[000:00:00;00] a with hillary structure, the plot parts you guys have reports from the heart of the received city of mario pl. outside the as of field factory in which russia and its allied forces are trying to pin down the remaining alleged ukrainian nationalist troops. ok, he gets access to audio recordings of alleged conversations of ukrainian security forces and foreign journalists near kia that the peer to contradict the mainstream media claims about russian troops killing civilian russia, top diplomats as washington is pushing to give to continue fighting despite the

ongoing piece talks with marketing, lot of direct, more studios in moscow. this is our t international. i'm john thomas is certainly glad to have you with us. are now harsh fighting in the city of mario paul has the russian army and its allied to don bass forces seeking to pin down the last remaining ukranian nationalist troops. such is what i got to have reports from outside the as of steel factory where the russian military has been advancing on the reported last pocket of resistance. most of mary jo passivity, a neighborhoods have been liberated by russian forces some unscathed, some scarred and wasted by urban combat. ah,

via alleys and yards. we walked as far as was relatively safe in the distance that 200 or so meters. he's the out of steel and iron works plant, which is where most of the fighting is now concentrated here on the left bank of mario port city, a vast number, thousands of ukrainian troops as well. and this is the majority at nationalist nationalist bud the. as off but that it, it is russian artillery striking the plot. from here we launched our drone to with us rockets and shells pounding ukrainian nationalists positions church with one of them over the situation as intense. we're engaging and gun battles is combat at close quarters. almost face to face the distance between buildings here as 50 to 70 meters of sometimes even closer. we've

been advancing from the very morning all along the front line. the enemy is fighting backwards, but we're pushing the rest of them out to the as of steel factory linea. it'll be much easier when all of them are. there. are cities of lucas lighting. now that fighting has moved out of populated areas. russian and allied artillery is playing a greater and greater role of the positive note. there are no civilians in the plot itself, which is opened up on hooks to open charities for russia to some russian artillery . they don't have to be so warrior of civilian casualties. now applied into industrial zones, but with the 5 discipline, they say that we have heard on radio, ah, english voices, so english and which voices which says that there may be or the woman is volunteers inside the plug. but they have also the room as nato instruct the,

the come in the alpha industrial complex laddies, according to various reports, get verified. instructors will offices from nato countries such as germany, britain frauds as well as neutral sweden. according to the latest report suffice of yeah, as you can, yes, is still very much fierce verbal dude, but xannon, they work professionally in small groups. it would have been impossible to train locals to that standard. even in 8 years, we've seen foreigners, even dark skinned individuals run through twice. now ukraine has launched high risk helicopter evacuation missions to mario book. several helicopters have even made it out, though most were destroyed. window of opportunity though is closing. with every day, more and more of mary, you will,

is liberated. and chances are high that soon will find out just who these that ukraine and its allies are so desperate to evacuate. more ad gasdio. arti from mario book or t has gotten access to lead to audio conversations, allegedly recorded in near keith, where russian troops had been stationed. now they contradicted the ukrainian governments version of the events that saw russia accused of deliberately killing civilians. let's listen to one of the recordings. now. crystal, your clue, our troops kicked out the russians. okay. through the will and the troops went further. oh, room. so the territorial defense force went in and they looted the village. they were looting houses and shooting, taking everything. they looted absolutely everything. the 1st order is a conversation between people of ukraine's security service known as, as be here. and one of them is apparently on the ground in the little town of co. heidi,

that's not far from the capital key of the around 100 kilometers west of it. and what is he basically doing? he's describing what he saw there, what he discovered, they, well, why don't know, walking around maybe talking to residents, but that's unlikely because again, it's a little village and it has been under fears. fighting and fell under the control the russian army at the beginning of moscow special military operation. and around a month later in mid march, it was were captured by ukraine's horses. and shortly after that, so called territorial defense forces, how they are volunteer battalions within ukraine's armed forces. they came in and this man from the audio he's describing their behavior in their actions while they were there. and you will hear it yourself now, and you just heard a bit great. he sounds surprised from what he found out and before we play another great, i have to tell you that there is another i town mentioned in these order. how the

town of marlin knights not far from hardy, and apparently these are these people, this battalion came from that place. let's take another miss. you could walk you through the door. we'll do to you from march 24th to april. 3rd, after the russians were driven out of sheer, the territorial defense force came in from mon whistle in short week, during these days they were looting virtually looted everything they could be. they kicked in the doors, they kicked everything over safes were open when the cars were taken away, they stuffed the cars with everything they found and took everything out. it turns that the musket vice did not take anything when ours went in and completely plundered everything. there wasn't anything here already because of the fighting, so no houses were left even. what was left was completely looted by our own interest in is that this man can paris russian troops with these people from territorial defense. and later in this conversation, the one from the ground also have colleagues,

whether these crimes and this behavior by these people should be documented and he get the answer. yes, they should be fall neat. so maybe we're going to hear any, like, i don't know the official statement from the side soon. and there were many journalists, but we have to understand that there were only particular western journalists apart from ukrainians on the ground there. so these audio is a conversation between western journalist it's in english, and again, one of them is on the ground in another town, which is also like 60 kilometers west of kiev on the same road as the town of butcher that we have been here in a lot in the news recently, you remember bought scores but further to the west and we can understand that this man, this journalist was sent there of course, to report, but particularly to try to find proofs of crimes committed by the russian troops. and you will now hear that he's, he actually failed to find any evidence to that. let's take

a look. so basically just explain wayne both already anchor. so that, that place further on from boot check, it's been shell to pieces. besides missing whatever. there's no bodies in the streets a call. i've just spoken to the police forensic experts that he hasn't seen. they think that probably people are under the rubble or whatever they've been killed in the shelling. evidence for any right here told one of the gen, a french guy said that he'd seen a been killed by shelling but so in some other we haven't found that. but no excuse, nothing like that. so i don't know what the prosecutor was going on about to be honest. it's true, this place is golf far more selling damage than butcher. but in terms of extra additional killings, there's no evidence at all. and in fact, the, to some of the old ladies in spoken to said the russian trees are really nice of them. they gave them food, water interests and actually said to say,

if you look for news reports coming right now out of the town of, but i don't know that these journalists mentioned, you will say, a completely different picture. you will read about piles of dead bodies line on the streets again, like in the town of water. and you will hear accusations and you will hear about mass killings committed by the russian troops. but this surely says there is no evidence to that at all. and sometimes, i mean it is a journalist, i have a feeling that we live in parallel reality, and i just don't understand why it's happening. because when to send that we have to be extra cautious with information where we cover more than military conflicts. because force reports can actually hurt, and now we see again coming back to the town of butcher, we hear about sanctions and like punishment. you know, and, you know, all kind of calls towards russia because they have already made a conclusion that russian troops committed lots of crimes,

they before even any investigation. russia's top diplomats are de la rob has cooled hopes for a breakthrough in peace negotiations with ukraine. thank you. has backed away from previous promises. was system lula. most of these symbols folks in response to the sprouting of realism in the ukranian position, with our forces conducting the escalation in the directions of cave and china, as a gesture of good will. and to help with the movement towards in agreements in response, there was a provocation in purchase, which is immediately used by the west to announce a new batch of sanctions as well as atrocities against russian prisoners of war by ukrainian neo nazis could assist you in the phil, moscow has said the talk to miss dumble were constructive with ukraine appearing and climbed to remain outside of nato and did not acquire nuclear weapons. in turn, russia's defense ministry promised to reduce its military activity around cave and the northern city of chimney gulf. also,

russia and ukraine were to postpone any decision about the future status of crimea, and the don boss, foreign minister lab, rob says kia has shifted its positions. however, in a signal that someone else could be pulling the strengths bundled, move you to go to split. the inability to negotiate. once again, characterize is the true intentions of care and its line of delaying and even undermining the negotiations through departure from the understandings reached. we see this is a manifestation of the fact that the key of regime is controlled by washington on its allies who are pushing president to lensky to continue hostilities for those rooney. we will use a recent washington post article claimed some nato countries want to see ukrainians fighting until the bitter end in a proxy war against moscow. u. s. president joe biden has been open about arming and training ukrainians to engage in combat against russia. meanwhile, lot via defense minister and a senior fellow at the atlantic council are also calling for more military support

for ukraine. and besides the fact that the u. s. has already headed millions of dollars worth of weaponry to care if they have resurrected that the world war 2 era lend lease bill to more efficiently lend out military equipment to ukraine. that's as western powers have also accused russia of committing atrocities against ukrainian civilians, including the town of butcher near kiff. but there has been little coverage of cubes. failure to evacuate people to safety. the ukrainian president's own advisor alexi arrest of which has claimed that they knew about the approaching war, but didn't reveal anything to their citizens. mobile. all of it was possible to tell you crannies that russia would attack when we knew for sure that it would. but this would have proved master flow of 12 to 16000000 refugees. they would have walked all the roads and then the army would not have reached the defense areas and the inhabitants would have to be crushed with tanks and shot. retired us air force,

lieutenant colonel. karen krakowski isn't convinced that nato actually wants a peaceful resolution. nato feels it's all they can do is to a mass forces and, and that kind of conduct a blocking action in case russia is intending to go further. you know, to the west, i'm not sure what they're actually thinking in this regard, but it certainly doesn't seem to be promoting, promoting a peaceful resolution. and it doesn't seem to be geared towards helping the ukrainian people. there are some thoughts that the united states wants to keep russia there, as long as it can to engage a battle on the territory of ukraine. and again, at great cost to a lot of people who live there in order to kind of bond russia down to kind of show that nato means something. it looks like the west, which is supposed to be

a beacon of liberty and free trade is not incorporating those concepts into it. so it's predicted strategy for a defense against rush. i guess she would call it nato has been holding a meeting of it's a foreign ministers in brussels. but ahead of the gathering, the alliance's chief young, stolen burg, already made clear that more military support would be heading ukraine's way or to use kill them up and comments. in his remarks, the head of the nato meeting, one particular theme stood out, which was that nato does not seek to have a direct confrontation with russia while there is support for ukraine coming from nato countries. so they don't want the nato alliance to go head to head with the russian federation. here's some of what he said and what they dollars towards support to crane. at the same time natal main responsibility is to protect and defend a loss on the on to prevent this,

a conflict from escalating to full fridge war between nato on the, on the restaurant, on the reason why we have last week. so the deployed $40000.00 troops on those direct them to command a, to use them for 2 lines, and also added more. a troops under the national command, including a more use troops in europe, and this presence is to help prevent escalation of the conflict. now, when speaking, the nato chief said that the ideal and the conflict would simply be russia withdrawing its forces from ukraine. ah, however, he said that's very unlikely. and in fact, they are expecting a new russian offensive. soon as russian forces are currently regrouping and fighting goes on in the don das region. now he did talk about the humanitarian cost of the conflict. he did blame russia for the situation in ukraine. eyes is echoing a lot of the statements we're hearing from western leaders, members, the nato alliance. here's what he did describing the cost. if the war is going to

drag wrong, i'm belong than there is his 1st and foremost, for the people of ukraine, who will suffer more, who will see more damage, more death and more destruction or so this is the 1st and foremost charges you for them on the responsibility of impressed them put into end this war. now the nato chief also expressed concerns about growing operation between russia and china and the need for there to be better cyber security measures to protect computer systems, etc, protect data. now at this point, we also did hear concerns about the humanitarian situation that were expressed blaming the crisis and the situation on russia. people are looking ahead the meeting and seeing what will come out of it. but so far, the remarks that we've heard kind of seem to be setting the tone for what we may be hearing in the future. from one of the course live it to micro maloof a former senior pentagon security policy analyst. michael,

thanks for being with us to help us wrap our minds around these things. ok, so washington, if i get this correctly, is resurrecting a world war 2 era, lend lease law to more efficiently provide military a to ukraine. does this mean more tanks and jets for q cert? puddle? probably a heavy armor and it's heavier armor and heavier weapons? generally, i don't know that it'll be jets per se, cuz that that is politically risky in terms of no fly and, and a provocation. and it jets, unlike a tank, are more offensive cable, more offensive, capable than that, and then the tank would be, or, or javelin missile. so it's, it's just a matter of degree of complexity and,

and hardware and whether it's a going to be a heavy weapon or not. my question is, what does washington game from any of this? there's the ukraine is just a cog in a larger picture here. that's they, they, it's, it's unfortunate that so many deaths are occurring on both sides. the problem is, is that washington, if they wanted to stop this, they could control because they do basically control zalinski could get him to agree to the terms and to come to a conclusion that, that, that, that they had agreed to even before the hostilities began. but this, this, but as long as they keep feeding the weapons this into the, into the, into that country or ukraine will fight and there would be more slaughter on both

sides. and this is, but they, the, the intention of, of the west is basically to contain russia. it has a far greater geo strategic purpose. and ukraine, as i said, is just a cog in this, in this machinery of western, of the west of the u. s. lead unipolar, more world order and, and trying to maintain that leadership in the face of the, of a, of this alliance that's, that's a comment about now that we basically throw a self fulfilling prophecy, pushed moscow toward beijing. and now we're seeing iran joining it where, where, where we're seeing the india coming, becoming closer as a result and, and even turkey and the, you have the in all the countries under the so called shanghai cooperation organization. as well as the bricks countries. these that would be

a bridge, brazil, russia, china, india, and south africa. and it though, and these are major population centers in the world. and so that, that all of these combine into this multi polar world order that's emerging. and that's, but i think must, what washington fears the most because their control, their influence, their control of the, of the dollar and the, and the, and the western financial system is at risk right now. because that new polar, new multi polar world orders created its own independent financial system as a result of the sanctions that have been employed. so we basically drove them to this conclusion, and that's what we're seeing, the merch. if i wanted to define, i'm irony, i would go and go about it this way. the united states established the lendlease law to help countries fighting against nazi in germany. now it's using it to support

a country with the well documented problem with neo nazi groups in the country. what's your view on this? well, it's the united states actually helped create the qu and, and worked with those right wing groups within, within ukraine to do this. and we're talking to as a italian and about a half a dozen other militias that now are incorporated into the ukranian military into the ukrainian military and. and when the liskey avoid any mention of their right wing affiliation, he does conceive that they are in, out incorporated into the, into the ukrainian military and in and i might add, they also are involved in their law enforcement and pretty much throughout the entire government structure within ukraine, so there's, there's

a basis to be concerned about this, but when you hear it from the west, the west doesn't know this history. so when they hear d knots, if occasion they, they, they start, they start scratching their head and wondering what's that all about? that's because they haven't read history or micro maloof, former senior pentagon security policy, and someone who i always like to talk to when we get down to these talk to situations. thanks for being with you on our international. my pleasure. thank you . i now ukraine appears to be facing a default on its debts to international financial institutions, but it's western allies aren't rushing to write off or defer that debt. ukraine's total foreign debt is $54000000000.00 since the conflict interrupted about a month and a half ago. the m. s. loans, ukraine, $1000000000.00, and the world bank, another $300.00. sorry, excuse me. $589000000.00. ukraine's national currency has been plummeting. i made the increased debt load crippling the country's ability to pay off the dollar

denominated loans. key of government has found itself under mounting pressure to settle those deaths. right for me on that we can cross live to roll rasmussen, who's the executive vice president of the erasure center. a think tank. thanks for being with us here on our international now url. ukraine is set to pay more than $7000000000.00 of debts this year. to international financial institutions, could western powers right off or defer those debts because of the war they, they could typically what, what we see is kind of an unusual situation. but typically if, if they can, pre, cannot make their payments and for the betterment of the, of the concrete for the people to raise them on property and to ensure improved economic conditions. they can, there has been instances where,

where the debt has been forgiven for delay or restructured. but even though it's not just writing it off, typically what happens is there are additional requirements put on the country. in other words, you know, in democratic steps being put in place is freedom of the press putting, put, put in place, you know, are open competition is occurring, has corruption gone down. so those types of things typically are a trade off to show steps are being taken like that in order to forgive part or all of the debt. so that would be interesting with the current situation in ukraine, if we could, if we saw anything like that. so the i m f and the world bank have given ukraine loans of almost $2000000000.00 since the conflict directed in february. if ukraine had declared war on russia, would it still have even received those loans?

i think probably, i think they still would it, let's, the ukraine launched the offensive, the done bad and expanded it and tried to take over crimea will appear to be plans that were in place to do that. so if they launched that and they still needed money . yes, because they probably would not have done that without, without of okay, by the west, by nato, and by the us and european other european countries. and so i, i, and if they needed the money i, i envisioned the weapons would still be flowing in and the, and the additional loans would have probably been made. i'm gonna have to go down a little bit of a rabbit whole here. let's say ukraine's economy, it's been tutoring on the class for a long time. but could they actually default if the west doesn't step in and doesn't did for or do something to help them could they default?

and what would that look? but what would that look like? i mean, they could default, but i don't know, you know, i mean technically they could default that would, it would drive the currency down on even worse because you do have other lenders and you put in addition to the world bank and i m f, you've got the other lenders, you've got venture capitalists, you've got banks, you've got other private lenders as well that are included outside of the funding and stuff. but technically you could default on that. and if it's as far as contract available, perhaps resources get cut over to those investor steps on whether it's gonna be included. so technically they could still default, you see the currency crash even more but, but the currency has really taken a bad fall since 2014 anyhow. so you know,

it would plunge the, the, the country much, much worse, even worse than they are currently right now on the what the conflict. i'm going to kind of shift away from the actual debt itself and just on a question the i m f. and these institutions that to the ukraine is indebted to are considered controlled by the west. there's also already allegations that the west is trying to control ukraine already. does this give them more of an opening to kind of do what the west demand for them? and i'm using the term that a wildly cloak, really, i guess. absolutely. because as part of the negotiation for debt forgiveness, or restructuring even, they could put additional. i mean, they probably pretty much control them as it is. but they could put additional requirements upon them. and, you know, like i said, i mean, you know, as far as rule of law on enemy and things like that, they typically play, what would they put, i mean, you see it and african countries all the time,

austerity measures and things like that that occurred with with greek, when they got their i m f and world bank loans. so yes, they could have more control of them. but how much more, i'm not sure because it seems like pretty much ukraine controlled by the west as it is. but but technically yes. alright. rasmussen, executive vice president of the eurasia center thing. jen, thanks for being here on our international as you are, you are watching our international. i'll be back in about 30 minutes with another look at your news and commentary. students the for finds itself in a quandary is determined to punish russia for its military operation. and ukraine

is favored policy. instrument is of course, sanctions of all sorts. but alas, it's not so simple. sanctions and gender counter sanctions. this translates into economic pay for europe. ah with