Spoiler alert: I am not going to talk about how ChatGPT responds when prompted about economic-development strategies. It basically regurgitates reasonable, but mediocre ideas that it has seen in its training set. But ChatGPT’s design, which has given it far greater capabilities than its creators anticipated, offers a valuable lesson for tackling the complexities of economic development.

For more than a decade, deep neural networks (DNNs) have outperformed all other artificial-intelligence technologies, driving significant advances in computer vision, speech recognition, and translation. The emergence of generative AI chatbots like ChatGPT continue this trend.

To learn, AI algorithms require training, which can be achieved through two main approaches: supervised and unsupervised learning. In supervised learning, humans provide the computer with a set of labeled pictures such as “dog,” “cat,” “hamburger,” “car,” and so on. The algorithm is then tested to see how well it predicts the labels associated with images it has not yet seen.

The problem with the supervised approach is that it requires humans to go through the tedious process of manually labeling every picture. By contrast, unsupervised learning does not rely on labeled data. But the absence of labels raises the question of what the algorithm is supposed to learn. To address this, ChatGPT trains the algorithm simply to predict the next word of the text that is used to train it.

Predicting the next word may seem like a trivial task, akin to the auto-complete function in Google Search. But ChatGPT’s model allows it to perform highly complicated tasks, such as passing the bar exam with a better score than most high-performing law students.

The key to such feats lies in the impressive power of this simple learning process. In order to predict the next word, the algorithm is forced to develop a nuanced understanding of context, grammar, syntax, style, and much more. The level of sophistication it achieved surprised everybody, including its designers. DNNs proved capable of functioning much better without trying to incorporate into learning language models the theories that linguists had developed for decades.

The lesson for economic development is that policymakers should focus on a task that may seem mundane, provided that to excel at it, they will indirectly be forced to learn much more intricate development challenges.

By contrast, the prevailing approach in the field of development economics has been to distinguish between proximate causes and deeper determinants of growth and to focus on the latter. This approach is analogous to saying, “Instead of trying to predict the next word, understand the context and meaning of the entire book.”

In their 2012 book Why Nations Fail, for example, Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson argue that institutions, by affecting the structure of incentives in society, are the ultimate determinant of economic outcomes. Brown University economist Oded Galor has taken a different approach, emphasizing the complex demographic and technological transformations that brought humanity out of the Malthusian equilibrium and led to longer life expectancy, lower fertility rates, and higher investment in education. Together, these trends boosted women’s participation in the labor force and increased the availability of skills needed to sustain technology adoption and economic growth.

But do these theories match the facts? Over the past four decades, the developing world has indeed undergone many of the radical transformations that Galor described. As the late physician Hans Rosling observed, the gaps between developing and developed countries in life expectancy, infant mortality, fertility, education, university enrollment, female labor-force participation, and urbanization have all narrowed sharply. Reasoning à la Acemoglu and Robinson, developing countries’ institutions could not be all that bad if they were able to deliver progress on so many fronts. In Galor’s framework, progress on all these fronts should explain why developing countries caught up so much with the developed world in terms of income.

Except that they did not: the median country is no closer to US income levels than it was four decades ago. How is it possible that the narrowing gaps in education, health, urbanization, and female empowerment failed to narrow the income gap as well? Why hasn’t progress in the supposed deeper determinants delivered the goods?

To make sense of this puzzling outcome, economists invoke a widening technological gap. More than an explanation, this is a mathematical necessity: if more inputs do not generate more output, something must be making inputs less effective.

To explain this unexpected outcome, it is useful to note that the few countries that did manage to catch up share two distinctive features: their exports grew much faster than their GDP, and they diversified their exports by shifting toward more complex goods.

To achieve this feat, these successful countries must have adopted and adapted better technologies, adjusted the provision of public goods and their institutions to support emerging industries, and reduced inefficiencies and costs by increasing productivity and training workers. In that process, they may have fixed a bunch of other problems.

A ChatGPT-inspired development strategy would focus on a simple goal: to improve the competitiveness, diversity, and complexity of exports. Figuring out how to do this would force policymakers to learn how to do important things, just like predicting the next word enabled ChatGPT to learn context, grammar, syntax, and style.

Like early AI programmers who were sidetracked by linguists and their convoluted theories, policymakers have been distracted by too many objectives, such as the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. But applying the ChatGPT approach to economic development could simplify things: just as the language model tries to predict only the next word, policymakers could try to focus on facilitating the next export, as successful countries seem to have done. While this may seem like a small step, it could lead to surprisingly significant results.

Project Syndicate

Unrealistic optimism and boundless passion are critical parts of any good entrepreneur's DNA. If building something new and important from nothing was easy, anyone could do it.

And if everyone knew how difficult starting a business was going to be, no one would ever try. Persevering in the face of what appear to be overwhelming odds is also part of the requirements to eventually get to the finish line.

But what it doesn't take is lying to your peers, investors and customers, as well as to the media. That's crossing a line that no one should ever cross. And whether you acknowledge it to yourself or not, there's a surprisingly bright boundary in almost every case.

There's a day or a point in time or an ethical test that presents a clear choice; you don't slip or fall into fraud, it's a straightforward decision. You either consciously plunge forward into the abyss of illegality or you sharply pull back and stay legit.

This is why it's so important for the people who are trying to build real businesses in the right way to call out the cheats and creeps.

To make sure that everyone sees that – even if we all admit to ourselves just how easy cheating might be – there's a substantive and real difference between readily available rationalizations to justify illegal acts and actually making that initial bad decision to head down the wrong road.

But just because you can understand the complexities, temptations and risks doesn't mean you get to stand quietly by – especially when it's your own business that's being adversely impacted by competitors willing to do and say anything to get the sale. You're the one who has to act, even if it's clearly not easy.

I call this asymmetric competition (or bringing a knife to a gunfight) because one side is always trying to do the right thing and compete fairly while the other side has no limits, no ethics and no boundaries on how low they're willing to go.

In fact, the Orange Monster and the scum on the other side think that dishonesty is an admirable survival skill and claim, much like Trump bragging about being smart enough to evade any taxes.

That cutting corners, shaving points and edges and using inferior goods and components are all part of a big game where only winning ultimately matters. As Hitler said: "It is not truth that matters, but victory. The victor will never be asked if he told the truth."

Confronting and dealing with competitors who are lying to your customers is a very complicated task.

There's a fine line in the customers' minds between complaining and whining and the problem is growing because in the Trump era, where no lie is too big, bold or unthinkable, the numbers of unscrupulous players are multiplying.

It's becoming more and more difficult for buyers to determine who's telling the truth and who isn't. Worse yet, in the startup world, facts and factoids are often confused and concrete "proof" is often hard to come by.

Consider that JPMorgan Chase alleges it got hoodwinked by Charlie Javice, the  30-year-old founder of Frank, a fin tech the bank bought for $175 million.  The celebrated "fake it" culture and the media's glorification of growth at any cost, hasn't helped to clarify the worsening situation although we do seem to finally be turning a corner.  

It's been encouraging to belatedly see the demise of the "fake it 'til you make it" excuse for outright and grievous instances of theft and fraud although the general commentary in the mainstream media stills lags in calling out the harsh realities in many of these cases.

It appears that, in addition to simply creating copy, filling space and dancing around the truth, too many members of the tech press feel obliged to insert a paragraph or two reciting this old Silicon Valley saw, apparently in the name of neutrality, objectivity and even-handedness.    

In truth, spewing this bullshit adds nothing helpful to the conversation. This startup malarky persists even after convincing and broad-ranging criminal convictions.

It confuses and confounds the public and prospective investors, misleads other serious and honest entrepreneurs and frankly continues to provide some shelter and comfort to people who are demonstrably criminal.

We just had another round of criminal convictions in Chicago in the Outcome Health cases and sadly there are still far too many social media comments about how the thieves and villains are nice folks and did so many supportive things for others right up until the time their criminal scams and schemes were disclosed and prosecuted.

There really aren't two sides to these stories. Try telling the firemen that the arsonists aren't really such bad guys – they just have a thing for matches.

This bogus approach closely resembles the oblivious stupidity of the political press in constantly attempting to equitably compare the positions of conscientious and well-intentioned Democratic politicians with the dishonest, manipulative and extortionate proposals of performative MAGA morons whose sole interests are to delay, disrupt and interfere with the ongoing governance activities of the Congress and with those of state legislatures as well.

Instead of talking about what's happening in Washington, where one party is creating a potential catastrophe and attempting to hold the country and the economy hostage to their crazy demands, the media talks about the situation as if it were a normal, two-sided conversation among rational actors instead of a circus conducted by performative assholes.

These acts are so outside of the norm that the traditionalist and temperate Democrats like Dick Durbin don't even know how to address them.

It's hard to pretend that it's business as usual when people you have to call your colleagues are lying to your face and to the public daily, but that's what's going on and the country's much the worse for it.

Startup entrepreneurs face the same problem: Trying to honestly compete with liars and criminals in their own marketplaces. You've got to say something, you need to call the customers' and clients' attention to the situation – both for their sake and your own – but it's a difficult conversation to have.

It's frankly surprising how often we have to rediscover an old and very basic lesson,  which is that customers and clients don't really care even a little bit about your constraints and concerns, even when they clearly should. Even if theirbusinesses could also be at risk.

The pandemic presented case after case of this problem – honest suppliers (especially of food products) incurred enormous additional costs to avoid any risks of passing on virus-contaminated material.  But many were woefully unsupported when they tried to share these costs with customers.

They were happy to find lower-cost and less  conscientious vendors willing to sell them similar products and who falsely claimed that they had also taken suitable steps and precautions to avoid any problems.

In the end, your customers and clients believe that they hired you to do a job and not much else matters – get the job done, now and correctly.

They don't want you to waste their time with apologies or excuses. If that's all you've got to try to justify your concerns, you can bet that there's going to be some unhappy times ahead.

Let's be clear, though, that an apology isn't an excuse. Honestly, there's no such thing these days as a good excuse. But a thoughtful and solid explanation of the situation is an entirely different thing. The trick is to find the right way and the right time to tell your story.

Here are three key things to keep in mind.

(1)  The context of these kinds of conversations matters at least as much as the content. Find the right time and place and make sure that the customer is willing and able to listen. A congested and busy office isn't the right place.

A rushed phone call or having the talk while standing in the hall between meetings won't get the job done. Invest the time to make the conversation personal. Forget Zoom,  face-to-face matters.

(2)  In the war on truth that's raging these days, the only certain way to lose is to be passive. Honesty is difficult and sometimes painful at first, but it's the only way to develop a long-term relationship based on trust, which is the ultimate key to success.

A sincere effort is all anyone can ask. If you tell the truth, the truth becomes part of your past. If you lie, the lie becomes part of your future. The truth only hurts when it ought to.

(3)  Focus on a few important facts and stick to your story. It's more important to repeat the critical and personal concerns than to try to cover everything. Our minds process meaning before details. Passion and energy are more compelling and effective than a particularized parade of horrible.

 Take your time and be patient. Don't lose your place or your temper. If you're angry, people will focus on your anger and not on the facts that matter.

The objective in these conversations isn't to sell, convince, or share your burdens; it's to demonstrate why it's in the customers' own best interests to look carefully at the alternatives and the risks they face before they make the wrong choice.

Inc

The consumer price index (CPI), which measures the rate of change in prices of goods and services, rose to 22.22 percent in April 2023, up from 22.04 percent in the previous month.

The inflation rate data is contained in the latest CPI report released on Monday by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

The April increase comes across as the fourth consecutive surge in the country’s inflation figure since the year began.

“Looking at the movement, the April 2023 inflation rate showed an increase of 0.18% points when compared to March 2023 headline inflation rate,” the report reads.

“Similarly, on a year-on-year basis, the headline inflation rate was 5.40% points higher compared to the rate recorded in April 2022, which was 16.82%. 

“This shows that the headline inflation rate on a year-on-year basis increased in April 2023 when compared to the same month in the preceding year (i.e., April 2022).”

NBS said items such as food and non-alcoholic beverages; housing, water, electricity, gas & other fuel contributed largely on the divisional level to the increase in the headline index.

“The contributions of items on the divisional level to the increase in the headline index are presented below: food and non-alcoholic beverages (11.51 percent); housing, water, electricity, gas, and other fuel (3.72 percent),” the agency said.

“Clothing and footwear (1.70 percent); transport (1.45 percent); furnishings, household equipment and maintenance (1.12 percent); education (0.88 percent); health (0.67 percent); miscellaneous goods and services (0.37 percent); restaurant and hotels (0.27 percent); alcoholic beverage, tobacco and kola (0.24 percent); recreation and culture (0.15 percent) and communication (0.15 percent).”

FOOD INFLATION RISES TO 24.61%

The report said food inflation rose to 24.61 percent in the month under review, an uptick compared to the 24.45 percent recorded in the preceding month.

The rise in the food index, NBS explained, was caused by increases in prices of oil and fat, bread and cereals, fish, potatoes, yam and other tubers, fruits, meat, vegetable, and spirits.

“On a month-on-month basis, the food inflation rate in April 2023 was 2.13%, this was 0.06% points higher compared to the rate recorded in March 2023 (2.07%),” the report further reads.

“The average annual rate of food inflation for the twelve months ending April 2023 over the previous twelve months average was 23.22%, which was 4.35% points increase from the average annual rate of change recorded in April 2022 (18.88%).”

The Cable

Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has launched its Financial Literacy e-Learning Platform, called “SabiMoni” in its efforts to upscale Financial Inclusion in the country.

According to the CBN Governor, Godwing Emefiele, who launched the platform in Abuja on Monday, the apex bank was determined to achieve the 95 percent Financial Inclusion target next year.

He said that the “SabiMoni” would significantly impact the drive as more members of the Nigerian public key into the platform.

Emefiele promised that the CBN would urgently resolve the squabble between Deposit Money Banks (DMBs) and telecommunication companies over the sharing of Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD) income.

According to him, USSD has been very useful as a part of the mechanism for Financial Inclusion and would not be allowed to have its services disrupted over the sharing of the income between banks and telecommunication companies.

Vanguard

Nigerian tycoon Tony Elumelu’s family raised its stake in the nation’s biggest conglomerate after warding off a takeover threat from a rival. 

Elumelu’s wife, Awele Elumelu, acquired 5.1% of Transnational Corp. of Nigeria Plc, according to a regulatory filing on Friday. That boosts the family’s holding to at least 30%, which according to Nigerian takeover rules is the threshold for triggering an open offer. Transcorp didn’t immediately respond to an email seeking comment. 

Before the latest acquisition, the tycoon spent about $65 million to buy 11.7 billion shares of the company known as Transcorp at various price levels starting April 27. Elumelu began boosting his share days after rival Femi Otedola accumulated a 5% stake in the company, making him the largest single shareholder. Otedola has since sold his stake to Elumelu, according local media reports. 

Transcorp controls about 16% of Nigeria’s electricity generating capacity, runs hotels and explores for oil. That gives Elumelu an avenue to expand in areas that are crucial for Africa’s most-populous nation. A Transcorp-led group earlier this month acquired Abuja Electricity Distribution Co. in a move to expand into power distribution.

The fight for control has helped Transcorp’s shares advance 86% since April 1, making them the second-best performing on the NGX All Share Index.

Elumelu began his buying spree through his wholly owned investment firm HH Capital, raising his stakes in Transcorp to 25.58% from 2.07%. Elumelu rejected an offer from Otedola, who wanted to acquire Transcorp for 250 billion naira ($538 million), according to online newspaper Premium Times, citing a statement from Otedola. 

Lagos-based Transcorp owns three power plants, with a combined installed generating capacity of 2,000 megawatts. It also owns hotels in the capital, Abuja, the commercial hub of Lagos and the southern city of Calabar.

Nigeria’s Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, who leads the National Council on Privatization, last week said that a consortium led by Transcorp has been given approval to acquire Abuja Electricity, without disclosing financial details. 

United Bank for Africa Plc, a lender headed by Elumelu, put Abuja Electricity on sale in 2021 to recoup $122 million in debt that it had defaulted on. UBA declined to comment. 

Bloomberg

Oil companies including Shell Plc and Eni SpA should pay $12 billion to repair environmental devastation in Nigeria’s crude-rich Niger Delta, a new report said.

More than six decades of pumping oil has left Bayelsa state “in the grip of a human and environmental catastrophe of unimaginable proportions,” according to research published by a panel set up by the state government. The extraction of crude is “the overwhelmingly evident cause of this disaster” in the state, home to more than 2 million people, it said.

Bayelsa State Oil & Environmental Commission, established in 2019 by a former governor of the southern state, released its final report on Tuesday. British lawmaker and former Archbishop of York, John Sentamu, chaired the London-headquartered commission, whose research was conducted by a group of international experts.

The area that is today Bayelsa was the first place in West Africa to produce commercial quantities of oil in the late 1950s. Since then, firms — mainly Shell and Eni — have pumped billions of barrels of crude from beneath the state’s land, swamps and waterways. Spills from their infrastructure have transformed the region into “one of the most polluted places on Earth,” according to the commission’s report.

A spokesman for Shell’s Nigerian subsidiary declined to comment on the report, saying the company is not “privy” to the commission’s allegations and recommendations. Eni did not respond to a request for comment.

The oil companies say outside interference — by thieves and saboteurs — rather than equipment failure is to blame for the overwhelming majority of leaks from their facilities.

But the firms have failed to “properly invest in, maintain, manage and protect pipelines” that develop spills at a rate “unparalleled when compared to other major oil producing countries,” the report said. There are also “strong reasons to believe that the official statistics significantly and systematically over-state the number of leaks caused by sabotage while downplaying those attributable to other causes,” it said.

‘Fundamentally Compromised’

About one-fifth of Nigeria’s oil output comes from Bayelsa — with almost all the rest is pumped from other states in the Niger Delta or off the country’s shores. While international majors for decades produced most of the nation’s crude in partnership with the state energy company, they have been selling onshore and shallow-water licenses to local companies in recent years.

The oil majors that have extracted crude in Bayelsa and the state-owned Nigerian National Petroleum Co. should invest $12 billion to restore impacted areas, create new jobs, provide drinking water and treat health problems, according to the report. The fund’s work will require a “parallel bureaucracy” involving both domestic and international oversight, it said.

The commission also recommended an overhaul of the regulatory and legal regime to allow heftier penalties, introduce a fast-track arbitration body and remove the influence of producers from the “fundamentally compromised” spill inspection process. The government departments tasked with enforcing environmental standards lack “capacity, independence and influence,” it said.

NNPC, National Oil Spill Detection & Response Agency and Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission did not respond to requests for comment.

An environmental assessment published by the UN Environment Programme in 2011 led to the establishment of a $1 billion fund backed by Shell and the NNPC to clean up pollution in Ogoniland, a kingdom about 20% of Bayelsa’s size in the neighboring Rivers state. Internal documents prepared by the UN agency and reported by Bloomberg last year indicate the project is marred by wastefulness and mismanagement that could be making the region even dirtier.

Studies conducted for the commission found that “toxins from hydrocarbon pollution are present at often dangerous levels in the soil, water and air” across Bayelsa and “have been absorbed into the human food chain,” according to the report.

By tolerating what “they would never contemplate in their home jurisdictions,” the multinationals have displayed “many of the hallmarks not just of gross negligence but of environmental racism,” it said.

Bloomberg

Nigerian Association of Resident Doctors (NARD) has declared a five-day warning strike following failure of the Federal Government to meet its demands.

This was made known after an extraordinary National Executive Council (NEC) meeting held virtually on Monday.

According to the doctors, the strike will begin on Wednesday, May 17, and end on Monday, May 22.

On April 29, NARD issued a two-week ultimatum to the Federal Government to implement the agreements or face industrial action.

The ultimatum, however, ended on Saturday, May 13, 2023.

The doctors are demanding an immediate increment in the Consolidated Medical Salary Structure to the tune of 200 per cent of the current gross salary of doctors and the new allowances included in the letter written by the association to the Minister of Health, Dr Osagie Ehanire, on July 7, 2022, on the review of CONMESS.

They demanded the immediate payment of the 2023 Medical Residency Training Fund (MRTF), which aligns with the agreements reached at the stakeholders’ meeting convened by the Federal Ministry of Health.

Also, they demanded the commencement of payment of all salary arrears owed to its members including 2014, 2015, and 2016 salary arrears as well as areas of the consequential adjustment of the minimum wage.

The Guardian

The United States of America has accused Nigeria of severe violations of religious freedom.

This was contained in the Annual Report of the US Commission on International Religious Freedom published in April 2023 and obtained by our correspondent on Monday.

The commission stated that criminal activity and violent armed group incidents impacting religious freedom worsened.

The commission cited instances, such as “A Shari’a court sentencing Sheikh Kabara to death for blasphemy. Judicial authorities sentenced humanist leader Mubarak Bala to 24 years in prison for blasphemy and other charges,” among others.

According to USA, “in 2022, religious freedom conditions in Nigeria remained poor, with both state and non-state actors committing particularly severe violations of religious freedom.

“While some officials worked to address drivers of religious freedom violations, others actively infringed on the religious freedom rights of Nigerians, including by enforcing blasphemy laws. Criminal activity and violent armed group incidents impacting religious freedom worsened.”

It added that “rampant violence and atrocities across Nigeria continued to impact freedom of religion or belief, including militant Islamist violence; some forms of identity-based violence; mob violence; and criminal, political, and vigilante violence impacting worship.”

The US said it noted that the federal authorities accelerated efforts to address violence impacting religious freedom, including by institutionalising harsher punishments against perpetrators, improving military efforts to neutralise Islamist fighters in the North, and strengthening efforts to investigate and arrest perpetrators of the most egregious attacks.

It, however, said, “The effectiveness of these efforts remained in question, while in some regions state and local officials failed to fully prosecute individuals who incited mob violence against alleged blasphemers.

“Security and judicial sector reform aimed at deterring and providing redress for religious violence remained stagnant, with such efforts largely absent from or peripheral to leading politicians’ policy priorities.”

It added that despite continued religious freedom challenges in the country, “In November, the U.S. Department of State failed to designate Nigeria as a Country of Particular Concern for engaging in particularly severe violations of religious freedom.”

The Commission advised the U.S. government to “Designate Nigeria as a CPC, for engaging in systematic, ongoing, and egregious violations of religious freedom, as defined by the International Religious Freedom Act, and redesignate Boko Haram and ISWAP as ‘entities of particular concern,’ or EPCs, for engaging in systematic, ongoing, and egregious violations of religious freedom, as defined by IRFA.”

Punch

No fewer than twenty persons have been reported killed following a clash between two ethnic groups over kingship in Taraba State.

This development comes on the heels of a coronation held for the traditional ruler of Wurkun Chiefdom.

Sources reveal that the ceremony which was put together by Governor Darius Ishaku, turned out to be a decision that was not welcomed by other tribes.

Houses, vehicles and farmlands were not spared in the carnage that ensued.

Prior to the clashes, Governor Ishaku had said that the essence of creating the chiefdom was to bring government closer to the people, and to give the masses a sense of belonging.

He added that the desired goal was not to balkanize the people along ethnic or religious lines.

This admonition however did little or nothing to forestall the violence.

It was gathered that some residents of Karim Lamido Local Government showed their outright rejection by burning of tyres which later degenerated into full blown crisis leading to the death of at least 20 persons and properties destroyed.

According to the Karimjo speaking tribe, the coronation was an injustice done to them, in that the kingship was supposed to be handed to an individual from their extraction and not the Wurkun speaking tribe who have ruled for decades before the demise of the last traditional ruler.

The Karimjo speaking tribe argued that they are the first settlers and true owners of Karim Lamido Local Council, adding that they only accepted the Wurkuns to reside as slaves, however, the enslaved later dominated and took over the land and kingship.

The Karimjo people allege that the Wurkuns who are educated and occupy several positions in the armed forces, called on the military and other sister agencies to brutalize, chase them away from their lands and set their houses on fire in the wake of the crisis.

Wurkuns on the other hand say the kingship is theirs and claim that the crisis was triggered by the Karimjo tribe who want to rule over them.

They denied any involvement in asking the military to intervene.

While noting that they have asked the feuding youths to sheath their swords, the Wurkuns say that should the karimjo speaking tribe continue attacking their people, they would be forced to retaliate.

Local government authorities say the military and other security agencies have taken control of activities in the area for peace to return, even as it was disclosed that a grenade was discovered at the new chief’s palace.

As the attacks and counter attacks rage on, at least over three hundred persons have so far been displaced in the wake of the crisis and should this linger, rice production which the area is known for will be grossly affected.

This is the second crisis the area is seeing, with the first one recorded in 1996 between the Karimjo speaking tribe and the Fulanis.

CTV

WESTERN PERSPECTIVE

Russia launches air raid on Kyiv 'exceptional' in intensity

Russia launched an exceptionally intense air attack on Kyiv in the early hours of Tuesday, using drones, cruise and probably ballistic missiles, city officials said, as the Ukrainian capital suffered its eighth air raid this month.

"It was exceptional in its density - the maximum number of attack missiles in the shortest period of time," Serhiy Popko, head of Kyiv's city military administration, said in comments posted on the Telegram messaging app.

"According to preliminary information, the vast majority of enemy targets in the airspace of Kyiv were detected and destroyed!"

It was not immediately known how many objects were shot down over the city and if any of them managed to hit their target.

After a weeks-long hiatus, Russia in late April resumed its tactic of long-range missile strikes and has launched a flurry of attacks in recent days, often targeting Kyiv. Ukraine has been able to repel vast majority of the attacks so far.

On Tuesday, falling debris was reported in Kyiv's Obolonskyi, Shevchenkivskyi, Solomyanskyi and Darnytskyi districts, officials said.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said falling debris set several cars on fire and damaged a building in the Solomyanskyi district in the capital's west. Three people were injured.

Klitschko said that south of Boryspil, air defence systems were repelling a drone attack. Boryspil, a city just southeast of Kyiv, is home to the capital’s main passenger airport, which is now closed.

The damage in other districts was not significant and there was no immediate information on potential casualties there, the military administration said.

Air raid sirens blared across nearly all of Ukraine in the early hours of Tuesday, and were heard over Kyiv and its region for more than three hours.

** Kremlin Distances Itself From Mercenary Leader After Damning Report

The Kremlin on Monday attempted to downplay an explosive new report suggesting Wagner Group mercenary leader Yevegeny Prigozhin told a Ukrainian intelligence service that he would give them the positions of Russian troops in exchange for withdrawing from the besieged city of Bakhmut.

“It looks like another duck,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters, employing a Russian idiom for a hoax or a media stunt, lamenting that a “respected news organization” would buy into it.

But, ultimately, he declined to comment on the substance of the report.

Peskov faced questions about the damning story in The Washington Post, based on recent U.S. intelligence assessments leaked through the online gaming platform Discord, that detailed Prigozhin’s machinations, apparently in an attempt to bolster his forces’ position around the strategic city in eastern Ukraine.

Several U.S. and Ukrainian officials confirmed to the Post on the condition of anonymity details of Prigozhin’s apparent offer but declined to say whether they believed the proposed trade was genuine. Prigozhin reportedly made the offer to Ukraine’s military intelligence directorate, with which he has maintained secret contact during the war, according to the documents. Intelligence services commonly maintain back-door contact with enemy forces during conflicts.

It remains unclear whether Prigozhin was, indeed, willing to trade the lives of uniformed soldiers for his own mercenary forces in their attempt to follow through on his pledges to seize Bakhmut before Russia’s Victory Day last Tuesday. Latest assessments indicate Russian forces control roughly 95% of the city, though Ukrainian troops have mounted surprising counterattacks in recent days.

But the latest report comes amid a growing feud between Prigozhin and the uniformed leaders of the Ministry of Defense – and with other top elements of Russia’s administration.

Monday’s exchange at the Kremlin represented only the latest time in recent days that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s government has had to distance itself from the leader of the paramilitary force on which it has increasingly relied in Ukraine. Peskov similarly declined to comment late last week on several expletive-laden rants Prigozhin published on his Telegram channel insulting the Russian Ministry of Defense for not supplying him with sufficient ammunition and criticizing Putin himself as a “grandfather” who is part of the problems facing Russia in Ukraine.

Prigozhin issued several more critical rants through his Telegram channel on Monday morning. In response to questions from the Post, he openly acknowledged maintaining lines of communication with Ukrainian intelligence, saying, “Yes of course I can confirm this information, we have nothing to hide from the foreign special services.”

The growing rift and deepening dysfunction among Russia’s fighting forces comes at a critical time as international powers await a pending spring offensive from Ukraine in an attempt to break the battlefield deadlock there. Ukrainian officials have suggested it could begin in a matter of weeks, or even days.

Yet it remains unclear if Russia is ready to defend against it.

British intelligence over the weekend assessed that forces loyal to the Kremlin in Ukraine still comprise 200,000 personnel on the ground formed into 70 combat regiments – about the same size as the army that first invaded Ukraine.

“However, in February 2022 it consisted of professional soldiers; was largely equipped with reasonably modern vehicles; and had been regularly exercised, aspiring to complex, joint operations,” according to the U.K. military intelligence assessment on Sunday. “Now the force is mostly poorly trained mobilized reservists and increasingly reliant on antiquated equipment, many of its units severely under-strength.”

It has been relegated to “very simple, infantry-based operations,” the assessment adds, instead of the complex maneuvers involving all of its fighting power working in concert as a modern military would operate.

And it concludes that Russia is likely unable to “generate a large, capable, mobile reserve” to respond to new challenges it may face in Ukraine, or organize itself to launch a large-scale military counter operation along the roughly 750 miles of front lines that Ukraine is currently challenging.

** Germany's Scholz: Some nations see Western double standards on Russia

Influential countries such as India, Vietnam and South Africa balk at criticizing Russia's invasion of Ukraine because they believe international principles are not applied equally, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said in a speech on Monday.

"When I talk to leaders from those countries, many assure me that they are not questioning the underlying principles of our international order. What they are struggling with is the unequal application of those principles," he said.

"What they expect is representation on equal terms, and an end to Western double standards."

RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE

Wagner boss denies talking to Kiev about selling out Russian troops

Head of Russia's Wagner private military company, Evgeny Prigozhin, has claimed it would have been “physically impossible” for him to meet with Ukrainian military intelligence agents in Africa to make a treasonous proposal to them. The alleged contacts were reported by the Washington Post based on purported leaks from the Pentagon.

The outlet claimed on Sunday that classified US documents, which made their way to the public through a Discord server, claim there had been communication between Prigozhin and Ukrainian military intelligence (GUR). 

The Wagner head allegedly sought to have Ukrainian troops withdraw from the area around the bitterly contested city of Artyomovsk (known in Ukraine as Bakhmut) in order to ease the pressure on his own troops for a while, in exchange for information on Russian troop positions elsewhere. The alleged contacts were said to take place by phone and an in-person meeting in Africa, where the Wagner Group is also active.

Prigozhin dismissed the report as “speculation dumped by the Washington Post”and insisted he had not been to Africa since months before the hostilities in Ukraine broke out in February 2022. He suggested that the newspaper was overstating the supposed intel or had fallen victim to planted disinformation.

The Post said two Ukrainian officials confirmed the contacts between Prigozhin and the GUR, but when the newspaper asked Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky about them, he appeared to be angered and demanded to know who the sources in his government were.

“Who is talking about the activities of our intelligence? Because this is the most severe felony in our country,” he said, before accusing the newspaper of trying to help Russia. The Post later redacted this portion of the interview on its website.

In a statement, Prigozhin alluded to the apparent act of self-censorship, calling into question the Post’s reliability.

** US money for Ukraine running out – Politico

US aid for Ukraine could completely run out as early as mid-summer, Politico reported on Monday, citing sources familiar with the matter. That’s as Washington has already spent most of the $48 billion aid package approved by Congress in December.

According to the outlet, the US only has some $6 billion left to spend on arms and supplies for Kiev, meaning that American aid to Ukrainian forces could soon come to a halt.

Members of Congress are reportedly alarmed that the White House could soon be unable to quickly deliver military aid to Ukraine, especially as Kiev plans a much-hyped counteroffensive against Russia.

“It is critical that the administration provide Ukraine with what it needs in time to defend and take back its sovereign territory,” Susan Collins told Pentagon leaders last week.

Politico reports that the White House is now discussing a brand new aid package designed to keep supplies flowing to Ukraine, according to a senior administration official, who noted that it is unclear what Kiev’s needs might be during or after the counteroffensive. The source added that the administration of President Joe Biden is “fully committed” to supporting the government in Kiev “for the long haul.”

The Pentagon announced its latest aid package for Kiev last week, valued at some $1.2 billion, which is intended to go to the military industry to produce artillery and air-defense ammunition. US military officials said these munitions are meant to meet Ukraine’s “most urgent requirements” and provide “critical near-term capabilities.”

Discussions of a new aid package for Ukraine, however, are expected to spark fierce congressional debate in the coming months and will face resistance from Republicans who have called for cuts in government spending on Ukraine, citing looming domestic issues.

The Biden administration is already engaged in a standoff with the Republican-majority House of Representatives over raising the US debt ceiling. Washington is currently running a national debt estimated at over $31 trillion, risking a default.

Moscow, meanwhile, has repeatedly slammed the US and its Western allies for continuing to pump weapons into Ukraine. By Russian estimates, the West had supplied some $100 billion worth of weapons, ammunition and supplies to the Ukrainian military by the end of 2022. The US and its allies, however, have continued to insist that they are not directly involved in the conflict.

Reuters/USA Reports/RT