Crossing accusations of the USA and Russia for the attack on the Kremlin

A drone attack on the Kremlin early Wednesday sparked a series of accusations between Russia, Ukraine and the United States. Moscow pointed out this Thursday that the attack would be a joint operation between Kiev and Washington. An accusation that the White House strongly denied. None of the three countries provided a definitive proof about the authorship of the attack, which triggered various hypotheses.

After claiming a day earlier that Kiev was behind the attack, Dmitry Peskov, Yesterday, President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman repeatedly accused the US government of “direct intervention» in a drone attack. Without any evidence, he asserted that in Moscow “they know very well” that decisions “about such actions and terrorist acts are not made in Kyiv but in Washington” and that “Kiev does what he is told”in addition to dismissing as “ridiculous” statements by President Volodymyr Zelensky, saying that Ukraine had nothing to do with the incident.

Peskov issued a final warning to the United States: importanceand “to understand how dangerous direct intervention in the conflict is”.

The White House denied the allegations through Homeland Security spokesman John Kirby. “Peskov lies”, was announced in the program of the MSNBC chain. Kirby was firm in his refusal to encourage Ukrainian attacks on Russian territory: “We were very clear with them publicly and we were very clear privately, we neither encouraged nor facilitated their attack outside of Ukraine.” US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken already on Wednesday emphasized the importance of “careful account-keeping” of the Kremlin’s statements.

Masking

For historian Timothy Snyder, the speed of the “Russian propaganda response” suggests that the operation was masking Russian or false flag operation. Snyder, a professor of modern Eastern European history at Yale University, speculated that in such a case the goal might be “trying” to build Russian support for the war. However, in his opinion, it cannot be ruled out that the attack is a response to a dispute between Russian government agencies or to the activity of partisans opposed to the war, who would have every incentive to “do something visible and humiliating” against the Kremlin.

The American think tank Institute for the Study of War (ISW) leaned in the same direction, stating that the attack would be staged to “bring the war closer to the Russian national audience and create conditions for wider social mobilization.” In support of his thesis, ISW argued that It would be a great shame for Russia that their anti-aircraft defense systems would not be able to detect an attack by drones on such a symbolic target.

The adviser to the Ukrainian presidency, Mikhailo Podolyak, repeated that it was a Russian parliament to justify the escalation of the war. Several Russian shells recovered after the night bombing had handwritten inscriptions on them “For Moscow” and “For the Kremlin”.

Justification for escalation

The event, which took place less than a week before Russia’s May 9 Victory Day celebrations, sparked reactions from other capitals. There were calls from Beijing to “avoid escalation” and “all sides” were urged to avoid reactions “that could further aggravate the situation”, according to Foreign Affairs spokesman Mao Ning. The head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, said he was concerned that the alleged attack would be used “to justify” a new wave of recruitment in Russia and “more attacks against Ukraine.”

French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna condemned the statements of former President Dmitry Medvedev, calling for the removal of Zelenski in retaliation for the action against the Kremlin.

Zelensky: Russia is trying to hide its own weakness

At the headquarters of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, President Volodymyr Zelensky called for the creation of a special court “to punish the crimes of Russian aggression” and especially against Vladimir Putin. “He deserves punishment for his criminal acts,” said the Ukrainian leader who arrived in the Netherlands from Finland on Wednesday evening, on another unannounced visit for security reasons. “I am grateful that The Hague is becoming a center of justice on behalf of all those who have suffered attacks and other crimes,”

In mid-March, the ICC issued an arrest warrant against Putin for allegedly illegally deporting Ukrainian children to Russia, which could amount to a war crime.

A few hours later, in front of the Dutch parliament, Zelenski pointed out that “Russia is trying to hide its own weakness” with its latest actions. After a meeting with Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte and Belgian Alexander de Croo, the Ukrainian president asked for a “very clear message” from NATO that his country will be able to join the Alliance. “after the war” “We are realistic. We know that we will not enter during the war, but we want to get a very clear message that we will enter after the war,” Zelensky said at a joint press conference in The Hague.

Rutte confirmed that his country “supports Ukraine’s ambitions” to be a member of the allied organization and specified that the preparatory work for the July summit in Vilnius includes efforts to “take some step” in the leaders’ final declaration on the entry of the Slavic country.

Zelensky, who was “confident” of victory against Russia, returned and asked for the delivery of weapons “as quickly as possible”.

The visit of the Ukrainian president to the Netherlands coincided with lCelebrating the country’s liberation from the Nazi regime in 1945.

Kiev and Moscow exchange drone attacks on infrastructure

Rafael M. Manueco

Moscow promised a strong response on Wednesday, and yesterday in the early hours of the morning there was a wave of drone attacks over Ukraine. Russia released twenty-four Iranian Shahed drones, eighteen of which were shot down, according to Kyiv Air Force spokesman Yuri Ignat. With its incursions, “Russia is trying to exhaust the anti-aircraft defense system, since the stocks of missiles for that purpose are decreasing,” he warned.

In the capital of Ukraine, the “highest intensity of bombing since the beginning of the year” was recorded, said the head of the military administration Sergej Popko, indicating that all the assets were shot down by the air defense system, although their fragments “fell in several areas”, apparently without causing casualties. He also pointed out that the night attack “lasted three and a half hours” and that it was “the third attack that Kyiv has suffered in the last three days”. In the afternoon, alarms sounded again in the capital and more than a dozen powerful explosions were heard shortly after 19:00 local time.

The port city of Odessa was also targeted. He managed to shoot down twelve drones, but three hit the student residence, which caught fire without any injuries.

The Ukrainian drones in turn attacks an oil refinery in the city of Ilski, in the Krasnodar Territory, i product factory Novoshakhtinsk oil platforms in the neighboring Rostov region. In both cases the fuel caught fire causing two very intense fires.

Kherson, 23 dead

Meanwhile, Kherson, a key city in Ukraine’s counteroffensive, braced for a three-day curfew after living one of the deadliest days in more than five months of Russian attacks since his release in November. Authorities raised the number of civilians killed in the bombing to 23. The attacks on the city center, among other things, hit an evacuation train waiting for Lviv-bound passengers to board, killing one person and injuring six others.