Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday visits NATO headquarters in Brussels for the first time since the Russian invasion, the military alliance said. Zelensky was in Romania on Tuesday for talks with President Klaus Iohannis about security and grain exports. Read our live blog to see how all the day's events unfolded. All times are Paris time (GMT+2).
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9:14pm: Turkey to work with Romania, Bulgaria against Black Sea mines
Turkey, Romania, and Bulgaria will work together against the threat of floating mines in the Black Sea due to war between Russia and Ukraine, the Turkish Defence Ministry said on Wednesday.
The ministry gave no details of how it would address the floating mine problem. It said on social media platform X that the three countries had discussed the issue at the NATO Defence Ministers meeting in Brussels.
Last week, the British government said Russia may use sea mines to target civilian shipping in the Black Sea, including by laying them on the approach to Ukrainian ports. Ukraine and Russia have accused each other of planting mines off the Ukrainian coast.
Turkey, Romania and Bulgaria, plus Georgia, Poland and Ukraine previously discussed clearing floating mines in April 2022.
8:39pm: Zelensky says US vowed aid will be 'constant'
President Volodymyr Zelensky said Wednesday he had received assurances from Washington that military aid to Ukraine would remain "constant and uninterrupted".
It came after he urged Ukraine's allies to arm his country to survive the winter, on his first visit to NATO headquarters since Russia's all-out invasion.
"It was made clear that America will continue to provide Ukraine with the constant and uninterrupted support necessary for its defence," Zelensky said in his daily address, following a meeting in Brussels with US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin.
6:25pm: US announces new $200 million Ukraine arms package
The United States announced a new weapons package for Ukraine valued at up to $200 million on Wednesday, the Pentagon said in a statement.
The package includes additional air defense capabilities, anti-tank weapons, and other equipment, according to the statement.
6:00pm: Russian inflation accelerates at fastest monthly rate since April 2022
Inflation in Russia accelerated in September at its fastest month-on-month pace since April 2022, when double-digit price rises gripped Russia after its invasion of Ukraine, data from the state statistics service Rosstat showed on Wednesday.
5:31pm: 'Thousands' of pieces of evidence against Russia in Ukraine, EU judicial agency says
An international team of prosecutors seeking to put Russia's top brass on trial over Ukraine has already gathered "thousands" of pieces of evidence, the president of EU judicial agency Eurojust said on Wednesday.
Prosecutors are sifting through wiretaps, videos, satellite imagery and witness testimony, building a mountain of evidence that could eventually run into the "hundreds of thousands", Ladislav Hamran said in an interview at his office in The Hague.
Eurojust is coordinating an unprecedented team from several European countries, Ukraine, the United States and the International Criminal Court seeking to bring the Kremlin's senior leadership to justice over the Ukraine invasion.
Set up just three months ago, the International Centre for the Prosecution of the Crime of Aggression (ICPA) aims to plug a hole in international law laid bare by Russia's February 2022 invasion.
Sometimes dubbed "Nuremberg 2.0", the ICPA is the first attempt since the Nazi war crimes tribunals to build a case against the top leadership of a country for the crime of aggression.
4:53pm: Russian missile strike kills two in Ukrainian school, Kyiv says
A Russian missile struck a school in the town of Nikopol in the central Ukrainian region of Dnipropetrovsk on Wednesday, killing at least two people, Ukrainian officials said.
The school was badly damaged and rescuers were still searching for people under the rubble, said regional governor Serhiy Lysak.
"It has been established that the victims were employees of the educational institution," Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko said in a post on the Telegram messaging app, alongside footage of rescue workers clambering through the rubble of the school.
Lysak said more than 40 private homes and an infrastructure facility had been damaged in the attack, and that two men of 24 and 71 had been wounded.
3:39pm: Nobel winners stage rare war protest in Moscow court
Two Nobel winners staged a rare denunciation of Russia's offensive in Ukraine in a Moscow courtroom Wednesday, as public dissent over the conflict has been all but silenced by a wave of arrests.
Oleg Orlov, the co-chair of Nobel Prize-winning group Memorial, again denounced the Kremlin's military campaign during his trial in which he is accused of "discrediting" the Russian army.
His friend and fellow Nobel laureate Dmitry Muranov, the editor of Russia's Novaya Gazeta newspaper who joined Orlov's defence team, stood by him.
Prosecutors have requested a 250,000-ruble (2,400-euro) fine for 70-year-old Orlov over an anti-war op-ed warning about "fascism" in Russia.
"The main theme was how the war affects our country and destroys the future of our country," Orlov told the court in a trembling voice.
"As a citizen of Russia, I believe the actions of the armed forces in Ukraine contradict Russia's interests," he said. "I am being tried just because I exercised my rights. This is a political trial."
3:18pm: Putin says Germany not buying gas via Nord Stream 2 is 'nonsense'
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday that Germany's refusal to certify the Nord Stream 2 pipeline and buy Russian gas from it did not make economic sense for Berlin which was instead paying much more for US liquefied natural gas.
Putin told an energy conference in Moscow he could not understand why Germany was still ready to buy Russian gas pumped via Ukraine but not to buy gas piped via Nord Stream 2.
"It's some kind of nonsense," said Putin.
2:44pm: Russia says 'improved' position around east Ukraine town
Russia on Wednesday said its forces had strengthened their position on the front line near Avdiivka, a day after Ukraine warned Moscow was stepping up strikes to encircle the eastern town.
Avdiivka is symbolically and strategically important to Kyiv, lying just north of the Moscow-controlled city of Donetsk that was seized by separatist forces in 2014. It has since become a symbol of Ukrainian resistance against Moscow, with Kyiv clinging on there despite relentless Russian attacks during the Kremlin's almost 20-month long offensive.
"Actions from the southern group of forces supported by aviation, artillery fire and heavy flamethrower systems, improved the situation along the front line in the vicinity of Avdiivka," the Russian defence ministry said.
Local Ukrainian officials on Tuesday told AFP that Moscow's forces had launched an artillery attack on the town in the morning and were firing incessantly.
"Battles continued throughout the night" in the north and south of the town, the head of the town's administration Vitaliy Barabash said Wednesday.
2:30pm: Returning Russians who backed Ukraine must be sent to the mines, says Putin ally
Russians who fled the country to side with Ukraine should be charged with treason and sent to work in mines in parts of Russia where there is no summer if they return home, the chairman of Russia's parliament said on Wednesday.
Russia's war in Ukraine, something it calls a "special military operation", and a subsequent mobilisation campaign, prompted several hundred thousand Russians to leave their homeland, though it is unclear exactly how many.
Moscow has tried to encourage some specialists, such as IT workers, to return and says some Russians have come back.
But Vyacheslav Volodin, the speaker of the Duma, the lower house of parliament, made it clear on Wednesday that the authorities were less keen to see Russians whom he and others regard as traitors returning.
"If they start returning now but have made statements against the country and financed the armed forces of Ukraine then of course we must choose a place to send them immediately," Volodin told parliament.
"Such actions relate to article 275 of the criminal code - state treason. We're probably... talking about mines and we need to find territories where the weather is more constant, where there's no summer."
2:27: US Treasury Secretary Yellen says support for Israel, Ukraine 'top priorities'
US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Wednesday that providing support to Ukraine and Israel are "absolute top priorities" for the United States and she expects bipartisan support despite political upheaval in Congress.
The ouster of House Speaker Kevin McCarthy last week by Republican hardliners has raised concerns about a prolonged paralysis in Congress.
Military and economic support for Ukraine "along with resources for Israel are our absolute top priorities for the Biden administration", Yellen said.
"We've made that completely clear to Congress, and we believe there is substantial bipartisan support," she said at a press conference on the sidelines of IMF-World Bank meetings in Marrakesh, Morocco.
2:23pm: Putin's intel chief says issue of Ukraine support turning 'toxic' in US
Russian President Vladimir Putin's foreign intelligence chief said on Wednesday that the issue of support for Ukraine was becoming toxic in the United States and that the divisions would deepen ahead of next year's US presidential election.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February last year, the United States and the European Union have made more than $160 billion in commitments to Ukraine, including tens of billions of dollars in weapons.
"The Ukrainian topic is becoming more and more toxic on theeve of the upcoming presidential election," Sergei Naryshkin, the director of Russia's Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), said during a visit to the Azerbaijani capital Baku.
"It is becoming a bone of contention," Naryshkin said, casting the struggle in Washington as one between those interested in improving the lives of Americans and those who were gripped with a hatred of Russians.
Diplomats and intelligence analysts have said for months that Putin is betting that American resolve over Ukraine will weaken as Washington faces different global crises and it becomes clear just how arduous a task it is to defeat hundreds of thousands of well-dug-in Russian soldiers in Ukraine.
Republican lawmakers' ouster of House of Representatives Speaker Kevin McCarthy has raised questions about the future of aid to Ukraine. The United States has also repeatedly urged Kyiv to do more to tackle corruption, CNN reported this month.
2:14pm: Ukraine calls for more aid for demining efforts
Ukraine has called for greater global support to help with demining large swaths of the war-torn country's land, warning that up to a third of its territory could be contaminated with ordnance.
"Russian mines and shells in Ukraine are a problem that must be solved together," Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said via video link during a donors' conference on demining in the Croatian capital Zagreb.
Shmyhal said up to six million people were actively at risk from extensive mining across Ukraine that has accelerated since Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022.
If the demining efforts are not increased "it will take many decades to clear Ukraine of mines", Shmyhal noted.
12:42pm: Ukraine identifies suspected informers in deadly strike at wake
Ukraine's security service on Wednesday said it had identified two suspected informers who allegedly helped Russia strike at a wake last week, killing more than 50 people.
The SBU named two local men now living in Russia, saying they were suspected of giving information that led to a missile attack on the village of Groza in the Kharkiv region, one of the deadliest strikes of the war.
A missile hit a large gathering at a café for the wake of a Ukrainian soldier on October 5, killing 55.
The SBU said the suspects handed over details knowing that local civilians would "surely die" in an attack.
The SBU named the suspects as 30-year-old Volodymyr Mamon and his 23-year-old brother Dmytro Mamon, who have both fled to Russia.
Dmytro was a traffic policeman, while Volodymyr was a police escort driver under the occupying authorities, according to documents posted by the SBU.
Parts of the Kharkiv region were occupied by Russian forces from February to September 2022.
12:23pm: US to provide new aid for Kyiv, pledges support
US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin said Wednesday that the United States will provide a new $200 million military assistance package for Ukraine, as opposition from hardline Republican lawmakers puts future aid for Kyiv in doubt.
"I'm proud that the United States will announce its latest security assistance package for Ukraine, valued at $200 million," Austin said alongside President Volodymyr Zelensky at the opening of a meeting of Kyiv's international supporters in Brussels.
The package includes air defence munitions, artillery and rocket ammunition and anti-tank weapons, among other items, the US defence chief said.
It is the first package announced since Congress dropped new funding for Kyiv from a recent bill to avert a US government shutdown – a move that called into doubt Washington's continued commitment to aiding Ukraine's fight against invading Russian forces.
Austin nonetheless insisted Wednesday – as he has before – that the US "will stand with Ukraine for as long as it takes".
11:25am: Denmark to deliver F-16 jets to Ukraine by April 2024, local media report
Denmark expects to make its first delivery of F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine in March or April next year, national broadcaster TV2 reported on Wednesday, citing Defence Minister Troels Lund Poulsen.
10:23am: Zelensky urges West to show Israelis they are not 'alone'
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday urged the West to rally around the people of Israel as they did around Ukraine after Russia's invasion, and show them they are not "alone".
"My recommendation to the leaders to go to Israel and I think to support people, just people I'm not speaking about any institutions, just to support people who have been under terrorist attacks," he said on a visit to NATO headquarters.
9:40am: US support for Israel won't come at expense of Ukraine, German defence minister says
The United States' decision to step up military support for Israel after a surprise assault by Hamas is not likely to cause material shortages for Ukraine, German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius said on Wednesday.
Speaking after a meeting of the parliamentary defence committee, Pistorius said Berlin would do "everything we can to ensure support for Ukraine does not crumble" in light of the recent escalation in the Middle East conflict.
9:30am: Ukrainians express solidarity with Israelis over Hamas attack
People in Ukraine have expressed solidarity with Israelis over Hamas's attack on Israel, FRANCE 24’s Ukraine correspondent Emmanuelle Chaze reports.
Pointing to billboards displaying the Israeli flag in Kyiv, Chaze says the recent atrocities committed by Hamas fighters reminded Ukrainians of the Bucha massacre that happened at the start of the Russian invasion.
8:38am: Zelensky making first visit to NATO HQ since Russian invasion
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday is visiting NATO's headquarters in Brussels for the first time since the start of Russia's invasion in February 2022, the military alliance said.
A spokesman wrote on social media that the Ukrainian leader would address the press with alliance chief Jens Stoltenberg before a meeting of NATO defence ministers.
8:15am: Belgium to send F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine from 2025, defence minister says
Belgium will send F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine from 2025, Belgian Minister of Defence Ludivine Dedonder said on Bel RTL radio.
Dedonder didn't say how many jets would be sent to Ukraine.
9:14pm, October 10: Kyiv 'certain' that Russia is supporting Hamas operations, says Zelensky
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Tuesday accused Russia of supporting the Palestinian militant group Hamas in its conflict against Israel. "We are certain that Russia is supporting, in one way or another, Hamas operations," Zelensky said in an interview with the France 2 television channel.
"Russia is really trying to carry out destabilising actions all over the world," he added.
9:12pm: Israel-Hamas war risks 'distracting' from Ukraine, says Zelensky
Zelensky said on Tuesday that the violence engulfing Israel and Gaza risked distracting international attention from the war in his own country.
"There is a risk that international attention will turn away from Ukraine, and that will have consequences", he said in an interview with French broadcaster France 2.
The tragedies affecting Ukraine and Israel "are different, but both are immense", he said.
Key developments from Tuesday, October 10:
Germany on Tuesday unveiled a fresh support package for Ukraine worth around €1 billion, its defence ministry said, adding the programme covered air defence, weapons and ground vehicles. "Germany will continue to support Ukraine with what it needs most urgently – air defence, ammunition and tanks," German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius said.
Ukrainian shelling killed two civilians Tuesday in the Russian region of Belgorod that borders Ukraine, its Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said. "One civilian was killed" in the village of Popovka while "an elderly woman died of serious shrapnel wounds” in an ambulance, he said on Telegram.
Russian forces were Tuesday trying to encircle the eastern front-line Ukrainian town of Avdiivka, a Ukrainian official said, adding it was being heavily bombed.
Read yesterday’s liveblog to see how the day’s events unfolded.
(France 24 with AFP, AP and REUTERS)
