Putin is trying to punish Prigozhin allies
Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, has indicated that he will punish those who facilitated Wagner mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigozhin’s uprising this weekend. But the Wagner leader’s deep ties to the ruling elite complicate those efforts.
Putin fueled speculation about wider repression during a private meeting with Russian media figures at the Kremlin on Tuesday, where he said he dug into Prigozhin’s lucrative business contracts with the Russian defense ministry. Pre-war Russian blogs reported that authorities were investigating military members associated with Prigozhin, but those reports could not be independently confirmed.
US officials are still trying to determine whether a top Russian general, Sergei Surovikin, who has significant support in his military, helped plan the mutiny led by Prigozhin. He has not been seen in public since Saturday morning.
Background: After a career in the shadows, Prigozhin turned himself into a public figure in the past year, casting himself as a tough mercenary leader far more effective than the traditional military. He regularly berated and belittled military leaders such as Sergei Shoigu, the Russian defense minister.
Wagner’s new home? Satellite images show that Belarus is rapidly building what appear to be temporary structures on an abandoned military base, revealing a possible location for the group’s fighters.
News from the war:
The death toll from the strike at a popular restaurant in Ukraine’s Kramatorsk has risen to 11.
The Pentagon said it would send another $500 million in weapons, including another 55 armored vehicles and minefield clearance equipment.
A Times analysis shows how Ukraine’s terrain is hampering the country’s counter-offensive.
Material recovered from submersible Titan
Debris and suspected human remains from the submarine Titan have been recovered and brought back ashore nearly a week after an international search and rescue operation ended and the ship’s five passengers were presumed dead. According to the US Coast Guard, the submarine suffered a “catastrophic implosion” with no survivors.
At a Canadian Coast Guard pier in St. John’s, Newfoundland, crews unloaded what appeared to be the Titan’s 7-meter-tall hull, wrinkled and twisted with exposed wires and cables. The debris will be taken to a U.S. port where the U.S. Coast Guard’s Marine Board of Investigation will conduct analysis and testing.
Medical professionals “will conduct a formal analysis of suspected human remains carefully recovered from the wreckage at the scene of the incident,” the Coast Guard said in a statement.
Research: The salvaged debris could contain vital information about exactly what happened to the Titan, experts said. Investigators would look for three things: a point of hull failure; how bits of carbon fiber and titanium, the materials of the submarine, were bonded together; and whether any electronic data could be recovered.
Wildfire smoke in the US
Thick smoke from wildfires in Canada has once again covered large parts of the US, warning residents to stay indoors. Air quality in several major cities, including Detroit and Indianapolis, fell well into the “very unhealthy” category, and smoke has drifted east toward New York. Follow the forecast with our map.
In Canada, nearly 500 active wildfires raged early yesterday, officials said, and more than 250 burned out of control, in one of the worst wildfire seasons in decades. Climate change has turned once improbably high temperatures into more mundane occurrences and intensified conditions fueling catastrophic wildfires and their effects on air quality.
Canada’s wildfire season usually doesn’t begin until early July, and the fires are likely to get even bigger, said David Brown, an air quality meteorologist with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency. As a result, hazardous air quality could threaten the northern United States for weeks.
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Cherishing the future of Mercedes: A closer look at Gwen Lagrue, the F1 talent guru tasked with scouting, recruiting and coaching the likes of George Russell and Esteban Ocon.
From the time: Star gymnast Simone Biles, whose performance at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics was disrupted by mental health problems and who has not competed since, may be planning a comeback a year before the Paris Games.
ART AND IDEAS
Silly AI detection tools
Did the Pope carry Balenciaga? Could Elon Musk have kissed a lifelike robot?
AI-generated images depicting such scenes threaten society’s ability to separate fact from fiction. To clear up the confusion, a fast-growing group of companies are now offering services to detect what’s real and what’s not using advanced algorithms.
But some technology leaders and disinformation experts have expressed concern that advancements in AI will always stay one step ahead of tools. The Times tested five new services, using more than 100 synthetic images and real photos. Often the services were right, but not always.