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At around 3 am, on Thursday 24th February 2022, Russian President Putin announced, via a pre recorded message that Russia had launched a full scale invasion of Ukraine in response, he said, to threats from the country. Explosions were heard in cities across Ukraine and initial reports of casualties by around 7am GMT  at least eight people had been killed and nine injured by the Russian shelling. I watched on TV in disbelief and horror, with millions of others around the world, as Russian tanks rolled across the border and reporters told of the escalating situation, minute by minute. Russian President  Vladimir  Putin   had  announced in a pre-recorded  broadcast that he had ordered "a special military operation" in eastern Ukraine in response, he said, to Ukraine aggression.  The Ukraine   Border Service said  that its border posts with  Belarus and Russia   were under attack and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy declared...

I do wish people would stop describing the worst areas of our country and communities as “like Beirut”. Areas which are constantly suffering from anti-social behaviour and criminal activity are often referred to in this way. A newspaper report tells us that residents in the Page Hall area of Sheffield say that they are living in a “hell hole which belongs in downtown Beirut, not 21st century South Yorkshire”. Note - not even just Beirut, but downtown Beirut. Now I am not for one moment suggesting that Page Hall is not experiencing serious problems (as are many areas, with the numbers of incidents increasing) There are reports of appalling behaviour, with partying till all hours with loud music, people living far too many to one house to be either healthy, safe or legal, car racing, rubbish being thrown on the streets and into others gardens and other totally unacceptable ways of living within a community. They are particularly despondent and despairing that the efforts that were pu...