WAR IN UKRAINE: July 16, 2022
Rescuers clear the debris of a heavily damaged building in central Vinnytsia on July 15, 2022, a day after a Russian missile attack on the city. (Getty Images)
LATEST DEVELOPMENTS: Day 143
Ukraine repels Russian offensive towards strategic highway in Donbas. According to Luhansk Oblast Governor Serhiy Haidai, Russian troops have aimed to capture the road between the towns of Lysychansk, Luhansk Oblast, and Bakhmut, Donetsk Oblast, for the past 2 months - Kyiv Independent
Russian Ministry of Defense admits deliberately hitting Vinnytsia's center. The Kyiv Independent reports that Russia boasted of the unfounded claim of targeting a meeting between representatives of Ukraine's military and foreign arms suppliers. A Russian missile strike on Vinnytsia hit civilian infrastructure in the city’s center on July 14, killing at least 23 people and injuring 117. The number of casualties is growing. Among them is a young girl who was out strolling with her mom. She is in hospital with serious injuries: doctors say she repeatedly asks for her daughter but they’re aren’t yet prepared to inform her of the tragic loss.
Russian long-range cruise missiles killed three people in Ukraine's central city of Dnipro when they hit a space rocket plant and a nearby street, local officials say. About 15 people were injured and nearby residential buildings damaged. Dnipro's Yuzhmash plant also builds satellites - with one launched into space by Elon Musk's SpaceX company - BBC
Speaking of long-range Russian cruise missile which threaten all of Ukraine - the country’s defense minister has told BBC Ukrainian that missile defense systems are capable of shooting down about 50 percent of all incoming missiles. Said Oleksii Reznikov: “Israeli experts, for example, will say that they guarantee 80% protection. But not a hundred. Today, there is no 100% protection against cruise and ballistic missiles of a certain type, for example, from the same "Calibers". Israel's "Iron Dome", a very famous defense system, also shoots down a certain type of missile, but not cruise missiles.”
The mayor of Sumy has advised residents to leave the city for the weekend, citing looming dangers - presumably from Russian long range rockets - Ukrainska Pravda. In the Lviv region, air raid sirens were triggered three times between Friday afternoon and early Saturday evening.
Kyiv quells fears of weapons smuggling from Ukraine. The defense minister tells the Financial Times tracking procedures are in place. Read the full interview here
According to the Head of the Mykolaiv Regional Military Administration, Vitalii Kim, the Russian military attacked Mykolaiv with rocket fire. He also said that the two largest universities were hit. “Today, terrorist Russia attacked the two largest universities in Mykolaiv. No less than 10 missiles. Now they are attacking our education. I ask the universities of all democratic countries to declare that Russia is what it really is — a Terrorist,” he wrote on his social networks. As a result of the morning shelling of the city, four people were injured, Mayor Sienkevych told Suspilne.
For months the Ukrainian military pleaded for long-range precision artillery and rocket systems from Western partners. Now they have them and are deploying them to considerable effect in both the south and east of the country. Read the full CNN report here
Weekend reading…
Ukraine - country once largely regarded as a Ruritanian backwater - is now considered not only the bravest nation on earth, for so powerfully and effectively resisting the Putin Fascists, but also as one of the smartest, most resourceful, and technologically superior, lethally bamboozling the invaders with hacking, drones, and other technologies - including Ajax, a home security system.
By the time the Russians began their war on Ukraine, Ajax had close to 2,000 employees, mostly in Kyiv and Kharkiv. Their response to the war, by a company representative’s account, was what we would now characterize as typically Ukrainian.
On day two of the invasion, they just moved the entire outfit in roughly 1,800 trucks to the safer, western regions of the country, and are now back in production—as well as building and opening a manufacturing plant in Turkey.
Ajax started shipping to the U.S. in recent months, as products needed to be adapted to American tech standards. And the company’s retailer-and-installer network is developing day by day.
Check out the Air Mail story here