Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy both appear to have visited troops in Ukraine on Tuesday.
The Kremlin said Putin visited military headquarters in Russian-occupied areas Ukraine. Putin was shown on Russian state television disembarking a military helicopter in Russian-held Ukraine and greeting senior military commanders. It was not stated when the visit took place.
The Kremlin said Putin attended a military command meeting in the Kherson region. The ministry of defence said he heard reports from commanders of the airborne forces and the “Dnieper” army group and other senior officers on the situation in Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions, both of which Moscow has proclaimed part of Russia. The Russian president is also said to have visited national guard headquarters in Ukraine’s Luhansk region in the eastern Donbas, which Moscow also claims to have annexed along with adjacent Donetsk region.
Zelenskiy’s office said he visited Ukrainian troops on Tuesday in Avdiivka, Donetsk region. “I have the honour to be here today, to thank you for your service, for defending our land, Ukraine, our families,” Zelenskiy was quoted as saying.
A Russian judge has rejected an appeal by the Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich against the decision to hold him in detention before his trial on charges of espionage. Gershkovich, 31, is the first US journalist to be detained in Russia on espionage charges since the end of the cold war and, if found guilty, could face up to 20 years in prison. Russia’s FSB security service has accused him of collecting state secrets about Russia’s military for the benefit of US intelligence, charges that have been roundly condemned as political and unfounded. Hearings in his case are being held in closed sessions because of the nature of the charges, but cameras were briefly allowed into the courtroom before Tuesday’s hearing started. The court was only deciding whether to hold Gershkovich in pre-trial detention, not on the substance of the case.
On Monday US ambassador to Russia Lynne Tracy said she had made her first visit to Gershkovich, who was arrested in Russia two weeks ago. “He feels well and is holding up. We reiterate our call for Evan’s immediate release,” Tracy said. Tracy was present at the court on Tuesday.
Russian forces are stepping up their use of heavy artillery and air strikes in the devastated eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut, the commander of Ukraine’s ground forces said on Tuesday.
Poland and Ukraine will resume negotiations early on Tuesday to try to reopen the transit of food and grains, the Polish agriculture minister told public radio station PR1. The two countries held talks on Monday over bans by central eastern European countries seeking to shelter their farmers from the impact of an influx of cheaper Ukrainian grain.
Romania’s ruling Social Democrat party (PSD) has said it will ask the coalition government to approve an emergency decree enforcing a temporary ban on Ukrainian grain imports, mirroring similar moves by countries in central and eastern Europe.
Russia’s defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, told his Chinese counterpart on Tuesday that their countries’ military cooperation was a “stabilising” force in the world and helped to reduce the chances of conflict.
Security concerns have prompted Russian authorities this year to cancel traditional “immortal regiment” nationwide victory day processions where people carry portraits of relatives who fought against Nazi Germany in the second world war.
The UK has condemned the sentencing of Russian opposition activist Vladimir Kara-Murza, who was jailed for 25 years on Monday for opposing the war in Ukraine. UK foreign secretary James Cleverly summoned the Russian ambassador, Andrei Kelin, for an explanation. Kara-Murza holds dual Russian-British citizenship.
Kara-Murza’s wife, Evgenia Kara-Murza, told British broadcaster LBC that she was “baffled” by the UK government’s “weak” response. “Introducing sanctions against his perpetrators would actually be a very practical step that I would very much like to see,” she said.
The UN’s human rights head, Volker Türk, urged Russia to release him, while Baltic neighbour Latvia sanctioned 10 Russian officials and lawyers involved in the case.
Russia’s leading opposition figure, Alexei Navalny, faces the prospect of new criminal charges, one of his lawyers has claimed. Vadim Kobzev alleged on Twitter that authorities had provoked Navalny by placing another inmate in his cell, and that Navalny had been given no choice but to drag him out. He had then been told he would be charged with thwarting prison authorities, which carries a maximum sentence of five years, Kobzev said.
The Belarusian leader, Alexander Lukashenko, held a meeting with the Russian-installed head of Ukraine’s occupied Donetsk region, Denis Pushilin, on Tuesday.
Russia is “not yet” planning to block Wikipedia, its minister of digital affairs said on Tuesday as a Moscow court handed the online encyclopaedia another fine for failing to remove content Russia deems illegal.
G7 foreign ministers have condemned Russia’s “irresponsible nuclear rhetoric” and its threat to deploy nuclear weapons in Belarus as “unacceptable”, after a three-day meeting in the Japanese resort town of Karuizawa. “Any use of chemical, biological or nuclear weapons by Russia would be met with severe consequences,” they warned.
The Pentagon said it expected findings within 45 days from a review into how the US military handles classified information after last week’s arrest of an airman over the leak a trove of highly classified documents online.
Russia said it had repelled an “illegal” Ukrainian attempt to infiltrate Russian territory in the southern border region of Bryansk, 11 days after reporting a similar incident. “The intruder stepped on a mined protection line,” said regional governor Alexander Bogomaz on Telegram.
Reuters and Agence France-Presse contributed to this report
