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"if Ukraine would surrender, our diplomacy would work"
"if Ukraine would surrender, our diplomacy would work"
Kushner claims there’s a peace deal if only Ukr withdrew from Donbas. That's not true. Ru wants Ukr withdrawal as the condition to begin peace talks not to end the war. Ru has not agreed to a single thing Ukr wants: NATO membership, peacekeeping troops, reparations, return of kidnapped children, etc.
https://www.propublica.org/article/d...-kremlev-putinDonald Trump Jr.’s Bahamas Wedding Was Secretly Bankrolled by Russian Oligarch Close to Putin
On May 24, Donald Trump Jr. was celebrating in the Bahamas, as scantily clad dancers in stilettos and sailor caps performed for him and his guests. It was the last night of his wedding, a lavish, three-day party held across a pair of ultra-exclusive private islands. A five-tier funfetti cake had been airlifted in from Florida, and helicopters and seaplanes descended on the islands before guests settled into their oceanfront villas. That night on the beach, Trump Jr. lifted his bride into the air while fireworks launched from a barge over the sea.
“It was everything we dreamed of and more,” his wife later wrote on Instagram.
That dream was heavily funded by a secret benefactor: Umar Kremlev, a Russian oligarch close to President Vladimir Putin.
Kremlev footed the bill for hundreds of thousands of dollars of wedding expenses, according to records reviewed by ProPublica and interviews with three people familiar with the event. The oligarch paid to rent out one of the private islands, where a reception was held and where guests slept. He also covered other big-ticket items, like the fireworks show, and his team helped plan the event. Kremlev is the head of the International Boxing Association, a scandal-plagued sports group that has been financed by the Russian state-owned energy giant Gazprom. The wedding payments came from an IBA-affiliated en y in Dubai that the boxing association uses for financial transactions.
The guest list numbered around 50. It included Trump Jr.’s brother-in-law Jared Kushner, Eric Trump — and Kremlev, an imposing man with a shaved head who speaks limited English. The oligarch was part of a large group whose presence puzzled other attendees. They sometimes stood off by themselves, speaking Russian.
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Holden Triplett, who served as Trump’s counterintelligence director on the National Security Council during his first term, said Russian intelligence frequently seeks to build ties with U.S. government officials and their family members. “Money is a tried-and-true method to gain access,” said Triplett, who also worked for the FBI in Moscow.
In the days leading up to Trump Jr.’s wedding, Kremlev was in China as part of the delegation accompanying Putin, according to Chinese state media. The month before, Putin had bestowed him with a state honor, the Order of Friendship. The Ukrainian government has imposed sanctions on Kremlev personally, citing his closeness to Putin and Russian security services.
It’s not clear why Kremlev helped pay for Trump Jr.’s wedding. The men appear to have met only recently. Public reporting suggests Trump Jr. could have afforded it himself, with Forbes recently estimating his net worth at roughly $300 million.
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In 2009, Umar Kremlev did not yet exist.
He was in his late 20s, with a criminal record for extortion and battery, still going by his birth name, Umar Lutfulloyev, according to the Russian independent news outlet Proekt. But he was about to rapidly ascend in Russia to a position of wealth and influence, with the help of a powerful friend. (“Mr. Kremlev has a completely clean legal record,” his press office said.)
In 2010, he changed his name to Kremlev. He soon joined a Russian government-backed biker gang called the Night Wolves, eventually taking a leadership role, according to news reports. That is what first brought him close to Alexei Rubezhnoi, who now leads Putin’s presidential security service, Proekt reported. In 2017, Kremlev took over the Russian Boxing Federation, after Rubezhnoi personally intervened to put him at the helm.
In 2020, Kremlev became president of the IBA. The association was something akin to FIFA but for boxing and had long overseen the sport in the Olympics. But it had been beset by corruption allegations and was on the brink of insolvency. Kremlev brought money to the table from Gazprom, the state-owned company that operates as an arm of Putin’s government. Gazprom publicly became the IBA’s financial backer, filling its coffers with tens of millions of dollars.
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In 2023, the International Olympic Committee stripped Kremlev’s IBA of its role organizing Olympic boxing. It has cited a host of governance issues and the group’s refusal to “transparently explain the sources of its financing or to explain its full financial dependency, at the time, on a single state-owned company.”
It was a major setback that deprived the IBA of a key source of its international influence. Kremlev has raged against the Olympic committee ever since and has said that his IBA predecessor, who he blames for the problems, “must be shot.”
Kremlev saw a potential ally in President Trump. After Trump’s second inauguration, in January 2025, Kremlev sent an open letter to the president asking him to look into the Olympic committee’s actions in advance of the 2028 Los Angeles Games. “We look forward with great optimism to the possibility of working together to make the Olympic movement great again,” he wrote.
In September 2025, the IBA brought in Trump Jr. for a panel discussion in Istanbul about boxing. With his then-girlfriend, Anderson, sitting offstage, he criticized transgender women competing in women’s sports and reminisced about watching Saturday night fights as a child. Trump Jr. shared the stage with Kremlev, the boxer Manny Pacquiao and Muhammad Ali’s daughter Rasheda. (Trump Jr.’s spokesperson said he was not paid for the appearance and was already in Turkey for an unrelated event.)
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Recently, Kremlev has been working to expand into the U.S. market. In July, his group hosted a bare-knuckle boxing event in Miami, a chance to showcase a particularly bloody form of the sport in which contenders fight without gloves. But the debut was overshadowed when manosphere influencer Andrew Tate, who the IBA had brought in to host, was arrested by U.S. Marshals outside the arena. (Tate is facing rape and sex trafficking charges in the United Kingdom, which he has denied.)
Much about Kremlev’s relationship with Trump Jr., and where it is headed, remains unknown. In a press release after the Istanbul panel, the IBA hinted there was more to come.
“President Kremlev and Donald Trump Jr made it clear – this alliance will not remain symbolic,” the press release read. “More joint initiatives will follow.”
https://tvpworld.com/95413224/ukrain...kostiantynivkaUkrainian drones kill Russian general decorated by Putin
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Brovdi said Grunis had been killed on September 12 “in his night-time lair in the temporarily occupied territory of Donetsk Oblast."
The drone commander claimed that Grunis is the seventh Russian commander at brigade, division or army level to have been confirmed killed by his unmanned units.
Independent Belarusian media outlet Nexta reported on X that pro-Kremlin Russian military bloggers suspect Grunis’s location was given away by informers and are now looking for “traitors.”
https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2026/09/21/8054511/Moscow Oil Refinery has halted operations after Ukrainian drone attack, Reuters reports
Details: Sources told Reuters on Monday that both of the refinery's crude oil distillation units caught fire after drones crashed onto the facility, and that repairs and the resumption of operations could take several weeks.
The refinery's AVT-6 unit has a capacity of 21,400 tonnes per day, accounting for 53% of the facility's total capacity, while the EURO+ combined oil processing unit has a capacity of 18,800 tonnes per day, accounting for the remaining 47%.
According to the sources, the refinery processed 11.6 million tonnes of crude oil in 2024, equivalent to about 230,000 barrels per day, and produced 2.9 million tonnes of petrol, 3.2 million tonnes of diesel fuel and 1.3 million tonnes of bitumen.
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https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2026/09/21/8054511/Moscow Oil Refinery has halted operations after Ukrainian drone attack, Reuters reports
Details: Sources told Reuters on Monday that both of the refinery's crude oil distillation units caught fire after drones crashed onto the facility, and that repairs and the resumption of operations could take several weeks.
The refinery's AVT-6 unit has a capacity of 21,400 tonnes per day, accounting for 53% of the facility's total capacity, while the EURO+ combined oil processing unit has a capacity of 18,800 tonnes per day, accounting for the remaining 47%.
According to the sources, the refinery processed 11.6 million tonnes of crude oil in 2024, equivalent to about 230,000 barrels per day, and produced 2.9 million tonnes of petrol, 3.2 million tonnes of diesel fuel and 1.3 million tonnes of bitumen.
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https://english.nv.ua/nation/ilsky-o...-50644919.htmlIlsky refinery in Russia's Krasnodar Krai halts operations after Ukrainian strike — Fire Point
According to the company, the attack hit three primary oil processing units, and the tank farm.
The refinery's operations are currently halted.
Earlier on Sept. 26, Ukraine's General Staff said Ukrainian Defense Forces had struck the Ilsky oil refinery in Russia's Krasnodar Krai.
The Ilsky refinery is capable of processing about 6.6 million metric tons of oil a year. The plant receives, stores and processes crude oil, and also produces and ships petroleum products, some of which are used to meet the needs of Russian troops.
https://www.cnbc.com/2026/10/04/russ...bas-lyman.htmlUkraine’s surprise robot offensive exposes a vulnerability in Putin’s war machine
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As part of the ongoing operation, which started in May, security experts said Ukraine’s Third Army Corps had been able to deploy large bomber drones and remote-controlled robots behind enemy lines around Lyman in the northern Donetsk Oblast, apparently catching Russian forces off guard.
Russian forces have been seeking to encircle Ukraine’s so-called fortress belt cities that make up the remaining Ukrainian-held territory in the region for the past 12 months.
The third phase of Operation Vivaldi, however, liberated an additional 51 square kilometers, taking the total area of territory retaken to 176 square kilometers, Ukrainian Brigadier-General Andrii Biletskyi said on Sept. 28. The latest phase of fighting inflicted over 2,000 Russian losses, with over 250 Russian soldiers taken prisoner, he added.
Patrick Bolder, a defense expert and strategic advisor at the Hague Center for Strategic Studies (HCSS), described the offensive as a “big bloody nose” to Putin’s minimal war aim of seizing Ukraine’s Donbas region.
Alongside demonstrating an ability to keep details of the operation secret, running disinformation campaigns against Russia and orchestrating a months-long air operation to disrupt logistical supplies to the frontline, Bolder said Ukrainian forces had managed to secure control of the air in the Lyman area, denying Russia the use of its drones.
Ukrainian forces were then able to deploy their own drones to drop unmanned ground vehicles behind enemy lines to attack the Russian troops from behind, Bolder said, without endangering their own personnel.
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now Trump is blowing Putin in public and giving him money to fight Ukraine, in exchange for about 10 days worth of diesel
t
Kinetic sanctions are still in effect
https://www.kyivpost.com/post/86663Drones Strike Rostov Oil Terminal, Igniting Major Fire
Ukrainian strike drones attacked an oil transshipment terminal in the southern Russian port city of Rostov-on-Don early Saturday morning, Oct. 10, igniting a large blaze at the facility, Russian regional officials and independent media reported.
Residents across Rostov-on-Don reported multiple explosions and visible air defense fire beginning late Friday evening and continuing into the early morning hours.
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The facility functions as a key logistics node for petroleum products, handling transshipment from the Novoshakhtinsk Petroleum Products Plant (NZNP) and other regional suppliers.
Operating with a designed annual handling capacity of approximately 2.5 million metric tons, the terminal processes fuel supplies utilized by the Russian armed forces and facilitates maritime export shipments generating foreign currency revenue.
Although commercially known as Yug Rusi since its commissioning alongside the first phase of the Novoshakhtinsk refinery in 2009, corporate filings by the Novoshakhtinsk plant designate the facility as the “NZNP oil loading terminal, Rostov branch.” The terminal was previously targeted by Ukrainian drone strikes in July.
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Witkoff and Kushner protecting revenue streams
A Ukrainian official claims Witkoff and Kushner threatened to cut off US intelligence sharing if Ukraine kept ignoring Trump's requests, which the US official denies
instant karma
https://www.rawstory.com/trump-putin-2678069413/Ukrainian drones hit the NZNP Rostovsky oil export terminal in Rostov-on-Don overnight, “setting the facility ablaze just hours after the U.S. eased sanctions on Russian fuel exports,” according to the markets account First Squawk. Al Jazeera also reported the strike came hours after what it called a “Trump-Putin diesel deal.”
...“This is a products export terminal, exactly where the diesel would leave Russia under the deal,” the account wrote.
It also said Ukrainian military sources had warned earlier in the day that the Trump administration’s effort to use Russian diesel to bring down U.S. prices before the midterms “will bear no fruit.”
he mad
Zelenskyy could’ve stopped this war many times, and he chose not to … he better damn well stop
Trump sure whines a lot for a tuff guy
I think it’s time for Ukraine to get a new president
(Trump announces ceasefire, Russia breaks it one hour later)
Yandex gets creamed, knocking out Russian internet, bots, cloud services and troll farms
https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-in...v-data-centersRussian bot traffic has dropped dramatically in the past few days after Ukraine knocked out Yandex’s biggest data centers, with a third attack happening last night. Cloudflare reports that bot traffic from the Yandex network has dropped to just 0.4% of the maximum number of HTTP requests recorded in the past two weeks. It initially dropped to around 57% on Oct. 8, which happened when Ukraine hit a Yandex data center housing two supercomputers in Sasovo, Russia, located around 195 miles to the southeast of the Kremlin. A second, bigger Yandex campus in Kaluga, about 220 miles to the west of Sasovo, was knocked offline yesterday.
These attacks are apparently Ukraine’s response to Moscow’s strikes on its own data centers, some of which resulted in the outage of some of the most popular piracy websites.
(Image credit: CloudFlare)
Yandex is Russia’s equivalent to Google, and its Yandex Cloud service status reports that at least 84 services are currently offline. Global internet monitoring firm NetBlocks said that Yandex’s network traffic has dropped to just 30% for Yandex Cloud and 63% for Yandex LLC, most likely resulting in slower internet services or complete disruption for the average Russian. Unfortunately, the ordinary Russian wouldn’t be able to use high-speed satellite internet as a backup, as Starlink does not work in Russia, while the competing Rassvet constellation has had a good number of its existing satellites fall back to the surface after launch.
https://thedeepdive.ca/us-may-end-up...umps-new-deal/US May End Up Buying Iranian Diesel Through Russia Under Trump’s New Deal
Trump’s deal to bring Russian diesel to the US covers only diesel of Russian origin, but reports don’t say how anyone will check that. Treasury’s General License 135, issued October 9, authorizes transactions in Russian-origin diesel, including its import, until April 7, 2027.
Trump said Russia would supply more than 300,000 tonnes immediately, and 500,000 more in November, followed by 1 million and, depending on the state of its refineries, 3 million after that. Those refineries are struggling.
Russia has barred diesel exports since July, with the ban set to run through October, and maritime analytics firm Windward says it brought in gasoline and diesel from abroad in the third quarter, a first. Ukraine’s Defense Ministry says its attacks have knocked out over half of Russian refining capacity, a claim the reports reviewed don’t verify.
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