Sergei Lavrov says Moscow ‘trying to stop’ war in remarks at India’s Raisina Dialogue conference
Comments by Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, were met with laughter at an international conference in India, when he said that the Ukraine war had been “launched against” his home country.
Speaking at the Raisina Dialogue, a politics and economics event in Delhi, Lavrov also claimed that Russia was trying to stop the war.
Continue reading...With Russian forces closing in, police try to persuade remaining citizens to get out and access routes come under fire
• Russia–Ukraine war: latest updates
War breeds euphemism and metaphor. In the battle for the Donbas city of Bakhmut, threatened with a closing encirclement by Russian forces after seven months of bitter fighting, there are “White Angels” and “Dark Angels”, the “road of life” (the Bakhmut-Lysychansk highway, which is anything but) and the “Invincibility Centre”.
The White Angels, a police evacuation group, scour the lethal districts of the shell-ruined city to evacuate children and the elderly.
Continue reading...Regular army and Wagner units advancing into northern suburbs of north-east Donetsk city, MoD reports
Ukrainian forces defending Bakhmut are facing increasingly strong pressure from Russian forces, according to British military intelligence, with intense fighting taking place in and around the eastern city.
Ukraine is reinforcing the area with elite units, while the regular Russian army and forces of the Russian private military Wagner group have made further advances into Bakhmut’s northern suburbs, the UK Ministry of Defence said in its daily intelligence bulletin on Twitter.
Continue reading...Situation in besieged city of Bakhmut appears dire as Joe Biden and Olaf Scholz meet to coordinate support for Ukraine
Continue reading...German chancellor’s working visit to the White House focuses on continuing support for Kyiv
Joe Biden has hailed Olaf Scholz for Germany’s “critical military support” for Ukraine, acknowledging in a White House meeting that, in the face of stiff domestic political resistance, such backing had been “very difficult” for the chancellor.
The meeting of the US and German leaders on Friday comes shortly after the first anniversary of Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and at a time when both are facing political challenges to their efforts to maintain the flow of military and economic support to Kyiv.
Continue reading...Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the Wagner mercenary group, says Russian ‘pincers are getting tighter’ around contested city
Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said on Friday that Russia “will not let the west blow up gas pipelines again” and said that Moscow would no longer rely on the west as an energy partner.
Reuters reports Lavrov was speaking at an event in India a day after attending a meeting of G20 foreign ministers.
Continue reading...Australia, the US, India and Japan join to ‘counter new and emerging forms of terrorism, radicalisation to violence and violent extremism’. This blog is now closed
‘A broken promise writ large’
Opposition leader Peter Dutton was also on the Today show (which has clearly been busy this morning).
They want to tax you on the profit before you actually sell the shares, which is unbelievable. And I think it continues to go from disaster to disaster for the government.
You can’t as a prime minister look people in the eye and tell them one thing and do the complete opposite, a broken promise writ large.
It is a modest change ... It only affects people if you have $3m in your superannuation fund. That’s about 0.5% of superannuants.
We inherited a budget from Peter [Dutton] and his crew which was a trillion dollars in debt. There’s nothing to show for it. We need to be responsible. That’s what we’re trying to do.
Continue reading...Anti-Putin émigré group claims its fighters crossed into Russia after Kyiv dismisses reports as ‘false flag’ attack
The Kremlin has claimed Russia has been attacked by “terrorists” after conflicting reports of firefights emerged from the Bryansk and Kursk regions, which Russian media blamed on Ukrainian “sabotage groups” and Ukrainian sources called a “provocation”.
The reports of fighting in Russia near the Ukrainian border began on Thursday morning. The head of the Bryansk region claimed that a “sabotage group opened fire on a moving automobile. As a result, one resident was killed; a 10-year-old child was injured.”
Continue reading...US secretary of state speaks to Russian foreign minister in what is believed to be their first one-on-one conversation since invasion of Ukraine. This live blog is closed
Olena Zelenska, Ukraine’s first lady, has tweeted about the overnight attack on Zaporizhzhia, writing:
Zaporizhzhia bravely resists the Russian aggressor. In retaliation, it attacks civilians. A high-rise building was deliberately hit last night. Three floors are completely destroyed. People died. We continue to search under the rubble. My condolences to the victims. We will not forgive this.
This is Martin Belam taking over the live blog in London. You can contact me at martin.belam@theguardian.com.
Continue reading...Investigators say sites set up during occupation of Ukrainian city were part of ‘calculated plan to terrorise’ locals
Evidence collected from Kherson in southern Ukraine shows Russian torture centres were not “random” but instead planned and directly financed by the Russian state, according to a team of Ukrainian and international lawyers headed by a UK barrister.
The city was under Russian control for eight months, from 2 March last year until Ukrainian forces entered the city on 11 November.
Continue reading...Camel, toffee and charcoal feature in Ukrainian collection created under Russian bombs
You would never guess from the immaculate tailoring and finely turned silhouettes of the Litkovska collection shown at Paris fashion week that its production was frequently interrupted by air-raid warnings, which forced the 23-strong team of tailors and stylists to flee the design studio for a bomb shelter. It remains the only Ukrainian brand on the Paris catwalks and is still designed and produced in Kyiv by Lilia Litkovska and her team.
The bombardments are just one of the logistical challenges faced by the designer and her team in Kyiv. “There are problems every day, but we find solutions every day,” said Litkovska backstage before her show.
“We are very lucky because our studio is close to a good bomb shelter,” added Olena Iakovenko, one of four team members who travelled to France with Litkovska to stage the event.
Continue reading...Alexei Moskalyov charged with ‘discrediting Russian army’, while daughter taken into care
A Russian man has been detained for making anti-war statements and his 12-year-old daughter temporarily taken into state care after the family faced pressure from authorities for drawings the girl made at school depicting Russia bombing a family in Ukraine.
Alexei Moskalyov, a single parent from the town of Yefremov, 150 miles south of Moscow, has been arrested for making anti-war statements on Odnoklassniki, a Russian social network.
Continue reading...Ukraine officials say ‘epic’ fight on plain near Vuhledar produced the biggest tank battle of the war. This live blog is now closed
Oleh Synyehubov, governor of Kharkiv region, has posted to Telegram to say two people were injured in Chuhuiv as a result of Russian shelling. He wrote:
According to the information of the regional centre of emergency medical assistance, a 52-year-old man and a 13-year-old boy were injured as a result of the morning shelling of Chuhuiv. The man was hospitalised with shrapnel wounds. The boy has minor injuries, was treated at the scene and did not require hospitalisation.
This is Martin Belam taking over the live blog in London. You can contact me at martin.belam@theguardian.com.
Continue reading...Construction begins on fence along part of 1,340km boundary amid fears Moscow could weaponise mass migration against Helsinki
Finland has started construction of a fence along parts of its 1,340km (830-mile) border with Russia to boost security and tackle any attempt by Moscow to weaponise mass migration as a result of its invasion of Ukraine.
Finland announced the start of construction on Tuesday. Terrain work would begin “with forest clearance and will proceed in such a way that road construction and fence installation can be started in March”, the Finnish Border Guard said in a statement.
Continue reading...Beijing propaganda includes messaging aligned with Moscow on Ukraine war, says James Rubin
The west has been slow to respond to China spending billions globally to spread poisonous disinformation, including messaging that is completely aligned with Russia on Ukraine, a US special envoy has claimed.
James Rubin, a coordinator for the Global Engagement Center, a US state department body set up to “expose and counter” foreign propaganda and disinformation, made the remarks during a European tour this week.
Continue reading...Pentagon official says war now a ‘grinding slog’; Belarus president to meet Xi Jinping
The regional government in Sumy, in Ukraine’s north-east, recorded 36 strikes on its territory in overnight Russian shelling, according to reports from Ukraine’s state broadcaster, Suspilne.
The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, on Tuesday pledged support for Kazakhstan’s independence on a trip to boost influence in central Asia, which has been rattled by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
This is Martin Belam taking over the live blog in London from my colleague Samantha Lock in Sydney. You can contact me at martin.belam@theguardian.com
Continue reading...Budget airline links decision to airspace risks from war in neighbouring Ukraine and tensions with Russia
Wizz Air will suspend all its flights to and from Moldova next month due to security concerns linked to growing tensions with Russia.
It comes after a Russian missile was fired over Moldovan airspace earlier this month.
Continue reading...Moscow says details need to be analysed after western leaders say Beijing lacks credibility to act as mediator
Ukraine’s ministry of defence has claimed that overnight its forces shot down 11 Iranian-made Shahed drones. It also confirmed that an officer of Ukraine’s emergency services was killed in Khmelnytskyi.
The claims have not been independently verified.
Continue reading...Group says it used drones to hit early warning aircraft at Machulishchy airfield 12km from Minsk
Belarusian anti-war partisans claim to have severely damaged a Russian military aircraft in what an opposition leader has called the “most successful diversion” since the beginning of the war.
BYPOL, the Belarusian partisan organisation, said it had used drones to strike the Machulishchy airfield 12km from Minsk, severely damaging a Beriev A-50 airborne early warning and control aircraft (Awacs).
Continue reading...Two killed as Ukraine claims to have shot down 11 of 14 drones in overnight attack; partisans claim to have destroyed Russian plane at Belarusian airstrip
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