Here is the situation on Thursday, September 12, 2024.
Fighting
- Top Russian military commander Major-General Apti Alaudinov said his forces pushed Ukrainian troops out of “about 10 settlements” captured as part of a major offensive in the western Kursk region, Russia’s TASS news agency reported.
- Ukraine has not yet commented on the alleged Russian fightback. The Institute for the Study of War said the “size, scale, and potential prospects” of the counterattack were “unclear”, describing the situation as “fluid”.
- Ukraine’s air force said it shot down 44 of 64 drones launched by Russia overnight. Russian forces also used five missiles, the Ukrainian Air Force added in a statement posted on the Telegram messaging app.
- Russian forces attacked energy facilities and civilian infrastructure in Ukraine’s northeastern town of Konotop overnight, officials in the Sumy region said via Telegram. The attack injured at least 13 people, according to the statement.
Politics and diplomacy
- United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced more than $700m in humanitarian aid for Ukraine during a joint trip to Ukrainian capital Kyiv with British Foreign Secretary David Lammy.
- Lammy confirmed in Kyiv that the United Kingdom would provide another $782m in assistance and loan guarantees to Ukraine. Much of the US and UK aid is aimed at bolstering the power grid, which has lost 70 percent of its generation capacity under Russian bombardment.
- Responding to Ukrainian officials’ renewed pleas for authorisation to use Western-provided missiles to strike deeper inside Russia, Blinken said he would bring the discussion “back to Washington to brief the president”, adding that US President Joe Biden and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer will “no doubt” discuss the issue when they meet on Friday in Washington, DC.
- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in an online post that he had held “very substantive” talks with Blinken and Lammy, adding that it was “important that Ukrainian arguments are heard”. “This includes the long-range weapons, the supply of combat brigades on the front lines, and the overall strategy for achieving a just peace,” he said.
- The British government announced new sanctions on Russia’s “shadow fleet” of tankers which Moscow uses to export oil, bypassing a Western embargo imposed after its invasion of Ukraine.
- It is the third time the UK has attempted to crack down on what the foreign ministry said were “critical revenue sources funding [Russian President Vladimir] Putin’s war machine”, bringing the total number of ships sanctioned to 25. The 10 ships targeted in this round were “high-volume offenders”, it said.
- Blinken is meeting Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk and President Andrzej Duda in Warsaw on Thursday to rally support for Ukraine. He is expected to discuss coordination with the country, a key logistical gateway for Western military support into Ukraine that has ramped up purchases of US weapons since the invasion.
- Putin said in televised comments that Russia should consider limiting exports of uranium, titanium and nickel in retaliation for Western sanctions. The restrictions could also be introduced for other commodities, he said, noting that Russia was a major producer of natural gas, diamonds and gold, but that measures did not need to be taken “tomorrow” and must not harm Russia itself.
Weapons
- Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi condemned allegations by Western countries that Tehran has supplied ballistic missiles to Russia for use against Ukraine, claiming that the US and its allies were acting on “faulty intelligence”.
- He called the US, the UK, France and Germany “sanctions addicts”, referring to announcements on Tuesday that they would be punishing the alleged transfers of missiles to Russia with sanctions, including on national carrier Iran Air.
- Lammy said during his trip to Kyiv that the UK would provide “hundreds of additional air defence missiles, tens of thousands of additional artillery ammunition rounds and more armoured vehicles to Ukraine by the end of the year”.
- Lithuania’s Defence Minister Laurynas Kasciunas said NATO aircraft based in the Baltic states should shoot down Russian drones that drift into their airspace after a Russian drone crashed in Latvia last week. NATO aircraft “must not only patrol but also, if necessary, if possible destroy the drones,” he said.
- Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha urged Kyiv’s allies on its western borders to shoot down Russian drones and missiles over Ukraine. “There have already been numerous instances of Russian aircraft violating the airspace of neighbouring countries and NATO countries,” he said.
- Influential Russian policy hawk Sergei Karaganov told Kommersant newspaper that Russia should clearly state its willingness to use nuclear weapons against countries that “support NATO aggression in Ukraine”.
- “It is time to declare that we have the right to respond to any massive strikes on our territory with a nuclear strike. This also applies to any seizure of our territory,” he said, according to the Reuters news agency.
