Closing summary
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said Russian officials have begun to “prepare their society” for the possible use of nuclear weapons in the war. In an interview with the BBC, Zelenskiy denied having called for strikes on Russia, urging instead for pre-emptive sanctions to be imposed on Moscow.
Russia has targeted Zaporizhzhia with explosive-packed “kamikaze drones” for the first time, as the death toll from a missile strike on an apartment building in the city on Thursday rose to 11. The regional governor, Oleksandr Starukh, said Iranian-made Shahed-136 drones damaged two infrastructure facilities, in the city. He said other missiles also struck the city again, injuring one person. On Monday, the Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanani denied supplying the drones to Russia, calling the claims “baseless”.
In the north-eastern Kharkiv region where Ukrainian forces regained a large swathe of ground in September, the bodies of 534 civilians including 19 children were found after Russian troops left, Serhiy Bolvinov of the National Police in Kharkiv told a briefing. The total included 447 bodies found in Izium. He also said that investigators had found evidence of 22 sites being used as “torture rooms”.
Russia has reportedly sacked the commander of its eastern military district, Col Gen Alexander Chaiko, the news outlet RBC has reported. The reported departure of Chaiko marks the latest in a series of top officials to be fired after defeats and humiliations in the war in Ukraine, following reports that the commander of the western military district, Col Gen Alexander Zhuravlyov, had been replaced by Lt Gen Roman Berdnikov on Monday.
Joe Biden has warned the world could face “Armageddon” if Vladimir Putin uses a tactical nuclear weapon to try to win the war in Ukraine. The US president made his most outspoken remarks to date about the threat of nuclear war, saying it was the closest the world had come to nuclear catastrophe for 60 years. “We have not faced the prospect of Armageddon since Kennedy and the Cuban missile crisis,” he said.
The US does not have indications that Russia is preparing to imminently use nuclear weapons, the White House said. Asked about Biden’s comments, White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters: “He was reinforcing what we have been saying, which is how seriously ... we take these threats.”
The 2022 Nobel peace prize has been awarded to human rights advocate Ales Bialiatski from Belarus, the Russian human rights organisation Memorial and the Ukrainian human rights organisation Center for Civil Liberties. Putin should face an “international tribunal”, the head of Ukraine’s Center for Civil Liberties said after the award. Writing on Facebook, Oleksandra Matviychuk called on the Russian president, the Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko, and other “war criminals” to face an international tribunal in order to “give the hundreds of thousands of victims of war crimes a chance to see justice”. Matviychuk also called for Russia to be excluded from the UN security council “for systematic violations of the UN charter”.
Ukrainian sources are attempting to clarify what President Volodymyr Zelenskiy meant yesterday when he talked about “preventive strikes” being necessary to stop Russia using tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine. Russia’s foreign minister Sergey Lavrov seized on the comments, interpreting them as a call for Nato to use nuclear weapons against Russia, and said the comments showed why Russia’s “special military operation” within Ukraine’s borders had been necessary. The adviser to Zelenskiy, Serhii Nykyforov, said: “Colleagues, you have gone a little too far with your nuclear hysteria and now you hear nuclear strikes even where there are none. The president spoke about the period before 24 February. Then it was necessary to apply preventive measures to prevent Russia from starting the war. Let me remind you that the only measures that were about then were preventive sanctions.”
A member of Vladimir Putin’s inner circle directly confronted the Russian president over mistakes and failings in the war in Ukraine, the Washington Post has reported, citing US intelligence.
The headquarters of the armed forces of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) has claimed to have captured three settlements from Ukrainian forces in Donetsk.
At least five people were killed and as many injured after Ukrainian forces struck a bus while shelling a strategically important bridge in the Russian-controlled part of Ukraine’s southern Kherson region, Russia’s Tass news agency has reported.
The office of Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has issued a brief read-out after he held a call with his Russian counterpart. The pair discussed the latest developments in Ukraine, and Erdoğan repeated Ankara’s willingness to do its part to peacefully resolve the war.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has congratulated Putin on his 70th birthday, applauding him for his “distinguished leadership and strong will” in the latest sign of deepening ties between the two countries. In the birthday message, Kim spoke of Putin’s achievements in “building powerful Russia” and said the Russian leader was “enjoying high respects and support from the broad masses of people”.
The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Rafael Grossi, will travel to Russia early next week for talks on setting up a protection zone around the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine, the agency said.
The UN nuclear watchdog had previously said Grossi would travel to Kyiv and Moscow this week. He was in Kyiv on Thursday.
