live blog
Status: 07/23/2022 04:34 am
Lithuania again allows Russia to transport sanctioned goods by train to the Kaliningrad exclave. According to Ukrainian sources, 1,000 Russian soldiers are surrounded in Cherson. The developments in the live blog.
4:33 a.m
Baerbock does not rule out the failure of the ring exchange
Federal Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock does not rule out the failure of the armored ring exchange agreed with Poland for Ukraine and wants to look for alternatives in this case. “If this path wasn’t right, then we have to reflect on that and see how we can get active elsewhere,” said the Greens politician to “Bild”.
In wartime situations, you don’t always know what the perfect way is. In the ring exchange procedure, eastern allies of Ukraine are to provide easy-to-operate Soviet-design tanks. In return, Germany promised its NATO partners modern equipment as a replacement.
However, Poland’s President Andrzej Duda has repeatedly accused Berlin of not keeping promises. Baerbock now said to “Bild” that the ring exchange had been initiated “because it seemed to us to be the best and quickest way at the time”.
Now the federal government must deal with the question of why such an exchange “obviously does not happen and whether we then have to provide other support”. The minister rejected the Polish government’s accusation of breach of word and deception in connection with the tank ring exchange: “In a situation like this, nobody deceives their European neighbors.”
She added: “It was clear from the start that we couldn’t replace every single tank overnight with a snap of our fingers.”
4:32 a.m
Lithuania allows freight transport by rail to and from Kaliningrad
Lithuania has lifted the ban on transporting sanctioned goods to and from Kaliningrad in Russia by rail. “It is possible that some goods will be transported today,” Mantas Dubauskas, spokesman for the state railway company, told Russia’s RIA news agency.
The state-owned Russian news agency Tass quoted a Kaliningrad government official as saying that 60 wagons of cement would soon be shipped to the exclave. The European Union said last week that the transit ban would only affect road traffic, not rail traffic. Therefore, the Baltic state of Lithuania should allow Russia to transport concrete, wood and alcohol to the exclave via EU territory.
Kaliningrad Oblast borders NATO and EU member states Lithuania and Poland and relies on transit rail and road transport through Lithuania for most goods. Since June 17, however, Lithuania’s customs have stopped the delivery of goods that are on the EU list of sanctions against Russia.
4:32 a.m
Zelenskyj adviser: More than 1000 Russians in Cherson surrounded
According to information from Kyiv, more than 1,000 Russian soldiers have been surrounded by Ukrainian forces in the occupied southern Ukrainian region of Cherson. Not far from the Vysokopillya settlement, the Russians found themselves in a “tactical encirclement,” said President Volodymyr Zelensky’s adviser, Oleksiy Arestovych. On Thursday they had unsuccessfully attempted a breakthrough.
Arestovych’s statements could not be checked independently. There was initially no confirmation from the Russian side. Some time ago, the Ukrainian army confirmed the capture of the village of Potemkyne. The general staff report spoke of Russian bombing of the place. Wyssokopillja and Olhyne were not mentioned. The Ukrainian army had recently launched several counter-offensives in the Cherson region, which Russian soldiers had largely brought under their control after the start of the war against the neighboring country that began at the end of February