Closing summary
The European Council outlined plans to seize the profits from frozen Russian assets and direct billions of euros to support Ukraine. In a set of formal public conclusions following the culmination of the EU leaders summit, it said:
Decisive progress is needed, in coordination with partners, on how any extraordinary revenues held by private entities stemming directly from Russia’s immobilised assets could be directed to support Ukraine and its recovery and reconstruction, consistent with applicable contractual obligations, and in accordance with EU and international law.
The French president, Emmanuel Macron, has condemned the Hungarian leader Viktor Orbán’s recent meeting and handshake with Vladimir Putin. In the situation we are in with Russia, we should not use these bilateral contacts to negotiate things about ourselves that would weaken our unity [on Ukraine],” Macron said after a meeting of EU leaders in Brussels.
Russia’s top investigative body has said it had opened a criminal inquiry into the attempted murder of former Ukrainian lawmaker Oleg Tsaryov, a pro-Russian figure who was reported to have been lined up by Moscow to lead a puppet administration in Kyiv after Russia‘s invasion. He is in intensive care after being shot, a Russian official said.
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, claimed that Russian forces have lost at least a brigade’s worth of troops attempting to advance on Ukraine’s eastern town of Avdiivka. Russia began a renewed push to encircle the embattled town in mid-October, trying to overwhelm Ukrainian positions with constant barrages of artillery and waves of troops and fighting vehicles, according to reports.
The wives and family of enlisted Ukrainian soldiers have gathered at Independence Square in Kyiv to call for the right to voluntarily demobilise after 18 months. “Our servicemen are strong, but they are not robots,” protesters shouted during the rally.
Russian forces heavily shelled the centre of the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson today, injuring a number of people and damaging at least 10 buildings, a senior local official and emergency workers said.
The new Slovak prime minister, Robert Fico, has told other EU leaders that €50 billion in EU aid to Ukraine should include guarantees that the funds would not be misappropriated, his office said. “Ukraine is among the most corrupt countries in the world,” he claimed.
Russian forces heavily shelled the centre of the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson today, injuring a number of people and damaging at least 10 buildings, a senior local official and emergency workers said.
Pictures posted on social media showed at least three sites dotted with piles of rubble after residents were told to enter shelters.
Roman Mrochko, head of the city’s military administration, said several people had been injured and one was being treated in hospital. He said at least 10 buildings suffered damage.
“In the evening the entire city trembled,” Ukraine’s emergency services said on Telegram. “The enemy targeted the very centre of Kherson.”
The post said emergency workers had rescued two women, in their 70s and 80s, who had been blocked in a building, and brought a fire under control in a rubble-strewn area.
Russian forces captured Kherson in the early days of the February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, but abandoned the city and the western bank of the Dnipro River late last year. They now regularly shell those areas from positions on the eastern bank.
The president of Belarus has invited Hungary’s prime minister to visit his country, which has faced increasing isolation over the government’s relentless crackdown on dissent and support of ally Russia‘s war with Ukraine.
President Alexander Lukashenko extended the invitation to Prime Minister Viktor Orban at a meeting with Hungarian foreign minister Peter Szijjarto, who arrived in Belarus earlier this week. Lukashenko expressed readiness “for a dialogue with European countries” and invited Orban over “to discuss serious matters.”
Orban’s press chief, Bertalan Havasi, said the prime minister would consider the invitation once he returns from the EU summit in Brussels.
Lukashenko won his sixth term in 2020 in an election the West and the opposition denounced as rigged. The vote sparked an unprecedented wave of mass protests, to which Lukashenko’s government and law enforcement agencies responded by arresting more than 35,000 people and violently beating thousands.
The country’s isolation increased after Russia used Belarus, its longtime and dependent ally, as a staging ground to send troops and missiles into Ukraine in 2022.
Drones loaded with explosives tried to attack Kursk nuclear power plant in Kurchatov last night, Russian media cited by the BBC have claimed.
One of the drones allegedly exploded near a nuclear waste storage facility. According to the Baza telegram channel, the first drone fell in the area of the dog training camp and did not detonate. The second, an aircraft-type jet UAV, was found lying on the asphalt; it also did not explode.
But the third drone allegedly attacked a warehouse with nuclear waste. According to Baza sources, the explosion damaged the façade of the warehouse building.
Elsewhere, the Ukrainian air force has said it has shot down three guided aircraft missiles and two drones over its skies, in the south of the country.
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French fighter jets have taxied alongside the Romanian Air Force after flying through the sky above the Fetesti air base, as Nato bolsters its military presence in member country Romania, bordering Ukraine.
AFP reports that following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Nato has stepped up its efforts to boost the alliance’s southeastern flank defences by sending additional battlegroups to the region.
Nato has also intensified its joint drills along the defence bloc’s wider eastern flank - which encompasses eight member countries - spanning from Estonia and Latvia bordering Russia in the east to Romania and Bulgaria on the Black Sea.
The most recent joint exercise in the region - held between 16-20 October - for the first time brought together French and Romanian pilots and their planes. Despite flying different combat jets, “we work like the French, we understand each other perfectly,” said Romanian Lt Col and pilot Lucian Tatulea.
As lead nation for the alliance’s “Mission Aigle” deployed to Romania, France acts as the point of contact between Bucharest and other allies, who seek to send troops to Ukraine’s neighbouring country. Romania currently hosts more than 5,000 foreign troops, the largest contingent anywhere in Nato’s southeastern region.
Russia’s defence ministry has confirmed the appointment of Colonel-General Viktor Afzalov as commander of the country’s aerospace forces, replacing General Sergei Surovikin who was removed from the role in August.
Russian state-run RIA and Tass news agencies had reported his appointment last week, citing sources. Russia’s Aerospace Forces comprise the air and space branches of its armed forces, reports Reuters.
Afzalov, 55, had been acting head of the aerospace forces after Surovikin’s dismissal. Kyiv says Afzalov played a direct role in the planning and prosecution of Russia’s “special military operation” against Ukraine.
Surovikin, dubbed “General Armageddon” for his use of carpet bombing tactics during Russia’s intervention in Syria’s civil war, briefly headed Russia’s campaign in Ukraine last year before being demoted in January.
He became popular among hardline critics of the Russian military establishment including Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin, who led a failed mutiny on 24 June. Prigozhin died in a plane crash in August. Surovikin, who had been praised publicly by Prigozhin, disappeared from public view after the mutiny.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy has expressed his gratitude to the UAE president Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan for humanitarian and energy aid that his country has received from the Gulf state.
I had a call with HH Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan @MohamedBinZayed.
— Volodymyr Zelenskyy / Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) October 27, 2023
I am grateful to the UAE for participating in the Peace Formula meeting in Jeddah and for its willingness to send a representative to Malta, as well as for its humanitarian medical and energy aid to…
The French president, Emmanuel Macron, has condemned the Hungarian leader Viktor Orbán’s recent meeting and handshake with Vladimir Putin.
“In the situation we are in with Russia, we should not use these bilateral contacts to negotiate things about ourselves that would weaken our unity [on Ukraine],” Macron said after a meeting of EU leaders in Brussels.
“Brussels did not invade Hungary,” he said. “Hungary made a sovereign decision to join our Europe … it is a sovereign choice which, afterwards, carries constraints, because we have all decided to delegate sovereignty to our Europe. All of us.”
Macron said no-one could prohibit Orbán from doing what he did, but that a meeting with Europe’s foremost enemy should be arranged in consultation with EU member states and leaders. The French president said he had reproached Orbán in front of other leaders:
I want to condemn it [the meeting with the Russian president] once again and make it very clear. I can tell you what I said to Viktor Orbán publicly around the table. First of all, I respect all the heads of state and government around the table and they have this sovereignty.
There’s absolutely no need to prohibit a head of state or government from going in one direction or another. It doesn’t shock us. What I am asking, out of respect and loyalty, is that we coordinate beforehand and coordinate afterwards and that, especially in the situation we are in with Russia, we do not use these bilateral contacts to negotiate things about ourselves that would weaken our unity.
Russia’s top investigative body has said it had opened a criminal inquiry into the attempted murder of former Ukrainian lawmaker Oleg Tsaryov, which follows the assassinations of several other prominent pro-Moscow figures since the start of the war.
Tsaryov, a pro-Russian figure whom sources said Moscow had lined up to lead a puppet administration in Kyiv after Russia‘s invasion, was shot and wounded in a late-night attack, family and officials said.
The attack took place in Yalta in Crimea, which Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014. “Around midnight he was shot twice on the premises of the sanatorium where he lives,” said a post on Tsaryov’s Telegram account, citing the family. “When the ambulance arrived, Oleg was unconscious and had lost a lot of blood.”
Three sources familiar with Russia‘s post-invasion plans told Reuters last year that Moscow had been looking to Tsaryov to head a puppet government in Kyiv if it had succeeded in ousting President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in the first days of the war in February 2022. Tsaryov, who runs hotels in Crimea, said Reuters’ account had “very little to do with reality”.
Andriy Yusov, a spokesman for Ukraine’s military intelligence agency, was asked on television about the shooting. “We won’t comment in too much detail yet, that’s too much of an honour for him. But yes, there is such information. I can’t say we’re following his health very closely, but we are following,” he said. “When there is information that his body temperature has fallen below 36.6, there will definitely be a statement.”
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In pouring rain, a jubilant crowd waving pompoms and flowers greeted the Russian foreign minister as he stepped on to the airport asphalt in Pyongyang.
While the heavily choreographed welcoming scenes were a familiar sight in totalitarian North Korea, Sergei Lavrov’s rare visit to the country came amid mounting evidence that Pyongyang has started to provide artillery rounds to Russia, opening up a supply line that could have profound implications for the war in Ukraine.
This month, the US said as many as 1,000 North Korean shipping containers bearing “equipment and munitions” had been sent to Russia “in recent weeks”.
Most EU leaders have backed granting more financial support to Ukraine – but Hungary and Slovakia voiced reservations before a decision the bloc needs to make unanimously in December.
The EU executive has proposed that the bloc’s 27 countries contribute more funds in a revision to its shared budget to finance additional spending through 2027, including extending €50bn in new aid to Kyiv.
The German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, said on Friday: “I have the impression that we will decide what is necessary for Ukraine‘s financial stability. And I don’t think that the partly different concrete assessments will affect that.”
Overall EU support for Ukraine has totalled almost €83bn since Russia invaded in February 2022, the Brussels-based executive European Commission said this week. “The European Union will continue to provide strong financial, economic, humanitarian, military and diplomatic support to Ukraine and its people for as long as it takes,” a joint statement from the EU leaders read.
However, fresh from meeting the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, the Hungarian prime minister said the EU strategy of sending money and military aid to Ukraine had failed. “The Ukrainians will not win on the battlefield,” Viktor Orbán said.
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European Council outlines plans to direct profits from frozen Russian assets to Ukraine
The European Council has outlined plans to seize the profits from frozen Russian assets and direct billions of euros to support Ukraine.
The body issued a set of formal public conclusions following the culmination of the EU leaders summit.
Russia is responsible for the massive damage caused by its war of aggression against Ukraine. Decisive progress is needed, in coordination with partners, on how any extraordinary revenues held by private entities stemming directly from Russia’s immobilised assets could be directed to support Ukraine and its recovery and reconstruction, consistent with applicable contractual obligations, and in accordance with EU and international law. The European Council calls on the high representative and the commission to accelerate work with a view to submitting proposals.
Meanwhile, the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, emphasised the EU’s continued support for Kyiv while finalising a proposed €50bn package for Ukraine.
It was very clear in the debate, despite the geopolitical tensions in the Middle East, our focus continues to be on supporting Ukraine … We will continue delivering the much-needed weapons and ammunition. We will continue providing the much-needed financial relief.
She said, according to my colleague Lili Bayer, that the EU was also consulting member states over the next sanctions package targeting Russia. She noted that the bloc was looking in particular at how to cut the remaining revenues Russia drew from the export of diamonds.
The commission would also work on plans on how to use channel the proceeds from Russian assets via the EU budget to Ukraine, she said.
In other news, Emmanuel Macron condemned Viktor Orbán’s meeting with Vladimir Putin. The French leader said EU member states must not undermine their policy on Ukraine and any such meeting must have prior coordination with EU member states.
He said part of being in the EU meant there were certain “constraints” and no member state should take action that weakened the bloc.
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Zelenskiy claims Russia has lost a brigade's worth of troops trying to encircle Avdiivka
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, claimed that Russian forces have lost at least a brigade’s worth of troops attempting to advance on Ukraine’s eastern town of Avdiivka.
Russia began a renewed push to encircle the embattled town in mid-October, trying to overwhelm Ukrainian positions with constant barrages of artillery and waves of troops and fighting vehicles, according to local and military authorities in Ukraine, Reuters reports.
“The invaders made several attempts to surround Avdiivka, but each time our soldiers stopped them and threw them back, causing painful losses. In these cases, the enemy lost at least a brigade,” Zelenskiy told the British prime minister, Rishi Sunak, in a phone call, according to the president’s office.
Brigades vary in size and can number between 1,500 and 8,000 troops, and both Ukraine and Russia keep their battlefield losses a secret. Russian military bloggers have reported territorial gains by Moscow’s troops in the area, while Ukraine has described the situation as extremely difficult.
In a battlefield update on Friday, the Ukrainian general staff said the military “steadfastly holds the defence and causes significant losses” to Russian troops, adding that they were not giving up in their attempts to encircle the town.
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Russia’s foreign ministry has issued a statement about the conflict between Israel and Hamas that will again most likely be criticised as hypocrisy by authorities in Ukraine.
In the statement, Russia says: “We consider unacceptable the manifestation of violence in any form against the civilian population, no matter what side it is on.”
Since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the UN has so far recorded more than 22,000 civilian Ukrainian casualties, including in excess of 7,000 deaths, in the areas of the country controlled by the Kyiv government. Russia, which denies targeting civilians, has also repeatedly struck at energy infrastructure in Ukraine.
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Putin: weapons are being smuggled into Russia from Ukraine
At a meeting of the Russian security council, the president, Vladimir Putin, has claimed that weapons from the conflict in Ukraine are being smuggled into Russia.
Tass reports that Putin said the council needed to discuss the issue of weapons trafficking, and quotes him saying:
We need to think about how weapons and ammunition enter the territory of the Russian Federation illegally. By the way, including from the territory of Ukraine. Not our troops, but such weapons still enter the territory of Russia from the territory of Ukraine.
We need to look at all these channels, look at how departmental control measures are organised, and see what needs to be done additionally to strengthen the regulatory framework.
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While EU leaders have been meeting in Brussels and discussing future funding and military support for Ukraine, another key meeting has been taking place, of the parliamentary committee of the Ukraine-EU association.
In a statement, Ukraine’s parliament said “the participants discussed the state of Ukraine’s progress in fulfilling the seven conditions that accompanied the granting of candidate status for joining the EU”.
It went on to say “Ukraine’s progress in fulfilling the seven conditions regarding the application is significant” and that “Ukraine has almost completely fulfilled all seven requirements.”
Ukraine is currently a candidate country to join the EU alongside Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia and Turkey.
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The wives and family of enlisted Ukrainian soldiers have gathered at Independence Square in Kyiv to call for the right to voluntarily demobilise after 18 months. “Our servicemen are strong, but they are not robots,” protesters shouted during the rally.
In the first weeks after the invasion, hundreds of thousands of ordinary Ukrainians volunteered to serve at the front, the Guardian has reported. But many of those initial recruits are now dead, wounded or simply exhausted, and the army needs new recruits to fill the ranks. However, most of those who want to fight have already signed up, leaving the military to recruit among a much more reluctant pool of men.
Fathers of more than three children, people with disabilities and those working in strategically important jobs are exempt from the draft, but everyone else is expected to join up if called. Crews of mobilisation officers roam the streets and sometimes go door to door to hand out notices. Viral videos show officers bundling men into vans to deposit them at enlistment offices.
Ukrainian men between the age of 18 and 60 are banned from leaving the country and tens of thousands are estimated to have fled, but some 20,000 have been reportedly caught while trying to leave and avoid fighting in the war with Russia.
The three incidents that resulted in damage to a gas pipeline and two telecom cables between Estonia, Finland and Sweden “are related”, Estonian prime minister Kaja Kallas has said.
Finnish police leading the pipeline investigation have named the Hong-Kong-flagged container carrier NewNew Polar Bear as the prime suspect in damaging the Balticconnector Finland-Estonia gas pipeline early on 8 October.
A large anchor was found near the pipeline, and the investigators believe the pipe was broken as a ship dragged it across the sea bed. Two telecom cables connecting Estonia to Finland and Sweden were also damaged on Oct 7-8. Tallinn is investigating the cables incidents.
In the case of the Estonia-Finland cable damage, it is also focusing on the Hong Kong vessel, and late night Kallas said all three incidents were likely connected. “We have reason to believe that the cases of Balticconnector and the communication cables are related,” she said. “No version [of events] can be confirmed or denied regarding the Estonian communication cables.”
Russia has dismissed as “rubbish” the idea that it was involved. Nato has stepped up its patrols in the Baltic Sea after the incidents, and the Norwegian Navy has shadowed the NewNew Polar Bear as it sailed over the country’s key gas pipelines.
The alliance launched a new centre for protecting undersea pipelines and cables in June after a still-unsolved series of explosions last year that ruptured three of the four Nord Stream pipelines that carried Russian gas to western Europe.
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President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s top diplomatic adviser said officials from up to 70 nations will meet in Malta to discuss Ukraine’s vision for peace this weekend, rejecting the idea that cracks are appearing in allied support for Kyiv.
The talks on Saturday and Sunday will bring together national security advisers and foreign ministry officials to discuss Zelenskiy’s 10-point blueprint for a peace settlement after 21 months of war with no end in sight.
The talks, which do not involve Russia, will help gauge Ukraine and the West’s ability to drum up continued and broader support, particularly in the Global South, as the conflict in Israel dominates headlines, moving the focus from Kyiv.
Ihor Zhovkva, Zelenskiy’s adviser, said some nations were still confirming their plans, but that up to 70 were expected in Malta, up from the 43 who attended the previous round in Jeddah in August, and the 15 who went to Copenhagen for talks in June.
“You can clearly see this is a growing number of countries compared to Jeddah and it’s very important it will be representatives of countries of all the continents,” he told Reuters in an interview in his office in Kyiv last night.
The Zelenskiy formula’s 10 points include calls for the restoration of Ukraine’s territorial integrity, withdrawal of Russian troops, protection of food and energy supplies, nuclear safety and the release of all prisoners.
Zhovkva declined to name the countries that will attend, saying that could help Moscow lobby them not to come, but, asked whether Beijing would send an emissary, he said: “We are working with many countries, including China.” China, which has maintained close economic and diplomatic ties with Russia during the war, attended the talks in Jeddah.
Zhovkva said Kyiv still aimed to convene a Global Peace Summit this year. “I cannot predict the discussion, but one of the most possible and desirable outcomes [of the Malta talks] will be to define the place and date of a peace formula summit at the level of heads of state and government.”
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The EU clearing house in Brussels, Euroclear, has earned more than €3bn this year from frozen Russian assets which it is holding due to EU sanctions.
The Financial Times reported that the windfall “is likely to crank up the pressure on European leaders to channel the profits to Ukraine”.
The Belgium-based group said on Thursday that income related to trapped Russian assets jumped in the first nine months of the year from €347mn in the same period in 2022, propelled by rising interest rates.
The sharp rise is uncomfortable for Euroclear, which has been sitting on Russian assets since Russian president Vladimir Putin ordered the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, because the EU’s subsequent sanctions on Moscow mean it cannot move funds to Russian banks.
Millions of securities deals a day are tracked and settled at the Brussels-based group. About €197bn Russian assets are stuck at Euroclear, according to the Belgian government. Of that total, €180bn are from the Russian central bank, the lion’s share of the $300bn of central bank assets frozen by western sanctions.
EU officials have been grappling with how best to deploy the proceeds from Russian assets that are stuck in Europe’s financial system. It is considering using the windfall profits Euroclear makes for Ukraine.
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Pro-Russian former Ukrainian lawmaker shot, in intensive care
The former Ukrainian lawmaker Oleg Tsaryov, a pro-Russian figure who was reported to have been lined up by Moscow to lead a puppet administration in Kyiv after Russia‘s invasion, is in intensive care after being shot, a Russian official has said.
The official, Vladimir Rogov, did not say where the shooting had taken place. “Oleg’s condition is very serious. He is currently in intensive care,” said Rogov, a senior Russian-installed official in southern Ukraine. “Oleg was shot,” he said on Telegram, asking Orthodox Christian believers to pray for Tsaryov.
Sources told Reuters last year that Russia had been lining up Tsaryov to head a puppet government in Kyiv after Moscow’s forces invaded.
Tsaryov dismissed that possibility when the Financial Times reported it, citing US intelligence, before the invasion. He told the FT at the time that the idea was “pretty funny” because he was just running a wellness business in Crimea and was “not important enough”.
Previously Tsaryov had been a member of the Ukrainian parliament and then speaker of the parliament of “Novorossiya” an entity formed after Russian-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine broke away in 2014 and began fighting Ukrainian forces.
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Four vessels have left Ukrainian Black Sea ports in the Odesa region today as shipping via a new export corridor resumed after a three day pause, the independent transport sector consultancy STC has said.
“On 27 October, vessel traffic in the temporary Black Sea corridor announced by Ukraine resumed,” STC said. The Propus, Iasos, Gloria G and Manassa Queen had sailed from Odesa ports, it added, while the tanker Mavka, bulk carrier Golden Arrow and general cargo vessel Maranta were heading to Ukrainian ports.
Yesterday, the Kyiv-based Barva Invest consultancy, British security firm Ambrey and a specialised outlet, Ukrainian Ports, reported that Ukraine had suspended use of the corridor due to a possible threat from Russian warplanes and sea mines.
Ukrainian officials denied this and President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said today the corridor would continue to function despite threats. Ukraine has been using the corridor to try to revive its seaborne exports, defying threats from Moscow, which quit a UN-brokered deal in July that had allowed some food exports to flow despite the war, reports Reuters.
Ukrainian officials said 23 ships were loading at the ports of Odesa, Chornomorsk and Pivdennyi as of yesterday. A total of 51 vessels had used the corridor so far with 33 exporting more than 1.3m metric tons of Ukrainian agricultural products and other cargo, they said.
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Russia has said it killed a suspected Ukrainian spy and shut down two pro-Kyiv online outlets during an operation in the occupied part of Ukraine’s southern Zaporizhzhia region.
Since seizing control of swathes of Ukraine last year, Russia has claimed to have foiled repeated acts of alleged sabotage as it tries to crack down on pro-Ukrainian resistance among the local population, AFP reports.
“As a result of a special operation in the territory of Zaporizhzhia region, the FSB suppressed the activities of three large agent groups coordinated by Ukrainian intelligence,” the FSB security service said.
One man it suspected of working for Ukrainian intelligence was killed in a gunfight during the operation, the FSB said. The administrators of a pro-Ukrainian chat room and a media outlet in the Russian-controlled city of Melitopol were also detained, it added.
It said the administrators persuaded residents to gather information on the “locations and movements of Russian military personnel” and had been fomenting “an anti-Russian agenda in the region … The functioning of the information resources was discontinued.”
Agence France-Presse was not able to immediately verify the FSB’s account of events.
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The new Slovak prime minister, Robert Fico, has told other EU leaders that €50 billion in EU aid to Ukraine should include guarantees that the funds would not be misappropriated, his office said today.
“Ukraine is among the most corrupt countries in the world and we are conditioning what is excessive financial support on guarantees that European money [including Slovak] will not be embezzled,” Fico said.
The leftist leader was appointed prime minister on Wednesday for the fourth time after pledging in his election campaign to end military support for Ukraine and criticising sanctions on Russia.
His call on conditions on EU aid to Ukraine came in a debate yesterday at a two-day summit of EU leaders, where Fico joined the Hungarian prime minister, Viktor Orbán, in criticising aid to Ukraine. Fico said part of any EU support to Ukraine should go to renewing Slovakia’s infrastructure along its eastern border with Ukraine as well as support for Slovak companies in the restoration of Ukraine.
Fico said he was ready to support increasing Slovakia’s contribution to the EU’s budget by €400m over the next four years, even though the country’s finances were “devastated”.
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EU leaders meeting in Brussels today have discussed bolstering support for Ukraine, as they strived to focus on helping that country against Russia’s invasion even as Middle East turmoil steals global attention.
The discussion on Ukraine was taking place on the second day of the summit, after the first day was dominated by coming up with a unified EU position on the Israel-Hamas war, even though Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky called in during yesterday’s session.
“It’s really important that one of the outcomes of this meeting is that we don’t lose focus on Ukraine because of all the other things that are happening in the world and not least in the Middle East,” the Irish prime minister, Leo Varadkar, said. “It would be very easy to lose focus on the war in Ukraine and essential that we don’t do that.”
The European Council president, Charles Michel, said the most important point for the second day of the summit was Ukraine, with discussion on how “we develop more support for Ukraine and that we maintain and even we reinforce the pressure against Russia through our sanctions”.
A significant EU measure is a plan, tentatively estimated at €20bn over four years, for a defence fund for Ukraine as part of broader western security commitments. Further financial support for Ukraine is backed by almost all 27 EU countries, with only Hungary and Slovakia baulking, Agence France-Presse reports.
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US contractors’ revenues are soaring as customers such as the US government restock supplies shipped to Ukraine and countries around Europe reinforce their stocks.
Contractors such as Lockheed Martin, General Dynamics and others expect existing orders for hundreds of thousands of artillery rounds, hundreds of Patriot missile interceptors and a big increase in orders for armoured vehicles expected in the months ahead will underpin their results in coming quarters, reports Reuters.
New contracts to supply Ukraine directly – or backfill US weapons sent to Ukraine – were signed late last year, and now revenue is flowing to the big defence contractors. Lockheed, General Dynamics and RTX all reported better than expected results recently, and executives expect the conflict in Ukraine and Israel’s war with the Palestinian militant group Hamas to drive up near-term demand.
Jason Aiken, General Dynamics’ chief financial officer, said on Wednesday: “We’ve gone from 14,000 [artillery] rounds per month to 20,000 very quickly. We’re working ahead of schedule to accelerate that production capacity up to 85,000, even as high as 100,000 rounds per month. And I think the Israel situation is only going to put upward pressure on that demand.”
General Dynamics’ Combat Systems unit, which makes armoured vehicles, tanks and the artillery Ukraine uses, said its revenue rose by almost 25% compared with the same period a year ago.
RTX, which makes AMRAAM rockets used in Ukraine, said on an earnings call with analysts that it had received $3bn of orders since Russia’s invasion in February 2022 that are related to replenishing Ukrainian and US war stocks.
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The alternative Black Sea export corridor will continue to function despite all threats, the Ukraine president has said.
The presidential office reported that Volodymyr Zelenskiy discussed the operation of the route as well as vessel insurance during a phone call with the British prime minister, Rishi Sunak.
Reuters notes that on Thursday, the Kyiv-based Barva Invest consultancy, British security firm Ambrey and a specialised outlet, Ukrainian Ports, reported that Ukraine had suspended use of the corridor after a possible threat from Russian warplanes and sea mines. Ukrainian officials denied this.
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Summary of the day so far …
It has just gone 1pm in Kyiv. Here are the latest headlines …
The White House has claimed Russia is executing soldiers who fail to follow orders and threatening entire units with death if they retreat from Ukrainian artillery fire. The White House national security council spokesperson, John Kirby, said it was a development that security officials believe reflected Russia’s morale problems 20 months into its invasion. “It’s reprehensible to think about that you would execute your own soldiers because they didn’t want to follow orders and now threatening to execute entire units, it’s barbaric,” Kirby told reporters. “But I think it’s a symptom of how poorly Russia’s military leaders know they’re doing and how bad they have handled this from a military perspective.”
Russia has said it thwarted a Ukrainian drone attack near a nuclear plant in the south of the country, where two news outlets said an explosion had damaged the facade of a warehouse storing nuclear waste. The defence ministry said air defences foiled “an attempt by the Kyiv regime to carry out a terrorist attack” when they intercepted a drone late on Thursday near the settlement of Kurchatov in the southern region of Kursk. Kurchatov is home to the Kursk nuclear power station, which said in a separate statement that an attempt to attack it with three drones had been thwarted.
A fire station has been struck in the Ukrainian city of Izyum, damaging equipment and injuring eight people.
The Russian-installed official Vladimir Rogov has claimed Russia destroyed “at least four” of the Leopard tanks supplied to Ukraine by the west in the Zaporizhzhia region within the past 24 hours.
Arriving at the EU’s summit in Brussels, the European Council president, Charles Michel, said he expected leaders to discuss Ukraine, adding that there was broad support for financial assistance to the country.
Irish leader, Leo Varadkar, said “Because of all the other things that are happening in the world, and not least in the Middle East, it would be very easy to lose focus on the war in Ukraine – and essential that we don’t do that.”
Viktor Orbán, has told Hungarian state radio that the EU’s strategy over the war in Ukraine “has failed”, and the bloc should create a plan B, as the Ukrainians will not win on the frontline. In comments likely to infuriate Kyiv, Orbán said he saw no reason for Hungary, which shares a border with Ukraine, sending any taxpayers’ money to the EU budget for financial support for Ukraine.
The UK’s Ministry of Defence has noted that “The Russian airforce’s long range aviation fleet of heavy bombers has not conducted air launched cruise missile strikes into Ukraine for over a month, one of the longest gaps in such strikes since the conflict began”. It suggests this may be because operationally the Russian air force needed to replenish cruise missiles stocks.
The Russian ambassador to the US has criticised Washington for its latest round of support for Ukraine. Anatoly Antonov said “The provocative and inflammatory actions of the US in the international arena are more like adding fuel to the fire than efforts to counter the further incitement and spread of bloody conflicts. It’s high time to stop senseless multibillion-dollar injections into the bankrupt Kyiv regime.”
Newly elected US Speaker of the House Mike Johnson said that funding to support Ukraine and Israel should be handled separately, suggesting he will not back President Joe Biden’s $106 billion aid package for both countries. Johnson, speaking in an interview on Fox News, said he had concerns about Ukraine funding in general. “We want to know what the object is there, what is the end game in Ukraine.”
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In Lviv, western Ukraine, the regional military authority building was evacuated this morning after an anonymous report said there were explosives inside. After a search turned up nothing, Suspilne reported that the building had reopened.
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Latvia’s prime minister, Evika Siliņa, told reporters this morning as she arrived at the EU summit in Brussels that “we must show endurance on support for Ukraine, because we have to … fulfil promises that we have given before.”
The Russian-installed official Vladimir Rogov has claimed Russia destroyed “at least four” of the Leopard tanks supplied to Ukraine by the west in the Zaporizhzhia region within the past 24 hours.
Zaporizhzhia is one of the regions Russia partly occupies and has claimed to annex.
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The Irish leader, Leo Varadkar, has said as he arrived in Brussels for an EU summit that there was still a need to focus on Ukraine. He said:
I think it’s really important that one of the outcomes of this meeting is that we don’t lose focus on Ukraine. Because of all the other things that are happening in the world, and not least in the Middle East, it would be very easy to lose focus on the war in Ukraine – and essential that we don’t do that.
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Russia claims Ukraine attempted to attack Kursk nuclear plant with drones
Russia has said it thwarted a Ukrainian drone attack near a nuclear plant in the south of the country, where two news outlets said an explosion had damaged the facade of a warehouse storing nuclear waste.
Reuters reports that the defence ministry said air defences foiled “an attempt by the Kyiv regime to carry out a terrorist attack” when they intercepted a drone late on Thursday near the settlement of Kurchatov in the southern region of Kursk.
Kurchatov is home to the Kursk nuclear power station, which said in a separate statement that an attempt to attack it with three drones had been thwarted. Tass quotes it as saying:
The Kursk nuclear power plant is operating as normal. We confirm that on the evening of 26 October, an attack by three enemy unmanned aerial vehicles on the Kursk nuclear power plant was stopped. This event did not affect the operation of the station.
The claims have not been independently verified.
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Arriving at the EU’s summit in Brussels this morning, the European Council president, Charles Michel, said he expected leaders to discuss Ukraine, adding that there was broad support for financial assistance to the country.
Asked about Hungary and Slovakia – both of which have expressed qualms about funding for Kyiv – the council chief said the EU needed to make sure decisions were made by consensus and that the function of summits was to make sure leaders convince, argue and, at the end, find unity.
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In its latest intelligence report on the war in Ukraine, the UK’s Ministry of Defence has noted that:
The Russian airforce’s long range aviation fleet of heavy bombers has not conducted air launched cruise missile strikes into Ukraine for over a month, one of the longest gaps in such strikes since the conflict began.
It suggests this may be because operationally the Russian air force needed to replenish cruise missiles stocks.
Latest Defence Intelligence update on the situation in Ukraine – 27 October 2023.
— Ministry of Defence 🇬🇧 (@DefenceHQ) October 27, 2023
Find out more about Defence Intelligence's use of language: https://t.co/SWYbN4Cgjx
🇺🇦 #StandWithUkraine 🇺🇦 pic.twitter.com/r5d74bIq38
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Russia’s defence ministry has claimed that overnight it intercepted a Ukrainian drone over the territory of the Kursk region. There were no reports of any damage or casualties.
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Suspilne, Ukraine’s state broadcaster, reports that the main news overnight has been an attack on the fire station in Izyum. It reports:
At night, Russia attacked the fire station in Izyum, Kharkiv region: eight rescuers were injured, 13 pieces of equipment were damaged.
It also reports that overnight Ukraine claims to have shot down five out of six Shahed drones launched by Russia.
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The Russian ambassador to the US has criticised Washington for its latest round of support for Ukraine. Tass quotes Anatoly Antonov as saying:
The provocative and inflammatory actions of the US in the international arena are more like adding fuel to the fire than efforts to counter the further incitement and spread of bloody conflicts.
It’s high time to stop senseless multibillion-dollar injections into the bankrupt Kyiv regime. Stop showing a disregard for the opinions of your citizens and indifference to the ever-new victims dying from American weapons.
Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, and the UN has so far recorded more than 22,000 civilians casualties, including in excess of 7,000 deaths.
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Orbán: EU strategy on Ukraine 'has failed'
Reuters reports that Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán, has told Hungarian state radio that the EU’s strategy over the war in Ukraine “has failed”, and the bloc should create a plan B, as the Ukrainians will not win on the frontline.
In comments likely to infuriate Kyiv, Orbán said he saw no reason for Hungary, which shares a border with Ukraine, sending any taxpayers’ money to the EU budget for financial support for Ukraine.
This is Martin Belam on the live blog in Bristol. You can contact me at martin.belam@theguardian.com.
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Russia executing soldiers who disobey orders, says White House
Hello and welcome to the Guardian’s live coverage of the war in Ukraine.
The White House has claimed Russia is executing soldiers who fail to follow orders and threatening entire units with death if they retreat from Ukrainian artillery fire.
White House national security council spokesperson John Kirby said it was a development that security officials believe reflects Russia’s morale problems 20 months into its invasion.
“It’s reprehensible to think about that you would execute your own soldiers because they didn’t want to follow orders and now threatening to execute entire units, it’s barbaric,” Kirby told reporters.
“But I think it’s a symptom of how poorly Russia’s military leaders know they’re doing and how bad they have handled this from a military perspective.”
In other developments:
Newly elected US Speaker of the House Mike Johnson said that funding to support Ukraine and Israel should be handled separately, suggesting he will not back President Joe Biden’s $106 billion aid package for both countries. Johnson, speaking in an interview on Fox News, said he had concerns about Ukraine funding in general. “We want to know what the object is there, what is the end game in Ukraine.”
The US ambassador to Ukraine said on Thursday that Ukrainian pilots were undergoing training in the United States on F-16 fighter aircraft, a key element on Kyiv’s wish list. The US approved sending F-16s fighter jets to Ukraine from the Netherlands and Denmark in August once pilot training is completed. “Ukrainian pilots are now training with the Arizona Air National Guard on F-16s,” ambassador Bridget Brink said on social media.
Russia criticised Ukrainian-backed peace talks set to be held in Malta this weekend, warning any discussions without its participation would be counterproductive. Foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said the upcoming meeting had “nothing to do with the search for a peaceful resolution” and criticised Malta for hosting what she called a “blatantly anti-Russian event.”
Dossiers of evidence of Russian war crimes in Ukraine were presented to German federal prosecutors at the start of a campaign to use the principle of universal jurisdiction to bring war criminals to justice. The cases were filed on Thursday morning by the Clooney Foundation for Justice (CFJ), representing 16 survivors and the families of victims in three separate war crimes cases.
The US has announced additional security assistance for Ukraine amid the Russian invasion valued at $150m (£124m), the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, and the Pentagon said. The latest package “utilizes assistance previously authorised for Ukraine during prior fiscal years,” the Pentagon said in a statement.
Russian lawmakers backed a record increase in military spending to fund Moscow’s offensive on Ukraine, in a first reading of the bill Thursday. Defence spending will account for almost a third of all outlays in 2024 – up 68% to 10.8tn rubles ($115bn).
Ukraine denied reports by Ukrainian and British firms that the new Black Sea export corridor had been suspended. “The information regarding the cancellation or unscheduled stoppage of the temporary #Ukrainian-corridor for the movement of civilian vessels from and to the ports of the Big Odesa (region) is false,” deputy prime minister Oleksandr Kubrakov said on social media.
Russia’s FSB security service said it had killed a man while foiling what it said was the latest of several Ukraine-inspired murder and sabotage plots against its soldiers. The FSB said it had “neutralised” a suspect during an attempted arrest after discovering a plot to blow up an enlistment building in the city of Tver, north-west of Moscow, the Tass news agency reported.
Finland is working with Beijing to find out more about a Chinese ship likely linked to damage of an undersea gas pipeline, prime minister Petteri Orpo said. Finnish police have recovered an anchor, believed to be from a Chinese vessel, that appears to have caused the breach in the Baltic Sea Balticconnector pipeline to Estonia this month.
Ukraine said it planned to evacuate hundreds of children from communities near the north-eastern city of Kupiansk, as Russia steps up assaults in the area. Kyiv’s forces recaptured Kupiansk and the surrounding areas of Kharkiv region in September 2022, but Moscow has since pushed back in a bid to move the frontline west ahead of the winter.
Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán said he was proud to keep communications open with Moscow after angering fellow EU leaders by meeting Russian President Vladimir Putin last month. “We keep open all the communication lines to the Russians. Otherwise, there will be no chance for peace,” Orbán told reporters ahead of a meeting of EU leaders in Brussels. “This is a strategy. So we are proud of it.”
Slovakia’s new populist prime minister, Robert Fico, said his three-party coalition government was ending military aid to its eastern neighbour Ukraine, fulfilling one of his central campaign pledges. He said he had spoken to the head of the European Commission about his government’s move at a meeting before the bloc’s summit in Brussels.
A Stockholm court acquitted a Russian-Swede accused of passing western technology to Russia’s military, ruling that while he did export the material his actions did not amount to intelligence gathering. Prosecutors had sought a five-year sentence against Sergei Skvortsov, a 60-year-old dual national who has lived in Sweden since the 1990s running import-export companies.
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