Closing summary
It’s 9pm in Kyiv. Here’s where we stand:
The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, has said that Russia’s downing of a US military surveillance drone over the Black Sea “is being investigated”. Blinken declined to speak to the motive or intent behind the incident, saying he would let the investigation proceed and that the US is “in close coordination” with allies and partners on the matter. The collision of a Russian fighter jet with a US MQ-9 Reaper drone over the Black Sea was likely an unintentional act from Russia’s side, the US state department’s spokesperson, Ned Price, has said. The US state department has summoned Russia’s ambassador over the drone incident.
The US defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, described the drone incident as a “hazardous episode” involving “dangerous and reckless and unprofessional” behaviour by Russian aircraft over the Black Sea. The incident is “part of a pattern of aggressive, risky and unsafe actions” by Russian pilots in international airspace, he said at a news conference on Wednesday, adding that he had “just got off the phone” with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Shoigu.
The UK defence secretary, Ben Wallace, accused Russia of acting “unprofessionally”. Wallace’s comments reflect an emerging western view that the extraordinary mid-air incident was a one-off, not immediately meriting anything stronger than diplomatic complaints.
The Kremlin said on Wednesday that relations with the US were in a “lamentable state” and at their lowest level after Washington accused Russia of downing one of its reconnaissance drones over the Black Sea. Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, said there had been no high-level contact with Washington over the incident.
The Russian ambassador to the US called the drone incident a “provocation”, while Russia’s defence ministry maintained that its fighters “did not use airborne weapons and did not come into contact” with the US drone. Russia’s RIA state news agency cited Anatoly Antonov as saying: “We do not want any confrontation between the United States and Russia. We are in favour of building pragmatic relations.”
Ukrainian ground forces have shot down a Russian fighter jet near the besieged eastern city of Bakhmut, a Ukrainian official has said. Andriy Yermak, the head of the Ukrainian president’s office, also said Kyiv’s forces had made gains in northern parts of the city.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Russian mercenary Wagner group, said Russian forces have taken control of the settlement of Zaliznyanskoye and are expanding the encirclement of Bakhmut. Neither side’s claims of success in what has become the longest-running battle since the war began could be verified.
Vladimir Putin and the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, met today in Moscow.
Russia’s defence ministry will start a new recruitment campaign on 1 April, with the aim of recruiting 400,000 professional soldiers to the Russian army, according to a report. Russian military recruitment offices are trying to compensate for its losses in specialised soldiers, such as tank drivers and artillerymen, according to a separate report.
Finland’s president, Sauli Niinistö, has said he expects his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, to tell him whether Turkey is endorsing the Nordic country’s Nato membership application when the two meet in Ankara later this week. The news came as the Swedish prime minister, Ulf Kristersson, said on a visit to Berlin that he hoped his country’s Nato accession would be ratified by Turkey soon after general elections scheduled for May.
Updated
Austin is asked by a reporter to provide more detail about his conversation with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Shoigu.
The US secretary of defence says he won’t go into the details of the discussion, but that he will reiterate that the US “will fly and operate wherever international law allows”.
Austin says:
We take any potential for escalation very seriously and that’s why I believe it’s important to keep the lines of communication open.
He says that it is “really key” that both sides can “pick up on the phone and engage with each other” and that he believes it will help to “prevent miscalculation” going forward.
Updated
