Russian army pulls back thousands of troops and Kyiv takes control of vital town of Izium

• Ukraine-Russia war: latest updates

Ukraine’s lightning counter-offensive in the north-east of the country has inflicted an extraordinary defeat on Moscow, prompting the Russian army to pull back thousands of troops after suffering a series of battlefield defeats.

In a day of momentous developments, Ukrainian forces confirmed the liberation of the crucial rail hub of Kupiansk and shortly after seized Izium, the major base for Moscow’s forces in the Kharkiv region.

Russia sends reinforcements to Kharkiv region amid Ukrainian counter-offensive; Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant situation increasingly precarious, says UN watchdog

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Russia said on Friday it was dispatching reinforcements to the Kharkiv region in eastern Ukraine, where Kyiv’s forces have announced robust gains as part of a broader counter-offensive. Russian state media broadcast footage of columns of Russian tanks, support vehicles and artillery travelling along paved roads and dirt tracks. Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said his forces had liberated more than 30 settlements in the Kharkiv region and that fighting continued in the eastern Donbas and the south.

The European Commission has urged EU states to reassess the terms on which they grant visas to Russian travellers and to root out applicants that pose a security threat. “We should not be naive, Putin’s aim is to destroy the EU and he would like to attack us where we are weakest,” the EU home affairs commissioner, Ylva Johansson, said on Friday.

The general staff of the Ukrainian armed forces said on Friday that it had pushed back against Russian attacks near 10 settlements, the Kyiv Independent reported. The staff said Russian forces had launched more than 12 missiles and more than 12 airstrikes on Ukrainian territory in the past 24 hours.

Shelling has destroyed power infrastructure at Enerhodar, the Ukrainian city where staff operating the Russian-held Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant live. The shelling possed a growing threat to the plant, the UN nuclear watchdog said on Friday.

The UN nuclear watchdog said conditions at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant were increasingly precarious and that a safety zone around it needed to be immediately established to prevent a nuclear accident. The International Atomic Energy Agency director, Rafael Mariano Grossi, said on Friday that there was minimal chance of re-establishing reliable offsite power lines to the plant and that its Ukrainian operator was considering shutting down the only remaining operating reactor.

EU finance ministers supported a €5bn ($5bn) loan for Ukraine to help maintain the country’s schools, hospitals and other needed operations amid Russia’s invasion. The loan, agreed on Friday, will be backed by guarantees of EU member states and is part of an overall €9bn package announced in May.

The EU executive have pledged to devise unprecedented measures in the coming days to address an energy price shock as a result of Russia’s war on Ukraine, including a controversial gas price cap that could further anger the Kremlin. European energy ministers tasked the European Commission with working through this weekend to draw up legal texts that will include emergency funding for consumers struggling to afford soaring bills.

A Russian-appointed official in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region announced on Friday that civilians were being evacuated from three of the region’s Russian-controlled territories that have come under threat from the Ukrainian counter-offensive.

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Ukraine’s counteroffensive in Kharkiv has proved that it can drive Russia out of its territories, a key adviser in President Zelenskiy’s government has said.

Writing on Twitter, Mykhailo Podoliak, adviser to the Head of the Office of President of Ukraine, said: “What does effective Ukrainian counteroffensive tell the world?

Antony Blinken visits Kyiv as US pledges nearly $2.7bn in new military aid; Zelenskiy says 1,000 sq km recaptured; Poland and Baltic nations restrict entry for Russians

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The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, has told Volodymyr Zelenskiy the war with Russia is in a “pivotal moment” as Ukraine’s military continues its counteroffensive in the south of the country. The Associated Press reported that Blinken told the Ukrainian president: “We know this is a pivotal moment, more than six months into Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, as your counteroffensive is now under way and proving effective.”

Blinken’s surprise trip to Kyiv came after the US unveiled nearly $2.7bn (£2.4bn) in new military support to Ukraine and other European countries threatened by Russia. Blinken travelled in secret on his second trip to Kyiv since the Russian invasion began in February. He approved $2bn in foreign military financing under a programme in which the US offers loans or grants to other nations to buy US-produced weapons. That amount is in addition to another $675m in military assistance announced by the defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, and includes more arms, ammunition and supplies for precision-guided Himars rockets.

Poland and the Baltic states have announced they will temporarily restrict access for Russian citizens holding European Union visas. The prime ministers of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland said in a statement that the move had been taken to address “public policy and security threats” arising from the “substantial and growing influx of Russian citizens” into the EU. The measures were expected to come into force by 19 September and would “restrict the entry into the Schengen area for Russian citizens travelling for tourism, culture, sport and business purposes”.

Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Kyiv’s forces had “liberated dozens of settlements” and reclaimed 1,000 sq km (385 sq miles) of territory in the east and south since 1 September in the counteroffensive. The Ukrainian president also posted a video in which Ukrainian soldiers claimed to have captured the eastern town of Balakliia near Ukraine’s second city of Kharkiv, Reuters reported.

Heavy fighting was reported on Thursday in areas near the Russian-held Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station in the south, after Ukraine warned it might have to shut down the plant to avoid disaster, Reuters reported.

Volodymyr Zelenskiy paid tribute to Queen Elizabeth, who has died at the age of 96. The Ukrainian president said on Twitter: “It is with deep sadness that we learned of the death of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. On behalf of the people, we extend sincere condolences to the @RoyalFamily, the entire United Kingdom and the Commonwealth over this irreparable loss.”

Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, extended his condolences to King Charles for the “irreparable loss” of his mother, saying the Queen had “rightfully enjoyed the love and respect of her subjects, as well as authority on the world stage”.

Norway said it would donate about 160 Hellfire missiles to Ukraine as well as launching pads, guidance units and night-vision equipment.

Two people have been killed and four injured by Russian shelling in the Donetsk region amid “massive shelling” in Bakhmut city, the Ukraine prosecutor general’s office said. In Kharkiv’s industrial district, authorities said two people had been killed and five injured in Russian shelling.

The UK’s Ministry of Defence said Ukraine appeared to be “imposing pressure on Russian forces” in Kherson and had probably destroyed a bridge that served as “one of the main routes between the northern and southern sectors of Russia’s military presence along the Dnieper River”.

Ukraine’s top military chief has claimed responsibility for an attack on Russia’s Saky airbase in Crimea last month – the first official acknowledgment from Kyiv that it was behind the strike, which destroyed at least nine Russian aircraft.

The UK’s permanent representative to the UN, Dame Barbara Woodward, has said the deportation of people from Ukraine has “chilling echoes from European history” and that the “appalling term ‘denazification’” was a “cover for obliterating Ukraine from the map”.

Belarus has started week-long military exercises near the Polish border, its capital of Minsk and the north-eastern region of Vitebsk, the country’s defence ministry said.

Ukrainian forces recapture about 154 sq miles of Russian-held territory, changing analysis of Kyiv’s military strategy

• Russia-Ukraine war: latest updates

A sudden, unexpected Ukrainian military success south-east of Kharkiv changes the analysis of Kyiv’s counterattack strategy. What had been expected to be a well-telegraphed effort to isolate the city of Kherson in the south has been turned on its head by the sudden pushback against Russian forces at the northern edge of the front.

The effort started on Tuesday, and by Wednesday the US Institute for the Study of War estimated that Ukraine’s forces had, in a surprise attack, advanced “at least 20km into Russian-held territory” recapturing approximately 400 sq km (154 sq miles) in an area scarcely focused on by military analysts until now.

Zelenskiy reports ‘good news’ from northern front as Donetsk People’s Republic says Balakliia ‘encircled’

• Russia-Ukraine war: latest updates

Ukraine has launched a surprise counterattack in the north-east Kharkiv region, stretching Russian forces who are also facing Ukrainian attacks in the south.

An official representing the Russian-controlled Donetsk People’s Republic said on Tuesday that Ukrainian forces “encircled” Balakliia, an eastern town of 27,000 people situated between Kharkiv and Russian-occupied Izium.

Paul Urey was charged with ‘mercenary activities’ by the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, who say he died of ‘stress’

The body of a British aid worker who was captured by Russian proxies in April has been handed to Ukraine with “possible signs of unspeakable torture”, according to the country’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba.

Paul Urey, 45, from Warrington, Cheshire, was captured in April by pro-Russian separatists, along with another Briton, Dylan Healey.

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Britain’s new prime minister Liz Truss and her US counterpart Joe Biden have promised to strengthen their relationship in the face of Vladimir Putin’s aggression.

Truss’s call to Biden on Tuesday night followed a conversation with Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelenskiy, and focused on what she called ”extreme economic problems caused by Putin’s war”.

Russia’s foreign ministry says US has pushed European leaders to cut economic and energy cooperation with Moscow

• At a glance: what we know on day 195 of the invasion

UK’s defence secretary Ben Wallace will be going to Germany this week to discuss longer-term funding for Ukraine, the Ministry of Defence says.

President Vladimir Putin attended large-scale military exercises on Tuesday involving China and several other Russia-friendly countries, Kremlin, spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told local news agencies.

Putin was meeting with defence minister Sergei Shoigu and military chief of staff Valery Gerasimov at the Sergeevski military range and could observe the final phase of the military exercises later, Peskov was quoted as saying.

The military drills, called Vostok-2022, started on 1 September and are due to take place until 7 September across several training grounds in Russia’s far east and in the waters off its eastern coast.