JRL NEWSWATCH: “West cranks up costs for Russia as war enters second month” – AP
“… Opening the NATO summit, Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said the alliance is ‘determined to continue to impose costs on Russia to bring about the end of this brutal war.’ …. [I]nstead of swiftly toppling Ukraine’s government, [Russia’s] forces are bogged down in a grinding military campaign and its economy is laboring under punishing international sanctions. … [I]n many areas, Ukrainian forces appear to have battled Russian troops to a stalemate …. Russian troops are bombarding targets from afar, falling back on tactics they used in reducing cities to rubble in Syria and Chechnya. … NATO estimates … that between 7,000 and 15,000 Russian troops have been killed — the latter figure about what Russia lost in a decade … in Afghanistan. Ukraine also claims to have killed six Russian generals. Russia acknowledges just one. … [S]ome fear the Kremlin could resort to other, more destructive weapons in its arsenal. …”