said, but he, it's about building strategic closeness. and the objective is to share a same understanding of the situation affecting our europe. all god does is the of course, this is now amazing that cannot be thought of in isolation from the russian attack and ukraine, you know? yeah, also shut the russian attack on ukraine is a brutal violation of security and peace that we've had in europe over the last decades. opa optimed unit unit, i would like to note some negative trends in the economy. consumer demand still remains weak, pretty them. it's important to understand that the sanctions pressure on russia will only intensified also on the day reactions are snowballing after a damning report on systemic abuse and the world's biggest professional women's soccer league. the players are demanding consequences all the way to the top. and it's my opinion that every owner, an executive, and you a soccer official who has repeatedly failed the players and fail to protect the players who have hidden behind legalities and have not participated fully in these at nist, investigations should be gone. ah, a 5 story apartment building at the crack of dawn, hardly a military target, and yet a residential part of southern ukrainian supper regio came under russian fire twice to day, leaving several residents dead and many more injured. a horrifying reminder of russia's ruthlessness as war coverage had all been shifted to ukraine's battle ground gains. in the past week's fulton's troops have been pushed further and further out of occupied territories, with surprisingly bold criticism of russia's military leadership growing louder by the day. gutted by russian rockets here ins apparition rescue workers searched the rebel from missing residence. local officials say several people were killed while moore had been hospitalized off the initial dawn attack fire fighters headed to the scene. but a 2nd salvo, sen, locals running for cover as well. as rescue workers, prison zelinski condemned the strikes was a but easier beast parisha after the 1st rocket strike today, when people came to pick apart the rebel, russia conducted a 2nd rocket strike, the absolute vileness absolute evil. up and there have been thousands of instances of this already, and there could be thousands more. unfortunately, he shannon, as rathermore humbled locals were left reeling through them. why are they doing this to us? what are they trying to prove? killing or people? why 4 walked the attacks comes, ukraine continues to force russian troops back in the south and east with these ukranian troops and the don bass telling french reporters that they were using shells captured from the russians with winter. fast approaching, keep seems determined to press its current advantage, as long as it can. and we can now bring in doctor j mclinn. she's a senior researcher at the monterrey initiative in russian studies. dr. mclean, welcome back to the day. buttons, troops keep moving backwards with ukraine pushing further and further into occupied territories. are we at a turning point of the war? we're certainly seeing the tight turning in the wall. i'm, as you say, you cranes in liberating more and more of its territory. 400 square kilometers of hudson region in a matter of days and the russian army, we've seen large numbers of surrendering. clearly it's quite unable to get itself together. and yet, while it's clear that ukraine is in a relatively relative to earlier position, relatively strong position, it feels to see exactly what this turning point might need to. and what road we are we're turning into. i mentioned earlier in your report, we saw that russia on straight on apartment blocks as people were, sleep, to sleeping in the city of separation, which russia claims as its own, despite not having a defect and control. and then in light of comments later on in the day that the situation is new territories, as he would call them would stabilize. it's quite hard not to worry that this is an ominous portion of what is to come on. and that's what always happens when rushes on the back foot, as we've seen in syria and in chechnya and ukraine, 2014, that it reacts by fire fighting, harder and ugly, and with less concern the for life, its own and others. these continued setbacks that we've been seeing over the past weeks have triggered an unprecedented wave of criticism towards putin's top brass in the russian installed head of the occupied her san region even suggested the defense minister shoot himself. how much credibility is this costing putin and his cronies? so 1st i, most of the, the russian saw them head of the hassle region to say that show you the minister ventured she herself, is really just beyond remarkable to, to be witnessing this sort of breakdown and discipline, normally these sorts of collaborators. you know, they do as they're told, they pretend everything's fine, but k does no longer tangible. things are a breaking point. so your question of credibility is very pertinent one. clearly, reality is starting to bite free. the mirage, though, i would say that is perhaps still to seem to talk about it, costing putin directly. i think instead, what we're going to see is criticism of officials and p different people trying to blame different people but, but not directly through to another. one of the very vocal critics of what is happening on the battlefield was the infamous chechen leader around on cartier of he accused the russian military of incompetence and nepotism. and he now claimed that the kremlin promoted him to general. what do you make of that? it would appear that he has been permitted to general, which i think is probably a new of how much the criminal on sticky. he durham inside the tent, but you're quite right alongside you're getting beggars in. for example, founder of the wagner group of mercenaries they've, together, they've been ridiculing the generals saying that the military rental group nepotism, that the senior officers should be sent the front to tone for their sins in blood. and in terms of accusations of incompetence, nepotism, i'm actually ford said one mind who have general good air of i think he's correct. the system that is created in russia is one on this riddled with incompetence of cronyism. and that really has ended up being making the system is for his own worst enemy. it's why the military isn't this modernized, and it's why the military is not doing as well as kaylee all that money didn't, didn't go on modernizing the army cutter of has been pushing for a more drastic approach by the russian army openly pushing for the use of nuclear weapons actually with increasing battlefield losses. does that option become more likely in your opinion? to sure, an honest answer here is i don't know, and i don't think we can ever be flipping about the use of nuclear weapons though that said it's also not wise to, to sort of scam longer or to be seen to give into nuclear black mail services of course, it's an incredibly difficult, i think so far. we've seen that in general, if one stands up to putins frets without sort of being deliberately escalate to re, than he tends to give in. so over sweden and finland joining nato ukraine itself, right back with the u. s. delivering i. mars. so i was russia likes to bring up his nuclear superpower status. i don't think we should necessarily interpret that as a readiness to, to use nuclear weapons. i think if that was going to happen, that we would start to see certain activities rather than just language in and thank god we haven't seen that yet. in recent days, we've seen many russian men who have been drafted as part of this mobilization complaining about the conditions they live in that they're being sent into bow without a 2nd. even of training or instruction. i mean that cannot be in the kremlin interest . why is this mobilization so chaotic is it's incredibly chaotic. and i mean, i even saw an account to day of people being told of men being told to go by bicycle helmets because there were no military helmets available. and they were not even to buy. but i think the reason for the chaos is because the russian state itself is so inefficient and square arctic again, going back to that corruption, we were just speaking about the military of york. see quite clearly is not capable of handling large scale mobilization of this kind and that's where the chaos comes from. now, while all of this is happening, scores of ukrainians continue to try and escape the war every day. and i want to talk about a specific group of them that are stranded in hostile russia trying to cross into each country estonia. how do they get there? and what's their situation? i know you've been following it. yes, i spent home a fair amount of time in discovery gin, which is the region that borders is dania. so i've been following this situation. i closely there, of course, very long queues up to 5 days in her end isn't very cold conditions. i wish to scoff, residents are trying to help with that. i'm. it's difficult. the delays come from the russians. i don't mean some of the people in this, you know, old. some of the quite a lot of them are ukranian and there's a large contingent for murray pool and they've lot, they've ended up. they're largely after passing through. i'm filtrate. secret filtration comes which they, we check all because the only way to escape the shelling the destruction of their city was basically to flee into other areas of occupied ukraine. and it's worth noting as well the under occupational mar, you pull most. murray, poor residents became convinced that they're no longer is it ukraine. so shut off. are they from? from the outside world. the, the key of is in smithereens that everything is destroyed and that they might to so go to crimea. clearly learning that that's not the case. now, quite a few of them are trying to get back on to ukraine by the you, or at least just to leave russia desolate situation there. dr. james glenn at the monterrey initiative in russian studies. always a pleasure talking to you. thank you so much for your time. thank you. ah. more than 40 leaders from around europe have met in prague for the 1st meeting of the new european political community. this european union initiative brings together e leaders with countries beyond the blocks orders including britain, turkey, ukraine, switzerland, and norway. the 1st meeting took place as europe is dealing with an energy crisis and economic turmoil that has been, were sent by russia's war in ukraine. the inaugural summits of the european political community brought together $44.00 european heads of state and government . the meeting in prague was attended by all 27 e u members. the u. accession candidates, an ex member, a neighboring countries. they all agreed on the need to discuss a common strategy regarding russian aggression in ukraine, thus as good. this is good for peace and security. and of course it's also good because the european union can then improve relations with its neighbors. many of whom want to become members of the european union for beth on the summit is also being attended by serbia, which has traditionally been closer to russia. and by turkey, which has a strained relationship with the you. the possibility of closer ties with the e u, even brought armenian azerbaijan, currently in conflict with each other into the same room, even without resolutions, the new community wants to form a common strategy for supporting ukraine. you the biggest hunter than the poor, the you member in you candidates or ex member ford, we do share a common region and often a common history that you can make it up to us to shape our future together. an avenue the ukraine crisis is also creating new divisions. germany's proposed 200000000000 euro scheme to caution high energy builds, has been questioned. the german economy is so large that the assistance that the german government is giving to its businesses could distort the common market. i with within the european union, the 27 e u member states. a said to talk on friday about how germany and the you can together help to bring down energy prices. thorough proposals on the table, but time is pressing because winter is coming. systemic verbal and emotional abuse and sexual misconduct as a result of a culture that normalizes inappropriate and harmful behavior. that's the damning result of an investigation into practices in the united states. professional women, soccer league. the theme is reeling and reactions have been swift. the governing body, he was soccer as promised, wide reaching changes. the owners of 2 clubs have removed themselves from any decision making processes. and one club has fired 2 executives, but that is them little to comfort players. here's us defender becky sovereign. the players are not doing well. we are horrified and heartbroken, and frustrated and exhausted, and really, really angry. we are angry that it took a 3rd party investigation. we are angry that it took an article in the athletic and the washington post and numerous others were angry that it took over 200 people, sharing their trauma to get to this point right now. and i think for so long this is always fallen on the player to, to man change. and that is because the people in authority and decision making positions have repeatedly failed to protect us. and they have failed to hold themselves and each other accountable. for more, let's bring in 2 journalists who have covered the story extensively. meredith cash senior sports reporter for business insider in new york city, and molly cal lane, senior tv reporter for ad week and host of the podcast, most powerful women in sports. welcome to you both, and i do want to start with you, meredith. the allegations had been floating around for quite some time. what did this report now reveal that was an already known? i think the biggest thing is the depth of the understanding of the abuse and to be negligence, that allowed it to go on for as long as it happened. another big major component of this that was unknown previously was the entire situation that happened at racing, louisville, f. c with head coach christy holly. we knew previously that he was terminated rather abruptly and that it was connected to allegations of misconduct. but the story with his player and you know, for anyone who read the investigation, the opening anecdote regarding an incident that happened one on one with a player during the film room viewing. none of that was known prior to this report. so all of that was rather staggering, and i think more than anything the depth of knowledge of all of this was alarming for everyone. molly, the fall out has been huge head start rolling as soon as the report came out, but that's not going to solve the problem. is it? i wish it did, but it's not. it means more than that. there was tremendous reporting that magland hannah molly hensley clancy did last year. that really got the investigation started back then you saw 5 of the 10 coaches were out of a league by the end of the year, but then you have a year later the report comes out and there's more we don't even now. so getting rid of a few people in the report isn't going to solve the problem that it's for, which is a league in which misconduct has been systemic across coaches, players leaks it, it needs a complete overhaul. how can it be tackled though, meredith, where to start? this is a web of abuse, condemnation complicity and fear. where do you start to overhaul that and rebuild the structure basically from scratch? i think the biggest issue that was laid out pretty well in an e 60 report that aired the night after on sally yates's report was released. i was, you know, the fundamental issues at the core of this that allowed such misconduct proliferate . and that's the fact that there's insecurity within the women's professional soccer at large. and there has been since its founding before the national women soccer league on came to be in 2013. there were 2 previous leagues, both of which folded after 3 years. and so by the time you get to the end w, a cell players who are there are just feeling great old to have a position to play professional soccer. and so they tolerated behavior and on facilities and compensation that was just sub standard. as a result, no one wanted to be the whistleblower who brought the entire league down and so they put up with things that they shouldn't have. and so i think part of the project that is rebuilding the n w a cell that's already under way for what it's worth since these initial allegations came to light late last year is to is to build a stronger structurally sound league that doesn't have these loopholes that allows players to feel competent in speaking their truth and, and demanding what their work. molly, you have looked into their response of v and w. s. l. sponsors to the report and they seem to be struggling to say the least to find an appropriate way to react something struggling is to put it a little lightly, but to be fair, they were probably pretty blindsided. just as a lot of us were. that hadn't seen the report and didn't fully know the extent, but my colleague, jason naughty, and i pretty much 48 hours straight up. the report came out reaching out to sponsored across the league and specific teams as well. pacifically teams like the red star support. thorne's racing louisville teams that were really named in the report. so we reached out to 19, we heard back from 10 since then a couple more have really statements, but it's been a lot of corporate jargon, a lot of deeply disturbed, which i'm sure they are as we all are. but i think what a lot of the brands and sponsors either don't want to realign or just haven't realized, is the power a lot of the power live with them to. it's been a lot of we can't, we need to see what the end of the we're hoping for change. so we all are. but if these brands want to continue on training and, and, and i hope they do because i don't want the leakage old. nobody wants to lead to old and you need sponsors. they need to use their power as fosters and they're spending power to try and force the end of the change and for what it's worth. i really do, believe us dr. in the end of the are committed to meaningful change and i've already started making those. but one concert reaction that really did stand up to me was allied financial. their nationwide sponsored lead kit on for lead sponsor. so they're c o andrew, rumors calling from meaningful change to find the truth, no matter how painful. and i'd like to see more brands react like that. how else the teams reacted because this investigation was focused on 3 teams in particular, meredith did one of these teams stick out with a particularly good response in your view. honestly, no. i wouldn't say that any one teams response has been particularly impressive. the portland thorns did part ways with 2 executives who were known for a while now to have been aware of the abuse and have essentially turned a blind eye. and given a vote of confidence to paul riley as he went from the portland thorns to the north carolina courage, another team in the league. but you know, the portland thorne's owner, mary paulson was also aware of these allegations. also voiced confidence and support for paul riley as he moved on to another team within the league, knowing what he had done within their own franchise. and you know, as long as he is the person who has the most power in that franchise, i don't think that's good enough personally. and i think a lot of fans and a lot of players have voiced the same opinion. becky sour brung the player, you just played a sound bite from voice the same thing during her recent her recent interviews. yep . and i think that's true across the board, right. i think in louisville with christy holly and with worry dames in chicago with the red stars. there were people in positions of power who knew and are still in positions of power within those franchises. and none of the 3 have gone as far as to lead out. every single person who knew and until that happens, i don't think players will be satisfied nor will fans a lot of work ahead for the and w. s. l meredith cashed visits. insider and molly calhane of ad week. thank you so much for your time. thank you. ah. the swedish academy in stockholm has awarded this year's nobel prize in literature to the french author. i need no, no is a professor of literature as well as a writer. she was born in 1940 and grew up in normandy for literary work is mostly autobiographical and maintains close links with sociology won't. and terry anders olson explained some of the reasons why the swedish academy shows or no for this year is award. i knew was born in 1914 and grew up in the little town of eve tool in normandy as setting was poor, but ambitious. and in her ever, she consistently explores the experience of alive, marked by great disparities regarding gender language and class. i literally work dealing with her class experience and rude background began earlier as a memory project with ambition, a widening of the boundaries of literature beyond fiction, in the narrow sense, in its reconstruction of the past, it liens on marcella posts. i love a sharp street, don't pell do, but she guides the search in an entirely new direction. despite or consciously plain literary style, she declares that she isn't quote, if knowledge east of herself and quote, rather than a writer of fiction, is nobela committee chair. and there's also explaining why the swedish academy shows at no for this year's nobel prize and literature. and that is unfortunately already our time for today. but as always, the conversation continues online. you'll find this on twitter at cdw news and myself at nicole underscore who do be in touch for now though. thank you so much for spending part of your day with a, with a to the point in strong opinion. so your position, international perspectives. protests in iran are gaining momentum led initially by women and girls, crime women, life liberty. they are now drawing thousands on to the streets. iran rises up, can be toppled. find out on to the point with freedom. so to successfully, with african american business, people on the report the all the 2nd largest community of median and their members growing america was black up applause. reach successful and power in 5 minutes on d w. o. listen carefully. don't know how to miss today. ah, feel the magic discover the world around you. subscribe to d w documentary on youtube. with protests in iran are gaining momentum lead initially by women and girls crying women life liberty after the death of a young kurdish women detained for wearing her headscarf inappropriately. the uprising is now drawing thousands of others under the streets. the protest.