A major fire occurred on Saturday September 30 after an oil pipeline ruptured in western Ukraine, injuring nine people, five of them seriously, authorities said. The incident caused an oil leak over an area of 100 m2 before the fire was brought under control.
“At 5 p.m., near the village of Strymba, Nadvirna district, an oil pipeline (150 millimeters in diameter) ruptured,” the National Emergency Service of Ukraine said. A fire then broke out for reasons still unknown and local media reported that a powerful explosion had occurred. “Nine people were injured,” said the region’s governor, Svetlana Onyshchuk. “According to preliminary information, two children and three adults are in critical condition, with numerous burns,” she added.
The wrong signal to Ukraine sent from Bratislava
The Slovak populist party Smer-SD, opposed to aid to Ukraine, won the legislative election in Slovakia, according to the count of almost all the votes. Smer-SD, led by former Prime Minister Robert Fico, obtained 23.3% of the vote, ahead of the centrist Progressive Slovakia party (17%), after almost all the votes were counted. The final results are expected during the day on Sunday. Smer is expected to obtain 42 seats out of the 150 in Parliament and will therefore need coalition partners to obtain a majority.
During the campaign, Robert Fico, a 59-year-old former communist, vowed that Slovakia would not send “a single ammunition” to Ukraine and called for better relations with Russia. Analysts predict that a Fico government could radically change Slovakia’s foreign policy closer to that of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.
Slovakia, a member of the EU and NATO, has provided substantial military aid to Ukraine since the Russian invasion began in February 2022. Bratislava has even been one of the main European donors to the Ukraine, as a proportion of its GDP. Slovak Defense Minister Martin Sklenar visited Kiev just before the vote, and on election day Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky thanked Slovakia for “standing with Ukraine “.
But Robert Fico promised that Slovakia will no longer send “a single bullet” to Ukraine. Robert Fico began his political career in the Communist Party just before the Velvet Revolution of 1989 swept away the regime in the former Czechoslovakia. In 1999, he left the Party of the Democratic Left (SDL), the political heir of the Communist Party, to found Smer-Social-Democrat (Smer-SD).
According to Slovak sociologist Michal Vasecka, interviewed by AFP, Robert Fico admires the authoritarianism of Russian President Vladimir Putin. The former Slovak Prime Minister recently assured that “the war in Ukraine began in 2014 when Ukrainian fascists killed civilian victims of Russian nationality”, echoing unproven Russian claims. “His relationship with Russia is historically determined by the socialist motto ‘With the Soviet Union for eternity'”, adds Michal Vasecka in a book he dedicated to him. Robert Fico also affirmed that he would not authorize the arrest of Vladimir Putin, under an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court, if he ever came to Slovakia.
United States: aid to Ukraine largely absent from the emergency measure
The United States avoided the paralysis of its federal administration at the last minute, the “shutdown”, with the adoption by the Senate of an emergency measure allowing its financing to temporarily continue. This, adopted by the American Congress, provides that the American administration continues to be funded for 45 days. However, it excludes aid to Ukraine at war requested by the White House.
Lawmakers are now expected to consider a separate bill for $24 billion in military and humanitarian aid to Ukraine. A vote could take place early next week, according to American media. Joe Biden immediately called on Congress to quickly approve aid to Ukraine. “I expect the President of Congress to uphold his commitment to the Ukrainian people and ensure the adoption of the support necessary to help Ukraine at this critical time,” the US president said in a statement, referring to Kevin McCarthy. The White House had initially demanded that the budget law include this $24 billion in aid.
“What Russia did is wrong. But I think whatever we do, we have to define what a victory means and what the plan should be,” Kevin McCarthy told reporters. “I think there is a real frustration across America, which sees this president ignoring the borders of the United States and being more concerned about another place,” he added, referring to this which Republicans call a “migrant crisis in the United States”.
Olympic Games-2024: Russia and Belarus under neutral banner? A “solution”, says Oudéa-Castéra
The participation of Russian and Belarusian athletes under a neutral banner in the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris is a “solution” towards which the sports movement is “moving”, said the French Minister of Sports on Saturday, the day after a decision to this effect by the Committee Paralympic.
For Amélie Oudéa-Castéra, it is up to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to decide the question of this participation of Russians and Belarusians, banned from world sport after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in early 2022. I think that the international sports movement is gradually moving towards this solution,” the minister told the press before the kick-off of the Fiji-Georgia Rugby World Cup match in Bordeaux.
“We remember that this was already the IOC’s recommendation to the federations which for the most part are part of this movement, which consists of authorizing the presence of Russian and Belarusian athletes but on an individual basis and under a very strict neutrality,” she stressed. On March 28, the IOC recommended that international federations authorize the participation of Russian and Belarusian athletes, as neutral individual athletes, in international competitions.
Amélie Oudéa-Castéra detailed the criteria for this “strict” participation regime: no Russian or Belarusian flag, no anthem, “no support for the war” in Ukraine and “no link with the Russian army” , as well as compliance with competition registration rules, such as the anti-doping program. “It is only if all of these parameters are secure that this presence can be considered and we will see the decision that the IOC will sovereignly take, probably in the coming weeks or by the end of the year,” she concluded.
On Friday, the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) authorized Russians and Belarusians to participate in the Paris Games under a neutral banner and strict neutrality conditions, a decision that Ukraine said it regretted. The IOC has not yet made a decision, postponing its decision “at the appropriate time”. Anne Hidalgo, mayor of Paris, host city of the Olympic Games, said in February that she was opposed to the coming of Russian athletes to Paris “as long as there is war” in Ukraine.