MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
For more on that pain, we're going to hear now how this is being seen from the other side of this conflict - Russia. NPR's Charles Maynes is in Moscow. Charles, welcome back.
CHARLES MAYNES, BYLINE: Hi there.
MARTIN: So how are these attacks being presented where you are?
MAYNES: Well, you know, I think it's important to note that Russians live in an information bubble, with independent media blocked or in some cases criminalized. So what most Russians will hear is the official government version of events, which is this.
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DMITRY PESKOV: (Non-English language spoken).
MAYNES: So this is the Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, who says that Russian President Vladimir Putin was informed by his top general of these latest retaliatory strikes on Kyiv, adding that the attacks exclusively targeted military or what he called near military installations. So there's no, you know, attention to the human cause, certainly nothing about apartment buildings being struck, unless you turn on a virtual private network - a VPN - to search for outside news. And meanwhile, Russians will hear about deaths of Russian civilians, which is happening, of course. One woman, for example, died this morning in the border region of Belgrade from a Ukrainian drone attack. And that's what Russian authorities say is part of this wider attack by Ukraine on civilian infrastructure.
MARTIN: OK, civilian infrastructure. Ukraine has been hitting oil and gas facilities in Russia for months. Is that what they're referring to?
MAYNES: Yeah. Yeah. And that's what's causing huge problems here, most notably with gas at the pump, as Joanna just alluded to in her segment. There's simply not enough of it. There are now massive lines at gas stations, we're talking sometimes miles long, as people try and fill up the tank. And that's prompted some innovative solutions.
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UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Non-English language spoken).
MAYNES: So this is a clip from social media where this gentleman is offering to pick up your car and sit in line for you for hours for a small fee, about 80 bucks. Now, the severity of this gas deficit varies from region to region. But this is now clearly a nationwide problem, one impacting not only commuter drivers, but industries like agriculture, trucking and logistics, really anything that relies on fuel. And needless to say, this is a pretty remarkable thing for a country that is a major world energy exporter and producer.
And so it's come on top of these other problems as well. We have rising taxes, inflation, bans on use of messaging apps that nobody seems to like. There are these near-daily drone attacks we've been talking about, and of course, massive casualties. And that's already contributing to a sense of fatigue and pessimism about the war and where the country's headed.
MARTIN: OK. What is the government telling its people about that?
MAYNES: Well, President Putin portrays these Ukrainian attacks as an attempt to undermine Russian society, which Putin says will fail. To a degree, the president has acknowledged the gas problem but insists that it's not critical. His energy minister has downplayed it even more, saying there's no deficit at all, it's just a logistics snafu. But people can see the lines. They can see the rising prices and hoarding. They see the double think, which in some ways also applies to the battlefield. You know, Putin continues to insist Russian forces are on the march, while outside analysts say Russia is making incremental gains at best.
MARTIN: Where do things go from here?
MAYNES: Well, as Joanna was explaining, Ukraine's goal is to force Putin to the negotiating table by bringing the war home. And there is pressure to end the war because of the state of the economy, because of war fatigue and all these other things we've been talking about. But there's a flip side here. Pressure to end the war is also coming from nationalists inside Russia who say Putin needs to punch harder. And if anything, these latest attacks on Kyiv suggest he might be listening to them.
MARTIN: That's NPR's Charles Maynes in Moscow. Charles, thank you.
(SOUNDBITE OF ENSEMBLE CONTRASTE'S "PARAPHRASE GNOSSIENNE") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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