Wicked Blue
Wicked Blue's JournalRussia Planning Post-Invasion Arrest and Assassination Campaign in Ukraine, U.S. Officials Say
Foreign Policy.com
By Amy Mackinnon, Robbie Gramer, and Jack Detsch
The United States has obtained intelligence that Russia may target prominent political opponents, anti-corruption activists, and Belarusian and Russian dissidents living in exile should it move forward with plans to invade Ukraine, as U.S. President Joe Biden warned on Thursday that the threat of a renewed Russian invasion of the country remains “very high” and could take place within the next several days.
Four people familiar with U.S. intelligence said that Russia has drafted lists of Ukrainian political figures and other prominent individuals to be targeted for either arrest or assassination in the event of a Russian assault on Ukraine.
A fifth person, a U.S. official who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that the United States has been downgrading its intelligence classification regarding threats to specific groups within Ukraine to share this information with Ukrainian government officials and other partners in the region positioned to help.
A spokesperson for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/02/18/russia-ukraine-arrest-assassination-invasion/
Second breakaway region in Ukraine organizes evacuation of civilians
Source: CNN
From CNN’s Tim Lister in Kyiv
The leader of the second self-declared republic in eastern Ukraine has announced that the evacuation of civilians to Russia is being organized. The announcement follows a similar move by the pro-Russian authorities in Donetsk.
Leonid Pasechnik, the most senior official in the Luhansk People's Republic, said in a statement that he had “due to the escalation of tension on the contact line, instructed the heads of the territories of the Republic to ensure the organized evacuation of the population ... and help the population in the delivery to border checkpoints.”
Pasechnik said “the Russian Federation is ready to provide organized reception and accommodation on its territory of residents of the Luhansk People's Republic.”
...
He accused Ukrainian forces of violating the ceasefire regime 29 times in the last day and listed 13 towns that he said had been shelled.
Read more: https://www.cnn.com/europe/live-news/ukraine-russia-news-02-18-22-intl/index.html
This is the start of the false flag operation.
Civilians in rebel-held Donetsk 'to be evacuated'
Source: BBC News
People in the rebel-held city of Donetsk, in eastern Ukraine, will be evacuated to Russia, the area's leader has said.
Denis Pushilin, who is head of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic (DNR), announced on social media that Russia had agreed to provide accommodation for people leaving.
Women, children and the elderly should be evacuated first, he added.
...
The US and its allies have raised concerns that rising violence in the Donbas region could form part of a Russian pretext to invade Ukraine.
Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/live/world-europe-60428211
Analysis: Evacuations troubling as disinformation swirls
Paul Adams
BBC diplomatic correspondent
The announcement by Denis Pushilin that women, children and the elderly will be evacuated to Russia is, potentially, a very troubling development.
The idea that an evacuation is needed because Ukraine is planning an attack on the two Russian-backed self-proclaimed republics of Donetsk and Luhansk is baseless.
With a vast chunk of Russia's military might positioned around Ukraine's borders, such an attack would be an act of lunacy. It is, quite simply, unthinkable.
But the separatists, and Moscow, want to create the impression of imminent danger. Yesterday, the Kremlin spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, said the situation around Russia's borders could ignite at any moment.
https://www.bbc.com/news/live/world-europe-60428211
US officials are watching new bridge construction in key area in Belarus
CNN
From CNN's Katie Bo Lills, Natasha Bertrand, Tim Lister and and Paul Murphy
Satellite images taken over the past two days show new road construction and a tactical bridge being built across a key river in Belarus less than four miles from the Ukrainian border, amid what sources say is an ongoing buildup of Russian military forces encircling three sides of Ukraine.
Western intelligence and military officials are closely tracking the construction as part of the support infrastructure Russia is putting in place in advance of a potential invasion, three sources familiar with the matter told CNN.
Both the new road construction and the bridge, across the Pripyat River in southern Belarus, are less than four miles from the border and could be used by Russian forces currently in Belarus in a drive to Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital. The satellite images, from Maxar and Planet, show the appearance of the pontoon bridge virtually overnight on Tuesday.
Russia is building “bridges, field hospitals, all kinds of support infrastructure,” said one source familiar with the matter. “Which is why we aren’t really taking seriously their claims of de-escalation."
https://www.cnn.com/europe/live-news/ukraine-russia-news-02-16-22-intl/index.html
US Kremlin backers seek to undermine Joe Biden
BBC
By Tara McKelvey
BBC News, Washington
A small but politically vocal portion of the American electorate that admires Vladimir Putin's muscular policies is seeking to undermine US President Joe Biden's efforts to stand up to the Russian president.
Mr Biden has threatened to impose crushing economic sanctions on Moscow amid a build-up of Russian troops on the Ukrainian border. Many, in loud whispers, say that Mr Putin plans an invasion.
But activists on the hard-right - and a few on the hard-left - of the US political spectrum say that it is Mr Biden who is "warmongering".
Arch-conservative voters who take this view are pressuring members of Congress to take a conciliatory tone towards Russia, tamp down rhetoric and refuse authorisation to send troops to the region. They are also working to elect Republican candidates who have publicly stated that they will not intervene in Ukraine.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-60297302
TRAITORS
Happy Lupercalia (February 15)
From Wikipedia:
"Lupercalia was a pastoral festival of Ancient Rome observed annually on February 15 to purify the city, promoting health and fertility. Lupercalia was also known as dies Februatus, after the purification instruments called februa, the basis for the month named Februarius
The festival was originally known as Februa "Purifications" or "Purgings" after the februum which was used on the day. It was also known as Februatus and gave its name variously, as epithet to Juno Februalis, Februlis, or Februata in her role as patron deity of that month; to a supposed purification deity called Februus; and to February (mensis Februarius), the month during which the festival occurred. Ovid connects februare to an Etruscan word for "purging". Some sources[who?] connect the Latin word for fever (febris) with the same idea of purification or purging, due to the "sweating out" commonly associated with fevers.
The name Lupercalia was believed in antiquity to evince some connection with the Ancient Greek festival of the Arcadian Lykaia, a wolf festival (Greek: ?ύ???, lýkos; Latin: lupus), and the worship of Lycaean Pan, assumed to be a Greek equivalent to Faunus"
At the Lupercal altar, a male goat (or goats) and a dog were sacrificed by one or another of the Luperci, under the supervision of the Flamen dialis, Jupiter's chief priest.An offering was also made of salted mealcakes, prepared by the Vestal Virgins. After the blood sacrifice, two Luperci approached the altar. Their foreheads were anointed with blood from the sacrificial knife, then wiped clean with wool soaked in milk, after which they were expected to laugh.
The sacrificial feast followed, after which the Luperci cut thongs (known as februa) from the flayed skin of the animal,] and ran with these, naked or near-naked, along the old Palatine boundary, in an anticlockwise direction around the hill. In Plutarch's description of the Lupercalia, written during the early Empire,
...many of the noble youths and of the magistrates run up and down through the city naked, for sport and laughter striking those they meet with shaggy thongs. And many women of rank also purposely get in their way, and like children at school present their hands to be struck, believing that the pregnant will thus be helped in delivery, and the barren to pregnancy."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lupercalia
Sad for the poor dog and goats.
And I have to wonder why people would want to run around Rome naked in the middle of February.
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