Suspect arrested over Pentagon leak as papers reveal more about Vladimir Putin’s health
More details were in the trove of highly classified US documents leaked online from the Pentagon about Vladimir Putin, as the FBI made its dramatic arrest. See the video.
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The head of a Discord group where a trove of sensitive US intelligence documents were leaked online has been arrested in relation to the “deliberate, criminal act” that exposed government secrets about the Ukraine war.
US Attorney General Merrick Garland confirmed that the suspect, a 21-year old Massachusetts Air National Guardsman naned Jack Teixeira, was arrested by the FBI on Thursday.
Dramatic news helicopter footage showed Teixeria, in red basketball shorts and a gray t-shirt, surrendering to what appeared to be camo-clad FBI agents.
The National Guard said in a statement it was aware Thursday of the “alleged role a Massachusetts Air National Guardsman may have played in the recent leak of highly-classified documents” from the Pentagon.
“The National Guard takes this issue very seriously and will support investigators,” the National Guard said in a statement. “National security is our foremost priority and any attempt to undermine it compromises our values and degrades trust among our members, the public, allies and partners.
“We will not have a comment concerning the ongoing investigation and refer you to the Department of Justice and the Federal Bureau of Investigation for details,” the statement added.
Those agencies did not respond to questions from News Corp Australia.
The New York Times first reported Teixeira’s identity earlier in the day, adding that investigators want to talk to the suspect about the leak and say that he may have information relevant to the investigation.
The leak revealed unease over the viability of a coming counteroffensive by Kyiv’s forces against Russian troops as well as concerns about Ukrainian air defences, and pointed to US spying on allies.
It also referred to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s health and his alleged chemo treatment.
The leaked documents say: “According to the [redacted name], who received the information from an unidentified Russian source with access to Kremlin officials, Russia planned to divert resources from the Taganrog, Russia to Mariupol, Ukraine and focus its attention on the southern front.
“According to the [redacted name] the plan for ‘the offensive’ … was suspected to be a strategy devised by Russian National Security Council Secretary Nikolay Patrushev and Russian Chief of the General Staff Valeriy Gerasimov to sabotage presumably Putin.
“Gerasimov reportedly planned to continue his efforts to sabotage the offensive, noting that he promised to “throw” the so-called special military operation by 5 March, when Putin was allegedly scheduled to start a round of chemo therapy and would thus be unable to influence the war effort.”
“This was a deliberate criminal act, a wilful violation of [existing] guidelines,” said Pentagon Spokesman Pat Ryder.
“We continue to review a variety of factors as it relates to safeguarding, including examining distribution lists, and accessing how and where intelligence products are shared”.
“There’s a full-blown investigation going on, as you know, with the intelligence community and the Justice Department, and they’re getting close,” US President Joe Biden also said during a visit to Ireland.
The president’s remarks came after The Washington Post reported that hundreds of pages of documents had been posted in a group called Thug Shaker Central on social media platform Discord by a man who worked on a US military base.
The New York Times said it had identified a “trail of digital evidence” leading to a young air national guardsman as both the leader of the group and the leaker, although they made clear he has not been officially identified as a suspect.
The newspaper identified the suspect, Mr Teixeira, as a 21-year-old member of the intelligence wing of the Massachusetts Air National Guard.
The Wall Street Journal also pointed the finger at an air national guardsman, and said an arrest could take place as early as Thursday.
The reports said the alleged leaker, who went by the nickname “OG,” regularly posted documents in the group for months.
The group of around 24, including people from Russia and Ukraine, bonded over their “mutual love of guns, military gear and God,” and formed an “invitation-only clubhouse in 2020 on Discord,” the Post – which like the Times cited unidentified members of Thug Shaker Central – reported.
OG told the group members that he spent “some of his day inside a secure facility that prohibited (mobile) phones and other electronic devices,” the Post report said.
He first wrote down the contents of classified documents to share with the group, but later began taking photos, telling other members not to share them, the newspaper reported.
OG had a “dark view of the government,” and “spoke of the United States, and particularly law enforcement and the intelligence community, as a sinister force that sought to suppress its citizens and keep them in the dark,” the Post said, citing one of the group’s members.
White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre said the US is “reviewing the national security implications” of the leak, which has sparked a criminal investigation by the Justice Department.
UKRAINIAN SOLDIER’S ‘DECAPITATION’ VIDEO SPARKS OUTRAGE
The European Union has pledged to hold war criminals to account as it denounced footage spread online allegedly showing the beheading of a Ukrainian prisoner of war by Russian forces.
The video, which lasts around one minute 40 seconds, shows a masked man in camouflage decapitating another man in green fatigues wearing a yellow armband, typically donned by Ukrainian fighters. His screams are heard before another man in camouflage uses a knife to decapitate him.
A voice is then heard saying that the head should be sent “to the commander”.
A third man holds up a flak jacket bearing the Ukrainian trident and apparently belonging to the slain man. All three men speak in Russian.
“We don’t have more information on the veracity of the video. Having said that, if confirmed, this is yet another brutal reminder about the inhumane nature of the Russian aggression,” EU spokeswoman Nabila Massrali said on Wednesday.
“The EU reiterates its firm commitment to holding to account all perpetrators and accomplices of war crimes committed in connection with Russia’s war,” she added.
European Council president Charles Michel later tweeted that he was “mortified by atrocious video showing murder of Ukrainian prisoner of war by Russian soldier.
“Accountability and justice must prevail over terror and impunity. The EU will do all possible to ensure that. The EU will continue to stand with Ukraine for as long as it takes,” he wrote.
Earlier, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy slammed the Russian “beasts” responsible for what he said was the execution of a Ukrainian prisoner of war.
“There is something that no one in the world can ignore: how easily these beasts kill,” Mr Zelenskyy said in a video address released on social media.
“We won’t forget anything, nor will we forgive murderers,” he added, vowing to bring justice to his war-torn nation.
“This video … The execution of a Ukrainian captive … The world must see it,” Mr Zelenskyy added in the video address.
AFP was unable to independently verify the footage but Ukrainian authorities are treating it as genuine.
‘WORSE THAN ISIS’
Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba described the video as “horrific”.
“It’s absurd that Russia, which is worse than ISIS, is presiding over the UNSC,” he wrote on Twitter, referring to the United Nations Security Council, where Russia took up the rotating presidency this month. “Russian terrorists must be kicked out of Ukraine and the UN and be held accountable for their crimes.”
ISIS (ISIL) was notorious for releasing videos of the beheadings of captives when they controlled swathes of Iraq and Syria from 2014-2017.
Ukraine’s domestic security agency (SBU) said it has launched an investigation into the suspected war crime.
“Yesterday, a video appeared on the internet showing how the Russian occupiers are showing their beastly nature – cruelly torturing a Ukrainian prisoner and cutting off his head,” the SBU agency wrote on Telegram.
Moscow and Kyiv have repeatedly accused each other of killing prisoners of war since Russia invaded Ukraine more than a year ago, and several videos alleging to show POW killings have made the rounds on the internet.
The Kremlin on Wednesday said the “horrible” footage showing an alleged decapitation of a Ukrainian prisoner of war has to be verified.
“First of all, the authenticity of this horrible footage needs to be verified,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters, adding that “we live in a world of fakes.”
LEAKED DOCS REVEAL US’ UKRAINE FEARS
The US has serious concerns about Ukraine’s ability to make significant gains in an upcoming counteroffensive and to keep defending against Russian strikes, according to leaked classified documents.
The documents are part of a trove of highly sensitive material that has been posted online, sparking a US criminal investigation into a breach the Pentagon says poses a “very serious” risk to national security.
Ukraine is expected to launch an attack on invading Russian troops in the spring – its first major military push of the year.
But one top secret document said tough Russian defences and “enduring Ukrainian deficiencies in training and munitions supplies probably will strain progress and exacerbate casualties during the offensive,” the Washington Post reported.
According to the newspaper, one document from early February expresses misgivings about Ukraine’s chances of success in its forthcoming counteroffensive, saying that problems with generating and sustaining sufficient forces could result in “modest territorial gains”.
A document reviewed by AFP – this one marked “secret” – details the dire state of Ukrainian air defences, which have been instrumental in protecting against Russian strikes and preventing Moscow’s forces from gaining control of the skies.
Ukraine’s international supporters have worked to beef-up the country’s air defences, providing a mix of cutting edge and older technology to create multi-layered defences that protect against attacks at different altitudes.
But the February 2023 document – the authenticity of which could not immediately be confirmed – said that 89 per cent of Ukrainian medium and high-range air defences was made up of SA-10 and SA-11 Soviet-era systems that could soon run short of missiles.
Based on munitions use at the time, the document projected that Ukraine’s SA-11s would be out of ammunition by late March, and its SA-10s by early May.
EGYPTIAN ROCKETS FOR RUSSIA?
Ukraine’s ability to provide medium-range air defences to protect the front line “will be completely reduced by May 23,” the document said.
The Post reported that another document said Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi ordered the production of 40,000 rockets for shipment to Russia, telling officials to keep it secret to “avoid problems with the West.” But Washington has pushed back against that report. “We have no indication that any such plan has ever been executed,” a senior administration official said.
“Egypt is a close partner and we are regularly engaged with its leadership on a host of regional and global issues,” the official said.
Dozens of photographs of documents have been found on Twitter, Telegram, Discord and other sites in recent days, though some may have circulated online for weeks, if not months, before they began to receive media attention.
In addition to information on Ukraine, the documents also include sensitive analyses of US allies, whom American officials are now seeking to reassure after the security breach.
Many of the documents are no longer available on the sites where they first appeared, and the US is reportedly working to have them removed.
The fallout from the apparent leak could be significant – even deadly – potentially putting US intelligence sources at risk, while giving the country’s foes valuable information.
‘SCORCHED EARTH’: RUSSIA ACCUSED OF DEVASTATING MOVE
Russia has switched to “scorched earth” tactics in Bakhmut as it continued to press the attack in the east of Ukraine, according to Kyiv.
The strategic city on the Donetsk frontline has been almost fully levelled to rubble after heaving fighting over the winter.
“The fighting from both sides is tough,” said Colonel Gen. Oleksandr Syrsky.
“The enemy switched to so-called scorched earth tactics from Syria. It is destroying buildings and positions with air strikes and artillery fire.”
It comes as Ukraine troops have reportedly retreated from the city centre, with a Moscow-backed official claiming he visited the significant gains in Bakhmut.
The battle for Bakhmut is the longest and bloodiest of Russia’s offensives, and the city has taken on huge symbolic importance even though analysts say it has little strategic value.
Denis Pushilin, the Russia-installed head of the eastern Ukrainian Donetsk region, posted a video of himself on Telegram in the heavily destroyed city.
“Here is our Artemovsk,” Pushilin said, using the Soviet-era name for Bakhmut. “It is being liberated by Wagnerites,” he added, in reference to the Wagner mercenary group spearheading Russia’s battle in the city.
Destroyed buildings and ruins could be seen in the background behind Pushilin, who wore a camouflage helmet.
He appeared to be standing in the central Svoboda square of the city. The sound of artillery could be heard in the video.
The head of Wagner, Yevgeny Prigozhin, last week claimed the group had “in a legal sense” captured Bakhmut because he said it had taken control of city hall.
The Russian army reported no such gains, and Ukraine has said it is continuing to defend the city.
In a sign that Wagner has made significant gains, several Russian war correspondents have in recent days published videos from Bakhmut.
One of those was Semen Pegov, who published images of himself riding on a motorbike accompanied by Wagner fighters through the ruins of the city.
PUTIN’S NEW WORLD ORDER
Russian President Vladimir Putin has planned to create a “new world order” with his invasion of Ukraine, a Kremlin spokesperson has confirmed.
This comes after Kyiv ruled out any chance of negotiations with Russia, claiming it would not consider peace until all land, including Crimea, was returned from the Russian Federation.
According to a Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Putin will only consider negotiations if they are based on “the principles on which the new world order will be based”.
Putin has also banned top Russian officials from leaving the country as paranoia over leaks from within his senior military and government ranks continue to spread.
According to the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) international travel to official business has been restricted within the Kremlin.
The British Ministry of Defence described the move as “likely designed to prevent the flight or defection of increasingly disaffected officials”.
Ukrainian military spokesperson Oleksii Dmytrashkovskyi also revealed the Kremlin’s forces have faced “colossal losses” as they try take over over the Donetsk region.
Russia’s army is losing more than 400 troops every day as it clashes with Ukrainian forces in the towns of Avdiivka and Marinka.
RUSSIAN MISSILES STRIKE
A 50-year-old man and his 11-year-old daughter were killed after Russian missiles struck a house in the southeastern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia, officials said on Sunday.
It was the latest Russian attack on civilian infrastructure in Ukraine as Moscow’s invasion stretches into its second year.
“The enemy carried out a missile attack on Zaporizhzhia and killed another Ukrainian family,” the head of the State Emergency Service, Sergiy Kruk, said on social media.
The girl died in an ambulance, said the head of Zaporizhzhia City Council, Anatoliy Kurtiev.
Rescue workers pulled the girl’s 46-year-old mother alive from under the rubble. Her elder daughter was not at home when the Russians struck at night, the emergency service said.
Kurtiev said two Russian missiles struck a residential building, adding that windows and roofs were damaged in dozens of neighbouring houses.
In his evening speech Sunday, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky said the mother was in a serious condition in hospital.
“This is how the terrorist state spends this Palm Sunday,” he added.
“This is how Russia puts itself in even greater isolation from the world, from humanity.” The region of Zaporizhzhia is one of four Ukrainian provinces Russian President Vladimir Putin claims to have annexed last year.
POPE’S WORDS FOR UKRAINE
Pope Francis has expressed concern over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine while delivering an Easter Mass in which he denounced the barriers to peace in the world.
The Argentine pontiff, a week after leaving hospital, cited a string of “stumbling blocks” to achieving world peace during his traditional Easter message, making special mention of the bloody war.
“Help the beloved Ukrainian people on their journey towards peace, and shed the light of Easter upon the people of Russia,” he told a crowd of some 100,000 people gathered in Saint Peter’s Square.
“Comfort the wounded and all those who have lost loved ones because of the war, and grant that prisoners may return safe and sound to their families.”
He also drew attention to conflicts around the world, from Syria to the Democratic Republic of Congo, and offered prayers for victims of the earthquake in Turkey and Syria.
The Pope’s words come after the US Department of Justice on Saturday said it had begun an investigation into a trove of leaked US documents, many related to Ukraine, that have spread to the internet.
The breach appears to include assessments and secret intelligence reports that touch not only on Ukraine and Russia but also highly sensitive analyses of US allies.
“We have been in communication with the Department of Defence related to this matter and have begun an investigation,” a Justice Department spokesperson told AFP.
A steady drip of dozens of leaked documents and slides have made their way onto Twitter, Telegram, Discord and other social media and chat sites in recent days, and new documents continue to surface.
– With AFP
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Originally published as Suspect arrested over Pentagon leak as papers reveal more about Vladimir Putin’s health
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