At the bottom of the Baltic

After an unexpected attack of Hamas on Israel, a situation arose in which news about the war in Ukraine almost disappeared from the media. This is what Russia and Iran were talking about, and both countries are behind Hamas' bloody aggression. There is besides Iranian Hezbollah in Lebanon on standby and announces action in due time. What will Putin's forces do in Syria? We do not know, but the Russians are busy on the Ukrainian front, they are besides active in the Baltic basin. They just damaged the gas pipeline connecting Estonia to Finland, lying at the bottom of the sea, as the paper “The Australian” (12 October 2023) says – “Finger pointed at Russia after pipelina attack”... And according to the NATO Convention, any attack on underwater infrastructure could be the basis for consulting allies and for taking retaliatory steps, including an option to launch Article 5 of the defence agreement.

The situation is serious, winter is coming, and the damaged gas pipeline can be closed for months. What's next? I hope NATO doesn't sleep its chances, due to the fact that it's in danger of disaster and for Europe.

Marek Baterovich

Marek Baterowicz (born 1944) made his debut as a poet in the pages of "The Weekly of the Common" and "The Student" (1971). Book debut - "Verses to Dawn" (W-wa, 1976); the title was an allusion to the night of PRL. In 1981, he published outside censorship a collection of poems entitled "Having broken branches of silence". Since 1985 on emigration, since 1987 in Australia. Author of respective prose titles(M.in "The Seed Rises in the Hurt"-1992 and 2017) and many poesy collections, specified as "The Heart and Fist" (Sydney, 1987), "From that side of the tree" (Melbourne, 1992 – poems collected), "Place in the atlas" (Sydney, 1996), "Chair and Shadow" (Sydney,2003), "On the Sun leash" (Sydney, 2008). In 2010 in Italy there was a selection of poems – "Canti del pianoa", followed by "Status quo" (Toronto, 2014), a collection of short stories – "Jeu de masques" (Nantes, 2014), "Over large Water" (Sydney, 2015) and an e-book of his naval novel, settled in the 16th century "Aux vents conjurés". (www.polskacanada.com/aux-vents-conjures-par-marker-batter