Ukrainian troops have withdrawn from the eastern city of Avdiivka to avoid encirclement, army chief Oleksandr Syrskyi has said, marking the biggest change on the frontlines since Russian forces captured Bakhmut in May last year. Syrskyi said on Facebook on Saturday he had acted to “preserve the lives and health of servicemen”, stabilise the situation and move troops to more favourable defence lines.
The US president, Joe Biden, led a wave of global outrage over Friday’s death in Russia of the opposition leader and pro-democracy activist Alexei Navalny, one of President Vladimir Putin’s most vocal critics, who was serving a lengthy prison term in an Arctic penal colony. Biden blamed Navalny’s death on Putin “and his thugs”. The European Union said Navalny was “slowly murdered” by the Putin regime and it would be held accountable.
At least 73 protesters were arrested at vigils and other celebrations of Navalny’s life in numerous Russian cities, human rights observers said. Mourners and protesters also gathered across several cities in Europe and the US.
Russia’s foreign ministry said the US should show restraint before accusing the country of causing Navalny’s death.
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said Russians who voted for Putin at elections next month should realise they were voting for a murderer. “The events tell (us) that Putin is a murderer and this is not rhetoric,” Zelenskiy told a news conference in Paris,
Zelenskiy signed a security pact with France on Friday, hours after securing a similar deal with Germany hailed by its chancellor, Olaf Scholz, as a “historic step” to lock in support for Kyiv in its battle against Russia. Both agreements were part of Zelenskiy’s drive to shore up help for his forces in Avdiivka. The 10-year agreement with France included a French pledge for up to €3bn (£2.6bn/$3.2bn) in aid for 2024, officials said.
Ukraine says it has brought back the bodies of nearly 60 soldiers who died fighting against Russia. The bodies were returned from Russian-controlled territory, the coordination headquarters for prisoners of war said, publishing photos of white trucks with a Red Cross insignia on the windshield and thanking the organisation for its assistance. There have been regular prisoner exchanges and repatriations of bodies between both sides since the war began in 2022.
Exiled banking magnate Oleg Tinkov was declared a “foreign agent” by Russian authorities over his opposition to the Ukraine war. Tinkov, 56, is best known for founding Tinkoff Bank, one of Russia’s largest lender. The justice ministry said on Friday it had added him to its foreign agents list after he “disseminated false information” about the authorities.
Vladimir Putin should urgently provide explanations about reports on Russian planned nuclear arms activities in space, the French president, Emmanuel Macron, said on Friday at a news conference with Zelenskiy. In Washington, Joe Biden said there was no sign Russia had decided to go ahead and deploy an emerging anti-satellite weapon.
