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Summary
It’s 9pm in Ukraine.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy met today with Kadri Simson, European Union commissioner for energy affairs, and told her that Russian forces have “seriously damaged” about 40% of Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, in particular thermal power plants and hydroelectric power plants. Because of the ongoing attacks, Ukraine has been forced to stop exporting electricity to Europe – a practice the country began after accession. “I am sure that we will restore everything, and in a calmer time, when the situation in our energy system will be stabilised, we will continue exporting electricity to Europe,” Zelenskiy said.
In an interview with Sky News, Boris Johnson said that he does not think Vladimir Putin will use a nuclear weapon in Ukraine and that doing so “would immediately tender Russia’s resignation from the club of civilised nations”.
With Russia continuing to attack Ukraine’s critical infrastructure as the country heads into what is predicted to be a very cold and hard winter, Vitali Klitschko, the mayor of Kyiv, is getting ready to open around 1,000 public points of heating for city residents.
Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine’s minister of foreign affairs, took a strong stance in describing Russia’s attacks on Ukraine’s critical infrastructure, going so far as to call it “genocide”.
The Russian occupying government in the Kherson oblast has moved its administration further south to Skadovsk, said the general staff of the Ukrainian armed forces. This comes as Russian authorities forcibly relocate 70,000 civilians from the left bank of the Dnipro river, one week after relocating them there from the right bank. The general staff described these tactics as “intimidation of civilian residents”.
Russian forces launched four missile and 26 air strikes, and carried out 27 multiple launch rocket system attacks on more than 20 settlements today, the general staff of the Ukrainian armed forces said.
The general staff of the Ukrainian armed forces today confirmed the destruction wrought by their attack on Russian ammunition depots in the Zaporizhzhia oblast on 29 October. Ukrainian forces destroyed five units of military equipment, killed 30 Russian personnel and wounded at least 100.
The UK’s defence secretary, Ben Wallace, gave evidence to the international relations and defence committee in the UK’s parliament, addressing why he thinks Russia’s plans for a swift invasion failed. He also spoke of future Nato deployments.
The Ukrainian government has accepted the resignation of Yuriy Vitrenko as chief executive of the state energy company Naftogaz. In a statement on the Telegram messaging app, Naftogaz said Vitrenko would remain in the role until 3 November, but gave no further details.
Updated
