Summary
Thank you for joining us for today’s live coverage of the war in Ukraine.
We will be pausing our live reporting overnight and returning in the morning.
In the meantime, you can read our comprehensive summary of the day’s events below.
- At least 23 people – including three children – were killed and up to 66 others wounded after Russian missiles struck civilian buildings and a cultural centre in the city of Vinnytsia, in central Ukraine. The attack on Vinnytsia, far from the war’s frontlines, occurred on Thursday mid-morning when the streets were full of people. Ukraine’s state emergency service says it is still searching for 39 people who are considered missing while 34 people remain in serious condition.
- Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, called the Russian attack in Vinnytsia “an open act of terrorism”. In a video address at The Hague conference, Zelenskiy urged European and International Criminal Court officials to open a “special tribunal” to investigate Russia’s invasion of his country.
- A top Ukrainian official said the missile attacks in Vinnytsia were an “approved military strategy” by Vladimir Putin. Mykhailo Podolyak, the head of Ukraine’s negotiating team and a key adviser to President Zelenskiy said Russian forces were attacking “peaceful” Ukrainian cities such as Vinnytsia, Kremenchuk, Chasiv Yar and Kharkiv in order to force Ukrainians to “peace at any price”, Podolyak wrote on Twitter. Russia’s attacks on peaceful Ukrainian cities are not a mistake, but an approved military strategy
- A Four-year-old girl was killed in the Vinnytsia strike with social media posts charting her life and death. Footage – which the Guardian is not publishing – showed Liza Dmitrieva lying dead in her overturned pushchair. “A girl is among the dead today in Vinnytsia, she was four years old, her name was Liza. The child was four years old! Her mother is in critical condition,” Zelenskiy added.
- The world’s largest security body has expressed “grave concern” about the alleged mistreatment of tens of thousands of Ukrainians in so-called filtration centres set up by Russia in Ukraine. Tens of thousands of civilians are taken to these centres in the self-proclaimed breakaway Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) in eastern Ukraine, before being deported to Russia, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) said.
- Russia has forcibly removed nearly 2 million people from Ukraine, including more than 200,000 children since its invasion in February, Zelenskiy said. “It is still being established how many children Russian forces abducted and took out of Ukraine... The preliminary figure is dreadful - about two hundred thousand children,” he told the Ukraine Accountability Conference in The Hague.
- The United States and more than 40 other countries have agreed to coordinate investigations into suspected war crimes in Ukraine. On Thursday, 45 countries including European Union states as well as Britain, the United States, Canada, Mexico and Australia signed a political declaration to work together at a conference in The Hague. With some 23,000 war crimes investigations now open and different countries heading teams, evidence needs to be credible and organised, officials said.
- The US treasury secretary, Janet Yellen, has said Russia’s war in Ukraine poses the greatest threat to the global economy. Representatives of Putin’s regime “have no place” at a meeting of the G20 countries in Bali, she said, adding that she will continue to press allies for a price cap on Russian oil, which she said would “deny Putin revenue his war machine needs”.
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Ukraine’s infrastructure minister, Oleksandr Kubrakov, said Kyiv was “definitely a step closer” to reaching a deal to export grain through its Black Sea ports after talks with Russia, Turkey and the UN. Turkey earlier announced a deal with Ukraine, Russia and the UN aimed at resuming Ukrainian grain exports blocked by Russia.
- Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, signed into law tougher measures for individuals or entities considered “foreign agents” by Russia, as well as a new law equating defection with high treason. The new bill, which will come into force on 1 December, will broaden the definition of “foreign agents” to anyone deemed to have fallen “under foreign influence” or receiving support from abroad – not just foreign money.
- Russia has begun “volunteer mobilisations” to address its soldier shortage, according to the Institute for the Study of War. In a new report, the US-based think tank said that the Kremlin has “likely ordered Russian “federal subjects” (regions) to form volunteer battalions to participate in the Russian invasion of Ukraine, instead of declaring partial or full mobilisation in Russia.”
Updated
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro says he knows how the war could be “resolved” and will pitch his suggestions to Ukraine’s president Zelenskiy in a phone call next week.
Bolsonaro told reporters while on a visit to the northeastern state of Maranhao:
I’ll tell him my opinion, what I think. The solution to this. I know how it could be resolved. But I won’t tell anyone.
The solution to this case would be like how Argentina’s war with the UK ended in 1982,” he said, without providing further details.
Argentina and Britain fought a short conflict in 1982 over sovereignty of the Falkland Islands in the south Atlantic, known in Argentina as the Malvinas. It began in April 1982 when Argentine troops landed on the British-controlled islands, and Britain sent a naval task force to retake them. The poorly-equipped Argentine troops stood little chance and Argentina surrendered two months later.
Bolsonaro has a phone call scheduled for July 18 with Zelenskiy.
The Brazilian president visited his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in Moscow in February, a few days before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and has so far taken a neutral stand on the conflict.
