Putin replaces Russia’s defense minister with a civilian as Ukraine war rages and defense spending spirals RUSSIA – Russian President Vladimir Putin has replaced his defense minister and a long-time close ally Sergei Shoigu with an economist, a major reshuffle of military leadership more than two years after Moscow’s grinding war against Ukraine has sent defense spending soaring. Andrey Belousov, a civilian who served as former first deputy prime minister and specializes in economics, was appointed to the top defense post, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said. Peskov tried to downplay the move, but the reshuffle comes amid speculation about infighting at the highest echelons of power. Just last month, one of Shoigu’s long-time protégés at the defense ministry was arrested and charged with corruption. Shoigu was “relieved” of his position by presidential decree, Peskov said, but he will remain an influential part of Putin’s administration as secretary of Russia’s Security Council, replacing Nikolai Patrushev, a former head of the Federal Security Service (FSB), who would “transfer to another job.” Shoigu will also become the deputy in Russia’s Military-Industrial Commission, Peskov said, as Putin embarks on a fifth term as president.

The timing of Shoigu’s exit is notable, coming off the back of several significant advances by Russian troops in eastern Ukraine. Russia has launched its most serious cross-border ground assault since Ukraine recaptured the northern Kharkiv region in the late summer of 2022. There have been several months of increased Russian air attacks on the city of Kharkiv amid a grinding advance in Donetsk in the east that has seen incremental but significant progress.

Shoigu had helmed the country’s defense ministry for 12 years and led the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Russian troops initially caught Kyiv by surprise but were soon beaten back, exposing the weaknesses of Moscow’s corruption-riddled military and its willingness to send waves of poorly trained and equipped soldiers into what Ukraine and Russian troops have both dubbed a “meat grinder.” His critics have frequently described Shoigu as remote and out-of-touch with the realities of the conflict. His most forceful critic was the late Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin who accused the Defense Ministry of starving his fighters of resources and bureaucratic incompetence before launching an unsuccessful mutiny last year and dying weeks later in a plane crash.

Despite the criticism, Shoigu has remained a popular politician in Russia. Having spent two decades as the minister of emergency situations, he cultivated an image of a helpful official who brings help when it’s needed.

Belousov was selected by Putin because of a need for “innovation,” Peskov said in a press call, during which he highlighted the ministry’s rising budget, saying it was approaching levels last seen during the Cold War.

In a reference to the war in Ukraine, Peskov said that due to “well-known geopolitical circumstances, we are gradually approaching the situation of the mid-80s when the share of expenses for the security bloc in the economy was 7.4%. It’s not critical, but it’s extremely important,” Peskov said. The budget currently amounts to 6.7% of GDP, he said. Peskov highlighted Belousov’s previous leadership experience and economic background. “This is not just a civilian, but a person who very successfully headed the Ministry of Economic Development of Russia, for a long time he was aide to the president on economic issues, and was also the first deputy chairman of the government in the previous cabinet of ministers,” Peskov said. Much has been made of Belousov’s civilian status, even though Shoigu himself has limited hands-on experience with the military. He holds a rank of a general as a result of his official roles and has never served in active service. Peskov added that the new appointment did not signal a shift in Russia’s current military system. “As for the military component, this appointment will in no way change the current coordinate systems. The military component has always been the prerogative of the Chief of the General Staff [Valery Gerasimov], and he will continue his activities. No changes are currently envisaged in this regard,” he said. In his new role, Shoigu will oversee Russia’s military industrial complex, Peskov said.

(CNN)…[+]

SPAIN – Spain’s Socialists won the biggest share of the vote in Sunday’s Catalan elections, dealing a serious blow to more than a decade of separatist governance and the independence dreams still nursed by some in the wealthy northeastern region. The Socialists, led locally by Salvador Illa, had 42 seats in the 135-seat chamber with more than 99% of the vote counted, while hardline separatist party Junts was in second place with 35 seats, and the incumbent more moderate separatist party Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya (ERC) had 20 seats. Spain’s largest opposition party, the conservative People’s Party, also had a good night, seeing the biggest increase since the last vote in 2021 from three seats to 15 on Sunday. Turnout for the vote was notably low at 58%. The result looks to be an existential threat for separatist governance in Catalonia which led a 2017 illegal independence referendum and declaration of independence that caused Spain’s worst institutional crisis in more than 30 years but whose movement has lost energy and unity more recently. It also represents a vindication of Spain’s Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s controversial bid to normalize relations with restive Catalonia, including issuing pardons for convictions over the independence drive and, more recently, a controversial amnesty including others still facing prosecution. Speaking as the voting count concluded, Illa hailed a “new era” for the region. However, with no party holding a clear majority and deep ideological divisions between them, there remains the risk the vote will have to be repeated.

The separatist parties combined of the ERC, Junts, far-left CUP and far-right Alianca Catalana, do not have the required 68 seats to be able to form a coalition government. Illa’s Socialists will also need to forge an agreement – most likely with the ERC – but separatist parties until now have rejected any suggestion of helping the national ruling party govern in Catalonia.

Illa might instead attempt to form an unorthodox alliance with not only far-left Sumar, its coalition partner in national government, but also the conservative People’s Party and far-right Vox, with whom the socialists have long said they would not negotiate.

Last Sunday night, the ERC’s leader Pere Aragones, Catalonia’s outgoing president, told reporters that his party would move into opposition, effectively ruling out backing the Socialists. Junts’ leader Carles Puigdemont said his party had performed well but turnout among separatist voters remained low and without a strong showing by the ERC, AC and CUP, his options were limited. He previously said that if he didn’t win and the Socialists allied with the PP to lead the region he might withdraw his support from its minority national government – offered after inconclusive national elections in July, risking fresh instability on a national level. Political analyst and historian Joan Esculies said whatever came next, the night’s headline was the tamping down of Catalan separatist sentiment: “The pro-independence movement has run out of ideas to convince or mobilize people as they did before.”

(CNN)…[+]

AFGHANISTAN – Three bewildered children sit on the roof of a mosque in Baghlan province, northern Afghanistan, their eyes blinking away mud that covers their entire bodies. Beside them, a rescuer lowers their baby brother, 2-year-old Arian, to the rooftop, a sheet tied around his waist that was used to pull him from the raging floodwaters below. “Take it, let’s get take off the rope from his body,” the rescuer says on the video. “Bring his mother to hold him in her arms and be warm.”

In the past few days, at least 300 people have been killed in flooding in 18 districts across at least three provinces in northern Afghanistan, according to the United Nations’ World Food Programme (WFP), with at least 200 injured. Videos show raging torrents of mud washing away mud houses – and people, their limbs flailing, in the fast-moving brown current, as would-be rescuers watch from higher ground, beyond reach.

Aerial photos show belongings piled in plastic bags on rooftops, among them the hooded figures of women forced to cover their entire bodies even in times of disaster. In Folo, more than 100 people are believed to have been killed, he said – mostly women and children. Some burials began over the weekend, but many more are already believed to be buried deep beneath mud.

The torrent swept away animals and farmland in an area already facing severe food shortages, according to Timothy Anderson, head of the WFP in Afghanistan. He said the areas hit by floods had already been marked vulnerable to starvation after a difficult summer when searing heat brought drought. “It was already pretty grim. And now it’s catastrophic,” he told CNN. Most years, locals expect to see flash flooding, he said. But this year, it’s been far worse. The loss of the homes and their land is devastating for survivors, who were already among some of the country’s most impoverished people, Anderson said.

This latest natural disaster comes after drought in Afghanistan, and is being seen as an example of a climate crisis hitting those who have least contributed to rising global temperatures.

“The need is massive, not just in Afghanistan. The world is seeing the impacts of much larger, more severe events, whether that’s drought, rainfalls cyclones,” Anderson said.

In a statement Sunday, Teresa Anderson, the Global Climate Justice Lead at ActionAid International, said: “The climate crisis continues to rear its ugly head. With the latest incident, Afghanistan joins a long list of Global South countries grappling with floods this year,” she said.

(CNN)…[+]

GAZA – Fierce fighting has been reported in Jabalia in northern Gaza, after the Israeli military went back into areas where it said Hamas had regrouped.

Residents who fled said they had seen tanks advancing towards Jabalia’s refugee camp, which has come under heavy bombardment since last Saturday. Hamas’s military wing also said it was battling troops east of the camp.

Meanwhile, the UN has said 360,000 people have fled Rafah, in the south, since an offensive began a week ago.

The Israeli military has ordered the evacuation of the eastern third of the city, which is swollen with more than a million Palestinians taking refuge. Those now displaced by the fighting around Rafah have been told to head towards the nearby coastal area of al-Mawasi and the city of Khan Younis, but the UN has warned that they lack basic services to support them.

Women who were filmed fleeing Jabalia on foot yesterday morning said they had decided to leave after seeing tanks advance into the area. “The tank was behind the school classrooms,” Umm Jumma told Reuters news agency. “We did not want to leave until we saw it with our own eyes.” Another woman said: “We have been displaced from one place to the next. And now we have left. We don’t know where to go.”

Hamas-affiliated Safa news agency reported clashes between Palestinian armed groups and Israeli tanks east of Jabalia camp’s market, near several UN-run schools which were being used as shelters by civilians.

The official Palestinian news agency Wafa meanwhile reported that two people were killed in Israeli strikes on homes in Jabalia camp yesterday and that a number of other people were killed in a strike in Jabalia town. It also cited ambulance crews as saying the bodies of 20 civilians had so far been recovered in Jabalia and taken to Kamal Adwan hospital in Beit Lahia. There was no immediate comment from the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).

Last Sunday, the IDF said troops had begun an operation in Jabalia the previous evening that was “based on intelligence information regarding attempts by Hamas to reassemble its terrorist infrastructure and operatives in the area”. Civilians there had been told to evacuate temporarily to “shelters in western Gaza City”, it added. The IDF also said on Sunday that it was operating in the Zeitoun area, in eastern Gaza City, to “eliminate terrorists and dismantle terrorist infrastructure”. The UN agency for Palestinian refugees, Unrwa, said the bombardment and evacuation orders had “created more displacement and fear for thousands of families” in northern Gaza. Safa reported that Zeitoun was hit by Israeli shellfire on Monday morning. In a statement issued last Sunday, Hamas accused Israel of “escalating their brutal massacres in various areas of the Gaza Strip”.

Israel launched a military campaign in Gaza to destroy Hamas in response to the group’s cross-border attack on southern Israel on 7 October, during which about 1,200 people were killed and 252 others were taken hostage.

More than 35,000 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.

(BBC)…[+]