(excerpted from Daily Beast article by Allison Quinn)

Russian authorities have gone all out to tighten their grip on cities taken over by Putin’s troops in east Ukraine.

Ordinary Ukranians are fighting back with arson attacks and poison fruit. That’s not a typo. Actual Poisoned Fruit. (No word on Snow White’s involvement at this time.)

The latest surprise for Russian troops came in Melitopol, where Mayor Ivan Fyodorov said local farmers had caused “mass illness” among Russians by poisoning cherries.

“Our farmers prepared another gift for the Russians: recently treated sweet cherries which caused mass illness among those who stole them from the farmer. It’s the latest kind of partisan resistance on the territory of Melitopol,” Fyodorov told reporters on Thursday.

He said pro-Ukrainian sentiment remains strong in the city, despite Russian authorities portraying themselves as saviors who “rescued” citizens from Ukraine. There is a very big difference between rescued and being forcibly torn away from your country and your lives. It’s like saying that the Jews in World War II concentration camps were “rescued” by the Nazis.

“Melitopol residence fully ignored the celebration of Russian Day. The whole country of Ukraine saw only 15 people of the 70,000 residents who stayed in the temporarily occupied city stood in line for Russian passports,” he said.

Even Russian troops in the Kherson region appeared to be keenly aware of the Ukrainian resistance, according to audio released Thursday by Ukraine’s Security Service. In a nearly two-minute recording as what Ukrainian Intelligence describes as an intercepted call between Putin’s troops, a man identified as a soldier, tells his friends “the guys on the front line there are going crazy. “

“Where they are located…no one is sure about the locals: who they are, what they are doing. Maybe they are f****** with us at night, while they are peaceful people in the day. No one can be trusted. An old woman walking around with pies, might be a f****** Colonel acting as an artillery spotter at night”

Russian authorities have begun opening up passport processing centers in the occupied territories, and in Kherson, residents were informed this week that any babies born after February 21, would be given Russian passports, Russia’s Ria-Novosti news agency reported.

But Ukrainian residents are not letting the Russians get off easy for the forced “Russification”. A new report by the Institute for the Study of War this week listed a series of recent guerilla style attacks by Ukrainian partisans in cities including Berdyansk and Mariupol.

UESLEI MARCELINO

“Russian authorities are continuing to face difficulties implementing their occupation agendas due to pro-Ukrainian pressure in occupied areas,” the report noted, describing teachers refusing to teach under Russian curricula in Berdyansk, and unidentified Ukrainian partisans targeting staffers of Russian’s emergency ministry in Mariupol.

Petro Andriushchenko, an aid to the Mariupol mayor described the latter incident in a post on Telegram on Wednesday. He said two tractors and three large truck trailers parked outside the Russian’s Emergency Ministry headquarters “suddenly” went up in flames on June 9, due to an arson attack. Two days later, he said, on the even of the city’s “Day of Russia” celebration, a staffer for the same ministry was stabbed in the back while standing in a crowd.

“The injury turned out to be fatal,” he said. “We’re talking to you, scum. Start looking behind you. Retribution is already near.”

Namaste,

Idealisticrebel