Russia’s Claim to Seize a Ukrainian Town Exposes Rifts Among Forces
"US and Germany agree to send infantry fighting vehicles to Ukraine"
Would be a pretty lousy life to be fighting over credit for killing people.
After Russia’s Defense Ministry said its troops had taken Soledar, a leader of the Wagner mercenary group accused the military of stealing credit. Ukraine said its forces were still fighting there.
A frame from a video released by the Russian Defense Ministry on Friday purportedly showed self-propelled howitzers firing in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine. Russian Defense Ministry/EPA, via Shutterstock
By Alan Yuhas, Megan Specia and Ivan Nechepurenko Jan. 13, 2023 [...] Most of Soledar has been reduced to shattered buildings, jagged rubble and shell craters, and most of its prewar population of about 10,000 has fled. But after months of Russian military setbacks — a chaotic collapse in the northeast in September, a retreat from a major city in the south in November, and heavy losses in the east all the while — Russian military leaders appeared to view the town as a symbolic prize worth competing for.
People from Soledar in a bus waiting to be registered and given temporary housing near Shakhtarsk, in the Russian-controlled part of the Donetsk region, on Friday. Associated Press The public quarrel between Wagner and the Russian military highlighted the deep rifts and disorganization that have plagued Russia’s invasion of Ukraine .. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/12/16/world/europe/russia-putin-war-failures-ukraine.html .. since it began almost a year ago. Late Friday, the Russian military appeared to try to patch up the dispute by issuing a second statement, this one with a rare statement of public praise for the Wagner fighters. [...] The founder of Wagner, Yevgeny Prigozhin, has for months taken a greater prominence in Russia’s war efforts, recruiting prisoners to join his troops, deploying his own fighter jets and tanks, and openly denigrating and taunting Russian generals. Analysts have said that Mr. Prigozhin, by seizing on Russian military failures in Ukraine and highlighting Wagner’s role, has sought to raise his stature with President Vladimir V. Putin.
In the battles for Soledar and Bakhmut, where Wagner troops have been engaged for months, Mr. Prigozhin has sought to portray himself as leading Russia’s only successful offensive. He has shared videos that show him with soldiers in person, purporting to be near the front, and criticized military leaders for staying far from the fighting. [...] In a reflection of the shifting power dynamics within the Kremlin, the top commander of Russia’s war effort — a general praised by Mr. Prigozhin — was abruptly replaced on Wednesday by Gen. Valery V. Gerasimov, a longstanding member of Russia’s military establishment.
German economy in recession after high prices take toll, revised figures reveal
"US and Germany agree to send infantry fighting vehicles to Ukraine"
Updated data shows economy went into reverse in first quarter with GDP falling by 0.3%
Kalyeena Makortoff, and Kate Connolly in Berlin Thu 25 May 2023 12.21 EDT First published on Thu 25 May 2023 03.45 EDT
A German shop in Cologne declares: ‘We’re closing’. After a few statistical revisions, the German economy did fall into a technical recession this winter, as widely feared last summer. Photograph: Ying Tang/NurPhoto/Shutterstock
Data from the Federal Statistical Office showed Europe’s largest economy contracted by 0.3% in the first quarter of 2023, compared with the previous three months, when it shrank by 0.5%. The technical definition of a recession is two consecutive quarters of contraction.
The statistics office said on Thursday that while private sector investment and construction grew at the start of the year, this was offset in part by a drop-off in consumer spending as higher prices forced households to rein in spending.
Overall, household spending dropped 1.2% in the first quarter, with shoppers less willing to splash out on food, clothes, and furniture. Government spending also dipped by 4.9% compared with the previous quarter.
The war in Ukraine has unsettled both businesses and consumers, both holding back on investing and buying respectively, which has affected demand. Interest rate rises by the European Central Bank have so far had little influence on reducing inflation, which stands at 7% across the eurozone.
Considerably higher heating costs, despite government subsidies, meant German consumers were holding back on spending on other things.
Carsten Brzeski, the global head of macro economics at the Dutch bank ING, said the overall decrease in Germany’s gross domestic product was “not the worst-case scenario of a severe recession” but was still “a drop of almost 1% from last summer”.
“The warm winter weather, a rebound in industrial activity, helped by the Chinese reopening and an easing of supply chain frictions, were not enough to get the economy out of the recessionary danger zone,” he added.
The Ifo Index – Germany’s most prominent leading monthly indicator, showed a continuing weak backdrop for businesses. In May it sank again for the first time in half a year. All sectors apart from services were on the decline.
The leader of the country’s main opposition party called the economic decline a “wake-up call” for the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz. “It has to shake him awake,” the CDU’s Friedrich Merz told the Agence France-Presse news agency. “The way his coalition is working means many firms doubt in the future of Germany as a location.”
The economics minister Robert Habeck cited Germany’s long-term dependence on Russian energy and the abrupt withdrawal of that supply after the invasion of Ukraine as the main reason for the downturn. “We are fighting our way out of this crisis,” he said at an event in Berlin.
Scholz appealed to people to have faith in the economy. “The prospects for the German economy are very good,” he said. He cited the massive expansion of clean energy that would “unleash the strengths of the economy” as a reason for optimism, making particular reference to large investments into semiconductors and battery factories.
Another dose of optimism was delivered by the Bundesbank. It predicted in its latest monthly report that growth would pick up in the second quarter, saying it based this outlook on improved supply chain issues and the fact, as a result, firms were now better able fulfil the backlog of orders built up during the pandemic and beyond.
However, the state-owned investment and development bank KfW said this week it expected German GDP to shrink by 0.3% overall this year. It added that two-thirds of the downturn may be caused by more work days being lost in 2023 to public holidays than last year.
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