This live blog has now closed, you can find more of our coverage of the Russia-Ukraine war here
Russia tested a new missile defence system rocket, its defence ministry said today.
The missile was launched from the Sary Shagan testing range in Kazakhstan.
Continue reading...British oil giant had said it would ‘exit Russia’ but still owns nearly 20% of state-controlled fossil fuel firm Rosneft
The chief economic adviser to the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has called on BP to exit Russia entirely after the fossil fuel firm was offered a £580m dividend by the oil giant Rosneft.
Oleg Ustenko has written to BP’s chief executive, Bernard Looney, to demand the British company cuts ties with the state-controlled Russian firm nine months after announcing its intention to leave the country.
Continue reading...Statement gave only limited details and made no mention of any Ukrainian forces having crossed the Dnipro
A bridge is seen collapsed over a river near Lyman city, Ukraine.
Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov also accused Nato of trying to drag India into what he called an anti-Russian and anti-Chinese alliance at a time when he said the West was attempting to squeeze out Russian influence.
Continue reading...Blast at Kyiv’s embassy in Madrid injures staff member; nine people killed in fires to heat homes in Ukraine
Continue reading...Foreign Office targets 22 officials, including Denis Manturov, deputy prime minister responsible for troop supplies
The UK has announced a fresh round of sanctions against 22 Russians, including those the Foreign Office says were involved in enlisting criminals to fight in Ukraine.
James Cleverly, the foreign secretary, said on Wednesday his department would target a new set of officials, including Denis Manturov, the deputy prime minister, who is responsible for troop equipment supplies.
Continue reading...Staff member sustained light injuries in blast that occurred while he was handling letter, say police
An employee at the Ukrainian embassy in Madrid has sustained minor injuries after opening what is thought to have been a homemade letter bomb, prompting Kyiv to warn its diplomats to bolster their security precautions.
Oleh Nikolenko, a spokesperson for the Ukrainian foreign ministry, said the embassy in the Spanish capital had received an envelope as part of a mail delivery.
Continue reading...Employee at Ukrainian embassy in Spain injured handling a letter; UK targets 22 Russians including deputy PM Denis Manturov. This live blog is closed
The UK is to sign a new digital trade agreement with Ukraine that will give the country access to Britain’s financial services industry.
Ukraine’s first deputy prime minister, Yulia Svyrydenko, will sign the agreement with the UK’s trade secretary, Kemi Badenoch, on Wednesday. Officials say the deal – based on a similar agreement earlier this year between the UK and Singapore – will support digital commerce through the facilitation of cross-border data flows.
Continue reading...Nato doubles down on promise to one day include Ukraine in alliance; supplies to restore Ukraine’s battered electricity grid running low
Continue reading...Andriy Pavelko and general secretary accused of embezzling funds related to construction of artificial grass factory
Two leading officials in Ukraine’s football association, including its head, have been arrested over fraud and money-laundering allegations related to the construction of an artificial grass factory.
Andriy Pavelko, the president of the Ukraine FA, and Yuri Zapisotsky, the association’s general secretary, are accused of “embezzling” 26.5m Ukrainian Hryvnia (£600,000).
Continue reading...Mélanie Joly, the foreign minister in Ottawa, says Russia’s targeting of energy grid and civil infrastructure only strengthens allies’ support
Nato remains firmly committed to supporting Ukraine through a “difficult” winter, even though an end to the conflict with Russia remains out of sight, Canada’s foreign minister has told the Guardian.
“Russia isn’t at the negotiation table at all. And so our goal right now is just to reinforce Ukraine’s position on the ground through military aid, intelligence sharing and financial support,” said Mélanie Joly. “Because when we do that, we’re actually reinforcing their position at the negotiation table. There will be a diplomatic solution eventually. That’s been the case in every single conflict. But we’re not there yet.”
Continue reading...Ukraine officials say Russia is continuing to shell cities with no strategic aim other than to cause casualties as it prepares for new mass strikes. This live blog is closed
The Kremlin’s spokesperson has denied reports that Russian forces were planning to leave the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant in Ukraine, telling reporters they should not look for signs where there were none.
Meanwhile, the Kremlin said it welcomed a Vatican offer to provide a negotiating platform to resolve the Ukraine conflict, but that Kyiv’s position made this “impossible”.
Continue reading...UK MoD says it has provided Brimstone 2 missiles to Ukraine; reports suggest there are signs troops could be getting ready to leave
The Belgium prime minister, Prime Minister Alexander De Croo, is on the second day of an unannounced visit to Ukraine.
Accompanied by Belgian foreign minister, Hadja Lahbib, De Croo used the visit to announce additional Belgian support of around 37.4 million euros.
Continue reading...UK defence ministry confirms providing missiles to Ukraine as civilians in Kherson flee from Russian shelling
The UK Ministry of Defence has confirmed that as part of its aid package, the UK has provided Brimstone 2 missiles, a precision-guided missile, to the Ukrainian armed forces. “This aid has played a crucial role in stalling Russian advancements,” it said.
Civilians in Kherson are leaving the city to flee Russian shelling, just weeks after celebrating Ukraine’s recapture of the southern city. Reports said a line of trucks, vans and cars – some towing trailers or ferrying out pets and other belongings – stretched a kilometre or more on the outskirts of Kherson on Saturday.
The Belgium prime minister, Prime Minister Alexander De Croo, was on the second day of an unannounced visit to Ukraine on Sunday. Accompanied by Belgian foreign minister, Hadja Lahbib, De Croo used the visit to announce additional Belgian support of around 37.4 million euros.
Russian forces have suffered heavy casualties during fighting in Ukraine’s south-central Donetsk province and are unlikely to achieve a breakthrough there, the UK Ministry of Defence says.
There are growing fears Russia’s relentless targeting of Ukraine’s electricity grid will threaten the safety of the country’s nuclear power plants, in the wake of the unprecedented emergency shutdown on Wednesday. Petro Kotin, the president of Ukraine’s nuclear power company, Energoatom, said all safety mechanisms had worked as intended on Wednesday but two generators were damaged in the process.
Ukrainian authorities are gradually restoring power, aided by the reconnection of the country’s four nuclear plants, but millions of people are still without heat or electricity after the most devastating Russian air strikes of the war.
The UK foreign secretary, James Cleverly, has warned rape in war violates international values as severely as the use of chemical weapons amid evidence of the “abhorrent act” being used in Ukraine.
Russia kept up its onslaught on Ukrainian cities on Saturday with an attack on Dnipro which injured six people and destroyed seven houses, said the regional governor, Valentyn Reznichenko.
Thirty-two civilians have been killed in Kherson since 9 November, when Russian forces withdrew from the southern city they had occupied for eight months, the Kyiv Independent quoted Ukraine’s national police chief, Ihor Klymenko, as saying. Since then, Russian troops have shelled Kherson frequently.
Ukraine accused the Kremlin of reviving the “genocidal” tactics of Josef Stalin as Kyiv commemorated a Soviet-era famine that killed millions of Ukrainians in the winter of 1932-33.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy hosted a summit in Kyiv with allied nations on Saturday to launch a “grain from Ukraine” initiative to export $150m worth of grain to countries most vulnerable to famine and drought. Up to 60 Ukrainian grain ships can be sent by the middle of next year to some of the world’s poorest countries in Africa, the Ukrainian president has said in a statement released to the Guardian.
Belarus’s long-time foreign minister, Vladimir Makei, has died. Belarus has been an ally of Russia and a base over the border for the invasion of Ukraine. Russian foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova posted on her Telegram channel that “we are shocked by the reports of the death”. Makei had been due to meet Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, in Minsk on Monday.
The prime ministers of Lithuania, Poland and Ukraine – Ingrida Šimonytė, Mateusz Morawiecki and Denys Shmyhal, respectively – met in Kyiv on Saturday for talks to discuss and reiterate their commitment to work together “in countering Russia’s armed aggression”.
Russia is firing ageing cruise missiles stripped of their nuclear warheads at Ukrainian targets because Vladimir Putin’s stocks are so depleted, the UK Ministry of Defence has suggested. An intelligence update from the ministry on Saturday said the desperate improvisation by the Russian president’s struggling forces were “unlikely to achieve reliable effects”.
Continue reading...Leonid Volkov warns Russian opposition leader’s health is at risk from indefinite solitary confinement
Alexei Navalny’s survival may depend on his value to Vladimir Putin as a future bargaining chip, his chief aide said, warning that the opposition leader’s health was at risk after being forced into indefinite solitary confinement.
Leonid Volkov, speaking on a visit to London, added that Navalny had lost access to his family and was being permanently detained in a “8 by 12ft” cell after the isolation decision by Russian authorities last week.
Continue reading...Russian attacks cut off essential power to the stations last week, forcing all four of them into high-risk mitigation procedures
There are growing fears that Russia’s relentless targeting of Ukraine’s electricity grid will threaten the safety of the country’s nuclear power plants, in the wake of an unprecedented emergency shutdown on Wednesday.
Petro Kotin, the president of Ukraine’s nuclear power company, Energoatom, said that all safety mechanisms had worked as intended on Wednesday, but two generators were damaged in the process, delaying the restart of two reactors. Kotin said repeated shutdowns caused by more Russian missile attacks could cause extensive damage, with a potentially severe impact on Ukraine’s power supply and possibly on nuclear safety.
Continue reading...Ukraine’s president calls on local government officials to do more as power cuts leave population vulnerable to the elements
My colleague Charlotte Higgins has written a feature on how Ukrainian artists have been weaponising their work to mount a cultural resistance, in defiance of Putin’s plan to eradicate Ukraine’s sense of identity and history.
The head of Ukraine’s presidential administration said on Saturday that Russia would answer for a Soviet-era famine that left millions of Ukrainians dead during the winter of 1932-33.
Continue reading...Programme to subsidise exports of grain to poor and hungry countries launched on anniversary of Ukraine’s Holodomor famine
Up to 60 Ukrainian grain ships can be sent by the middle of next year to some of the world’s poorest countries in Africa, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the Ukrainian president, said in a statement released to the Guardian.
In a move that challenges the Russian narrative that the west’s response to its war on Ukraine has aggravated pre-existing food shortages in Africa, Zelenskiy said ships moving out of the Ukrainian port of Odesa can reach humanitarian hotspots such as Sudan, Yemen and Somalia, but only so long as international funding comes forward to subsidise the grain.
Continue reading...More than 6m Ukrainian households still without power; EU to boost efforts to restore electricity and heating; Hungarian president to meet Zelenskiy
Continue reading...Germany’s former chancellor defends her actions amid barrage of accusations since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine
Angela Merkel has insisted that her position as a lame duck in the last months of her time in office made it more or less impossible for her to influence the behaviour of Vladimir Putin.
The former German chancellor appeared both defensive and quietly defiant about her inability to change the course of the Russian president’s decision-making in the run-up to the invasion of Ukraine in February.
Continue reading...This live blog has now closed, you can read more about the situation in Ukraine here
Nato secretary general Jens Stoltenberg has been speaking at a press conference this morning, ahead of a foreign ministers’ meeting in Romania next week.
Stoltenberg said it would continue its support for Ukraine and increase “non-lethal” aid, Reuters reports.
Continue reading...