NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said on Monday that the alliance could take steps to strengthen the nuclear deterrent, prompting mixed reactions from senior Kremlin officials. The Telegraph reported on June 16 that Stoltenberg said countries were discussing putting an unspecified number of nuclear missiles on high alert because of the growing threat from Russia and China.
Stoltenberg said that "transparency helps to convey the direct message that NATO is a nuclear alliance". The director of Russia's foreign intelligence service, Sergei Naryshkin, characterized the statements as "exercises". He understands that Stoltenberg's statement is intended to scare Russia, but "on the other hand, exercises should be held regularly."
Naryshkin stated that there was no "particular importance" in Stoltenberg's statement and Russia "must take it easy". Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that the statement was "nothing more than another escalation of tension".
Naryshkin has previously expressed opinions that diverge from the official Kremlin line. Russian President Vladimir Putin publicly led him to support Russia's recognition of the Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics on February 21, 2022, three days before the start of the war in Ukraine.
This is stated in an analysis by the Institute for the Study of War (ISW).
Putin fired four deputy defense ministers and replaced them with a "close relative", the son of a former Russian prime minister and an economist on June 17. This is part of an ongoing purge of officials in the Russian Ministry of Defense (MoD).
He dismissed Deputy Defense Ministers Nikolai Pankov, Ruslan Tsalikov, Tatiana Shevtsova and Army General Pavel Popov, replacing them with Deputy Defense Ministers Anna Tsivileva and Pavel Fradkov and First Deputy Defense Minister Leonid Gornin.
Tsivileva is Putin's first cousin, the wife of recently appointed Minister of Energy Sergey Tsivilev and the chairman of the Kremlin-initiated "Defenders of the Fatherland" foundation. He was also part of the Russian government's Social Trusteeship Council in 2019. The Russian Ministry of Defense specified that he will be responsible for social and housing support for the Russian Armed Forces as Deputy Defense Minister.
Fradkov is the son of former Russian Prime Minister and longest-serving director of Russia's Foreign Intelligence Service, Mikhail Fradkov. Pavel held the position of first deputy head of the administration of the president's affairs.
His brother, Pyotr, is chairman of Russia's state-owned Promsvyazbank and met with the Kremlin-linked governor of the pro-Russian Moldovan autonomous region of Gagauzia, Yevgenia Gutsul, on April 9, possibly as part of the Kremlin's efforts to destabilize Moldova.
The Ministry of Defense of Russia announced that it will control the management of property, land resources, the construction of MoD facilities and the national economy.
Gornin served as First Deputy Minister of Finance from May 2018, Deputy Minister of Finance from 2012 to 2018, and Minister of Finance and Tax Policy of the Novosibirsk Region from 2010 to 2011. The Russian Ministry of Defense specified that he will be responsible for the budgetary policy of the Ministry of Defense and control the financial support for the Russian armed forces. Gornin will also work to increase the transparency of financial flows and ensure the effective spending of budget funds. On June 17, Putin also signed a bill that increases the number of positions of Russian deputy defense ministers from 11 to 12.
The appointments confirm Putin's recent efforts to introduce his relatives and the children of other senior Russian officials to the Russian public and appoint economic advisers to the Defense Ministry to improve the wartime economy. Both Tsivileva and Fradkov reportedly attended the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum on June 6 and 7, along with Putin's daughters and the children of other senior officials.
Putin has increasingly appointed economists to top positions in the Russian Ministry of Defense and notably replaced Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu on May 12 with former First Deputy Prime Minister Andrey Belousov, an economist by profession.
Putin also replaced Russia's former deputy defense minister, Colonel General Yury Sadovenko, with former deputy economy minister and auditor of the Federation Council Audit Chamber Oleg Saveliev on May 20.
These appointments suggest that Putin is prioritizing appointing officials he considers loyal to the regime, as well as economists, to improve Russia's defense industrial base. Putin may also be trying to groom possible successors to his regime from his own children and relatives and the children of other senior officials.
Russian bloggers welcomed the new Defense Ministry appointments and the removal of officials who were considered untouchable. These dismissals were a step in the right direction to resolve corruption in the Russian Ministry of Defense and improve the defense industrial base.
A blogger associated with "Wagner" claims that the Kremlin stopped considering Tsalikov as Shoigu's deputy in 2022 after Putin received a memo from unnamed state security services about Tsalikov's corruption.
>The "Wagner"-linked blogger added that Shevtsova had been the subject of numerous independent investigations, including into how former deputy finance minister Tatyana Nesterenko and former head of the federal treasury Roman Artyukhin sang songs that ridiculed Russia army and soldiers at Shevtsova's birthday celebration. The Wagner-affiliated blogger concludes that he is disappointed that Putin has not fired Deputy Defense Minister Aleksey Krivoruchko, a leading figure in many independent anti-corruption investigations, over his corruption schemes involving a Russian joint-stock production company weapon "Kalashnikov Concern".
Some Russian political bloggers have drawn parallels between the appointments of deputy defense ministers under Belousov and former Russian Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov, who also had an economic background as Russia's tax service minister from 2004 to 2007.
Russian political bloggers noted that Serdyukov appointed officials from Russia's Federal Tax Service, while Belousov appointed officials from Russia's ministries of finance and economic development and from among Putin's friends and family.
Russian state media manipulated an interview with International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Raphael Grossi to blame Ukraine for the strikes on the Russian-occupied Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) in an attempt to legitimize Russia's illegal occupation of Ukraine. Grossi said on June 15 that he would not attend the June 16-17 Global Peace Summit in Switzerland so as not to "mix political considerations with the technical work of the IAEA," but gave an interview to "Izvestia," which was published on June 17.
Grossi said that unspecified individuals attacked IAEA inspectors and experts at the NPP and disrupted or compromised the safe operation of the plant.
Grossi said there had been undescribed drone strikes against the nuclear power plant and that the IAEA was unable to identify the perpetrators because it was difficult to identify the drones' starting points or deduce the origin of the drones based on debris. He spoke about the strikes on the nuclear power plant on April 7, but did not specify whether, according to the IAEA, these were Ukrainian or Russian strikes. "Notifications" however, inserted an editorial alleging that Ukrainian forces carried out the "unprecedented" NPP strikes on April 7 to directly claim that Grossi discussed Ukrainian NPP strikes. In particular, the IAEA refrained from attributing responsibility for the April 7 strikes at the time.
The use of "Notifications" of Grossi's interview, in which he specifically emphasized that the IAEA could not identify the origin of the strikes, is part of ongoing Russian efforts to use physical control to force the IAEA to legitimize the occupation - over the headquarters and over Ukrainian territory.
Ukraine's Western partners continue efforts to train more Ukrainian pilots on Western-supplied F-16 fighter jets. French newspaper Le Monde reported on June 17 that the French aerospace force has committed to training 26 Ukrainian military pilots from 2024 to 2026.
Le Monde said the French Air Force and Space Force are currently training 10 Ukrainian pilots on Alpha Jet trainer aircraft, which use avionics similar to the F-16. Agence-France-Presse (AFP) reported on June 17 that Ukrainian pilots are participating in an accelerated six-month training program.
Politico reported on June 6 that US Air Force spokeswoman Laurel Falls said the US National Guard plans to train 12 Ukrainian F-16 pilots by the end of September 2024.
Denmark announced in August 2023 that Denmark had begun training eight Ukrainian F-16 pilots.
On June 17, the Kremlin confirmed that Russian President Vladimir Putin will visit North Korea on an official state visit on June 18 and 19.
Russian Ambassador to North Korea Alexander Matsegora recently said Putin will visit North Korea, and another Russian diplomatic source said Putin will visit in the coming weeks around his visit to Vietnam.
Putin has not visited North Korea since 2000
The Kremlin announced that he will also visit Hanoi, Vietnam on June 19 and 20 and discuss the prospects for developing a strategic partnership in trade-economic, scientific-technological and humanitarian relations.