Ukraine enters this Saturday July 8 in its 500th day of war against Russia. This day is already marked by strong gestures from President Zelensky and his allies. The United States has thus crossed a new line by deciding to deliver cluster munitions to Ukraine, which kill indiscriminately and are banned in many countries, particularly in Europe. “It was a very difficult decision for me,” President Joe Biden told CNN, adding that he had discussed it beforehand with allied countries and the US Congress. He justified his decision by saying that Ukraine was “out of ammunition”. This decision comes at a time when kyiv is engaged in a vast counter-offensive against Russian forces, which is progressing slowly, according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
These so-called cluster munitions scatter or release up to 600 small explosive charges designed to explode before, on, or after impact. Many countries have banned its use and production under the 2008 Oslo Convention, of which neither the United States nor Ukraine are parties. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan defended that “artillery is at the heart of this conflict” and that Russia had been using this type of weapon since the beginning of the war. He also claimed that the Ukrainians had provided “written” guarantees on the use they would make of these weapons to minimize “the risks posed to civilians”.
Washington’s announcement causes embarrassment on the European side. In Berlin, the spokesman for the German government, said he was “certain that our American friends did not take the decision to deliver the ammunition in question lightly”. The French Ministry of Foreign Affairs recalled that France would respect its commitments made within the framework of the Oslo Convention. But “we understand the arbitration at which the United States has reached in its wish to help Ukraine in the exercise of its self-defense against the illegal aggression unleashed by Russia”, specified the Quai d’Orsay . NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg noted that Russia and Ukraine use these weapons but that Moscow uses them “in its brutal war against Ukraine while Ukraine uses them to defend”.
For their part, the NGOs are strangling. The presence of these weapons may pose a long-term danger due in particular to the unexploded charges. Human Rights Watch believes that this decision “will inevitably cause long-term suffering and undermine international efforts to eradicate their use”.
Ukraine “will not join NATO” in Vilnius, according to the United States
Ukraine “will not join NATO” after the Vilnius summit, scheduled for next week, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said on Friday. This statement comes at a time when the Ukrainian president is leading an international tour aimed in particular at obtaining more support for Kiev’s ambition to join NATO, before an Alliance summit on July 11 and 12 in Lithuania.
Joe Biden will thus carry out a balancing act during this Alliance meeting, which will consist on the one hand of strengthening the allies’ support for Kiev, and on the other of maintaining a firm position on Ukraine’s ambition to join quickly the Alliance. The US president “has been clear that we will support Ukraine for as long as necessary and provide it with an exceptional amount of weapons but that we are not looking to start a Third World War”, insisted Jake Sullivan.
Regarding the country’s accession to NATO, American experts believe that Ukraine could be offered, instead of joining the Alliance, an agreement similar to that between the United States and Israel, the latter receiving significant annual funding for its security, which gives it long-term visibility.
Zelensky celebrates Ukraine’s courage from Snake Island
The head of the Ukrainian government has also multiplied symbols in favor of the victory of the war. A video published this Saturday, July 8 in the morning notably shows the army chief on Snake Island, located in the Black Sea, where Kiev had obtained a prestigious victory at the start of the war with Russia. “Today we are on Serpents’ Island, which will never be conquered by the occupier, just like the rest of Ukraine, because we are the country of courage”, declared the head of the State. “I want to thank here, from this place of victory, each of our soldiers for these 500 days”, he continues in this video where we see him arriving by boat on the island and laying flowers in front of a memorial.
Shortly after the start of the invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, the Russian army seized this island, a pebble strategically located a few tens of kilometers from the coast, where a small contingent of Ukrainian soldiers was stationed. The Russian cruiser Moskva had demanded their surrender but the soldiers had refused and ordered the ship to “fuck off” during a radio exchange that became cult on the Internet and featured on stamps in Ukraine. The Ukrainian soldiers had ended up being captured before being exchanged with Russian prisoners. The Moskva had sunk in the Black Sea after being hit by Ukrainian missiles, according to kyiv, a version refuted by Moscow.
Zelensky prays with the Patriarch of Constantinople
On a visit to Istanbul on the same day, the president appeared performing a prayer alongside the Orthodox Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople for the victims of the war in Russia. He went on Saturday morning to the headquarters of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, on the Golden Horn in Istanbul. Patriarch Bartholomew, elected in 1991, exercises an honorary and historical primacy over the other patriarchs of the Orthodox world. He is “first among equals”: this does not give him the right to intervene in the religious affairs of the other Orthodox Churches, but gives him spiritual and formal precedence. In 2018, the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople recognized the independent Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which angered Russia to the point that it became, according to it, a “target for Moscow”.
The Ukrainian president spoke the day before with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. His Turkish counterpart then reiterated unequivocal support for Volodymyr Zelensky, saying that Ukraine “deserves” to join NATO. The Turkish head of state, who announced the visit of Russian President Vladimir Putin “next month”, also considered that Russia and Ukraine “should return to peace talks”. He also wished that the agreement on the export of Ukrainian cereals, concluded in July 2022 with the sponsorship of the United Nations and Turkey, be extended.
UN denounces 500 days of civilian casualties
More than 9,000 civilians, including 500 children, have been killed since the Russian invasion on February 24, 2022, the United Nations Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine said in a statement on Friday July 7.
“Today we mark another grim milestone in the war that continues to exact a horrific toll on Ukrainian civilians,” said Noel Calhoun, deputy head of the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine. On Saturday July 8, a Russian bombardment in the eastern Ukrainian town of Lyman again killed 6 people, according to the governor of the Donetsk region on social networks.