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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
World
Samantha Lock (now); Maya Yang, Léonie Chao-Fong, Martin Belam and Ben Doherty (earlier)

Putin denies Russian forces were responsible for Kremenchuk shopping centre strike – as it happened

NATO Russia United States Volodymyr Zelenksyy Ukraine Finland Sweden United Nations Kremenchuk Dmitry Polyanskiy

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 day’s events in our summary below.

  • Nato leaders have announced a new “strategic concept” in response to Russia’s war against Ukraine, describing Moscow as “the most significant and direct threat to allies’ security and stability”. Nato has invited Sweden and Finland to become members of the military alliance, according to a communique published by the Nato summit in Madrid. Leaders also pledged further help to Kyiv and agreed on a package of support aimed at modernising the country’s defence sector.
  • Russian president Vladimir Putin issued fresh warnings that Russia would respond in kind if Nato set up military infrastructure in Finland and Sweden after they joined the US-led alliance. If Sweden and Finland wanted to join Nato then they should “go ahead” Putin said. “But they must understand there was no threat before, while now, if military contingents and infrastructure are deployed there, we will have to respond in kind and create the same threats for the territories from which threats towards us are created.”
  • Putin also pushed back against allegations that Russian forces were responsible for a strike on a crowded shopping centre in the Ukrainian town of Kremenchuk on Monday in which 18 people were killed. “Our army does not attack any civilian infrastructure site. We have every capability of knowing what is situated where,” Putin said. Moscow said its military fired a “high-precision air attack at hangars where armament and munitions were stored” and the explosion of those weapon caches caused a fire in the nearby shopping centre– a claim discredited by first-hand accounts from survivors and expert analysis.
  • Ukraine announced the largest exchange of prisoners of war since Russia invaded, securing the release of 144 of its soldiers, including 95 who defended the Azovstal steelworks in Mariupol. Ukrainian military intelligence said that most of the Ukrainians released had serious injuries, including burns and amputations, and are now receiving medical care.
  • The frequency of shelling on the eastern Ukrainian city of Lysychansk is “enormous”, the regional governor of Luhansk said on Wednesday. Lysychansk “is constantly being shelled with large calibres. The fighting is continuing at the outskirts of the city. The Russian army is trying to attack constantly,” Serhiy Haidai said.
  • Joe Biden announced that the US will increase its military forces across Europe with more land, sea and air deployments. During a Nato summit in Madrid, Biden announced the stationing of a brigade of 3,000 combat troops in Romania, two squadrons of F-35 fighters in the UK and two navy destroyers in Spain. Nato members are expected to announce further commitments to a strengthening of forces on the alliance’s eastern flank.
  • Britain will also commit an extra 1,000 troops and one of its two new aircraft carriers to the defence of Nato’s eastern flank. The forces will be earmarked for the defence of Estonia, where Britain already has about 1,700 personnel deployed, but they will be based in the UK, ready to fly out to defend the Baltic country if deemed necessary.
  • Separately, Downing Street said it has pledged another £1bn ($1.2bn) in military aid, almost doubling the UK commitment to military support. Defence secretary, Ben Wallace, said some money would likely be spent on supplying longer-range rocket artillery. This will be a “first step” to allow Ukraine to move towards “mounting offensive operations” to regain territory,” Downing Street said.
  • Zelenskiy announced the end of diplomatic ties between Ukraine and Syria after the Russia-ally recognised the independence of eastern Ukraine’s two separatist republics, Donetsk and Luhansk. “There will no longer be relations between Ukraine and Syria,” Zelenskiy said, adding that the sanctions pressure against Syria “will be even greater.”
  • Ukraine and the European Union have signed an agreement that liberalises road transport. According to the agreement, Ukrainian carriers no longer need to obtain permits to enter the European Union.
  • Turkey says it will seek the extradition of 33 alleged Kurdish militants and coup plot suspects from Sweden and Finland under a deal to secure Ankara’s support for the Nordic countries’ Nato membership bids. Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan dropped weeks of resistance to Sweden and Finland joining Nato after crunch talks ahead of Wednesday’s Nato summit in Madrid.

Russia’s state natural gas producer Gazprom will increase gas supplies to the Baltic exclave of Kaliningrad, regional governor Anton Alikhanov said on Wednesday, amid increased tensions with neighbouring Lithuania.

Russian President Vladimir Putin in May told Gazprom it should consider boosting liquefied natural gas (LNG) supplies to Kaliningrad - a region sandwiched between Nato members Lithuania and Poland.

Alikhanov said the decision to increase supplies was made at a meeting with Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak.

The government said on its website the two officials discussed strengthening of the region’s energy security.

Lithuanian authorities imposed a ban this month on transit through their territory to Kaliningrad of goods subject to EU sanctions.

Kaliningrad is home to Russia’s Baltic naval fleet and a deployment location for Russian nuclear-capable Iskander missiles.

Billionaire British businessman, Sir Richard Branson, visited Kyiv on Wednesday to meet with Ukraine’s president Zelenskiy, foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba and a group of Ukrainian business leaders.

Zelenskiy thanked Branson for his visit and his “willingness to join the post-war reconstruction of our country”.

One of the most famous businessmen in the world, Richard Branson, also visited Ukraine. He is more than just an entrepreneur. He is a visionary, a man who works for progress and the best technology for all mankind.

His arrival in Ukraine right now - and he visited Hostomel, where he discussed, in particular, the possibility of rebuilding the airport and building our ‘Mriya’, the world’s largest aircraft - is a very strong signal to everyone in the world that Ukraine will definitely withstand this war.”

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy during his meeting with Sir Richard Branson in Kyiv, Ukraine.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy during his meeting with Sir Richard Branson in Kyiv, Ukraine. Photograph: Ukrainian Presidential Press Office/PA
Zelenskiy thanked Branson for his visit and his “willingness to join the post-war reconstruction of our country”.
Zelenskiy thanked Branson for his visit and his “willingness to join the post-war reconstruction of our country”. Photograph: Ukrainian Presidential Press Office/PA

Updated

Britain has pledged another £1bn ($1.2bn) in military aid to Ukraine, including air-defence systems and drones.

The package includes “sophisticated air-defence systems, uncrewed aerial vehicles, innovative new electronic warfare equipment and thousands of pieces of vital kit for Ukrainian soldiers,” it said, according to a Reuters report.

This will be a “first step” to allow Ukraine to go beyond its “valiant defence” efforts and move towards “mounting offensive operations” to regain territory.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Vladimir Putin’s attacks against Ukraine were “increasingly barbaric” as the Russian leader “fails to make the gains he had anticipated and hoped for and the futility of this war becomes clear to all.

“UK weapons, equipment and training are transforming Ukraine’s defences against this onslaught,” the statement quoted him as saying.

“And we will continue to stand squarely behind the Ukrainian people to ensure Putin fails in Ukraine.”

The fresh funds will bring Britain’s total military support to Kyiv since the start of the war to £2.3bn, Downing Street said in a statement.

Russia will respond in kind if Nato deploys troops in Finland and Sweden: Putin

Russia will respond in kind if Nato deploys troops and infrastructure in Finland and Sweden after they join the US-led military alliance, Vladimir Putin has said.

The Russian president told Russian state television after talks with regional leaders in the central Asian ex-Soviet state of Turkmenistan:

With Sweden and Finland, we don’t have the problems that we have with Ukraine. They want to join Nato, go ahead.

But they must understand there was no threat before, while now, if military contingents and infrastructure are deployed there, we will have to respond in kind and create the same threats for the territories from which threats towards us are created.”

Putin said it was inevitable that Moscow’s relations with Helsinki and Stockholm would sour over their Nato membership.

Everything was fine between us, but now there might be some tensions, there certainly will.

It’s inevitable if there is a threat to us.”

Summary

It’s 1am in Kyiv. Here’s where things stand:

  • Russian president Vladimir Putin pushed back against allegations that Russian forces were responsible for a strike on a crowded shopping center in the Ukrainian town of Kremenchuk on Monday in which 18 people were killed. “Our army does not attack any civilian infrastructure site. We have every capability of knowing what is situated where,” Putin said on Wednesday.
  • Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy announced on Wednesday the end of diplomatic ties between his country and Syria after the Russia-ally recognized the independence of eastern Ukraine’s two separatist republics, Donetsk and Lugansk. “There will no longer be relations between Ukraine and Syria,” Zelensky said, adding that the sanctions pressure against Syria “will be even greater.”
  • The mother of Alex Drueke, a U.S. military veteran who went missing after he traveled to help Ukraine in its fight against Russia has spoken with her son by telephone, the family said Wednesday. “He sounded tired and stressed, and he was clearly reciting some things he had been made to practice or read, but it was wonderful to hear his voice and know he’s alive and alright,” she said.
  • The frequency of shelling on the eastern Ukrainian city of Lysychansk is “enormous”, the regional governor of Lugansk said on Wednesday. Lysychansk “is constantly being shelled with large calibres. The fighting is continuing at the outskirts of the city. The Russian army is trying to attack constantly,” governor Serhiy Haidai said.
  • Canada announced that would increase its diplomatic presence in central and eastern Europe as well as the Caucasus on Wednesday in attempts to “help counter Russia’s destabilizing activities” the region. “Canada is announcing that we are increasing our diplomatic footprint. Canada will be opening four new embassies in Estonia, Lithuania, Slovakia and Armenia,” Canadian foreign minister Melanie Joly said on the sidelines of a NATO summit in Madrid.
  • Turkey said Wednesday it would seek the extradition of 33 alleged Kurdish militants and coup plot suspects from Sweden and Finland under a deal to secure Ankara’s support for the Nordic countries’ NATO membership bids. Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan dropped weeks of resistance to Sweden and Finland joining NATO after crunch talks ahead of Wednesday’s NATO summit in Madrid, focused on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
  • Ukraine and the European Union have signed an agreement that liberalizes road transport. According to the agreement, Ukrainian carriers no longer need to obtain permits to enter the European Union.

That’s it from me, Maya Yang, as I hand the blog over to my colleague in Australia, Samantha Lock, who will bring you the latest updates. I’ll be back tomorrow, thank you.

Russian president Vladimir Putin pushed back against allegations that Russian forces were responsible for a strike on a crowded shopping center in the Ukrainian town of Kremenchuk on Monday in which 18 people were killed.

“Our army does not attack any civilian infrastructure site. We have every capability of knowing what is situated where,” Putin told a news conference in the Turkmenistan capital of Ashgabat.

“Nobody among us shoots just like that, randomly. It is normally done based on intelligence data on targets” and with “high-precision weapons.”

“I am convinced that this time, everything was done in this exact manner,” Putin said.

Ukraine accuses Russia of hitting the centre on Monday in Kremenchuk, 330 kilometres (205 miles) southeast of Kyiv.

Russia has denied the accusation and claimed earlier that its missile salvo was aimed at an arms depot and the centre was not operating at the time it was hit.

Debris removal works continue at Amstor shopping mall targeted by a Russian missile strike in Kremenchuk, Ukraine, June 29th, 2022.
Debris removal works continue at Amstor shopping mall targeted by a Russian missile strike in Kremenchuk, Ukraine, June 29th, 2022. Photograph: Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

Ukraine cuts diplomatic ties with Syria after Damascus's

Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy announced on Wednesday the end of diplomatic ties between his country and Syria after the Russia-ally recognized the independence of eastern Ukraine’s two separatist republics.

The breakaway states of Donetsk and Lugansk are situated in the Donbas region at the centre of Russia’s invasion and have escaped Kyiv’s control since 2014. Moscow recognized their independence in February.

Earlier on Wednesday, Syria became the first state other than Russia to formally recognize the two separatist republics.

“There will no longer be relations between Ukraine and Syria,” Zelensky said in a video posted on Telegram, adding that the sanctions pressure against Syria “will be even greater”.

Zelensky described Syria’s move as a “worthless story”.

In 2018, Syria recognised South Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent from the former Soviet state of Georgia, prompting Tbilisi to cut diplomatic ties.

Abkhazia and South Ossetia are internationally recognised as part of Georgia, which gained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, but Russia and a handful of other countries recognise their independence.

Mother of missing US military veteran in Ukraine speaks to son on phone

The mother of a U.S. military veteran who went missing after he traveled to help Ukraine in its fight against Russia has spoken with her son by telephone, the family said Wednesday.

Associated Press reports:

Lois “Bunny” Drueke, of Tuscaloosa, answered a call from what appeared to be a Russian exchange and talked to son Alex Drueke on Tuesday for nearly 10 minutes in their first conversation since he and Andy Huynh, another Alabama veteran who traveled to Ukraine, were captured after a fight earlier this month in Ukraine.

Apparently at the prompting of his captors, Drueke said the people holding him were anxious to begin negotiations and that he had food, water and bedding, Bunny Drueke said in a statement released by her family.

“He sounded tired and stressed, and he was clearly reciting some things he had been made to practice or read, but it was wonderful to hear his voice and know he’s alive and alright,” she said.

Drueke said he hadn’t been in contact with Huynh for several days, according to the woman. The United States has said both men should be protected as prisoners of war under the Geneva Conventions.

Huyhn’s fiance, Joy Black, said his family was thrilled the Drueke was able to speak with his mother.

“We are still hoping to get a similar communication from Andy,” she said.

Druke and Huynh didn’t return to a meeting spot after their group came under heavy fire in the Kharkiv region of northeastern Ukraine near the Russian border on June 9. The two traveled separately to help Ukraine and became buddies there in part because of their shared Alabama background, relatives have said.

The U.S. State Department said it was looking into reports that Russian or Russian-backed separatist forces in Ukraine had captured at least two American citizens. If confirmed, they would be the first Americans fighting for Ukraine known to have been captured since the war began Feb. 24.

This undated photograph provided by Diane Williams shows U.S. military veteran Alexander Drueke of Tuscaloosa, Ala., and his mother, Lois “Bunny” Drueke.
This undated photograph provided by Diane Williams shows U.S. military veteran Alexander Drueke of Tuscaloosa, Ala., and his mother, Lois “Bunny” Drueke. Photograph: Lois "Bunny" Drueke/AP

Pictures have emerged of the latest and largest prisoner swap since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February.

The exchange involved 144 Ukrainian soldiers, including troops who were at Mariupol’s beseiged Azovstal steel plant, according to the Ukrainian defense ministry. It did not specify when and where the swap took place or how many Russian prisoners were released as part of the exchange.

The frequency of shelling on the eastern Ukrainian city of Lysychansk is “enormous”, the regional governor of Lugansk said on Wednesday.

Lysychansk “is constantly being shelled with large calibres. The fighting is continuing at the outskirts of the city. The Russian army is trying to attack constantly,” governor Serhiy Haidai said.

“Now there is a peak of fighting. The frequency of shelling is enormous,” he said, adding that out of the population of nearly 100,000 prior to the war, the city has only about 15,000 civilians remaining.

Their evacuation “might be dangerous at the moment,” he said.

The Russians “brought in big numbers of vehicles, enormous number of people. Shelling and attacks do not stop,” Gaiday said.

Mosow, which is currently setting its sights on Lysychansk, has already taken over the neighboring city of Siervierodonetsk after several weeks of fighting which killed dozens of civilians.

It is the last major city the Russians need to take over in the Lugansk region, one of two provinces in the large Donbas region that Moscow wants to control completely.

Canada announced that would increase its diplomatic presence in central and eastern Europe as well as the Caucasus on Wednesday in attempts to “help counter Russia’s destabilizing activities” the region.

“Canada is announcing that we are increasing our diplomatic footprint. Canada will be opening four new embassies in Estonia, Lithuania, Slovakia and Armenia,” Canadian foreign minister Melanie Joly said on the sidelines of a NATO summit in Madrid.

The announcement came as G7 and NATO leaders including Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau meet this week on how to support Ukraine in its fight against the Russian invasion.

“This diplomatic expansion will help guide Canada’s response to evolving security threats, enhance political and economic cooperation to support European allies, and further counter the impacts of the Russian invasion of Ukraine and support Armenia in its democratic development,” the ministry said in a statement.

The ministry said the changes would also “further enhance Canada’s engagement in the region, help counter Russia’s destabilizing activities and increase support for Operation REASSURANCE.”

That international military operation, under which 1,400 Canadian soldiers are deployed in Latvia, is currently Ottawa’s biggest. Its goal is to reinforce NATO’s collective defense.

“We believe that diplomacy remains one of the most effective ways to support security and stability,” Joly said in Madrid.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken (L) speaks with Canadian Foreign Minister Melanie Joly during a round table meeting at a NATO summit in Madrid, on June 29, 2022.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken (L) speaks with Canadian Foreign Minister Melanie Joly during a round table meeting at a NATO summit in Madrid, on June 29, 2022. Photograph: Susan Walsh/AFP/Getty Images

Turkey said Wednesday it would seek the extradition of 33 alleged Kurdish militants and coup plot suspects from Sweden and Finland under a deal to secure Ankara’s support for the Nordic countries’ NATO membership bids.

Agence France-Presse reports:

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan dropped weeks of resistance to Sweden and Finland joining NATO after crunch talks ahead of Wednesday’s NATO summit in Madrid, focused on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Erdogan emerged from Tuesday’s talks declaring victory, after securing a 10-point agreement under which the two countries vowed to join Turkey’s fight against banned Kurdish militants and to swiftly extradite suspects.

Turkey put the deal to the immediate test by announcing that it would seek the extradition of 12 suspects from Finland and 21 from Sweden.

“We ask them to fulfil their promises,” Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag said in a statement.

The unnamed suspects were identified as being members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and a group led by a US-based Muslim preacher that Erdogan blames for a failed 2016 coup attempt.

The European Union and Washington both recognise the PKK as a “terrorist” organisation because of the brutal tactics it employed during a decades-long insurgency against the Turkish state.

But the agreement also stipulates that Sweden and Finland vow to “not provide support” to the YPG - a PKK offshoot in Syria that played an instrumental role in the US-led alliance against the Islamic State group.

Sweden and Finland abandoned decades of military non-alignment in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and were formally invited into the alliance at Wednesday’s summit in Madrid.

Ukraine and the European Union have signed an agreement that liberalizes road transport, the Kyiv Independent reports.

According to the agreement, Ukrainian carriers no longer need to obtain permits to enter the European Union.

The agreement also “envisions the recognition of Ukrainian drivers’ licenses by the EU,” the outlet reports.

Summary

It’s 9pm in Kyiv. Here’s where we stand:

  • Nato leaders have announced a new “strategic concept” in response to Russia’s war against Ukraine, describing Moscow as “the most significant and direct threat to allies’ security and stability”. Nato has invited Sweden and Finland to become members of the military alliance, according to a communique published by the Nato summit in Madrid. Leaders also pledged further help to Kyiv and agreed on a package of support aimed at modernising the country’s defence sector.
  • Zelenskiy also accused the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, of becoming “a terrorist” leading a “terrorist state” and urged Russia’s expulsion from the United Nations. In a virtual address on Tuesday, Zelenskiy called for the UN to visit the site of Monday’s missile strike on a shopping mall in the city of Kremenchuk, which killed at least 18 people.

That’s it from me, Léonie Chao-Fong, today. My colleagues in the US will be here shortly with all the latest from Ukraine. Thank you.

Updated

The Ukrainian tennis player Lesia Tsurenko said she backs Wimbledon’s decision to ban Russian players from this year’s tournament after she was met with “silence” on the invasion of her home country by people she considered friends.

Tsurenko progressed to the third round of the women’s draw after recovering to beat her compatriot Anhelina Kalinina 3-6, 6-4, 6-3 in an emotional contest on Wednesday afternoon. Wearing a yellow and blue ribbon, in a break with the tournament’s longstanding all-white rules, the pair were cheered on by a crowd waving flags reading: “We stand with Ukraine.”

Speaking after the match, the 33-year-old said she agreed with the ban. “It’s just a step,” she said. “[But] it’s a good step to show that that’s what we all have to do. I am Ukrainian. There is no other opinion in my head.”

Lesia Tsurenko (right) shakes hands with Anhelina Kalinina after beating her fellow Ukrainian player in three sets.
Lesia Tsurenko (right) shakes hands with Anhelina Kalinina after beating her fellow Ukrainian player in three sets. Photograph: Adrian Dennis/AFP/Getty Images

Tsurenko said that in other circumstances she might have supported the inclusion of Russian and Belarusian players in the competition. “I would be the first one to say that, no, you should not ban them. But I have heard only from one Belarusian player and from one Russian player, who talked to me personally and told me: ‘I’m against the war.’

“I have heard one Belarusian and one Russian player. I did not hear anything from any other player,” Tsurenko said, as her voice began to be affected by her emotions. “So for me, the silence means … I mean, it’s not good when … I don’t know. I thought I had a lot of friends on tour, especially from Russians and Belarusians.”

Vladimir Putin has not changed his political goals since he ordered his troops into Ukraine and still “wants to take most of” the country, according to the top US intelligence official.

Avril Haines, the US head of national intelligence, said American intelligence agencies see three possible scenarios in the near term, the most likely being a grinding conflict in which Russian forces only make incremental gains, but no breakthrough towards Putin’s goal.

The other scenarios include a major Russian breakthrough and Ukraine succeeding in stabilising the frontlines while achieving small gains, she said.

The situation in Ukraine remains “pretty grim”, Haines said.

The US president, Joe Biden, has also thanked his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, for dropping his opposition to the entry of Finland and Sweden into Nato.

A senior American official, Celeste Wallander, said the US defense department “fully supports” Turkey’s modernisation plans which include upgrading its air force with new F-16 fighter planes and improvements to its existing older fleet.

On Tuesday, a senior US official said Turkey had not asked for any “particular concession” to dropping weeks of opposition to the Finland and Sweden applications to join the alliance.

“There’s nothing the United States offered in direct connection with this,” the official said after Turkey gave the green light.

Britain’s prime minister, Boris Johnson, praised his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, for his efforts in getting grain out of Ukraine, a Downing Street spokesperson said.

Johnson “welcomed the announcement that Turkey, Sweden and Finland have agreed a memorandum agreement, paving the way for Finland and Sweden’s accession to the alliance”, the spokesperson said in a statement.

Boris Johnson and Recep Tayyip Erdogan ahead of a meeting during the Nato summit in Madrid.
Boris Johnson and Recep Tayyip Erdogan ahead of a meeting during the Nato summit in Madrid. Photograph: WPA/Getty Images

The PM said Finland and Sweden’s accession to Nato “will make the alliance stronger as we look ahead to a more dangerous decade”, it continued.

The spokesperson said:

The Prime Minister praised President Erdogan’s leadership on the issue of getting grain out of Ukraine. The Prime Minister stressed that President (Vladimir) Putin’s ongoing blockade of Ukraine’s ports is creating an international humanitarian crisis, both in Ukraine and around the world.

Evidence contradicts Russian claims about Kremenchuk mall attack

First-hand accounts from survivors and expert analysis have discredited Moscow’s account of the deadly missile strikes on a shopping mall in the Ukrainian city of Kremenchuk.

Igor Konashenkov, a spokesperson for Russia’s defence ministry, said its military fired a “high-precision air attack at hangars where armament and munitions were stored”, and the explosion of those weapon caches caused a fire in the nearby shopping centre, which he said was “non-functioning” at the time.

However, witness statements, information released by Ukrainian prosecutors and analysis by independent military experts point to three possible erroneous statements in that account – that the Ukrainian military was hiding weapons nearby, that the mall was not a target, and that nobody was using it.

Rescue workers at the site of the missile strike on a shopping mall in Kremenchuk. Rescue services worked for more than 20 hours to recover bodies in the hope of finding survivors.
Rescue workers at the site of the missile strike on a shopping mall in Kremenchuk. Rescue services worked for more than 20 hours to recover bodies in the hope of finding survivors. Photograph: Alessio Mamo/The Guardian

CCTV footage shows the first missile struck the mall at 3.51pm on Monday, and a second shortly afterwards hit a factory that Moscow contends was storing western munitions.

Outside the mall, Ukrainian police set up a table to collect twisted bits of a missile found inside. It is believed to have been an X-22 Russian cruise missile fired from a Tu-22M long-range bomber.

Satellite images show the factory is 500 metres from the mall. According to independent military experts and researchers from Molfar, a global open-source intelligence community, the explosion there could not have provoked a fire strong enough to reach another building that far away.

During a visit to the area between the mall and the factory, little to no damage to buildings or roads was observed, suggesting no spreading fire.

Dozens of workers who survived the attack, as well as witness accounts of the incident from nearby residents, told the Guardian that the mall was open and busy when attacked. Debris included the remains of worker badges, and products sold that day at the supermarket.

Read Lorenzo Tondo’s full article: Evidence contradicts Russian claims about Kremenchuk mall attack

Updated

Russian troops are scattering mines “anywhere” in the city of Lysychansk in eastern Ukraine, the Luhansk governor, Serhiy Haidai, has said.

The mines were extremely dangerous and “any child or civilian who has gone out for humanitarian aid may step on them and die or lose a limb”, Haidai told CNN.

The bombardment of Lysychansk was now “constantly” happening night and day, he added. About 15,000 people remained in the city, and the majority had “refused to leave, despite us constantly urging them to leave”, Haidai said.

He said it was hard to give a damage report on the city due to the shelling on multiple fronts by Russian forces, but remained upbeat about the possibility of Ukrainian troops inflicting as many losses on the Russian troops as possible.

Haidai said:

It is possible that during the assault of Lysychansk, they will lose so much equipment and troops that they will no longer be able to fully conduct offensive operations, during which we will get more Western weapons which will defeat our enemy.

We will not only stop, we will start the de-occupation.

Updated

Britain will commit an extra 1,000 troops and one of its two new aircraft carriers to the defence of Nato’s eastern flank, the defence secretary has announced at the military alliance’s summit.

The forces will be earmarked for the defence of Estonia, where Britain already has about 1,700 personnel deployed, but they will be based in the UK, ready to fly out to defend the Baltic country if deemed necessary.

On Wednesday, Ben Wallace said “we are going to allocate a brigade” to Estonia, effectively an increase in the number of British troops available to about 3,000, but said it would be more efficient to base some of the forces at home and their equipment in Germany.

The commitment forms part of Nato’s revamped European defence force, which will comprise 300,000 troops across the continent placed at high readiness in case Russia were to threaten a military attack on any member of the alliance.

A substantial part of Britain’s commitment to the defence force announced at this week’s Madrid summit would be naval, Wallace added: “We will put in a huge amount of the Navy. I think we’ll dedicate one of the carrier groups to it.”

Read the full article here.

Indonesia’s president, Joko Widodo, has “offered to deliver a message” from his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, to Russia’s Vladimir Putin in an attempt to restart peace talks between Moscow and Kyiv.

President Widodo – also known as Jokowi – has been visiting Ukraine and is due to go to the Russian capital to meet Putin. Jokowi is the current chair of the G20 group of nations and one of six UN-appointed leaders of a Global Crisis Response Group formed in response to the food crisis posed by the war in Ukraine.

Indonesian president Joko Widodo and first lady Iriana in Irpin.
Indonesian president Joko Widodo and first lady Iriana in Irpin. Photograph: PRESIDENTIAL PALACE/AFP/Getty Images

After meeting Zelenskiy, Jokowi said:

Even though it’s very hard to achieve, I expressed the importance of a peace resolution. I offered to deliver a message from President Zelenskiy to President Putin, whom I’ll meet soon.

He said he was committed to tackling the rise in food and energy prices and shortages since Russia’s invasion, and underlined the need for safety guarantees for Ukrainian food deliveries, especially by sea.

Indonesia’s President Joko Widodo shakes hands with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Kyiv.
Indonesia’s President Joko Widodo shakes hands with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Kyiv. Photograph: Reuters

Updated

Ukraine’s defence ministry said 144 Ukrainian soldiers, including troops who were at Mariupol’s besieged Azovstal steel plant, have been freed in a prisoner swap with Russia.

The latest prisoner swap was the largest exchange since Russia invaded Ukraine, the main intelligence directorate of Ukraine’s defence ministry said on Telegram.

Of the 144 Ukrainian soldiers freed, 95 had been involved in defending the Azovstal steelworks, it said. It did not specify when and where the swap took place or how many Russian prisoners were released as part of the exchange.

Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has shared CCTV footage of the moment a shopping mall in Kremenchuk was hit by a Russian missile strike on Monday, saying it was a deliberate attack.

“It is clear that Russian killers received those exact coordinates for this missile [launch]. They wanted to kill as many people as possible in a peaceful city,” Zelenskiy said in a video address.

Today so far...

It’s 6pm in Kyiv. Here’s where we stand:

  • Nato leaders have announced a new “strategic concept” in response to Russia’s war against Ukraine, describing Moscow as “the most significant and direct threat to allies’ security and stability”. Nato has invited Sweden and Finland to become members of the military alliance, according to a communique published by the Nato summit in Madrid. Leaders also pledged further help to Kyiv and agreed on a package of support aimed at modernising the country’s defence sector.
  • Zelenskiy also accused the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, of becoming “a terrorist” leading a “terrorist state” and urged Russia’s expulsion from the United Nations. In a virtual address on Tuesday, Zelenskiy called for the UN to visit the site of Monday’s missile strike on a shopping mall in the city of Kremenchuk, which killed at least 18 people.

Hello everyone, it’s Léonie Chao-Fong with you today with all the latest developments from the war in Ukraine. Feel free to drop me a message if you have anything to flag, you can reach me on Twitter or via email.

Ukraine’s foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba praised Nato for its “clear-eyed stance” on Russia and for inviting Finland and Sweden to join the military alliance.

Kuleba tweeted that Nato leaders had taken “difficult, but essential decisions” at the summit in Madrid today, adding:

An equally strong and active position on Ukraine will help to protect the Euro-Atlantic security and stability.

Chief of the Ukrainian presidential staff, Andriy Yermak, also welcomed the message Nato had sent to Russia.

Updated

A man examines pictures over the debris after shelling at a residential area in Mykolaiv, southern Ukraine.
A man examines pictures over the debris after shelling at a residential area in Mykolaiv, southern Ukraine. Photograph: George Ivanchenko/EPA
A man stands by a window inside his damaged apartment after shelling at a residential area in Mykolaiv.
A man stands by a window inside his damaged apartment after shelling at a residential area in Mykolaiv. Photograph: George Ivanchenko/EPA

Syria officially recognises self-proclaimed republics of Luhansk and Donetsk

Syria has said it officially recognised the independence and sovereignty of the Russian controlled territories of Luhansk and Donetsk in eastern Ukraine.

Reuters reports that the Syrian presidency had affirmed its intention to build relations with the two self-proclaimed republics in February, and that today the move was confirmed by state news agency SANA, citing a foreign ministry source.

The self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic and Luhansk People’s Republic were formed in April 2014. Until now, the only UN member state to recognise their legitimacy had been Russia. South Ossetia, itself a breakaway region recognised by most international states as part of Georgia, has also previously offered them recognition.

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Point 41 of the new 2022 Nato strategic concept document directly addresses the possibility of Ukraine joining the alliance in the future. The document reads:

The security of countries aspiring to become members of the Alliance is intertwined with our own. We strongly support their independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity. We will strengthen political dialogue and cooperation with those who aim to join the Alliance, help strengthen their resilience against malign interference, build their capabilities, and enhance our practical support to advance their EuroAtlantic aspirations. We will continue to develop our partnerships with Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia and Ukraine to advance our common interest in Euro-Atlantic peace, stability and security. We reaffirm the decision we took at the 2008 Bucharest Summit and all subsequent decisions with respect to Georgia and Ukraine.

Nato has published its new strategic concept in full on its website. The introduction lays out how starkly Nato portrays the threat of Russia, saying:

The Russian Federation’s war of aggression against Ukraine has shattered peace and gravely altered our security environment. Its brutal and unlawful invasion, repeated violations of international humanitarian law and heinous attacks and atrocities have caused unspeakable suffering and destruction. A strong, independent Ukraine is vital for the stability of the Euro-Atlantic area. Moscow’s behaviour reflects a pattern of Russian aggressive actions against its neighbours and the wider transatlantic community.

The introduction concludes:

Our vision is clear: we want to live in a world where sovereignty, territorial integrity, human rights and international law are respected and where each country can choose its own path, free from aggression, coercion or subversion. We work with all who share these goals. We stand together, as Allies, to defend our freedom and contribute to a more peaceful world.

Download: Nato 2022 strategic concept PDF

The Jens Stoltenberg Nato press conference in Madrid has finished, but while that has been happening, also speaking has been Maria Zakharova, press secretary of Russia’s foreign ministry. She has said that Russia does not rule out seizing western assets within its borders.

Reuters quotes her saying Russia was prepared to “act accordingly” if the west decided to use Russia’s frozen state assets – chief among them being around $300bn of central bank foreign currency reserves.

Zakharova, dismissed as a “comedy turn” by the UK defence secretary, Ben Wallace, earlier today, said the use of such funds “will be interpreted by us as an unlawful and defiantly unfriendly attack, giving us the right to take retaliatory actions to protect our interests”.

“We should not forget about the foreign assets of western countries, businesses and citizens who are located on the territory of our country,” she said.

If the west failed to adhere to the principles of democracy, an open economy, private property and judicial independence, then “we will recognise this and act accordingly”, Zakharova added.

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A Ukrainian journalist at the Nato press conference asked Jens Stoltenberg what the reaction was like from the leaders in the room when Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy addressed the meeting. Stoltenberg said “the message from the leaders in the meeting room was a very strong special support.”

He went on to say:

Not only a special support, but actually they announced additional systems, weapons, equipment, that our Nato allies are now delivering to Ukraine. It is a message in words and deeds.

I think also it is very clear that allies are prepared for a long war. Wars are unpredictable, but we have to be prepared for the long haul. And that was the clear message to all of us in the room for President Zelenskiy.

And our answer was, yes, we are prepared because they are fighting for their independence, but they’re also fighting for values which are important for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of every nation.

And therefore, this matters for our security.

Our focus now is to support Ukraine. This war will, as most other wars do at some stage, end at the negotiating table.

But it is important that Ukraine is able to get an agreement on their terms, which is acceptable for Ukraine. And therefore we know that there is a very close link between what they can achieve around the negotiating table, and their strength on the battlefield.

And therefore our focus now is to support them on the battlefield with many different types of lethal or non-lethal support. That is the focus.

The journalist had also asked what chance Stoltenberg thought there might be after the war for a quick accession to Nato for Ukraine, in a similar manner to the one offered to Finland and Sweden. The secretary general said “Nato’s door remains open” and cited the alliance’s declaration in Bucharest in 2014 that Ukraine was welcome to apply.

Nato’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, is taking questions from the media at the press conference now. The first question was whether Nato would be placing permanent bases in Sweden and Finland once their membership of the alliance was ratified. He said:

First of all, the decision to invite Finland and Sweden to become members demonstrate that Nato’s door is open. It demonstrates that President Putin did not succeed in closing Nato’s door. Nato’s door remains open.

And it also demonstrates that we respect the sovereign right of every nation to choose its own path. So we of course, respect that Finland and Sweden when they decided to stay out of Nato for many, many years, but then we also welcome them and respect the decision to join Nato.

Stoltenberg then emphasised that the plan would be to pre-position more equipment further forward closers to Nato’s borders. He said:

We know that actually to move, people can go quite fast. But to move heavy equipment, battle tanks, ammunition, fuel, all kinds of supplies, that takes time. So if we have that pre-positioned in place, then you can move in very quickly with the personnel.

He said that “what we will make sure with our presence is that we are able to defend all allies, including of course, Finland, and Sweden”.

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Nato’s new strategic concept, Jens Stoltenberg has explained in Madrid, also looks at the environmental impact of the defence alliance. He said: “We cannot choose between having green militaries or strong militaries. They must be both. So we must maintain our operational effectiveness and readiness as we continue to adapt.”

He described the climate crisis as “the defining challenge of our time” and said that “Nato is committed to playing our part in mitigating the impact on our security.”.

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Jens Stoltenberg has addressed the invitation of Finland and Sweden into the alliance at the Nato press conference in Madrid. He told the media:

Today, Nato leaders took a historic decision to invite them to become members of Nato. The agreement concluded last night by Turkey, Finland and Sweden paved the way for this decision.

I would like to thank Turkey, Finland and Sweden for accepting my invitation is to engage in negotiations to find a united way forward.

This has been hard work over many weeks, with multiple contacts at many different levels. Senior officials have about two rounds of talks in Brussels, under my auspices, and last night we were able to reach the final agreements.

This is a good agreement for Turkey. It is a good agreement for Finland and Sweden. And it is a good agreement for Nato.

At the Nato press conference in Madrid Jens Stoltenberg has said “we face a radical change to our security environments”, and that the new strategic concept that has been agreed by leaders today identifies Russia as a direct threat to Nato.

On financing he said nine allies now reach or exceed the 2% target of GDP spending, 19 allies have clear plans to reach it by 2024 and an additional five have concrete commitments to meet it thereafter.

Jens Stoltenberg says that in the future Nato will have to spend more to do more, and so the target of spending 2% of GDP on defence will be seen more as a floor rather than a ceiling on funding.

Nato: Russia 'the most direct threat to security and stability'

Nato leaders have announced a new “strategic concept” in response to Russia’s war against Ukraine which has “gravely altered our security environment”, describing Moscow as “the most significant and direct threat to allies’ security and stability”.

Nato has invited Sweden and Finland to become members of the military alliance, according to a communique published by the Nato summit in Madrid.

The statement reads:

The accession of Finland and Sweden will make them (the allies) safer, Nato stronger and the Euro-Atlantic area more secure.

The alliance pledged further help to Kyiv and agreed on a package of support aimed at modernising the country’s defence sector. Nato also said it had decided to significantly strengthen its own deterrence and defence.

The statement continues:

Allies have committed to deploy additional robust in-place combat-ready forces on our eastern flank, to be scaled up from the existing battlegroups to brigade-size units, where and when required underpinned by credible available reinforcements, prepositioned equipment, and enhanced command and control.

Updated

Jens Stoltenberg has begun his Nato press conference in Madrid. The secretary general has announced in his opening remarks:

  • Nato will enhance its battlegroups in the eastern part of the alliance up to the grade levels.
  • It will transform the Nato Response Force and increase the number of high readiness forces to well over 300,000.
  • It will also boost its ability including more pre-positioned equipments and stockpiles of military supplies, more forward deployed capabilities like air defence, strengthen command and control, and upgraded defence plans with forces pre-assigned to defend specific allies.

Updated

The US will ramp up its forces and equipment across Europe in response to threats from Russia, including creating a new permanent army headquarters in Poland, President Joe Biden said.

Biden underscored Nato’s commitment to “defend every inch” of its territory while speaking to reporters at the start of a meeting with Nato’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, at the summit in Madrid.

Biden said:

We mean it when we say an attack against one is an attack against all.

The US will increase the number of US destroyers based in Spain and send two additional F-35 squadrons to Britain, he said.

Biden also outlined plans to continue to boost the number of US forces, air defences and other weapons in Poland, Romania, the Baltic states and other bases across Europe.

The UK was still importing about £140m of Russian oil in April, two months after Moscow’s troops invaded Ukraine, according to data from the Office for National Statistics.

The ONS said the amount represented a significant drop from about £410m in oil imports in February, when Russia had been the UK’s biggest supplier.

Two months later, Russia was the UK’s sixth-biggest supplier after supplies increased from the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Belgium.

The UK has said it will stop importing petrol and diesel from Russia by the end of this year.

Updated

Britain’s prime minister, Boris Johnson, said he would most likely attend this year’s G20 summit in Bali even if Russian president Vladimir Putin decides to go, saying to boycott it would simply “leave the whole argument” to Russia and its allies.

Johnson told reporters he would be “absolutely amazed” if Putin went in person to the leaders’ summit in November on the Indonesian island, noting the Russian president’s lack of recent overseas travel – although Putin has just visited Tajikistan and is due to go to Turkmenistan.

Russia remains a member of the G20, despite being expelled from what was the G8, and the Kremlin has said Putin plans to attend the Bali summit in person.

This would, Johnson said, create “a very difficult question”. He said:

Yes, he’s been formally invited. I don’t think he will go. The question is: do we as the western countries vacate our seats at the G20 and leave the whole argument to China, to Russia?

Much of the conversation at the G7 has been about, are we doing enough to win over the swing voters? What can we do with the middle of the congregation, the people who look at Ukraine and have mixed feelings? We need to be doing more to win them over. We need to be making our case.

I think if you vacate something like the G20 you risk just handing the propaganda opportunity to others.

Updated

Zelenskiy: Russia waging war 'to dictate future world order'

Volodymyr Zelenskiy has told Nato leaders in Madrid that Kyiv needs more weapons and money to defend itself against Russia’s invasion.

The Ukrainian president warned Moscow’s ambitions did not stop at his country during a virtual address to the Nato summit.

Zelenskiy said:

This is not a war being waged by Russia against only Ukraine. This is a war for the right to dictate conditions in Europe – for what the future world order will be like.

Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy during a Nato summit in Madrid.
Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy during a Nato summit in Madrid. Photograph: Yves Herman/Reuters

It was “absolutely necessary” for Nato countries to support Ukraine “with weapons, finances and political sanctions against Russia”, he said.

The monthly cost of defending Ukraine against Russia’s invasion was about $5bn, Zelenskiy said. Ukraine needed modern missile and air defence systems to “break Russia’s tactics to destroy cities and terrorise civilians”, he added.

He said Russia did not want to stop at taking areas of southern Ukraine or the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine.

Zelenskiy told Nato leaders:

It wants to absorb city after city in Europe, which the Russian leadership considers its property and not independent states. This is Russia’s real goal. The question is – who is next for Russia? Moldova? The Baltic states? Poland? The answer is all of them.

Updated

Pope Francis has condemned the bombing of a crowded shopping centre in Kremenchuk, describing it as the latest in a string of “barbarous attacks” against Ukraine.

Addressing crowds in St Peter’s Square in Vatican City, Francis said:

Every day, I carry in my heart dear and martyred Ukraine, which continues to be flagellated by barbarous attacks like the one that hit the shopping centre in Kremenchuk.

I pray that this mad war can soon end and I renew my appeal to persevere without tiring in praying for peace.

Great Britain plans to stop supplying gas to mainland Europe if the country is hit by extreme shortages in the coming months, it has emerged.

National Grid could cut off gas pipelines to the Netherlands and Belgium under emergency measures as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine puts pressure on global energy supplies.

Shutting off the pipelines – known as interconnectors – would be part of a four-step plan that would include cutting supplies to big industrial users and asking consumers to reduce their household consumption, the Financial Times reported.

Ministers have been scrambling to shore up Great Britain’s energy supplies amid a squeeze exacerbated by Russia’s invasion on Ukraine. Russia has also ramped up pressure on other European nations by cutting their gas supplies in response to a rush to fill up European storage caverns before the winter.

The two undersea interconnectors that link Great Britain with Belgium and the Netherlands have been transporting their maximum capacity – exporting 75m cubic metres a day of gas to the European mainland – since March.

Britain has healthy quantities of gas supplies, including liquified natural gas imports, but low storage capacity.

The Investec analyst Nathan Piper said: “The interconnectors play an important role in European energy security, allowing LNG volumes landed in the UK to be transported into European storage in the summer that provide a buffer for volumes to be sent back to the UK where storage is limited, through the winter months.”

European gas companies have warned that shutting off the pipelines could backfire on the UK.

Nato leaders pose for family photo during summit in Madrid.
Nato leaders pose for a group photograph during the summit in Madrid. Photograph: WPA/Getty Images
US president Joe Biden with British prime minister Boris Johnson and Turkish tresident Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
US president Joe Biden with British prime minister Boris Johnson and Turkish tresident Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Photograph: JuanJo Martin/EPA

Updated

The UK has announced new sanctions against 13 individuals and entities, including a cousin of Vladimir Putin as well as the oligarch Vladimir Potanin, described by the British government as Russia’s second-richest man.

Potanin, known as Russia’s “Nickel King”, has continued “to amass wealth as he supports Putin’s regime, acquiring Rosbank, and shares in Tinkoff Bank in the period since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine”, a UK government press notice accompanying the announcement said.

He was included in the latest wave of sanctions listings because he was “obtaining a benefit from or supporting the government of Russia by owning or controlling Rosbank”, it said.

Also among those newly sanctioned are Vladimir Putin’s cousin, Anna Tsivileva, who is president of the JSC Kolmar Group coalmining company. Tsivileva’s husband, Sergey Tsivilev, is governor of the coal-rich Kemerovo region and the couple are said to have “significantly benefited” from their relationship with the Russian leader.

A UK government spokesperson:

As long as Putin continues his abhorrent assault on Ukraine, we will use sanctions to weaken the Russian war machine.

Today’s sanctions show that nothing and no one is off the table, including Putin’s inner circle.

Updated

A Ukrainian MP in Madrid to lobby world leaders at the Nato summit has warned that further efforts are needed to unblock grain supplies to avoid rising food prices and unrest worldwide.

Oleksiy Goncharenko, an MP in the Odesa region, told reporters that Vladimir Putin was “acting just like a terrorist – he has taken hundreds of millions of people as hostages by starving them” through the Russian blockade of Ukrainian grain exports.

Goncharenko said Ukraine needed more weaponry to help remove the blockade, noting that direct Nato intervention seemed unlikely due to the “risk of direct clashes”.

He reiterated Ukrainian calls for more land weaponry, notably rocket launchers, saying the country needed “multiples of 10” more than what had so far been sent by other countries.

“If we had thousands, we would finish everything in days. But I understand that even the Nato countries themselves probably don’t have thousands,” he said.

Updated

A last-minute agreement has been reached between Turkey, Finland and Sweden to allow the two Nordic countries to become Nato members on the eve of the military alliance’s summit in Madrid.

Updated

Today so far …

  • Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy accused Russian leader Vladimir Putin Tuesday of becoming “a terrorist” leading a “terrorist state” and urged Russia’s expulsion from the United Nations. In a virtual address to the UN security council, Zelenskiy urged the UN to establish an international tribunal to investigate “the actions of Russian occupiers on Ukrainian soil” and to hold the country accountable.
  • The Ukraine president also called for the United Nations to visit the site of a missile strike on a shopping mall in the city of Kremenchuk. “I suggest the United Nations send either a special representative, or the secretary general of the United Nations … so the UN could independently find out information and see that this indeed was a Russian missile strike,” he said of Monday’s attack, which killed at least 18 people.
  • The Russian army claimed on Tuesday it had hit a nearby weapons depot with the explosion sparking the blaze at the shopping centre, which according to Moscow was “not operational” at the time.
  • At least three people were killed and five wounded by a Russian missile strike on a residential building in Ukraine’s southern city of Mykolaiv on Wednesday, according to local authorities who have launched a rescue effort for survivors. Mayor Oleksandr Senkevych said eight missiles had hit the city, and urged residents to evacuate. He said the building appeared to have been hit by a Russian X-55 cruise missile.
  • Russia has claimed to have destroyed a training base for foreign mercenaries near Mykolaiv in its latest military operational briefing.
  • Fighting continues in all settlements of the Lysychansk community, according to Serhai Haidai, Ukraine’s governor of Luhansk. “The shelling continues constantly, the destruction is catastrophic” he said.
  • Russia’s “special military operation” in Ukraine will continue until Ukraine stops shelling Donbas and until no threat comes from its territory, Russian first deputy permanent representative to the United Nations, Dmitry Polyansky, has said. He criticised the supply of arms to Ukraine, saying: “By supplying your weapons, you only prolong the agony of the criminal Kyiv regime that is ready to sacrifice its own population.”
  • Finland and Sweden will be invited to join Nato at its Madrid summit after Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Tuesday lifted his opposition following crunch talks with the leaders of the two Nordic countries. US president Joe Biden congratulated Turkey, Finland and Sweden on reaching an agreement.
  • Nato secretary general Jens Stoltenberg has said he expected a swift ratification of Sweden and Finland’s membership of the military alliance. He told reporters: “After invitation, we need a ratification process in 30 parliaments. That always takes some time but I expect also that to go rather quickly because allies are ready to try to make that ratification process happen as quickly as possible.”
  • Stoltenberg also said the alliance’s new strategic concept will “state clearly that Russia poses a direct threat to our security”. Zelenskiy will address the Nato summit in Madrid virtually today.
  • Nato allies will continue to supply Ukraine with weapons in its war against Russia for as long as necessary, German chancellor Olaf Scholz said in Madrid.
  • British prime minister Boris Johnson will urge his Nato allies to boost their defence spending in response to Russia’s invasion “to restore deterrence and ensure defence in the decade ahead”, his office said.
  • Kirill Stremousov, deputy head of the Russian-backed administration in occupied Kherson, has said a date for a referendum for the region to join the Russian Federation had not yet been chosen, but that he expected the vote in “the coming half-year”.
  • Russia-installed officials in Ukraine’s Kherson region said their security forces had detained Kherson city mayor Ihor Kolykhayev on Tuesday after he refused to follow Moscow’s orders, while a Kherson local official said the mayor was abducted.
  • In an interview with the NBC network in the US, Zelenskiy has compared scenes he saw at Bucha to a war movie, saying: “It was just so quiet, everything was destroyed, dead people, destroyed army equipment. There was this sense of death. When they found people in the bottom of wells, hands bound, raped, and murdered – they’d done everything to them. I just didn’t know that this could be done by people who, 30 years previously, we had lived together in the Soviet Union, in one country. I just never had thought that humanity could be capable of this, and this changes how you look at people.”
  • Indonesia’s president, Joko Widodo, has arrived in Kyiv this morning, where he will meet Zelenskiy. The Indonesian president is the current chair of the G20 group, and his European trip is also expected to include a visit to Moscow and meet Russian president Vladimir Putin.
  • UK defence secretary Ben Wallace has echoed Boris Johnson’s words about Putin and “toxic masculinity”, saying in an interview that the Russian president has got “small man syndrome … in spades”. Wallace also described Maria Zakharova’s regular appearances as press secretary for Russia’s foreign ministry as a “comedy turn”.

Updated

“Old Freud during his lifetime would have dreamed of such an object for research!” is the response of Russia’s presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov to UK prime minister Boris Johnson’s claim that Vladimir Putin would not have invaded Ukraine if he were a woman and his statement that the war is a “perfect example of toxic masculinity”.

Peskov’s words came in response to the RIA Novosti news agency asking him about Johnson’s comments.

Updated

Occupied Kherson region referendum on joining Russian Federation expected in 'the coming half-year'

Kirill Stremousov, deputy head of the Russian-backed administration in occupied Kherson, has told Reuters that a date for a referendum for the region to join the Russian Federation had not yet been chosen, but that he expected the vote in “the coming half-year”.

Updated

Russia has claimed to have destroyed a training base for foreign mercenaries near Mykolaiv in its latest military operational briefing.

The update also claims that Russia has virtually destroyed Ukraine’s 108th battalion, destroyed four command posts in a day including two in Kharkiv, shot down a MiG-29 aircraft, two Su-25 aircraft, an Mi-8 helicopter and nine Ukrainian drones.

The briefing claims that “the food situation is critical” for several units of Ukraine’s armed forces, suggesting that “numerous cases of abandonment of positions and desertion of military personnel are recorded due to hunger”.

None of the claims have been independently verified.

Updated

Indonesia’s president, Joko Widodo, has arrived in Kyiv this morning, where he will meet Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

The Indonesian president is the current chair of the G20 group and one of six world leaders the United Nations appointed as “champions” of a global crisis response group, formed to address the threat of an hunger and destitution posed by the war in Ukraine.

Reuters notes that before the war, Ukraine had been one of Indonesia’s biggest wheat suppliers.

Handout picture from Indonesia’s Presidential Palace shows Indonesian President Joko Widodo (front R) walking with aides and escorting military personnel upon his arrival in Kyiv.
Handout picture from Indonesia’s presidential palace shows Indonesian president Joko Widodo (front right) walking with aides and escorting military personnel upon his arrival in Kyiv. Photograph: Presidential palace/AFP/Getty Images

Often known as ‘Jokowi’, the Indonesian president and his wife arrived in Ukraine by train, and his European visit will next call on Moscow where he is expected to meet Russian president Vladimir Putin.

Updated

US president Joe Biden has announced new US deployments in Europe, saying: “At a moment Putin has shattered peace in Europe … US and allies are stepping up, proving Nato is more needed than ever, and more important than ever.”

Updated

As part of Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s interview with US television network NBC overnight, the Ukrainian president explained that he had turned down offers to fly him out of Kyiv when Russia invaded. He said:

At that moment, the first day of the war, a lot of leaders called me on my phone, they told me that you have to go, you have to ride, you have to run and a lot of them, it was also from the heart, very directly and very openly, because they wanted just to help and they said we can give you all you want, all you need, airplanes, helicopters, cars or something more.

And I said no, I don’t really need any cars. We need weapons and we’ll stay here.

And also, a lot of phone calls were about my family. If you decided to be in the country that is your decision, but what about your children, wife? Maybe we can help you with this situation. That was what came. Thank you, thanks leaders for the propositions.

Describing the first moments when he found out that Russia had launched its attack, Zelenskiy told viewers:

I only thought about us, about our nation. I only thought of Ukraine. I immediately went to my office, I was ready, I was prepared, for want of a better word. I didn’t waste time on reflecting.

We gathered immediately, gathered our military committee and we were ready to fight back. There’s no point wasting any more time on this moment.

The main thing is to make a decision, not delve into what will happen tomorrow or the day after. You need to think of what’s happening now.

Updated

Liz Truss, the UK’s foreign secretary, has told the Nato summit that invading Taiwan would be “a catastrophic miscalculation” by China, arguing that the UK and other countries should reconsider their trading relationships with countries that used their economic power in “coercive” ways.

“I do think that with China extending its influence through economic coercion and building a capable military, there is a real risk that they draw the wrong idea that results in a catastrophic miscalculation such as invading Taiwan,” Truss told a panel meeting alongside Anthony Albanese, the Australian prime minister, and Alexander De Croo, the Belgian prime minister.

With China expanding its strategic ambitions, Truss, said, Nato needed to expand its strategic concept, its core mission last updated in 2010 and due to be revamped at this summit in Madrid, to specifically reference China. Spain’s prime minister Pedro Sánchez has already indicated that the new strategic concept will specifically name Russia as a threat, following its latest invasion of Ukraine.

The G7 countries and nations like Australia should use their “economic weight” to challenge China, Truss said – adding that countries such as the UK could even rethink their approach to trade with Beijing.

“I think historically we haven’t used that economic power,” she said. “We’ve been equidistant, if you like, about who we trade with, who we work with. And I think countries are becoming much more focused now on, is this trade with trust, do we trust this partner? Are they going to use it to undermine us, or are they going to use it for the mutual benefit of both of our economies? So trade has got a lot more geopolitical.”

Updated

The Italian prime minister, Mario Draghi, provoked the ire of the Kremlin after saying the Russian president Vladimir Putin is excluded from attending the G20 summit in Indonesia in November.

Speaking during a press conference at the end of a G7 leaders’ summit in Bavaria on Tuesday, Draghi said Putin might be able to instead participate remotely.

“As for president Putin’s presence at the G20, the Indonesian president excluded him, he was categorical, he won’t come,” Draghi told reporters. “A remote participation could happen, we’ll see.”

Kremlin aide Yury Ushakov told the Russian news agency, Tass, that Russian was working on the assumption that the invitation had already been received and accepted and that it was not up to Draghi to determine Putin’s presence.

“He probably forgot that he is no longer chairman,” added Ushakov.

Italy held the presidency of the G20 in 2021. Indonesia’s president Joko Widodo is due to arrive in Moscow for talks with Putin on Thursday, Tass reported. The G20 summit is taking place in Bali on 15-16 November.

Updated

The self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic has issued its military update for the day on social media. It claims to have 239 settlements under its control, and claims that Ukrainian forces have shelled 10 settlements within the area it occupies. The claims have not been independently verified. Russia is the only UN member that recognises the Donetsk People’s Republic as a legitimate authority.

Updated

Scholz: Nato will continue to supply Ukraine with weapons 'for as long as it is necessary'

Nato allies will continue to supply Ukraine with weapons in its war against Russia for as long as necessary, German chancellor Olaf Scholz said in Madrid.

“It is good that the countries that are gathered here but many others, too, make their contributions so Ukraine can defend itself – by providing financial means, humanitarian aid but also by providing the weapons that Ukraine urgently needs,” Reuters report Scholz told the media as he arrived for the second day of a Nato summit.

“The message is: We will continue to do so – and to do this intensively – for as long as it is necessary to enable Ukraine to defend itself,” he added.

Updated

Nato's Stoltenberg: 'We’ll state clearly that Russia poses a direct threat to our security'

Those words of Spanish prime minister Pedro Sánchez have been echoed by Nato secretary general Jens Stoltenberg. Having said that the alliance will move to ratify the membership of Sweden and Finland as quickly as possible [see 7.44am], Agence France-Presse is carrying further quotes from Stoltenberg.

He told reporters in Madrid: “We’ll state clearly that Russia poses a direct threat to our security.”

Stoltenberg said the meeting in Madrid was set to be “historic and transformative” for the seven-decade-old alliance, and also singled out China, saying:

China is not an adversary. But of course, we need to take into account the consequences to our security when we see China investing heavily in new modern military capabilities, long-range missiles or nuclear weapons and also trying to control critical infrastructure, for instance, 5G.

Updated

A quick snap from Reuters here that Spanish prime minister Pedro Sánchez, the host of this week’s Nato summit, has told Cadena Ser radio that Russia will be identified as Nato’s “main threat” in its new strategic concept, as opposed to “a strategic partner” as previously designated.

Updated

In the UK, Labour’s Lisa Nandy has criticised the UK government for running down the size of Britain’s armed forces, and for having too much of a focus on China. She told viewers of Sky News:

Just a year ago they published their integrated review of foreign and defence policy that was meant to set the country’s strategic security priorities for the next 10 years. And in there was very little reference to Russia, even though we were already seeing Russian aggression on the increase and a growing threat in our own backyard.

We said to the government at the time it is a mistake to reduce the size of the army. They’ve cut 10,000 troops out of our armed forces. They’ve reduced our army to its smallest size in 300 years. And in the focus on China, they forgot about the problems in our own neighbourhood.

Updated

The UK defence secretary Ben Wallace has appeared on LBC radio in the UK, where he has said that Russian president Vladimir Putin has “small man syndrome”. He is quoted as saying:

I certainly think Putin’s view of himself and the world is a small man syndrome, macho view. You rarely hear the phrase small woman syndrome. You always hear small man syndrome and he’s got it in spades.

He also referred to Maria Zakharova’s regular appearances as a “comedy turn”. Zakharova is press secretary of Russia’s foreign ministry.

Updated

Maksym Kozytskyi, governor of Lviv, has posted his daily update. He said that there were no air raids in his region overnight, and that 102 internally displaced people arrived in Lviv in the last 24 hours on two evacuation trains.

Updated

One person who has not been impressed with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s diplomatic efforts is the Russian first deputy permanent representative to the United Nations, Dmitry Polyansky. This morning, Russia’s foreign ministry has chosen to highlight some of Polyansky’s words at the UN, posting to their social media channels:

The security council should not turn into a platform where President Zelenskiy, though remotely, can angle for more Nato weapons. This erodes the authority of the council as a body responsible for collective decision-making in the interests of maintenance of international peace and security. The Ukrainian side, supported by our western colleagues, seeks to undermine this authority and use UNSC members as audience at its performances.

He also claimed that social media, far from exposing the actions of pro-Russian forces in Ukraine, instead was exposing the truth about Ukrainians, stating:

Ukrainians and their western sponsors realised quickly that in a digital era, the developments on the ground do not matter. But at some point everything went off the rails. On social media, there appeared more evidence and more reasons to blame Ukrainian soldiers and neo-Nazis for committing atrocities and war crimes.

Updated

In an interview with the NBC network in the US, Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy has compared the scenes he saw at Bucha on the outskirts of Kyiv to a war movie, and said that witnessing the aftermath of the atrocities that Ukraine alleges took place there has changed the way he views people. He said:

With what you saw in Bucha, there was a terrifying feeling and understanding that it looked like something from a movie, a violent war movie about the effects of war. But in that moment, you realise that this is no movie, it’s not from a book, it’s not a biopic, it’s nothing like that. It has nothing in common, it’s reality. And reality is more terrifying than the film I told you about.

There is less blood than in a Tarantino movie, and less shooting than with Spielberg. It was just so quiet, everything was destroyed, dead people, destroyed army equipment. There was this sense of death.

And you understand that reality is scarier than any movie and the thing that changed me or surprised me was before I didn’t think that people were capable of this, that people are capable of such atrocities.

When they found people in the bottom of wells, hands bound, raped, and murdered – they’d done everything to them. I just didn’t know that this could be done by people who, 30 years previously, we had lived together in the Soviet Union, in one country. I just never had thought that humanity could be capable of this, and this changes how you look at people.

Moscow has repeatedly denied that its forces target civilians, and has termed reports of war crimes committed by Russian soldiers occupying Ukraine “provocations”.

Updated

Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy has posted to his Telegram channel a clip form an interview with US television network NBC. He accompanies the clip with these words:

The war will end with the victory of Ukraine. No matter how difficult it is, we must oust the occupiers from our land.

Zelenskiy’s social media channel states that during the interview, part of the Festival of Ideas of the Aspen Institute, he spoke about the struggle for independence, the importance of supporting the civilised world, the current situation on the battlefield and his decision-making process. Opening the interview, Zelenskiy said:

For me, it was always very important for Ukraine not to become a ‘buffer zone’. The Ukrainian people chose the European way, the relevant values. These values correspond in Europe, the United States, and Ukraine. And we want to be a part of these values.

Yet, once upon a time there was the Soviet Union, we were part of this state. We were a part of this Soviet Union. Our parents were born there and I was born there, in those times.

However, today, we want to be independent.

Even before the Soviet Union, Ukrainians wanted to have their own land, their own traditions, and I believe this is normal if one respects Ukraine’s choice of sovereignty. At last, we have independence, and you see how hard we are fighting for it and how we are fighting for these values.

Updated

Nato's Stoltenberg: 'allies ready to make ratification process as quick as possible' for Sweden and Finland

Nato secretary general Jens Stoltenberg has said he expected a swift ratification of Sweden and Finland’s membership of the military alliance.

“We will make a decision at the summit to invite Sweden and Finland to become members, that’s unprecedented quick,” he told reporters on the second day of the Nato summit in Madrid. Both countries applied for membership of the alliance in mid-May.

Reuters reports he said: “After invitation, we need a ratification process in 30 parliaments. That always takes some time but I expect also that to go rather quickly because allies are ready to try to make that ratification process happen as quickly as possible.”

Updated

The UK’s defence secretary Ben Wallace has been interviewed from Madrid about Nato defence spending, and the UK’s commitment to defence spending. He said that Russia’s actions in Ukraine had changed the mid-term focus. He told viewers of Sky News:

As defence secretary my most important target is remaining above 2%, if not greater, of GDP, which is the main Nato benchmark. And you know, I think that’s really important that we continue to commit to that, if not greater.

The question is really the next spending period, the middle of the decade. And we were prepared to take certain vulnerabilities on board in the middle of the decade, as we got rid of some equipment and re-equipped new. I think the invasion of Russia into Ukraine has changed that. And that’s why I think the discussion is so important for the sort of middle-of-the-decade funding.

Fighting continues in all settlements of the Lysychansk community, according to Serhai Haidai, Ukraine’s governor of Luhansk. His daily briefing on Telegram states that while Ukrainian forces are out-numbered they continue to put up a defence, saying:

Fighting continues in all settlements of the Lysychansk community. Orcs [slang for pro-Russian forces] try to break through our defences, but they fail, then take the most favourite route – total destruction. The shelling continues constantly, the destruction is catastrophic.

Only in Lysychansk did the Russians throw two battalion-tactical groups of heavy equipment. Orcs have a quantitative advantage in both personnel and equipment, but in the skill of fighting – our defenders will win.

The Lysychansk-Bakhmut highway is not surrounded.

The claims have not been independently verified.

Updated

Roman Starovoyt, governor of Kursk in Russia, has posted pictures this morning of what he claims is a drone shot down over Russia overnight. He posted to Telegram:

I am publishing photos of the drone we shot down last night. The Ukrainian “Swift” Tu-141, produced back in Soviet times, entered our airspace. The investigative committee is working at the site of the discovery of the wreckage.

Russian strike hits residential building in Mykolaiv

More on the attack on Mykolaiv, from Reuters:

At least three people were killed and five wounded by a Russian missile strike on a residential building in Ukraine’s southern city of Mykolaiv on Wednesday, said local authorities who have launched a rescue effort for survivors.

Mayor Oleksandr Senkevych said eight missiles had hit the city, and urged residents to evacuate. He said the building appeared to have been hit by a Russian X-55 cruise missile.

Photographs from the scene showed smoke billowing from a four-storey building with its upper floor partly destroyed.

Updated

Russia’s state-owned news agency Tass is reporting on the comments of Russia’s representative to the UN security council:

Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine will continue until Ukraine stops shelling Donbas and until no threat comes from its territory, Russian first deputy permanent representative to the United Nations Dmitry Polyansky has said.

“We started a special military operation in order to put an end to bombardments of Donbas by Ukraine, and also to make sure that this country (that western states helped to turn into an anti-Russia) and its nationalist leadership stop posing a threat to both Russia and people living in Ukraine’s southern and south-eastern areas. The special operation will continue until these goals are achieved,” he told the UN security council session on Tuesday.

Russia’s deputy UN ambassador Dmitry Polyansky
Russia’s deputy UN ambassador Dmitry Polyansky Photograph: AP

“By supplying your weapons, you only prolong the agony of the criminal Kiev regime that is ready to sacrifice its own population. The sooner you realize this, the sooner Ukrainian leadership comes to a negotiations table with a realistic position rather than pompous slogans and phantom pains,” the Russian diplomat added.

Updated

More on the attack in Mykolaiv, in Ukraine’s south, near the Black Sea:

Reuters is also reporting that further east, in Lysychansk in the Luhansk region, a key battleground in Russia’s assault on the industrial heartland of Donbas, the governor reported increased military action.

The situation in Lysychansk resembles that in its twin city Sievierodonetsk more than a month ago when the Russians started taking building after building, Luhansk governor Serhiy Gaidai said on Wednesday. Sievierodonetsk fell to Russia on Saturday.

“The situation in Lysychansk is very difficult,” Gaidai said earlier on television.

“The Russians are using every weapon available to them … and without distinguishing whether targets are military or not – schools, kindergartens, cultural institutions,” he said.

“Everything is being destroyed. This is a scorched-earth policy.”

Updated

The Ukraine war will take centre stage at a Nato summit in Madrid on Wednesday, while Finland and Sweden will be formally invited to join the alliance after Turkey dropped its opposition.

Four months after Russia invaded Ukraine, upending the European security landscape, more than 40 leaders will gather for what the Nato secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, called a “pivotal summit” for the alliance’s future.

The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has been invited to participate and will speak twice via videolink, as Kyiv pushes for accelerated weapons deliveries from its allies.

Nato countries, which have already committed billions of dollars in military assistance to Kyiv, will agree to a “comprehensive assistance package to Ukraine, to help them uphold the right for self-defence” said Stoltenberg.

“It is extremely important that we are ready to continue to provide support because Ukraine now faces brutality which we haven’t seen in Europe since the second world war.”

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, second left, and Nato Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg
Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan, second left, and Nato secretary general Jens Stoltenberg. Photograph: Bernat Armangué/AP

At the end of a G7 summit in Germany, French president Emmanuel Macron urged Nato allies to show they were united.

“The message that should come out of Madrid is a message of unity and strength for member countries, as well as for those that wish to join and whose applications we are supporting,” he said.

British prime minister Boris Johnson will urge his Nato allies to boost their defence spending in response to Russia’s invasion “to restore deterrence and ensure defence in the decade ahead”, his office said.

Beyond Ukraine, the summit will see a revamp of Nato’s strategic concept – which outlines its main security tasks, but has not been revised since 2010 – to mention challenges posed by China for the first time.

Finland and Sweden will be invited to join the alliance at the summit after Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Tuesday lifted his opposition following crunch talks with the leaders of the two Nordic countries in Madrid.

Erdoğan had stubbornly refused to back the applications from the Nordic pair – lodged in response to Russia’s war on Ukraine – despite pressure for a change of course from his Nato allies.

But Erdoğan’s office said it had agreed to support them as Ankara had “got what it wanted”.

Ankara had accused Finland, and especially Sweden, of offering a safe haven to Kurdish militants who have been waging decades-long insurgency against the Turkish state.

US president Joe Biden congratulated Turkey, Finland and Sweden on reaching an agreement.

“As we begin this historic Nato summit in Madrid, our alliance is stronger, more united and more resolute than ever,” he said in a statement.

But it will still take months for Finland and Sweden to officially join Nato, as their entry into the alliance needs to be ratified by the parliaments of the 30 member states.

Updated

The horror that unfolded when a Russian missile struck a shopping mall in the Ukrainian city of Kremenchuk was shown around the world. But if you were watching Russian television that day, you would probably have seen nothing about it.

The Russian media blackout on the attack, which left at least 18 people dead according to the Ukrainian government, is part of a playbook on how similar attacks have been handled as the Kremlin tries to present itself as a liberating force that does not harm civilians.

And with images of charred bodies emerging in the foreign press, Russian officials began to declare the strike a “Bucha-like provocation”, disregarding evidence of war crimes amid growing international isolation.

Television, the most closely controlled sector of the Russian media, did not mention the strike in the main evening news broadcasts on Monday. Only when it was confirmed by the Russian defence ministry, which claimed without evidence that there had been ammunition stored in the shopping centre, did most Russian media begin coverage.

Reuters is reporting two people have been killed, and three wounded, by a Russian strike on a residential building in Mykolayiv in southern Ukraine on Wednesday, citing the region’s governor Vitaly Kim.

Kim did not clarify whether it was a bomb or a missile strike, artillery or mortar shelling.

We will bring you more details as they emerge.

Updated

Boris Johnson has claimed that Vladimir Putin would not have invaded Ukraine if he was a woman and believes that the war is a “perfect example of toxic masculinity”.

In an interview with German media following the G7 summit in Schloss Elmau, the prime minister cited the Russian president’s gender as a contributory factor to the conflict.

Johnson told broadcaster ZDF: “If Putin was a woman, which he obviously isn’t, if he were, I really don’t think he would have embarked on a crazy, macho war of invasion and violence in the way that he has.

“If you want a perfect example of toxic masculinity, it’s what he is doing in Ukraine.”

I’m writing these words from Australia.

This, below, is... well... comprehensive: many of Australia’s finest and most useful exports are included, including New Zealand-born actor Russell Crowe.

Dan Sabbagh has filed from Madrid on the Nato summit:

A last minute agreement has been reached between Turkey, Finland and Sweden to allow the two Nordic countries to become Nato members on the eve of the military alliance’s summit in Madrid.

But at the United Nations Security Council, China has had this to say about Nato’s history... saying Russia’s aggression in Ukraine has its origins in Nato’s eastward expansion.

Shocking CCTV footage has emerged of people spending a summer’s day at a peaceful park suddenly running for their lives after a Russian cruise missile strike on a nearby mall sent debris flying into the air.

The CCTV images were taken from a park opposite the shopping centre in Kremenchuk that was hit on Monday, in an attack claiming at least 18 lives and leading to a prolonged search in the rubble for survivors and bodies.

Updated

Summary

Hello, welcome to today’s ongoing coverage of Russia’s war on Ukraine. It’s just gone 7am in the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, and here’s a summary of the latest developments:

  • Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy accused Russian leader Vladimir Putin Tuesday of becoming “a terrorist” leading a “terrorist state” and urged Russia’s expulsion from the United Nations. In a virtual address to the UN security council, Zelenskiy urged the UN to establish an international tribunal to investigate “the actions of Russian occupiers on Ukrainian soil” and to hold the country accountable.
  • Zelenskiy said urgent action was needed “to make Russia stop the killing spree,” warning that otherwise Russia’s “terrorist activity” will spread to other countries, singling out the Baltic states and Poland.
  • The Ukraine president also called for the United Nations to visit the site of a missile strike on a shopping mall in the city of Kremenchuk. “I suggest the United Nations send either a special representative, or the secretary-general of the United Nations … so the UN could independently find out information and see that this indeed was a Russian missile strike,” he said of Monday’s attack which killed at least 18 people.
  • Rescuers continued to work through the devastation left behind by the strike in Kremenchuk, with dozens of people still missing.
  • The Russian army claimed Tuesday it had hit a nearby weapons depot with the explosion sparking the blaze at the shopping centre, which according to Moscow was “not operational” at the time.
  • All 15 Security Council members, including Russia, stood for a moment of silence after Zelenskiy asked them to “commemorate all the Ukrainians who have been killed in this war.”
  • Russia’s deputy UN ambassador Dmitry Polyanskiy told the council that Zelenskiy’s appearance via video had undermined the authority of the body. “The UN security council should not be turned into a platform for a remote PR (public relations) campaign for president Zelenskiy in order to get more weapons from participants of the Nato Summit,” Polyanskiy said.
  • During the Nato summit, Turkey, Finland and Sweden signed a trilateral memorandum, paving the way forward for the two Nordic countries to join the alliance. Jens Stoltenberg, Nato’s secretary general, said on Tuesday evening: “I am pleased to announce that we now have an agreement that paves the way for Finland and Sweden to join Nato.”
  • The agreement involves Finland and Sweden lifting their arms embargo, amending their laws on terrorism, supporting Turkey in its conflict with the Kurdistan Workers’ party (YKK) and stop supporting the party’s Syrian affiliate People’s Protection Forces (YPG)
  • World leaders welcomed the trilateral agreement. US president Joe Biden described the deal as “a crucial step towards a Nato invite to Finland and Sweden, which will strengthen our alliance and bolster our collective security.” Boris Johnson tweeted: “Fantastic news as we kick off the Nato Summit. Sweden and Finland’s membership will make our brilliant alliance stronger and safer.”
  • Ukrainian forces will try to hold the line against Russia in the east from the vantage point of the city of Lysychansk, buying time for the arrival of western weapons and the region’s defenders to prepare fortifications, Luhansk province’s governor said.
  • Russia again shelled Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest city, hitting apartment buildings and a primary school, the regional governor said. The shelling killed five people and wounded 22 including children.
  • Russia-installed officials in Ukraine’s Kherson region said their security forces had detained Kherson city mayor Ihor Kolykhayev on Tuesday after he refused to follow Moscow’s orders, while a Kherson local official said the mayor was abducted, Reuters reported. “I can confirm that Kolykhayev was detained by the commandant’s (military police) office,” Ekaterina Gubareva, the Moscow-appointed deputy head of the Kherson region, said on the Telegram messaging app. The reports could not be immediately independently verified and there was no official confirmation from Ukrainian authorities.
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