Evening summary
The time in Kyiv is just coming up to 9pm. Here is a roundup of the day’s headlines:
President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that Russia needed to fight enemy agents and improve its defences against attacks deep inside its own territory, but that there was no need to follow Ukraine’s example and declare martial law. “There is no reason to introduce some kind of special regime or martial law in the country,” Putin told a televised meeting of Russian war correspondents and military bloggers. “There is no need for such a thing today.”
Ukraine is making advances and gaining ground in its counteroffensive, Nato secretary-general Jens Stoltenberg said on Tuesday, although he added it was still early in Kyiv’s renewed push against Russia’s invasion. In brief remarks before his meeting with the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, Stoltenberg said the alliance was preparing for the leaders’ summit in the Lithuanian capital, Vilnius, where it was expected to step up further support for Ukraine, Reuters reported.
A top Russian officer has been killed in a Ukrainian missile strike during Kyiv’s counteroffensive against Russian forces, a Russian-backed official in Ukraine said on Tuesday, offering his condolences. Vladimir Rogov, a Russian-installed official in part of the southern Zaporizhzhia region which is under Moscow’s control, said Maj Gen Sergei Goryachev, chief of staff of Russia’s 35th army, had been killed on the Zaporizhzhia front on Monday where Ukrainian forces have been retaking some territory.
Russia’s defence ministry said on Tuesday its forces had repelled Ukrainian attacks near the villages of Makarivka, Rivnopil and Prechystivka in the southern part of Donetsk region, the state-owned news agency RIA reported. In its daily briefing, the defence ministry also said Ukraine was continuing to mount attacks in the south Donetsk and Bakhmut areas.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, the founder of Russia’s Wagner mercenary group, said on Tuesday that he was “not sure” if Wagner would stay in Ukraine after having taken the eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut after a months-long battle. Wagner mercenaries have in the past been active in Africa and the Middle East and still have some contracts there, Reuters reported.
A 72-year-old priest was killed by Russian shelling of the Ukrainian settlement of Bilozerka in southern Kherson region, the head of the Ukrainian president’s office said on Tuesday. Artillery fire struck the courtyard of a church and also injured a 76-year-old woman, Andriy Yermak said on Telegram messenger, Reuters reported.
The death toll from flooding in two Russian-controlled towns in southern Ukraine has risen to 17, one week after the breaching of a dam that held back a reservoir, a Russian-installed official said on Tuesday. Andrei Alekseyenko, chair of the Russian-installed administration in the Kherson region, said 12 people were confirmed dead in Hola Prystan and five in Oleshky, two small towns downstream from the breached Kakhovka dam.
At least six people were killed and 25 injured after a Russian missile strike on Kryvyi Rih, Dnipropetrovsk oblast, destroyed a five-storey residential building. Russian airstrikes hit several civilian structures in the city, said the mayor of Kryvyi Rih, Oleksandr Vilkul, adding: “Likely, there are people under the rubble.”
Ukraine’s deputy defence minister, Hanna Maliar, has reported small incremental advances for Ukrainian forces near Bakhmut and Toretsk. She said in a message on Telegram that Ukraine had advanced 250 metres in the direction of Bakhmut in the area of the Berkhiv reservoir, and 200 metres in the Toretsk direction. She also claimed that 3 sq km of territory had been captured in the Berdiansk direction.
Russia’s defence ministry has released video footage of what it claims were German-made Leopard tanks and US-made Bradley fighting vehicles captured by Russian forces in a battle with Ukrainian forces. In a message on Telegram, the ministry said some of the vehicles still had their engines running, illustrating the rapid flight of the crews during the battle. The location and timing of the video footage has not been independently verified.
Russian military bloggers appear to be claiming that Makarivka, one of the villages that Ukraine said it had liberated in the last couple of days, is back in Russian hands. The claims have not been independently verified.
Putin said on Tuesday that Russia was considering withdrawing from the Black Sea grain deal, saying that Moscow had been “cheated” over implementation of the parts of the accord that concerned its own exports. In a televised meeting with pro-Kremlin war correspondents, Putin said the deal was intended to help “friendly” countries in Africa and Latin America, but that Europe was the largest importer of Ukrainian grain and this was providing a key source of foreign currency to Kyiv.
France prevented an attack on its foreign ministry website that was likely carried out by Russian or Russian-speaking individuals, said a statement from the French foreign minister, Catherine Colonna. Reuters reports that Colonna’s statement on Tuesday said authorities had prevented an identity-hack attempt on that site, and that France believed there was a broader campaign of spreading disinformation in France from Russian parties.
A British-led defence alliance of several European countries will strengthen its sharing of tactical intelligence, the group, known as the Joint Expeditionary Force (JEF), said on Tuesday. “We know since the attack on [the] Nord Stream [pipeline] that our critical infrastructure is vulnerable and needs to be protected,” said Kajsa Ollongren, the Netherlands defence minister, after a JEF meeting.
That’s it from me, Tom Ambrose, and indeed the Ukraine live blog for today. Thanks for following along.
Updated
Two things stand out with Ukraine’s counteroffensive more than a week under way. Ukraine is pushing forward at several points, mostly along the southern front but also in the east. And in some places, its army is making incremental but real gains, liberating villages near the frontline.
In the last week, Ukraine has attacked on the western edge of the Zaporizhzhia sector, where the frontlines meet the Dnipro River at a point; again south of Orikhiv 18 miles east and, most significantly, either side of a Russian salient at the border between Zaporizhzhia and Donetsk oblasts.
It is in the last of these that the most gains have been recorded, with Ukraine’s brigades recording videos of flag-raisings in a series of villages: Velyka Novosilka, Neskuchne, Storozheve, Blahodatne and Makarivka. The last of these may still be contested, however, with Russian war bloggers reporting a successful counterattack.
That advance amounts to nearly four miles in a week, a far greater speed than Russian forces managed during their winter offensive, but it is only at one point. Nearby, about eight miles west, Ukraine says it has taken another village, Novodarivka, and Kyiv’s forces may be able to threaten Russian troops positioned in between.
Updated
