Russia-Ukraine war: IOC bans Russian Olympic Committee for including annexed regions of Ukraine

International Olympic Committee says inclusion of Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia merits immediate suspension

Romania’s defence ministry has reported the discovery of a drone crater near the country’s border with Ukraine after Russian attacks on Ukrainian port infrastructure on Wednesday evening.

Reuters reports the ministry said there was a “possible explosion on impact”, and measures had been taken to secure the area and forces would continue to monitor Romania’s airspace.

Avdiivka. We are holding our ground. It is Ukrainian courage and unity that will determine how this war will end. We must all remember this.

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Finland says ‘state actor’ not ruled out in mystery of damaged Baltic gas pipeline

US secretary of state pledges support for Finland and Estonia, as Finnish officials say Russia is treating their country as ‘hostile’

Finland has said it cannot exclude the possibility that a “state actor” was behind damage to a gas pipeline under the Baltic Sea, amid what its national security intelligence service called “significantly deteriorated” relations with Russia.

The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said on Thursday the US would support Finland and Estonia as they probed the damage to the Balticconnector pipeline and parallel Estlink telecommunications cable between the two countries.

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Pressure mounts for Turkey and Hungary to ratify Swedish Nato bid – as it happened

At Nato meeting of foreign ministers, ongoing saga of Sweden’s bid to join organisation in spotlight again

One issue defence ministers will discuss today is the implementation of the alliance’s new military plans – and how equipment and troops will be placed on Nato’s sensitive eastern flank.

The US defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, assured other Nato defence ministers that it was possible to give strong support to both Israel and Ukraine, a US official and a European diplomat told the Guardian.

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Nato vows to respond if Finland-Estonia gas pipeline damage is deliberate

Alliance’s chief says if there is proof of attack it will be met with ‘determined’ response, amid speculation about Russian sabotage

Nato has promised a “determined” response if damage to an undersea gas pipeline between Finland and Estonia proves deliberate, as investigators said traces of an “external, mechanical force” had been found on the seabed.

Amid widespread media speculation about the likelihood of Russian sabotage, Risto Lohi of the Finnish national bureau of investigation told a press conference in Helsinki on Wednesday: “There is reason to suspect an external force … caused the damage.” The force, he added, “appears to have been mechanical, not an explosion”.

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Zelenskiy fears Middle East conflict could hit military aid to Ukraine

President warns of ‘dangerous situation’ for his country as western attention shifts to Israel after Hamas attack

The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has said he fears that the aftermath of Hamas’s attack on Israel and US politics could threaten military support for his country, as he made a surprise visit to Brussels where Nato defence ministers are meeting.

“I want to be honest with you, of course it is a dangerous situation for people in Ukraine,” he said on his first visit to Nato headquarters since Russia’s 2022 invasion, making an in-person plea for continued assistance at a time when turbulence in the US Congress threatens to disrupt aid for Kyiv and the world’s attention is drawn to the crisis unfolding in the Middle East.

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Russia-Ukraine war at a glance: what we know on day 595 of the invasion

Gas pipeline and communications cable connecting Finland and Estonia deliberately damaged, says Helsinki; Russia defeated in bid to return to UN human rights council

Extensive damage to an undersea gas pipeline and communications cable connecting Finland and Estonia “could not have occurred by accident” and appears to be the result of a “deliberate … external act”, Finnish authorities said. Local media cited unnamed government sources as saying Russian sabotage was suspected, while regional security experts said a Russian survey vessel had recently been observed making repeated visits to the vicinity of the Balticconnector pipeline

Rafael Grossi, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said Volodymyr Zelenskiy had promised him that Ukraine would not attack Europe’s biggest nuclear plant as part of its counteroffensive against Russia. In an interview with the Guardian, the nuclear watchdog chief said he was most concerned about the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant becoming engulfed in fighting between the two sides, but insisted he had obtained a commitment from the Ukrainian president.

Russia was defeated in its bid to return to the UN’s human rights council, with Albania and Bulgaria winning more votes at the general assembly, which voted last year to suspend Moscow after its invasion of Ukraine.

Russian forces are closing in on Avdiivka, which has been hit by intense shelling since Tuesday morning, officials said. The eastern Ukrainian town is symbolically and strategically important to Kyiv, lying just north of the Moscow-controlled city of Donetsk that was seized by separatist forces in 2014.

Germany announced an additional €1bn ($1.1bn) in military aid for Ukraine, in a race to step up weapons deliveries ahead of winter. The “winter package” includes an extra Patriot air defence system, as well as two more Iris-T air defence missile systems this month capable of short- and medium-range protection.

Zelenskiy called for steps to ensure Russia does not turn the Black Sea into a “dead zone” for shipping after Moscow quit a deal allowing safe Ukrainian grain exports. On his first trip to Romania since Russia’s invasion, Zelenskiy said after talks with his counterpart, Klaus Iohannis, that he had heard “good news” on artillery and air defence supplies from the Nato and EU member state.

Zelenskiy also expressed his concern that the international community was turning away from the war in Ukraine in the face of the “tragedy” that has befallen Israel following the Hamas attacks. “I don’t wish to make any comparisons. There is a terrible war going on in our country. In Israel, many people have lost their loved ones. These tragedies are different, but both are immense,” he said in an interview with the France 2 television channel. He warned however, that if “international attention risks turning away from Ukraine, and that will have consequences”.

Ukraine said on Tuesday that it was holding two senior defence ministry officials on suspicion of embezzling $7m (£5.7m) earmarked for buying bulletproof vests. The state bureau of investigation said the two officials, which it did not name, ordered “low-quality body armour” from abroad.

A Russian court dismissed a complaint by the Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich against the extension of his pre-trial detention, more than six months after his arrest on spying charges. Judge Yuri Pasyunin at Moscow city court ruled to “keep the detention without changes” until 30 November, an Agence-France Presse reporter at the court said.

The National Police of Ukraine has documented nearly 100,000 war crimes committed by Russian forces in Ukraine, according to the head of the body. Speaking to the Interfax-Ukraine news agency, Ivan Vyhovsky said the evidence being gathered would form the basis of future attempts to prosecute the perpetrators.

Russia is unlikely to launch an additional mobilisation drive before the presidential election next year, the UK’s Ministry of Defence said. In its daily intelligence update, the MoD said Vladimir Putin would “almost certainly” run for re-election in the vote, scheduled to take place on 17 March.

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Russia fails to win back seat on human rights council after UN vote

Country was suspended from body last year after Ukraine invasion but scale of support for readmittance will worry Kyiv and allies

Russia has been defeated in its attempt to regain a seat in the UN’s top human rights body by a significant majority at the general assembly, which voted last year to suspend Moscow after its invasion of Ukraine.

Russia was competing against Albania and Bulgaria for two seats on the Geneva-based human rights council representing the East European regional group.

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Undersea pipeline damage appears to be deliberate, says Finland

Media cites intelligence sources saying Russian sabotage suspected after unusual drop in pressure

Extensive damage to an undersea gas pipeline and communications cable connecting Finland and Estonia “could not have occurred by accident” and appears to be the result of a “deliberate … external act”, Finnish authorities have said.

“It is likely that the damage to both the gas pipeline and the communication cable is the result of external activity,” the Finnish president, Sauli Niinistö, said on X, formerly Twitter, on Tuesday, adding that the cause of the damage was not yet clear.

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Russia-Ukraine war: Moscow’s bid to return to UN’s top human rights body fails after vote – as it happened

Albania and Bulgaria receive more votes at general assembly, after Russia was suspended from body last year

The National Police of Ukraine has documented nearly 100,000 war crimes committed by Russian forces in Ukraine, according to the head of the body.

Speaking to the Interfax-Ukraine news agency, Ivan Vyhovsky said the evidence being gathered would form the basis of future attempts to prosecute the perpetrators.

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Uefa forced into stalling plans to reintegrate Russia’s under-17 teams

  • Blanket ban on Russian sides ended after vote in September
  • However at least 12 federations will not play against Russia

Uefa has been forced to stall plans to reintegrate Russia’s under-17 teams into its competitions after widespread opposition rendered them unworkable.

The surprise decision to accept junior teams and end a blanket ban on Russian sides, in place since the country’s illegal invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, came when a vote was passed on 26 September. A Uefa executive committee meeting in Nyon on Tuesday had been due to discuss the issue again, with suggestions beforehand that it could be brought to a fresh vote, but the topic was pulled after the governing body accepted its efforts had hit a dead end.

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Russia-Ukraine war: Zelenskiy to visit Romania on Tuesday in first trip since Russian invasion – as it happened

Ukrainian president’s visit to neighbouring Nato member country will be first visit since Russia invaded Ukraine

Russia has claimed to have thwarted five attacks by Ukrainian armed forces, according to a report from Tass. It writes that the media officer for Russia’s central group of troops, who are positioned in occupied Luhansk, claimed Russia had repelled the attacks near Lyman and Torske, killing 50 members of Ukrainian armed forces in the process. The claims have not been independently verified.

Volodymyr Zelenskiy has appealed at the Nato parliamentary assembly for the international rule of law to unite and deal with terrorism, comparing the attack by what he called a “terrorist organisation” on Israel with the similar tactics used by Russia, which he said was a “terrorist state”.

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Russia-Ukraine war live: Ukraine expects ‘record number’ of Russian drone attacks this winter

Spokesman for air force says country has already seen more than 500 Iranian-designed Shahed drones in September alone

Four people including a nine-year-old girl have been injured in a rocket strike on Konstantinivka on Sunday morning, according to the acting governor of Donetsk.

A 27-year-old woman and her nine-month-old baby are among those wounded in a Russian attack on the Kherson region in southern Ukraine, according to its governor, Oleksandr Prokudin. The woman and the infant were hospitalised with moderate wounds, he said, adding that a 33-year-old Red Cross medic was also wounded. Several houses and gas pipelines were damaged in the attack.

UN and local investigators are searching for answers in the village of Hroza in Kharkiv following one of the deadliest air strikes of the war. The strike on Thursday turned the sole cafe and store in the village to rubble and killed nearly 52 people gathered for a dead soldier’s wake, according to President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and other top officials in Kyiv. Only six people in the cafe survived.

Ukraine’s armed forces report that about 580 Russian troops have been killed during fighting over the last day. Posting its latest overnight summary of casualties, the Ukrainian military claims Russia has suffered 282,280 losses since the start of the war on 24 February last year.The figures have not been independently verified and are still being updated.

Poland’s president, Andrzej Duda, says that current violence between Hamas and Israel is useful for Russia in diverting the world’s attention and works in their favour. Duda argued in an interview with private broadcaster Polsat News on Sunday that conflict in the Middle East distracts international scrutiny away from Moscow’s aggression in Ukraine and may result in new migration pressures on Europe.

Volodymyr Zelenskiy has spoken about the situation in Israel, drawing parallels with the war in Ukraine by stating that “Israel’s right to self-defence is unquestionable”. He said his government had set up an operational headquarters to aid any Ukrainians in Israel. Officials have estimated that about 15,000 Ukrainian refugees have fled to Israel. While having sent tons of humanitarian aid, Netanyahu has consistently refused to supply weapons to Kyiv.

A United Russia party official in the Russian-held town of Nova Kakhovka in the Kherson oblast was killed in a car explosion on Saturday, the Russian-installed regional governor said. Vladimir Malov, executive secretary of the town branch of Russia’s governing United Russia party, died in hospital, Vladimir Saldo said in a post on his Telegram channel. Kyiv has not claimed responsibility.

Dmitry Medvedev, Russia’s former leader, has called for a civil war in the US, as he said a civil war would be the only thing that could stop “America’s manic passion for sparking conflicts everywhere on the planet”.

Train traffic between North Korea and Russia has dramatically increased after the recent summit between leaders Kim Jong-un and Vladimir Putin, indicating a “likely” transfer of arms, according to a new report by Washington-based analysts. High-resolution satellite imagery reveals at least 70 freight cars at North Korea’s border Tumangang rail facility, the Beyond Parallel group said on Friday, a number described as “unprecedented”.

Poland’s president, Andrzej Duda, says that current violence between Hamas and Israel is useful for Russia in diverting the world’s attention and works in their favour, Reuters reports.

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Russia-Ukraine war at a glance: what we know on day 592 of the invasion

Volodymyr Zelenskiy says Israel has ‘unquestionable’ right to defence, draws parallels with the war in Ukraine

Four people including a nine-year-old girl have been injured in a rocket strike on Konstantinivka on Sunday morning, according to the acting governor of Donetsk.

A 27-year-old woman and her nine-month-old baby are among those wounded in a Russian attack on the Kherson region in southern Ukraine, according to its governor, Oleksandr Prokudin. The woman and the infant were hospitalised with moderate wounds, he said, adding that a 33-year-old Red Cross medic was also wounded. Several houses and gas pipelines were damaged in the attack.

UN and local investigators are searching for answers in the village of Hroza in Kharkiv following one of the deadliest air strikes of the war. The strike on Thursday turned the sole cafe and store in the village to rubble and killed nearly 52 people gathered for a dead soldier’s wake, according to President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and other top officials in Kyiv. Only six people in the cafe survived.

Ukraine’s armed forces report that about 580 Russian troops have been killed during fighting over the last day. Posting its latest overnight summary of casualties, the Ukrainian military claims Russia has suffered 282,280 losses since the start of the war on 24 February last year.The figures have not been independently verified and are still being updated.

Poland’s president, Andrzej Duda, says that current violence between Hamas and Israel is useful for Russia in diverting the world’s attention and works in their favour. Duda argued in an interview with private broadcaster Polsat News on Sunday that conflict in the Middle East distracts international scrutiny away from Moscow’s aggression in Ukraine and may result in new migration pressures on Europe.

Volodymyr Zelenskiy has spoken about the situation in Israel, drawing parallels with the war in Ukraine by stating that “Israel’s right to self-defence is unquestionable”. He said his government had set up an operational headquarters to aid any Ukrainians in Israel. Officials have estimated that about 15,000 Ukrainian refugees have fled to Israel. While having sent tons of humanitarian aid, Netanyahu has consistently refused to supply weapons to Kyiv.

A United Russia party official in the Russian-held town of Nova Kakhovka in the Kherson oblast was killed in a car explosion on Saturday, the Russian-installed regional governor said. Vladimir Malov, executive secretary of the town branch of Russia’s governing United Russia party, died in hospital, Vladimir Saldo said in a post on his Telegram channel. Kyiv has not claimed responsibility.

Dmitry Medvedev, Russia’s former leader, has called for a civil war in the US, as he said a civil war would be the only thing that could stop “America’s manic passion for sparking conflicts everywhere on the planet”.

Train traffic between North Korea and Russia has dramatically increased after the recent summit between leaders Kim Jong-un and Vladimir Putin, indicating a “likely” transfer of arms, according to a new report by Washington-based analysts. High-resolution satellite imagery reveals at least 70 freight cars at North Korea’s border Tumangang rail facility, the Beyond Parallel group said on Friday, a number described as “unprecedented”.

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Russia-Ukraine war: Russian border region of Belgorod attacked, local governor says – as it happened

This live blog is now closed, you can read more of our Ukraine war coverage here

One woman was killed and two more people injured in the Russian shelling of the village of Bilenke in the Zaporizhzhia oblast this morning, the head of the Zaporizhzhia regional military administration said on Telegram.

A private house and outbuildings were damaged in the attack, said Yuriy Malashko.

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Russia-Ukraine war at a glance: what we know on day 591 of the invasion

Boy and his grandmother killed in Russian missile attack on block of flats in Kharkiv, hours after strike in regional village of Hroza that left 52 dead

A 10-year-old boy and his grandmother have been killed and more than 20 people wounded after a Russian missile attack on an apartment block in Kharkiv, Ukrainian officials have said. Rescuers found the boy’s body under debris after the strike on the north-eastern city’s densely populated downtown area early on Friday. Two Iskander missiles hit the flats in what President Volodymyr Zelenskiy called another act of “Russian terror”.

The death toll from a Russian missile strike on Hroza village in Kharkiv province the previous day rose to 52 on Friday after another victim died overnight in hospital, regional governor Oleh Synehubov said. A missile slammed into a cafe and grocery store in the village on Thursday as people gathered to mourn a fallen Ukrainian soldier. Separately, interior minister Ihor Klymenko said people from every family in Hroza had been affected by the attack.

Russian airstrikes also damaged grain and port infrastructure in the Odesa region in southern Ukraine early on Friday, Ukrainian officials said.

The head of an international watchdog on nuclear tests has raised concern about Russian intentions after remarks by President Vladimir Putin, who said Moscow could withdraw its ratification of a global ban on testing. “It would be concerning and deeply unfortunate if any state signatory were to reconsider its ratification of the CTBT,” Robert Floyd, the executive secretary of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization, said.

Moldova’s pro-European president, Maia Sandu, said Russia’s Wagner paramilitary force was the main force behind an attempt to foment a coup against her. She told the Financial Times in an interview published on Friday that Wagner’s late leader Yevgeny Prigozhin was behind the bid to overthrow her and that Moscow remained engaged in attempts to destabilise the country, located between Ukraine and EU member Romania, notably by funnelling money into Moldova to bribe voters in next month’s local elections.

European leaders rallied around the Ukrainian president in the face of US jitters over defence funding. The gathering at the European political community (EPC) summit in Granada, Spain, gave leaders including French President Emmanuel Macron, German chancellor Olaf Scholz and British prime minister Rishi Sunak a chance to restate their commitment to Ukraine after political turbulence in the US and Europe raised questions about continued support.

Russia is seeking re-election to the UN’s top human rights body next week in what is seen as a crucial test of western efforts to keep Moscow diplomatically isolated over its invasion of Ukraine. Some diplomats are reported to have said Russia has a reasonable chance of getting voted back on to the UN Human Rights Council in Tuesday’s secret ballot, 18 months after it was ousted in a US-led drive.

The US said on Friday it was expelling two Russian diplomats – a retaliatory step after Moscow kicked out two American diplomats last month.

Sweden will send Ukraine a new military support package worth 2.2bn crowns ($199m), consisting mainly of ammunition and spare parts to earlier donated systems, Swedish defence minister Pål Jonson said on Friday.

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Russia will revoke ratification of nuclear test ban treaty, envoy says

US condemns announcement by Mikhail Ulyanov, saying it ‘needlessly endangers the global norm’ against nuclear testing

A senior Russian diplomat has said that Moscow will revoke its ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), in a move Washington denounced as jeopardising the “global norm” against nuclear test blasts.

Mikhail Ulyanov, the Russian representative to the international nuclear agencies in Vienna, was speaking after Vladimir Putin suggested Moscow might resuming testing for the first time in 33 years, signalling another downward turn in relations between the world’s two biggest nuclear powers

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Kazakhstan drafts media law to increase use of Kazakh language over Russian

Legislation under debate stipulates share of state language on television and radio should grow to 70%

Kazakhstan has announced efforts to promote the use of the Kazakh language over Russian in its media, amid growing scepticism over Moscow’s influence in the country since the invasion of Ukraine.

Kazakh is the official language of the former Soviet republic in central Asia, but Russian is recognised too and is widely spoken among the tightly controlled country’s population of about 20 million.

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UK government pressed for answers on Sheikh Mansour and Russians

  • Ukrainian activist urges government to investigate City owner
  • ‘Many oligarchs appear to have found home for wealth in UAE’

The UK government has been asked to reveal what steps it has taken to investigate whether Manchester City’s owner, Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan, assisted wealthy Russians on whom it has imposed sanctions in moving their assets to the United Arab Emirates.

Lawyers acting on behalf of a Ukrainian activist – who wishes to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals from Russia – have written to the foreign secretary, James Cleverly, to ask whether investigations have been carried out to determine whether Mansour, the UAE’s deputy prime minister, should be identified as a “designated person” subject to financial sanctions under the Russia (Sanctions) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019.

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Russia-Ukraine war: death toll rises to 52 after attack on Kharkiv village; boy, 10, and grandmother killed in new attack – as it happened

US and European leaders accuse Russia over attack on cafe and grocery store in Hroza that killed dozens; further airstrikes in Kharkiv kill two and injure 28

The office for the UN high commissioner for human rights (OHCHR) on Friday deployed a field team to investigate the Russian attack on the Ukrainian village of Hroza that left at least 52 people dead.

“The UN high commissioner for human rights, Volker Turk, who saw for himself the horrific impact of such strikes, is profoundly shocked and condemns these killings,” OHCHR spokesperson Elizabeth Throssell told reporters in Geneva.

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