World Biz
“Ukraine will never forgive Russia”
Ukraine will never forgive Russia for a shameful conflict that has thrown back Russia’s development by half a century to Soviet times predating Mikhail Gorbachev, journalist and Nobel Peace laureate Dmitry Muratov told.
Russia’s military campaign in Ukraine has killed tens of thousands, left some Ukrainian cities wastelands and triggered Moscow’s biggest confrontation with the West since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.
Muratov, the long-time editor-in-chief of Novaya Gazeta, one of the last independent media outlets in Russia, said Ukraine would never agree to peace or to the annexation of any of its territory.
“Ukraine will never forgive Russia,” Muratov, who co-founded Novaya Gazeta in 1993 with money from Gorbachev’s Nobel Peace Prize, said in an interview in his office, which is adorned with ice hockey sticks and dozens of front pages from the paper.
Muratov said that modern technology had brought the horrors of the war home to people, along with the devastation of the battle for Mariupol in southern Ukraine and the claims of war crimes against Russian soldiers in Irpin and Bucha.
“You many want to forgive everything, but you click on the search engine: Mariupol, Irpin or Bucha. And you can’t forgive a goddamn thing anymore,” Muratov said. “Every step of this war, every crime and every shot, every torn scrotum will now remain forever.”
Ukraine has accused Russia of war crimes. Russia says such accusations are a lie. The Russian government did not respond to a request for comment on Muratov’s remarks.
President Vladimir Putin says Russia’s soldiers are “heroes” and that all Russia’s aims will be achieved.
Putin casts the operation in Ukraine as an attempt to foil a Western plot to rip Russia apart. Ukraine says it is fighting an illegal occupation and will never give in.
RUSSIA BACKWARDS
The war, Muratov said, was a “huge national shame” that was wiping out not just half a century of development but also extinguishing hope, love and confidence in the future among Russians.
The war had destroyed the reputation of the land of Gorbachev, Russian physicist and human rights campaigner Andrei Sakharov and Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, Muratov said.
“We have been thrown back in our development by at least half a century into the pre-Gorbachev era,” Muratov said.
Russia, he said, had forgotten the lessons of the past, including the need to end wars.
“We no longer have faith. Russia and Russians are disliked. Love was a very important thing in order to travel, to learn, to believe in your god, to read the books that you love.”
Gorbachev, lauded in the West as the man who helped bring down the Berlin Wall and end the Cold War without bloodshed, died on Aug. 30, 2022. Muratov was his friend.
“Unfortunately, there has been a loss of our reputation globally, a loss of trust,” Muratov said. “The loss of reputation is a difficult thing to recover.”
ANNEXATION
After Putin backed a plan leading to the formal annexation of Russian-controlled areas in Ukraine, including parts of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions, Muratov said many Russians were not interested.
“If you go out onto the street and ask: ‘Do you need Kherson?’ people will look at you as if you are a moron,” he said. “They will ask: ‘What? Why are you talking about Kherson? I have a mortgage, not Kherson’.”
“For geopoliticians with inflamed brains, victory is associated with the annexation of foreign territories.”
In mid-September, Russia’s Supreme Court revoked the last media licence of Novaya Gazeta. The newspaper Novaya Gazeta is no longer published in paper form in Russia, though it has a limited online version and has a magazine.
Muratov said he has no intention of leaving Russia.
“We have 82 people staying here and naturally I am staying with them. And we are going to work here,” Muratov said, referring to the newspaper’s employees.
“We will work here until the cold gun barrel touches our hot foreheads.”
At least 20 Umrah pilgrims were killed and 29 injured in a horrific bus crash southwest of Saudi Arabia, according to Gulf News reports.
The passenger bus crashed into a bridge on Monday, overturned, and caught fire, killing 20 and injuring 29.
According to Saudi media, the accident occurred around 4pm on the 14 km-long Aqabat Shaar road in the Asir province, as the bus was traveling from Khamis Mushayt to Abha.
The road, according to Saudi Press Agency, cuts through mountains, and has 11 tunnels and 32 bridges. When the bus was making its way down a bridge it underwent a brake failure, which caused it to crash into a barrier at the end of the bridge, overturn and catch fire. About 29 other people were also injured in the accident, according to reports.
The Saudi civil defense and Red Crescent Authority teams rushed to the site of the accident and cordoned off the area.
The deceased and the injured have reportedly been transferred to nearby hospitals.
Greeting Bangladesh, the United Nations on Sunday (26th March) said Bangladesh has many accomplishments — extraordinary economic development, a significant cultural legacy, leadership on a global stage for climate-vulnerable countries, and immense generosity in welcoming and hosting nearly a million Rohingya refugees.
“The hospitality of Bangladesh’s diverse people is just one of the many facets of a country that my colleagues and I have been fortunate to experience every day,” UN Resident Coordinator in Bangladesh Gwyn Lewis said in a press statement on the occasion of the country’s Independence Day.
“On behalf of the United Nations, I warmly congratulate the people of Bangladesh on the 52nd anniversary of independence,” she said.
Over the last 52 years, Bangladesh has made impressive and remarkable achievements: evolving from a war-torn country to one of the leading economic powers in South Asia, standing at the threshold of upcoming graduation from least developed countries (LDCs) in 2026, and planned achievement of the sustainable development goals (SDG) by 2030, she said.
The UN fully supports Bangladesh’s commitments to economic and sustainable development and appreciates the strong and long-lasting relationship with Bangladesh and our shared values.
The constitution of the country, which was adopted even before Bangladesh had formally become a member of the United Nations in 1974, guarantees fundamental human rights. The right to freedom of speech, religion, movement and assembly, the right to speak one’s own language and other rights that are in line with the UN charter, said the UNRC.
“Wishing you all a Happy Independence Day!” — she concluded.
South Asian Bourse or Stock Markets dropped last week. Among them, the biggest fall was in the stock markets of India and Pakistan.
A review of South Asian markets shows that India’s Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) index BSE Sensex has dropped 462 points during the week. At the end of the week, the index stood at 57,527 points. On the other hand, the Nifty-50 index of the country’s National Stock Exchange dropped by 467 points last week. At the end of the week, the index stood at 16,945 points.
Pakistan Stock Exchange Index ‘KSE 100’ lost 1,387 points last week. After a week of losing, the index settled at 39,942 points.
On the hand The Sri Lankan stock market hiked, the Colombo Stock Exchange index ‘ASPI’ lost 251 points in a week. After a week the index settled at 9,419 points.
Bhutan’s stock market index ‘BSI’ hiked by 23 point and the index stood at 1,127 points throughout the whole week. Nepal’s ‘NEPSE’ lost 18 points last week, as the index stands at 1,915 points.
