For full coverage of the crisis in Ukraine, visit Flashpoint Ukraine.

The latest developments in the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. All times EDT:

1:02 a.m.: The latest intelligence update from the U.K.’s defense ministry says Russian efforts to complete the capture of Mariupol, including its Azovstal steel plant, are likely linked to Russia’s plans to celebrate Victory Day on May 9. Victory Day marks the Soviet Union’s 1945 victory over Nazi Germany. Putin, the update says, wants to have a symbolic success in Ukraine.

12:02 a.m.: The Washington Post reports that the western Ukraine city of Ivan-Frankivsk is warning its residents about possible shelling ahead of Russia’s May 9 Victory Day celebration.

Russia uses Victory Day to celebrate the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany; it’s a traditional celebration of national pride. Leaders in Ivano-Frankivsk fear that this year it’ll lead to increased Russian attacks. They’re telling residents to evacuate or to stay inside, and they’ve canceled all public events, the Post reports.

Some information in this report came from The Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Presse.
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U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Thursday that a third evacuation operation is underway to assist civilians in Ukraine’s southern city of Mariupol and the Azovstal steel plant.

“We must continue to do all we can to get people out of these hellscapes,” he told the U.N. Security Council, refusing to go into details about the sensitive mission.

The U.N. chief met Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow on April 26 and then traveled to Kyiv to see Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on April 28.

During his meeting in Moscow, the Russian president agreed to allow some evacuations from the besieged southern city of Mariupol and the mammoth steel plant where hundreds of civilians have been sheltering throughout the 10-week war.

This week, 101 civilians from inside Azovstal and around 400 others from nearby areas were safely evacuated by a joint U.N.-International Committee of the Red Cross team.

“I hope that continued coordination with Moscow and Kyiv will lead to more humanitarian pauses to allow civilians safe passage from the fighting and aid to reach those in critical need,” Guterres told council members.
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Russian President Vladimir Putin reportedly apologized to Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett for antisemitic comments made earlier this week by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

Lavrov reportedly said “the biggest antisemites are the Jews themselves” and that Hitler had Jewish blood, among other long-discredited antisemitic tropes while speaking to an Italian television journalist.

“The prime minister accepted President Putin’s apology for Lavrov’s remarks and thanked him for clarifying his attitude towards the Jewish people and the memory of the Holocaust,” Bennett’s office said.

A readout of the call from the Kremlin did not mention the apology, but said, “The President of Russia recalled that of the 6 million Jews tortured in ghettos and concentration camps, killed by the Nazis during punitive operations, 40% were citizens of the USSR, and asked to convey wishes of health and well-being to the veterans living in Israel. Naftali Bennett, in turn, noted the decisive contribution of the Red Army to the victory over Nazism.”

Lavrov made the comments in an Italian television interview on Sunday as he sought to justify Russia’s war. Asked about Russian claims that it invaded Ukraine to “denazify” the country, Lavrov said that Ukraine could still have Nazi elements even if some figures, including the country’s president, were Jewish.

“So when they say ‘How can Nazification exist if we’re Jewish?’ In my opinion, Hitler also had Jewish origins, so it doesn’t mean absolutely anything. For some time we have heard from the Jewish people that the biggest antisemites were Jewish,” he said, speaking to the station in Russian, dubbed over by an Italian translation.

Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid issued a statement saying Israel would demand an apology from the Russian government for Lavrov’s comments.

Putin and Bennett also reportedly discussed the upcoming May 9 celebrations in Israel and Russia commemorating the defeat of Nazi Germany, the war in Ukraine and bilateral issues.

Some information is from The Associated Press.
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An International Labor Organization survey in 80 countries finds collective bargaining agreements and practices are critical to improving working conditions, closing the gender wage gap, and in reducing inequality and discrimination in the work place. The ILO has just launched the first in a series of reports on Social Dialogue.

The report finds one third or one in three workers around the world benefits from collective bargaining agreements negotiated between trade unions and employers.

One of the more dramatic examples of that is the crucial role collective bargaining has played in mitigating the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on employment and earnings.

ILO Director-General Guy Ryder says the negotiating parties arrived at solutions that proved critical in protecting workers on the front lines of the COVID-19 pandemic. He says those solutions have proved crucial in preserving essential health care, social care, and other services.

“Secondly, collective bargaining helped prevent the spread of COVID-19 in the workplace through paid sick leave provision and the joint oversight of workplace safety and health during successive lockdowns and workplace returns. And, thirdly, and as with previous crises, collective bargaining helped save jobs, protect earnings, and safeguard business continuity.”

Much attention recently has been given to efforts to unionize corporate giants Amazon and Starbucks in the United States. However, the ILO report highlights the important role collective bargaining plays in developing, as well as developed countries. Lead author of the ILO report Susan Hayter says 57 of the agreements reviewed were in African countries. She says country studies found that collective bargaining in those countries is as effective, if not in some ways more effective, than in developed countries.

“Let me just take the example of Sierra Leone, where we did not have the employment retention measures that perhaps other countries in Europe had. And the parties sat down at the bargaining table and really sought to find a way to ensure that employment in tourism, that workers were able to come in on a rotational basis given the lockdown so that all workers could at least get some income.”

Authors of the ILO report say collective bargaining will be an essential tool to face the fundamental changes that are shaking up the world of work. They call the process a powerful problem-solving tool, which can be used for the benefit of workers and employers alike.

Rather than being a controversial issue, they say collective bargaining should be used as a public good.
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Twenty years after Vladimir Putin flattened their capital Grozny in the same way that his forces are now destroying Mariupol, Chechen refugees in Europe still live in fear of Russia’s long arm.

Tens of thousands fled the small Muslim-majority republic in the North Caucasus in the aftermath of two bloody wars with Moscow, the last launched by Putin in 1999 to bring the breakaway region to heel.

The Russian leader later installed Ramzan Kadyrov as Chechnya’s strongman. He has since ruthlessly suppressed all opposition, and never tires of declaring his ferocious loyalty to Putin.

Austria has one of Europe’s biggest Chechen communities. Many of the 35,000 exiles live in nondescript post-war blocks in a working-class district of northeastern Vienna. The men tend to work as security guards while women bring up the children.

But many on these streets dotted with Chechen grocery shops and wedding boutiques live in dread.

Dozens told AFP of the constant menace of being targeted by Kadyrov’s notorious henchmen, the “Kadyrovtsy,” who have been accused of hunting down his opponents abroad.

Others are afraid of being sent back to be tortured and killed — a fear that is far from unfounded according to human rights groups.

Before the war in Ukraine, extraditions of Chechens from Europe to Russia were being speeded up after the terror attack on the Boston Marathon and the gruesome murder of a French teacher by a young exile.

Despite the conflict, there are no signs the deportations will stop.

‘Rewriting history’

Moscow’s arm reached Zorbek Nazuev, a grandfather with a long grey beard who has lived in Austria for 18 years, last February.

He had fled there with his children after the second conflict fearing retribution for fighting with the “boeviki,” the Chechen rebels who defeated the Russians during the first war between 1994 and 1996, when Chechnya briefly won its independence.

He had heard nothing from Moscow since he left until a letter from the Austrian prosecutor’s office arrived accusing him of terrorism and murder.

According to a document seen by AFP, prosecutors claim to have intelligence that he took part in a massacre of Russian civilians in 1995.

Nazuev denies that he “killed innocent people,” insisting that he and other Chechen fighters were only “defending ourselves from the Russian invader.”

“They are rewriting history,” said the thickset man in his 50s, whose name has been changed to protect him.

Nazuev wonders if the charges and possible extradition he is facing could be linked to the fact that one of his relations fought in Syria with the Islamic State group.

The Austrian authorities refused to discuss the case despite numerous attempts by AFP through police and judicial sources.

Agreement with Russia

Hundreds of Chechens have been expelled from the European Union since it signed a 2006 agreement with Russia to ease the return of convicted suspects or those subject to an Interpol red notice.

No official statistics on the extraditions exist, but the Council of Europe denounced the abuse of the Interpol system by some countries to “persecute political opponents abroad” in a 2017 report.

Exiles also believe European countries have toughened their line against them because of terror fears after Chechens were involved in a number of jihadist attacks.

“Clearly security services are on alert” to try to prevent future attacks, said Anne le Huerou, an expert on post-Soviet conflicts at Paris Nanterre University.

Indeed, after the killing of French teacher Samuel Paty by a Chechen refugee in October 2020, Austria created a special force to tackle extremism and “parallel societies” within its Chechen community.

A month after Paty’s murder, Vienna suffered its first-ever Islamist attack when four people were killed by a man said to be jihadist sympathizer, with authorities lambasted for surveillance failures in the run-up to the attack.

Just over a year later in December 2021, Austria chartered a flight to deport 10 people to Russia, boasting of its “efficient cooperation” with Moscow.

Questioned by AFP, the Austrian government admitted that currently “four Russian nationals are in custody awaiting deportation.”

Despite commercial flights with Russia being cut by sanctions over the war in Ukraine, the expulsions are still live, according to the Austrian interior ministry.

Tortured in Grozny

“I’d rather kill myself here than go back,” said Nazuev, who said he was left handicapped after he was tortured with electric shocks before he fled Chechyna.

Moscow has continually assured European governments that Chechen exiles sent back to Russia will be fairly treated.

However, several have been killed or disappeared, while others have been tortured or convicted on charges that human rights group say were “fabricated.”

Last month the Russian rights group Memorial — which has since been banned by Moscow — criticized France for turning a blind eye to the death of 20-year-old Daud Muradov, who was sent back to Russia in December 2020 after being deemed a security risk.

At the end of last year, he was transferred to Grozny where he was tortured, they said.

His relatives were told in February that he was dead. They have not been given his body nor the results of a post-mortem, Memorial added.

Killed in Vienna

But even more than extradition, Chechen exiles fear the assassins that Kadyrov sends to liquidate his opponents in exile.

The Austrian courts singled out the Chechen leader for being involved in the killing of one of his opponents who was shot in Vienna in 2009 after criticizing Kadyrov’s human rights record.

The victim’s lawyer, Nadia Lorenz, told AFP that the case “still stops me sleeping,” claiming that “correspondence between the Austrian courts and Grozny” allowed the killers to pinpoint where her client lived.

A few days before he was shot, father-of-four Umar Israylov had been refused police protection despite being followed in the street.

The case threw the spotlight on how Kadyrov’s killers work, with prosecutors convinced he gave the order for Israylov’s assassination.

According to Israylov’s widow, the Chechen leader called her husband twice before he was shot, demanding he return to Russia immediately.

But Kadyrov’s role was never fully aired because Moscow ignored Vienna’s calls for help with the investigation.

Chechen activist Rosa Dunaeva insists the “Kadyrovtsy” were responsible for another hit in Vienna in July 2020 as well as similar killings in Lille, France, earlier that year and in Istanbul in 2011.

Harassment

“The media give the impression that we are involved in crime and religious extremism, when the vast majority of Chechens are living in fear and don’t want anything to do with politics anymore,” said Dunaeva at one of the regular protests against the deportations.

Indeed, many Chechens are well integrated in Austria, like judo champion Shamil Borchashvili, who won a bronze medal at the Tokyo Olympics last year.

Or Zelimkhan Kazan. The 19-year-old — whose name AFP has changed for his safety — was born in Austria and has never been to Chechnya. He is studying programming and has already set up two start-ups.

“I work and have everything I need but I don’t feel 100% safe,” said the mixed martial arts (MMA) fan as he worked out by the Danube Canal.

“There is no way I could get away with the things an Austrian teenager might do — for me it would be a death sentence,” he insisted, meaning deportation to Russia.

Kazan, who has no Russian papers, but only leave to stay in Austria, cannot be naturalized in the country he was born in because of Vienna’s strict nationality laws.

Which can make life difficult when Kazan says plainclothes police stop him “three or four times a month” to check his papers.

“Some call me a (slurs), hoping that I will react violently,” he added.

All the Chechen refugees AFP talked to said they felt targeted by the police, with the slightest clash leading to a conviction that could see them being deported.

Last July Austrian police officers were found guilty of beating a Chechen after being caught on security cameras.

Kadyrov’s ‘brainwashing’

Kazan also has to run the gauntlet of the “Kadyrovtsy,” who stand out because of their big cars and their swagger. When he sees them, he pulls down his hood, so they don’t ask him any questions.

Activist Dunaeva is as worried about the growing grip Ramzan Kadyrov — who has a vast social media following — has on young Chechens born in Europe. “When he is not killing them, he brainwashes them and tries to turn them against the West,” she said.

Chechens also talk about cocaine dealing that is destroying the lives of young men who see no future and are easy prey for Mafia clans. And women complain of having their freedom curtailed by their “big brothers.”

Angered by the discrimination they face in Austria, some fall into the charismatic Kadyrov’s trap, and are easy fodder for his macho posturing on social media, dividing families who had fled his grip.

“The regime also promises good career prospects for young Chechens educated in Europe who return” to their homeland, French expert Le Huerou said. “The anti-gay propaganda which celebrates masculinity can also be attractive” for some Chechens steeped in the country’s martial mythology.

A contingent of 1,000 Chechens were reportedly sent by Kadyrov to fight for Moscow in Ukraine. But other Chechens are also fighting alongside the Ukrainians, several sources told AFP.

And among the millions of refugees fleeing the fighting, a young Chechen woman travelling with her son was arrested in Romania. Courts there have already ordered her extradition, accusing her of “being part of an armed group opposed to the Russian Federation.” Her appeal has now been rejected.

Russia may have started a new war, but its hunt of Chechens continues unabated.  
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For full coverage of the crisis in Ukraine, visit Flashpoint Ukraine.

The latest developments in the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. All times EDT:

1:16 a.m.: Britain’s defense ministry said Thursday that with forces in Belarus conducting regular military exercises, Russia is likely to “inflate the threat posed to Ukraine” by Belarus in order to keep more Ukrainian forces in the northern part of the country and not deploying to eastern Ukraine.

 

1:10 a.m.: Reuters reported that five civilians have been killed by shelling from Russian forces in Ukraine’s Luhansk region in the past 24 hours, governor Serhiy Gaidai said on Thursday. Gaidai said the shelling focused on Sievierodonetsk and Popasna, Hirske and Lysychansk.

1:00 a.m.: Russia pledged to observe a cease-fire Thursday in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, where its forces have controlled all but a steel plant complex where Ukrainian troops are holed up along with civilians the United Nations is working to evacuate. Russia said its daytime cease-fire would continue again Friday and Saturday to facilitate more evacuations from the Azovstal site.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in an early morning address Thursday, said a long cease-fire was needed to evacuate the remaining civilians in Mariupol. “It will take time simply to lift people out of those basements, out of those underground shelters. In the present conditions, we cannot use heavy equipment to clear the rubble away. It all has to be done by hand,” he said.

In Washington, State Department spokesperson Ned Price expressed skepticism about Russia’s commitment to a cease-fire. “What we have consistently seen, and we’ve seen this even in recent days, is the tendency on the part of the Russian Federation to embrace a so‑called humanitarian pause to cloak itself in the guise of an actor that has humanitarian concerns only to quickly and promptly resume shelling and violence, including against civilians who are trapped in besieged areas, including in Mariupol.”

12:46 p.m.: The Washington Post posts a video documenting one family’s escape from Mariupol.

12:29 a.m.: CNN quotes a Ukrainian commander who said Russian forces who broke into the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol are waging “bloody battles” inside the complex.

12:01 a.m.: The Holocaust is at the center of a growing diplomatic row between Moscow and Jerusalem. This week, Russia accused Israel of supporting what Moscow describes as the “neo-Nazi regime” in Ukraine. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov angered Israelis when he said that even Jews like Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy can be antisemitic, and that Hitler had Jewish blood. Meanwhile, an estimated 500 Ukrainian Holocaust survivors have had to flee their homes once again for the second time in their lives. Linda Gradstein reports from the Israeli town of Petach Tikva.

 

Some information in this report came from The Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Presse.
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India and France on Wednesday called for “an immediate cessation of hostilities” in Ukraine, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi again stopping short of condemning Russia’s invasion of its neighbor.

India, which imports much of its military hardware from Russia, has long walked a diplomatic tightrope between the West and Moscow, notably refusing to denounce the latter or vote against it at the United Nations over its actions in Ukraine.

“France and India expressed their deep concern over the humanitarian crisis and the ongoing conflict in Ukraine,” Modi and French President Emmanuel Macron said in a joint statement after they met in Paris for talks and a working dinner.

“Both countries unequivocally condemned the fact that civilians have been killed in Ukraine and called for an immediate cessation of hostilities in order for the two sides to come together to promote dialogue and diplomacy, and to put an immediate end to the suffering of the people.”

However, only France condemned “Russian forces’ illegal and unjustified aggression against Ukraine.”

The two countries said they would “respond in a coordinated and multilateral way” to the risk the conflict would intensify a global food crisis. Ukraine and Russia are among the world’s main wheat producers.

Ahead of the meeting, Macron’s office had said he would “emphasize the consequences of the war for the international order well beyond the European Union, including in Asia” to Modi.

France wants to “help the Indians diversify their supply” away from Russian arms and energy, officials added.

The aim, they said, “is not to leave the Indians with no way out, but to offer solutions.”

Modi, who is on a European tour, told reporters after meeting with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Berlin on Monday that “there won’t be any winners in this war and everyone will lose.”

The Elysee said Macron has an “extremely warm relationship” with Modi, who has visited France three times since 2017, while the French leader went to India in 2018.

Modi invited Macron to visit India again to deepen cooperation on defense technology and the transition to clean energy.

The two men embraced and posed for photographs when Modi arrived in the courtyard of the Elysee Palace, where he was also greeted by Macron’s wife, Brigitte.

Going into the meeting, officials described France’s relationship with India as “trusting,” and the joint statement reaffirmed the two countries’ desire to strengthen the “strategic Franco-Indian partnership, particularly in the Indo-Pacific.”

Securing France’s place in the region is especially important after Britain, the United States and Australia last year sealed their AUKUS security pact, dumping a lucrative French contract to supply Canberra’s next generation of submarines along the way.

India has bought dozens of French Rafale fighter jets and six submarines and cooperates with Paris on civil nuclear projects. French state-owned energy giant EDF wants to build six next-generation EPR reactors in Jaitapur on India’s west coast.

The Elysee said it was pushing hard to get that deal signed, fitting in with Macron’s vow ahead of his reelection last month to renew France’s nuclear industry and replace its fleet of ageing power plants. 
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