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MOSCOW, September 2. /TASS/. Kiev launches major drone assault on Russian cities in deadly terrorist attack, Western powers quiet; six hostages, including Russian citizen, found dead in Gaza as ceasefire negotiations continue; and Indonesia weighs BRICS membership ahead of upcoming Kazan summit. These stories topped Monday’s newspaper headlines across Russia.
Over the weekend, the Kiev regime carried out one of its largest terrorist attacks on Russian cities to date. On September 1, more than 150 drones attacked 15 Russian regions. Facing setbacks on the Donetsk front, the Ukrainian Armed Forces are trying to make up for these failures by targeting civilians in residential areas, Izvestia writes. According to the newspaper, the Western puppet masters behind the Kiev militants either turn a blind eye to these actions or justify them outright. Meanwhile, Moscow has announced that attacks beyond the Russian border will not go unpunished – according to Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, a response “is already underway.”
The Ukrainian strikes on Russian soil were carried out against the backdrop of the ongoing failures of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in Donbass. On Sunday, the Ministry of Defense reported the liberation of the settlements of Ptichye and Vyemka. The day before, the Ministry announced the liberation of the settlement of Kirovo in the Donetsk People’s Republic.
Western countries, as expected, support the Ukrainian attacks on Russian border regions – they see them as a way to weaken Russia or as a means to apply pressure, a member of the Council for Interethnic Relations under the President Bogdan Bezpalko, told Izvestia. “To a certain extent, the West’s strategy is to provoke Russia into retaliating, then accusing it of disproportionate use of force. The West prefers to gradually raise the stakes, so that the escalation is manageable and predictable,” the expert believes.
“In any case, the West, using Ukraine as a proxy, will not condemn this, but at the same time they can always claim that this decision was not theirs, but was made by Kiev itself without coordination. This is a very convenient position for them,” the expert added.
On Sunday, the Ukrainian armed forces once again attacked the Belgorod region. The shelling of Belgorod cannot be called anything other than a terrorist attack, Senator from the Donetsk People’s Republic Natalia Nikonorova believes. “It is not possible to classify the criminal actions of the Kiev regime against the civilian population in any other way,” she told Izvestia.
The rapid developments around the border regions of Russia, primarily Belgorod, Kursk, and Bryansk, have shown that Kiev is clearly not going on the defensive. Now, instead of a ground offensive, the enemy’s main focus will be on holding territory, military expert Gennady Alyokhin suggested. That is why the Ukrainian forces are probing for weak points in Russia’s defenses to exploit when the opportunity arises, the expert told Izvestia. The drone assault on Moscow and other regions of the Central Federal District is proof of this.
All parties to the international negotiations on a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip and the release of hostages held by the radical Palestinian movement Hamas have reached “agreements in principle” on a possible deal, US President Joe Biden announced adding that “it is time to end this war.” At the same time, on the evening of August 31, reports surfaced that the dead bodies of six hostages had been found in the Gaza Strip, including 32-year-old Russian citizen Alexander Lobanov. According to experts interviewed by Vedomosti, these developments may not change the situation much, but could affect the domestic political situation in Israel.
Hamas representatives said that the hostages found in Rafah were allegedly killed by an Israeli air strike, but according to the Ynet portal, citing the results of forensic examinations, there are traces of bullet wounds on the bodies of the deceased. After this tragic news, Netanyahu said that “whoever murdered the hostages does not want a deal.”
It is still very difficult to say how the news of the hostages’ deaths will affect the negotiations, senior lecturer at the School of Oriental Studies at the Higher School of Economics Andrey Zeltyn told Vedomosti. There are two opposing positions in Israel: the first is Netanyahu’s – the hostages can only be freed by active military action, otherwise Israel will find more and more of them dead. On the other side are those that think the war should be stopped, and negotiations held to free the hostages. But so far, negotiations have led to nothing, because, as the expert says, Netanyahu has repeatedly flip-flopped on his terms last-minute.
The death of Israeli hostages will not affect the peace process in any way, expert at the Russian International Affairs Council Kirill Semenov believes. However, it will affect the domestic political situation in Israel, where the opposition will increase pressure on Netanyahu, arguing that he has not done enough to free them.
In a more cynical sense, according to the analyst, Netanyahu may actually gain from the hostages’ deaths, because it could untie his hands and give him even greater freedom of action.
Indonesia has received an invitation to the BRICS summit in Kazan, which will be held on October 22-24. However, which officials will participate has not been decided yet, the country’s embassy in Moscow told Izvestia. President-elect Prabowo Subianto will officially take office on October 20, just two days before the summit begins. At the same time, the visit to Kazan does not mean that the country has agreed to join the association. Indonesia is wary of jeopardizing its ties with the West, and joining BRICS would mean buddying up to Russia and China, experts believe.
“We do not yet know who exactly will attend the BRICS summit from Indonesia,” the country’s embassy told Izvestia. However, the diplomatic mission made it clear that Indonesia will participate in the event in some capacity.
“It is possible that Indonesian President-elect Prabowo Subianto will use the Kazan summit as a platform to introduce himself to the world. His visit to Kazan will allow him to meet with all BRICS leaders on a special occasion and at the same time promote new Indonesian initiatives in the name of global peace and prosperity,” Associate professor of international relations at Padjadjaran University in Indonesia Teuku Rezasia told Izvestia.
These could include ideas on cooperation between the countries of the global south to share technology, knowledge and resources, the expert believes. He emphasized that given the close historical relations between Indonesia and Russia, Subianto will also likely be anticipating initiatives from Vladimir Putin regarding the future of BRICS. According to the Indonesian political scientist, there may even be consultations between the two sides to discuss these ideas, so that Subianto could then support them at the summit or beyond.
Meanwhile, Senior researcher at the Center for Vietnam and ASEAN Studies at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences Alexander Popov told Izvestia, “It is no secret that joining BRICS means joining the circle of countries that, to one degree or another, are trying to resist Western dictates on the world stage, including in the sphere of international economic relations. Both the current and the recently elected leadership of Indonesia are well aware that joining BRICS will be seen in the West as moving over to the camp of Russia and China, which are leading the fight for a new world order, and Indonesian leaders are not yet ready to sacrifice relations with the West.”
On September 1, Azerbaijan held early parliamentary elections throughout the country, including Karabakh, for the first time in 30 years. This is the second early election in 2024, following the presidential election in February, in which the current head of state Ilham Aliyev was re-elected for a fifth term in a landslide victory, receiving 92% of the vote. Just like last time, part of the opposition refused to participate under the pretext of the lack of real conditions for competition. According to initial exit polls, Aliyev’s ruling New Azerbaijan party could win a majority in the new assembly – 63 out of 125 seats, Vedomosti writes. Voter turnout two hours before the polls closed was about 34%, according to the Central Election Commission.
The vote was originally scheduled to take place several months later, but was moved up because in November 2024, Azerbaijan will host the 29th UN Climate Change Conference (COP29), which is expected to attract more than 80,000 guests, including more than 50 heads of state and government.
As things stand, the opposition cannot hope to gain any ground in Azerbaijani politics, political scientist and specialist on the Caucasus region Artur Ataev told Vedomosti. According to him, Azerbaijan is currently experiencing economic, political, and military successes, proving that this country is a serious regional power. Azerbaijani voters associate all these successes with Aliyev’s activities, the expert believes.
Niyazi Niyazov, an expert on military security in the South Caucasus, agrees that there are unlikely to be any surprises in the election. According to Niyazov, after the election cycle is over, the authorities will launch new initiatives related to the restoration of Karabakh’s territories. “I believe that Baku will focus mainly on returning involuntarily displaced people to the region. It would be a big plus if the authorities would extend the return program not only to residents of Azerbaijan, but also to people living outside the country,” the expert said.
In foreign policy, Ataev believes, Baku will try to double down on its strategy to position Azerbaijan as one of the centers of Islam in the Middle East-Caucasus. In relations with Russia, Azerbaijan will continue the current line of cooperation, the expert said. And as for the West, Baku will continue its policy of distancing itself from France, especially in connection with Baku’s cooperation with separatist structures of its overseas territories, he added. However, the expert believes the country will continue to strengthen its positions in the European energy sector.
Russian President Vladimir Putin will make an official visit to Mongolia on September 3. The last time he was in Ulaanbaatar was in September 2019. Since then, relations between the two countries have progressed considerably, including in the economic sphere, but Russian experts believe that there is still a lot of room for growth, Kommersant writes. This applies, among other things, to the field of nuclear energy, as well as the mining and extraction of minerals. At the same time, Russia faces a lot of competition and lacks many unique advantages in these areas, according to a report by the PIR Center.
Vladimir Putin’s trip will also focus on strengthening trade and economic cooperation between the two countries. In 2022, the trade turnover between them reached a record $2.6 bln. Meanwhile, according to the latest report from the PIR Center, cooperation between Moscow and Ulaanbaatar in a number of areas could be boosted.
“Mongolia does not consider exclusively Russian or Chinese companies as counterparties and seeks to strengthen energy security by attracting investments in the energy sector from other countries,” the report authors noted. “The country, sandwiched between major powers Russia and China, is trying to implement the strategy of the ‘third neighbor’ – a pool of economic partners that do not share borders with it. In turn, amid the disruption of global supply chains, major Western players began to turn their attention to Mongolia with its huge reserves of resources. A real geopolitical struggle is unfolding for them,” the report said.
According to the report, Germany, France, the United States, and South Korea are already actively offering Mongolia their models for improving its legal framework, laying the groundwork for displacing Russia and China from the Mongolian market.
Meanwhile, in their opinion, Russia’s advantage over Western players is that it “does not see Mongolia as a raw material appendage.” “Russia sees Mongolia as an equal partner and can meet Mongolia’s needs in the area of diversifying energy resources and developing alternative energy sources, such as nuclear power plants, in cooperation with state corporation Rosatom.”
The authors consider it extremely important “to convey to the Mongolian side that partnership with Russia has a positive effect on the economy, helps to maintain energy supplies, develop transport infrastructure, and increase trade and economic exchange. This, among other things, is what the Russian delegation led by Vladimir Putin could do during the visit.
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