Ukraine said Yevgeny Prigozhin’s uprising reflected Russia’s ‘full-scale weakness’ as western allies watched closely
As Vladimir Putin responded with ire and defiance to Yevgeny Prigozhin’s uprising, later halted by the Wagner chief to avoid “Russian bloodshed”, world leaders closely watched the biggest challenge yet to the Russian president’s decades-spanning rule.
Ukraine
Continue reading...Russian president gives televised address as Yevgeny Prigozhin claims to have taken over city of Rostov
The Russian president has accused Yevgeny Prigozhin of “treason” after the warlord launched an uprising against Russia’s army, taking over at least one major Russian city as social media footage showed his mercenaries at the main headquarters of Russia’s southern military command.
In an emergency televised address on Saturday morning, Vladimir Putin said “the fate of our people is being decided”, accusing the Wagner group headed by Prigozhin of “armed mutiny” and vowing to “neutralise” the uprising.
Continue reading...Zelenskiy aide claims Ukrainian counteroffensive intensified internal divisions between Moscow and paramilitaries
Glued to their mobile phones, millions of Ukrainians spent a sleepless night on Friday, after the head of the Wagner mercenary group declared war against his rivals in the Russian military, sparking unprecedented political turmoil in Moscow.
“Events are developing according to the scenario we talked about all last year,’’ said Mykhailo Podolyak, a key adviser to the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy. “The start of the Ukrainian counteroffensive finally destabilised the Russian elites, intensifying the internal split that arose after the defeat in Ukraine. Today we are actually witnessing the beginning of a civil war.’’
Continue reading...Images of tanks in streets of Moscow evoke memories of a faltering Soviet Union’s final months in 1991
For months Yevgeny Prigozhin has theatrically railed against Russia’s military leaders. He has lambasted the defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, and commander in chief, Valery Gerasimov, accusing them of bungling and incompetence over the war in Ukraine.
In one video Prigozhin blamed Moscow for the deaths of soldiers from his Wagner mercenary unit. Their bodies were piled up behind him. In a letter, he challenged Shoigu to visit the bloody Ukrainian frontline for himself, where Wagner troops have been fighting and dying in the eastern city of Bakhmut.
Luke Harding’s “Invasion: Russia’s Bloody War and Ukraine’s Fight for Survival” is published in paperback by Guardian Faber
Continue reading...Sydney protest was held over the decision to block the building of a new Russian embassy near Parliament House in Canberra
Anthony Albanese has renewed his call for Russia to withdraw from Ukraine as Russia was plunged into crisis and pro-Putin protesters marched on Kirribilli House in Sydney on Saturday.
The protest was held over the decision to block the building of a new Russian embassy near Parliament House.
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Continue reading...Australian prime minister says ‘it is Russia and its involvement that keeps this war going’. This blog is now closed
Forced property sales on the rise in outer Sydney as interest rate hikes start to bite
My colleagues, Peter Hannam and Nick Evershed have this report on the rise in forced property sales as interest rate rises begin to bite.
Sydney’s outer suburbs are showing signs of rising numbers of distressed property sales with higher interest rates the likely cause, a trend that can be expected to spread to other capitals, according to property data group Domain.
Distressed listings as a share of the national market remain low, at about 2.8% across the capital cities, compared with a record 5.1% in late 2018.
Continue reading...This live blog is now closed, you can find our latest coverage of the Russia-Ukraine war in our new live blog
Russian security services have moved swiftly against the Wagner boss,
denouncing Prigozhin for “treachery” and ordering the mercenary
group’s fighters to detain their commander.
The defence ministry also published videos with several senior
military generals who urged Prigozhin to stop what one commander
described as a “coup.”
FSB opens criminal case after Yevgeny Prigozhin accuses Russia’s military of rocket attack and says ‘evil’ leadership must be stopped
Russia’s FSB security service has opened a criminal case for armed mutiny against Wagner’s Yevgeny Prigozhin after the mercenary chief accused the Russian military of targeting his forces and vowed to “destroy” his rivals.
In an extraordinary series of audio clips released late on Friday, Prigozhin claimed that a Russian rocket attack had killed scores of his fighters, vowing to take “revenge” and “stop the evil brought by the military leadership of the country”.
Continue reading...Yevgeny Prigozhin dismisses justification for war that Kyiv was planning 2022 attack on Donbas and Crimea
The Wagner head, Yevgeny Prigozhin, has accused Moscow’s leadership of lying to the public about the justifications for invading Ukraine, in the latest sign of conflict between Vladimir Putin’s government and one of his most important allies.
In an explosive 30-minute video posted on his Telegram channel, Prigozhin dismissed Moscow’s claims that Kyiv was planning to launch an offensive on the Russian-controlled territories in eastern Ukraine in February 2022.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Head of ground forces says ‘everything is still ahead’ in counteroffensive against Russia
The commander of Ukraine’s ground forces has confirmed for the first time that the main force of his offensive reserve is yet to be committed into battle with Russia, saying: “Everything is still ahead.”
In an exclusive interview from a military base in east Ukraine, Col Gen Oleksandr Syrskyi spoke of the stresses and difficulties of the fight, with Moscow launching its own offensive efforts in recent days.
Continue reading...Vladimir Saldo, the Moscow-installed governor of the southern Ukrainian region of Kherson, says Chongar bridge would be closed for around 20 days. This live blog is now closed
Ukraine’s armed forces have stopped a Russian offensive in the east of the country towards the cities of Kupiansk and Lyman, a senior defence official has claimed.
The deputy defence minister Hanna Maliar told Ukrainian television: “We had very fierce battles in the Kupiansk and Lyman directions, but our soldiers stopped the enemy there.”
Continue reading...Russia killed 136 children in Ukraine last year, says UN report; Kyiv accuses Moscow’s forces of hiding bodies in aftermath of Kakhovka dam breach
The United Nations secretary general, António Guterres, has called out Russia for killing 136 children in Ukraine in 2022 and added its armed forces to a global list of offenders, according to a report to the UN security council. The UN also verified that Russian armed forces and affiliated groups injured 518 children and carried out 480 attacks on schools and hospitals. The forces used 91 children as human shields, according to the report. Guterres was “particularly shocked” by the high number of child casualties, he said in the report, while also saying he was disturbed by the high number of offences against children by Ukrainian forces.
Russia has formed special groups to collect and hide bodies of people killed in the aftermath of Kakhovka dam breach in southern Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskiy said. The Ukrainian president said in a video address on Thursday that the situation in Russian-occupied parts of the region was “catastrophic to put it mildly”.
Ukraine’s prime minister has said its counteroffensive will take time but he is optimistic about its success. Denys Shmyhal’s comments, on the sidelines of a Ukraine reconstruction conference in London on Thursday, came after Zelenskiy said the counteroffensive might be going “slower than desired” but he would not needlessly risk soldiers’ lives to meet international expectations. Moscow had suggested there appeared to have been a break in the counteroffensive’s intensity.
Foreign donors pledged €60bn of new financial support for Ukraine, the UK said, as the international conference in London aimed at funding the country’s reconstruction closed. The commitments from governments and international organisations targeted supporting Ukraine in the short- and medium-term, the British foreign minister, James Cleverly, said on Thursday.
Russia fired cruise and ballistic missiles and strike drones at targets in Ukraine early on Thursday, causing damage in the cities of Odesa and Kryvyi Rih, Ukrainian officials said.
Russian-backed officials in southern Ukraine have accused Kyiv of using British-supplied long-range missiles to strike a bridge connecting Kherson province with the Crimean peninsula. A series of photos and videos circulating on Telegram on Thursday showed a large crater on the bridge, and debris littering the roads. There were no casualties reported.
Ukraine and Moldova have made good progress on their journey to becoming members of the EU, a European commissioner has said. The EC reportedly made clear that Ukraine had a way to go to complete the seven steps the EU outlined last year when it granted Kyiv the status of a candidate for membership.
Russia is 99.9% certain to quit a UN-brokered deal on the safe wartime passage of Black Sea grain in July as it no longer needs Ukrainian ports to export ammonia, a senior Ukrainian diplomat has said.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy reportedly said Ukrainian spies believed Russia was plotting an incident to release radiation from the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia plant in southern Ukraine, Europe’s largest nuclear plant, an allegation denied by the Kremlin.
Continue reading...Chonhar Bridge is one of a handful of infrastructures linking Crimea with the mainland
Russian-backed officials in southern Ukraine have accused Kyiv of using British-supplied long-range missiles to strike a bridge connecting Kherson province with the Crimean peninsula.
The strike on the Chonhar Bridge, one of the few links between mainland Ukraine and Crimea, came two days after Moscow threatened to attack Kyiv’s “decision-making centres” if western-supplied missiles were used against Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014.
Continue reading...UK defence secretary had earlier shown interest in the role, but the US is believed to want Jens Stoltenberg to stay in post
The defence secretary, Ben Wallace, has said he does not expect to be the next head of Nato, amid claims that the US wants the current leader to stay.
In an interview with the Economist, the Conservative MP said “it’s not going to happen”, adding that he thinks the United States wants the current secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, to remain in post for another year.
Continue reading...EU members agree new sanctions against Russia; Russian president says warheads can soon be deployed for duty. This live blog is closed
Ukrainian forces are gaining some ground towards Melitopol and Berdiansk in the southern Zaporizhzhia region, Andriy Kovalev, a spokesman for the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, has said according to Reuters.
“They had partial success, they are gaining ground,” Kovalev was quoted as saying in a post on the Ukraine Military Media Center’s Telegram channel, adding that the gains were near the settlements of Mala Tokmachka and Robotyne, among others.
Continue reading...Ukraine president says war is not a Hollywood movie, as Putin announces nuclear-capable ICBMs will soon enter service
Volodymyr Zelenskiy has conceded that Ukraine’s counteroffensive may be going “slower than desired” but has insisted that he will not needlessly risk soldiers’ lives to meet international expectations.
The comments from Ukraine’s president came as Vladimir Putin suggested that there appeared to have been a break in the intensity of Kyiv’s long-anticipated counteroffensive.
Continue reading...UK foreign secretary says Ukraine has ‘evolved quickly’, as Zelenskiy tells summit it can be engine of green growth
The UK foreign secretary, James Cleverly, has said all Nato allies are backing a plan to give Ukraine a fast track to Nato membership of the kind offered to Sweden and Finland earlier this year.
Speaking on the margins of the two-day Ukraine Recovery conference in London, Cleverly said the UK was “very, very supportive” of Ukraine being able to join Nato without the usual need for it to meet the conditions set out in a Nato membership action plan (Map).
Continue reading...Previous error doubles in size but will mean a boost in weapons, ammunition and other equipment to repel Russian forces
The Pentagon says it has overestimated the value of the weapons it has sent to Ukraine by $6.2bn – about double early estimates – resulting in a surplus that will be used for future security packages.
A detailed review of the accounting error found that the replacement cost was used rather than the book value of equipment that was pulled from stocks, said Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh.
Continue reading...Largest amount of money Kyiv previously worked with was $6bn a year in 2014, Mustafa Nayyem says
Ukraine will struggle to absorb the expected billions of western private and public sector aid for its recovery not due to corruption, but a simple lack of capacity to process and invest such huge sums, a senior Ukraine official has said on the eve of the UK-sponsored Ukraine recovery conference in London.
“It is about the capacity to work with this amount of money,” said Mustafa Nayyem, the head of the Ukraine State Agency for Restoration and Infrastructure Development.
Continue reading...One person killed and seven injured while clearing mud, officials say; Air raids reported in Lviv, Kyiv and Zaporizhzhia
Suspilne, Ukraine's state broadcaster, reports that yesterday Russia shelled 19 settlements in the Zaporizhzhia region, and that one person was injured in Orikhiv as a result. It cited the local authority. Zaporizhzhia is one of four Ukrainian regions that the Russian Federation claimed to annex late last year.
This is Martin Belam taking over the live blog in London. You can contact me at martin.belam@theguardian.com.
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