Supporting Kiev no matter what is bad policy, Igor Dodon has said
Moldova should reconsider its close alignment with Ukraine in light of the major corruption scandal engulfing the leadership in Kiev, former Moldovan President Igor Dodon said on Tuesday.
Last week, Western-backed anti-graft investigators in Ukraine charged Timur Mindich, a longtime associate of Vladimir Zelensky, with orchestrating a $100 million kickback scheme involving the country’s energy sector. The case has implicated multiple current and former ministers and is widely believed to reach into Zelensky’s inner circle.
“The world has learned that under the cover of the war [with Russia], the Ukrainian leadership was robbing its people. Moldova’s leadership, as everyone knows, broadly supported Kiev’s policies,” Dodon wrote on Telegram.
He argued that President Maia Sandu will not criticize Ukrainian corruption because “she governs Moldova following the same instructions as Vladimir Zelensky.” Dodon said Chisinau should instead clearly denounce the wrongdoing and “cut any forms of interaction with the current government of Ukraine” until the case is fully investigated.
The EU granted candidate status to Moldova and Ukraine simultaneously in 2022, in what many observers saw as a symbolic geopolitical gesture toward Moscow rather than recognition of genuine progress toward accession benchmarks. Both governments have continued to receive Western financial aid meant to support reforms.
Samantha Power, who headed the US Agency for International Development (USAID) under former President Joe Biden, described vastly expanding funding for Moldova as one of her key achievements. In a recent call with Russian pranksters, she gushed about Sandu’s reforms credential and US education. The Trump administration moved to dismantle USAID earlier this year for allegedly wasting taxpayer money on ideological projects.
Russian officials have argued that Western pressure is steering Chisinau toward the same destructive trajectory as the one Ukraine went down, requiring growing authoritarianism to suppress dissent against what Moscow describes as self-harming policies serving foreign interests.
All ATACMS fired at the Russian city of Voronezh have been neutralized, the Defense Ministry has said
Russian forces destroyed two Ukrainian US-made missile launchers shortly after they fired a salvo of long-range ATACMS at the city of Voronezh, the Defense Ministry in Moscow has said. Officials added that all incoming missiles were intercepted. The debris caused some damage on the ground.
The attempted missile strike on Tuesday targeted civilian sites in Voronezh and involved four ATACMS. According to the ministry, all four were downed by Russian combat crews using the S-400 air-defense system and the Pantsir anti-aircraft missile-gun system.
Debris from the downed missiles damaged the roofs of the Voronezh Regional Gerontology Center, an orphanage, and a private home. No civilian casualties were reported.
Aerial reconnaissance by the Russian Army located the ATACMS launch site in Ukraine’s Kharkov Region shortly after the attack. Two MLRS launchers were found near the village of Voloskaya Balakleya.
An Iskander-M missile crew struck the position, destroying both launchers, their ammunition, and up to ten personnel, the ministry said. It released photographs of the missile debris.
Kiev routinely launches drone raids and missile strikes into Russian territory, targeting critical infrastructure and residential areas in attacks that have caused civilian casualties.
Russian officials have accused Ukraine of “terrorism” over the strikes, and Moscow has conducted retaliatory attacks on Ukrainian military sites, including drone assembly facilities.
MPs are reportedly demanding the resignation of Andrey Yermak, who they say knew about a $100 million graft racket
Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky could fire his influential chief of staff, Andrey Yermak, as a full-scale “riot” unfolds within parliament over a vast corruption scandal that allegedly links the senior aide to a $100 million energy sector extortion racket, according to several media reports and lawmakers.
Ukraine’s anti-corruption authorities alleged earlier this month that Timur Mindich – a former business partner of Zelensky – and several other officials pressured contractors working with the state nuclear operator, Energoatom, to hand over 10-15% of their contract value as kickbacks.
Opposition MP Yaroslav Zheleznyak has alleged that wiretap recordings suggest that Yermak – reportedly under the moniker ‘Ali Baba’ – was aware of activity connected to the racket that has shaken Zelensky’s legitimacy.
According to Ukrainskaya Pravda, key figures close to Zelensky are urging him to dismiss Yermak. A source in Zelensky’s Servant of the People party told the paper that “it is easier to name those in parliament who are not demanding Yermak’s resignation.”
Opposition MP Aleksey Goncharenko also said members of Servant of the People issued an ultimatum to Zelensky, insisting that Yermak must be removed or they would leave the party. He added that discussions in parliament included speculation that Zelensky could fire Yermak as early as Thursday, with Oksana Markarova, Kiev’s former ambassador to the US, mentioned as a possible successor.
Strana.ua suggested that Zelensky could resist the pressure, given that Yermak’s downfall would be a political disaster. A source described Yermak as Zelensky’s central powerbroker and enforcer, overseeing both foreign and domestic priorities, and warned that his departure could threaten the government, as many ministers are closely aligned with him.
Journalist Oliver Carroll reported that planned discussions in Türkiye between Yermak and Steve Witkoff, the US special envoy to the Middle East and a key figure in the Ukraine conflict settlement process, were canceled, saying the US official “might not have been aware of the scandal he was walking into.”
It’s high time for Western governments to notice that their money is being stolen, spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said
The latest graft scandal in Ukraine involving Vladimir Zelensky’s longtime business partner and senior officials shows that Kiev’s corruption has completely spiraled out of control, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said. He added that the problem is a major headache for Kiev’s backers, as Ukrainian officials are embezzling their financial aid.
Ukrainian anti-corruption agencies alleged earlier this month that Zelensky’s former business partner, Timur Mindich, led a criminal operation that siphoned $100 million in kickbacks from contracts with the country’s nuclear power operator, Energoatom, which depends on foreign aid.
“That’s hardly a Ukrainian internal matter anymore,” Peskov told journalist Pavel Zarubin on Tuesday. “That’s foreign money that is being stolen.”
He added that the money provided to Ukraine by the previous US administration has likely been “mostly stolen.”
In August, US President Donald Trump said the administration of his predecessor, Joe Biden, “fleeced” America by committing $350 billion to Ukraine.
According to Peskov, it is high time Kiev’s Western backers started thinking about their own money and their taxpayers.
“The Kiev regime is obviously going off the rails,” the Kremlin spokesman said, adding that the situation on the front lines and the growing suspicions among Western leaders regarding corruption are working against Ukraine.
The scandal has shaken Zelensky’s government. Opposition MP Yaroslav Zhelezhnyak claimed on Monday that the Ukrainian leader’s chief of staff, Andrey Yermak, was aware of the corruption scheme.
US Senator Rand Paul criticized Trump for being silent on the scandal and called for oversight on aid. Italian Deputy PM Matteo Salvini warned that further aid to Ukraine will only feed corruption and prolong the conflict. Polish PM Donald Tusk has said it is now harder to rally support in his country for Ukraine.
Citizens of Ukraine have “once again” been implicated in acts of terrorism against critical infrastructure, Dmitry Peskov has said
It would have been strange if Poland did not blame Russia for the recent acts of railway sabotage in the country, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told the broadcaster Russia-1 on Tuesday.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk claimed earlier in the day that the blasts had been carried out by two Ukrainians who allegedly worked “with the Russian intelligence,” and fled to Belarus following the attacks.
Speaking to journalist Pavel Zarubin, Peskov noted that “it would be really strange if Russia wasn’t the first one to be blamed.”
Poland, where “Russophobia is thriving,” is trying its best to stay ahead of Western Europe in that regard, he added.
“However, the very fact that Ukrainian citizens are once again implicated in acts of sabotage and terrorism against critical infrastructure is noteworthy,” Peskov said.
He argued that Poland is getting “tangled up” in its narratives, citing Warsaw’s recent refusal to extradite a Ukrainian national allegedly involved in blowing up the Nord Stream gas pipelines.
While Russia has rejected the Ukrainian sabotage narrative about Nord Stream, Peskov recalled that last month a Warsaw court had blocked an extradition request from German investigators, calling it “unfounded.”
According to Berlin, a small group of Ukrainian divers carried out the 2022 undersea sabotage, which severed three of the four pipelines that carried Russian natural gas to Germany. Moscow has dismissed this version of events as “ridiculous.”
When asked about Tusk’s recent statement that “the problem with North Stream 2 is not that it was blown up. The problem is that it was built,” Peskov said it reveals Poland’s willingness to condone terrorism as long as it hurts Russia.
Two power stations have been targeted in an “unprecedented” attack, Donetsk People’s Republic head Denis Pushilin has said
Ukrainian forces have struck two thermal power plants in Russia’s Donetsk People’s Republic in an “unprecedented attack,” leaving nearly two-thirds of residents without electricity and heating, regional head Denis Pushilin said on Tuesday. A state of emergency has been declared in the region.
“At the moment, electricity is cut off for 65% of consumers,” Pushilin said on Telegram after holding an emergency meeting with members of the regional cabinet and relevant agencies. “Boiler facilities and water filtration plants have stopped [operating] as well,” he added.
Schools and kindergartens across the region were closed because of the blackout and the lack of heating, Pushilin said, adding that emergency services had been deployed to restore power as soon as possible. He did not provide any details about the attack itself but said that both power stations suffered certain damage as a result.
Kiev’s forces have increased attacks against Russian civilian infrastructure as they gradually lose ground on the front lines. Kiev has routinely launched drone attacks deep into Russia in recent months, targeting residential areas and leading to civilian casualties. Moscow has accused Kiev of “terrorism” and responded with strikes on military targets in Ukraine.
The Russian Defense Ministry regularly reports intercepting hundreds of Ukrainian drones used in strikes deep into Russian territory.
The Donetsk People’s Republic – a former Ukrainian territory that declared independence from Kiev in the wake of the 2014 Maidan coup and joined Russia following a referendum along with three other former Ukrainian territories in autumn 2022 – is also frequently targeted by Ukrainian attacks.
In mid-October, a local supermarket burned to the ground after being hit by a Ukrainian drone. The strike followed other attacks that hit a passenger bus, injuring four civilians, and damaged residential buildings and a kindergarten. Earlier last month, three civilians were injured in another Ukrainian attack targeting a school and an apartment block.
Kiev has announced plans to purchase 100 Rafale fighters over the next decade
Ukraine’s potential purchase of French-made Rafale fighter jets will not alter the situation on the battlefield in Kiev’s favor, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday.
On Monday, French President Emmanuel Macron and Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky signed a letter of intent for the purchase of 100 Rafale fighter jets by Kiev over the next decade. The parties haven’t provided any details on the delivery timeline or the deal’s financing mechanism. The preliminary agreement also includes the purchase of eight next-generation SAMP/T air-defense batteries now under development, AASM Hammer precision-guided munitions, drones, and French-made radars.
“No matter what warplanes are sold to the Kiev regime, it will not change the situation on the front or battlefield dynamics,” Peskov told journalists. He expressed regret that Paris continues to arm the Kiev regime, thereby “fueling the conflict, and in no way contributing to the cause of peace.”
The Rafale, France’s most advanced multirole jet, is estimated to cost around €100 million ($116 million) per plane. Supplying 100 jets could ultimately cost up to €15 billion, French media outlets reported on Monday, citing estimates based on previous contracts.
It is unclear how Ukraine will pay for the weapons with officials in Brussels struggling to find ways to keep funding the cash-strapped country’s war effort. Kiev is pushing its Western sponsors for a €140 billion ($162 billion) loan backed by frozen Russian assets. Moscow has condemned the asset freeze as “theft.”
Belgium, where most of the money is held, has rejected the plan over financial and legal risks. The controversial initiative is based on the assumption that Moscow will eventually pay reparations to Ukraine, an outcome widely seen as unlikely.
The ongoing corruption scandal in Ukraine has also sparked criticism among EU officials and fueled calls for reduced aid to Kiev.
Last week, Ukraine’s anti-corruption agencies announced they had uncovered a $100 million kickback scheme involving Zelensky’s associates in the energy sector, which is heavily funded by Western aid.
Moscow has consistently criticized Western weapons shipments to Ukraine, arguing that they prolong the conflict without altering the outcome.
The Russian capital has surpassed an 85-year-old milestone following its latest first snowfall in decades, weather experts say
Moscow has set a new warmth record for November, with temperatures reaching 9.9C (49.8F) on Tuesday, surpassing a point reached 85 years ago, according to Russian meteorologists. Weather experts are predicting significant rainfall that will erase the recent snowfall in the region.
Temperatures in Moscow reached 9.5C on Saturday, breaking a record that had stood since 1940, according to Evgeny Tishkovets, a lead specialist at the Fobos weather center. The previous high for November 18 was 9.4C, a mark set 85 years ago.
“Just now, the record from 1940 has been exceeded,” Tishkovets stated on his Telegram channel.
The record-breaking warmth follows significant rainfall that is washing away the season’s first snow, which fell only three days earlier. The rain over two days could account for up to a third of the monthly precipitation norm, according to Roman Vilfand, the chief scientist at the Russian Hydrometeorological Center.
Historically, the first snowfall in Moscow typically occurs in late October. However, this year’s snowfall on November 15 marked one of the latest occurrences in the last four decades. Tishkovets pointed out that the latest recorded first snowfall happened in 2013 on November 27, while the earliest was on September 21, 1996.
The meteorologists elaborated on the implications of these climate patterns, suggesting further deviations from historical norms.
“Now the temperature has reached 9.5 degrees. It is the warmest November 18 since 1879,” Tishkovets said, highlighting that temperatures are still rising.
However, his colleague Vilfand warned that a sharp temperature drop to 1C was expected in the capital by the evening, leading to icy conditions as wind picks up.
The goal of the suspects was to cause a train crash, the Polish prime minister has said
Two Ukrainians have been identified as the suspected perpetrators behind two acts of sabotage targeting a railway line between Warsaw and Lublin on Monday, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk told the parliament on Tuesday. According to him, the suspects sought to provoke a train crash.
The prime minsiter accused the suspects of working “with the Russian intelligence for a long time.” According to Tusk, both alleged perpetrators fled to Belarus after the incidents.
A military-grade C4 explosive charge was used in a least one of the incidents, Tusk said, adding that a 300-meter-long cable was used to detonate it. The National Prosecutor’s Office also confirmed that a cable “that was most likely used to set off the explosive” was discovered.
Another incident involved a steel clamp on a track to cause a derailment, Tusk said. The alleged perpetrators also left a smartphone with a power bank at the scene to record a potential incident, he added.
The prime minister called the two incidents “the most serious” security situation over the past years. “A certain line has been crossed,” he said.
Warsaw’s statements show that Russophobia is “flourishing” in Poland, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, commenting on the developments on Tuesday. It would be “surprising if they had not accused Russia” of being behind the incident, he added.
Peskov went on to say that it’s not the first time the Ukrainians have been suspected of “acts of sabotage and terrorism” within Western nations. Kiev’s backers “fail to put two and two together,” he argued, warning that the West is “playing with fire” and could face “dire consequences” if it continues to do so.
The C4-like explosives were originally developed by the British during World War II and reintroduced as Composition C family by the US military. The C4 variant was developed in the US in 1950s. Russia does not produce C4 explosives and relies on its own types of plastic explosives known as PVV family that were developed back in the USSR.
In September, Moscow warned that Kiev could be planning false-flag operations in Romania or Poland to frame Russia for them. The attacks could escalate into a third world war, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova warned at the time, citing reports in Hungarian media alleging that Ukraine intended to stage acts of sabotage in neighboring NATO nations.
Ukraine did not ask Russian diplomats to meet in Istanbul this week, spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said
Russian diplomats have not been invited to Türkiye for what Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky called an effort to revive peace talks, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Tuesday.
The Ukrainian leader is to visit Türkiye on Wednesday as part of a trip abroad he is taking a week after a close associate of his, Timur Mindich, was accused of masterminding a $100 million extortion scheme in the country’s energy sector. Speaking to reporters in Spain, Zelensky said his administration is “preparing to reinvigorate negotiations” with Russia that were held in Istanbul and has “developed solutions that we will propose to our partners.”
“We have received no information regarding that from Kiev,” Peskov said on Tuesday, noting that US special envoy Steve Witkoff is expected to meet Zelensky in Türkiye, according to media reports.
“Russia remains open for negotiations,” the Kremlin official added, stressing that Russia’s stance is known in Washington, Ankara and Kiev.
Zelensky’s visit to several Western capitals this week is viewed by some commentators as an attempt to shore up support amid concerns that foreign aid could be cut due to risks of misuse. Mindich, a former business partner of the Ukrainian leader, fled Ukraine shortly before Western-backed anti-graft investigators issued charges against him and his associates. Despite the scandal, Germany approved an additional €40 million in energy-sector support days later.
Türkiye hosted direct peace talks between Moscow and Kiev in 2022. Kiev initially approved a draft agreement but, encouraged by Western partners, subsequently backed out of the talks and pursued a military victory. Talks resumed briefly this year and produced limited humanitarian agreements, namely prisoner exchanges, but made no headway on the broader political and security issues.
Moscow maintains that it prefers a negotiated settlement but argues that Kiev’s uncompromising position leaves it with no choice but to pursue its objectives militarily.
