← Ukraine: The Latest
Ukraine: The Latest
Putin and Xi: ‘Colonial’ world order has failed & British PM accused of ‘killing of Ukrainian soldiers’
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Nikayla Matthews Akome
The telegraph.
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What makes a leader worth following? What should you really care about in your job?
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Dom Nichols
As technology is changing so quickly, is
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Dom Nichols
I'm Dom Nichols and this is Ukraine. The latest today, as the British government suggests their pledge to stand with Ukraine as long as it takes. Should actually say as long as it doesn't upset my summer holiday. We examine the reaction to the British government's decision to relax some Russian sanctions. We report how Russian jets flew so close to an RAF aircraft over the Black Sea it triggered onboard emergency systems. And we look at how Putin's trip to Beijing is being reported in Russia. Plus we take our regular look at how brilliantly the Russian economy is performing and talk about magic mushrooms in Armenia. Bravery takes you through the most unimaginable hardships to finally reward you with victory.
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James Kilner
The Russia does not want peace.
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Dom Nichols
If I'm president, I will have that war settled in one day, 24 hours.
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Alex Nicholl
We are with you, not just today or tomorrow, but for 100 years.
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James Kilner
Nobody's going to break us. We are strong. We are Ukrainians.
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Dom Nichols
It's Wednesday the 20th of May, 4 years and 85 days since the full scale invasion began. Today I'm joined by my Telegraph colleagues Alex Nicholl and James Kilner. Now the big story of the day is the issuing of a license by the British government that will allow some imports of diesel and jet fuel derived from Russian crude oil as long as the oil has been refined in other countries, because that makes all the difference. Prime Minister's questions in Parliament a couple of hours ago, the opposition leader accused Sikhistama of losing his moral compass by backsliding on Ukraine. Kemi Badenoch said he is now choosing to buy dirty Russian oil. That money will be used to fund the killing of Ukrainian soldiers. Isn't he ashamed? More on this shortly from Alex. But now, earlier this morning Lithuania issued an air alert after a suspected drone incursion. People in the capital Vilnius were told to shelter in place. An alarm sounded in the Lithuanian parliament and flights were temporarily suspended at Vilnius Airport. In a statement, Lithuania's Ministry of Defense said Lithuania has issued an air alert in parts of the country after a suspected drone approaching from Belarus was detected near the border. NATO Baltic air policing has been activated. You'll remember only yesterday a Romanian jet taking part in NATO's Baltic Air Policing mission shot down a drone over Estonia. It's thought these drones are Ukrainian, having been diverted into NATO airspace by Russian electronic warfare Systems. More on NATO's air policing missions shortly. Now. The incident comes amid claims by Russia's Foreign Intelligence Service that Ukrainian forces are preparing to launch an arsenal of drone strikes into Russia from the territory of the Baltic states, particularly Latvia. The Institute for the Study of War, the US Based think tank, says that Russia's SVR said on Monday that Ukrainian drone operators have already deployed to Latvian military bases and heavily implied that Russia intends to strike these Ukrainian drone launch points as well as Latvian decision making centers. In response, Mark Rutte, NATO Secretary General, said the Russian claim is totally ridiculous and Russia knows it now. The arsenal of long range Ukrainian drone strikes was unleashed inside Russia again last night. Russian telegram media channels reported two hits, making the second reported strike on each of those sites just this week alone. The oil refinery in Kostovo, a city in Nizhny Novgorod Oblast, was hit in one drone strike, producing an impressive amount of smoke, according to independent Russian Telegram media channel Astra. The fire was probably still smouldering from the last time it was hit on Monday night. Then the Nevinomysk Azop plant in Russia's southern Stavropol Krai area, one of Russia's largest producers of mineral fertilisers and chemicals used in manufacturing explosives, decided to self sanction. Local Mayor Mikhail Minenkov said air defenses were active over the city. The strikes come as Reuters report the Moscow oil refinery hit earlier this week has temporarily halted its processing operations now into Ukraine and eight people were killed and over 50 injured yesterday in attacks across the country. Ukraine's air force said 154 drones and one ballistic missile were fired by Russia. 131 drones were shot down, but direct hits by a missile and 23 other drones were recorded at 20 locations. Strikes on the city of Konotop in Sumy Oblast hit a multi storey building, killing a woman and injuring at least 11 people, Regional Governor Ole Higorov said. According to Mayor Artem Semenyakhin. The mass attack caused three stories of a residential building in Sumy to collapse. Several people were pulled from the rubble. Now all this comes as a United nations report looking at civilian casualties was presented to the Security Council earlier this week. The report by the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine Ukraine said more civilians were killed by Russia in April this year than in any month since July 2025. At least 238 civilians were killed and 1,404 injured in Ukraine last month. The UN says that's up nearly 20% from April last year. The cities with the highest casualty rates in April were Kherson, Dnipro, Nikopol and Odessa. No great move on the ground yesterday. Still very active at the front. 920 Russian casualties yesterday. There is more evidence suggesting the arsenal of Ukrainian drones is now reach the outskirts of Mariupol, heaping yet more pressure on Russian logistic lines supporting the front. Couple more for me. Polish authorities have arrested three people suspected of espionage for Russia, Minister Coordinator of Special Services Tomas Szyminiak said earlier today. Now the Polish press agency says the detainees are all Polish nationals aged 48 to 62, Mr. Simoniak said on X. They are accused of intelligence activities and identifying the deployment of NATO troops on the territory of the Republic of Poland and producing and sharing propaganda and disinformation materials. And then finally for me, the MOD here in London has said today that RAF aircraft were dangerously intercepted by Russian jets over the Black Sea recently. They say Russian Su35 and Su27 jets flew so close to a UK rivet joint electronic surveillance aircraft that on one occasion the aircraft's emergency systems were triggered and and the autopilot disabled. The innocence happened in the middle of last month over the Black Sea. In a second incident, a Russian SU27 conducted six passes in front of the British aircraft flying as close as 6 meters from the rivet joint's nose. Rivet joints are unarmed and work in international airspace. The MoD says this was the most dangerous Russian action against the UK Rivet joint since 2022, when a Russian plane fired a missile very close to an RAF aircraft over the Black Sea. Defense Secretary John Healey said this incident is another example of dangerous and unacceptable behavior by Russian pilots towards an unarmed aircraft operating in international airspace. These actions create a serious risk of accidents and potential escalation. Let me be very clear, this incident will not deter the UK's commitment to defend NATO, our allies and our interests from Russian aggression. Now then, that's it from me. Alex, let's come to you for diplomatic stories. There's a biggie in town, really, and that's this waiver or license that the UK is now offering. It comes after US action yesterday that we criticised. What are the British done and what's the reaction been?
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David Knowles
Yeah, absolutely. So, top story coming out of the UK at the moment is as touched upon by Francis yesterday about how the US were issuing waivers on oil sanctions Russia, a move that invoked pretty strict criticism from the UK government. When they did it, we've pretty much gone and followed suit and now we've issued, essentially it's a two parter, We've eased sanctions on crude oil that has essentially been exported to third party countries. So India or Turkey, for example, where they can then refine it into jet fuel or something that we can then purchase and use for ourselves. So as you said in the introduction, you know, what is the difference? We're essentially buying Russian oil. The second part is a separate license been issued by the Department of Business and Trade which will permit the sea transport of LNG from two separate ports in Russia. So again, another easing of sanctions on the Russian government there. Now behind all this, clearly domestically economic pressures for the UK cost of living crisis. And you'll see reports of petrol reaching 158.52 p per litre as reported by the RAC. And then also since the conflict began in Iran at the end of February, jet fuel prices have increased by 103% to about $150 per barrel. Ryanair have been preparing for essentially an Armageddon situation. So lots of holidays, cancelled fare hikes, etc. Why this is important, again for the UK is the Gulf refineries typically gave us 65% of our jet fuel before the war in Iran kicked off. And now we need alternatives to lower the price. And again, in PMQS today, we saw a pretty fiery exchange. I think the PM tried to soften the blow by saying he was going to extend the freeze on fuel duty for the rest of the year. However. However, this didn't stop Kemi Badnoch sinking her teeth into him. I think she gave some pretty aggressive rhetoric.
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Kemi Badenoch
He says that other countries are doing this. The EU is not doing this. Let me make it clear. I know it hurts him to hear it. He is now choosing to buy dirty Russian oil. That money will be used to fund the killing of Ukrainian soldiers. Isn't he ashamed now?
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David Knowles
The PM's response, I thought, was a bit vague. I haven't quite wrapped my head around how he thinks he's gonna get away with that one.
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Dom Nichols
Yeah, I saw that quote flash up on the old. On the old ticket saying, nothing's changed. It was a bit like Theresa May go, nothing has changed. Nothing has changed when the world's burning behind them. I mean, I couldn't. I just couldn't work it out. I mean, what. It literally has changed. They are allowing these licenses. Russian oil is going to be sold to third parties for us to purchase. Are they seriously hoping that we just think, well, we're not buying directly from Russia, therefore it's okay? Is that as far. Is that as nuanced as their argument goes?
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David Knowles
I think that is as nuanced as it goes. He goes on to say, I really think that.
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Alex Nicholl
To misunderstand and misrepresent what is happening. This is a very serious issue where we're working with. These are new bans, their new sanctions as of yesterday, their new bans on refined oil products from Russia as of yesterday. They are being phased in in the same way that previous sanctions regimes have been phased in, exactly in the way the last government did, and we have done. Other countries do exactly the same. And the only people that benefit when we play party politics in here on Russia and Ukraine is Putin.
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David Knowles
Similar methods are used by other countries. I'm guessing he's referring to the United States, which is obviously clearly the same government that he was happy to criticise or the British government was happy to criticise earlier in the year when they did their own waivers. So it felt like a bit of a weak response to the questions. And further to that, the leader of the opposition said, how can it be acceptable for us to buy oil from Russia, but we can't buy oil from Aberdeen? Referencing essentially a vote yesterday in which it was decided that there would be no licenses for North Sea oil drilling.
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Kemi Badenoch
And just listen to him. And I wonder if he is okay. He is so deep in the bunker, Mr. Speaker. He is importing sanctioned Russian oil, He's nationalizing steel, he's imposing price controls in the supermarket. It's like the Soviets won. This country needs a government that has got its act together, Mr. Speaker. Instead, what we have is a Prime minister hanging by a thread, fake support from his backbenches, too scared to take difficult decisions, losing his moral compass by backsliding on Ukraine. Yes, he is.
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Dom Nichols
Yeah. It does sort of ask questions of the. The government's net zero policy. I'm sure Ed Miliband will be offering an opinion on this quite soon. Yes. Refusing to allow drilling in the North Sea and yet, you know, stimulating the production of Russian oil. I don't know.
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David Knowles
And a wider context, not sort of reading something. It's been a bit of a saga, obviously. Earlier a few weeks ago, they talked about deterring the Shadow fleet and you imagine sort of special forces or the military boarding tankers and essentially clamping down on that. And none of that's happened. And now we're actually just.
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Dom Nichols
Well, the French did and so did
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David Knowles
the U.S. there you go. The French did war, but we just
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Dom Nichols
sort of watched them go watch them down the English Channel with a fist.
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David Knowles
And I think besides looking at criticism of our own government and the US Government, it's about what other countries are going to be looking at when they see this. Are they going to follow suit? If the justification that it's going to ease domestic pressures in our own country, what's to stop others doing the same? Now, I know Macron came out recently saying the Strait of Hormuzza shutdown is in no way justified lifting the sanctions on Russia, while Ukraine's President, Volodymyr Zelensky said every dollar paid for Russian oil is money for the war, which I think we can all agree with. So if we're going to start easing sanctions, are others going to start do it? And I think if you're sat in the Kremlin right now, you're probably smiling quite a lot.
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Dom Nichols
Yeah, I mean, I know politics is all about choices, but I mean, this is just, it's so blatant and it just sort of happens at the dinner. The treasury put this note out quite late last night. I mean, it's not as if anyone's come out and said, here's the big idea, fellas, this is what we want to do. This is the challenges we've got, that's how much money we got. So we're going to choose to do this, accepting that it means that X, Y and Z is also going to happen and we don't like X, Y and Z, but I'm afraid that's the direction we're going to go in. There's been no big idea. All we hear, as I said at the start, we just hear we're going to be sticking with Ukraine for as long as it takes. And then you get this. I mean, it's just extraordinary. It's very easy to get quite.
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David Knowles
Well, I mean, if we label ourselves as sort of head of the so called coalition of the willing and yet, you know, we're the first people to sort of start easing sanctions, it's not a great look and it's not one to sort of rally support from others, particularly in terms of UK leadership with regards to Ukraine.
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Dom Nichols
Now, you've been looking at some EU sanctions as well.
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David Knowles
Yes. So carrying on sanctions and a positive sanctions, it's very easy to criticise them, particularly when people ease them off all the time. But next month there's going to be a meeting in Brussels between EU diplomats and one of the things on the agenda is they're going to set to extend this sort of time frame in which their sanctions on Russia exist. So currently it gets reviewed every six months, which is a bit of a miniature burden because each time they review them, if one member state vetoes them, then basically the whole thing unravels, which is pretty dire for Ukraine.
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Dom Nichols
Orban's trump card, wasn't it?
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David Knowles
Well, exactly. So now that we've said goodbye to Orban, hopefully this will get put through and be extended to 12 months, which would be, you know, positive step. And clearly the EU as a bloc, when issuing sanctions, when they do do it, is a powerful one. And right now, sanctions, again, as much as we criticize them, are one of the most powerful tools in our arsenal in combating Russian aggression in Ukraine.
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Dom Nichols
Yeah, I mean, I still think Ukrainian sanctions are working the best. The long range baby burn.
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James Kilner
Yeah.
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Dom Nichols
And finally you. I know this is. James, you're going to be. You're going to be taking deep, deep, deep into this. But Alex, you've got some thoughts on Putin visiting China.
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David Knowles
Yeah. So I believe I stand to be corrected. That this is his 25th visit to China, almost his 40th meeting, almost as
- [17:59]
Dom Nichols
many as Steve Wyckoff made to Moscow.
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David Knowles
And I sort of watching the footage this morning, was getting a bit of a sense of deja vu. It was only a week ago that Trump was there, so we had the whole military inspection, sort of faultless foot drill by the Chinese military, children, cheering banners etc, and then the usual sort of awkward handshakes. Obviously a different agenda.
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Dom Nichols
What would you know about faultless foot troll? Are you in the KRH field, say?
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David Knowles
Well, if you'd seen us a couple of Sundays ago, you would have seen it was absolutely faultless.
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Dom Nichols
Of course, of course.
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David Knowles
But, yeah, I feel that there's a lot to talk about on what was announced so far today.
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Dom Nichols
Yeah, this is, this is the biggie, isn't it? I mean, it's of relevance to the whole world and of course to Ukraine. So we've got to have a look at Putin in China. James, how do we look at it? Tell us how to receive this information.
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James Kilner
Well, Alex, absolutely right. It's his 25th trip to Beijing since 2000, when he became Russian president. So, you know, he's a relatively regular visitor. It's his first overseas trip this year. So that, that puts it in context. It comes a week after Trump was in Beijing. That's important. And it's only three weeks before this critical parliamentary election in Armenia, which I'll touch on in a minute. But we know that Putin loves these overseas trips. They're very, very important to the Kremlin because in times when he's under a lot of pressure, and I think he is now regarding the war in Ukraine, he can fall back on these international trips and show himself to be an international statesman, etc. Project power, calmness, etc, etc, especially going to see his strongest and most important international ally, Xi Jinping, in Beijing. As we discussed on this podcast before, China is a huge economic powerhouse for many countries in, well, for the entire Central Asia, for example, South Caucasus, many countries in Africa, and these are the same countries that Putin's also trying to impress. So if he's received kindly in Beijing, which he was, and we'll talk about that, these images, these videos, shots of Xi shaking his hand, laughing, joking with Putin, really rams home the prestige that Putin wants to project. And like I said, this is only three weeks before a very important election in Armenia, which we discuss a lot on this podcast about how the Armenian people are basically being asked to vote on whether they want to move closer to the EU and away from Russia or not. And I think the timing of this visit to Beijing is no coincidence. I think it's absolutely timed to overshadow Trump's trip only a week ago and time to project influence and aura from Beijing across Armenia, if you like. And I think that sort of context is very important in regards to the Trump trip. I mean, obviously the Russian media has been all over this, they've been all over this trip. It's headlined in every newspaper. There's lots of column interests about it. And we've got Peskov, Dmitry Peskov, he's the Kremlin spokesman. He is quoted as saying, everyone's getting into the trip. But it's very important, guys, that you don't compare this trip, Putin's trip, with Trump's trip. And then the Kremlin is briefing all the media on the comparison points about how much more friendly Putin is with Xi than Trump to the extent where, you know, little details like photographs of the 20 lever bound agreements that the Russia and China signed or have been leaked to the media. The photographs of the seating plan for the signing ceremony has been leaked. Details about how Putin and Xi had such a chummy 40 minute, it was meant to be a 40 minute catch up conversation. They were dragged away from each other after two hours because they had so much catching up to do. All this sort of nonsense. It's been heavily leaked to the media, Russian media, and as well, direct comparisons. So we had the comparison that when Trump was there a week or so ago, he had to stay in the Four Seasons Hotel. He took a entire floor in the Four Seasons Hotel. Pussin got put up in one of the best state villas, an old tea house in, in central Beijing. You know, all this sort of stuff has come out. So the comparisons are really important.
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Dom Nichols
Does either one, she or Putin speak the other's language? Are they doing all this, all this great chumminess? Because it's very difficult to get emotion and sentiment through working through translators. So does either speak the other.
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James Kilner
No, it's all done through translators. Right, okay.
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Dom Nichols
So it is all kind of choreographed because it is exceptionally hard to, you know, you might be, offer some gushing welcome, but by the time it's gone through the translator, it's sort of lost some of its.
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James Kilner
Yeah, it's definitely all choreographed. It's heavily choreographed and it's, it's a deliberate show of power and chumminess. The Russian media have worked very hard to concoct this image of a bromance between Xi and Putin basically, and Putin you know, just the importance. Putin took a very like the most heavyweight team with him. Every single top minister, central bank chief was there, all the, you know, some of the top oligarchs who control Russian business. They were all on this trip which has huge consequences for Russia. Obviously. We know that China props up Russia financially. The entire financial system is basically propped up by the Chinese yuan and Chinese finance. We know that China is Russia's main oil and gas client. There was a lot of negotiations done today in Beijing about a project called power of Siberia 2, which is this huge gas pipeline that Russia is trying to get built to China. It stalled a bit and actually I think the Russians have walked away slightly disappointed. China agreed to a general understanding that this project would go ahead, but they didn't get a full sign off on it. But this sort of thing is very important. But come back to the same point, it was really the optics for Putin and the fact he's able to squeeze us in only a week after Trump. And I think that is, you know, to my mind that does seem very much like one upmanship in the school playground. He goes, well, you know, Trump turns up and says, you know, I can deal with Xi. Putin turns up seven days later or whatever it is, saying, you know, I'm actually better mates with him than you and he's going to brief me on what he told you and we're going to have a get together about Iran, who obviously the war in Iran still in some sort of status, etc. We also had another piece of interesting Kremlin propaganda, the way the Kremlin mind thinks they dropped in this piece of theater really on this trip that Putin's just done today. It happened today in Beijing where RT formerly known as Russia Today. One of the Kremlin propaganda channels found this photo of Putin from 25 years ago when he was in Beijing. And in the photo he's talking to a 12 year old boy. So they concocted this entire mission to find the 12 year old boy and reunite Putin. Good lad. Putin in quotation marks with this 12 year old boy. Very conveniently they found the 12 year old boy and they filmed Putin and this 12 year old boy being reunited. And in a wonderful coincidence with The Kremlin, this 12 year old boy, now 37 year old engineer, is a massive Russophile. He went to Russia, trained in engineering there. He speaks Russian, he's got a Russian nickname, Pasha. And he attributed this all to meeting Putin when he was 12 years old. And he came out with a great quote today. On camera, he said to Putin, you are still full of strength and majestic presence.
- [25:10]
Dom Nichols
You're so full of strength.
- [25:13]
James Kilner
You're still full of strength and majestic presence. And I've grown from a little boy into slightly podgy man.
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Dom Nichols
Bloody hell.
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James Kilner
I mean, this is absolute Kremlin theater. But it's clever. It's designed to be perfect for our social media age. You can just drop in this quote and the whole backstory can unravel. It's something that the Russian public can understand and get behind straight away. And it comes with all these sub text messaging about Putin's longevity of the amount of times he's been going to China. He's been going to China so long that this little boy is now a podgy man, fully trained engineer. And this little boy is also loves Russia and he loves our leader and all this sort of thing compared to Trump. So it sounds comical, but there is a very serious messaging behind this little bit of Kremlin theater in China today.
- [26:04]
Dom Nichols
I'm surprised that he went for that. I thought Xi Jinping was quite sensitive about his image. He doesn't like this, doesn't like Winnie the Pooh pictures. This idea of him being quite jovial and, and round and podgy. I'm surprised that they've actually sort of used that because he. I thought he didn't like these references to his. Or any allusion to his weight and his size and his shape. I'm just surprised because he's not a million miles away from going, well, Xi Jinping's a bit of a pudgy man as well. So more travels. Witkoff and Kushner back off to their freighten flyer points back to Moscow.
- [26:38]
James Kilner
That's right. They're due. Apparently, according to Peskov. Dmitry Peskov confirmed it today in Beijing that Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner trumps negotiation. Everyone, son in law are due in Moscow next week. This will be their first visit to Moscow since January. Again, it is. There's no coincidence. The timing, it clearly shows that the US now has the bandwidth to concentrate once again on trying to negotiate or potentially negotiating a peace deal now that the war.
- [27:08]
Dom Nichols
Well, I saw Pete Hegseth yesterday saying that it's now Europe's war. So war you need to sort out Europe.
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James Kilner
Well, to whatever purposes. They're due back in Moscow next week. Whether or not it's actually trying to negotiate and enter the war in good faith is another question. Or whether it's just Trump passing a message on to Putin, you know, in a relatively direct manner. Kirill Dmitriev, Putin's envoy, is also confirmed to be going back to the US So there are things happening. I'm not sure if this is to Ukraine's actual Ukraine's benefit or not, but the US Seemingly getting involved again. There was also another piece of information reported on by the Russian media. I haven't seen this reported anywhere else. Says on the Russian news websites with Peskov ruminating that there may be another meeting lined up between Trump and Putin at a summit in China in November. Long way off. No other sources on that, but that has been talked up in Russian media. Hmm.
- [28:07]
Dom Nichols
All right. Well, we'll look forward to that one because that's going to be. Yes, that's for next week. Okay. Economy. We always like talking about the Russian economy. What if. What, what bellwethers have you been taking note of recently?
- [28:19]
James Kilner
Well, as, as Alex was saying earlier and very eloquently, the decision by the UK to lift these tertiary sanctions, or however you want to frame it on places like India and Turkey, which refine Russian crude into diesel and jet fuel, will give the Kremlin a boost, an economic boost and a propaganda boost. This will be reported and twisted in the Russian media tomorrow morning. Is the west crumbling? And in many ways I agree it has twist that far already, do you? So that is economic news. It's definitely in the plus box for the Kremlin. Other indicators less positive for the Kremlin? There's a conference I think at the end of last week in Kazan, normally an Islamic self autonomous governing republic in the Russian Federation, but of course under the Kremlin yoke, because all the other regions are. But the importance is here the Kremlin uses Kazan and Tatarstan to host conferences for the Islamic world. In this case, they've been hosting Afghanistan. We remember how quickly the Kremlin was to become friends with the Taliban once they recaptured Afghanistan. They were back in Russia in the last few days and they seem to be making a deal, Russia and Afghanistan, for Russia to import thousands, tens of thousands, possibly, we don't know the number of migrant laborers into Russia to help prop up Russian industry. Central Bank. Russian Central bank has said that Russian industry is short of about 2 million workers and is on the brink of collapse.
- [29:43]
David Knowles
Is that from the, from the conflict
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James Kilner
shortage just happened since February 22, it's both men dying and getting killed and maimed and also the. Just the numbers that have been attracted out of industry into warfare. So I mean, Russia has made these sort of deals with other countries. The Indian migrant workers have been shipped to Russia. And also we know that North Korean, essentially slave laborers have been imported as well.
- [30:09]
Dom Nichols
A lot of Africans.
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James Kilner
Yeah, and Africans as well. And we know increasingly that they're using students to piece together these drones, etc. So that's an interesting vignette on what the Russians are desperately trying to do to plug a gap in their economy. Important to keep on top of that. And again, it's a global issue. It is a country, in this case, obviously, Taliban controlled country, doing a deal with the Kremlin to basically ship off a load of humans to make weapons and keep the Russian economy going on that front, on the economic front. Dom, a little cucumber index update.
- [30:41]
Dom Nichols
Oh, yeah, no, we like the cucumber index.
- [30:43]
James Kilner
Yeah. Yeah. And this has been talked about on the social media, on Russian social media. And we've been discussing how earlier this year the cucumber prices were going through the roof in Russia and shops were slicing it up like salami and selling it by the gram or whatever. And this irked the Kremlin because these sort of stories really play into the Russian psyche. And this upset the Kremlin. The Kremlin has worked very hard in the last couple of months, put out a load of propaganda stories saying just how many cucumbers are being grown in Russia, how bounteous it is, how big the cucumbers are, as we discussed last week, and how many they're exporting. Apparently this is not all true. Funny enough, there are now reports from Yaka Trinbourg, large city, the Urals, that cucumber rationing is back in, certainly in some shops, and you can only buy it by the per 5 gram. And it's all getting very expensive. So, you know, that's another indicator of very serious structural problems in the Russian economy.
- [31:40]
Dom Nichols
Right. Do we know the price of a 5 gram slice of cucumber?
- [31:44]
James Kilner
I don't, I don't. That's my homework for next week, I think. Yeah.
- [31:48]
Dom Nichols
Now, Francis passed me a note earlier on. It said, james Kilner, magic mushrooms. I don't know if I should say that on it. Is this a story or are you.
- [31:57]
James Kilner
Is it just how I'm coming across today? Is it?
- [32:00]
Dom Nichols
Well, not just today.
- [32:03]
James Kilner
I think this is a reference to Armenia.
- [32:05]
Dom Nichols
I hope so. I hope it is not your lunch.
- [32:07]
James Kilner
No, it's not my lunch. It's a reference to Armenia. This, which is one of our favorite subjects on this podcast. They have this very important parliamentary election coming up at the beginning of June, 7th of June, I think it is as I was saying earlier, it's really a straight contest between getting closer to the EU or remaining very firmly in the Kremlin orbit. This is a very front and center international tug of war between the west and Russia. It's really that simple. Nicole Pashinyan, the Prime Minister, came to power in a peaceful revolution in 2018. He is leading the charge to basically join the EU. There's a load of EU leaders in Yerevan last week, etc. He has accused this guy called Samvel Katapetyan, who's the pro Russian oligarch guy in Armenia. He's actually in prison and banned from running, but still orchestrating things from prison as happens. He's accused Katipatian of slander. Basically. Katipatian has put out a load of information saying that Nicole Pachinian has a magic mushroom problem. Basically, the story goes according to Kadipatian and I, I in no way believe this. It's all this sort of, you know, all the legal stuff dealt with that. Pashinian went on a trip to China last year in a restaurant he took some magic mushrooms, was offered magic mushrooms, took them rather like them, brought back a load of them and uses them regularly at government meetings and meetings with journalists.
- [33:27]
Dom Nichols
Right, okay.
- [33:28]
James Kilner
This is the story which has been annoying Pashinyan and Pashinian is suing Katipatian now for slander in Armenia. The point is here is that this Armenian parliamentary election is getting increasingly heated as we knew it would. Armenia is a fighty place. It's under a lot of stress geopolitically. It's been involved in a couple of wars with Azerbaijan and it's now under a lot of glaring spotlight from the Europeans and the US trying to drag it in. The campaign is getting increasingly tense and manic. The stories floating around that the Armenian security services have uncovered an assassination plot against Pashinian himself. I mean, the details of this are rather unclear and there's no evidence to link it with Russia or the Kremlin. But this is heightened state that the campaign has been fought in. We also know that Russia has openly said that it's going to try and influence the result of this parliamentary election. And the EU has tried to counter it by setting up a sort of resistance groups or whatever you want to call it. Putin himself has warned Armenia not to get any closer to the EU and said, reading between the lines, look at Ukraine, they also tried to join the EU and look what happened. That was Putin's actual direct warning to Armenia.
- [34:42]
David Knowles
Does Russia still have troops stationed in country?
- [34:45]
James Kilner
Yeah, it's got a base of about 2,000 soldiers, I think in Gyumri, which is the second city. It's about a couple of hours drive away from Yerevan and until recently, until a few years ago, used to see Russian soldiers driving around in armored personnel carriers around Russia. That's all been toned back a bit, but that was the state of play. But the Kremlin has actually set up. There's more and more evidence of this and it's been reported on most more recently by Russian sort of oppositionist media. It's actually set up a unit under Sergey Kitienko. He's a deputy head of the Kremlin's presidential administration. He set up a rather Wellian sounding unit specifically to spread Russian influence and propaganda in Armenia. It's been given the name the Presidential Directorate for Strategic Partnership and Cooperation.
- [35:30]
Dom Nichols
Oh, sounds all right.
- [35:31]
James Kilner
Sounds good.
- [35:32]
Dom Nichols
Not all.
- [35:34]
James Kilner
There we go.
- [35:34]
Dom Nichols
Fascinating. So we will obviously keep our eye on the Armenian elections up to and, and cover the elections themselves. Now you've got another story, I think, James?
- [36:03]
James Kilner
Sure, I've got another story. This is an unusual sort of story, Dom, that we rarely get the opportunity to talk about. And the reason I'm highlighting this story, it encapsulates the. And of course all our sympathies are in Ukraine, but this story encapsulates the pain and suffering of many, many people in Russia about Putin's invasion and this trauma that they're also living through. This is a woman called Nina Litvinova, eight year old woman, she's well regarded human rights campaigner, comes from a strong intelligentsia background. Her grandpa was a Soviet foreign minister, her brothers are a scientist, that sort of thing. She threw herself out of her central Moscow apartment window at the end of last week and died. My colleague Tom Parfit is a reporter for, a very good reporter on Russia for the Times. He wrote very movingly about this incident. He actually lived in the same block and Nina was a neighbor for some time. And I urge anyone who wants to know more about it to go and read Tom's piece. But the important thing is here is the suicide note that she left, which I think is really telling and this is, to put it into context, this is a story that has really shaken a lot of the sort of telegram platforms that have read and been used by intelligentsia and opponents of Putin. So her death has been strongly felt. If I can read the suicide note or part of the suicide note, it's probably worth a quick listen to Nina wrote shortly before she threw herself out of her apartment window in central Moscow. I love you all and I think about you, but I have to leave. Life is unbearable. Ever since Putin attacked Ukraine and started killing thousands of innocent people, it's been unbearable here in our country. He's endlessly imprisoned thousands of people who are suffering and dying because, like me, they're against this war and against murder. I can't help them in any way. I tried to help them, but my strength is gone and I suffer day and night from impotence. I'm ashamed and I've given up. Please forgive me.
- [38:15]
Dom Nichols
Well, thanks for that, James.
- [38:21]
James Kilner
Worth contemplating more people suffering at the hands of Putin.
- [38:27]
Dom Nichols
Well, that's it for today. Thanks folks. 20th of May. Seven years since President Zelensky was inaugurated. We'll be back same time, same place tomorrow. Hope you can join us. Thanks very much. Thanks guys.
- [38:43]
Podcast Producer/Announcer
Ukraine the Latest is an original podcast from the Telegraph created by David Knowles. Every episode featuring us in the studio maps and battlefield footage is now available to watch on our YouTube channel. Subscribe at www.YouTube.com Crainethelatest. There's a link in the description. You can also sign up to the Ukraine the Latest newsletter. Each week we answer your questions, provide recommended reading and give exclusive analysis and behind the scenes insights plus diagrams of the front lines and weaponry to complement our reporting. It's free for everyone including non subscribers. You can find the link to sign up in the episode description. If you appreciate our work, please consider following Ukraine the Latest on your preferred podcast. Appreciate and leave us a review as it helps others find the show. Please also share it with those who may not be aware we exist. You can also get in touch directly to ask questions or give comments by emailing ukrainepodelegraph.co.uk we continue to read every message. You can also contact us directly on X. You'll find our handles in the description. As ever, we're especially interested to hear where you're listening from around the world. And finally, to support our work and stay on top of all of our Ukraine news, analysis and dispatches from the ground. Please subscribe to the Telegraph. You can get one month for free, then two months for just one pound at www.telegraph.co.uk Ukraine the latest Ukraine the latest was Today, produced by Rachel Porter. Executive producers are Francis Dernley, Louisa Wells and David Knowles.
- [40:22]
David Knowles
My name is David Knowles. Thank you all for listening.
- [40:25]
James Kilner
Goodbye.
- [40:33]
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