Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky called on the West to speed up weapons deliveries as Ukrainians move to consolidate control over the territories surrounding Kharkiv seized back from Russia. In a retaliatory move Russia struck several recaptured areas with missiles overnight. Read about the day's events as they unfolded on our liveblog. All times are Paris time (GMT+2).
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11:37pm: Ukraine is in full control of more than 4,000 square km recaptured from Russia
Ukraine is in full control of more than 4,000 square km (1,500 square miles) of territory recaptured from Russian forces and is stabilising another 4,000 square km, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in an address on Tuesday.
On Monday he said Ukraine had retaken 6,000 square km in its recent counter-offensive. Ukrainian officials, though, say it is important to make a distinction between taking territory and ensuring it is totally safe.
9:44pm: Successful Ukraine counteroffensive marks ‘turning point’ in Kharkiv
Some 150 thousand people living in the Kharkiv region have been liberated from under Russian control Ukrainian officials said on Tuesday, following successful Ukrainian military operations to regain the territory.
Ukrainian forces have now advanced as far as Vovchansk, a town just 3 kilometres from Russia seized on the first day of the war.
“Ukrainians generally see this as a turning point, an unexpected military success,” said FRANCE 24's Gulliver Cragg, reporting from Kharkiv. “What we don’t know now is what direction the war will take from now, and what kind of a turning point this is.”
7:33pm: Ukraine expects Russian strikes on energy system to increase
Ukraine expects the quantity of Russian attacks on its energy infrastructure to grow, a senior presidential aide told Reuters on Tuesday evening.
Referring to Sunday's strike on a major coal power and water heating plant in the city of Kharkiv, presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said: "We expect the quantity of such attacks to grow, and are ready for various scenarios."
Podolyak added that Ukrainians should expect problems with power and heat this winter.
6:45pm: Scholz tells Putin to 'fully implement' Ukraine grain deal
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Tuesday called on Russian President Vladimir Putin to stick to a deal on grain exports from Ukraine which Moscow has repeatedly criticised.
In a phone call, Scholz urged Putin "not to discredit and continue to fully implement" the grain deal in light of the stretched global food supply, the chancellor's spokesman Steffen Hebestreit said.
4:08pm: Ukraine retakes hundreds of settlements in Kharkiv region
Ukraine's lightning counter-offensive has recaptured 3,800 square kilometres (1,467 square miles) of territory in its northeastern Kharkiv region since Sept. 6, Deputy Defence Minister Hanna Malyar said on Tuesday.
Speaking live on Ukrainian television from the recaptured town of Balakliia, Malyar said that the territory recaptured from Russian forces consisted of more than 300 settlements and around 150,000 current residents.
"The operation is ongoing. Its aim is the full liberation of Kharkiv region ... We believe that this will happen in the nearest future," Malyar said.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said overnight that in total Ukraine had "liberated more than 6,000 sq km (2,400 sq miles) of the territory of Ukraine in the south and in the east" since Sept. 1. This includes the figure mentioned by Malyar for the past week.
4:00pm: Russian and Chinese leaders to discuss ‘Ukraine crisis’
Russia's Vladimir Putin and China's Xi Jinping will discuss Ukraine and Taiwan at a meeting in Uzbekistan on Thursday which the Kremlin said would hold "special significance" given the geopolitical situation.
"The presidents will discuss both the bilateral agenda and the main regional and international topics," Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov said at a briefing in Moscow.
Ushakov said Moscow values China's position towards what he called the "Ukraine crisis", saying Beijing had struck a "balanced approach" towards the conflict.
China "clearly understands the reasons that forced Russia to launch its special military operation. This issue, of course, will be thoroughly discussed during the upcoming meeting," Ushakov said.
12:58pm: Ukraine's foreign minister slams Germany over arms supplies
Ukraine's Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba accused Germany on Tuesday of ignoring Kyiv's pleas for Leopard tanks and Marder infantry fighting vehicles, saying Berlin offered only "abstract fears and excuses" for not providing such military hardware.
"Disappointing signals from Germany while Ukraine needs Leopards and Marders now – to liberate people and save them from genocide," Kuleba tweeted, as Ukraine presses a counter-offensive to retake land in the east and south from Russian forces.
"Not a single rational argument on why these weapons cannot be supplied, only abstract fears and excuses. What is Berlin afraid of that Kyiv is not?" he wrote, in unusually blunt language.
12:15pm: Finnish PM urges EU unity against Russian 'blackmail'
Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin on Tuesday appealed for EU unity in the face of Russian "blackmail" over energy supplies, and for more sanctions on Moscow. Her call, made to the European Parliament sitting in Strasbourg, France, came a day before EU chief Ursula von der Leyen was to deliver her annual "State of the European Union" address to be dominated by the impact of the war in Ukraine on Europe.
Accusing Russia of weaponising energy by severely reducing gas supplies, Marin told MEPs: "Blackmailing our societies through energy supply is a way for Russia to crumble and destroy Europeans' support to Ukraine and to destroy our unity." Russian President Vladimir Putin "must not be allowed to succeed in this," she said, urging EU "unity, determination and courage" to get through the coming winter.
Von der Leyen's European Commission, she said, must come up with "new, bold solutions" to bring down a sky-high surge in electricity prices for European households and businesses.
12:13pm: Russia says delivering 'massive' strikes on Ukraine front lines
The Russian military said Tuesday it had launched "massive strikes" on all front lines in Ukraine, after Kyiv's forces made dramatic advances in a counter-offensive.
"Air, rocket and artillery forces are carrying out massive strikes on units of the Ukrainian armed forces in all operational directions," the Russian defence ministry said in its daily briefing on the conflict.
12:11pm: Kremlin accuses Ukraine of torturing civilians in recaptured territory
The Kremlin on Tuesday accused Ukrainian forces of abusing civilians in territory Kyiv's army had taken back from Russian troops in a sweeping counter-offensive.
"As for the residents of the Kharkiv region, according to incoming reports, there are a lot of punitive measures... people are being tortured, people are being mistreated and so on. This is, of course, outrageous," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.
11:02am: Ukraine military claims downing Iranian drone used by Russia
Ukraine's military claimed Tuesday for the first time that it encountered an Iranian-supplied suicide drone used by Russia on the battlefield, showing the deepening ties between Moscow and Tehran as the Islamic Republic's tattered nuclear deal with world powers hangs in the balance.
US intelligence publicly warned back in July that Tehran planned to send hundreds of the bomb-carrying drones to Russia to aid its war on Ukraine. While Iran initially denied it, the head of its paramilitary Revolutionary Guard has boasted in recent days about arming the world's top powers.
10:59am: EU is unlikely to cap price of Russian gas
The European Union is retreating from imposing a price cap on Russian gas, but pushing ahead with windfall taxes on energy companies' surplus profits, the Guardian reported on Tuesday, citing a leaked document.
10:42am: Bank of America moves some of its Russia-based bankers to Dubai
Bank of America (BofA) is moving some of its Russia-based bankers to Dubai, two sources told Reuters, following a move by several Western banks this year to relocate staff in the wake of the Russia-Ukraine war.
BofA has moved some of its staff recently and is in the process of moving others, across different units of the bank, said the sources, declining to be identified as the matter is not public.
BofA declined to comment when contacted by Reuters on Tuesday. JP Morgan, Rothschild & Co and Goldman Sachs all relocated some of their Russia-based staff earlier this year.
10:34am: China-Russia bond tightens as Moscow sees Ukraine setbacks
Chinese leader Xi Jinping is set to meet Putin during a regional summit in Uzbekistan this week, in a public show of unity that flies in the face of United States-led campaign to isolate Russia over its war in Ukraine.
While Beijing has not explicitly endorsed Moscow's invasion, it has steadily built economic and strategic ties with Russia over the six months of the war, and President Xi has assured his counterpart of his support of Russian "sovereignty and security".
10:25am: Ukraine advancing in Kharkiv region, govt says
Fighting is still raging in Ukraine's northeastern Kharkiv region but Ukraine's forces are making good progress because its forces are highly motivated and its operation is well planned, Deputy Defence Minister Hanna Malyar told Reuters on Tuesday.
"The aim is to liberate the Kharkiv region and beyond - all the territories occupied by the Russian Federation. Fighting is continuing (in Kharkiv region). It is still early to say full (Ukrainian) control has been established over Kharkiv region," Malyar said in an interview.
8:30am: Zelensky calls on Western partners for more support after lightening counteroffensive
Ukrainian authorities claimed to have captured more than 6000 square kilometres in their last counteroffensive, including in the southern Kherson region, FRANCE 24's Gulliver Cragg reports from Kyiv.
"You've also got Volodymyr Zelensky, the president, calling in not entirely friendly tones, almost in an angry tone, on Ukraine's Western partners to really step up their game now in terms of providing weapons so that Ukraine can finish this off," Cragg said.
5:12am: Ukraine recaptures more ground as Russia strikes back
Ukraine said Monday that its forces regained yet more ground in the past 24 hours and retook an area seven times the size of Kyiv this month, as Russia responded with strikes on some recaptured areas.
The territorial shifts marked one of Russia's biggest reversals since its troops were turned back from Kyiv in the earliest days of the nearly seven months of fighting, yet Moscow signalled it was no closer to agreeing to a negotiated peace.
1:54am: Ukraine calls for more Western arms after Russian retreat
Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky called on the West to speed up deliveries of weapons systems as Ukrainian troops move to consolidate control over a large swath of northeastern territory seized back from Russia.
Since Moscow abandoned its main bastion in northeastern Ukraine on Saturday, marking its worst defeat since the early days of the war, Ukrainian troops have recaptured dozens of towns in a stunning shift in battleground momentum.
A senior US military official said Russia has largely ceded territory near Kharkiv in the northeast and pulled many of its troops back over the border. Washington and its allies have provided Ukraine with billions of dollars in weapons that Kyiv says have helped limit Russian gains. In a video address late on Monday, Zelensky said Ukraine and the West must "strengthen cooperation to defeat Russian terror".
(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP and REUTERS)
