A strike by Russian forces hit residential buildings in the eastern region of Kharkiv, killing a 10-year-old boy and injuring nearly two dozen others, Ukrainian officials said Friday. The strike comes a day after a Russian missile strike on the eastern Ukrainian village of Hroza on Thursday, killing at least 52 people who had gathered for a wake. Read our blog to see how the day's events unfolded. All times are Paris time (GMT+2).
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10:38pm: US slams Russia plan to reverse nuclear test ban pact ratification
The United States is "disturbed" by a Russian envoy's announcement that Moscow will reverse its ratification of the 1996 Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), a State Department spokesperson said on Friday.
"A move like this by any state signatory needlessly endangers the global norm against nuclear explosive testing," the spokesperson said in a statement.
7:54pm: US expels two Russian diplomats in reciprocal step
The United States said Friday it was expelling two Russian diplomats, a retaliatory step after Moscow kicked out two Americans last month.
"In response to the Russian Federation's specious expulsion of two US embassy Moscow diplomats, the State Department reciprocated by declaring persona non grata two Russian embassy officials operating in the United States," a State Department spokesperson said.
Russia said last month that it was expelling two US diplomats for liaising with a Russian citizen who had formerly worked at the US consulate in the Far Eastern city of Vladivostok, Robert Shonov.
Russia arrested Shonov in August on charges of passing along what it called confidential information on Ukraine.
The State Department "will not tolerate the Russian government's pattern of harassment of our diplomats", the spokesperson said.
"The Department's actions send a clear message that unacceptable actions against our embassy personnel in Moscow will have consequences."
7:13pm: Zelensky warns Russia will 'again try to destroy' power grid
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned Friday that Russia will "again try to destroy" Ukraine's power grid this winter and that Kyiv was making "preparations" to protect its heating facilities.
"This winter, Russian terrorists will again try to destroy our power system," Zelensky said in his daily evening address. "We are fully aware of the danger," he said, adding Kyiv was making "preparations for winter, (for) the protection of our generating facilities and provision of electricity and heat."
5:00pm: 'Concerning' if Russia considering quitting treaty, says nuclear-test-ban body
The head of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) said on Friday that for Russia to consider pulling out of the treaty would be "concerning" after Moscow indicated it was moving towards revoking its ratification.
"The Russian Federation has consistently reaffirmed its strong support of the CTBT since its very inception," CTBTO chief Robert Floyd said in a statement. "It would be concerning and deeply unfortunate if any State Signatory were to reconsider its ratification of the CTBT."
4:48pm: A sixth of village population die in missile strike on Ukraine's Hroza
The death toll from a Russian missile strike on the village of Hroza in northeastern Ukraine rose to 52 on Friday after another victim died overnight in hospital, the regional governor said.
A missile slammed into a cafe and grocery store in the village on Thursday as people gathered to mourn a fallen Ukrainian soldier. The death toll makes the strike in one of the deadliest attacks in the war in months.
FRANCE 24's Emmanuelle Chaze reports from Hroza, Ukraine.
2:34pm: Ukraine freezes assets of three Russian tycoons worth $464 million, prosecutors say
A Ukrainian court has frozen the Ukrainian assets of three Russian businessmen over their alleged support for Russia's war in Ukraine, prosecutors and the security service said on Friday.
The Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) said assets owned by Mikhail Fridman, Pyotr Aven and Andrey Kosogov had been frozen.
They were considered part of President Vladimir Putin's close circle and contributed to "large-scale financing of the Russian Federation's armed aggression", it said.
The three businessmen did not immediately comment on the moves and comments by the SBU and prosecutors.
"At the request of prosecutors ... assets of 20 Ukrainian companies totalling over 17 billion hryvnias ($464.48 million) were frozen," the Prosecutor General's Office said on the Telegram messaging app.
It said the frozen assets included securities and corporate rights of mobile phone operators, a mineral water producer, financial and insurance companies.
12:01pm: Kremlin, asked about Hroza attack, says Russia does not strike civilian targets
The Kremlin on Friday repeated its assertion that the Russian military does not strike civilian targets in Ukraine, after the death toll from an air strike on the village of Hroza in northeastern Ukraine rose to 52.
Rescue workers scoured the rubble for bodies after what Kyiv said was one of Moscow's deadliest attacks on civilians since its invasion.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Russia strikes Ukraine's military infrastructure, as well as concentrations of troops and the country's military leadership.
11:40am: UN rights chief deploys field team to probe Russian attack on Ukrainian village of Hroza
The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) on Friday deployed a field team to probe the Russian attack on the Ukrainian village of Hroza that left at least 52 people dead.
"The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Turk, who saw for himself the horrific impact of such strikes, is profoundly shocked and condemns these killings," OHCHR spokesperson Elizabeth Throssell told reporters in Geneva.
"He has deployed a field team to the site to speak to survivors and gather more information."
11:34am: Russia says it destroyed Ukrainian navy drone near Crimea
A Ukrainian navy drone was destroyed off the coast of Crimea by the Russian Black Sea Fleet's naval aviation forces, the Russian Defence Ministry said on Friday.
The Defence Ministry did not provide further details of the incident.
10:34am: Russian propaganda falsely blames Ukrainian refugees for Paris bedbug outbreak
Russian propaganda is linking the current bedbug outbreak in Paris to Ukrainian refugees. To "prove" this false narrative, pro-Russian accounts on social media are sharing fabricated French media publications from Le Figaro, Libération and Contrepoints, falsely claiming that "parasite experts believe that the bedbug epidemic in Paris is linked to the influx of Ukrainian refugees in the capital". Click on the story below to watch the full report in full.
10:10am: Russian defence minister calls to speed up bomber production
Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu on Friday called for more Su-34 fighter jets to be produced, as Moscow pursues its offensive in Ukraine.
The Kremlin has announced a massive spending hike to accomodate its military needs in Ukraine as its large-scale offensive approaches its second year.
"These planes are real workhorses. They can make four to five flights a day," Shoigu said during a visit to an aeronautical manufacturing base in Novosibirsk in Siberia.
"That's why we need to step up, accelerate" their manufacture, Shoigu said.
9:29am: Sweden announces $200 million military aid package to Ukraine
Sweden will send Ukraine a new military support package worth 2.2 billion crowns ($199 million), consisting mainly of ammunition and spare parts to earlier donated systems, Defence Minister Pal Jonson said on Friday.
The new military aid package will be Sweden's 14th to Ukraine since the start of the war, taking the total value of the Nordic country's such aid to just over 22 billion crowns.
Jonson told a news confrence the government had also formally tasked the armed forces with analysing whether Sweden would be able to send Jas Gripen fighter jets to Ukraine.
8:46am: Russian strikes on Ukraine kill boy in Kharkiv, hit port facilities in south
Russia unleashed new air strikes on Ukraine early on Friday, killing a 10-year-old boy in the northeastern city of Kharkiv and damaging grain and port infrastructure in the Odesa region in the south, Ukrainian officials said.
The boy was killed when Russia hit Ukraine's second biggest city with two Iskander ballistic missiles, regional governor Oleh Synehubov said. Twenty-three others were wounded, including an 11-month-old baby, he said.
The boy's father, Oleh Bychko, told Reuters he had managed to pull his younger son and wife out of the rubble after the strike. Bychko, his face scratched and his clothes covered in blood, stood shocked and lost for words after the death of his 10-year-old son, Tymofiy.
7:58am: Russia to move towards revoking ratification of nuclear test ban treaty
Russia's top lawmaker said on Friday that parliamentary bosses will swiftly consider revoking ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty after President Vladimir Putin held out the possibility of resuming nuclear testing.
A resumption in nuclear tests by Russia, the United States or both would be profoundly destabilising at a time when tensions between the two countries are greater than at any time since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.
7:28am: Russian missile strike on Ukraine village wreaks carnage
Ukrainians woke up today in shock across the country following the Russian missile strike on the eastern Ukrainian village of Hroza, said FRANCE 24's correspondent in Ukraine Emmanuelle Chaze.
At least 52 people were killed when a rocket hit a group of people gathered for a wake. "The wife, the mother and the son of the soldier who was being buried were among the victims," added Chaze.
French diplomats slammed the strike on Hroza in "the strongest possible terms" in a communiqué released early Thursday morning.
"By deliberately targeting the Ukrainian civilian population, Russia is once again guilty of atrocities that constitute war crimes," the statement added.
Key developments from Thursday, October 5:
A Russian attack killed at least 50 people, including a six-year-old boy, in the village of Hroza in the Kharkiv region of northeastern Ukraine on Thursday, Ukrainian officials said. President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Thursday that the Russian missile attack was “no blind strike” and Russian troops could not have been unaware of where they were striking.
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday suggested that the plane crash which killed Wagner mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin in August was caused by hand grenades detonating inside the aircraft, not by a missile attack.
Putin on Thursday held out the possibility that Russia could resume nuclear testing for the first time in more than three decades and might withdraw its ratification of a landmark nuclear test ban treaty.
Read yesterday’s live blog to see how the day’s events unfolded.
(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP and Reuters)
