Firm’s owner, Pernod Ricard, faced calls for boycott and political pressure after resuming some exports in April
The maker of Sweden’s Absolut vodka has said it is ceasing all exports to Russia after calls to boycott the brand flared up in Sweden and on social media.
The Absolut Company said it had “decided to stop the export of its brand to Russia”.
Continue reading...Deal would build closer economic ties as most western states push to isolate Moscow over Ukraine
India and Russia have entered “advanced negotiations” over a free trade agreement that aims to build closer economic ties as most western governments push to isolate Moscow over the war in Ukraine.
In a development likely to add to tensions in Washington, London and EU capitals, Russia and India’s trade ministers said on Monday the two countries were in talks to strike a free trade deal.
Continue reading...This blog has now closed, you can read more of out Ukraine war coverage here
You may have seen that we are testing a new feature across some of the Guardian’s live blogs, including the Ukraine live blog, which allows you to contact some of our live bloggers directly. This is for people who want to message us, they are not public comments.
If you have something you’ve seen you think I’ve missed, or you have questions or comments about the war or our coverage, or have spotted one of my regular typos or transliteration errors, please do drop me a line.
Continue reading...Kremlin says president visited occupied territories where he discussed conflict with military officials
Vladimir Putin has visited military headquarters in Russian-controlled Ukraine, the Kremlin has said, where he discussed the war with a general from Russia’s airborne troops who has reportedly taken up a powerful role in the invasion.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, launched on 24 February 2022, has triggered the deadliest European conflict since the second world war.
Continue reading...Critics argue some cases have highlighted serious issues with the way officials are targeting people
A fierce debate has broken out in Ukraine over allegations that a clampdown on corruption is being used to frame high profile business advocates of state reform, raising wider doubts about Ukraine’s internal political trajectory – and its ability to absorb billions in European reconstruction funds once the war ends.
The concerns have been expressed to the US Department of State and UK Foreign Office, and are shared in part by Ukrainian anti-corruption campaigners.
Continue reading...Officials ready for nuclear threats and cyber-attacks as part of Russian response to predicted counter-offensive
Western leaders are preparing for Vladimir Putin to use “whatever tools he’s got left” including nuclear threats and cyber-attacks in response to an expected Ukrainian counter-offensive against Russia.
British officials at the G7 foreign ministers’ summit in Japan said they were expecting Russia to retaliate and “must be prepared” for extreme tactics as it attempted to hold on to Ukrainian territory.
Continue reading...Earlier this year, hundreds of top secret Pentagon documents were posted on the social media platform Discord. Manisha Ganguly and Julian Borger report
The US authorities are investigating the leak of hundreds of secret US defence documents, some of which related to the war in Ukraine.
The Guardian’s investigations correspondent, Manisha Ganguly, tells Hannah Moore how these documents migrated between different websites before being picked up by the press. Julian Borger, the Guardian’s world affairs editor, explains what we learned from the leak and how the US authorities have responded.
Continue reading...West condemns sentencing of Kremlin critic Vladimir Kara-Murza to 25 years in prison; US ambassador makes first visit to jailed Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich
The UK has condemned the sentencing of Russian opposition activist Vladimir Kara-Murza, who was jailed for 25 years for opposing the war in Ukraine. UK foreign secretary James Cleverly summoned the Russian ambassador, Andrei Kelin, for an explanation. Kara-Murza holds dual Russian-British citizenship.
Kara-Murza’s wife, Evgenia Kara-Murza, told British broadcaster LBC that she was “baffled” by the UK government’s “weak” response. “Introducing sanctions against his perpetrators would actually be a very practical step that I would very much like to see,” she said.
The UN’s human rights head, Volker Türk, urged Russia to release him, while Baltic neighbour Latvia sanctioned 10 Russian officials and lawyers involved in the case.
US ambassador to Russia Lynne Tracy said she had made her first visit to jailed Wall Street reporter Evan Gershkovich, who was arrested in Russia two weeks ago on charges of spying. “He feels well and is holding up. We reiterate our call for Evan’s immediate release,” Tracy said.
The United States and more than 40 other countries said in a joint statement that they were deeply concerned over Russia’s detainment of a Wall Street Journal reporter and protested Moscow’s “efforts to limit and intimidate the media.” The statement read further: “We urge Russian Federation authorities to release those they hold on political grounds, and to end the draconian crackdown on freedom of expression, including against members of the media.”
Two Russian fighter jets and a spy plane flying close to Nato airspace have been intercepted by the UK and German air forces. Eurofighter typhoons from the RAF and the German air force’s 71 Richtofen Wing were scrambled to intercept the jets as they flew over the Baltic Sea and Gulf of Finland.
The US has blasted Brazil’s approach to the war in Ukraine and accused it of parroting Russian and Chinese propaganda after president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said on a trip to China that the US “needs to stop encouraging war and start talking about peace”. The US’s national security council spokesperson John Kirby said: “In this case, Brazil is parroting Russian and Chinese propaganda without at all looking at the facts.”
Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov thanked “our Brazilian friends for their clear understanding of the genesis of the situation (in Ukraine)“ after meeting his Brazilian counterpart Mauro Vieira in Brasília at the start of a Latin American tour. He was later due to meet Lula.
The Pentagon said it expected findings within 45 days from a review into how the US military handles classified information after last week’s arrest of an airman over the leak a trove of highly classified documents online.
Russia said it had repelled an “illegal” Ukrainian attempt to infiltrate Russian territory in the southern border region of Bryansk, 11 days after reporting a similar incident. “The intruder stepped on a mined protection line,” said regional governor Alexander Bogomaz on Telegram.
The Kremlin has said prospects for a renewal of the Black Sea grain initiative, in which Russia allows Ukraine to ship agricultural exports from its Black Sea ports via Turkey, were “not so bright”. Russia has repeatedly complained that western economic sanctions are preventing it from exporting agricultural products, and that these need to be lifted in order for it to agree to any extension.
Slovakia will temporarily halt imports of grains and other selected products from Ukraine to protect its farmers, joining Poland and Hungary in the move, a government spokesperson said on Monday. Ukraine and Poland meanwhile began talks aimed at reaching an agreement on imports.
Slovakia has handed over all 13 MiG-29 fighter jets it had pledged to Ukraine, the Slovak defence ministry.
Almost 500 children have been killed in Ukraine since Russia’s invasion, according to a report by the Ukrainian prosecutor general. As of Monday, 470 children had been killed and 948 injured, it said, adding that the department believes that the number of injured children is higher.
Reuters and Agence France-Presse contributed to this report
Continue reading...UN condemns 25-year prison sentence for Vladimir Kara-Murza for criticising the war in Ukraine
Ukraine’s agriculture minister said Kyiv would aim to secure the reopening of food and grain transit via Poland as a “first step” at talks in Warsaw on Monday, after Poland and Hungary announced bans on some imports from Ukraine.
Agriculture minister Mykola Solsky also said there would be additional talks this week in Romania on Wednesday, and in Slovakia on Thursday. Reuters reports the minister’s comments were published on the Telegram messaging app by the agriculture ministry.
Continue reading...Latest disclosure includes claims that social media platforms detect false accounts only 1% of the time
Russia has increased the effectiveness of its disinformation campaigning on social media and boasts that vast amounts of fake accounts are escaping detection, according to a report on leaked US intelligence documents.
The latest material disclosed on the Discord chat platform contains claims by Russian operators of false social media accounts that they are detected by social media platforms only 1% of the time. The Russian disinformation network is known as Fabrika, according to the leak.
Continue reading...Li Shangfu travelled to Moscow where he said ties between the countries ‘surpass military-political alliances of the cold war era’
Vladimir Putin and China’s defence minister Li Shangfu have vowed to deepen military cooperation between China and Russia after the men met in Moscow over the weekend.
Li, who met the Russian president on Sunday on his first trip overseas in the role, said China was willing to work with Russia to have close strategic communications between their militaries.
Continue reading...A court in Moscow has sentenced the opposition activist Vladimir Kara-Murza to 25 years prison; Slovakia will temporarily halt imports of grains and other selected products from Ukraine
Continue reading...Intense fighting in middle of eastern city as Russia claims advances; Sloviansk death toll rises to 11 while Russian shelling also kills two in Kherson
More on a story we reported earlier that Poland is to ban imports of Ukrainian grain to protect its own agricultural sector.
A Polish ban on imports of Ukrainian grain and other food will also apply to the transit of these products through the country, the development and technology minister has said, according to Reuters.
Poland and Hungary said on Saturday that they had decided to ban imports from neighbouring Ukraine to protect the local agricultural sector after a flood of supply depressed prices across the region. The Polish ban came into effect on Saturday evening.
Continue reading...Cathedral service overseen by clerics independent of Russian-affiliated patriarchate for first time since 17th century
Dawn did not break over wartime Kyiv on Orthodox Easter Sunday. It was more that the darkness gradually paled, leaving the pinnacle of the 18th-century bell tower wreathed in a wan mist.
Soon after 5.30am, the faithful began to trickle into Dormition Cathedral, which stands at the heart of the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra, or Monastery of the Caves.
Continue reading...Mikheil Saakashvili warned of Putin’s ambitions 15 years ago. Now he tells of torture by a regime that panders to Moscow
Locked up in a Tbilisi hospital, Mikheil Saakashvili is slowly wasting away.
“I am asking to be transferred to Poland, as it is crystal clear that in Georgian hospital I will die,” Georgia’s former president wrote in response to questions from the Observer last week. His answers were scrawled in blue ballpoint pen on sheets of paper, passed to his lawyers.
Continue reading...Death toll from Russian attack on Sloviansk apartment block rises to 11; Moscow claims Wagner forces have captured two more areas of Bakhmut
The death toll from a Russian missile strike on the eastern Ukraine city of Sloviansk has risen to 11. A block of flats was badly damaged and rescue crews were continuing on Saturday to try to rescue people trapped underneath rubble.
Russian shelling in Kherson killed two women on Saturday, the Ukrainian president’s office said.
The Wagner mercenary group has captured two more areas of Bakhmut, Russia’s defence ministry said. Ukraine’s military said pro-Kyiv forces were still holding on amid “bloody and fierce battles”. The claims have not been independently verified.
A Russian official has claimed four people were killed and 10 injured in Ukrainian shelling of a town in Russian-controlled Donetsk. Denis Pushilin said a seven-year-old girl was among those wounded in Yasynuvata.
Russia has been using drones to attack Ukrainian police in Kherson, according to the region’s police force. It said a police car was attacked in the Korabel area, injuring two officers and damaging the car, while in Beryslav one officer was injured and cars damaged.
A new international economic support package of $115bn is giving Ukraine more confidence it can prevail against Russian forces amid growing recognition the war could continue for longer than expected, the Ukrainian finance minister said on Saturday. Serhiy Marchenko said Group of Seven (G7) finance ministers assured him during International Monetary Fund and World Bank meetings in Washington this week that they would support Ukraine for as long as needed.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy spoke to the French president, Emmanuel Macron, on Saturday. In two tweets, the Ukrainian president said they had discussed Macron’s recent visit to China to meet President Xi Jinping.
Poland and Hungary have banned imports of grain and other food from Ukraine to protect local farmers, officials from both countries said on Saturday. Ukraine’s grain exports have been transiting through the European Union to other countries since Ukraine’s Black Sea routes were blocked by Russia’s invasion, leading to prices being driven down.
A new Russian law has removed an obstacle that has allowed some men to dodge the draft and suggests Moscow anticipates a lengthy conflict in Ukraine, the UK Ministry of Defence says. Vladimir Putin was reported to have signed a bill on Friday to create a digital draft system, making it easier to mobilise Russians into the army and stirring fresh fears in the country.
The Brazilian president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has said the US should stop “encouraging war” in Ukraine “and start talking about peace”. In that way, the international community would be able to “convince” the Russian and Ukrainian presidents that “peace is in the interest of the whole world”, Lula told reporters in Beijing at the end of a visit where he met president Xi Jinping.
Continue reading...UK Ministry of Defence says Kremlin has made it harder for civilians to avoid being drafted into the army
Five Ukrainians from Russian-occupied Melitopol in the Zaporizhzhia oblast will be tried by a Russian court for being part of a “terrorist group”, according to Russian state media.
The five Ukrainians were transported from Melitopol to Crimea, which has been occupied by Russia since 2014, and subsequently transferred to the Lefortovo pre-trial detention centre in Moscow, the Kyiv Independent reports.
Continue reading...Yulia and Tetiana knew they would have to marry abroad – but never in the context of an invasion
Yulia and Tetiana had spent a while deliberating over a date for their wedding before they decided it had to be 1 March – exactly a year to the day they fled the war in Ukraine.
“That date should be a sad anniversary, the anniversary of us leaving our old life behind, but we decided to rewrite this story and made it our special anniversary,” said Tetiana, 42. “We lost a lot and there is a lot of evil in this world, but we’ve turned that evil into something good.”
Continue reading...Nine killed and 21 wounded in Russian missile attack on apartment blocks in Sloviansk; Vladimir Putin signs bill sparking fears of new wave of mobilisation
Continue reading...Intercept of Russian intelligence shows Beijing wanted to disguise lethal aid as civilian items, says report
China approved the provision of lethal aid to Russia for its war in Ukraine but wanted any shipments to remain a secret, according to leaked US government documents.
A top-secret intelligence summary dated 23 February states that Beijing had approved the incremental provision of weapons to Moscow, which it would disguise as civilian items, according to a report in the Washington Post.
Continue reading...