Belarusian Political Scientist Alexander Shpakovsky (for @ukraina_ru)

“The situation in Ukraine is getting worse. A significant part of the energy infrastructure has been destroyed. Deputy Prime Minister Shmygal urges citizens to evacuate – a harsh heating season is ahead. But they won’t freeze, they’ll spend the winter in sleeping bags, warm up somehow.

It’s not pleasant, but not fatal. A much more bleak situation is brewing. The inflation, which is already more than 30%, the budget deficit. And the colossal losses of people, no matter how they were hidden! The 6th (!) wave of mobilization is already underway, citizens over 55 years of age are being called.

The hawks of war insist on forcing the conflict, pragmatists consider it possible to achieve at least a temporary respite in order to restore any potential of Ukraine as an irritant state. But, still, in order to continue using it as a second Afghanistan to deplete Russia”