1/ As Ukrainian forces advance in the Kursk region, law and order in frontline Russian-held areas is reported to have collapsed completely. "Rampant looting" is said have broken out – being done by the Russians themselves – while local residents say they feel abandoned. ⬇️
2/ The VChK-OGPU Telegram channel reports that "in the border areas of the Kursk region, where fighting has been going on all week, there are no police, no firefighters, no doctors, no representatives of the administration.
3/ "According to official information, more than 76,000 people left the settlements (most of them left on their own, since there was no organized evacuation, despite the statements of the authorities), but there are still people there, mostly elderly."
4/ The channel says that "the desertion of villages and towns has become a catalyst for rampant looting". The disorder is being carried out by the Russians themselves, though it isn't clear if opportunistic civilians or indisciplined soldiers are responsible.
5/ A local resident says: "They are robbing stores, there is a collapse in Korenevo, the “Magnit” [supermarket, pictured below] was simply destroyed. There is no water, no gas, no electricity.
6/ "There was no organized evacuation, and if there was, then why didn’t we hear anything about it in Lobanovka [an outlying area of Korenevo]?"
According to VChK-OGPU, "a similar situation exists in other border municipalities."
7/ It reports that "Kursk residents are sure that representatives of the [regional] administration, having abandoned people to their fate, themselves provoked the collapse in the border areas.
8/ "Currently, it is impossible to get through to the administration of the Korenevsky district of the Kursk region. People are forced to self-organise in order to protect themselves and their property and essentially perform the functions of state and law enforcement agencies."
Addendum: The Ukrainians have now published a video which shows soldiers, possibly from the Rosgvardia, looting an abandoned Russian house in the Kursk region. New thread here:
1/ Russian Major-General Pavel Klimenko reportedly did not die in a drone strike, as previously reported, but from injuries sustained after drunkenly driving his motorcycle into a ditch. Relatives of men who served under him have assailed him as a butcher and torturer. ⬇️
2/ It was reported a few days ago that Klimenko had died from wounds sustained after a Ukrainian FPV drone strike while he was riding a motorcycle near Krasnohorivka in the Donetsk region. However, the VChK-OGPU Telegram channel says this was a cover-up.
3/ According to VChK-OGPU, Klimenko was in a state of "severe alcoholic intoxication" before his death. His body "did not have any thermal or shrapnel injuries characteristic of an explosion."
1/ Russian soldiers are being provided with Warhammer 40,000-style 'purity seals', blessed by the Russian Orthodox Church, to protect them from harm on the battlefield. The initiative illustrates the huge popularity of Warhammer 40K on both sides of the war in Ukraine. ⬇️
2/ Purity seals are an element of Warhammer 40K lore. As the 'Lexicanum' wiki says, they comprise "prayers or litanies inscribed onto paper and then affixed to the Space Marine armour with red or black wax".
3/ The Russian military equipment maker Ratnik Tactical says on its Telegram channel that "the best warriors of humanity applied scrolls with prayers and promises to their armor before the battle."
1/ A headless Russian man was rated as fit for military service by no fewer than five doctors working for the Smolensk military registration and enlistment office. Not surprisingly, relatives are now demanding that the doctors be investigated for fraud. ⬇️
2/ The Russian Telegram channel Baza reports on the bizarre case of Alexander L., who was found decapitated on a railway line in October 2021. Investigators found a strange anomaly when his personnel files were obtained from the local military enlistment office.
3/ The files showed that the day after his death, Alexander L. underwent a military medical commission. He supposedly complained about his health and was given an EEG and allergy tests. Two examination reports were drawn up based on the tests, signed by five doctors.
1/ Two Russian soldiers who massacred an entire Ukrainian family while they slept have been given a life sentence by a Russian court. The length of the sentence means that they are – for now at least – unlikely to be allowed to go back to fighting in Ukraine as convict troops. ⬇️
2/ Anton Sopov and Stanislav Rau, both from Primorsky Krai in the Russian Far East, were arrested after killing nine members of the Kapkanets family on 27 October 2023 with silenced weapons, allegedly in a dispute over illicit alcohol sales.
3/ The men were tried behind closed doors because the Russian authorities claimed that "the criminal case materials contained information constituting an official secret in the field of defence and data revealing the locations of Russian troops participating in…
1/ A man from Crimea is in hiding after, he says, he was forced by two of Russia's notoriously corrupt police officers to sign a military contract, give them his enlistment bonus and marry a 'black widow' fictitiously to get compensation money for his death.
2/ Ex-convict 35-year-old Sergei Zhukov from Stary Krym in Crimea says that he was was drinking beer on a bench in Mikhaylovka when two police officers approached and detained him. They threatened to "find drugs on him" and have him jailed unless he signed a military contract.
3/ Zhukov, who has no living relatives, says that they told him. "You're an orphan, you have no one. We'll bury you, and the rest of the money will go to our needs... Naturally, I refused. They started hitting me in the ribs and back."
1/ Less than half of Russians would support a family member's wish to go to war in Ukraine, according to a new poll. Rather than indicating anti-war sentiment, however, it's likely that this simply indicates a widespread unwillingness to make sacrifices for the war effort. ⬇️
2/ Russia's Levada Centre carried out a poll asking respondents whether they would approve or disapprove if a family member or someone close to them was to sign a contract to go to fight in Ukraine.
3/ The poll, carried out between 24-30 October, found that 42% of respondents would not approve, while only 40% would approve. Another 17% found it difficult to answer, while 1% refused to answer.