Slovakia unilaterally terminates the Agreement on Mutual Assistance in Emergency Situations with Ukraine and will not supply emergency power supply. This was announced by Ukrenergo, referring to an official statement from the Slovak system operator SEPS.
According to the statement from May, Ukraine will not receive electricity from Slovakia in case of emergency need. Applications to suspend this assistance have been made several times by official Bratislava in the last two months due to Ukraine's reluctance to resume the transit of Russian oil through the "Druzhba" oil pipeline.
Ukrenergo assures that the termination of the agreement with SEPS will not affect the country's electricity system. Emergency assistance from Slovakia has been received rarely and in small volumes, the Ukrainian national company explains.
At the same time, electricity trade between the two countries will continue without any restrictions, Ukrenergo emphasizes.
An international naval group led by Ukraine has shown the vulnerability of NATO naval forces and has "sunk" at least one warship.
This is what the Frankfurter Algemeine Zeitung writes about the REPMUS/Dynamic Messenger exercises, held late last year off the coast of Portugal.
According to a participant in the winning team, in five scenarios played out for the defense of ports and convoys, as well as for attacks on sea convoys, the "reds" led by Ukrainians defeated the "blues" - NATO naval forces.
Ukrainian Magura V7 surface drones were used in the exercises. These are small, fast, autonomous boats that can carry 300 kilograms of explosives. In various modifications, they can be equipped with cameras and radar equipment, or with machine guns.
During the exercises, it was enough for one of the teams to be the first to target the enemy. It turned out that fast and maneuverable boats pose a threat to large warships. In one of the scenarios, the "reds" delivered so many hits to a NATO combat frigate that in real conditions it would have sunk.
The problem was not only that drones were difficult to counter. They were not even noticed on the warship's radar, says the participant in the exercises.
After the exercises, NATO stated that they would gain valuable experience in order to develop new capabilities to deal with such real threats.
The EU has activated a system to combat online disinformation ahead of the elections in Hungary, ANSA reports. It is a fact-checking platform designed to combat Russia's attempts to influence election results in Europe through large-scale disinformation campaigns.
In addition to EU member states, NGOs, various online platforms, including giants such as Meta and Tik Tok, voluntarily participate in the mechanism.
The Rapid Response System, or RRS, is a time-limited special framework for cooperation and communication between relevant signatories during elections. It allows signatories that are not part of the platform to quickly report time-sensitive content, accounts or trends that they consider to be threats to the integrity of the electoral process and discuss them with the platforms in light of their respective policies.
The aim is to monitor the online space a week before the vote in Hungary in order to thwart possible attempts to interfere in the elections, European Commission spokesman Thomas Renier stressed. He added that the system for combating disinformation will remain active for a week after the elections in Hungary, which are on April 12.
Thus, the platform will also be active for the snap parliamentary elections in Bulgaria on April 19.
The damaged and abandoned Russian tanker Arctic Metagaz is drifting uncontrollably in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Italy and is a “time bomb“, CNN reported.
Italian authorities have issued a warning to all vessels in the area of the Sicilian island of Linosa, part of an archipelago to which the island of Lampedusa also belongs, to be careful and avoid the area.
The tanker, damaged after an alleged strike by a Ukrainian surface drone, is carrying over 60,000 tons of liquefied natural gas, as well as 900 tons of diesel fuel. Thus, it poses a huge environmental hazard if it sinks or crashes into the rocks.
Arctic Metagaz on the list of Russia's so-called shadow fleet for transporting sanctioned oil and gas. An explosion occurred on board on March 3, and the 30 crew members abandoned the ship and were rescued by another vessel passing nearby.
Authorities in Italy and Malta have sent rescue ships to accompany the drifting tanker and intervene in the event of a fuel spill. According to maritime law, the owner of the ship must ensure its safety, but so far the Russian owner company has not taken any action.
The Maltese authorities have hired a specialist company to assess whether the vessel can be safely towed to a port or should be pushed to deeper waters, where it will be sunk.
The second option would cause irreparable environmental damage, the WWF is categorical.