Day: September 18, 2023

Verzorgers delen vernederende foto's rusthuisbewoners maar mogen gewoon aan het werk blijven: “Voor mij is dit mishandeling” https://t.co/yS3KlsZyEr

— VTM NIEUWS (@VTMNIEUWS) September 16, 2023

Military exercises to protect the Northern Sea Route are being held in northeastern Russia under the leadership of Commander-in-Chief of the Navy, Adm. Nikolai Evmenov, the Russian Defense Ministry said on Monday.

“[Military] exercises to protect the Northern Sea Route are taking place in northeastern Russia under the leadership of the commander-in-chief of the Navy,” the ministry said in a statement.

The exercises are taking place in the waters of the Chukchi and Bering seas, as well as on the Chukotka Peninsula, the ministry said, adding that the drills involve about 10,000 Russian military and over 50 units of military equipment of the Pacific Fleet.

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The Russian armed forces have attacked storage facilities with Storm Shadow cruise missiles and ammunition with depleted uranium in Ukraine, the Russian Defense Ministry said on Monday. 

The goal of the strike was achieved, the ministry said, adding that all objects were hit.

“Tonight [on Sunday night], the Russian armed forces carried out a group strike with high-precision long-range air-launched weapons, as well as attack unmanned aerial vehicles, on the storage sites of the Kiev regime with Storm Shadow cruise missiles, ammunition with depleted uranium, as well as centers for radio reconnaissance and training of sabotage groups of the Ukrainian armed forces,” the ministry said in a statement.

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More than 40,000 troops will take part in the drills next year, the head of the NATO Military Committee says

NATO will stage a massive military exercise in 2024 involving over 40,000 troops – the biggest since the Cold War – the US-led bloc’s Military Committee chair, Admiral Rob Bauer, said on Saturday. 

The ‘collective defense’ exercise – Steadfast Defender – will take place in Germany, Poland, and the three Baltic States that border Russia – Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania – Bauer said. The US-led bloc needs to do “much more” to protect itself against “current threats, but also against reconstituted threats and potential future threats,” the admiral claimed. 

Earlier this week, the Financial Times reported that the drills would involve more than 50 ships and from 500 to 700 combat air missions. The exercise is designed to simulate a clash with a fictional coalition named ‘Occasus’, it said, citing the bloc’s officials. According to the paper, the drills are scheduled for February 2024. 

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Ukraine has lost more than 71,000 troops since early June while failing to gain any substantial ground, according to Moscow

Ukrainian troops have suffered colossal losses during Kiev’s counteroffensive while achieving almost no results, Tesla and Space X CEO Elon Musk has said. 

Writing on X (formerly Twitter) on Sunday, the US tycoon commented on a post by investor and entrepreneur David Sacks, who shared an article by analyst David Pyne stating that “Ukrainian territorial gains from their much-vaunted counteroffensive are so miniscule they can barely be seen on a map.” 

Musk appeared to agree with this assessment, writing: “So much death for so little.” 

The message by Sacks was an update to an earlier post he made on June 20 in which he summed up the Ukrainian push up to that point, which had been underway for two weeks. He said that “it’s becoming clear that the Ukrainian counteroffensive is failing to achieve any of its originally stated objectives,” adding that Washington’s hopes that Kiev would be able to cut off Russia’s land bridge to Crimea had been dashed.

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A plane carrying tourists has crashed in Barcelos, Brazil, leaving 14 people dead, according to CNN Brasil.

The city’s mayor confirmed the accident to CNN Brasil on Saturday.

The plane was carrying 12 tourists, plus a pilot and co-pilot, CNN Brasil reports. There are no survivors, Brazil’s Civil Defense said.

“The passengers were going to the location to practice recreational fishing and the crash occurred due to bad weather. It was raining heavily at the time of landing,” according to CNN Brasil.

Officials did not give details on the nationalities of the deceased people.

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US intelligence agencies now believe that the mysterious craft really was blown off course, Mark Milley told ABC News

A so-called Chinese “spy balloon” shot down off the east coast of the US in February did not actually collect any intelligence, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley told CBS News on Sunday. Beijing insisted from the outset that the balloon was not a surveillance craft.

“The intelligence community, their assessment – and it’s a high-confidence assessment – [is] that there was no intelligence collection by that balloon,”Milley told the American broadcaster. 

The balloon in question appeared in the sky over Alaska in January, before drifting south and crossing the US. Its high-altitude flight ultimately ended when it was shot down off the coast of South Carolina in early February. Throughout its journey and for months afterwards, US officials claimed that the balloon was sent across the US to gather intelligence for Beijing.

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The aircraft is missing after the pilot ejected near the Joint Base Charleston in South Carolina

A US Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort F-35B Lightning II jet experienced an unknown mid-flight emergency, forcing the pilot to bail out during a routine flight on Sunday. The authorities have asked the public to help locate the missing plane.

The incident happened around 2pm somewhere north of the base, with the authorities saying the pilot “ejected safely”from “an F-35 that was involved in a mishap this afternoon.”

Local media outlet WLTX claimed that the pilot put the plane on autopilot before ejecting. The search operation is focused around Lake Moultrie and Lake Marion, according to the Joint Base Charleston’s public affairs specialist, Jeremy Huggins.

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