Russia knows about Finland’s agreements on deployment of NATO forces

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko
©Russian Foreign Ministry/TASS

The Russian side knows that Finland has already agreed to allow NATO forces to be deployed on its territory, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko said.

"Evidently, the entire [North-Atlantic] alliance has increased the zone of contact with its main enemy, as Russia is viewed by the alliance, by 1,300 kilometers. And they will demand that Finland do what other allies are doing, i.e. take all necessary measures and deploy foreign forces on its territory. We know that Finland has signed relevant bilateral agreements," he said at the Primakov Readings forum.

In this context, he stressed that Russia will be taking all possible precautions in response to NATO’s activity near its borders. "We will do this, as the Russian president [Vladimir Putin] said, based on real changes in the military situation. I mean the military forces that can be deployed or appear along our borders," he said, adding that NATO’s military activity near the Russian border "creates a military-political reality, which is heavily charged with destabilization."

The 9th Primakov Readings international forum is being held in Moscow from November 27 to 28. TASS is the general information partner of the Primakov Readings international forum and conference.

NATO foreign ministers recognize failure of Ukraine's counteroffensive — Hungarian MFA

NATO foreign ministers have acknowledged that the Ukrainian Armed Forces’ counteroffensive against Russian troops has failed, falling far short of their expectations, Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto, participating in the two-day meeting that opened in Brussels, said.

"The goals and hopes of the Ukrainian counteroffensive have been dashed because there has been no major change on the battlefield and no breakthrough since its beginning. This has been recognized by many people here. Quietly, cautiously, but still recognized," Szijjarto told Hungarian journalists after the first day of the NATO ministerial meeting.

"Regarding the course of the counteroffensive in Ukraine, they mostly said that it brought lower-than-expected results," the foreign minister, whose speech was broadcast by the M1 TV channel, said. He specified that almost no one "considered the counteroffensive a success," save for a lone holdout. "But this was an isolated attempt that no one joined," Sijjarto said. He added that the main idea was that "everything that is happening is not living up to expectations."

Scholz urges support for Ukraine despite budget crisis

Germany’s economy needs to be modernized in order to be prepared for unexpected crises in the future, Chancellor Olaf Scholz said in his address to parliament on Tuesday. A recent Constitutional Court ruling blocked the government’s plans to divert unused pandemic funds into its Climate and Transformation Fund intended for that purpose.

In his speech, Scholz recalled that the country had faced challenges, including the COVID-19 pandemic, the Ukraine conflict, and rising energy prices.

According to Reuters, Scholz said that “it would be a grave and unforgivable mistake to neglect the modernization of our country in the face of all these acute challenges.”

While Scholz called for the “transformation” of the German economy, he said that the country would continue to provide assistance to Ukraine “as long as it is necessary.” As quoted by the Guardian, he said this support had “existential importance” not only for Germany but for all of Europe, with the chancellor adding that “if Putin won” there would be “even more serious consequences.”

Earlier this month, the German government reportedly agreed to double military aid to Ukraine next year to a total of €8 billion ($8.79 billion).

During his address, Scholz also said that “it is also clear that we must not let up in our support for Ukraine and in overcoming the energy crisis,” according to Reuters.

While Scholz claimed that his government would deal with the budget crisis, the opposition Christian Democrats (CDU), whose legal action sparked the Constitutional Court ruling, greeted his words with laughter.

According to Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck, the legal decision could have “massive implications” for the country’s transformation into a cleaner and more technologically advanced economy, Bloomberg reported last week.

A few days ago, Bavarian premier Markus Soeder, who also leads the state’s largest party and CDU ally, the Christian Social Union (CSU), said Scholz’s government had “gone bankrupt” and criticized its strategy of lifting energy price controls by the end of the year. The controls were designed to protect households and businesses from soaring gas and electricity costs caused by dwindling energy imports from Russia amid EU sanctions.

Ukrainian Shell Hits Residential Building in Donetsk

Ukrainian forces shelled the Kuibyshevsky district in Donetsk using Grad multiple rocket launcher systems (MLRS), leaving five civilians wounded.

According to Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) representatives in the Joint Center for Control and Coordination, the Ukrainian military shelled the DPR 15 times in the past 24 hours. Reports say that four residential buildings and two other infrastructure facilities sustained damage.

The Ukrainian military routinely shells multiple districts in the city. The attacks result in killed and injured civilians, as well as damaged infrastructure.

Ukraine Loses Up to 135 Soldiers in Donetsk Direction in Past Day - MoD

Ukraine has lost up to 135 soldiers in the Donetsk direction in the past 24 hours, the Russian Defense Ministry said on Tuesday.

During the given period, the Russian armed forces have repulsed three attacks by Ukrainian troops in the Donetsk direction and another one in the Zaporozhye direction.

"In total, the enemy lost up to 135 military personnel in this [Donetsk] direction, as well as three pickup trucks," the ministry said in a statement, adding that Kiev has also lost up to 65 soldiers in the Zaporozhye direction.

The Ukrainian counteroffensive began on June 4. Kiev has thrown into battle brigades trained by NATO instructors and armed with Western equipment, including Leopard and Challenger tanks. Three months later, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Kiev's push had failed, with Ukraine suffering severe casualties. Several Western officials also admitted that the Ukrainian counteroffensive had not been successful so far. On November 1, Ukrainian Commander-in-Chief Valerii Zaluzhnyi said in an interview with the Economist that Kiev's counteroffensive had reached a "stalemate."

US Cover-Up of Pentagon’s Secretive Bioweapons Labs Poses Global Threat

©AP Photo/Victor R. Caivano

The US is blocking probes into its secretive overseas bio-laboratories while continuing its controversial experiments with hundreds of deadly pathogens in Ukraine; the Pentagon-funded overseas biolabs pose a direct threat Russia and other countries, too, warned Mark Sleboda, US military veteran and international affairs and security expert.

The State Duma on April 12 approved the final report of the parliamentary commission investigating the activities of US biological laboratories in Ukraine. The 200-page document is based on findings made by Russia's Radiation, Chemical, and Biological Defense Troops over the past year due to new data obtained during the special military operation to demilitarize and de-Nazify Ukraine. According to Russian lawmakers, Washington is developing a "universal" genetically engineered biological weapon designed to cause severe damage to adversaries comparable to that of a "nuclear winter." The Duma commission drew attention to the fact that the Pentagon-funded US bioweapons labs dot the globe, threatening the biological security of both Russia and the international community.

"The Pentagon is funding dozens of biological laboratories around the world – the Pentagon, not the Centers for Disease Control, not the Department of Health of the United States, the Pentagon," Mark Sleboda told Sputnik. "We know from documents that have been revealed as of years ago that they were looking for Russian-specific DNA, biological material. And (…) then they say, 'Oh, yeah, we were doing it, but it's completely for, you know, beneficent, you know, not serious reasons. Don't worry about it.' Don't look, you know, at the little man behind the curtain, this sort of thing. Well, sorry, as a Russian living in Russia, yeah, it concerns me. And the refusal of the US, their blocking in the [UN] Security Council of any attempt for the World Health Organization (WHO) to conduct investigations to have any degree of transparency is, of course, even more concerning."

Earlier this month, the Russian Ministry of Defense revealed that the US had resumed the program for the construction of biological laboratories in Ukraine after a temporary pause and is expanding the format to train Ukrainian biologists. The Russian MoD specifically cited the minutes of a meeting of the working group of US and Ukrainian specialists under the leadership of representatives of the US Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) dated October 20, 2022 on the plans for the implementation of the "Biological Threat Reduction Program" in Ukraine. The ministry is currently investigating a staggering 240 pathogens of dangerous diseases found in four laboratories in Ukraine, including cholera and anthrax. According to Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov, the head of Russia's Radiation, Chemical, and Biological Defense Troops, the US is creating components of biological weapons in the immediate vicinity of Russia's borders. The Russian MoD first shed light on the US controversial bioweapons research in 30 Ukrainian laboratories in February 2022.

"At least a couple of these biological laboratories have now fallen behind Russian lines in Ukraine," Sleboda said. "And Russia continues to pore through the information and the material that they found there, the Russian Defense Ministry has also just announced that 240 dangerous pathogens were found in a total of just four of these laboratories, including cholera and anthrax that were weaponized and intended for offensive purposes. So, that alone, to my mind, is enough for Russia to continue the special military operation until every one of these laboratories is gone. And we've heard in recent days, the Russian military has also announced that although the US put these programs in Ukraine on pause last year (…) they have since resumed them and sought to expand the operation, all the while denying any type of international transparency and accountability investigation into what they continue to do. And it's not just Russia. Similar biological laboratories have been placed around China and they are also extremely concerned and want the US, if these are beneficent, to engage in transparency of what they're doing with, you know, no real justification of why they would not."

Little-Known Facts About Russia’s Radiological, Chemical and Biological Defense Troops

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Russia’s Radiological, Chemical and Biological Defense Troops first gained international attention and recognition in the spring of 2022, when they started uncovering trove after trove of classified documents detailing the extent of the US’s military biological programs in Ukraine and across the globe. Monday is their professional holiday.

On November 13, 1918, the Revolutionary Military Council of the fledgling Soviet Russian Republic ordered the creation of the Chemical Troops of the Red Army of Workers and Peasants.

The decision to establish the specialized force was taken in the immediate aftermath of World War I, which saw Imperial Germany liberally use chemical weapons against Russian forces on the Eastern Front.

Through the 1920s and 1930s, the Chemical Troops prepared for the next great global conflagration, anticipating the widespread use of chemical weapons, training both troops and civilians in chemical defense, while stocking up on chemical weapons. The specialized units were eventually attached to all rifle and cavalry divisions and brigades.

Soviet children, members of the Young Pioneers movement, pose for a photo with chemical protection kits during training, 1937.
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During the Second World War, fearing that Germany would repeat its WWI-era practice of using chemical weapons, the Red Army maintained forces and equipment to protect against and respond in kind to such attacks, creating 19 specialized chemical weapons brigades by 1944. Fortunately, the weapons were never used, and the most of these units were disbanded after the war.

But the Cold War weapons of mass destruction arms race between the USA and the Soviet Union brought new importance to the Chemical Troops, whose responsibilities grew to include working with and defending against various other weapons of mass destruction, including biological, bacteriological and nuclear, and operating flamethrower-equipped ground forces.

The Chemical Troops played a major role in dealing with the aftermath of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in the spring and summer of 1986, with 10 regiments and battalions involved in cleanup operations, and the construction of the massive sarcophagus covering the building’s damaged Reactor Number 4. Chemical Troops chief Vladimir Karpovich Pikalov, who personally remained in the disaster zone for two straight months and received a severe dose of radiation, earned the title of Hero of the Soviet Union for his work. Ultimately, hundreds of troops at Chernobyl were exposed to dangerous levels of radiation while dealing with the consequences of an unprecedented technogenic catastrophe that no one has ever faced before, with dozens falling sick and dying prematurely in the years and decades following their exposure to ensure the safety of their motherland.

In 1992, shortly after the collapse of the USSR, the Chemical Troops were renamed to their current name - the Radiological, Chemical and Biological Defense Troops. Their duties today remain mostly the same as before, including reconnaissance to detect heightened levels of radiation and the use of biological weapons, decontamination, degassing, disinfection and disinfestation of uniforms and equipment of forces operating in areas contaminated by WMDs.

Treatment of the area of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant with a decontaminating solution. The Chemical Troops played a central role in these activities, and in the construction of the sarcophagus over Reactor Number 4.
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RCBD Troops include combat-ready formations, units and subunits sprinkled across military districts, formations and branches of the Russian Armed Forces, and man military scientific and training centers, where hundreds of grunts receive training in radiological, chemical and biological defense on a daily basis.

Modern RCBD formations include nuclear-biological-chemical reconnaissance, protection, aerosol countermeasures, processing, equipment repair, and analysis centers, as well as units operating flamethrowers (like the deadly TOS-1A Solntsepek and TOS-2 Tosochka thermobaric warhead rocket launchers). For their service in Ukraine, Russia’s RCBD Troops have received a number of commendations, with two brigades bestowed the prestigious title ‘Guards,’ four officers getting Hero of the Russian Federation medals, and 310 troops receiving Order of Courage medals (four of them twice).

TOS-2 (left) weapon system seen during a military parade in Moscow on June 24, 2020.
©Sputnik/Ekaterina Chesnokova

“The success of our troops depends on the RCBD Troops’ professionalism and heroism,” Vasily Dandykin, a veteran military analyst and Russian Navy Captain 1st Rank (ret.) told Sputnik. “The enemy senses this and hunts for” RCBD Troops' operated flamethrowers. “Many fighters, dozens, hundreds have been awarded orders and medals, including the title of Hero of Russia,” Dandykin said.

“We have these units not only in the Ground Forces, but across the military, including aviation and the Missile Forces. They also exist within the part of the Navy related to nuclear submarines,” the naval officer stressed, pointing to the RCBD Troops duties’ monitoring radiation levels, and standing ready to liquidate the consequences of accidents aboard nuclear missile subs.

RCBD Troops have also proven their propensity to help Russia prevent conflicts, Dandykin pointed out, recalling their dispatch to Syria in 2013 to remove and dismantle the country’s stocks of chemical weapons to disarm the risk of a US invasion after a rebel false flag chemical attack.

But it has been in the context of the Ukrainian crisis that the RCBD Troops have gained their highest level of international attention and renown, spending week after week and month after month in 2022 reporting on the vast network of military-biological labs funded and operated by the United States in Ukraine, across the former Soviet space, and around the world. The RCBD Troops reported on US-led work creating a dizzying variety of pathogens, including hemorrhagic diseases, leptospirosis, meningitis, hantaviruses, and work with serum samples specifically targeting populations of “Slavic ethnicity.”

Not asking the international community to take their word for it, RCBD Troops' commanders accompanied their press releases with digital scans of some of the literally tens of thousands of documents seized from biolabs in Ukraine and found online.

US officials and media initially dismissed the biolabs reporting as 'Russian propaganda', but ultimately went silent on the matter after Undersecretary of State Victoria Nuland confirmed the labs’ existence and their danger, and after a small number of foreign outlets also began reporting on the information, corroborating RCBD Troops’.

“We know that the Americans have created a large number of laboratories, including in Ukraine, where strains of viruses were made on the basis of genetic materials of Ukrainian military personnel,” Dandykin recalled. “This is also the concern of the RCBD Troops, and their chief speaks about it regularly, reports on the sad and tragic consequences these weapons can have on the civilian population, reports on what the Americans are doing in this direction, their work on viruses, etc.”

“If before, even during the Great Patriotic War, the regimental Chemical Troops commanders were treated as idle officers…because the Germans did not dare to use chemical weapons against us, knowing our inevitable response, today the RCBD Troops are a combat service in the full sense of the term,” unparalleled in the world “in terms of their combat professionalism,” Dandykin stressed.

In addition to their work uncovering US activities at Ukraine’s biolabs, Russia’s the RCBD Troops have served on the ground at the Chernobyl and Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plants, and monitored out for enemy provocations, including those involving the use of dirty bomb weapons.

Russian MoD Fears Ukraine May Resort to Biological Warfare Following Counteroffensive's Failure

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Ukrainian Armed Forces Commander-in-Chief Valery Zaluzhny admitted to British media earlier this month that Kiev's much-touted summer counteroffensive had reached a "stalemate," sparking a deadly, behind-the-scenes conflict with President Zelensky, who assured the dire situation was "not a stalemate."

Kiev may resort to the use of biological weapons following the failure of its summer counteroffensive, Igor Kirillov, the head of Russia's Radiological, Chemical and Biological Defense Troops, has warned.

"Due to the fact that Ukraine's Armed Forces have by and large failed to achieve any serious successes during their so-called counteroffensive, the Russian Defense Ministry expects a shift in their activity toward non-standard forms of warfare, including the use of biological weapons. This may include the deliberate contamination of water resources, including drinking water, the contamination of food supplies and animal feed," Kirillov said at a briefing Tuesday.

Russia has already uncovered "indirect evidence" of such activities, Kirillov emphasized, citing the discovery of "a large number of strains of thermal cultures, as well as frozen biological media for the cultivation of bacterial and viral pathogens," all from American collections.

Russia's RCBD Troops spent months after February 2022 revealing the dramatic extent of US military-biological activities in Ukraine, uncovering documents and other evidence pointing to a network of nearly four dozen biolabs alleged to be involved in the development of a dizzying array of bioweapons, including strains of viruses designed to target specific races or ethnic groups, and research into the modification of local flora and fauna as a form of economic warfare against an adversary. Beyond Ukraine, the RCBD Troops uncovered American and German research into an assortment of deadly viruses across the globe, from Africa and Asia and Latin America.

The RCBD Troops' revelations have reported led the United States to scale back its military-biological activities across the planet, and have prompted some Western media to independently investigate the Russian military's claims to independently verify the allegations. For instance, after a briefing by Kirillov implicating a hedge fund linked to President Joe Biden's son Hunter in a private-public partnership scheme funding shady biological research in Ukraine, British media dug through files from Hunter's so-called "laptop from hell," corroborating Russia's claims.

US officials themselves have also indirectly confirmed the presence of deadly biological research in Ukraine, with under-secretary of state Victoria Nuland telling senators last spring that Washington was "quite concerned" that Russian troops might seize "biological research facilities" in the country.

Putin Notes Importance of Establishing Palestine Within 1967 Borders

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Russian President Vladimir Putin said in a message to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas that the key to resolving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is the creation of a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders.

"It is in this (the creation of a sovereign Palestinian state within the 1967 borders) that we see the key condition for achieving a comprehensive, long-term and just Palestinian-Israeli settlement," Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov read out the Russian president's message to Abbas at an event marking the Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People at the Palestinian Embassy in Russia.

In the text of the telegram published on the Kremlin's website, Putin stressed that "now, when the bloody conflict is bringing untold suffering to the peaceful population of Palestine, I consider it particularly important to reaffirm Russia's consistent position in favor of the realization of the legitimate rights of your people to establish their own sovereign state within the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital."

"This undoubtedly corresponds to our common interests and is in line with the consolidation of regional security and stability. I wish you, Mr. President, good health and success, and I wish all Palestinians peace, well-being and prosperity in their homeland," the Russian leader concluded.

On October 7, Hamas launched a surprise large-scale rocket attack against Israel from the Gaza Strip and breached the border, killing more than 1,200 people and abducting over 200 others in neighboring Israeli communities. Israel launched retaliatory strikes and ordered a complete blockade of the Gaza Strip, cutting off supplies of food, water, and fuel.

Putin Addresses World Russian People's Council

The World Russian People's Council was established and held its inaugural meeting exactly 30 years ago, in 1993. Its aim is to unite leaders of traditional religions, prominent public figures, esteemed scientists and cultural personalities, as well as delegates from various government agencies. This year, the council will be held on November 27-28.

Sputnik comes to you live as Russian President Vladimir Putin, via video link from his Sochi residence, joins the plenary session of the World Russian People's Council dedicated to its 30th anniversary.

The theme of the forum is the "Present and Future of the Russian World". The last time that Putin spoke at a meeting of the Council was in 2018.

The event will be attended by Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia, members of the Russian Orthodox Church and other centralized religious organizations of the Russian Federation. State authorities, public associations, and prominent figures from the fields of science and culture will also be present.

Talks with US unlikely – Moscow

FILE PHOTO: The Kremlin in Moscow.
©Getty Images / Mlenny

Meaningful negotiations with the US are impossible under the current circumstances, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said on Monday.

“I don’t think that, in the foreseeable future, the dialogue will return to how it was before its unilateral suspension by the US,” Ryabkov told reporters on the sidelines of an international policy forum in Moscow.

Ryabkov added that Moscow is still considering whether to respond to a letter which Washington sent last month informally requesting that the countries restart communication about “strategic stability.” If Moscow decides to send a formal reply, “our American colleagues will be unlikely to find something looking like a concession,” he said.

“Unilateral concessions from our side are out of the question,” Ryabkov stressed. “Right now, it’s not even an issue of concessions or the search for compromises, but whether there is any sense in communications of that sort.”

Russia maintains that it is open to dialogue with the US on nuclear weapons and other issues, but only as equals. Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said this month that Washington should stop “lecturing” Moscow if it hopes for useful negotiations to happen.

The unprecedented tensions between Russia and the US unfolded after Moscow launched its military operation in Ukraine in February 2022.

Washington has since imposed sweeping sanctions on Moscow and provided weapons and other aid to Kiev. President Joe Biden has said that the US would continue backing Ukraine for “as long as it takes.”

Russia insists that the delivery of Western-made heavy weapons to Kiev makes the US and other NATO countries de facto direct participants in the conflict.