City of “Russian military glory”, without parade this year

Russia has canceled a military parade in Sevastopol for Navy Day on July 31, according to the Russian press. In addition, the meeting of sailors in the House of Officers, as well as a reception with the commander of the Black Sea Fleet of the Russian Federation, was canceled. The reasons for the cancellation of the parade are not reported.

Once a thief, always a thief

According to military intelligence, the occupiers place polling stations in the southern regions, but partisans interfere with them. The media write about the Kremlin’s plans to annex all the occupied Ukrainian territories in September.

Statement by Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on expanding the geography of “special operations” – this is preparation for the annexation of the temporarily occupied territories of southern Ukraine, Speaker of the Main Directorate of Intelligence of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine Vadym Skibitsky said at a briefing.

He noted that Lavrov is preparing the international community to advance the policy of protecting Russian speakers in Ukraine. “The occupiers are preparing to hold so-called referendums in the south of Ukraine. We are talking about the Kherson and Zaporozhye regions.”

Unblocking of ports, a condition for economic growth

The National Bank of Ukraine has predicted that Ukraine’s economy will contract by a third in 2022. NBU Governor Kyrylo Shevchenko said this at a briefing on Thursday. “Ukraine's economy will shrink by a third in 2022, but if the Black Sea ports are unblocked, it will return to growth in 2023-2024,” Shevchenko said. He noted that in the second quarter, the decline of the economy was close to 40%.

Ukraine wants Ukrainian symbols

In Diia application, the voting on the further fate of the coat of arms of the USSR on the Motherland monument in Kyiv has ended. Almost all survey participants want to replace it with a trident, Ukrainian state coat of arms. Almost 800,000 people took part in the survey. Of these, 85% voted to replace the coat of arms with a trident. 9% said that the coat of arms of the USSR should simply be removed, and another 6% voted to leave the monument unchanged.

USSR no longer exists, but its arms still shoot

The representative of the Main Directorate of Intelligence of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine Vadim Skibitsky said that Russia had already used more than 50% of the high-precision weapons that it had at the beginning of the war.

“Military intelligence has made a certain assessment of high-precision weapons, as the Russian Federation claims, these are the Iskander, Caliber systems, air-launched cruise missiles, Kh-101, Kh-155, then, according to our estimates, today from 55 to 60% of the reserves that were before the war,” he said.

At the same time, Skibitsky stressed that Russia has very large stocks of old Soviet weapons. “These are cruise missiles – X-22, which were used twice from the territory of Belarus and others. This is a complete set of Smerch, Uragan, Grad rockets, various kinds of aerial bombs, all that remains after the Soviet Union,” he said. He noted that the stocks of old missiles are very large and it is very difficult to calculate how much is left there.

Dead and injured in Vinnitsyia and Harkov

At least two people have been killed and 19 injured in a new bomb attack by Russian forces in the city of Kharkov. Four of them are in serious condition, said Oleg Sinegubov, head of the Ukrainian regional military administration in the city.

“The enemy is attacking the residential areas and the streets of the city,” he said, before denouncing another attack on a home that left no casualties or injuries.

The Russian attack on civilian buildings in Vinnytsia has claimed its 26th victim, officials have confirmed today, Thursday, July 21.  Over 90 innocent civilians were injured in the Russian rocket attack, which also hit a hospital, shopping mall, and damaged numerous residential buildings.  

Serhiy Borzov, the head of the Vinnytsia Regional Military Administration, said in Telegram post: “26… 20-year-old Olha Lysenko died in the hospital. On July 14, she was at Peremohy Square at 10:40. She was on her way home from the dentist… 98% of body burns”.

Russians would award themselves medals even for… evacuation of Ukrainian wheat

Reuters reported that German national railways Deutsche Bahn (DB) plans to start freight train services to carry Ukrainian grain exports to German ports for loading on ships, DB said. Grains will be brought by rail to German ports including Rostock, Hamburg, and Brake, DB said. Details of capacity were not given but several trains a week are planned, largely picking up Ukrainian grain in Romania.

Grain will be exported from Ukraine through three ports, among them Odessa, Yuzhny, and Chernomorsk, a member of the Ukrainian delegation at the talks Rustem Umerov said on Wednesday. He expressed hope their number would be increased in the future. “All recommendations of the naval forces, the armed forces should be observed. There are safe corridors, the routes that we have developed together with the military, and all civil vessels will sail along those routes.”

What couldn’t be achieved in three days, cannot be achieved in 147 days either

The head of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, said that, most likely, the war in Ukraine will be protracted. “Today is the 147th day since the Russian invasion, illegal and unprovoked, large-scale, strong against the weak. This fight is likely to be a long-term conflict“, the American general predicted.

Mark Milley said the weapons are delivered to Ukraine from the United States within 48 hours of the decision taken by Biden and they reach the front line in two weeks of training.

Russia daily spends about US$400 million for military operations in Ukraine, as Forbes calculated. The salaries of military personnel are among the most insignificant elements of the war costs.

Russians with apartments in Melitopol

In Melitopol, the Russian occupants dispossess of apartments inhabitants who bought real estate before February 19 this year, the city’s mayor Ivan Fedorov stated in a TV program.

He said the Russians have been going door-to-door conducting a census in the city. Those supporting Ukraine will be forcibly sent out of Zaporizhzhia Oblast.

According to Ivan Fedorov, the occupants demand that the entrepreneurs who remained in the occupied territories should register with their tax bodies.