Russia occupies Mariupol port

Berlin In the future, Russia will have to do without its most important missile cruiser in the Black Sea in its war against Ukraine. At 1:05 a.m. local time on Thursday night, the Black Sea Fleet’s warship “Moskva” SOS: The ship was badly damaged after an explosion in the ammunition depot, the crew evacuated, according to the radio message. The causes would be investigated.

Kremlin boss Vladimir Putin is also informed about the incident. Ukraine claims to have hit and sunk the cruiser with two “Neptune” missiles. But it remains unclear what exactly happened.

The Russian military leadership denies the sinking, but concedes serious damage. The fire with unknown causes has since been contained, the “Moskva” is still seaworthy and the missile decks are undamaged. Now the ship should be towed to the nearest port.

The US Department of Defense sees the situation similarly. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby says in Washington that the ship is probably still able to move itself. Presumably, do just that and head towards Sevastopol for repairs.

In any case, the loss for the Russian armed forces weighs heavily: the “Moskva”, launched in 1979 and commissioned in 1983, is the flagship of the Russian Black Sea Fleet, more than 180 meters long and with a crew of more than 500 men. In addition, the cruiser was completely renewed just a few years ago and has enormous firepower and actually also the most modern air and missile defense systems. A repair could take months, if not years.

This certainly means problems for the further conduct of the war by the Russians. Their warships, which have so far navigated unhindered in Ukrainian waters and shelled land targets from there, must also be prepared to become increasingly the target of shore batteries.

Kyiv has recently secured anti-ship missiles from Britain, in addition to the domestically manufactured Neptune missiles. In order to avoid these missiles, the Russian warships will probably have to increase the distance to the coast. Landing maneuvers like the one in Odessa, which has been the subject of speculation for weeks, are becoming significantly less likely.

On land, the war is shifting to the east and south of Ukraine. According to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, more and more Russian military convoys are making their way to the south-east of his country. Rocket, bomb and artillery attacks would be continued by the attackers.

According to the Ukrainian armed forces, they repelled eight Russian attacks in the eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk. British military intelligence anticipates major Russian attacks on the eastern Ukrainian cities of Kramatorsk and Kostyantynivka.

Read more about the Ukraine war here:

Meanwhile, the governor of the southern Russian province of Bryansk reported on Ukrainian attacks on Russian territory. “Today the Ukrainian army shelled Klimovo. Two residential buildings were hit as a result and there were injuries among the residents,” Alexander Bogomas said on Telegram. There was initially no reaction from the Ukrainian army and the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense.

Russia announces further rearmament if Sweden and Finland join NATO

The verbal arguments also continued in foreign policy. If Finland and Sweden joined NATO, Russia threatened to station nuclear weapons on the border with the Baltic States and to significantly increase Russian troops in the region. This was announced in Moscow by the former Russian President and current Deputy Head of the Russian Security Council, Dmitry Medvedev.

If the two Scandinavian countries were included in the Western Defense Alliance, there would be “serious strengthening of ground forces and air defense and the deployment of extensive naval forces in the waters of the Gulf of Finland”.

Medvedev wrote on the social network Telegram that there would then no longer be any talk of a non-nuclear status in the Baltic States. Military experts point out, however, that Russia has long since stationed Iskander-type missiles in the Russian Baltic Sea exclave of Kaliningrad.

Because of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the attitude of Finland and Sweden, which have been non-aligned for decades, has changed fundamentally. For the first time, a clear majority of the population is in favor of joining NATO. Among the EU countries, Finland has the longest border with Russia at over 1300 kilometers.

Threat number two from Moscow: Russia wants to redirect its oil and gas exports from the West to the East in the face of Western boycott threats. President Putin announced that Russia must create the necessary infrastructure to multiply exports to China and Asia. So far, Europe has been Russia’s most important export market, and most of the pipelines lead there.

European countries have reacted to the invasion of Ukraine, among other things, by stopping or restricting imports of oil and natural gas. Many states, including Germany, shy away from an immediate full boycott because of the impact on the domestic economy. However, the declared goal is to become independent of Russian deliveries as quickly as possible.

Lindner: No cooperation with Russia within the framework of the G20

The federal government rules out cooperation with Russia in the group of 20 leading industrial and emerging countries (G20). A G20 meeting of finance ministers and central bank governors is planned for next week on the fringes of the IMF spring meeting in Washington. There can be no cooperation with Russia as long as President Putin is at the helm and responsible for war crimes in Ukraine, said Finance Minister Christian Lindner in a Reuters interview on Thursday.

“We will isolate Russia with the G7 partners.” There are currently agreements on this in the G7 circle of the most powerful industrial nations. “Right now, Russia is not a country with which you can have exchanges like in the past. We assume that the G20 meeting will take place next week and that we will then set a political example.”

What that means exactly, he left open. Russia’s Finance Minister Anton Siluanov wants to take part in the deliberations virtually, and this year’s G20 host Indonesia does not want to uninvite him. This amounts to a power struggle – above all between the USA and Russia. US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen recently called for a G20 boycott of Russia. Indonesia, for its part, is considering inviting non-G20 Ukraine to the meeting, which is scheduled to take place on April 20.

Dispute over arms deliveries in the traffic light coalition

Meanwhile, Western countries announced further arms sales to Ukraine. For the first time, the US wants to start supplying howitzers to Ukraine as part of its new $800 million military aid package. This brings US military aid to date to more than $2.4 billion. The US government detailed the planned shipments of military material. Australia announced the deployment of armored transport vehicles.

In Berlin, the discussion about the delivery of heavy weapons to Ukraine becomes a contentious issue in the traffic light coalition. SPD parliamentary group leader Rolf Mützenich criticized the demands of several traffic light politicians for such arms deliveries. It could be right to get an idea on the spot, he says, referring to the trip to Ukraine by the chairmen of three Bundestag committees.

“Under this impression, however, it is wrong to demand unprecedented decisions without having to answer for them yourself – especially since these could have far-reaching consequences for the security of our country and NATO,” he warns at the same time. The background is the demands of Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann (FDP), Anton Hofreiter (Greens) and Michael Roth (SPD) for the delivery of heavy weapons to Ukraine. Hofreiter had sharply criticized Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) and demanded more leadership.

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