giocomai - Network

"No amount of unilateral Ukrainian concessions would address what Russia considers the ‘root causes’ of the conflict."My...

"No amount of unilateral Ukrainian concessions would address what Russia considers the ‘root causes’ of the conflict."

My latest: https://www.balcanicaucaso.org/eng/Areas/Ukraine/Why-Kyiv-cannot-possibly-fix-the-root-causes-of-the-conflict-237613 #Ukraine #Russia

#Romania Already time to vote for Romania's diaspora. Some pics I took earlier today from one of the 965 (!) sections opened abroad...

#Romania Already time to vote for Romania's diaspora. Some pics I took earlier today from one of the 965 (!) sections opened abroad https://www.mae.ro/sites/default/files/file/2025_files/alegeri_2025/pdf_alegeri_2025/lista_sectiilor_de_votare_prezidentiale_2025_site_-_09.04.2025.pdf

screenshots from here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IvqG1hHDxs&t=3515s - after a quote confirming that in the PSD they knew that...

screenshots from here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IvqG1hHDxs&t=3515s - after a quote confirming that in the PSD they knew that Dăncilă had no chance

About #Romania presidential elections. I'm sorry to end up thinking about the parallels between PSD and Viorica Dăncilă back in 2019...

About #Romania presidential elections. I'm sorry to end up thinking about the parallels between PSD and Viorica Dăncilă back in 2019 and USR/Lasconi now. In both cases, the party was fully convinced their party leader had no chance, but confirmed them as candidates. Both Dăncilă and Lasconi took the expectation that they should leave in favour of an alternative candidate as a rallying call, to demonstrate that they "don't give up". These are form Dăncilă's campaign, but could be Lasconi's:

I quite can't still come to terms with Lasconi's positioning after the vote earlier last year. The whole USR party messed up so bad,...

I quite can't still come to terms with Lasconi's positioning after the vote earlier last year. The whole USR party messed up so bad, but she could still be a leader at this very time, and a positive force for her party and a net positive for the quality of the political debate we've been having through these weeks and this very night. And yet, here we are, and in this reality, things are quite the opposite. Sorry about the amount of political goodwill getting wasted #Romania

I find Ponta's political cynicism unbearable, but I still think he has political talent. I thought the same when he left government on a...

I find Ponta's political cynicism unbearable, but I still think he has political talent. I thought the same when he left government on a high risk bet, that he got wrong, and was sidelined within the PSD by people much less talented and smart than himself. Such thirst for power... A career politician and former PM for the most systemic party in Romania trying to pitch himself as an "anti-system" candidate. Even besides his political pivot, it should be too much for #Romania

Don't know if anyone is watching the presidential debate in #Romania for the upcoming vote, but... What a sad show, in so many ways....

Don't know if anyone is watching the presidential debate in #Romania for the upcoming vote, but... What a sad show, in so many ways. Would comment on them, but... Anyway, Simion absent likely because he's sure of reaching the second turn, but not sure about who he'll be against then... Much safer to wait and set up a line when this will be clear.

Current U.S. leadership is...erranterratic

Current U.S. leadership is...

errant
erratic

Russia's youth mostly loyal to the regime, largely because it's not paying attention.> "only about 35% of Russians under the...

Russia's youth mostly loyal to the regime, largely because it's not paying attention.

> "only about 35% of Russians under the age of 25 say they are “more or less closely” following the special military operation in Ukraine (this includes 7% of the whole sample who say they follow it “very closely”), whereas among Russians over 55 the figure is as high as 71% (including 32% who pay close attention)."

in Russian: https://gorby.media/articles/2025/04/02/molodezh-i-vlast-ot-liubvi-do-nenavisti-i-obratno
translated in English: https://russiapost.info/society/young_people #Russia 🇷🇺

Much ado about all U.S. - Russia meetings and the (supposedly) ongoing peace process. But not much really changed over the last couple of...

Much ado about all U.S. - Russia meetings and the (supposedly) ongoing peace process. But not much really changed over the last couple of months, and this take by Heiko Pleines remains 100% correct:

https://laender-analysen.de/ukraine-analysen/311/frieden-ukraine-trump-probleme-und-szenarien/ #Ukraine 🇺🇦

@doncow hosted #mailcow down for almost an hour... all good?

@doncow hosted #mailcow down for almost an hour... all good?

Key to remember that Russian fertisilers are not sanctioned, and indeed their exports are surging around the world, including Europe.>...

Key to remember that Russian fertisilers are not sanctioned, and indeed their exports are surging around the world, including Europe.

> "Russian fertiliser exports to the EU surged by over 33% in 2024 alone", and about doubled in Poland, which is the main importer.

https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/kremlins-fertilizer-cash-stream-is-blind-spot-eu-sanctions-vladimirov-2025-03-14/

Excellent economic perspective on Russia's pre-ceasefire demands: > "Russia’s demands [...] are unfulfillable, and difficult...

Excellent economic perspective on Russia's pre-ceasefire demands:

> "Russia’s demands [...] are unfulfillable, and difficult to understand. It’s either a tactic to frustrate negotiations, or a symptom of incoherence in Russia’s negotiating strategy."
https://en.thebell.io/russias-odd-ceasefire-demands/

Part of the question is if Russia's negotating team believes the US can deliver on those demands/can strongarm EU into complying. Russia is either assuming or testing if this is the case. #Russia

"Armenia and Azerbaijan agreed on peace — so why do they seem headed for...

"Armenia and Azerbaijan agreed on peace — so why do they seem headed for war?"
https://oc-media.org/armenia-and-azerbaijan-agreed-on-peace-so-why-do-they-seem-headed-for-war/

The article suggests an all out war is highly unlikely, but I actually think it is a distinct possibility

Nice read, with context on disgust itself, and what it is, really"Adjust your disgust - The future of food is nutritious and...

Nice read, with context on disgust itself, and what it is, really

"Adjust your disgust - The future of food is nutritious and sustainable – if we can overcome our instinctual revulsion to insects and lab-grown meat"
https://aeon.co/essays/would-you-eat-a-cockroach-what-if-it-was-sterilised-why-not

Good summary and analysis of the readouts of the Putin-Trump call by Paul Goode"Quick Take: Kremlin and White House Communications...

Good summary and analysis of the readouts of the Putin-Trump call by Paul Goode
"Quick Take: Kremlin and White House Communications Provide Insight after Trump-Putin Call"
https://carleton.ca/eetn/2025/quick-take-trump-and-putin-talk/ #Russia 🇷🇺

Good BBC Russia podcast on the current state of affairs in the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflictЧто это было?: Армения и...

Good BBC Russia podcast on the current state of affairs in the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict

Что это было?: Армения и Азербайджан помирились?

Episode webpage: https://www.bbc.com/russian/podcasts/p076qqzl/p0kyw07g

Media file: http://open.live.bbc.co.uk/mediaselector/6/redir/version/2.0/mediaset/audio-nondrm-download-rss-low/proto/http/vpid/p0kyvztw.mp3

New measures to facilitate local production of renewable energy introduced in Transnistria...

New measures to facilitate local production of renewable energy introduced in Transnistria https://novostipmr.com/ru/news/25-03-19/proizvoditeli-zelenoy-elektroenergii-poluchat-nalogovye-i

Good recap by EuObserver on the state of affairs with military spending across Europe. Among other things, the much debated prominence of...

Good recap by EuObserver on the state of affairs with military spending across Europe. Among other things, the much debated prominence of the US as the main source of weapon systems emerges clearly https://euobserver.com/eu-and-the-world/ar0fa3f12f

New post, in which I indulge in exploring categorisation of text with open LLMs, and along the way incidentally develop an R package to...

New post, in which I indulge in exploring categorisation of text with open LLMs, and along the way incidentally develop an R package to facilitate relevant workflows.

Post: Analysing Russian news via Telegram, processing them with open LLMs - https://tadadit.xyz/posts/2025-03-telegram-ru-news/

Package: `quackingllama`. Basically, a llama that quacks like a duck (or, more technically, a package that relies on `Ollama` for interacting with LLMs, and on DuckDB for caching results). - https://giocomai.github.io/quackingllama/ #rstats