USAF and RAN operate from Fetesti base in Romania, about 50 miles inland from the Black Sea, stated purpose to protect NATO Black Sea members. Italy is also understood to have supplied aircraft to be used in Romania.
NATO has a Combat Air Patrol Zone close to the UA Border ( not so far from Odesa), patrols reportedly run for 4 hours.
Sources include NATO site and airforcemag.com
@Aceman would probably be able to elaborate.
Russia since 2021 has intermittently run no fly warnings to civilian aircraft around Crimea.
ICAO IIRC considers Black Sea International airspace, Russian claims of airspace jurisdiction contested, UA has some jurisdiction.
Sounds similar to airspace claims in Taiwan Straits and South China Seas.
Individually, France and some German States have mandated restrictions on non industrial use, including households and commercial. Reportedly, Germany’s main concern is supply to its chemical sector, currently gas storage is full in Germany ( which relies on Russia for around 35% of its gas supplies. Reportedly some French plants can switch between oil and gas.
The EU managed to cope with the first OPEC oil crisis (saved by the Seven Sisters)
No that is an unlikely explanation. The lines cross over there - they are def going around. It must somehow be Russian airspace but how? It is way outside the 12 n mile zone.
US also has a naval air base at Sigonella in Sicily, reportedly doing sorties over the Black Sea as well as mainland Europe and the Med , the mainland ones tracked at 10 hours in total.
NATO would be careful to avoid confrontation with Russian aircraft in the Black Sea close to Russian claimed territory.
For those of you that didn’t click through this thread when I last posted it, trust me. Hilarious. The story of some internet randoms sending Russian counter espionage on a wild goose chase, flying between countries.
And for those that did, there’s new hilarity at the end.
Could be an oil platform?
Don’t the Russians have some oil platforms out there that are armed in one way or another.
Still no texts of grain agreements circulating, but longer UN SG statement and UN notes on the agreements provided insights, including the scope of the UN to facilitate exports to world markets, some coded terms ( facilitate and unimpeded)
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Joint Control Centre will be UN run and involve IMO (IMO was at the signing and IMO , describing itself as neutral, will apply IMO standards to merchant shipping)
- Centre will only facilitate UA exports of food ( grains and sunflower oil) and fertilisers
- Centre will have no role in facilitating Russian exports or of any other cargoes
- no surveillance role in monitoring any non food non fertiliser cargoes carried
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UN scope to facilitate unimpeded exports of Russian food and fertilisers, including raw materials for fertiliser manufacture, on the principle that measures imposed on Russia do not apply to those products
- ( seems that undertakings on that score have been given by relevant governments to UN SG)
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Russia committed to facilitate the unimpeded export of UA food and fertilisers from Black Sea ports controlled by UA
Media reported on 26 June that Ukraine missiles had struck 3 Russian gas platforms which had been converted to small garrisons, strikes purportedly to provide options for Ukraine food exports.
Russian occupiers are planning to rename Mariupol to Zhdanov. The city had this name since 1948 until 1989, named after the Soviet politician Andrey Zhdanov, who among other things was the ideologist of The Great Terror, organized repressions, personally approved death penalty lists (including the Executed Renaissance), was one of top figures who provoked the Winter war in Finland, and was managing the introduction of Soviet system in Estonia after its occupation in 1940.
To be fair, it looks like box channel.
This is the southern flank of where the Lysychansk/Sieverodonetsk pocket was. Only territorial gain of any significance they’ve managed in about 2 weeks.
Main bridge at Kherson being hammered all night by Ukrainian artillery. Won’t know for a few hours how well it took the punishment.
Bump?
Business Retreats and Sanctions Are Crippling the Russian Economy
Abstract
As the Russian invasion of Ukraine enters into its fifth month, a common narrative has emerged that the unity of the world in standing up to Russia has somehow devolved into a “war of economic attrition which is taking its toll on the west”, given the supposed “resilience” and even “prosperity” of the Russian economy. This is simply untrue – and a reflection of widely held but factually incorrect misunderstandings over how the Russian economy is actually holding up amidst the exodus of over 1,000 global companies and international sanctions.
That these misunderstandings persist is not surprising. Since the invasion, the Kremlin’s economic releases have become increasingly cherry-picked, selectively tossing out unfavorable metrics while releasing only those that are more favorable. These Putin-selected statistics are then carelessly trumpeted across media and used by reams of well-meaning but careless experts in building out forecasts which are excessively, unrealistically favorable to the Kremlin.
Our team of experts, using private Russian language and unconventional data sources including high frequency consumer data, cross-channel checks, releases from Russia’s international trade partners, and data mining of complex shipping data, have released one of the first comprehensive economic analyses measuring Russian current economic activity five months into the invasion, and assessing Russia’s economic outlook.
From our analysis, it becomes clear: business retreats and sanctions are catastrophically crippling the Russian economy. We tackle a wide range of common misperceptions – and shed light on what is actually going on inside Russia, including:
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Russia’s strategic positioning as a commodities exporter has irrevocably deteriorated, as it now deals from a position of weakness with the loss of its erstwhile main markets, and faces steep challenges executing a “pivot to Asia” with non-fungible exports such as piped gas
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Despite some lingering leakiness, Russian imports have largely collapsed, and the country faces stark challenges securing crucial inputs, parts, and technology from hesitant trade partners, leading to widespread supply shortages within its domestic economy
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Despite Putin’s delusions of self-sufficiency and import substitution, Russian domestic production has come to a complete standstill with no capacity to replace lost businesses, products and talent; the hollowing out of Russia’s domestic innovation and production base has led to soaring prices and consumer angst
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As a result of the business retreat, Russia has lost companies representing ~40% of its GDP, reversing nearly all of three decades’ worth of foreign investment and buttressing unprecedented simultaneous capital and population flight in a mass exodus of Russia’s economic base
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Putin is resorting to patently unsustainable, dramatic fiscal and monetary intervention to smooth over these structural economic weaknesses, which has already sent his government budget into deficit for the first time in years and drained his foreign reserves even with high energy prices – and Kremlin finances are in much, much more dire straits than conventionally understood
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Russian domestic financial markets, as an indicator of both present conditions and future outlook, are the worst performing markets in the entire world this year despite strict capital controls, and have priced in sustained, persistent weakness within the economy with liquidity and credit contracting – in addition to Russia being substantively cut off from international financial markets, limiting its ability to tap into pools of capital needed for the revitalization of its crippled economy
Looking ahead, there is no path out of economic oblivion for Russia as long as the allied countries remain unified in maintaining and increasing sanctions pressure against Russia, and The Kyiv School of Economics and McFaul-Yermak Working Group have led the way in proposing additional sanctions measures.
Defeatist headlines arguing that Russia’s economy has bounced back are simply not factual - the facts are that, by any metric and on any level, the Russian economy is reeling, and now is not the time to step on the brakes.
On the basis of information on the NATO and other sites, NATO aviation became more active in the Black Sea after the annexation of the Crimea, then last year there was a huge build up in NATO activity in the Baltic and Black Sea, with reports of scrambles with Russia in the Black Sea, references to protecting NATO airspace (including operations connected to Bulgaria) and overfly rights, international airspace .
Reports indicate anticipation of increased aggression by Russia last year. The closure of the Bosphorus to warships has to some extent alleviated the situation, although there would be enhanced surveillance and warnings to discourage Russian warships from entering from the Med or going further south in the Black Sea . There can be some assurance that Bulgaria would assist in providing some scope for operations, Romania more direct engagement, but Turkey not a player in the air and an uncertain ally because of its relations with Russia ( Erdogan reported to meet with Putin)
Seems plausible.
google “map oil platforms black sea” or some better term list
Does produce images that might answer. Not interested in inspecting them myself.
Renaming and confusion. One of the grain ports was renamed by UA in 2019 from Yuzhnye to Pivdennyi . However, the reports of the grain deal, including from the UN, call it by the Y name.
Given up on the different spelling in the Roman alphabet, including from the Russian and Ukraine languages.
Also Turkey now saying the official international spelling for Turkey is now Türkiye