This blog is closing now but we’ll be back in a few hours with more rolling coverage.
Summary
It’s 2am in Kyiv. Here’s where things stand:
- Ukrainian first lady Olena Zelenska and other officials commemorated 261 children killed by the Russian war against Ukraine by hanging bells near St. Sophia Cathedral in Kyiv. The bells symbolize the voices of killed children, Euromaidan Press reports.
- Top US General Mark Milley said on Saturday that the United States is determined to support Sweden and Finland as the countries pursue Nato membership, a statement underscored by his visit to the USS Kearsarge after it became the largest US warship ever to dock in Stockholm. “It’s important for us, the United States, and it’s important for the other Nato countries to show solidarity with both Finland and Sweden in this exercise,” Milley said ahead of Nato’s annual Baltic Sea naval manoeuvres.
- Ukrainian forces have been managing to push back against Russian troops in fierce fighting in Severodonetsk despite Russia “throwing all its power” into capturing the key eastern city, Ukrainian officials said on Saturday. In an interview aired online, Lugansk regional governor Sergiy Gaiday said that the Russian army has taken control over most of Severodonetsk, but that Ukrainian forces were still pushing them back.
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Russian anti-aircraft forces have shot down dozens of Ukrainian weapons and are “cracking them like nuts,” said Russian president Vladimir Putin in an interview that aired on Saturday. “Russian news agency RIA, which first cited the comments, quoted Putin as responding to a question about US-supplied arms by saying Russia was coping easily and had already destroyed the weapons by the dozen,” Reuters reported.
- The US expressed support for international investigations into war crimes committed in Ukraine, the US embassy in Kyiv announced on Saturday. “Those responsible for war crimes - including direct perpetrators and those who ordered them - must face justice,” the US embassy in Kyiv tweeted on Saturday.
- Western sanctions would not have an effect on Russia’s oil exports, said Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov on Saturday. Lavrov also predicted a significant increase in profits from energy shipments this year, Russian news agency Tass reported.
- Some Ukrainian military units have been withdrawing from the key city of Severodonetsk in eastern Ukraine, the Russian army announced on Saturday. “Some units of the Ukrainian army, having suffered critical losses during fighting for Severodonetsk, are pulling out towards Lysychansk,” Severodonetsk’s twin city, which sits just across a river, the defence ministry said in a statement.
- A European Union decision to extend sanctions against Russian billionaire Andrey Melnichenko to his wife is “irrational” because she has never held Russian citizenship or resided in Russia, a representative for the couple said on Saturday. The EU sanctioned Melnichenko’s wife on Friday as part of a sixth round of sanctions against Russia for waging a war against Ukraine. The EU said Aleksandra Melnichenko “takes good advantage of the fortune and benefits from the wealth of her husband”.
That’s it from me, Maya Yang, today as I hand the blog over to my colleagues in Australia. Thank you.
Ukrainian first lady Olena Zelenska and other officials commemorated 261 children killed by the Russian war against Ukraine by hanging bells near St. Sophia Cathedral in Kyiv that symbolize the voices of killed children, Euromaidan Press reports.
On the Int. Day of Innocent Children Victims of Aggression, Ukrainian first lady Olena Zelenska and other officials commemorated 261 children killed by the Russian war against Ukraine by hanging bells near St. Sophia Cathedral in Kyiv that symbolize the voices of killed children pic.twitter.com/MrFrilAJ40
— Euromaidan Press (@EuromaidanPress) June 4, 2022
Top US general, in Stockholm, signals support for Sweden and Finland’s NATO bids
Top US General Mark Milley said on Saturday that the United States is determined to support Sweden and Finland as the countries pursue Nato membership, a statement underscored by his visit to the USS Kearsarge after it became the largest US warship ever to dock in Stockholm.
Agence France-Presse reports:
“It’s important for us, the United States, and it’s important for the other Nato countries to show solidarity with both Finland and Sweden in this exercise,” Milley said ahead of Nato’s annual Baltic Sea naval manoeuvres.
He was speaking during a joint press conference with Swedish prime minister Magdalena Andersson.
The “Baltops 22” naval exercise - set to run from 5 to 17 June and involving 14 Nato countries as well as Sweden and Finland - takes place this year in the shadow of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
That invasion prompted the two Nordic countries to reverse decades of military nonalignment and apply for Nato membership.
The presence in Stockholm of the USS Kearsarge, an amphibious assault ship designed to deploy land forces, “demonstrates commitment in a common cause, in the rules-based international order, in the idea that large countries cannot invade small countries at no cost,” said Milley, the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Andersson in turn said the presence in the Swedish capital of the imposing 250-metre-long (840-foot) vessel - with a full complement of helicopters and some 1,200 Marines aboard - “is a concrete expression of the US support and also a very strong political signal at a crucial time in history”.
“It also shows that the security assurances that President Biden was very outspoken on when I and President (Sauli) Niinisto visited him in the White House, is actually followed with concrete action,” the Swedish prime minister added. She and Niinisto met with Biden in Washington on 19 May.
“We are very, very grateful” for such support, Andersson said.
Updated
Ukraine says Russia using ‘all its power’ to capture eastern city
Ukrainian forces have been managing to push back against Russian troops in fierce fighting in Severodonetsk despite Russia “throwing all its power” into capturing the key eastern city, Ukrainian officials said on Saturday.
In an interview aired online, Lugansk regional governor Sergiy Gaiday said that the Russian army has taken control over most of Severodonetsk, but that Ukrainian forces were still pushing them back.
“The Russian army, as we understand, is throwing all its power, all its reserves in this direction,” said Gaiday.
“Our soldiers have managed to redeploy, build a line of defence,” said the city’s mayor, Oleksandr Striuk, in a televised interview broadcast on Telegram Saturday.
“We are currently doing everything necessary to re-establish total control” of the city, he added, while also acknowledging that the current situation is “quite difficult,” due to fierce street fighting and artillery exchanges.
At least seven civilians were reported killed in the Lugansk region where Severodonetsk is located and in the southern city of Mykolaiv, while a revered wooden church was reported to be on fire because of the fighting.
Updated
Russian anti-aircraft forces have shot down dozens of Ukrainian weapons and are “cracking them like nuts,” said Russian president Vladimir Putin in an interview that aired on Saturday.
Reuters reports:
Russian news agency RIA, which first cited the comments, quoted Putin as responding to a question about US-supplied arms by saying Russia was coping easily and had already destroyed the weapons by the dozen.
But the clip of an interview to be aired on Sunday made clear that Putin had in fact been responding to a different question, which was not shown.
“Our anti-aircraft systems are crunching them like nuts. Dozens have been destroyed,” Putin said.
Although the exact kind of weapon was not clear, Russia says it has destroyed both aircraft and missiles fielded by Ukraine.
Updated
The US expressed support for international investigations into war crimes committed in Ukraine, the US embassy in Kyiv announced on Saturday.
Those responsible for war crimes - including direct perpetrators and those who ordered them - must face justice. In addition to our direct support to @GP_Ukraine, the United States supports international investigations to ensure accountability for atrocities committed in Ukraine. https://t.co/ELBEUUon8b
— U.S. Embassy Kyiv (@USEmbassyKyiv) June 4, 2022
In a separate tweet, US ambassador Bridget Brink to Ukraine wrote, “Bearing witness to atrocities committed in Russia’s brutal war, including families killed in their own homes, only strengthens my resolve to do everything we can to hold the perpetrators of these awful crimes to account.”
Updated
Western sanctions would not have an effect on Russia’s oil exports, said Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov on Saturday.
Lavrov also predicted a significant increase in profits from energy shipments this year, Russian news agency Tass reported.
Considering the price level that has been established as a result of the west’s policies, we have suffered no budgetary losses. On the contrary, this year we will significantly increase the profits from the export of our energy resources,” Tass quoted Lavrov as telling a Bosnian television station.
Updated
Some Ukrainian military units have been withdrawing from the key city of Severodonetsk in eastern Ukraine, the Russian army announced on Saturday.
“Some units of the Ukrainian army, having suffered critical losses during fighting for Severodonetsk, are pulling out towards Lysychansk,” Severodonetsk’s twin city, which sits just across a river, the defence ministry said in a statement.
“The Ukrainian authorities, having realised that it was impossible to resist further and to hold on to the industrial zone of Severodonetsk, ordered a mixed tactical unit to mine the tanks containing nitrate and nitric acid in the Azot factory,” it added.
Russia’s army said the remaining group of Ukrainian fighters that are still in the city includes “survivors” of the 79th Air Assault Brigade and members of the Ukrainian Territorial Defence Forces.
The defense ministry went on to claim that the Ukrainian army attempted to contaminate the area and “delay” the Russian military operation.
A European Union decision to extend sanctions against Russian billionaire Andrey Melnichenko to his wife is “irrational” because she has never held Russian citizenship or resided in Russia, a representative for the couple said on Saturday.
Reuters reports:
Aleksandra Melnichenko, who was born in Belgrade and holds Serbian and Croatian citizenship, will “vigorously contest the unfortunate decision against her”, the representative said in an email statement to Reuters, declining to give a name.
Reuters reported last month that Melnichenko ceded ownership of coal company SUEK AO and fertilizer company EuroChem Group AG to his wife on March 8, a day before the EU put him on a sanctions list.
The EU sanctioned Melnichenko’s wife on Friday as part of a sixth round of sanctions against Russia for waging a war against Ukraine. The EU said Aleksandra Melnichenko “takes good advantage of the fortune and benefits from the wealth of her husband”.
The step could disrupt operations at SUEK and EuroChem because the sanctions include freezing her assets.
A EuroChem spokesperson said that while the company was committed to complying strictly with EU sanctions law, it would also seek to discuss with EU authorities how it could continue supplying fertilisers to farmers.
“EuroChem will engage with the European Commission and table proposals to find solutions that will maintain its operations and provide crop nutrients to its customers around the world at a most critical time of food crisis,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
EuroChem produces roughly 5% of world fertiliser output.
Upon sanctioning Melnichenko in March, the EU accused him of being close to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The Melnichenko family representative said in Saturday’s statement that the businessman has no political affiliations in Russia, calling the decision to sanction him “reckless” and “arbitrary”.
Pope Francis said on Saturday he would meet soon with Ukrainian officials to discuss the possibility of a visit to their country.
Francis disclosed the coming meeting in a question-and-answer session with children in one of the Vatican’s main courtyards, Reuters reports.
A Ukrainian boy named Sachar asked him: “Can you come to Ukraine to save all the children who are suffering there now?”
The 85-year-Francis, who has been using a wheelchair because of knee pain, responded that he often thought of Ukrainian children and wanted to visit the country but had to choose the right time.
“It is not easy to make a decision that could do more harm than good to the rest of the world. I have to find the right moment to do it,” he said, according to a Vatican transcript of the event. He did not elaborate.
“Next week I will receive representatives of the Ukrainian government, who will come here to talk, to talk even about an eventual visit of mine there. We’ll see what happens,” Francis said.
Vladimir Putin, in comments about a US decision to send new arms to Ukraine, said Russia was easily coping and was already destroying American-supplied weapons by the dozen, state-run news agency RIA reported.
Putin made the remarks in an interview with national television which is scheduled to be broadcast on Sunday.
Updated
Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Russian artillery hit an early 17th century Ukrainian Orthodox monastery in eastern Ukraine.
Russia’s Defence Ministry denied involvement, accusing Ukrainian troops of setting fire to the All Saints Monastery in Donetsk before pulling back, Reuters report.
Flames could be seen ripping through the timber walls of a church with domes in footage posted by Zelenskiy on his official Telegram channel. Reuters could not immediately verify the authenticity of the footage.
“Russian artillery struck the Svyatohirsk Lavra in the Donetsk region again today. Destroyed All Saints Monastery. It was consecrated in 1912,” the Ukrainian leader wrote.
“It was first destroyed during the Soviet era. Later it was rebuilt to be burned by the Russian army.”
Zelenskiy called for Russia to be expelled from the United Nations’ cultural agency Unesco and said there had been no military targets present at the site.
He added: “Every church burned by Russia in Ukraine, every school blown up, every destroyed memorial proves that Russia has no place in Unesco.”
Updated
Lugansk regional governor, Sergiy Gaiday, said in an interview that the invading forces had captured most of Sievierodonetsk, but that the Ukrainian military was pushing them back.
“The Russian army, as we understand, is throwing all its power, all its reserves in this direction,” said Gaiday, who on Friday claimed Ukrainian troops had managed to win back a fifth of the city.
Russia’s army however claimed some Ukrainian military units were withdrawing from the city.
The press service of Ukraine’s presidential office said that “street fighting” was continuing in Sievierodonetsk and “assault operations are underway” in an industrial part of the city, AFP reports.
Updated
As thousands of people have descended on The Mall in London to celebrate the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, a few hundred pro democracy supporters have assembled further down Whitehall.
“Stop the war, stop Putin”: Ukrainians in the UK have joined a 300 strong rally for democracy taking place opposite Downing Street, London, today pic.twitter.com/jDEUmgdRfq
— Jason Rodrigues (@RodriguesJasonL) June 4, 2022
Updated
Here are more details about the death of Dmitry Kovtun, one of the two Russian men accused of assassinating the former spy and Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko in London, from coronavirus.
Litvinenko died in 2006, weeks after drinking tea laced with the radioactive isotope polonium 210 at a London hotel, where he met Kovtun and the other suspect, Andrei Lugovoi. The case has since weighed on relations between Britain and Russia. After Litvinenko’s death, detectives found polonium in all the hotel rooms where Kovtun and Lugovoi had stayed in London, as well as on Lugovoi’s plane seat from Moscow and in numerous other locations including at Arsenal’s Emirates stadium.
Updated
Finland and Sweden joining Nato would put Russia in a difficult military position in the Baltic Sea, top US general Mark Milley said.
The two Nordic neighbours, which both have long borders on the Baltic Sea, applied last month to join the military alliance amid security concerns after Russia invaded Ukraine in February, although they face objections from Turkey.
Their joining would mean the Baltic Sea’s coastline would, bar short strips around Russian cities Kaliningrad and St Petersburg, be encircled by Nato members, Reuters reports.
So from a Russian perspective that will be very problematic for them, militarily speaking, and it would be very advantageous to Nato,” said Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
“The Baltic [Sea is] very strategically important, it’s one of the great seaways of the world,” Milley added.
He was speaking at a joint news conference with his Swedish counterpart, the Swedish prime minister and the Swedish defence minister ahead of an annual Nato exercise in the Baltic Sea that Sweden and Finland take part in.
Updated
Today so far...
It is 6pm in Kyiv. Here’s where we stand:
- Ukraine has staged a counterattack on the frontline city of Sievierodonetsk and recaptured a fifth of the city it had previously lost to Russian invaders, according to the head of the region, Serhiy Haidai. He said Russian forces were forfeiting recent gains in the city and Ukraine’s military had pushed them back by 20%. His claims are hard to verify amid the heavy fighting.
- Russian forces have combined airstrikes and massed artillery fires to bring its “overwhelming” firepower to bear in Donbas, the UK Ministry of Defence said in its latest intelligence report. This combined use of air and artillery strikes has been a key factor in Russia’s recent tactical successes in the region, the report reads.
- A famous monastery in eastern Ukraine, Svyatohirsk Lavra, caught fire after it was hit by Russian shelling. The monastery is affiliated with the Moscow Patriarchate, which is run by Putin’s ally Patriarch Kirill. There are reports that four monks were killed as a result of the attack but this has not been verified.
- France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, said it is vital that Russia is not humiliated so that a diplomatic solution can be found once fighting stops in Ukraine. Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, reacted angrily to Macron’s comments and said such calls would “only humiliate France” and others taking the same view.
- Negotiations with Russia will only resume after new weapons arrive from the west and Ukraine’s position is “strengthened,” said David Arakhamia, a member of Ukraine’s negotiation group with Russia. Another negotiator, Mykhailo Podolyak, said there was no point in talks with Russia until Moscow’s forces are pushed back as far as possible towards Ukraine’s borders.
- The world faces a critical food shortage unless Russia lifts its blockade on Ukraine’s Black Sea ports, Ukraine’s infrastructure minister, Oleksandr Kubrakov, has warned. Efforts to improve other transport options in order to get its grains out by road, river and rail would be insufficient for Ukraine to deliver a fraction of its total grain stockpile, Kubrakov told the Financial Times.
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Ukraine’s intelligence services are in communication with the captured Azovstal steelworks fighters and Kyiv is doing all it can to ensure their release, according to Ukraine’s interior minister, Denys Monastyrskiy. Hundreds of fighters were taken into Russian custody in mid-May after being ordered to stand down. Ukraine wants the fighters to be returned in a prisoner swap. However, some Russian officials have said forces could be tried or executed.
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Ukraine’s volunteer brigade announced the deaths of four foreign military volunteers fighting Russian forces. The International Legion of Defence of Ukraine, an official volunteer brigade, announced the four men were from Germany, the Netherlands, Australia and France. They did not specify when or under what circumstances the deaths took place.
That’s it from me, Léonie Chao-Fong, today as I hand the blog over to Nadeem Badshah, who will continue to bring you all the latest news from the war in Ukraine.
Ukraine slams Macron's call not to 'humiliate' Russia
Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, has dismissed calls by the French president, Emmanuel Macron, not to “humiliate” Russia for the sake of diplomacy.
In an interview, Macron offered to mediate in the war and warned against humiliating Moscow so as to keep the door open to a diplomatic solution.
In response, Kuleba said such calls “could only humiliate France and every other country that calls for it”.
Kuleba tweeted:
It is Russia that humiliates itself. We all better focus on how to put Russia in its place. This will bring peace and save lives.
Calls to avoid humiliation of Russia can only humiliate France and every other country that would call for it. Because it is Russia that humiliates itself. We all better focus on how to put Russia in its place. This will bring peace and save lives.
— Dmytro Kuleba (@DmytroKuleba) June 4, 2022
Updated
Our Shaun Walker reports on how in towns near Russia’s border, Moscow’s influence was strong and Ukrainian was rarely spoken. The war has changed that:
Gamlet Zinkivskyi grew up speaking Russian in the city of Kharkiv, just like his parents. But when Vladimir Putin launched the invasion of Ukraine on 24 February, it was the final push for him to switch fully to Ukrainian.
“Unfortunately, I grew up speaking Russian, but it’s not pleasant to speak the same language as the army that is destroying whole areas of our country,” said Zinkivskyi, a 35-year-old street artist widely known to Kharkiv residents, who usually refer to him by his first name.
The switch of language is part of a broader journey towards a more pronounced Ukrainian identity for Zinkivskyi, something shared by many in the largely Russian-speaking areas of east and south Ukraine. It is a process which has become more pronounced in the past three months, but it has been brewing for some years.
As a young artist, Zinkivskyi had a longstanding dream: an exhibition in Moscow. Kharkiv is just a few dozen miles from the border with Russia and has long been almost entirely Russian-speaking. Culturally, Moscow felt like the centre of the universe. But when Zinkivskyi finally made it to a gallery there in 2012, he was horrified. He said:
They were obnoxious and patronising about Kharkiv and Ukraine, and frankly I thought: fuck them.
He returned to Kharkiv and became more focused on the Ukrainian art scene.
After the annexation of Crimea, in 2014, Zinkivskyi started trying to speak some Ukrainian with a few friends. Now he has fully switched, and for the first time is also introducing political and patriotic themes into his art.
The language issue is something that comes up again and again in Kharkiv. Oleksandra Panchenko, a 22-year-old interior designer, said that since 2014 she had been trying hard to improve her Ukrainian, but conceded that she still often speaks Russian with friends.
However, she is adamant that by the time she has children, she will be fluent enough to speak only Ukrainian at home. “I grew up in a Russian-language family, my kids will grow up in a Ukrainian-language family,” she said.
Read the full story here: Enemy tongue: eastern Ukrainians reject their Russian birth language
Here’s more on the fire at the Svyatohirsk Lavra in eastern Ukraine after it was hit by shelling this afternoon.
A statement on the Ukrainian Orthodox church website said:
As a result of hostilities, a large-scale fire broke out on the territory of the All Saints Hermitage of the Holy Dormition Sviatohirsk Lavra. The flames engulfed the main shrine of the monastery.
Videos published on social media show flames engulfing the monastery.
#Святогорск Донецкая обл., горит деревянный Всехсвятский скит Святогорской лавры https://t.co/9Uq4v6vaA3 pic.twitter.com/3Lmek0yNdx
— Necro Mancer (@666_mancer) June 4, 2022
A tweet from the Ukrainian government shows the monastery, located near the town of Sviatohirsk in the Donetsk region, before and after it was hit.
The monastery is affiliated with the Moscow Patriarchate, which is run by Patriarch Kirill. Kirill is a long-serving Putin ally who has given his blessing to the war in Ukraine.
After russia's bombardment wooden All Saints Monastery of Svyatogorsk Lavra is on fire. It's affiliated w/ Moscow Patriarchate. On 30.05 russsia killed 4 monks here. Would Patriarch Kiril finally call president putin 2 end the war or would he continue blessing russia's army? pic.twitter.com/3HI3sjQnf4
— Ukrainian Mission to OSCE & UN in Vienna (@UKRinOSCE) June 4, 2022
The tweet claims that four monks were killed as a result of a Russian attack on the monastery. It has not been possible to verify this.
Updated
Ukrainian negotiator, Mykhailo Podolyak, said there was no point in talks with Russia until Moscow’s forces are pushed back as far as possible towards Ukraine’s borders.
Asked about an offer from France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, to mediate talks between Kyiv and Moscow to end the war in Ukraine, Podolyak said:
...Until we receive weapons in their full amount, until we strengthen our positions, until we push them (Russia’s forces) back as far as possible to the borders of Ukraine, there is no point in holding negotiations.
Podolyak’s remarks come after another member of Ukraine’s negotiation team, David Arakhamia, said Kyiv wanted to strengthen its positions on the ground with the help of new weapons deliveries from the west before it resumes peace talks with Russia.
Ukraine announces deaths of four foreign military volunteers
Ukraine’s volunteer brigade announced the deaths of four foreign military volunteers fighting Russian forces and paid tribute to “their bravery, their memory and legacy”.
The International Legion of Defence of Ukraine, an official volunteer brigade, announced the four men were from Germany, the Netherlands, Australia and France. They did not specify when or under what circumstances the deaths took place.
In a statement, it said:
We lost our brothers in combat but their bravery, their memory and legacy will forever inspire us.
A Dutch citizen, Ronald Vogelaar, was buried on 21 May in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second city, according to AFP. Colleagues said he had been killed several days earlier by artillery.
An Australian was reported killed in May and his death was confirmed by a foreign affairs department spokesperson. He was identified as Michael Charles O’Neill, 47, in a local Tasmania newspaper.
On Friday, Paris confirmed that a French volunteer fighter had been killed in combat in Ukraine, following reports that the man died in artillery fire in the Kharkiv region.
In a briefing on Thursday, the Russian ministry of defence said it had “eliminated hundreds of foreign mercenaries in Ukraine”, adding that 3,500 foreign fighters were currently in the country.
The ministry also warned that captured foreign soldiers would not be treated under the standards of international humanitarian law.
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has urged the US to cut ties with Russian cities on the basis that “tyrants must not be allowed to enjoy ties to the free world”.
Zelenskiy was addressing the 90th annual conference of US mayors via video link, where he called on his audience to cut their connections with “twin” or “sister” city relationships.
Using the examples of Chicago, which names Moscow as its sister city, as well as Jacksonville and Murmansk, San Diego and Vladivostok, as well as Albany and Tula, Zelenskiy said:
Dozens of American cities maintain the so-called ‘brotherhood’ with the cities of the Russian Federation. What do these connections give you? Probably nothing. But they give Russia the opportunity to say that it is not isolated, even after beginning such a war.
Since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine, 3,620 settlements have “faced Russian occupation” and Russia has aimed almost 2,500 missiles at Ukraine, Zelenskiy said.
He urged mayors to take part in “the largest economic project of our time” by helping to rebuild Ukraine after the war.
Zelenskiy said:
I invite you, your cities, your companies, your business and professionals, to take part in this project. You can also become the people who choose to defend freedom and thus put an end to the history of tyranny.
Take patronage over a city, region, or industry that has been destroyed by Russian strikes. And rebuild them with the latest technology. This may be the largest economic project of our time, which will strengthen Ukraine, each country and each company that will participate in the post-war reconstruction.
A church in Donetsk has been hit by Russian shelling and has caught fire, with footage and photos circulating of the aftermath.
The Skete of All Saints of Svyatohirsk Lavra was built in 1526.
In Donetsk Oblast, Skete of All Saints of Sviatohirsk Lavra which belongs to the Moscow Patriarchate caught fire due to Russian shelling. No casualties are reported yet, say Ukrainian Orthodox Church and an officer of the Ukrainian Armed Forces pic.twitter.com/eVgJdluajG
— Hromadske Int. (@Hromadske) June 4, 2022
Macron: Russia must not be humiliated despite Putin’s ‘mistake’
France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, said it is vital that Russia is not humiliated so that a diplomatic solution can be found once fighting stops in Ukraine.
He said that his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, had made a “historic and fundamental mistake” by invading Ukraine and was now “isolated”.
Macron said he told Putin that he had “made a historic and fundamental error for his people, for himself and for history” in an interview with regional newspapers.
Macron said:
I think he has isolated himself. Isolating oneself is one thing, but being able to get out of it is a difficult path.
Russia should not be “humiliated... so that the day the fighting stops we can pave a way out through diplomatic means”, he said, adding that he was “convinced that it is France’s role to be a mediating power”.
Macron has spoken with Putin regularly since the Russian president ordered his troops into Ukraine. France has supported Ukraine militarily and financially but unlike many other EU leaders, Macron has not yet travelled to Ukraine to show his support.
Updated
Updated
A former KGB agent who was accused of poisoning Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko in London has died of Covid-19, according to reports.
Dmitry Kovtun, one of two Russian men accused by Britain of carrying out the poisoning in 2006, died in a Moscow hospital, according to the Russian state-owned news agency Tass.
Litvinenko, a British citizen and former KGB officer who had become an outspoken opponent of Vladimir Putin, died weeks after drinking green tea laced with radioactive polonium-210 at London’s Millennium Hotel, where he met Kovtun and the other suspect, Andrei Lugovoy.
Investigators found traces of polonium at sites across London where the two men had been, including in offices, hotels, planes and the Arsenal soccer stadium.
From his deathbed, Litvinenko accused Putin of ordering his killing, but the Kremlin has always denied any role. Kovtun and Lugovoy denied carrying out the poisoning, and Russia refused to extradite them to face trial.
Lugovoy, who is now a prominent member of Russia’s parliament, was quoted by Tass as saying he was mourning the death of a “close and faithful friend”
Russian forces are blowing up bridges across the Seversky Donets river to prevent Ukraine from bringing in military reinforcements and delivering aid to civilians in Sievierodonetsk, according to the governor of the Luhansk region, Serhiy Haidai.
Haidai said the Ukrainian military continued to hold its positions inside the key eastern city and was pushing back Russian forces in several locations, Reuters reports.
The world faces a critical food shortage unless Russia lifts its blockade on Ukraine’s Black Sea ports, Ukraine’s infrastructure minister, Oleksandr Kubrakov, has warned.
Ukraine and its allies are seeking ways to get some 22m tonnes of grain out of the country after Russia captured much of its southern coastline. The Russian navy now controls major transport routes in the Black Sea, blocking Ukrainian shipments and threatening tens of millions of people who rely on Ukraine’s cereals.
Efforts to improve other transport options in order to get its grains out by road, river and rail would be insufficient to enable Ukraine to deliver a fraction of its total grain stockpile, Kubrakov told the Financial Times.
Kubrakov said:
All of our activity won’t cover even 20% of what we could do through the Black Sea ports.
He added:
Everyone is doing superhuman activity, and the [amount exported] is growing every month . . . in the short term it could go up to 30% [of Ukraine’s Black Sea exporting capacity].
Russia’s blockade risked creating famine “on a global scale”, Kubrakov said, accusing Moscow of acting like “total pirates”.
Kubrakov said:
They don’t care about the lives of these people in Africa. They’re telling them: ‘We don’t care about you. We are only worried about sanctions against us. Now you are hostages.’
Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, yesterday denied Moscow was preventing Ukrainian ports from exporting grain, calling reports of a Russian export ban a “bluff” from western nations.
Updated
Ukrainian negotiator, David Arakhamia, said Kyiv wants to strengthen its positions on the ground with the help of new weapons deliveries from the west before it resumes peace talks with Russia.
Speaking on national television yesterday, Arakhamia said:
Our armed forces are ready to use (the new weapons)...and then I think we can initiate a new round of talks from a strengthened position.
A quick snap from Reuters, also from Odesa in southern Ukraine. Russia’s defence ministry said it shot down a Ukrainian military transport plane carrying weapons and munitions near the Black Sea port.
Russian missiles also struck an artillery training centre in Ukraine’s Sumy region where foreign instructors worked, the ministry said.
It also claimed another missile strike destroyed a “foreign mercenaries’” outpost in the Odesa region.
It has not been possible to independently verify these claims.
A Russian missile struck an agricultural building in the southern Ukrainian region of Odesa this morning, wounding two people, according to a local official.
Serhiy Bratchuk, a spokesperson for the Odesa regional military administration, said on Telegram:
The morning in Odesa began with a missile strike. Strategic aviation aircraft of the Russian Federation launched a cruise missile attack on one of the districts of the Odesa region. A Ha-59 type missile hit an agricultural enterprise. According to preliminary information, two people were injured.
A team is investigating the incident and rescuers have put out the resulting fire, he added.
He also noted that several ships carrying cruise missiles continued to be in the Black Sea, adding that Russian forces were trying to strengthen their foothold on Snake Island.
Russia ‘suffering huge losses’ after Ukraine recaptures chunk of Sievierodonetsk, says governor
Ukraine now controls around half of the key eastern city of Sievierodonetsk after recapturing 20% of the territory they had lost to Russian forces, according to the head of the eastern region of Luhansk, Serhiy Haidai.
Russia had “previously managed to capture most of the city”, he said, “but now our military has pushed them back. They are really suffering huge losses”.
Speaking on national television, Haidai said:
They are moving forward step-by-step. They are simply destroying everything with artillery, aircraft, mortars, tanks.
But as soon as we have enough Western long-range weapons, we will push their artillery away from our positions. And then, believe me, the Russian infantry, they will just run.
The situation in the region as a whole remained “difficult”, with Sievierodonetsk “now just a concentration of hostilities” because the Russian army “is throwing all its reserves into this direction”, Haidai said.
It has not been possible to independently verify his claims.
Our Dan Sabbagh is in the Ukrainian capital where he has shared images of Russian wreckage displayed for the public, “safe now for children to play on, and for adults to peer at”.
Safe now for children to play on, and for adults to peer at. Destroyed Russian armour and spent missile casings now displayed open air in a relatively safe Kyiv. Not so much history but reality pic.twitter.com/CVSMEbwwqB
— Dan Sabbagh (@dansabbagh) June 4, 2022
More Russian wreckage pic.twitter.com/dqotDKalw9
— Dan Sabbagh (@dansabbagh) June 4, 2022
Russia combining air and artillery strikes to bring ‘overwhelming firepower’, says UK MoD
Russian forces have combined airstrikes and massed artillery fires to bring its “overwhelming” firepower to bear in Donbas, the UK Ministry of Defence has said in its latest intelligence report released this morning.
This combined use of air and artillery strikes has been a key factor in Russia’s recent tactical successes in the region, the report reads.
Russian air activity remains high over contested ground in the Donbas with Russian aircraft conducting strikes using both guided and unguided munitions.
Russian air activity has been “largely restricted to deep strikes using air and surface launched cruise missiles” to disrupt the movement of Ukrainian reinforcements and supplies, the report says.
These strikes alone however have failed to have a meaningful impact on the conflict and Russian stocks of precision guided missiles are likely to have been significantly depleted as a result.
After switching its focus to Donbas, Russian forces have been able to “increase its employment of tactical air to support its creeping advance, combining airstrikes and massed artillery fires to bring its overwhelming firepower to bear,” the ministry said.
The combined use of air and artillery strikes has been a key factor in Russia’s recent tactical successes in the region. The increased use of unguided munitions has led to the widespread destruction of built-up areas in the Donbas and has almost certainly caused substantial collateral damage and civilian casualties.
Latest Defence Intelligence update on the situation in Ukraine - 4 June 2022
— Ministry of Defence 🇬🇧 (@DefenceHQ) June 4, 2022
Find out more about the UK government's response: https://t.co/0aOZJCGvVJ
🇺🇦 #StandWithUkraine 🇺🇦 pic.twitter.com/3W92EWHUmh
Good morning from London. I’m Léonie Chao-Fong, here to bring you all the latest developments from the war in Ukraine. Please feel free to drop me a message if you have anything to flag, you can reach me on Twitter or via email.
Updated
Summary
- Ukraine’s intelligence services are in communication with the captured Azovstal steelworks fighters and Kyiv is doing all it can to ensure their release, according to Ukraine’s interior minister, Denys Monastyrskiy. Hundreds of fighters were taken into Russian custody in mid-May after being ordered to stand down. They had spent weeks holed up in a warren of tunnels and bunkers underneath the steelworks.
- Ukraine’s military said on Saturday that Russia had reinforced its troops and had used artillery to conduct “assault operations” in Sievierodonetsk. On Friday, Ukraine said its forces had recaptured about 20% of the territory they lost in the city.
- The US-based thinktank the Institute for the Study of War reports that Russian occupation authorities have begun issuing Russian passports in Kherson City and Melitopol, but adds “they continue to face challenges establishing societal control over occupied territories”.
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Russian troops now occupy a fifth of Ukraine’s territory, according to Agence France-Presse, and Moscow has imposed a blockade on its Black Sea ports. However, the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, was defiant on Friday, stating “victory shall be ours”.
- Vladimir Putin says exporting grain from Ukraine is “no problem”, after Moscow’s invasion raised fears of a global food crisis. The Russian president said in a televised interview on Friday that exporting could be done via Ukrainian ports, via others under Russian control, or even via central Europe. Putin accused the west of “bluster” by claiming Moscow was preventing the grain exports from Ukraine.
- The African Union head and Senegalese president, Macky Sall, said he was “reassured” after meeting Putin in Sochi regarding food shortages caused by the Russian invasion of Ukraine. However, he told Putin that Africans were the victims of the war in Ukraine.
Updated
Ukraine's intelligence in communication with captured Azovstal fighters, says minister
Ukraine’s intelligence services are in communication with the captured Azovstal steelworks fighters and Kyiv is doing all it can to ensure their release, Ukrainian Interior Minister Denys Monastyrskiy said late on Friday, according to a Reuters report.
Uncertainty has surrounded the fate of hundreds of fighters who were taken into Russian custody in mid-May after being ordered to stand down. They had spent weeks holed up in a warren of tunnels and bunkers underneath the steelworks, as Russian forces took control of the rest of the city. Many had serious injuries, with limited medical care and dwindling supplies.
Ukraine wants the fighters to be returned in a prisoner swap. However some Russian officials have said forces could be tried or executed.
In comments made to Ukrainian television on Friday, Monastyrskiy said:
It is through them [intelligence services] that we are learning about the conditions of the detention, nutrition and the possibility of their release. We all know that they will all be here, in Kyiv, and we are doing everything possible to do so.”
The Kremlin has said the fighters who surrendered will be treated according to international standards.
Updated
Russia issuing passports in Kherson and Melitopol, says US defence thinktank
In its latest analysis, the US-based thinktank the Institute for the Study of War reports that Russian occupation authorities have begun issuing Russian passports in Kherson and Melitopol, but adds “they continue to face challenges establishing societal control over occupied territories and ending Ukrainian partisan actions”.
ISW also provides the following commentary on the conflict:
• Russian forces conducted unsuccessful assaults southeast and southwest of Izyum and west of Lyman but remain unlikely to secure major advances towards Slovyansk.
• Russian forces made minor gains in the eastern part of Sievierodonetsk, but Ukrainian forces continues to launch localized counterattacks.
• Russian forces did not attempt to launch assaults on Avdiivka.
• Russian forces failed to regain lost positions in northeastern Kherson Oblast and continued to defend previously occupied positions.
Here are today's control-of-terrain maps for #Russia's invasion of #Ukraine from @TheStudyofWar and @criticalthreats. pic.twitter.com/VAi8ENTT5m
— ISW (@TheStudyofWar) June 3, 2022
Updated
More than 1,400 cases of treason and collaboration with the Russian army have been brought against Ukrainian citizens. Guardian correspondents Lorenzo Tondo and Shaun Walker in Kharkiv report on the difficult decisions facing prosecutors.
For the Ukrainian authorities, it is important to show that punishment for those who helped the Russian invasion will be swift and stern. But at the same time, the process comes with lots of tricky questions.
These include whether Ukraine’s prosecutors and judges, who for years have battled accusations of corruption and nepotism, can be trusted not to abuse the process. Numerous high-ranking officials may also be asked questions about negligence at the beginning of the invasion, or even treason.
Ukraine’s military said on Saturday that Russia had reinforced its troops and had used artillery to conduct “assault operations” in Sievierodonetsk, Reuters has reported.
But Russian forces had retreated after failed attempts to advance in the nearby town of Bakhmut and cut off access to Sievierodonetsk, Ukraine military said.
On Friday, Serhiy Gaidai, the head of the eastern region of Luhansk, said on national television that Ukrainian forces have recaptured around 20% of the territory they lost in Sievierodonetsk.
From Odesa, Guardian correspondent Luke Harding reports on calls for a campaign of “de-Russification” once Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine comes to an end.
Ukraine has already twice dismantled Soviet-era state symbols. In the 1990s many Lenin statues were removed, including those in Odesa. Kyiv’s parliament embarked on a further round of “decommunisation” in 2014 after the Maidan uprising against the country’s pro-Moscow president, Viktor Yanukovych, and Putin’s annexation of Crimea and his war in the eastern Donbas region.
In Russian-occupied areas this process is going into reverse. In April Russian troops erected a new statue of Lenin outside the main administration building in the southern city of Henichesk, in Kherson province. They have torn down blue-and-yellow Ukrainian flags from municipal buildings and hung Russian and Soviet ones in their place. This “re-Russification” is part of Putin’s attempt to erase Ukraine, Kyiv says.
Updated
Images taken in Ukraine over the past 24 hours show the devastation of the war, defiance and a longing for peace.
Welcome
Hello, I’m Rebecca Ratcliffe and welcome to our rolling coverage of the war in Ukraine.
Here are some of the key developments of the past few hours.
- Ukrainian forces have recaptured around 20% of the territory they lost in Sievierodonetsk since Russia’s invasion, according to Ukrainian officials. “Whereas before the situation was difficult, the percentage [held by Russia] was somewhere around 70%, now we have already pushed them back by approximately 20%,” Serhiy Gaidai, the head of the eastern region of Luhansk, announced on national television on Friday.
- “Victory shall be ours,” Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in a video featuring the same key ministers and advisers who appeared with him in a defiant broadcast on 24 February, the day his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, launched his unprovoked assault. “The armed forces of Ukraine are here. Most importantly, our people, the people of our country, are here. We have been defending Ukraine for 100 days already … Glory to Ukraine,” Zelenskiy added.
- Vladimir Putin says exporting grain from Ukraine is “no problem”, after Moscow’s invasion raised fears of a global food crisis. The Russian president said in a televised interview on Friday that exporting could be done via Ukrainian ports, via others under Russian control, or even via central Europe. Putin accused the west of “bluster” by claiming Moscow was preventing the grain exports from Ukraine.
- The African Union head and Senegalese president, Macky Sall, said he was “reassured” after meeting with Putin in Sochi regarding food shortages caused by the Russian invasion of Ukraine. However, he told Putin that Africans were the victims of the war in Ukraine.
- Leading US general Mark Milley has met Finnish president Sauli Niinisto to pledge US support for Finland’s and Sweden’s Nato membership bids, which Turkey is blocking. Milley told reporters it was clear that, if the two countries’ applications were approved, “they will bring a significant increase in the military capability of Nato”, Agence France-Presse reported. After Helsinki, Milley was expected to visit neighbouring Sweden on Saturday.
- European president Ursula von der Leyen said that Ukraine must meet all the necessary standards and conditions for accession. She went on to call on the EU to help Ukraine achieve its goals.
- A driver transporting two Reuters journalists in eastern Ukraine was killed and the two reporters lightly wounded on Friday, a company spokesperson said. They had come under fire while en route to Severodonetsk. “They were travelling in a vehicle provided by the Russian-backed separatists and driven by an individual assigned by the separatists,” the international news agency said.
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French president Emmanuel Macron says Putin has committed a “historic and fundamental error” by invading Ukraine and is now “isolated”. “I think, and I told him, that he made a historic and fundamental error for his people, for himself and for history,” Macron said in an interview with French regional media on Friday. “Isolating oneself is one thing, but being able to get out of it is a difficult path”.
- 14 million Ukrainians have been forced to flee their homes, the majority women and children, the UN Crisis Coordinator for Ukraine, Amin Awad, said on Friday. In a statement released on the 100th day of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Awad spoke of displaced Ukrainians, describing the “scale and speed of [their] displacement not witnessed in history”.
- Moscow will help restore and rebuild Luhansk and Donetsk, Moscow mayor Sergei Sobyanin announced on Friday after a visit to Luhansk. About 1,500 specialists from various departments of the Moscow municipal economy complex and 500 pieces of equipment had arrived in Luhansk, the mayor said.
- Ukraine’s ambassador to Ankara, Vasyl Bodna, accused Russia of “stealing” and sending Ukrainian grain abroad. “Russia shamelessly steals Ukrainian grain and sends it overseas from Crimea, including to Turkey,” Bodna said in a tweet on Friday.
