Russia

An explosion yesterday afternoon (2 April) in a café in central St Petersburg has killed Vladlen Tatarsky, a high-profile Russian military blogger and vocal supporter of Russia's war in Ukraine. The explosion, which happened at 18.13 local time, killed Tatarsky, whose real name was Maxim Fomin, as well as injuring twenty-four others, six of whom are in a critical condition, according to the Russian health ministry. It is not yet clear who is responsible for the attack, which Russian authorities have said is being investigated as "high-profile murder". Tatarsky had been a guest speaker at an event at the Street Food Bar No 1 café in central St Petersburg when he was targeted. While there are conflicting reports about the nature of the explosive device that killed him, soon after the explosion videos on social media emerged of him being handed a box with a statue inside as a gift, which had a bomb hidden inside, according to Russian sources. Later on Sunday evening, Russian media published a video of a woman being taken out of an apartment belonging to Darya Trepova, a St Petersburg local understood to have been born in 1997 and had previously been arrested at anti-war rallies. Sources suggest they have reason to believe she was responsible for Tatarsky's murder.

Writing on Telegram on Thursday (30 March), the Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar has said that Russian and Ukrainian losses in the east of Ukraine are as high as 10 to 1 on some days. This comes a few hours after the UK Defense Secretary Ben Wallace said on Sky News that the total Russian number of dead and injured since 24 February 2022 could be as high as 220,000. "The Russian forces have some really significant and deep systemic problems at the moment in their efforts," Wallace said, adding the Russian military was making "almost no progress whatsoever." Meanwhile, the General Staff of Ukraine's Armed Forces claimed on 29 March that Russia had lost approximately 172,340 troops in Ukraine since the beginning of its full-scale invasion, including 610 casualties just over the past day. Although these numbers are all but impossible to verify, reports do suggest very high casualty numbers, especially on the Russian side. In other news, Ukraine's Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov has said that Ukraine's counteroffensive involving recent deliveries of Western tanks may begin in April or May, but cautioned that a lot depends on weather conditions.

Russian Kalibr cruise missiles have been destroyed in an explosion in the Crimean city of Dzhankoi late on Monday (20 March). According to the Ukrainian Ministry of Defence, they were being transported by rail at the time of the explosion. As has become standard, Ukrainian authorities confirmed the explosions in Dzhankoi, located in the north of the Russian-occupied Crimean peninsula, but they did not claim an attack. "The [explosions] continue the process of Russia's demilitarisation and prepares the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea for de-occupation," the Ukrainian Defence Ministry said in a statement. Sergei Aksenov, the head of Moscow-installed proxies in Crimea, said that Russian air defense had been working in Dzhankoi, saying that the wreckage injured one person and damaged a household and a shop. Meanwhile Igor Ivin, the head of the occupying administration in Dzhankoi, reported a drone attack. The Kalibr missiles which have reportedly been destroyed in the explosion are designed to be launched from surface ships of the Russian Black Sea Fleet.

The Chinese President Xi Jinping has arrived in Moscow for face-to-face talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday (20 March). Both the Kremlin and China foreign ministry have been tight-lipped about the purpose of the trip, revealing only that Xi and Putin will discuss a "comprehensive partnership and strategic co-operation", adding that Xi will be in Moscow until Wednesday. The visit comes only days after the International Criminal Court in The Hague issued Vladimir Putin with an international arrest warrant for alleged war crimes, namely the unlawful deportation of people, including children, from Ukraine to Russia. Xi Jinping is scheduled to have lunch with the Russian President before an informal one-to-one meeting this afternoon, while formal talks with delegations are planned for tomorrow. Ever since 24 February 2022, China's stance over the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine has been somewhat ambiguous. China has neither openly welcomed the war, nor openly criticised Russia. Less than a month ago China also published its own 12-point peace plan to bring the war in Ukraine to an end, calling for peace talks and respect for national sovereignty.

The International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague has issued an international arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Commissioner for Children's Rights Maria Lvova-Belova. In a statement released on Friday (17 March), the ICC said that both Putin and Lvova-Belova are "allegedly responsible for the war crime of unlawful deportation of population (children) and that of unlawful transfer of population (children) from occupied areas of Ukraine to the Russian Federation". The statement says that there are "reasonable grounds" to believe that both Mr Putin and Ms Lvova-Belova bear "individual criminal responsibility for the aforementioned crimes". It also adds that the ICC had considered issuing secret warrants, but decided that public awareness of the warrants "may contribute to the prevention of the further commission of crimes". Since the start of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022, the Ukrainian government estimates that Russia has deported as many as 16,000 Ukrainian children, to Russia.