Putin 'Hopes to Torment Millions’ – Ukraine at War Update for Sept. 26

At a rally in the swing state of North Carolina on Wednesday, US Republican candidate Donald Trump said that President Volodymyr Zelensky “refuses to make a deal” with Moscow to end the 32-month-long invasion of his country, saying that there is nothing left of Ukraine anyway after more than two years of war.

“We continue to give billions of dollars to a man who refuses to make a deal, Zelensky,” said Trump, who continually boasts that he could negotiate an end to the war “in 24 hours” by gaining concessions from both Zelensky and Russian leader Vladimir Putin.

“What do you have left now?” Trump asked. “The country is absolutely obliterated.”

Once more describing Zelensky as “probably the greatest salesman on Earth,” Trump again repeated the absurd claim that “every time” Zelensky arrives in the US he is given $60 billion.

Having run six companies that have filed for bankruptcy, and having been convicted on 34 counts of financial felonies, Trump has long promoted himself as a business genius and master negotiator. A book he co-authored in 1987, “The Art of the Deal,” has sold over a million copies. (Both the publisher and the book's co-author, journalist Tony Schwartz, said that Trump had very little input in the writing process. In a 2016 interview with New Yorker magazine, Schwartz said that authoring that book was his “greatest regret in life, without question.”)

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The Zelensky and Trump camps had considered a face-to-face meeting on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly meetings in New York this week, but AFP has reported that any such meeting is expected to be canceled. Quoting American media, AFP said that Trump “did not appreciate the interview Zelensky gave to The New Yorker magazine, in which the Ukrainian president said he believed the 78-year-old Republican ‘doesn’t really know how to stop the war.’”

Before this summer, Trump had constrained his remarks on Ukraine to his brush-off that he’d settle the war in a day, leaving his populist cohorts, such as Rep. Marjorie Taylor Green (R-GA) and his vice presidential pick Sen. JD Vance (R-OH), to carry the right-wing’s isolationist mantle. But in recent weeks leading up to the November election, Trump has stepped up his criticism of the current administration’s stalwart support of Kyiv, and his concocted claims that NATO allies are not making proportionate contributions.

AFP noted that it had contacted Trump’s team but they refused to confirm whether the meeting between the two men had been scrapped. 

For the first time in recent history, North Carolina is considered a toss-up in the 2024 elections, as more liberals from northern states have declared residency in the once-solidly conservative southern state, whose economy and population have blossomed over the past two decades.

Trump continues to campaign heavily in North Carolina, where he and his party have faced political setbacks. The state’s Republican Lieutenant Governor, whom Trump once called “better than Martin Luther King,” has been answering questions this week about his posts on a pornographic website called Nude Africa, referring to himself as a “black Nazi.” Mark Robinson wrote in the site’s comment section, among other things, that he would buy slaves if he could, and called himself a “perv” who enjoys watching pornography with transgendered stars. 

Zelensky warns UN that Moscow is planning to attack three nuclear power plants to shut off the heat in Ukraine this winter

In his address to the UN General Assembly, Zelensky told diplomats and foreign leaders that Putin intends to target Ukraine’s nuclear power plants this fall, as Russian attacks on thermal plants so far have knocked out close to 80 percent of the country’s generating capacity and millions of Ukrainians have been left without power throughout the war.

“Now, as we near the third winter of this war, Russia is once again trying to destroy our energy system, and this fall, they’re being even more cynical. They’re preparing to target our nuclear power plants, three of them – we have this information, and we have proof of this,” Zelensky told the Assembly.

The president noted that Moscow receives intelligence about Ukrainian power supply from satellite images provided by third-party countries’ technology.

“This kind of Russian cynicism will keep striking if it’s given any room in the world,” Zelensky said.

Ukrainska Pravda reported that some 80 percent of Ukraine’s energy generation has been destroyed by Russian attacks on all of the country’s thermal power plants, and a “significant” percentage of its hydroelectric output as well.

“This is how Russian dictator Vladimir Putin is preparing for the winter. He hopes to torment millions and millions of Ukrainians. Ordinary families – women and children. Ordinary cities and ordinary villages,” Zelensky added. “Putin wants to leave them in the dark and cold this winter, forcing Ukraine to suffer and surrender.”

Kyiv wonders when Russian-asset-backed loans from G7 will materialize

State news outlet Ukrinform reported Wednesday that Japan is working with other G7 members to offer loans to Ukraine backed by frozen Russian assets.

Speaking at a conference called “Make Russia Pay,” Japanese Ambassador to Ukraine Kuninori Matsuda said that Tokyo is “fully prepared” to offer these kinds of loans drawn from frozen Russian funds within its jurisdiction.

“Regarding Russia’s frozen assets, Japan is working and will be working in close cooperation with G7 partners and Ukraine to advance discussions on and implementation of the extraordinary revenue acceleration loans for Ukraine. And I reiterate again Japan's position. That is, Japan is fully prepared to extend these loans to Ukraine,” Matsuda said.

“Russia’s sovereign assets in our jurisdiction will remain immobilized and frozen until Russia ends its aggression and pays for all the damage it has caused to Ukraine. This is a solely legal and political guarantee,” he said.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian delegates at the conference wondered aloud when the loans promised by those other G7 countries would be made available.

“Today, we don’t even have an estimated timeline, although G7 leaders promised in June that by the end of the year, Ukraine would receive part of this $50 billion. Right now, we do not understand, organizationally, technically, or legally, how this will happen, through which instruments, or under what conditions,” Deputy Head of the Presidential Office, Iryna Mudra, was quoted by RBC-Ukraine as saying.

She added that the €1.4 billion ($1.56 billion) from frozen Russian assets, which the European Union plans to allocate for military purchases for Ukraine, remains in the EU.