Ukraine War: ‘We are ready’: Russia plans ‘direct conflict’ with NATO

Wagner’s fighters will return to the Ukraine battlefield after Vladimir Putin promoted a top commander of the killed mercenary leader.

The Wagner group’s fighters are set to return to the Ukraine battlefield after Vladimir Putin stuck a deal with a key ally to the killed mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin.

The Russian president promoted a former aide to the Prigozhin to oversee the return of Wagner’s “volunteer units” to Ukraine, according to the Kremlin.

The move seemingly wrests control of the rebel mercenary unit to Moscow after the failed mutiny of Prigozhin, who was killed alongside several senior commanders in an August plane crash.

Vladimir Putin meets with Russian Deputy Defence Minister Yunus-Bek Yevkurov and Andrei Troshev. Picture: AFP

Russian state television showed Putin meeting with former Wagner commander Andrei Troshev, who Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said now worked at the defence ministry.

The absorption of Wagner into the official Russian defence hierarchy was the impetus for Prigzohen’s failed march to Moscow in June, when Putin ordered the mercenary fighters to sign an oath of allegiance.

“At the last meeting we talked about you overseeing the formation of volunteer units that can carry out various tasks, first and foremost of course in the zone of the special military operation,” Putin was quoted as saying to Troshev.

Troshev, a retired colonel known by the nickname “Sedoi” (Gray-haired), hails from Putin’s hometown of Saint Petersburg and is a decorated veteran of Kremlin campaigns in Afghanistan, Chechnya and Syria.

Andrei Troshev was a former aid of Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin. Picture: AFP

Yevgeny Prigozhin died in a plane crash two months after a failed mutiny. Picture: AFP

He was one of the leaders of the Wagner Group in Syria, for which the European Union put him on its sanctions list in December 2021.

The meeting was also attended by Deputy Defence Minister Yunus-Bek Yevkurov, who underlined the integration of fighters from the mercenary Wagner Group into Russia’s regular military.

Prigozhin, the head of the Wagner mercenary group, died with nine other people when a plane flying from Moscow to Saint Petersburg crashed on August 23.

Exactly two months earlier, Prigozhin had openly challenged Russia’s military high command by leading a short-lived mutiny with his fighters that threatened to spiral into civil conflict.

Observers have said this was the most significant challenge to Putin’s rule. Prigozhin called off the rebellion after apparently striking a deal with the Kremlin through the mediation of Belarus but he faced no criminal prosecution.

RUSSIA’S BRUTAL NEW THREAT

Russia’s former president and current Security Council deputy Dmitry Medvedev said they’ve been left with no options other than a “direct conflict” with NATO.

One of Vladimir Putin’s closest allies, the 58-year-old said the alliance between the United States and its European allies has become an “openly fascist bloc” that Russia is ready to fight.

“It seems that Russia is being left with fewer and fewer options but to come into direct conflict on the ground with NATO,” he said, adding that the alliance had become larger than Adolf Hitler’s Axis coalition of Nazi Germany, Italy, and Japan.

“We are ready, although the result will be achieved at a much greater cost to humanity than in 1945.”

Russia's former president and current deputy chairman of the country's Security Council says they’re ‘ready’ for war with NATO. Picture: AFP

Medvedev, who served as Russian president from 2008 to 2012 and prime minister from 2012 to 2020, suggested in December that Russia could attack NATO members as

“legitimate military targets” for providing Ukraine with weapons and aid.

“The main question is whether the hybrid war de facto declared on our country by NATO can be considered to be the alliance’s entry into war with Russia? Is it possible to view the delivery of a large volume of weapons to Ukraine as an attack on Russia?” he wrote at the time.

Medvedev this week said he visited troops near the frontline in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region to witness the progress of the war.

Footage released by the Russian Ministry of Defence shows Russian troops firing a multiple rocket launcher in an undisclosed area allegedly in Ukraine.

“On the instructions of the president, I visited a firing range near the contact line on the territory of the Donetsk People’s Republic,” said Medvedev.

“The servicemen are demonstrating excellent combat qualities of will, firmness and a general attitude to victory”, he continued, adding that “over 325,000 people” had been recruited into the Russian armed forces since the start of the year, an increase of 45,000 from previously reported figures.

Medvedev has been one of Moscow’s most hawkish voices in support of the Ukraine offensive and often denounces the West in inflammatory posts on social media.

Medvedev, who served as president and prime minister of Russia, is one of Vladimir Putin’s closest allies. Picture: AFP

TRUDEAU, ZELENSKYY ROCKED BY NAZI SCANDAL

Canada’s parliament has apologised as its speaker faces calls to resign after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy led two standing ovations to a surviving veteran of Adolf Hitler’s notorious SS Division.

The 98-year-old “literal Nazi”, who fought to bring about Hitler’s vision of the Third Reich, was praised by Speaker of the House Anthony Rota as “a Ukrainian Canadian war veteran from the Second World War who fought for Ukrainian independence against the Russians”.

“He is a Ukrainian hero and a Canadian hero, and we thank him for all his service,” said Mr Rota.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau are in hot water over a standing ovation to a Nazi. Picture: AFP

Yaroslav Hunka, who emigrated from Ukraine to Canada after the end of the Second World War, served in the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS, a Nazi military branch which the Nuremberg Trials declared a criminal organisation for the murder of Jews during the Holocaust.

Zelenskyy posed with photos of the proud veteran of the SS Galichina, which was formed from western Ukraine volunteers in 1943 and whom SS head, Heinrich Himmler, praised for their “willingness to slaughter Poles”.

The “Ukranian freedom fighter” who received the praise was a member of Hitler’s notorious SS Division. Picture: AFP

The unit was renamed after the war as the “First Ukrainian Division” in an effort by some of its former members to whitewash its Nazi origins. Hunka revealed his service in the unit in blog posts he wrote in 2010 and 2011.

Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center, a Canadian non-profit dedicated to educating people on the Holocaust said they were owed an explanation and apology.

“The fact that a veteran who served in a Nazi military unit was invited to and given a standing ovation in parliament is shocking. At a time of rising antisemitism and Holocaust distortion, it is incredibly disturbing to see Canada’s parliament rise to applaud an individual who was a member of a unit in the Waffen-SS, a Nazi military branch responsible for the murder of Jews and others and that was declared a criminal organisation during the Nuremberg Trials,” the Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center continued in their statement.

FSWC is appalled that Canada’s Parliament gave a standing ovation to a Ukrainian veteran who served in a Nazi military unit during the Second World War implicated in the mass murder of Jews and others.

An apology and explanation is owed.https://t.co/ZkzIkOCvBe

— Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center (@CanadianFSWC) September 24, 2023

Mr Rota issued a written apology over the weekend and followed up with an in-person apology on Monday, local time, after the full parliament delivered the standing ovation to the Nazi survivor last week.

“I have subsequently become aware of more information, which causes me to regret my decision to recognise this individual,” Rota said. “I am deeply sorry that I have offended many with my gesture and remarks.”

“I particularly want to extend my deepest apologies to Jewish communities in Canada and around the world,” Rota added.

The Prime Minister’s Office placed responsibility for the remarkable incident on the House Speaker, who they claimed provided “no advance notice” to Trudeau or Zelenskyy about the invitation or the recognition”.

NDP House Leader Peter Julian called Rota’s error “unforgivable” and that he could not “continue in this role”. “I must respectfully ask that you step aside,” Julian said.

Conservative House Leader Andrew Scheer said the ultimate responsibility for the “Nazi in the chamber”, which could have been prevented with a “straightforward Google search” rested on Trudeau.

“The prime minister failed”, he said, adding that it has fed into Russia’s propaganda about the “deNazification of Ukraine as justification for its war.

In response to giving Hunka a standing ovation, Trudeau said it was important to “push back against Russian propaganda and Russian disinformation” and continue support for Ukraine.

“Obviously it’s extremely upsetting that this happened. The Speaker has acknowledged his mistake and has apologised,” Trudeau said.

“But this is something that is deeply embarrassing to the parliament of Canada, and by extension to all Canadians.”

NEW - Trudeau: "I think it's going to be really important that all of us push back against Russian propaganda, Russian disinformation."pic.twitter.com/CJQ2UOKP9U

— Disclose.tv (@disclosetv) September 25, 2023

Moscow wasted no time in pouncing on the presentation of Hunka as a “hero” by Canada, saying it showed an “outrageous: disregard for historical truth.

“Such sloppiness of memory is outrageous,” said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. “Many Western countries, including Canada, have raised a young generation that does not know who fought whom or what happened during the Second World War. And they know nothing about the threat of fascism.”

With AFP