Closing summary
The blog is now closing. Below is a roundup of today’s stories:
At least 11 people have been killed after a strike on Tuesday that hit a restaurant in Kramatorsk on Ukraine’s Donetsk region. The dead included at least three children, and more than 60 people are said to have been wounded. Emergency services said seven people had been rescued from under the rubble.
Ukrainian secret service arrested a man it accused of helping Russians carry out attack on Kramatorsk. Ukraine’s counter-intelligence service said it has arrested “an agent of the Russian special services” who it accuses of helping Russia direct a missile strike that killed 11 people in the Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk.
The Ukrainian government appointed a new head of state-owned weapons producer Ukroboronprom on Wednesday. “The newly appointed general director faces three main tasks: to increase the production of ammunition and military equipment, build an effective anti-corruption infrastructure in the company, and transform Ukroboronprom,” said Oleksander Kamyshyn, the minister for Ukraine’s strategic industries. The appointment of Herman Smetanin is part of a broader transformation of the key industry, officials said.
Oleh Synyehubov, the governor of Kharkiv, reported that a 70-year-old woman was injured in shelling in the Kupiansk district.
Ukraine’s air force has reported that overnight it destroyed six Shahed drones. Two drones were shot down over Cherkasy region, but two more hit an empty warehouse in the region, it said.
Ukraine’s defence minister said Ukrainian forces have made “certain gains” that have not been made public and that the bulk of its troops reserves have yet to be deployed. Oleksiy Reznikov told the Financial Times the retaking of small villages from Russian occupation in recent weeks were “not the main event” in Kyiv’s planned attack.
One of the Russian-imposed leaders in occupied Zaporizhzhia region, Vladimir Rogov, reported that explosions have been heard in the city of Polohy. On Telegram, he has suggested that three explosions were heard near the train depot there. The claims have not been independently verified.
Vyacheslav Gladkov, the governor of the Belgorod region in Russia, claimed more than 200 people had their water supply interrupted after a Ukrainian cross-border strike on the region.
Lithuania’s president, Gitanas Nausėda, has confirmed that his country is to supply Ukraine with two Nasams launchers. Nausėda visited Kyiv on Wednesday ahead of travelling to an EU summit later in the week.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy has thanked the parliament of Croatia for recognising the Holodomor as a genocide.
Gen Sergey Surovikin, the deputy commander of Russia’s military operations in Ukraine, had advance knowledge that the mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin was planning a rebellion against Moscow’s defence officials, the New York Times reported on Tuesday.
Updated
Support for arming Ukraine among the US public has seen a sharp rise after the attempted mutiny in Russia by the Wagner mercenary group over the weekend.
A two-day poll, carried out by Reuters/Ipsos that concluded on Tuesday, found 65% of respondents backed arming Ukraine and approved of shipments, compared with 46% in a May poll.
The Biden administration has approved 41 weapons packages for Ukraine totalling more than $40bn since the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, launched what he calls “a special military operation” in February 2022.
According to the latest poll, 81% of Democrats, 56% of Republicans and 57% of independents favour supplying US weapons to Ukraine.
The survey was conducted just days after Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the private Wagner mercenary company, launched and then called off a mutiny over what he charged was the Russian defence ministry’s mishandling of the war in Ukraine.
The survey also found that large majorities of Americans – 67% and 73% – are more likely to support a candidate in next year’s US presidential election who will continue military aid to Ukraine and one who backs the Nato alliance.
A number of US presidential candidates have expressed tepid support for Ukraine, including Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis, the Republican party’s frontrunners.
In a CNN town hall last month, Donald Trump did not say whether he wanted Russia or Ukraine to win the war. DeSantis labelled the invasion a “territorial dispute” earlier this year, which he later said was misunderstood. He has called Putin a “war criminal”.
Robert F Kennedy Jr, who is running in the Democratic primary against Joe Biden, caused controversy this week after saying Russia was “acting in good faith” in the Ukraine invasion. He also said the US had spent $8tn in the war. The actual figure is about $77bn spent and $113bn pledged. A CNN poll carried out last month had Kennedy Jr at 20% support among Democratic and Democratic-leaning voters.
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Reuters reports that at least three of the Wagner mercenaries who seized the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don on Saturday in a failed mutiny were convicted criminals.
The Kremlin allowed Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin to recruit thousands of mercenaries from prisons across the country last year. Those who survive six months in Ukraine are pardoned by Putin by secret decree.
Reuters has identified the convicted criminals as 25-year-old Dmitry Chekov, a Rostov local who had been convicted four times for theft and drug offences; 33-year-old Sergei Shirshov, who was sentenced to seven years in prison for armed robbery in 2019; and 31-year-old Roman Yamalutdinov, who had been sentenced to prison at least twice since 2017, having been variously convicted for drunk-driving, car theft and assaulting a police officer.
Updated
UK officials are coordinating with the EU over plans to seize the interest on billions of frozen Russian assets and send the proceeds to Ukraine. The transfer of the interest on the frozen Russian assets is seen as one of the most legally viable routes to use Russian assets to help the recovery of Ukraine.
The move was disclosed by the UK’s Europe minister, Leo Docherty, who told MPs: “Clearly, the EU has some ideas about the potential use of interest payments on seized assets. That is an idea, not a legally tested viable route. As the EU is considering that, so are we, which is why our officials were in Brussels earlier this week.” The amount of money likely to be raised from the measure depends on how broadly western powers coordinate any steps to hand interest payments to Ukraine.
The Treasury minister John Glen told MPs this week: “We have sanctioned 24 banks with global assets of over £940bn and 120 elites with a combined worth of £140bn.”
He said it is also estimated that more than 60% of Putin’s war chest of central bank foreign reserves worth £275bn have been immobilised. The UK has frequently said it has frozen more than £18bn-worth of assets in the UK between the point of invasion last February and October 2022.
If interest was paid on the frozen £18bn of Russian assets in the UK, the sums raised would be in the tens of millions, but if the principle was adopted by a wider group of countries, the income available to Ukraine would be considerably larger.
Despite political rhetoric that Russia must pay the cost of the damage inflicted on Ukraine, western nations are reluctant to confiscate Russian assets. Many thinktanks such as the Basel Institute on Governance have warned straight asset seizure would breach European human rights law, and international law relating to state immunity.
But the mood appears to be changing in the UK Commons with demands growing for the seizure of Russian assets, as opposed to freezing.
The shadow foreign secretary, David Lammy, told MPs this week that Labour does “recognise concerns that repurposing Russia’s central bank reserves could violate Russia’s sovereign immunity but there are exceptions to that rule. We believe that Russia’s continued refusal to comply with international human rights law or to follow the orders of the international court of justice are good grounds for such an exception. We believe that Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine represents a wholly exceptional act, from which exceptional countermeasures can flow”. The Commons voted to give the government 90 days to come up with a plan to repurpose the assets.
If Russian state assets were seized, the State Immunity Act 1978, which gives central banks immunity from jurisdiction and from enforcement, would probably need to amended.
Updated
Here is a picture from the Ukrainian parliament during a session dedicated to Constitution Day, which celebrates the adoption of the constitution of Ukraine on 28 June 1996.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy presented Anna, the wife of fallen soldier Oleksandr Lukianovych, with the order of the Hero of Ukraine while their daughter hands Zelenskiy a gift.
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Reuters reports that Ukraine is due to face a power deficit later this year, including throughout the autumn and winter, as its energy infrastructure struggles to recover from months of Russian missile attacks, the country’s national grid operator said on Wednesday.
Volodymyr Kudrytskyi, head of state-owned Ukrenergo, said an unprecedented repair campaign was under way across the country and 50-60% of planned work had been completed, but the situation remained difficult.
“The sources of the deficit are known. This is damage to thermal and hydroelectric power plants. Not a single large thermal hydroelectric plant in this country has escaped damage of a certain degree,” Kudrytskyi told an online media briefing.
He also said the distribution networks, especially in large cities and in frontline regions, were severely damaged as they were the main targets of Russia’s attacks.
Also, some units at nuclear power plants were undergoing planned repair work to enable them to produce more electricity during the colder months, Kudrytskyi said.
Ukraine’s energy infrastructure survived the lengthy campaign of frequent missile and drone attacks which resulted in power cuts and scheduled blackouts, leaving towns and cities in darkness for hours at a time over winter.
Fast repairs and equipment sent by Kyiv’s western partners helped people and businesses adapt. Kudrytskyi said the pace of repairs this year was six to seven times quicker than the average before Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.
Ukrenergo has already received about €900m in foreign financing to help with the repairs and the company is looking for additional financing for the coming winter season.
Kudrytskyi estimated additional needs at about $300m and said the company was in talks with lenders, including the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
Kudrytskyi declined to give figures on the existing power deficit but said Ukraine would have to import electricity from other European countries and also add additional power units to be able to balance the system.
Updated
Kramatorsk missile attack death toll rises to 11
The death toll from the missile attack on Kramatorsk has risen to 11, Kyiv Post reports, citing the city’s mayor, Oleksandr Honcharenko.
Updated
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Wednesday he wanted to receive a signal that the country could join Nato after its war with Russia ends.
“We understand that we cannot be a member of Nato during the war, but we need to be sure that after the war we will be,” Zelenskiy told a press conference with the visiting Polish and Lithuanian presidents.
“That is the signal we want to get – that after the war Ukraine will be a member of Nato”.
Reiterating Kyiv’s stance before a Nato summit in Lithuania next month, he said Ukraine also wanted security guarantees for the period until it can join the alliance.
“We would want a third signal at the Nato summit that Ukraine will get security guarantees – not instead of Nato but for the time until we are in the alliance,” he said.
Russia’s defence ministry claimed on Wednesday that the target hit in Kramatorsk was a “temporary command post” of the Ukrainian army, Reuters reports.
Earlier on Wednesday, answering questions about the attack, the Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters: “The Russian Federation does not strike at civilian infrastructure.”
He added: “Strikes are carried out on objects that are connected with military infrastructure in one way or another.”
Updated
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said on Wednesday that the security situation in northern Ukraine was unchanged and under control after Russian mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin flew into exile in Belarus.
“Wagnerites are in occupied territory in Ukraine – they were and are in the [eastern] Luhansk region,” Zelenskiy told a press conference, confirming that some of the group’s fighters remained on Ukrainian soil after fighting in the east.
Asked about the presence of Wagner mercenaries in Belarus, he said: “I don’t think this contingent will be very big.”
“Our army believes that the situation in the north of our country is unchanged and is under our control,” he said.
Updated
Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and German chancellor Olaf Scholz held a phone call on Wednesday during which they discussed developments in Russia and Sweden’s Nato bid, according to the Turkish presidency’s communications directorate.
Erdoğan said Sweden had taken steps in the right direction, referring to a new anti-terrorism law targeted at Kurdish and anti-Turkish government groups, which include the Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK) and the Gülen movement, which came into force this month. Sweden sought Nato membership following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, however Turkey has been blocking Sweden’s bid after criticising it for not taking a tougher line against these groups.
The Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK) was already designated as a terrorist group in Sweden before this legislation came into force.
Updated
Poland will strengthen security on its border with Belarus if it needs to, but the frontier is already tightly secured, Reuters reports the Polish president, Andrzej Duda, has said during a visit to Kyiv.
“If necessary, its readiness will be strengthened,” Duda told a news conference. “It is at a high level now and it is very professional.”
Duda added that Poland and Lithuania would do everything they could to ensure that Ukraine became a member of Nato as soon as possible, Reuters reports.
“We will do everything to make this happen as soon as possible,” Duda told a joint press conference with Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, and the Lithuanian president, Gitanas Nausėda.
“We are trying to ensure that the decisions made at the [Vilnius Nato] summit clearly indicate the perspective of membership, we are conducting talks on this issue with our allies.”
Updated
Biden says Putin is a 'pariah' but 'hard to tell' if he has been weakened by Wagner mutiny
The US president, Joe Biden, said on Wednesday that the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, had become a pariah around the world, but it was hard to say if he had been weakened by recent events involving the head of the Wagner group, Reuters reports.
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Reuters has a snap that Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said some members of Russia’s Wagner mercenary group remained in Ukraine, but the Ukrainian army believed the situation in the north of the country was under control.
Updated
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the Polish president, Andrzej Duda, and the Lithuanian president, Gitanas Nausėda, are giving a press conference in Kyiv. We will bring you the key lines.
Updated
It is Constitution Day in Ukraine, which celebrates the adoption of the constitution of Ukraine on 28 June 1996. Ceremonies have been taking place in various locations in the country. Here are some of the pictures in Lviv, west Ukraine.
Updated
The Kremlin has called a New York Times report that suggested a senior Russian general had known in advance about Wagner’s aborted mutiny on Saturday “gossip”.
The report in the New York Times cited US officials who claimed Gen Sergei Surovikin, the deputy commander of Russia’s military operations in Ukraine, had advance knowledge of the planned mutiny.
Responding to a question about the report, the Kremlin’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters: “There will now be a lot of speculation, gossip and so on around these events. I think this is one such example”.
Surovikin has not been seen in public since Saturday, when he made an appeal for the mutiny to be called off. Wagner chief, Yevgeny Prigozhin, has often praised Surovikin.
The New York Times reported that US officials were “trying to learn if Gen Sergei Surovikin, the former top Russian commander in Ukraine, helped plan Prigozhin’s actions last weekend”.
Updated
Ukrainian secret service arrests man it accuses of helping Russians carry out attack on Kramatorsk
Ukraine’s counter-intelligence service says it has arrested “an agent of the Russian special services” who it accuses of helping Russia direct a missile strike that killed 10 people in the Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk.
The Security Service of Ukraine (SSU) said the man lived in the city and was an employee at a local gas transportation company.
Vasyl Malyuk, the head of the Security Service of Ukraine, said in a statement: “The agent of the Russian Federation will definitely answer to the Ukrainian court. But his detention is also a signal to all other adjusters and traitors who work for the enemy. Remember – the punishment is inevitable!”
He added: “We constantly conduct legal work and continue to collect evidence for international courts.”
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The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said he would not accept any peace proposal that turns Russia’s war on the country into a frozen conflict.
In a speech to parliament on Wednesday, Zelenskiy signalled that he remains opposed to any peace plan that freezes territorial gains made by Russia since it began its full-scale invasion in February 2022.
“Ukraine will not agree to any of the variants for a frozen conflict,” he said.
Zelenskiy has drawn up a 10-point peace “formula” that includes restoring Ukraine’s territorial integrity, the withdrawal of Russian troops and the restoration of Ukraine’s state borders.
Updated
The Kremlin has confirmed the arrival of the papal envoy Cardinal Matteo Zuppi in Moscow for peace talks.
Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesperson, said: “We highly value the efforts and initiatives of the Vatican and welcome the aspiration of the pope to contribution to ending the armed conflict.”
He added that Vladimir Putin’s foreign affairs adviser would hold talks with Zuppi at the Russian president’s request.
Earlier this month, the Vatican sent Zuppi to Kyiv on a two-day trip. Last month, the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, met Pope Francis in Rome. Zelenskiy asked Francis to back Kyiv’s peace plan and the pope indicated the Vatican would help in the repatriation of Ukrainian children taken by Russians.
Updated
The Polish president, Andrzej Duda, is in Kyiv for talks with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, his office said on Wednesday.
On Twitter, his office said the pair would discuss “the current situation at the front, including the threat of a Russian attack on the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant”. It added that “preparations for the July Nato summit will also be discussed”.
Prezydent @AndrzejDuda z wizytą Kijowie 🇺🇦. Rozmowy z Prezydentem @ZelenskyyUa są związane z uczczeniem ukraińskiego Dnia Konstytucji, a także konsultacjami dotyczącymi obecnej sytuacji na froncie, w tym groźby rosyjskiego zamachu na Zaporoską Elektrownię Atomową. Poruszony… pic.twitter.com/q6vyvVMVIu
— Kancelaria Prezydenta (@prezydentpl) June 28, 2023
Updated
The Kremlin said on Wednesday that Russia only attacks military targets, not civilian ones, when asked about a missile strike on a crowded restaurant in Ukraine’s eastern city of Kramatorsk on Tuesday evening that killed at least 10 people.
“The Russian Federation does not strike at civilian infrastructure,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters at a regular briefing. “Strikes are carried out on objects that are connected with military infrastructure in one way or another.”
Peskov also said the Kremlin firmly rejects a UN report alleging that Russia had violated children’s rights in Ukraine.
The report, released on Tuesday, accused Russia of detaining more than 800 civilians, some of them children, since the conflict began in February of last year. Peskov said that Russian forces had taken measures to protect children by evacuating them from areas of conflict.
Updated
Oleh Synyehubov, the governor of Kharkiv, says three civilians were killed by shelling in the Chuguyiv district on Wednesday.
On Telegram, Synyehubov said “About an hour ago, the enemy once again shelled the Vovchan community of the Chuguyiv district.
“Unfortunately, as a result of this shelling, three residents of the village were killed.”
Synyehubov said three men aged 45, 48 and 57 were killed.
The king of Bahrain, Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa, expressed support for the measures taken by Vladimir Putin to end the armed mutiny mounted by the Wagner group during a phone call with the Russian president on Monday, the Kremlin said in a statement.
Summary of the day so far …
At least 10 people have been killed after a strike on Tuesday that hit a restaurant in Kramatorsk on Ukraine’s Donetsk region. The dead included at least three children, and more than 60 people are said to have been wounded. Emergency services said seven people had been rescued from under the rubble.
The Ukrainian government appointed a new head of state-owned weapons producer Ukroboronprom on Wednesday. “The newly appointed general director faces three main tasks: to increase the production of ammunition and military equipment, build an effective anti-corruption infrastructure in the company, and transform Ukroboronprom,” Oleksander Kamyshyn, minister for Ukraine’s strategic industries, said. The appointment of Herman Smetanin is part of a broader transformation of the key industry, officials said.
Oleh Synyehubov, governor of Kharkiv, reports that a 70-year-old woman was injured in shelling in the Kupiansk district.
Ukraine’s air force has reported that overnight it destroyed six Shahed drones. Two drones were shot down over Cherkasy region, but two more hit an empty warehouse in the region, it said.
Ukraine’s defence minister says Ukrainian forces have made “certain gains” that have not been made public and that the bulk of its troops reserves have yet to be deployed. Oleksiy Reznikov told the Financial Times the retaking of small villages from Russian occupation in recent weeks were “not the main event” in Kyiv’s planned attack.
One of the Russian-imposed leaders in occupied Zaporizhzhia region, Vladimir Rogov, reports that explosions have been heard in the city of Polohy. On Telegram he has suggested that three explosions were heard near the train depot there. The claims have not been independently verified.
Vyacheslav Gladkov, governor of the Belgorod region in Russia, claimed that over 200 people had their water supply interrupted after a Ukrainian cross-border strike on the region.
Lithuania’s president, Gitanas Nausėda, has confirmed that his country is to supply Ukraine with two Nasams launchers. Nausėda is visiting Kyiv on Wednesday ahead of travelling to an EU summit later in the week.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy has thanked the parliament of Croatia for recognising the Holodomor as a genocide.
Gen Sergey Surovikin, the deputy commander of Russia’s military operations in Ukraine, had advance knowledge that the mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin was planning a rebellion against Moscow’s defence officials, the New York Times reported on Tuesday.
Updated
Ukraine’s emergency services say that rescue work continues at the site of the strike in Kramatorsk, which has claimed the lives of 10 people including three children. Fifty-six people have been wounded, including a baby.
#Краматорськ
— DSNS.GOV.UA (@SESU_UA) June 28, 2023
Станом на 12:00 28 червня з-під завалів деблоковано тіла 10 осіб (у тому числі 3 дитини), постраждало 56 осіб (у тому числі 1 дитина, 2022 р.н.) та 7 осіб врятовано.
Роботи тривають. pic.twitter.com/Pys6CZ5uqi
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Suspilne, Ukraine’s state broadcaster, reports that the national police service now says 10 people were killed in Kramatorsk
Suspilne, Ukraine’s state broadcaster, reports that the national police service now says that ten people were killed in Kramatorsk.
Ukrainian authorities and social media are widely sharing this photograph, which purports to be two 14-year-old girls killed in the Russian strike, which hit a popular restaurant in the city.
сестры Аня и Юля. учились в краматорской школе №24. погибли вчера от российского ракетного удара по нескольким кафе в центре города pic.twitter.com/oAwwfMcGCb
— Lilia Yapparova (@lilia_yapparova) June 28, 2023
The children are being named as sisters Yulia and Anna Aksenchenko.
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Volodymyr Zelenskiy has thanked the parliament of Croatia for recognising the Holodomor as a genocide. Ukraine’s president tweeted:
The parliament of the Republic of Croatia has adopted the declaration on recognition of the 1932-1933 Holodomor as genocide of the Ukrainian people. I am grateful to the Republic of Croatia for this historic vote. The world will never put up with the crimes of the Kremlin – neither past nor present.
The Parliament of the Republic of Croatia has adopted the Declaration on recognition of the 1932-1933 Holodomor as genocide of the Ukrainian people. I am grateful to the Republic of Croatia for this historic vote. The world will never put up with the crimes of the Kremlin –…
— Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) June 28, 2023
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The Ukrainian government appointed a new head of state-owned weapons producer Ukroboronprom on Wednesday, as Kyiv seeks to boost domestic weapons production.
“The newly appointed general director faces three main tasks: to increase the production of ammunition and military equipment, build an effective anti-corruption infrastructure in the company, and transform Ukroboronprom,” Reuters reports Oleksander Kamyshyn, minister for Ukraine’s strategic industries, said.
The appointment of Herman Smetanin, who has been serving as head of the Kharkiv Malyshev plant in northeast Ukraine, as the new general director of Ukroboronprom is part of a broader transformation of the key industry, officials said.
Updated
One of the Russian-imposed leaders in the occupied Zaporizhzhia region, Vladimir Rogov, reports that explosions have been heard in the city of Polohy. On Telegram he has suggested that three explosions were heard near the train depot there. He stated that he had no information yet on any damages or casualties. The claims have not been independently verified.
Updated
Oleh Synyehubov, governor of Kharkiv, reports that Russian shelling of his region has continued this morning. On Telegram he wrote:
The enemy continues to fire on peaceful residents of Kharkiv oblast. Unfortunately, there are victims.
This morning, the Russian occupiers fired at a village in the Kupiansk district with surface-to-air missiles. A 70-year-old woman who was in her own yard during the shelling was seriously injured. Doctors are now fighting for her life.
The claims have not been independently verified.
The Kramatorsk city mayor has confirmed that the death toll has risen to nine and added that the latest victim is a boy.
“Rescuers pulled a boy’s body from the rubble,” Oleksandr Goncharenko wrote on the Telegram messaging app on Wednesday morning as search and rescue operations continued. Reuters reports that he did not give the boy’s age.
Emergency services said seven people had been rescued and put the number of wounded at 56, slightly lower than the figure of 60 provided by the prosecutor general. Officials said two girls aged 14 and a girl aged 17 were among the dead.
Reuters spoke to one person on the scene, Valentyna, a 64-year-old woman who declined to give her surname. She said she had run there “after the explosion because I rented a cafe here. Everything has been blown out. None of the glass, windows or doors are left. All I see is destruction, fear and horror. This is the 21st century.”
Updated
Vyacheslav Gladkov, governor of the Belgorod region in Russia, has posted a status update to Telegram, where he has said that cross-border shelling from Ukraine has continued, hitting multiple settlements.
He reported no injuries, but stated that explosive devices were dropped from a drone over one village, and “as a result of the attack, one of the infrastructure facilities was damaged and about 220 residents were temporarily left without water. The water supply has now been restored”.
The claims have not been independently verified.
Updated
Here are some images that have been sent over the news wires from Kozatske in the Kherson region. The settlement sits of the right-bank on the Dnipro, directly to the north-west of the destroyed Kakhovka dam.
Updated
Death toll in the attack on Kramatorsk increases to nine
The death toll in the attack on Kramatorsk has increased to nine. Suspilne, Ukraine’s state broadcaster, reports that as of 10am local time, “the bodies of nine dead people, including three minors, were retrieved from the rubble”.
It goes on to report that the number of wounded has risen to 56 people, according to the latest data from the Donetsk regional prosecutor’s office.
Suspilne reports that “Rescuers continue to clear the rubble, and have rescued seven people, the state emergency service reported. Dog handlers and psychologists also work on site.”
Oleksiy Goncharenko, a Ukrainian MP, has shared on social media what purports to be pictures of a baby “wounded by fragments of Russian missiles”. He said:
Propagandists on Russian TV justify the actions of the army and claim that they hit a military facility. It looks like a small Ukrainian child is a military facility.
Other unconfirmed social media reports have suggested that the three children killed in the strike were a 17-year-old and two 14-year-old girls. The claims have not been independently verified.
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There are reports of explosions being heard in occupied Melitopol. Vladimir Rogov, one of the Russian-imposed leaders in the region, has said on Telegram it is “loud”, and the work of air defence.
Lithuania’s president, Gitanas Nausėda, has confirmed that his country is to supply Ukraine with two Nasams launchers. Nausėda is visiting Kyiv today.
Lithuania has acquired two NASAMS launchers that will be transferred to Ukraine.
— Gitanas Nausėda (@GitanasNauseda) June 28, 2023
Air defense is key in 🇺🇦 fight against the aggressor.
Looking forward to more collective decisions on support to Ukraine at the #NATO summit in Vilnius.
Together until victory!
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Ukraine’s air force has reported that overnight it destroyed six “Shahed” drones. Two drones were shot down over Cherkasy region, but two more hit an empty warehouse in the region, it said. The claims have not been independently verified.
Suspilne, Ukraine's state broadcaster, reports that three people were injured overnight by Russian shelling in the Kherson region. Listing a number of settlements that were struck, it claims “the Kherson community was hit 12 times, 49 shells were fired. Three residents of the community were injured.”
The claims have not been independently verified.
The Lithuanian president, Gitanas Nausėda, will meet the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, in Kyiv later today to discuss Nato as Ukraine seeks to enter the alliance, ahead of the forthcoming summit in July in Vilnius.
Reuters notes Nato members are close to agreeing incremental steps to strengthen ties with Ukraine by then, but have yet to resolve differences over how to address Ukraine’s desire for membership.
The Nato chief, Jens Stoltenberg, has ruled out the country joining the alliance until the war is over.
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Death toll in Kramatorsk strike includes three children – governor
Three children were among the dead, with another child wounded, after the Russian strike on a pizzeria in Kramatorsk, according to Ukraine’s regional governor of Donetsk, who warned the figure may still rise.
In a message posted to Telegram, Pavlo Kyrylenko said:
Eight dead and 44 injured - these are the preliminary consequences of yesterday’s attack on Kramatorsk. Three children were among the dead, one child was among the wounded.
The Russians struck with two missiles - one aimed at a private enterprise, the second at a pizzeria.
The impact completely destroyed the building of the pizzeria, damaged 18 high-rise buildings, 65 private houses, five schools, two kindergartens, a shopping centre, a hotel, an administrative building and a recreational facility.
The final figures for victims and destruction may still change.
The claims have not been independently verified. Donetsk is one of the regions of Ukraine that the Russian Federation claimed to annex last year.
Pskov regional governor Mikhail Vedernikov has paid tribute to two Russian pilots killed during the Wagner rebellion at the weekend. Lt Col Alexei Vorozhtsov and Lt Denis Oleinikov were service personnel at the Pskov territorial garrison. Tass quotes Vedernikov saying:
The events of the weekend will remain in our memory for a long time: before our eyes, an armed rebellion broke out and quickly burned out, but it had threatened to develop into a fratricidal conflict with a large number of victims. The trouble passed by thanks to the professional, diplomatic work of a number of departments who saved hundreds, if not thousands of lives.
Vedernikov offered condolences to the families of the victims. The Pskov region borders Estonia, Latvia and Belarus.
This is Martin Belam taking over the live blog in London. You can contact me at martin.belam@theguardian.com
Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s closest adviser has claimed the “countdown has started” on the end of Vladimir Putin’s tenure as Russian president in the wake of the Wagner rebellion.
At a briefing for reporters Tuesday in Kyiv, Andriy Yermak said:
What Ukraine has seen since 2014 has become evident for the entire world. This [Russia] is a terrorist country whose leader is an inadequate person who has lost connection with reality. The world must conclude that it’s impossible to have any kind of serious relationship with that country.
The BBC also spoke to Oleksiy Danilov, head of Ukraine’s national security and defence council, who suggested Putin faces significant opposition in his inner circle, including those representing oligarchs. “Prigozhin is not the most senior. They might become the new political elite,” he is quoted as saying.
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Ukraine’s defence minister says Ukrainian forces have made “certain gains” that have not been made public and that the bulk of its troops reserves have yet to be deployed.
Oleksiy Reznikov told the Financial Times the retaking of small villages from Russian occupation in recent weeks were “not the main event” in Kyiv’s planned attack.
When it happens, you will all see it … Everyone will see everything.
Reznikov appears to be responding to media commentary on the slow progress of the offensive against heavily dug-in Russian positions.
Ukraine’s main troop reserves, including most brigades recently trained in the west and equipped with modern Nato tanks and armoured vehicles, have yet to be used in the operation, Reznikov said.
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Gen Sergey Surovikin, the deputy commander of Russia’s military operations in Ukraine, had advance knowledge that the mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin was planning a rebellion against Moscow’s defence officials, the New York Times reported on Tuesday.
The newspaper cited US officials briefed on US intelligence regarding the matter, and reported that the officials were “trying to learn if Gen Sergey Surovikin, the former top Russian commander in Ukraine, helped plan Mr Prigozhin’s actions last weekend”.
Prigozhin flew into exile in Belarus on Tuesday under a deal that ended a brief mutiny by his Wagner fighters over the weekend, as Vladimir Putin praised his armed forces for averting a civil war.
At the outset of the insurrection, Surovikin was among the first generals to release a video, in which he was pictured holding a submachine gun, asking Wagner forces to stand down. He is also commander of the Russian Aerospace Forces, which lost several aircraft during the incident, killing 13 pilots.
The New York Times reported that American officials also said there were signs that other Russian generals also may have supported Prigozhin.
These reports could not be independently verified.
Surovikin, nicknamed “General Armageddon” by the Russian media, had been put in overall charge of Ukraine operations in October. But in January Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu appointed chief of the general staff Valery Gerasimov to oversee the campaign, with Surovikin staying on as his deputy.
Prigozhin demanded the removal of Shoigu at the start of his mutiny, which he called a “march for justice”.
- with Reuters
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The US has taken fresh aim at Russia’s Wagner group, imposing sanctions on companies it accuses of engaging in illicit gold dealings to fund the mercenary force.
In a statement on Tuesday, the US treasury department said it slapped sanctions on four companies in the United Arab Emirates, Central African Republic and Russia it accused of being connected to the Wagner Group and its leader, Yevgeny Prigozhin.
The companies engaged in illicit gold dealings to fund the militia to sustain and expand its armed forces, including in Ukraine and some countries in Africa, the treasury said.
Treasury’s under secretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, Brian Nelson, said in a statement:
The Wagner group funds its brutal operations in part by exploiting natural resources in countries like the Central African Republic and Mali.
The United States will continue to target the Wagner Group’s revenue streams to degrade its expansion and violence in Africa, Ukraine, and anywhere else.
For more on this developing story, read the full report:
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China’s envoy to the European Union has implied Beijing could support Ukraine’s effort to reclaim its 1991 territorial borders.
Fu Cong was in Brussels for the 2023 Europe-China Business Summit on June 16 where he was interviewed by Al Jazeera and other news organisations. When asked whether China supported Ukraine’s war goals in the conflict, including retaking regions currently occupied by Russia, including the Crimean peninsula, he said: “I don’t see why not.”
We respect the territorial integrity of all countries. So when China established relations with the former Soviet Union, that’s what we agreed. But as I said, these are historical issues that need to be negotiated and resolved by Russia and Ukraine and that is what we stand for.
Fu has previously said, in an interview with the New York Times in April, that China did not support Russian attempts to annex Ukrainian territory, and stressed that Beijing’s position is that the conflict be resolved by negotiations.
China has not explicitly criticised Russia over the conflict since the 2022 invasion and has declared a “no limits” partnership. Comments from senior officials on the conflict are rare.
Taiwan spotted two Russian warships off its eastern coast on Tuesday and sent its own aircraft and ships to keep watch, the island’s defence ministry said.
In a statement late on Tuesday, the ministry said the two frigates sailed in a northerly direction off Taiwan’s east coast and then “departed from our response zone” in a southeasterly direction off the port city of Suao, which is home to a major Taiwanese naval base.
Taiwan’s military sent aircraft and ships to keep watch and activated shore-based missile systems, it added, without providing further details.
Russia’s Interfax news agency reported on Tuesday that a detachment of ships of the Russian Pacific Fleet had entered the southern parts of the Philippine Sea to perform tasks as part of a long-range sea passage.
Taiwan has joined the United States and its allies in enacting wide-ranging sanctions against Russia following its invasion of Ukraine.
Democratically governed Taiwan, which China views as its own territory, has over the past three years regularly reported Chinese navy ships and air force aircraft operating around the island, as Beijing seeks to press its territorial claims.
- Reuters
Opening summary
Hello and welcome back to our live coverage of Russia’s war in Ukraine – this is Royce Kurmelovs bringing you the latest developments.
The death toll from a Russian missile strike on a shopping centre and popular restaurant district in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kramatorsk has risen to eight, including three children, according to state emergency services. The site is home to Ria, a restaurant popular with locals and foreign correspondents covering the ongoing war.
Meanwhile, Nato chief Jens Stoltenberg has said the alliance is ready to defend itself against any threat from “Moscow or Minsk” and has increased its military presence on its eastern flank in recent days after Belarus welcomed Wagner rebel leader Yevgeny Prigozhin.
“It’s too early to make any final judgment about the consequences of the fact that Prigozhin has moved to Belarus and most likely also some of his forces will also be located to Belarus,” Stoltenberg told reporters.
“What is absolutely clear is that we have sent a clear message to Moscow and to Minsk that Nato is there to protect every ally and every inch of Nato territory,” he said after a meeting in The Hague of eight Nato leaders.
Nato allies Lithuania and Poland had raised security concerns ahead of Wagner mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin’s relocation to Belarus. The movement of Wagner troops to Belarus is a negative signal for Poland, its president, Andrzej Duda, said on Tuesday, as he headed for talks with other Nato leaders in the Netherlands.
In other news:
Wagner forces in Russia are expected to begin the process of disarming after Moscow announced plans for the group to hand over weapons, vehicles and equipment. Elements of the force will be disbanded, absorbed into the Russian military or head into exile in Belarus along with Prigozhin under the agreement hammered out between the mercenary leader and Russian president Vladimir Putin.
The Wagner mercenary group was entirely financed by the Russian state, which spent 86bn roubles ($1bn) on it between May 2022 and May 2023, Putin said. In addition, Prigozhin, who led the group’s brief mutiny on Saturday, made almost as much during the same period from his food and catering business, Putin said at a meeting with security forces.
The US Treasury department announced new sanctions on Tuesday targeting four companies it says engaged in illicit gold trading to help fund the Wagner Mercenary group. The treasury’s under secretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, Brian Nelson, said the companies were located in the United Arab Emirates, Central African Republic and Russia with the transactions used by the mercenary group to sustain itself. “The Wagner group funds its brutal operations in part by exploiting natural resources in countries like Central African Republic and Mali,” Nelson said.
Putin on Tuesday told members of Russia’s security services that they “essentially prevented a civil war” by acting “clearly and coherently” during Prigozhin’s armed mutiny on Saturday. “The people and the army were not on the side of the mutineers,” Putin said, speaking outside the Kremlin in front of the heads of Russia’s main domestic security service, including the defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, whom Prigozhin had sought to oust with his uprising.
Taiwan spotted two Russian warships off its eastern coast on Tuesday, according to the island’s defence ministry. Two frigates were observed sailing north before breaking off in a southeasterly direction near the port city of Suao, which is home to a naval base, and heading out of range. Russian state media reported on Tuesday that a detachment of ships of the Russian Pacific Fleet had entered the Philippine Sea to perform tasks as part of a long-range sea passage.
Russian forces have carried out widespread and systematic torture of civilians detained in connection with its attack on Ukraine, summarily executing more than 70 of them, the UN human rights office said on Tuesday. The global body interviewed hundreds of victims and witnesses for a report detailing more than 900 cases of civilians, including children and elderly people, being arbitrarily detained in the conflict, most of them by Russia.
Alexei Navalny, the imprisoned Russian opposition leader, is “ready to continue to fight” for an alternative to Putin, despite being in solitary confinement and facing new charges that could put him in jail for decades, his friends and supporters have said. Launching a campaign in front of the European parliament on Tuesday, Maria Pevchikh, a Russian journalist and CEO of the Anti-Corruption Foundation, said he had been locked up in “punishment cell” for 180 days on fake charges, including not washing his teeth at the correct time.
Ukraine’s government reprimanded Vitali Klitschko, Kyiv’s mayor, on Tuesday as city officials faced criticism over the state of bomb shelters after the deaths of three people locked out on the street during a Russian air raid. The government said it had also approved the dismissal of the heads of two Kyiv districts and two acting heads of districts, Reuters reported. It was not immediately clear whether Klitschko, a former boxer, would face any further action.
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