Tag: Russia

As the Russia-Ukraine war enters its 196th day, we take a look at the main developments.

Here is the situation as it stands on Wednesday, September 7.

Energy

• United Nations chief Antonio Guterres has urged Russia and Ukraine to agree to a demilitarised perimeter around the Russian-held Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant.

• Russia’s Gazprom says it has signed an agreement to start switching payments for gas supplies to China to yuan and roubles instead of dollars.

• Myanmar has started buying Russian oil products and is ready to pay for deliveries in roubles; the RIA news agency cited military ruler Senior General Min Aung Hlaing as saying.

Fighting

• The Russian-installed commandant of a southern Ukrainian city was seriously wounded in a blast, an official said, the latest in a series of apparent assassination attempts in occupied areas.

• Ukrainian forces attacked the Russian-held eastern town of Balakliia in the Kharkiv region, according to a senior pro-Moscow separatist official, as Ukrainian officials were coy about how a counteroffensive was faring.

• Speaking to Ukrainian television, the governor of the Luhansk region said, without giving locations, that a “counterattack is under way and … our forces are enjoying some success. Let’s leave it at that.”

Diplomacy and politics

• Russia could be about to buy “literally millions” of artillery shells and rockets from old Cold War ally North Korea, the White House has said.

• Russia questioned a UN-brokered deal with Ukraine to boost grain and fertiliser exports by both countries, accusing Western states of failing to honour pledges to help facilitate Russia’s shipments.

• The United Kindgom’s new prime minister, Liz Truss, spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in her first call with a foreign leader and accepted an invitation for her to visit Ukraine.

• Russia has not taken any steps to change an UN-brokered deal to facilitate grain exports, Ukraine’s agriculture minister said after Russian President Putin suggested routes should be changed.

Economy/Markets

• The head of Russia’s VTB Bank has said the banking sector had largely overcome the most serious effects of Western sanctions and that systemic capitalisation of Russian banks was likely not needed.

• The United States Treasury is seeking to design a simple compliance regime for enforcing a price cap on Russian oil exports and hopes that China and India join the coalition or at least take advantage of it, Deputy Secretary Wally Adeyemo said.

As the Russia-Ukraine war enters its 192nd day, we take a look at the main developments.

Here is the situation as it stands on Friday, September 3.

Get the latest updates here.

Energy

• Russia scrapped the planned restart of Nord Stream 1, deepening Europe’s difficulties in securing winter fuel, after saying it had found faults in the pipeline during maintenance.
• G7 finance ministers agreed to impose a price cap on Russian oil aimed at slashing revenues for Moscow’s war in Ukraine while keeping crude flowing to avoid price spikes, but their statement left out key details.
• Ukraine has sharply increased fuel imports in recent months to overcome shortages which hit the country after the Russian invasion, the economy ministry said.

Nuclear plant

• Ukraine and Russia traded accusations over each others’ actions around the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant as a team of inspectors from the United Nations nuclear watchdog tried to check the safety of the facility.
• Ukraine’s state nuclear company, Energoatom, said it would be “difficult” for the International Atomic Energy Agency to make an impartial assessment of the situation at the Zaporizhzhia plant due to Russian interference.
• The fifth reactor at Zaporizhzhia was reconnected to Ukraine’s grid on Friday, a day after it shut down due to shelling near the site, Energoatom said.
• Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu said Ukraine’s shelling of the Zaporizhzhia plant was raising the risk of a nuclear catastrophe in Europe.
• Ukraine’s military said it had carried out strikes against Russian positions in Enerhodar, a town near the Zaporizhzhia plant. The announcement was unusual since the military rarely gives details of specific targets.

Here are the key events from Thursday, August 25.

Fighting

• A Russian missile attack killed 22 civilians and set a passenger train on fire in eastern Ukraine on the country’s Independence Day, according to officials in Kyiv.
• Two employees of Ukraine’s Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant have been detained for passing information to Ukrainian authorities, Russia’s National Guard said.
• There have been 473 verified attacks on healthcare facilities in Ukraine since Russia invaded six months ago, which have killed nearly 100 people, according to the World Health Organization.
• Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said the slowing pace of Moscow’s military campaign was deliberate and aimed at reducing civilian casualties. Ukraine has repeatedly accused Russian forces of war crimes and targeting civilians, charges Moscow rejects.

Diplomacy

• UN chief Antonio Guterres called for an end to the war in Ukraine as the country marked the 31st anniversary of independence from the Soviet Union and six months since Russian forces invaded.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy pledged in an Independence Day address that his country would fight Russia’s invasion “until the end” and would not make “any concession or compromise”.
• Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko congratulated Ukraine on its Independence Day, saying “today’s contradictions” should not destroy long-term neighbourly ties. Belarus is one of the strongest allies of Russia.
• Pope Francis and the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, who backs the war in Ukraine, will not meet when they attend a gathering of religious leaders in Kazakhstan next month, the RIA news agency has cited a senior Orthodox official as saying.

Economy

• The United States has announced nearly $3bn in new military aid to Ukraine, with President Joe Biden saying the assistance aims to help the country defend against Russia’s invasion “over the long term”.
• British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has promised a 54 million pound ($63.5m) military package which will include 200 drones and loitering munitions to support Ukraine after meeting with Zelenskyy in Kyiv.
• Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi has said the European Union countries should agree on a cap on the price of gas imported from Russia to help ease the burden of rising prices on businesses and households.
• The United Kingdom imported no fuel from Russia in June for the first time since records began 25 years ago, as sanctions on Moscow in response to its invasion of Ukraine helped drive a 97 percent fall in imports of Russian goods, official data has shown.

Here are the key events from Monday, August 22.

Fighting

• In the eastern Bakhmut region, Russian forces inflicted damage from artillery and multiple rocket launcher systems in the areas of Soledar, Zaytseve and Bilogorivka settlements, Ukraine’s General Staff said in its daily update.

• Russia said its Kalibr missiles destroyed an ammunition depot containing missiles for the US-made High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) in Ukraine’s southeastern Odesa region, while Kyiv said a granary had been hit.

• Dnipropetrovsk governor wrote on Telegram that Nikopol, which lies across the Dnieper River from the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, was shelled on five different occasions. He said 25 artillery shells hit the city, causing a large fire at an industrial premises and cutting power to 3,000 inhabitants.

• The southern Ukrainian city of Mykolaiv was hit with multiple S-300 missiles, the regional governor said on Telegram.

Car bomb death

• The daughter of an ultranationalist Russian ideologue who advocates Russia absorbing Ukraine was killed in a suspected car bomb attack outside Moscow on Saturday evening, Russian state investigators said.

Diplomacy, economy

• President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said if Russia went ahead with plans to try captured Ukrainian defenders in Mariupol, then it would have violated international rules and cut itself off from negotiations.

• Germany has a good chance of getting through the coming winter without taking drastic measures but faces a difficult time and must prepare for Russia to tighten gas supplies further, Economy Minister Robert Habeck said.

• The leaders of the United Kingdom, the United States, France and Germany stressed during a joint call the importance of ensuring the safety of nuclear sites in Ukraine, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s office said.

• Albania said it was investigating why two Russians and a Ukrainian had tried to enter a military factory.

As the Russia-Ukraine war enters its 179th day, we take a look at the main developments.

Here are the key events from Sunday, August 21.

Fighting

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has warned Russia could “try do something particularly ugly” ahead of Wednesday’s celebration marking 31 years of independence from Soviet rule.
• A Russian missile attack in Voznesensk, a town about 30km (20 miles) from the Pivdennoukrainsk nuclear plant in Mykolaiv province, wounded 14 people, including 12 children, and has raised ongoing concerns of a nuclear disaster caused by the fighting.
• Russian forces have continued assaults on strategic towns and cities in eastern and southern Ukraine, but have not made major gains as of Saturday, according to the Washington, DC-based Institute for the Study of War.
• A drone struck a building in a “failed” attack near the headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet in Russian-annexed Crimea, according to Moscow-appointed governor Mikhail Razvozhayev. Ukraine has not claimed responsibility for the incident, which follows a string of explosions at key strategic sites on the peninsula.
• Russian forces have reached the outskirts of Bakhmut in the eastern Donbas region, but have not been able to pass Ukrainian defences there, according to the United Kingdom defence ministry.
• Russia’s defence ministry has accused Ukraine of poisoning its soldiers in the Russian-controlled part of the southeastern region of Zaporizhia in late July. An adviser to Ukraine’s interior ministry said Russian forces may have eaten expired canned meat.

Sport

• Ukrainian boxer Oleksandr Usyk has defeated the United Kingdom’s Anthony Joshua in a split-point decision to retain his WBA, WBO, IBF and IBO belts in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. He dedicated the victory to Ukraine.

Economy

• The Russian-controlled part of the Zaporizhia region is exporting up to 7,000 tonnes of grain a day, the Russian-installed authorities have said, although they did not say where the grain was bound. Ukraine has accused Russia of stealing grain from seized territories.
• Wally Adeyemo, the deputy United States treasury secretary, has warned that Russian entities and individuals were attempting to use Turkey to bypass Western sanctions, during a call with Turkey’s Deputy Finance Minister Yunus Elitas.

Diplomacy

• Two Russians and a Ukrainian caught trying to enter a military plant in central Albania are suspected of espionage, Albanian authorities said. One of the Russians was trying to take photos, the defence ministry said.
• The United Nations is working with the US and European Union to overcome obstacles to Russian food and fertilisers reaching world markets, said UN chief Antonio Guterres. While western sanctions do not apply to food and fertiliser, they have had a general chilling effect on exports.
• Talks on arranging a visit to the Zaporizhzhia plant by the UN’s nuclear agency have stretched more than a week. Ukrainian authorities have urged the UN and other global bodies to compel Russian forces to leave the plant.

Here are the key events from Friday, August 19.

Diplomacy

• The United Nations chief Antonio Guterres has expressed grave concern at the situation around the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, warning any potential damage to the plant would be “suicide”.

• Guterres called for the demilitarisation of Europe’s biggest nuclear plant, but his proposal was rejected by the Russian foreign ministry.

• The UN secretary-general’s comments came after he met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Lviv amid growing fears of a nuclear catastrophe.
• Erdogan renewed his offer to act as a mediator. Turkey, along with the UN, has brokered a deal to allow the resumption of Ukrainian grain exports to address the global food crisis.
• The UN wants to step up grain exports from Ukraine before winter, Guterres said.

• The United States is preparing about $800m of additional military aid for Ukraine and could announce it as soon as Friday, three sources familiar with the matter told Reuters.

Fighting

• Russia is keeping up a steady bombardment of the northeastern Kharkiv front to tie down Ukrainian forces and prevent them from being used for counterattacks in other regions, Britain’s defence ministry said on Friday.
• Seventeen people were killed and 42 wounded in two separate Russian attacks on Kharkiv, the regional governor said.
• At least four explosions hit an area near the Russian Belbek military airport north of Sevastopol in annexed Crimea, three local sources said, but a pro-Moscow official said no damage had been done.
• The inhabitants of two villages in southern Russia near the Ukrainian border were evacuated after a nearby ammunition storage depot caught fire, but no one was hurt, an official said.

Here are the key events from Tuesday, August 16.

Fighting

• Vladimir Rogov, the Russia-installed official in the Ukrainian city of Enerhodar, said that in the space of two hours, some 25 heavy artillery strikes from M777 howitzers had landed near the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant and residential areas. The Russian-appointed administration blamed Ukrainian forces.

• Yevhen Yevtushenko, head of the administration of the Ukrainian-held Nikopol district, which lies across the river from Enerhodar, said the shelling was carried out by the Russians who were trying to make it look as if Ukraine was attacking the city. Al Jazeera could not verify the rival claims.

Diplomacy

• Russia said it would do “everything necessary” to allow specialists from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to visit the plant, but warned a mission through Kyiv would be too dangerous. United Nations spokesman Stephane Dujarric said the UN could provide logistics and security support if Russia and Ukraine agree.

• UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres spoke with Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu about conditions for safe operations at Zaporizhzhia, the UN and Russia said.

• Russia’s defence ministry said British reconnaissance aircraft violated the Russian air border near Cape Svyatoy Nos between the Barents Sea and the White Sea, and a Russian fighter jet forced it out.

• Russia is ready to sell advanced weapons to allies globally and cooperate in developing military technology, Putin said, adding its latest arms are far superior to those of rival nations.

Ukrainian forces reported heavy Russian shelling and attempts to advance on several towns in the eastern region of Donetsk that has become a key focus of the near six-month war. However, they said they had repelled many of the attacks.

“Every Russian soldier who either shoots at the [Zaporizhzhia nuclear] plant, or shoots using the plant as cover, must understand that he becomes a special target for our intelligence agents, for our special services, for our army,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in an address.

The exiled mayor of Enerhodar, where the Zaporizhzhia plant is located, said on Telegram on Sunday the city had been shelled from the suburbs, causing civilian casualties. Local Russian-installed official Vladimir Rogov wrote on Telegram on Saturday that Ukrainian forces were shelling the plant.

Russia, in a daily briefing, said it had taken control of Udy, a village in the eastern Kharkiv region.

Particularly heavy fighting has focused on the village of Pisky, near Donetsk airport, the British Ministry of Defence said in its daily intelligence bulletin on Twitter.

As the Russia-Ukraine war enters its 172nd day, we take a look at the main developments.

Here are the key events from Sunday, August 14.

Fighting

• Russia and Ukraine have blamed each other for the latest round of shelling around the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, Europe’s largest, which is in Russia’s control and has come under fire repeatedly in the past week.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Saturday said any Russian soldier who shoots at the plant or uses it as cover would become a “special target”, repeating accusations that Moscow was using the power station as nuclear “blackmail”.
• Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak accused Russia of “hitting the part of the nuclear power plant where the energy that powers the south of Ukraine is generated”.
• Pro-Moscow officials in the occupied area have blamed the shelling on Ukrainian forces, with Vladimir Rogov, a member of the Moscow-installed administration, saying the Zaporizhzhia plant, and the town where it is located, Energodar, “are again under fire by Zelenskyy’s militants”.
• Western powers have expressed increasing concern over the plant since Russian forces took control of the facility in early March. They have called on Moscow to withdraw its troops from the plant, which is still run by Ukrainian technicians.
• The United Kingdom’s military intelligence said Russia’s priority in the last week has likely been to “reorient units to reinforce southern Ukraine” amid a Ukrainian counteroffensive.

Diplomacy

• The head of the North American department at the Russian foreign ministry has said any possible seizure of Russian assets by the US will completely destroy Moscow’s bilateral relations with Washington, according to the TASS news agency. The US has seized billions of dollars of assets of Russians under sanctions since the invasion began.
• Russia has also told the US that diplomatic ties would be badly damaged and could even be broken off if Washington declares Russia a “state sponsor of terrorism”, TASS cited a top foreign ministry official as saying. Zelenskyy and several US legislators have called for Russia to be designated as such.

Economy

• Two more ships left from Ukraine’s Black Sea ports on Saturday, Turkey’s defence ministry said, bringing the total number of ships to depart the country under a United Nations-brokered deal to 16.
• A UN-chartered ship, MV Brave Commander, is set to become the first humanitarian food shipment for Africa to depart from Ukraine since the Russian invasion. A UN official has said the ship will travel in the coming days from the Ukrainian port of Pivdennyi to Ethiopia along the Black Sea corridor brokered by the UN and Turkey. It is set to carry 23,0000 tonnes of wheat.
• Zelenskyy’s chief economic adviser has said securing a new $5bn loan from the IMF would help assure Ukraine’s other creditors that its macroeconomic situation was under control.
• The US has expressed concern that an Indian ship earlier this year used a high-seas transfer to export fuel to New York made from Russian crude, a top Indian central banker said. US sanctions on Russia prohibit imports to the US of Russian-origin energy products, including crude oil, refined fuels, distillates, coal and gas.
• Hungary said Russia has begun to deliver additional gas to the country following a July visit to Moscow by its foreign minister. Hungary has resisted European Union’s efforts to reduce Russian gas consumption.