia not to have human spaceflight," Zak says. The space program "has a huge role in Russian propaganda and Russian politics."

Cosmonauts unfurled a Soviet-era victory banner on a recent space walk. The banner, which is used to mark "Victory Day" in Russia, has also been used frequently by Russian forces in Ukraine. Screenshot by NPR/Roscosmos Youtube hide caption

Cosmonauts unfurled a Soviet-era victory banner on a recent space walk. The banner, which is used to mark "Victory Day" in Russia, has also been used frequently by Russian forces in Ukraine.

Indeed the station has played a part in Russia's propaganda efforts around its latest war.

Soviet-era memorabilia has begun to appear in the Russian part of the station, Zak notes. And on a space walk in April, two cosmonauts unfurled a Soviet victory banner to celebrate Russia's "Victory Day" that marks the defeat of Nazi Germany in 1945. The banner has more recently been flown by Russian forces throughout Ukraine.

NASA astronaut Scott Kelly says the U.S. should start thinking about how to keep the station operating without the Russians. "It would be really really hard, but I think NASA is great at doing really, really hard things," he says.

Kelly, an outspoken opponent of Russia's actions in Ukraine, says he supports continuing to work together in space, for the time being.

But as the war grinds on and the allegations of atrocities grow, he says his views may change: "At some point, things like murdering innocent people, rape, genocide transcend the importance of space cooperation."

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Ukraine war strains space station ties between Russia and US - NPR

Geography of the country of Ukraine

The geography of Ukraine varies greatly from one region of the country to another, with the majority of the country lying within the East European Plain. Ukraine is one of the largest European countries .[a] Its various regions have diverse geographic features ranging from highlands to lowlands, as well as climatic range and a wide variety in hydrography.

Lying between latitudes 44 and 53 N, and longitudes 22 and 41 E, Ukraine covers an area of 603,628 square kilometres (233,062sqmi), with a coastline of 2,782 kilometres (1,729mi).[1]

The landscape of Ukraine consists mostly of fertile steppes[2] and plateaus, crossed by rivers such as the Dnieper, Seversky Donets, Dniester and the Southern Bug as they flow south into the Black Sea and the smaller Sea of Azov. To the southwest, the delta of the Danube forms the border with Romania. The country's only mountains are the Carpathian Mountains in the west, of which the highest is Hoverla at 2,061 metres (6,762ft), and the Crimean Mountains, in the extreme south along the coast.[3]

Ukraine also has a number of highland regions such as the Volyn-Podillia Upland (in the west) and the Near-Dnipro Upland (on the right bank of the Dnieper). To the east there are the south-western spurs of the Central Russian Upland, over which runs the border with the Russia. Near the Sea of Azov can be found the Donets Ridge and the Near Azov Upland. The snow melt from the mountains feeds the rivers and their waterfalls.

Significant natural resources in Ukraine include lithium,[4] natural gas,[5] kaolin,[5] timber[6] and an abundance of arable land. Despite this, the country faces a number of major environmental issues such as inadequate supplies of potable water, air and water pollution, deforestation, and radioactive contamination in the north-east from the 1986 accident at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant.

Ukraine is located in Eastern Europe: lying on the northern shores of the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov. The country borders Poland, Slovakia and Hungary in the west, Belarus in the north, Moldova and Romania in the south-west and Russia in the east.[7]

The total geographic area of Ukraine is 603,550 square kilometers (233,030sqmi). Ukraine has an Exclusive Economic Zone of 147,318km2 (56,880sqmi) in the Black Sea.[7]

The land border of Ukraine totals 6,993 kilometers (4,345mi).[8] The border lengths with each country are: Belarus 891 kilometers (554mi), Hungary 103 kilometers (64mi), Moldova 939 kilometers (583mi), Poland 428 kilometers (266mi), Romania 169 kilometers (105mi) on the south and 362 kilometers (225mi) on the west, Russia 1,974 kilometers (1,227mi), and Slovakia 90 kilometers (56mi). Ukraine is also bordered by 3,783 kilometers (2,351mi) of coastline. The border with Russia is the country's longest border - it runs in part through the Sea of Azov.[citation needed]

The village of Vel'k Slemence is an anomaly, as it is split between Slovakia and Ukraine.[9]

Most of its territory lies within the Great European Plain, while parts of western regions and southern regions lay within the Alpine system. In general Ukraine comprises two different biomes: mixed forest towards the middle of the continent, and steppe towards the Black Sea littoral. Major provinces include, Polesian Lowland, Dnieper Lowland, Volhynia-Podolie Plateau, Black Sea-Azov Lowland, Donets-Azov Plateau, Central Russian Upland, Carpathians, and Pannonian Basin.

The western regions feature an alpine-like section of Carpathian Mountains, the Eastern Carpathians that stretches across Poland, Ukraine and Romania. The highest peak is Hoverla, which is 2,061 metres (6,762ft) tall. Mountains are limited to the west, the southern tip of Ukraine on the Sea of Azov. The western region has the Carpathian Mountains, and some eroded mountains from the Donets Ridge are in the east near the Sea of Azov. The highest elevation in Ukraine is located at the peak of Mount Hoverla which is 2,061 meters (6,762ft) above sea level.

Most of Ukraine's area is taken up by the steppe-like region just north of the Black Sea. Most of Ukraine consists of fertile plains (or steppes) and plateaus. In terms of land use, 58% of Ukraine is considered arable land; 2% is used for permanent crops, 13% for permanent pastures, 18% is forests and woodland, and 9% is other.

Most of Ukraine consists of regular plains with the average height above sea level being 175 metres (574ft). It is surrounded by mountains to its west and extreme south. Wide spaces of the country's plains are located in the south-western part of the East European Plain. The plains have numerous highlands and lowlands caused by the uneven crystallized base of the East European craton. The highlands are characterized by Precambrian basement rocks from the Ukrainian Shield.

Plains are considered elevations of no more than 0600m (01,969ft) among which there are recognized lowlands (plains) and uplands (plateaus, ridges, hill ridges).

From northwest to southeast the soils of Ukraine may be divided into three major aggregations:[10]

As much as two-thirds of the country's surface land consists of black earth, a resource that has made Ukraine one of the most fertile regions in the world and well known as a "breadbasket".[11] These soils may be divided into three broad groups:

Interspersed in various uplands and along the northern and western perimeters of the deep chernozems are mixtures of gray forest soils and podzolized black-earth soils, which together occupy much of Ukraine's remaining area. All these soils are very fertile when sufficient water is available. However, their intensive cultivation, especially on steep slopes, has led to widespread soil erosion and gullying.

The smallest proportion of the soil cover consists of the chestnut soils of the southern and eastern regions. They become increasingly salinized to the south as they approach the Black Sea.[10]

The territory of Ukraine is bordered by the waters of the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov. More than 95% of the rivers are part of those two seas' drainage basins. A few rivers are part of the Baltic Sea basin. There are seven major rivers in Ukraine: Desna, Dnipro, Dnister, Danube, Prypiat, Siverian Donets, and Southern Buh.[12]

Ukraine has a mostly temperate climate, with the exception of the southern coast of Crimea which has a subtropical climate.[14] The climate is influenced by moderately warm, humid air coming from the Atlantic Ocean.[15] Average annual temperatures range from 5.57C (41.944.6F) in the north, to 1113C (51.855.4F) in the south.[15] Precipitation is disproportionately distributed; it is highest in the west and north and lowest in the east and southeast.[15] Western Ukraine, particularly in the Carpathian Mountains receive around 1,200 millimetres (47.2in) of precipitation annually, while Crimea and the coastal areas of the Black Sea receive around 400 millimetres (15.7in).[15]

Water availability from the major river basins is expected to decrease, especially in summer. This poses risks to the agricultural sector.[16] The negative impacts of climate change on agriculture are mostly felt in the south of the country, which has a steppe climate. In the north, some crops may be able to benefit from a longer growing season.[17] The World Bank has stated that Ukraine is highly vulnerable to climate change.[18]

Significant natural resources in Ukraine include: iron ore, manganese, natural gas,[19] titanium, kaolin, uranium, and arable land.[20][21]

Ukraine has many environmental issues.[22][23] Some regions lack adequate supplies of potable water.[24] Air and water pollution affects the country, as well as deforestation, and radiation contamination in the northeast stemming from the 1986 accident at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant.[25]

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Geography of Ukraine - Wikipedia

Notably, in the mid-14th century, Lithuania began to extend its borders and took over the rule of Ukraine, which proved to be reasonably beneficial for the Ukrainians. However, in 1569 Poland and Lithuania formed a union which disrupted the relative peace that the Ukrainians had been enjoying. The peasants soon found themselves subject to serfdom and persecution was brought upon the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. In 1596 the Bishops of the Ukrainian Church, to preserve their own identity and not be assimilated into Polish Catholicism, established the Greek Catholic faith. They acknowledged the authority of the pope, but kept their Orthodox rites.

In the 16th century, the term Ukraine, which is translated as borderland or at the border, came into use. Poland-Lithuania was now struggling against the growing principality of Moscow for control of the area of Ukraine. Many Ukrainians fled beyond the area of the lower Dnieper rapids in order to escape the religious persecution and serfdom that harsh Polish rule had brought upon them. These fugitives established a military order known as Cossacks, or Kozaks, being taken from the Turkic kazak which means adventurer or outlaw. The Cossacks waged a successful revolution against Polish domination in 1648.

Ukraine was unable to stand alone though, and a treaty was concluded with Moscow, acknowledging their superiority, but allowing Ukraine a large measure of independence. Russia did not respect the terms of the treaty however, and treated the Ukrainians with contempt, referring to them as little Russians. Ukraine concluded a treaty with Poland in 1658 which resulted in the Russo-Polish war and the partitioning of Ukraine. Thereafter followed years of domination, treaties and unrest in Ukraine until after the Bolshevik Revolution, when Ukraine declared complete independence in January 1918.

This situation was fairly short-lived though, when after much conflict in the area, Soviet troops gained control of Ukraine, which became one of the republics of the USSR in 1922. This inclusion into the USSR under communist rule resulted in much hardship for the Ukrainians, and so during World War II when Germany invaded Ukraine, many saw them as liberators. However, the Nazis viewed all Slavs with contempt and treated them very harshly during their occupation of Ukraine.

After the devastation of World War II Ukraine still suffered much unrest on their way to independence. In July 1990 a declaration of sovereignty was passed by the Ukrainian parliament, and in August 1991 Ukraine was declared to be independent of the Soviet Union. Leonid Kravchuk became the first president of Ukraine in December 1991.

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History of Ukraine - Ukraine.com

An extra 1.3bn in military support is to be handed to Ukraine by the UK, in a significant increase in support for the country as it continues to resist Russias illegal invasion.

In a package that marks the UKs highest rate of military spending since the end of the Iraq and Afghanistan campaigns, the funding was revealed before a meeting of G7 leaders to discuss what additional help can be given to Volodymyr Zelenskiys forces. Boris Johnson is also due to meet arms companies to ask for an increase in production.

The funding will come from UK reserves after being agreed with the Treasury and will include 300m in military equipment already agreed by Johnson. It includes anti-battery radar systems to target Russian artillery, GPS jamming equipment and night-vision devices.

Equipment dispatched by Britain to Ukraine has already played a significant role in picking off Russian tanks and heavy vehicles. The use of NLAWs, or next-generation light anti-tank weapons, became a feature of the early weeks of the conflict as they were easy to deliver and simple for Ukrainian troops to use.

Putins brutal attack is not only causing untold devastation in Ukraine, it is also threatening peace and security across Europe, Johnson said. The UK was the first country to recognise the scale of the threat and send arms to help the Ukrainians defend themselves. We will stand by that endeavour, working with our allies to ensure Ukraine can continue to push back the Russian invasion and survive as a free and democratic country.

The US president, Joe Biden, has also pledged military help for Ukraine. The next tranche of US equipment will include artillery rounds, counter-artillery radars and electronic jamming equipment. Biden and Johnson will be among G7 leaders holding a virtual meeting with Zelenskiy to mark VE Day and discuss future support.

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UK poised to hand further 1.3bn military package to Ukraine - The Guardian

The 2S22 in action.

The Kramatorsk Heavy Machinery Plant, in Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraines Donbas region, built exactly one 2S22 howitzer around five years ago.

As a Russian army attacked across Ukraine along multiple fronts starting on Feb. 23, the 155-millimeter 2S22, mounted on a six-by-six KrAZ-6322 truck, narrowly escaped destructionby Kramatorsks own employees.

But the self-propelled howitzer, the most sophisticated big gun Ukrainian industry ever has developed, survived. And now, with the Russians reeling and Ukrainian forces on the move, its shooting back at the invaders.

The Ukrainian army, like the Russian army, generally follows Soviet doctrine. Its artillery-centric. Other forcestanks, infantry, engineersexist to position and protect the guns, which deliver the decisive firepower.

Its for that reason that the active brigades in Kyivs army have a battalion of 2S1 or 2S3 tracked 122-millimeter or 152-millimeter howitzers as well as a battalion of BM-21 122-millimeter rocket-launchers. A battalion might have a dozen or 18 guns or launchers.

In addition, the Ukrainian army has independent artillery and missile brigades with bigger artillery including 2S7 203-millimeter howitzers, 300-millimeter BM-30 rocket-launchers and Tochka ballistic missiles.

Kyivs guns and rockets arent new. Most are more than 30 years old. But the gunners are skilled and creative and theyve learned to take cues from special operations forces, volunteer drone crews and even civilians calling in Russian positions on their cell phones. Some artillery batteries have access to Kvitnyk laser-guided shells that precisely can hit vehicles nestled in alleyways and trenches.

When a Russian force barreled toward Kyiv in the early weeks of the current campaign, Ukrainian anti-tank missile teams slowed them down. But what killed them was our artillery, a senior adviser to Gen. Valerii Zaluzhnyi, commander of the Ukrainian armed forces, told Jack Watling and Nick Reynolds from the Royal Services Institute in London.

But the war has been hard on Ukraines artillery. Ukrainian brigades have lost at least 67and probably many moreof the 1,800 guns and launchers they had in service or in reserve before the war.

Perhaps the greater problem is that Kyiv has called up tens of thousands of reservists and also formed territorial brigades. Reserve and territorial formations need artillery, toopotentially straining the pre-war stockpile. There is evidence the territorials are using their old 100-millimeter anti-tank guns for indirect fire.

Hundreds of fresh artillery pieces are en route from the United States and other NATO countries. Wheeled Cesars from France. Tracked PzH 2000s from Germany and the Netherlands. Towed American M-777s. The first of the donated guns, and newly-trained crews, finally are arriving at the front line.

The growing demand for artillery, perhaps exacerbated by recent shifts in the wars momentum, explains why the Ukrainian army bothered to preserve one prototype gun that only had just begun trials.

In the heady early hours of the war, when it perhaps seemed like the Russian army might perform better than it has done, officials at the Kramatorsk factory prepared to destroy the sole 2S22. Destroy it so that [it] does not go to the enemy, is how Ukrainian politician Serhiy Pashynskyi described the officials thinking.

But the Russian offensive met stiff resistance and ground to a haltfirst in the south, then in the north. Today in the east, Ukrainian brigades around Kharkiv, just north of Kramatorsk, have launched a counteroffensive. For the 2S22, the risk of capture faded.

The 28-ton 2S22 had fired a few rounds in testing back in October. It apparently worked just fine. So in recent weeks, Kramatorsk packed up the gun and deployed it along the front. Pashynskyi circulated videos depicting the 2S22 firing at Russian targets spotted by drones.

One wrinkle is that the 2S22 fires 155-millimeter shells, the standard NATO caliber, rather than Soviet-caliber shells. Production problems at factories in Ukraine mean the Soviet calibers are in ever-shorter supply. On the other hand, there are a dozen countries that can supply NATO-size shells in large quantities.

In that sense, the 2S22 design might actually become more useful as the war grinds on. Its unclear whether Kramatorsk is in a position to make more of the howitzers.

One gun alone cannot bend the trajectory of a war. The 2S22 is an oddity whose inspiring story might be more valuable than its actual firepower is.

But a thousand guns can bend a war. And its evident Ukraine is working hard to push every gun it can to the front.

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Ukraine Made Exactly One Copy Of Its Best Cannon. It Just Joined The War. - Forbes

The more Ive gotten to know her, the more Ive come to think that Wang Tzu-Hsuan exemplifies some of the best qualities of the younger Taiwanese Ive met here in Taipei: open-minded, serious but not too serious, spontaneous, and thoughtful. At 33, she is unlike most surgeons in Taiwanwho are typically older, and maleand while many of her medical-school classmates sought more lucrative careers in the United States, she opted to stay, out of a sense of duty. When shes not busy in the operating room or meeting with patients, we catch up over food or drinks and talk about whats happening in the world, which for us in Taiwan, where pandemic rules still bar foreign visitors, feels quite far away.

I was taken aback when Wang told me over dinner at a local Japanese-style izakaya restaurant that shed decided to broaden her skill set from her usual thyroid, liver, pancreatic, and intestinal surgeries to include traumanamely bullet and shrapnel wounds. Gun and bomb violence are almost nonexistent in Taiwan, but having spent her whole life unworried about the possibility of China attacking her homeland, she said she had begun to think about how she could help if the worst happened. Although the threat from China has always been there, she said, it has also always seemed so distant for us.

Not anymore. Seeing the devastation that Russian bombs and missiles have wrought upon once-tranquil Ukrainian cities spurred Wang to approach local volunteer groups to figure out how to prepare a generation of surgeons who have never experienced war for the realities of conflict. The Chinese Communist Party seeks to annex Taiwan, which it claims despite having never ruled it, and eliminate Taiwanese identity. With a densely concentrated population roughly the size of Floridas on a mostly mountainous island that is little bigger than Maryland, any invasion attempt by China would incur substantial civilian casualties.

Wang is not alone, either. Many Taiwanese are looking at Ukraines current reality as something that could befall their homeland. A number of Taiwanese friends and interviewees have told me theyd stay and fight, while others have described family plans to secure citizenship elsewhere, just in case. The former commander of Taiwans military has called for the formation of a territorial defense force to deter Chinas ambitions. The war has intensified political discourse too, and Taiwanese politicians are using it to rationalize their views of China: For President Tsai Ing-wens Democratic Progressive Party, it justifies the past five years of buying weapons from the U.S. while expanding largely unofficial diplomacy with other democracies; for many members of the opposition party Kuomintang, an on-and-off frenemy of the Communists over the past century, heightened concerns over an invasion attempt by Beijing highlight the risks of getting too close to Washington.

Both Taiwan and Ukraine democratized in the 1990s, following years of brutal authoritarian rule. Today these two young democracies, as well as those in Central and Eastern Europewho share similar historiesare most directly affected by Russias and Chinas expansionist pushes. Whereas the threat to democracy posed by the Beijing-Moscow alliance is more ephemeral in older and more established democracies such as the United States, Britain, Germany, France, and Japan, in Ukraine it is manifested in widespread death and destruction. In Taiwan and the European countries of the former Soviet bloc, it is viscerally unsettling.

Indeed, if there is a front line in the emerging global standoff between democracy and autocracy, it lies at the borders of these younger democracies, where peoples and governments are changing their behavior in real ways and making tangible sacrifices to maintain their freedomsfrom a peacetime surgeon in Taiwan preparing to deal with conflict, to countries adjoining Ukraine donating weapons to aid the fight against Russia.

Whether Ukraine and Taiwan get the support they need to remain sovereign is likely to be a defining geopolitical question of this generation, extending beyond regional political dynamics. Countries in both Europe and Asia appear to see this clearly nownote how quickly the Biden administration enlisted Asian allies such as South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and even Singapore to sanction Russia over its invasion of Ukraine. Their willingness to show concern about faraway Ukraine suggests that they think one day they could be looking for similar support from Europe, should China enter into a conflict with one of them.

The revanchist violence that Vladimir Putin has unleashed on Ukrainians has yet to come to Taiwan, but it has jarred the collective consciousness nevertheless. There have been multiple protests outside the de facto Russian embassy in Taipei, a solidarity march through the center of the capital, and a rush to send money and nonmilitary aid to Ukraine. Tsais move to sanction Russia and cut it off from crucial Taiwanese semiconductors is perhaps the most confrontational shes been with any major power. (For his part, Putin declared in a joint statement with President Xi Jinping on February 4 that Russia considers Taiwan an inalienable part of China.)

Just as much as Russias invasion of Ukraine has stoked fears here in Taiwan that a Chinese attack might be more a matter of when than if, the whole-of-society Ukrainian response has also inspired Taiwanese to think that, should Xi make a move, it wouldnt necessarily end in Chinese victory. I think Ukraine has shown us all a lesson that people in their own countries have to be willing to fight for their democracies and freedom, if it really comes down to it, Albert Wu, a historian who relocated back from Paris last year, told me. Their bravery and resistance has been a real inspiration to us all.

Ukrainians I know who live here have made similar observations. I hear from Taiwanese friends saying that Ukraine is currently fighting for Taiwan as well, and that means a lot, Oleksander Shyn, a university student living in Taipei, told me. Because if Ukraine loses, and if the Ukrainian people end up in Putins hands, it might inspire China to do this here. So while most people around the world are wishing us peace, many Taiwanese people are wishing us victory.

The Russian invasion has awoken many of Taiwans leaders and its people from a collective slumber, a less-than-urgent attitude toward the threat from Beijing rooted in decades of a poorer China being ill-equipped to pull off what would be the largest amphibious invasion ever. But Chinas rapid economic development, and consequent naval buildup, is tipping the scales in Beijings favor.

Last month, Taiwans defense minister, Chiu Kuo-cheng, proposed extending military conscription for men from the current four months to one year. In a mid-March survey by the Taiwan Public Opinion Foundation, 75.9 percent of respondents supported the idea. One senior legislator from Tsais ruling party has floated the idea of mandating conscription for Taiwanese women for the first time.

Thinking has been changing at the diplomatic level too, with a growing awareness in Taiwan and the countries of Central and Eastern Europe that the threats they face are part of a global struggle. In recent months, Taipei has seen a flurry of visits from lawmakers from Lithuania, Slovenia, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Estonia, and Latvia, all of whom became democracies in the 1990s after being controlled by Moscow. Alongside those was a visit from Jakub Janda, a Russia expert who arrived here late last year from Prague. The 31-year-old Czech think-tank director and reservists mission: to establish a Taipei office for the European Values Center for Security Policy, founded in 2005 to protect Czech democracy. Now back in Prague, Janda told me that the struggles against Russian expansionism in Europe and Chinese expansionism in Asia have converged. After the initial Russian invasion of Ukrainian territory in 2014, Janda said, his think tanks focus shifted to protecting European democracy from Russia. By 2018, Beijings growing influence in Central Europe led the center to include China in its remit.

Today it is clear, Janda said, that Ukraine and Taiwan are not disparate geopolitical tinderboxes, but rather different fronts of the same battle against a new bloc that occupies eastern Ukraine and Crimea, has taken over and militarized disputed islands in the South China Sea, and subsumed Hong Kongs democracy. Both Russia and China have territorial disputes with Japan. Moscow has put former Soviet states on alert, while also making vague nuclear threats in Europes direction. Meanwhile, Beijing is testing the resolve of India, the Philippines, Malaysia, and Indonesia to defend their territory.

To either side of the Atlantic, the repercussions of a successful Russian invasion of Ukraine are obvious: Countries once under Soviet sway would face a greater threat from Putin, who might continue his adventurism to shore up support as the Russian economy suffers from sanctions. Citizens in Western democracies are less aware, however, of the importance of Taiwans continued sovereignty to the current security order in Asia, and beyond.

Geographically, China would control key sea lanes through the South and East China Seas, significantly increasing its ability to exert military pressure across the Western Pacific and political influence around the globe. Technologically, Beijings jurisdiction over the worlds most advanced semiconductor manufacturing facilities would put China in a commanding position to establish dominant military advantages, expand global economic dependencies, and set the standards for humankinds technological future.

Politically, the loss of Taiwan would validate and propel Beijings narratives of the inevitability of American decline and the superiority of Chinas ruthlessly efficient autocratic system over the incoherence and disunity of Western-style liberal democracy, says Ivan Kanapathy, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments who previously served as the National Security Councils deputy senior director for Asia and as a U.S. military attach in Taipei. It would, he told me, represent an epochal strategic shift of global power and influence.

As in Ukraine, the most important factor in Taiwans survival is the willingness of its people to defend its hard-earned democracy. Wang, the surgeon, told me that shes already shifted from wanting to avoid getting involved in politics to feeling a sense of responsibility for doing so, and hopes that other Taiwanese do too.

I want to be more brave, and am more willing to speak up about my feelings for my country, she said. No matter what happens, I will choose to stand up for Taiwan.

Originally posted here:

The Lessons Taiwan Is Learning From Ukraine - The Atlantic

BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) Jill Biden heard heartbreaking stories Saturday from Ukrainian women and children who fled Russias war and found safe haven in Romania, with one mother telling the U.S. first lady of a harrowing escape after being holed up in a cramped, cold basement with her traumatized 8-year-old daughter.

Reaching Romania was a game change for us, Svitlana Gollyak of Kharkiv, Ukraine, told Biden in her native language during the first ladys tour of a Bucharest public school hosting refugee children. Gollyak said her daughter feels much better here. ... No more tears and she adapted very nicely.

Biden told Gollyak and the other women, I think mothers will do anything for their children, adding that they were amazingly strong and resilient.

Biden said her message to the families was we stand with you. During a craft activity, she watched as the children scrawled messages on paper cutouts of their hands. One young Ukrainian girl wrote, I want to return to my father. Biden later told reporters the girls words were heartbreaking.

The first lady praised the Romanian government and relief organizations for the range of humanitarian aid they are providing to refugees. At the school, the first lady herself a teacher saw how teachers are helping some of the approximately 900,000 Ukrainians who have fled to Romania since Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24.

Really, in a lot of ways, the teachers are the glue that help these kids deal with their trauma and deal with the emotion and help give them a sense of normalcy, Biden said.

She added that she saw signs of hope for families who felt that there was some structure to their lives and they were getting supplies. They all realized how much money the United States has been giving to Ukraine and to the refugee situation and to Romania to support the refugees.

Most of the Ukrainians who have fled to Romania, mainly women and children, have moved on to other countries, but about 100,000 remain, officials said.

Earlier, Biden was briefed at the U.S. Embassy on the relief effort. Her visit to Eastern Europe comes as President Joe Biden is pressing Congress to pass an additional $33 billion in security and economic assistance for Ukraine.

Jill Biden called the show of solidarity amazing but also just the beginning. She said it was inspiring for Romanians to welcome all these refugees into their homes and offer them food and clothing and shelter and give them their hearts.

But she also cautioned that much more needs to be done by the U.S. and allies to assist Ukraine.

Were all hopeful, right, she told reporters. We wake up every morning and think this has to end but it still keeps going on and on.

About 7,000 Ukrainians cross the border and arrive in Romania daily, said Pablo Zapata, the Romanian representative for the U.N. refugee agency.

The United Nations, other agencies and the Romanian government are assisting refugees with food, shelter, education, health and mental health care, and counseling, among other services.

Biden asked specifically about the provision of mental health services and whether summer school was available to help refugee students catch up on their education. She said later that the whole world is seeing that we need more mental health assistance for the children and their parents.

The first lady is on the second day of a four-day trip to Romania and Slovakia, which shares a border with Ukraine, that is designed to showcase U.S. support for the refugees. Biden was scheduled to spend Sunday, Mothers Day, meeting with refugees in Slovakia and visiting a border village.

Biden had lunch with Romanias first lady, Carmen Iohannis, at her private residence. Iohannis, who accompanied Biden during the school visit, kept her job as an English teacher when her husband took office, just like Biden kept hers teaching at a Virginia community college.

The emotional thread to Bidens day continued after she arrived in Slovakias capital. At her first stop, she left flowers at a memorial dedicated to Jan Kuciak, a 26-year-old investigative journalist, and his fiancee, who were assassinated in 2018. The case triggered a political crisis and brought down the countrys government.

___

Associated Press writer Aamer Madhani in Wilmington, Delaware, contributed to this report.

___

Follow the APs coverage of the war at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

Follow all AP stories on global migration https://apnews.com/hub/migration

Original post:

'This has to end': Jill Biden sees Ukraine moms' heartbreak - The Associated Press - en Espaol

One of the few welcome surprises of Putins invasion of Ukraine was the speed and apparent effectiveness of western governments imposition of conventional sanctions on his country. In short order, half of Russias $600bn foreign reserves held in western financial institutions was immediately frozen. The country was expelled from Swift, the vast messaging network that banks use to transfer money across the world. PayPal, Visa and Mastercard abruptly ceased to work in Russia. There was an immediate ban on technology transfers from the west. Then there was the sudden sanctioning of Putin-friendly oligarchs and those who service them in London, though Ben Elliot, the Tory co-chair and Quintessentially, the concierge service for the super-rich that he runs, seem to have been exempted from the strictures.

Trebles all round, then? Only up to a point: some of the successes involve measures that in other contexts are deeply toxic. Russian troops, for example, have been nabbing high-end John Deere tractors in Ukraine and shipping them back to Mother Russia. But when the lucky beneficiaries of these wondrous machines attempt to start them up, they discover that John Deere has remotely bricked them ie turned them into multi-ton paperweights. Which is why many western farmers detest John Deere. Having paid a fortune for their new tractors, they find that they are not allowed to repair them themselves and any attempt to download bootleg software to diagnose malfunctions may get them into legal trouble on intellectual-property and user-agreement grounds.

Similarly, Ukraine has been using another toxic technology facial recognition to identify dead Russian soldiers. Forbes magazine reported in March that Mykhailo Fedorov, vice prime minister of Ukraine and minister of digital transformation, had confirmed on his Telegram channel that the country was using the software to find the social media accounts of deceased Russian soldiers, allowing authorities to contact their friends and families. The aim, he said, is to dispel misinformation surrounding the war in the country and, specifically, Russian claims that it is just a special operation with few losses. He did not specify which particular technology had been used, but his department later confirmed to Forbes that it was Clearview AI, which the American firm had provided to the Ukrainian government free of charge.

So whats the problem? Only that Clearview AI, a company backed by PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel, among others, is pretty controversial back home. In February, a group of US senators and representatives issued a call to federal agencies to avoid using its particularly dangerous technology, which poses unique threats to Black communities, other communities of colour and immigrant communities.

Thus technology taketh away and technology also giveth, as the Old Testament might put it. But the tech that is suddenly on everyones mind in relation to sanctions and Russia is blockchain, the software that underpins cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, Ethereum and the like. These currencies have been proliferating like wildfire for some years, and I long ago lost count of them all, but in essence they all have one thing in common: theyre decentralised payment systems that can enable anyone to transfer value to someone else anywhere. And because every part of the process is heavily encrypted and unsupervised by any authoritative institution such as a central bank, cryptocurrencies are clearly useful for money laundering and for evading sanctions.

Whatever else it is, Russia seems to be a crypto-savvy country. An official government estimate puts local holdings of cryptocurrencies at $200bn, which is, at a guess, 12% of the world total. Another survey, by a Singapore-based crypto payment gateway, concluded that 17 million Russians own cryptocurrencies and that upwards of half a million computer programmers work in the industry. And Russia is currently third in terms of Bitcoin network-mining activity apparently with government backing; Putin has called for the use of surplus energy for crypto mining.

Given that, it would be surprising if the regime did not have a strategy for using cryptocurrencies as a way of dodging or undermining sanctions. This would be a viable option for individual Russian citizens seeking to trade with others outside the country (or even to protect their savings at a time when the rouble has crashed). But for an economy the size of Russia, crypto transactions on the scale required to offset the impact of sanctions would be much too large to conceal from western governments. For once, theres no technical fix for the problem that Putin has created for his country and for the world.

Majestic mealThe Queens Touch is an unmissable 1996 New Yorker essay by Paul Theroux.

President takes the podiumJoe Bidens speech to the annual White House correspondents dinner. A few good jokes, too.

The shipping newsA Yacht Owners Worst Nightmare is an interesting piece by Olga Khazan in the Atlantic on the tricky business of seizing oligarchs yachts.

Read more from the original source:

How Russia and Ukraine are finding new ways to use tech in the war - The Guardian

SALZBURG, Austria Finland and Sweden need to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) now while Russia's Putin is focused on Ukraine, the alliance's former chief told CNBC.

The two Nordic countries have been considering joining NATO in the wake of Russia's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine. Becoming NATO members would represent a sharp U-turn in their policies towards the Kremlin after years of taking a neutral approach. Finland and Sweden are due to announce their plans in the coming days.

"As far as Finland and Sweden are concerned, I think there's a window of opportunity for [the] two countries to join, exactly now because Putin is preoccupied elsewhere. He can't do anything about it," Anders Rasmussen, former NATO secretary general, told CNBC Saturday.

Russia has repeatedly stated it's against NATO's enlargement and it has named this as was one of the reasons for its invasion of Ukraine.

In addition, the Kremlin has also said if Stockholm and Helsinki were to join the alliance, then it would have to "rebalance the situation."

It is unclear how the Kremlin would react if both nations move ahead with their memberships.

However, their accession would lead to doubling the current NATO-Russia border and significantly add more military power to the alliance.

NATO's Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has previously said both nations would be warmly welcomed.

But it could take "some months" before their memberships were to become official, Rasmussen told CNBC.

"Even if it's considered an urgent procedure, and it is, it will take some months because you have to go through 30 Parliaments before it can be ratified all over NATO," he said.

NATO currently has 30 members, including the United States.

"It will take some months and during that period both Finland and Sweden could potentially be exposed to Russian intimidation or even threats, and that's why we have to guarantee their security," Rasmussen said, "as if they were already members of NATO."

These security guarantees would have to come from individual members of NATO as the alliance's famous Article 5 which states that an attack on one NATO member is an attack against all would only apply to Finland and Sweden once their applications were ratified by all the 30 NATO members.

Now, it is quite clear that being a member of NATO means Article Five, and being just friends of the United States does not.

Ivan Krastev

Political Analyst

Russia's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine has led to a shift in defense policy in Europe. Countries have announced a lot more spending on their military capabilities, have sent weapons to Ukraine and in the case of Finland and Sweden it has led to more public support for joining NATO.

"You should also understand the Swedish and the Finnish [potential] decisions was a message that there is no neutral countries on the border of Russia. And this is a new reality, even during the Cold War, it was not like this," Ivan Krastev, a political analyst, told CNBC Friday.

"Before [Russia's invasion of Ukraine] it was not clear what is the difference between member of NATO and just being friends of the United States. Now, it is quite clear that being a member of NATO means Article Five, and being just friends of the United States does not. And this is why Finland and Sweden should move from friends to members," he added.

Read more here:

Finland, Sweden need to move now on NATO while Putin is preoccupied with Ukraine, former secretary general says - CNBC