Ukraine, Russia: Desperate measures
Also: Azerbaijan, Japan, mpox, Israel, and Iran.
In today’s dispatch:
UKRAINE. RUSSIA. Kyiv seems to be playing for a penalty shootout.
AZERBAIJAN. RUSSIA. Putin visits on the eve of a possible Armenian peace deal.
JAPAN. RUSSIA. Another warning of a ‘megaquake’.
MPOX. China announces border screening measures.
ISRAEL. IRAN. As ceasefire talks collapse, Tehran could get its signal.
Geopolitical Dispatch is the daily intelligence and risk briefing of Geopolitical Strategy, an advisory firm specialising exclusively in geopolitical risk.
UKRAINE. RUSSIA. Desperate measures
Kyiv seems to be playing for a penalty shootout.
Moscow Sunday denied reports it was in indirect talks with Kyiv. Ukraine ordered the evacuation of Pokrovsk. The IAEA decried a new drone strike on the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant. Germany will end military funding, national media said.
INTELLIGENCE. Since the Kursk incursion, Kyiv has proven it’s still in the fight but at risk to its Donbas frontline, which could collapse should Pokrovsk, which controls its supply routes, fall to Moscow. Russia, and by extension the UN’s nuclear watchdog, have blamed Ukraine for another attack on Zaporizhzhia. The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung says Germany will soon stop military aid on account of fiscal pressures, but Berlin is reportedly livid with Kyiv’s risk taking.
FOR BUSINESS. Berlin is also livid over the 2022 Nord Stream sabotage, which its courts have now attributed to Kyiv. This in turn has reopened a rift with Warsaw, with Donald Tusk saying the pipeline’s patrons should “apologise and keep quiet”. Germany is meanwhile dealing with a second alleged sabotage attack at an army facility in a week. All of this can ultimately be blamed on Vladimir Putin, but for now, more voices are just calling for the war to be over.
AZERBAIJAN. RUSSIA. Baku to the USSR
Putin visits on the eve of a possible Armenian peace deal.
Russia’s president arrived in Baku Sunday for talks on Azerbaijan’s putative border deal with Armenia, until recently a Russian treaty ally. Armenia appointed a new ambassador to Moscow as it denied opening fire on Azeri border guards.
INTELLIGENCE. Low-level tensions continue in the Caucasus but there are increasing signs one of the region’s longest-running conflicts could soon end. Armenia and