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Thomas Bach, the head of the International Olympic Committee, has today defended plans to get Russian and Belarusian athletes back into competitions as neutrals.

He claimed their participation "works" despite the war in Ukraine.

The IOC sanctioned Russia and Belarus after the 2022 invasion, but is now eager to see athletes have a chance to qualify for the Paris Olympics.

It has set out a pathway for these competitors to earn Olympic slots through Asian qualifying and has left it up to international federations to decide on organisation.

But Ukraine has since threatened to boycott the Paris 2024 Games should these athletes try to compete there, even as neutrals.

"Participation of athletes with Russian and Belarusian passports in international competitions works," Mr Bach said today.

"We see this almost every day in a number of sports, most prominently in tennis but also in cycling, in some table tennis competitions.

"We see it in ice hockey, handball, we see it in football and in other leagues in the United States but also in Europe and we also see it in other continents," he said.

"In none of these competition security incidents have been happening."

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Ukraine war - latest updates: Russia says it has intercepted US ... - Sky News

Beijing has repeated its calls for a peaceful settlement of the Ukraine crisis following reports that Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, plans to station tactical nuclear weapons in neighbouring Belarus, reports Nicola Smith.

Last year, the leaders of the five nuclear-weapon states released a joint statement, in which they affirmed that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought and stressed the importance of the avoidance of war between nuclear-weapon states and the reduction of strategic risks, said Mao Ning, a foreign ministry spokesperson on Monday.

Under the current circumstances, all sides need to focus on making diplomatic efforts towards a peaceful settlement of the Ukraine crisis and work together for de-escalation, she added.

Xi Jinping, the Chinese president, proposed a peace plan to end the crisis during a visit to Moscow last week, although it has been met with scepticism in the west as a possible stalling tactic to allow Russia to freeze the war and its territorial gains on its own terms.

Asked if the deployment of nuclear weapons in Belarus would complicate Chinas proposal, Ms Mao said Beijing was in talks with all sides and would continue to play a constructive role, urging the US to help create the conditions for peace talks rather than add fuel to the fire.

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Ukraine-Russia war latest: Russia claims to have shot down US ... - The Telegraph

Leonid Volkov, the chief of staff of , is visiting Australia this week to meet with senior foreign affairs officials and representatives of Foreign Minister Penny Wong to push his message that only sustained economic, military and political pressure on Russia would put enough strain on Putin that he would make a mistake.

Russian opposition figure Leonid Volkov is in Australia to talk to politicians and the media. Simon Schluter

Putin equals the war, Volkov told The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald. Putin will not, and cant, stop. He cant admit he lost; he cant admit he was wrong.

The military burden of the opposition to Putin was being shouldered by the Ukrainian people, Volkov said, and the global sanctions regime was hitting the Russian economy and causing pain to both its citizens and its oligarchs.

The job of imposing political pressure was being done by organisations such as Navalnys Anti-Corruption Foundation.

There is no silver bullet, but what we really need is patience, and everyone has to do their job, Volkov said. We have to work with public opinion in Russia to decrease the support for the war to make it harder for Putin to mobilise more men.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has announced plans to station tactical nuclear weapons in neighboring Belarus.

Volkov said it was impossible to accurately gauge public sentiment in Russia towards the war because state TV was a propaganda machine, dissent had been criminalised and Putin had encouraged political apathy among ordinary people for so long.

However, the Anti-Corruption Foundation, now based in exile in Vilnius, Lithuania, was trying to measure the level of support for the war by using indirect questions in polling.

We asked the question, Imagine there is additional money in the Russian budget, how would you like to spend it? Less than 10 per cent are in favour of additional military spending, despite the fact that propaganda is telling them 24 hours a day ... We are at war against the evil NATO, and we have to invest everything we have in defeating NATO.

So ... we can actually figure out that, well, there is no such thing as a popular support for the war there, Volkov said.

Putin had also lost the support of the elites, he claimed.

Theyve lost everything. Their lifestyle is ruined. No more kids in London, no more ski vacations ... and he doesnt present them with an exit strategy. They are asking him, Whats next? Whats the end game? and there is no answer. And they are getting more and more angry.

On calls for sporting bodies to prevent Russian athletes from competing in international events, Volkov said bans did have some impact on Russian society, but that Putin had also tried to weaponise them as an example of Western discrimination.

Ukraines sports minister recently renewed a threat to boycott the Olympic Games in Paris next year if Russia and Belarus were allowed to compete, and the sports ministers of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Poland and sporting organisations to ban athletes from those countries. But the IOC held firm, saying Russians and Belarusians could compete under neutral status if they were not actively supporting the war.

Vladimir Putin on a recent visit to Mariupol in Russian-controlled Donetsk, Ukraine. Russian TV

Volkov said that individual athletes who condemned the war, and make clear statements against the war, should be allowed to participate, but only under a neutral flag.

The good news, said Volkov, was that the war and the criminal warrant for Putins arrest issued by The Hague this month were likely to hasten the presidents demise.

Its a black swan event for him, Volkov said. Until the invasion, the most probable scenario was he would remain in power for 20 more years, until he dies.

Now the probability for this scenario ... has decreased dramatically.

Once Putin was off the scene, there was no reason Russia could not become a democracy, Volkov said.

There is no such thing as a nation thats incapable [of democracy].

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Putins death would end Ukraine war, says Russian opposition figure - Sydney Morning Herald

25 March 2023

President Zelensky said he would not send his troops to the front lines without more tanks, artillery and Himars rocket launchers

President Volodymyr Zelensky has said Ukraine's counter-offensive against Russia cannot start until Western allies send more military support.

He told a Japanese newspaper he would not send his troops to the front lines without more tanks, artillery and Himars rocket launchers.

In an interview with Yomiuri Shimbun, he said the situation in eastern Ukraine was "not good".

"We are waiting for ammunition to arrive from our partners," he said.

And when asked about the expected counter-offensive, he said: "We can't start yet, we can't send our brave soldiers to the front line without tanks, artillery and long-range rockets."

He added: "If you have the political will, you can find a way to help us. We are at war and can't wait."

There has been talk for some weeks of Ukraine launching a spring offensive against Russian forces. Ukrainian commanders have hinted it might be imminent. Oleksandr Syrskyi, commander of Ukraine's ground forces, said this week it might come "very soon".

Some analysts say Ukraine's military is talking up the idea of a counter-offensive to discomfit their Russian counterparts. They want Russian commanders to spread their forces thinly along the front lines, ready for any attack, rather than concentrate them in particular places, such as the eastern city of Bakhmut.

Other analysts believe a counter-offensive is possible soon. A US-based think tank, the Institute for the Study of War, last week suggested that Russia's own offensive was potentially losing momentum and concluded: "Ukraine is therefore well positioned to regain the initiative and launch counter-offensives in critical sectors of the current front line."

But President Zelensky is more pessimistic. He has often warned that the war could drag on for years unless Western allies speeded up the delivery of weapons. But this is the first time he has actually said the counter-offensive itself might be delayed by the lack of Western equipment.

His remarks reflect not only his desire to encourage more speed, but also his frustration at what he sees as the lack of haste.

Ukraine's allies have promised more tanks, artillery and longer-range missile systems. But some countries are struggling to deliver what they pledged, while others are taking more time than expected to get the equipment to Ukraine.

Western officials say military support is arriving, but admit training and planning is taking time. They also point to other factors such as muddy terrain making it hard for any army to start manoeuvring easily and break through front lines.

Such is the speculation about Ukraine's counter-offensive - in particular, when and where it might come - that the defence ministry has urged people to stop discussing potential plans.

Ukraine's Deputy Defence Minister Hanna Malyar claimed on social media that only three people had the right to disclose military plans publicly - the president, the minister of defence, and the commander in chief.

"All others can only quote them," she wrote. "Please stop asking experts questions about a counter-offensive on the air, please stop writing blogs and posts on this topic, please stop publicly discussing the military plans of our army."

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No Ukraine offensive without more weapons Zelensky - BBC

A by-product of enriching uranium,depleted uraniumhas been stripped of mostbut not allof its radioactivity and is dense enough to pierce many types of armour.

The British governmentconfirmedlast week that it would supply Ukraine with the ammunition to aid its fight against Russia.

Russian PresidentVladimir Putinreacted to the newsby vowing to respond accordingly,giventhattheWest collectivelyisalready beginningtouseweaponswithanuclearcomponent.

Putin followed up by quicklyinking a dealwith long-time allyAlexander Lukashenkoto store nuclear arms inBelarus.

The British government replied to Putins threat by accusing him of spreading disinformation, noting that British forces have been using the armour-piercing shells legally for several decades in accordance with Article 36 of the 1977 Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions.

Washington voiced its support for the UKs initiative last Thursday, withJohn Kirby, the National Security Council's strategic communications coordinator, statingthat the ammunition is not radioactive and "notanywherecloseto"therealm ofnuclearweaponry.

Severalstudies have shown that depleted uranium is less radioactive than its enriched cousin because it contains fewer isotopes.

Nevertheless, delivering these kind of shells to Kyiv will provide an argument for those who buy into the "Russianrhetoric on how the West is responsible foraggravating the conflict, said Jeff Hawn, a Ukraine war specialist and a non-resident fellow at the New Lines Institute, a Washington, DC-based think tank.

"This is standard anti-tank ammunition that can be used against anything armoured, Hawn said.

These kind of shells have gotten bad press for decades, but the dangers of exposure to their radiation have never been clearly proven or disproven due to contradicting scientific studies.

The idea of using depleted uranium in ammunition dates back to Nazi Germany. In 1943, the Reich's minister of armaments and war production, Albert Speer, hoped to use the radioactive material to replace tungsten, an essential component of tank shells that was in short supply. There is no evidence the Third Reich managed to create depleted-uranium shells, but the United States advanced the technology to developed tank killer munitions in the 1970s.

The US wanted to have the most efficient weapons in case of armed conflicts in Europe against Soviet tanks, Hawn said.

Depleted-uranium shells proved to be ideal against tanks, as theyare much denser than the other, more widely available heavy-tank ammunition, Hawn said, citing another advantage in its combustibility. They are extremely flammable and self-sharpening rather than flattening, like tungsten ammunition," he explained, adding that these munitions often lead a tank to explode because of the heat produced near its fuel tank.

One of the major downsides remains the fact that, even when depleted, uranium is quite toxic. Although countries including France, the UK, the US, China and Pakistan have produced such shells, they remain in limited use.

"For most countries, this is 'politically toxic' ammunition. The cost-benefit equation compared to tungsten rounds is not in favour of uranium shells," Hawn said.

Only the US and UK have openly used the armour-piercing shells, notably during the first Gulf War (1990-1991) and the wars in the decade following the breakup of Yugoslavia (1991-2001). Many studies have since been published in an effort to evaluate their potential damage to health.

Research on the subject initially focused on the health risks incurred by soldiers in handling the depleted-uraniumshells. The focus later shifted to the long-term health risks incurred by local inhabitants due to radiation. For example, studies have been conducted in Iraq to link unsuccessfully anincrease in cancer cases in certain regions to the use of depleted-uranium shells by the US army.

The risks are two-fold: first, debris from the shells remains radioactive and potentially dangerous in case of prolonged exposure. Second,the shells emit a cloud of radioactive dust upon impact that goes on to pollute the environment. Soil and water tables can thus be tainted, which can then contaminate local populations through ingestion, areport published by the Royal Society showed.

Meanwhile, the US and UK have insisted for years that the health risks are minimal. The British Royal Society concluded that the risk of lung cancer is somewhat higher, but only in cases of direct exposure to the shells for long periods of time.

Despite the large body of scientific work on the subject, the UN has deemed it necessary to continue evaluating the health risks tied to the use of depleted-uranium shells while noting that no significant proof of health risks has yet been established.

Nevertheless, the use of such shells has "a lasting environmental effect", Hawn said.

Despite the environmental risks, Hawn defends the UKs decision to supply Ukraine with the munitions, saying that "there are a lot of depleted-uranium rounds sitting around in stockpiles". Given a shortage of ammunition, "its a good way to get [Ukraine] ammunition quickly".

"At the end of the day, Ukraine should use whatever they can to defend themselves, and one advantage with this ammunition is that they can increase the firing range, which helps Ukrainian soldiers who are outnumbered by Russians stay safe," he added.

And this might be the real reason behind Russias concern not the radioactivity of the anti-tank munitions, but that the armour-busting bullets might help its adversary gain the upper hand.

This article has been translated from theoriginal in French.

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Depleted-uranium shells, the armour-busting munitions heading to Ukraine - FRANCE 24 English