Love in the Time of Cholera

A woman walks outside a shopping mall as black smoke rises over an oil refinery in the south-eastern suburbs of Moscow, Russia. Photo: AFP/Getty Images.

Handstand

A painting of a gymnast doing a handstand has popped up on the wall of a destroyed building in Borodyanka, Bucha Raion, Kyiv Oblast, Ukraine, and appears to be a work of British street artist Banksy. Photo: Andrew Kravchenko/AP.

Actually Factually

In a talk show interview on Rete 4, Under-Secretary of the Presidency of the Council with responsibility for the security of the Republic, Franco Gabrielli, gave his impression on the Bucha killings (as far as it is known so far): “Doubtless it was a massacre, but we have to be very cautious about responsibilities. In such cases, one needs to strip away self-confidence and Manichaeism”. Such words, coming from a high-profile official, do suggest one should be careful not to jump to hasty conclusions. “Also because if there are situations that can be represented in different ways, the damage to the credibility of a narrative may be devastating”, Gabrielli says. “Let’s stick to facts, let’s stick to satellite analysis, let’s stick to eyewitness accounts, always bearing in mind that wars bring with them forms of degeneration and mystification. I’m always suspicious of easy, simple answers to complex problems”, especially when such answers are dictated by “prejudice in favour of one rather than another”.

The Parting of the Sea

But as they say, what goes around comes around. And so all those Ukrainians who jump the queue of different coloured people, get through the Shehyni–Medyka border crossing, and take at least one day and one night to get Calais on their way to Albion, are being denied entry to UK as an indirect consequence of new visa policies aimed at reducing as much as possible an Ukrainian diaspora to Britain. Welcome in the old Europe.

Willy Stöwer, Titanic Sinking, 1912. Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

The War of the Poor

Not only Indian students, but also Africans and Asians are facing racial discrimination in Ukraine, as they are prevented from exiting the country through the border with Poland by Ukrainian police and paramilitary groups, who continually send differently coloured people off to the back of the queue to the shout of “Ukrainians first”. Welcome to the new Europe.

Ivan Alekseevich Vladimirov, In the queue for bread. First World War, before 1947. Courtesy of WikiArt.

Lockdowns on Trial

Indian physician and International Master of chess Anwesh Upadhyaya shared with the The Indian Express his fears and apprehensions at being stuck in his apartment alone in Kyiv (Kiev), Ukraine, where he is doing his apprenticeship as a gastroenterologist at one of the city hospitals. With the city under siege — and with a curfew being called until Monday — it is almost inevitable to fall prey to bad thoughts, although for now he still has enough to eat. “The Indian Embassy has asked people to stay indoors and not go out”, Upadhyaya said, in the hope that sooner or later they may “ensure a safe evacuation”, by a flight which he and many his compatriots are anxiously wishing. As for power and potable water supply, “so far everything is working fine by God’s grace”, he said. Photo: Valentyn Ogirenko/Reuters.

Teleportation

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Oleksandrovych Zelenskyy’s face can be seen on a TV as it broadcasts CNN from a top room inside the White House in Washington, D.C., United States. Photo: Leah Millis/Reuters.