Russia thwarted a Ukrainian drone attack near Sebastopol, a crucial port in Russian-annexed Crimea, Russia's defence ministry said Sunday morning. Moscow's air defence forces and Black Sea fleet reportedly took out a total of nine drones throughout the assault, which the ministry said caused no damage or casualties. Also, President Vladimir Putin said that Russia would use its own cluster bomb stockpiles if the munitions were used against Russian forces in Ukraine. Read our blog to see how the day's events unfolded. All times are Paris time (GMT+2).
This page is no longer being updated. For more of our coverage of the war in Ukraine, click here.
7:26pm: Ukraine officials say Russian shelling injures at least 4 in Kharkiv
At least 4 people were injured on Sunday in Russian shelling of a district of Kharkiv, the biggest city in eastern Ukraine, local officials said.
Oleh Sinehubov, Kharkiv's governor, said on Telegram that four people had been injured and a fire had broken out. Medics had hospitalized three men with shrapnel wounds and treated one person on the spot, he said.
Kharkiv Mayor Ihor Terekhov said a total of seven people were injured in the shelling of the southern Osnovyanskyi district of the city. Reuters could not independently confirm details of the attack and casualty figures.
Ukraine recaptured much of the eastern Kharkiv region in September, with Russian forces occupying now only a small strip of land there.
7:10pm: Wagner fighters arrive in Central Africa, Russian security group says
Several hundred "experienced" Wagner fighters have arrived in the Central African Republic to secure a referendum on July 30, a Russian private security company said Sunday.
The troubled nation, where Wagner mercenaries are already helping the government fight rebels, will vote on a constitutional change which could enable President Faustin Archange Touadera to seek a third term in office.
"Another plane has arrived in Bangui with instructors to work in the Central African Republic," said the Officers' Union for International Security (OUIS) on Telegram.
"The planned rotation continues. Several hundred experienced professionals from the Wagner company are joining the team working in CAR," said the statement.
According to the United States, OUIS is a front company for the Wagner group in CAR. It is run by Russian Alexandre Ivanov, who was placed under American sanctions in January.
5:09pm: Russia seizes shares of Danone and Carlsberg subsidiaries
Russia took control of shares belonging to French agribusiness Danone and brewer Carlsberg, according to a decree published Sunday.
The decree signed by President Vladimir Putin says the Russian state would "temporarily" manage shares belonging to Danone Russia and to Baltika, which is owned by Carlsberg.
Baltika is a leading brewing company in Russia, with approximately 30 percent of the market share.
4:28pm: China and Russia to hold joint naval drills
Chinese naval vessels set sail this weekend to participate in joint manoeuvres with the Russian military, Chinese defence authorities said Sunday.
Ties between Moscow and Beijing have grown closer since Russia invaded Ukraine last year, a move China has not condemned.
The two have ramped up defence contacts, including joint military drills in recent months.
The latest air-and-sea exercises will take place in the Sea of Japan and are aimed at "safeguarding strategic maritime routes", the Chinese Ministry of Defence had said Saturday.
The Chinese military has sent five warships, including a guided-missile destroyer, it added in the statement published Sunday, without specifying when the drills will take place.
4:03pm: Putin says Ukraine's counteroffensive 'not successful'
Russian President Vladimir Putin said Kyiv's counteroffensive, launched last month to push back Moscow's forces, was failing.
"All enemy attempts to break through our defences... they have not succeeded since the offensive began. The enemy is not successful", Putin said in a televised interview broadcast Sunday.
3:14pm: Ukraine says 'on the defence' near eastern Kupiansk
Ukraine said Sunday its forces were on the defensive against Russian assaults near the eastern city of Kupiansk, while noting gradual progress near the hotspot city of Bakhmut.
“For two days in a row, the enemy has been actively attacking in the Kupiansk sector in the Kharkiv region. We are on the defence," Deputy Defence Minister Ganna Malyar said.
"Fierce battles are going on, and positions... change several times a day," she added.
Malyar noted Ukrainian forces were "gradually moving forward" near Bakhmut, seized by Russia in May. "There is a daily advance on the southern flank around Bakhmut. On the northern flank, we are trying to hold our positions, the enemy is attacking," she said.
Ukraine last month began its highly anticipated fightback after stockpiling Western weapons and building up its offensive forces. It has however admitted difficult battles, and called on allies to provide more long-range arms and artillery.
12:18pm: Putin denies use of cluster bombs in Ukraine war despite evidence to the contrary
In his first comments on the delivery of cluster munitions to Ukraine from the US, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Russia has not used cluster bombs in its war in Ukraine so far, despite widespread evidence to the contrary.
“Until now, we have not done this, we have not used it, and we have not had such a need,” he said.
The use of cluster bombs by both Russia and Ukraine has been widely documented, including by The Associated Press and international humanitarian organizations, and cluster rounds have been found in the aftermath of Russian strikes.
10:00am: Russia will use cluster bomb stockpiles if necessary, says Putin
President Vladimir Putin said that Russia has a "sufficient stockpile" of cluster bombs and that Moscow reserves the right to use them if such munitions are used against Russian forces in Ukraine.
"Оf course, if they are used against us, we reserve the right to take reciprocal action," Putin said in a state TV interview, excerpts of which were published on Sunday.
Ukraine has received cluster bombs from the United States, munitions banned in more than 100 countries. Kyiv has pledged to only use them to dislodge concentrations of enemy soldiers.
8:19am: Russia repelled drone attack, says defence ministry
Russia's defence ministry said on Sunday that it had thwarted a Ukrainian drone attack attempt near the port of Sevastopol in Crimea.
"This morning, an attempt by the Kyiv regime to carry out a terrorist attack by seven unmanned aerial vehicles and two unmanned semi-submersible boats on objects on the territory of the Crimean Peninsula near the city of Sevastopol was thwarted," the ministry said on the Telegram messaging app.
There were no casualties and no damage, the ministry added.
The ministry's version of events could not be independently verified.
7:26am: Ukraine aid 'single best thing we can do for the global economy', says Yellen
Redoubling support for war-stricken Ukraine is the "single best" way to aid the global economy, US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Sunday, along with boosting emerging economies and tackling debt distress.
Yellen, speaking on the sidelines of a G20 finance minister summit in India, said a "key priority" was "to redouble our support for Ukraine" in its defence against Russia.
"Ending this war is first and foremost a moral imperative," Yellen told reporters in Gandhinagar. "But it's also the single best thing we can do for the global economy."
Russia's invasion of Ukraine – both global breadbaskets that together exported almost a quarter of the world's wheat supply – triggered shockwaves in global economies by sending prices for food and fuel shooting up.
7:24am: Russia says it shot down nine drones over Sevastopol
Russia's air defence forces and fleet in the Black Sea intercepted nine Ukrainian drones over the Crimean port of Sevastopol early on Sunday, a Moscow-installed official said.
"No objects, either in the city or in the water area were damaged," Mikhail Razvozhayev, the Moscow-installed governor of Sevastopol, said on the Telegram messaging app.
Two aerial drones were shot down over the sea, five were intercepted by Russia's electronic warfare forces and two water surface drones were destroyed on the outer shore, he added.
The attacks were over the harbour of Sevastopol and the city's Balaklava, Khersones districts, Razvozhayev said earlier.
4:04am: G7 finance chiefs to talk aid to Ukraine
G7 finance chiefs are set to discuss Sunday aid to war-stricken Ukraine, debt distress faced by struggling economies, bank reform and a global tax deal, alongside wider G20 meetings in India.
A key focus of the talks, which will include US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, will be supporting multilateral development lenders such as the World Bank to better tackle challenges like climate change and poverty, US officials said.
"With over half of all low-income countries at high risk of or in debt distress, it is critical that we take collective action to help put them – and by extension the global economy – on a surer footing", the US Department of the Treasury said in a statement ahead of the meeting in Gandhinagar.
3:44am: Russia repelling Ukraine drone attacks on Crimea: Moscow-installed official
Russia's air defence forces and fleet in the Black Sea were engaged in repelling Ukrainian drone attacks over the Crimean port of Sevastopol early on Sunday, a Moscow-installed official said.
The attacks were over the harbour of Sevastopol and the city's Balaklava and Khersones districts, Mikhail Razvozhayev, the Moscow-installed governor of Sevastopol, said on the Telegram messaging app.
There were no immediate details of the scale of the attack or any damage from the attacks on the Crimean Peninsula, which Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014.
2:43am: Wagner mercenaries arriving in Belarus, say Ukraine and Poland
Fighters from the Wagner Group have arrived in Belarus from Russia, Ukrainian and Polish officials said on Saturday, a day after Minsk said that the mercenaries were training the country's soldiers southeast of the capital.
Andriy Demchenko, a spokesman for the Ukrainian border agency, said in a statement posted on the Telegram messaging app, that "separate groups" from Russia has also been observed in Belarus.
Some Wagner fighters have been in Belarus since at least Tuesday, two sources close to the fighters told Reuters.
The Belarusian defence ministry released a video on Friday, showing what it said were Wagner fighters instructing Belarusian soldiers at a military range near the town of Osipovichi.
Wagner's move to Belarus was part of a deal that ended the group's mutiny attempt in June after taking control of a Russian military headquarters, marching on Moscow, and threatening to tip Russia into civil war, President Vladimir Putin said.
12:32am: Ukraine, Russia trade accusations of shelling civilians in Zaporizhzhia
Three civilians were wounded in Russian shelling of a village in Zaporizhzhia, the head of Ukraine's presidential administration said on Saturday, while Moscow-backed officials said that Kyiv's forces shelled a school there.
Fighting has been taking place in Zaporizhzhia for months, a frontline region in southern Ukraine that Moscow moved to annex last year but does not occupy it in its entirety. The regional capital, the city of Zaporizhzhia, remains under Kyiv's control.
Andriy Yermak, the head of Ukraine's presidential administration, said on his Telegram messaging app that Russian forces shelled the village of Stepnohirske in the region from multiple rocket launchers, hitting an administrative building.
Vladimir Rogov, a Russian-installed official in parts of Zaporizhzhia controlled by Moscow, said that Ukrainian forces destroyed a school in the village of Stulneve, while air defence forces intercepted a drone over the city of Tokmak.
Neither side's accounts could be independently verified. Both sides deny targeting civilians in the nearly 17-month long war that Russia has been waging on its neighbour.
Key developments from Saturday, July 15:
A spokesperson for Ukraine's State Border Guard Service said Saturday that the force had observed “some groups” of Wagner fighters crossing from Russia into Belarus. The spokesperson, Andriy Demchenko, made the remarks in an interview with the Ukrainska Pravda newspaper.
Separately, an independent monitoring group reported that a large convoy carrying fighters from the Wagner private army was spotted entering Belarus from Russia early Saturday, after the Belarusian defence ministry said it planned for the mercenaries and Minsk's own armed forces to conduct joint military drills.
The Belarusian defence ministry said in an online statement late Friday that it had developed a “road map” with Wagner’s management for joint training exercises between the nation's military personnel and the private mercenaries.
Read yesterday’s liveblog to see how all the day’s events unfolded.
(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP and Reuters)
