Navalny’s ally attacked with a hammer, Danish women forced into military service: war in Ukraine, day 759

Alexei Navalny’s former chief of staff, Russian opposition leader died a month agowas attacked on Tuesday night with an ax in Vilnius, capital of Lithuania, where he has lived since leaving Russia more than three years ago, fearing reprisals from the Kremlin.

“A man attacked me in the garden, he hit me on the leg about 15 times. The leg is ok, but I have pain walking… Anyway, I broke my arm”, reported Leonid Volkov, 43 years old, on the social network Telegram. “They wanted to destroy me into pieces”, he stressed. The suspect has not yet been identified, but Volkov guarantees that the attack was carried out “in the style of Saint Petersburg”, Putin’s hometown.

Gitanas Nausėda, President of Lithuania, reacted immediately to the act of violence: “I can only say one thing: Nobody is afraid of Putin here”, he stated, regretting Moscow’s provocations to destabilize the country. Lithuanian authorities are investigating the case, including intelligence services.

Meanwhile, Volkov promised to continue opposing the Kremlin from Lithuania – and urged Russians to join the protest scheduled for this Sunday, the main day of the presidential elections. “We will continue to work and we will not give up,” said Navalny’s ally.

“The Kremlin is trying to destroy Navalny’s legacy, and we will not let that happen,” said Ruslan Shaveddinov, also part of the Russian opposition, in statements to “The Guardian” about this episode.

Denmark advances to 2% of GDP in Defense this year

The Danish government today announced the introduction of compulsory military service for women. It is the third European country to do so, after Norway (2015) and Sweden (2017). The minimum length of service will also increase from the current four months to 11, for both women and men. Until now, it was only mandatory for men over 18.

“More robust recruitment, including full gender equality, should contribute to resolving the challenges of defense, national mobilization and the manpower of our armed forces,” said Defense Minister Troels Lund Poulsen at a press conference.

Currently, the Danish armed forces have around 9,000 professional troops, plus 4,700 recruits in training. Copenhagen’s immediate objective is to increase training capacity to 5,000.

On the same day, the Scandinavian country announced that it will increase defense spending by €5.43 billion over the next five years. “The government plans to increase defense spending by a total of DKK 40.5 billion between 2024 and 2028,” the Defense Ministry wrote in a statement.

“We are not rearming because we want war, destruction or suffering. We are rearming to avoid war in a world where the international order is being challenged”, explained Mette Frederiksen, Prime Minister, at a press conference.

The plan is to invest in its own military capacity and support for Ukraine. According to Mette Frederiksen, this increase means that the country will spend more than 2% of GDP on Defense this year – a commitment made by NATO members and highlighted several times by the United States, but which several countries do not fulfill. Last year, Denmark was at 1.4%.

Denmark is one of the founding member countries of NATO and has been one of the most active European allies in supporting Kiev in resisting the Russian invasion that began in February 2022, being one of the few countries supplying F-16 fighters to Ukraine.

Other news:

> Austria announced the expulsion of two Russian diplomats for behaving “incompatible with their diplomatic status”, the Austrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced in a statement, without adding further explanation. The two Russians have a deadline of March 19 to leave the country. The Russian embassy in Vienna declared itself “outraged” and promised a firm response.

> According to the “Financial Times”, the European Commission is considering channeling money from profits from frozen Russian assets into a program to support Ukraine’s defense industry. The amount in question is between €2 billion and €3 billion, from a support program worth a total of €5 billion, which was announced yesterday but is still being negotiated between Member States.

> The president of the Ukrainian World Congress, an organization that represents 20 million people in the diaspora, conveyed to the Patriarch of Lisbon his indignation at the Pope’s statements about possible negotiations with Moscow. In an interview with Lusa during a visit to Lisbon, Paul Grod guarantees that Ukrainians are “disillusioned” with the Vatican, which has already backed down.

> On the other hand, Moscow praised the Pope as “one of the few political leaders with a truly strategic vision of world problems”, wrote the Russian embassy to the Holy See in a message commemorating the 11th anniversary of Francis’ pontificate. The Russian embassy described Francis as “a true and sincere defender of humanism, peace and traditional values.”