Closing summary
It’s 9pm in Kyiv. Here’s where things stand:
Fighting around the key eastern Ukraine town of Bakhmut has descended into a bloody morass with hundreds of dead and injured reported daily. As Russia moved fresh formations to the area in recent weeks, neither Russian or Ukrainian forces were able to make a significant breakthrough after months of fighting
Russian forces continue to shell residential infrastructure and housing in the recently liberated city of Kherson, according to Ukraine’s military. In its latest update, the US thinktank the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) said Russian troops were digging trenches and fortifying their positions in preparation for a possible Ukrainian counteroffensive in eastern Kherson.
Russians are sporadically shelling cities with no apparent strategic aim other than to cause casualties. The Guardian visited a residential district in Dnipro, where a series of houses were destroyed by a fragmentation warhead, designed to inflict maximum casualties, which had landed on Saturday.
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has claimed Russia will soon launch a series of new missile strikes on his country, warning his defence forces and citizens to prepare for the attack. He gave the ominous caution in his Sunday evening address.
Nato’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, has warned that Russia will probably continue to attack Ukraine’s power grid, gas infrastructure and basic services. He said Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, was trying to use “the winter as a weapon of war against Ukraine”.
Ukraine’s prosecutor general’s office has said 329 children are currently considered missing in Ukraine, while 12,034 have been deported to Russia. According to the Ukrainian government’s children of war portal, 440 children have been killed as a result of Russia’s war and 851 children are now reported as injured.
Russia has “unilaterally postponed” talks with the US aimed at resuming nuclear weapons inspections in Cairo this week, a US state department spokesperson confirmed. Talks between US and Russian officials were scheduled to begin tomorrow. The Russian foreign ministry confirmed in a statement that talks would no longer take place this week.
The Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant remains under Russian control, the Russia-installed administration of the occupied city of Enerhodar has said. The announcement comes after the head of Ukraine’s state-run nuclear energy firm suggested that there were signs that Russian forces might be preparing to leave the occupied plant. The Kremlin has denied the reports.
Foreign ministers of Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway and Sweden visited Kyiv today to show support for Ukraine. Gabrielius Landsbergis, the Lithuanian foreign minister, vowed that Ukraine would win despite Russia’s “barbaric brutality”.
Olena Zelenska, the wife of Ukraine’s prime minister, has visited Downing Street during her visit to London to discuss the prevention of sexual violence in conflicts. Zelenska met with Britain’s foreign secretary, James Cleverly, and prime minister Rishi Sunak’s wife, Akshata Murty.
Russia’s foreign ministry said it has summoned the Norwegian ambassador after a number of Russian citizens were arrested over the use of drones.
Nearly a dozen Russians have been arrested in Norway in recent weeks or violating the flight ban or the ban on photographing sites deemed sensitive.
The arrests, which Russia has described as “politically motivated” and Norway said were legal, comes as Oslo has heightened security following suspected sabotage on the Nord Stream gas pipelines under the Baltic Sea.
In a statement, the Russian foreign ministry said:
It was noted that the sentences against the Russians were politically motivated and had nothing to do with the principles of fair and impartial justice.
A spokesperson for Norway’s foreign ministry, Lars Gjemble, said after the summoning:
Our ambassador took the opportunity to inform [Russia] of Norwegian legislation on sanctions.
He added:
He also reviewed the cases that are currently being processed in Norwegian courts. The meeting was held in a good tone
Updated
