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 days’ events in our summary below.
- Ukraine’s army said it had launched airstrikes on Zmiinyi Island, also known as Snake Island, causing “significant losses” to Russian forces. The military’s southern operational command said it had used “aimed strikes with the use of various forces” on the island. The military operation “continues”, it added.
- The military situation for Ukraine’s defenders in the eastern Donbas is “extremely difficult”, officials say. Some 568 civilians are thought to be holed up in Sievierodonetsk’s Azot chemical plant, as Russian attacks intensified in an effort to capture Sievierodonetsk and Lysychansk. Serhiy Haidai, governor of the Luhansk region, said Lysychansk was getting shelled “en masse”.
- Russian forces have captured several settlements near the embattled eastern cities of Lysychansk and Sievierodonetsk. The head of the Sievierodonetsk district military administration, Roman Vlasenko, said the frontline village of Toshkivka had not been under Ukrainian control since Monday. Russian forces also reportedly captured Pidlisne and Mala Dolyna, located southwest of Sievierodonetsk, and saw success near the Hirske settlement in Luhansk.
- At least 15 civilians were killed in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region by Russian shelling on Tuesday, according to regional governor Oleh Synegubov.
- Mass mobilisation is “about to happen” in Russia with the Kremlin recruiting people in poorer regions to fight in Ukraine, according to western officials. Officials also said there was “more chatter” about Vladimir Putin’s health and “more speculation” about who would replace him in Russia. However, there does not appear to be an “immediate threat” to the Russian president’s position from the elite or the general population, they said.
- A fire that broke out after Ukrainian forces allegedly attacked oil rigs in the Black Sea off the coast of Crimea is approaching an oil well, according to a pro-Russian official. Three people were wounded and seven people are still reportedly missing. The Russian-backed leader of annexed Crimea, Sergei Aksyonov, blamed Kyiv for the attack.
- Russia has demanded that Lithuania immediately lift a ban on the transit of goods on an EU sanctions list across its territory to the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad. The secretary of the security council of the Russian Federation, Nikolai Patrushev, said the consequences of the ban “will have a serious negative impact on the population of Lithuania”.
- The US attorney general, Merrick Garland, visited Ukraine on Tuesday to discuss efforts to prosecute individuals involved in war crimes during Russia’s invasion, a justice department official said. Garland met with Ukraine’s prosecutor general, Iryna Venediktova, and announced a War Crimes Accountability team that will work to identify and prosecute anyone who committed war crimes in Ukraine. “There is no hiding place for war criminals,” Garland said.
- The Kremlin has said that two captured US volunteers are not covered by the Geneva conventions and could face the death penalty. Russian media claimed that two of three US volunteers missing in Ukraine have been captured and are being held by pro-Russian separatist forces. The Kremlin has denied it knows the location of the two men.
- German self-propelled howitzers have arrived in Ukraine in the first delivery of heavy weapons promised by Berlin. “We have replenishment!” Ukraine’s defence minister Oleksii Reznikov announced. “The German Panzerhaubitze 2000 with trained Ukrainian crews joined the Ukrainian artillery family.”
- Turkey should be cautious about delivering more weapons to Ukraine, the head of Turkey’s weapons production agency said. Remarks by Ismail Demir to the Wall Street Journal show how Ankara is increasingly playing both sides of Russia’s war in Ukraine in contrast to other Nato allies, just months after Turkish-made drones played a critical role in Kyiv’s defence against Russia’s invasion.
- Turkey’s military delegation will travel to Russia this week to discuss a possible safe sea corridor in the Black Sea to export Ukrainian grain, according to Turkish presidency sources. A four-way meeting between Turkey, Ukraine, Russia and the United Nations will be held in Istanbul in the coming weeks, possibly with the participation of Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and the UN’s secretary general, António Guterres, the sources said.
- European countries are united in their support for granting Ukraine the status of European Union member candidate, Luxembourg’s foreign affairs minister said. Jean Asselborn told reporters: “We are working towards the point where we tell Putin that Ukraine belongs to Europe, that we will also defend the values that Ukraine defends.”
- The UK government is “determined” to impose further sanctions on Russia and will continue to do so until Moscow fully withdraws from Ukraine, Britain’s foreign secretary, Liz Truss, said. She told parliament that she would be travelling to Turkey on Wednesday to discuss options to help get grain out of Odesa. Prime minister Boris Johnson also warned of “growing fatigue” around the war and said any concessions to Russian president Vladimir Putin would be a “disaster”.
- Estonia summoned the Russian ambassador on Tuesday to protest an “extremely serious” violation of its airspace by a Russian helicopter. The Estonian foreign ministry said the helicopter had flown over a point in the south-east without permission on June 18.
- Russia has blocked the website of the Telegraph for its reporting on the invasion of Ukraine. The newspaper said it had been accused of “disseminating false information about a special military operation by the Russian armed forces in Ukraine”.
British prime minister Boris Johnson warned of “growing fatigue” around the war and said any concessions to Russian president Vladimir Putin would be a “disaster”.
Johnson promised the UK would be “steadfast” in supporting Ukrainians and vowed to ensure “fresh political, military and financial support from the international community” to the war-torn country, his official spokesman said on Tuesday.
The Prime Minister’s concern is that it may not be at the forefront of everyone’s minds, because of ... some of those wider global challenges we’re facing, not least on inflation around the world,” according to the official.
Johnson told Cabinet that “we must not allow anyone to believe that making concessions to Putin would lead to anything but disaster”, as this could be “perceived to be a reward for their unwarranted aggression” and “would embolden not just Russia but their allies and have an impact on UK security and on our economy,” the spokesperson said.
At the Cabinet meeting, Johnson also said Britain would work to “drain the grain from Ukraine” as “the bombardment of cities and infrastructure and the blockade of ports is crippling Ukraine’s ability to export its produce”.
