australian prime minister had to say today. he mentioned this squatter who since last week has refused to leave the site. he has diplomatic immunity. here is what anthony albanese had to say earlier today. look, russia will never, ever build its embassy on that site. we respect the rule of law. russia hasn t had a great record of respecting the rule of law lightly, whether it be domestically, the way it behaves towards its own citizens or whether their interpretation of international law. we are very confident of our position. we expected russia to react badly. we had this rather bizarre demonstration outside the house on saturday by pro-russian demonstrators. i wasn t even there. but i think we anticipated this.
public spat with the minister of defense, who is, in, fact the person who he was ultimately targeting it is insurrection. that kind of spat was the first time in many years that people in russia who have actual power who have things to say but have no power, the people with actual power we re having a public disagreement. that is really what a lot of politics is about. russia hasn t seen that kind of politics and decades. we talked about some things, it was surprising to you that we have not seen them in the past 48 hours? that we haven t seen putin? we haven t seen putin and we haven t seen well, it s interesting. putin, you know, we know how careful putin.
system. russia hasn t entered the 21st century in economic and power turns. it is an autocracy. worse, a addidictatorship. to the point of prigozhin living safely in belarus. i m not sure that lukashenko is not looking over his shoulder. putin bailing him out. got the forging of elections a couple years ago. mass arrests of people on the streets. perhaps prigozhin provides lukashenko with a counter weight to putin s influence. what we re witnessing hear, and it will be easy to see when we look back in a year, is the break-up of a system that has been in place for a long time. lukashenko has been in power, he s way past, for decades.
there, have achieved what they wanted to, and outrageous business last week when he was claiming that he was going to withdraw his forces, is an indication of the disharmony on the russian side. look at it from ukrainian point of view and the western ally supporting ukrainians point of view, this is very good. yes, frankly, i think the russians are showing themselves to be in some disarray. themselves to be in some disarray- themselves to be in some disarra . ., , ., , disarray. he wrote in february that russian disarray. he wrote in february that russian offensive - disarray. he wrote in february that russian offensive was - disarray. he wrote in februaryj that russian offensive was set to fail and bloody fashion. [30 to fail and bloody fashion. do ou to fail and bloody fashion. dr? you think it has? russia hasn t really been able to make much of an offensive and the winter. it might have wanted to do so, it s exhausted itself in a very bloody fashion and trying to take bakhmut and
they advance in hope. his comrade adds they walk towards us with no fear. he says they must be on drugs. russia hasn t given up yet. there artillery still firing. but not as frequently as in the past. ukraine hopes bakhmut will have exhausted their enemy as they now prepare for their own offensive. but it also shows taking ground can prove even more costly. jonathan beale, bbc news, bakhmut. now, a meeting between president biden and congressional leaders over the us debt limit resulted in no progress. leaders from both parties blame each other for the looming crisis