Closing Summary
It is now 11pm in Kyiv. Here is a wrap-up of today’s developments:
Officials of the Kharkiv oblast have ordered a partial mandatory evacuation in Kupiansk for families with children and residents with physical with physical disabilities. The evacuation was ordered “in light of the unstable security situation caused by the constant shelling of the community by Russian troops,” the Kyiv Independent reports.
US president Joe Biden and German chancellor Olaf Scholz met at the White House on Friday where both leaders praised each other’s country’s support towards Ukraine. “As NATO allies, we’re making the alliance stronger and more capable,” said Biden. Meanwhile, Scholz told Biden that it was important that the US and Germany organized in “lockstep” following the Russian invasion of Ukraine last February.
US Attorney general Merrick Garland has made an unannounced trip to Ukraine on Friday, according to Department of Justice officials. Garland had traveled to Lviv, Ukraine following an invitation from the Ukrainian prosecutor general, USA Today reports officials saying.
Serbia has denied that it has supplied weapons to Ukraine, its foreign minister said on Friday. Following Russia’s demand on Thursday to know whether Serbia provided thousands of rockets to Ukraine in its fight against Russia, Serbia foreign minister Ivica Dacic said that zero weapons have been exported from the country to any parties involved in the “conflict.”
The US has announced a new military aid package of ammunition and other support for Ukraine worth $400m (£333m). The package will be funded using presidential drawdown authority, which authorises the president to transfer articles and services from US stocks without congressional approval during an emergency, the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said.
Russia is deploying the most experienced units of the mercenary Wagner group and the country’s army in an attempt to seize the besieged eastern city of Bakhmut, the Ukrainian military has said. The commander of Ukraine’s ground forces, Oleksandr Syrskyi, was pictured visiting the frontline city today for briefings with local commanders on how to boost defence capacity.
The chief of the Russian paramilitary group Wagner has said his fighters have “practically encircled” Bakhmut. Only one road remains under Ukrainian control, Yevgeny Prigozhin added in a video posted online in which he called on the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, to abandon the city. His claims could not be verified.
The situation in Bakhmut appeared to be extremely precarious amid evidence that Ukraine was preparing extensive new defensive positions, including around the nearby city of Kramatorsk. Video posted online showed the blowing up of a railway bridge over the Bakhmutka River to the east of the city, while other footage purported to show damage to a small road bridge.
Ukraine has ordered a mandatory evacuation of families and vulnerable residents from the frontline city of Kupiansk and adjacent northeastern territories. The evacuation order was due to the “unstable security situation” caused by Russia’s constant shelling of the town and its surroundings, it said. Russian troops retreated from key cities in the northeastern Kharkiv region, including Kupiansk, and Ukraine recaptured it last September.
Ukraine’s defence minister, Oleksii Reznikov, has said he is confident that western countries will supply fighter jets to Kyiv, and that he is optimistic that the war will end this year. Reznikov, in an interview with the German newspaper Bild, said Ukraine expects to receive “two to three different types” of fighter jets and that he believed it would be “done through a kind of coalition again”, referring to the “tank coalition” of Leopard 2 tanks from western allies.
Foreign ministers of the so-called Quad group denounced Russia’s threat to use nuclear weapons in the Ukraine war as unacceptable, according to a statement issued after a meeting on Friday. The ministers also said they opposed any unilateral actions to increase tensions in the South China Sea, and expressed concerns about the “militarisation” of disputed territories, in a thinly veiled reference to China. The Quad group comprises India, Australia, Japan and the United States.
The EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, said he saw a “small improvement” in diplomacy with Russia after a meeting of G20 foreign ministers in New Delhi. Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, remained in the room when western countries criticised Russia – unlike at the last G20 foreign ministers’ meeting in Bali last year, when he stormed out – said Borrell, the EU’s foreign policy chief.
Mykhailo Podolyak, a Ukrainian presidential adviser, has again issued a denial that Ukraine has mounted any attacks within Russian territory. Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that Russia had been hit by a “terrorist attack” in Bryansk, and vowed to crush what he said was a Ukrainian sabotage group that had fired at civilians. Ukraine accused Russia of staging a false “provocation”. The Kremlin said Friday it would take measures to prevent a repeat of what it described as a border incursion.
Switzerland’s defence ministry has said it received a request from its German counterparts to allow Rheinmetall AG to acquire some of Switzerland’s mothballed Leopard 2 battle tanks. A German defence ministry spokesperson said it would not send Switzerland’s Leopard 2 tanks onwards to Ukraine if Bern agreed to send them to Berlin.
The US has imposed sanctions on a number of Russian individuals connected to the arbitrary detention of the prominent Kremlin critic Vladimir Kara-Murza, who has been jailed in Moscow for nearly a year after speaking out against the war in Ukraine.
That’s it from me, Maya Yang, as we wrap up the blog for today. Thank you for following along.
Officials of the Kharkiv oblast have ordered a partial mandatory evacuation in Kupiansk for families with children and residents with physical with physical disabilities.
The evacuation was ordered “in light of the unstable security situation caused by the constant shelling of the community by Russian troops,” the Kyiv Independent reports.
“Residents of Kupiansk will be provided with accommodation and food. They will also be provided with humanitarian aid and medical support. Appropriate social services will help in obtaining the status of internally displaced persons, financial support under state programs and assistance from international organizations,” said Kharkiv Oblast governor Oleh Syniehubov.
According to he Kyiv Independent, 812 children, as well as 724 people with disabilities are currently registered Kupiansk residents.
Biden and Scholz praised each country's support for Ukraine
US president Joe Biden and German chancellor Olaf Scholz met at the White House on Friday where both leaders praised each other’s country’s support towards Ukraine.
“You stepped up and provided critical military support and you know, I would argue that beyond your military support, the moral support you gave to Ukrainians has been profound. And you’ve driven historic changes at home — increase in defense spending and diversifying away from Russian energy sources — I know that has not been easy, very difficult for you,” Biden told Scholz, CNN reports.
Biden went on to add, “As Nato allies, we’re making the alliance stronger and more capable.”
Scholz told Biden that it was important that the US and Germany organized in “lockstep” following the Russian invasion of Ukraine last February.
“This is a very, very important year because of the very dangerous threat to peace that comes from Russia invading Ukraine, and it’s really important that we acted together, that we organized in lockstep, and that we made it feasible that we can give the necessary support to Ukraine during all this time,” the German chancellor said.
The high-level meeting follows a standoff between the two countries after German officials indicated that they will not provide Ukraine with Leopard tanks unless the US agrees to also provide its M1 Abrams tanks to the war-torn country.
Updated
Attorney general Merrick Garland visits Ukraine - reports
US Attorney general Merrick Garland has made an unannounced trip to Ukraine on Friday, according to Department of Justice officials.
Garland had traveled to Lviv, Ukraine following an invitation from the Ukrainian prosecutor general, USA Today reports officials saying.
“The Attorney General held several meetings and reaffirmed our determination to hold Russia accountable for crimes committed in its unjust and unprovoked invasion against its sovereign neighbor,” justice department officials said, USA Today reports.
They added that the meeting was not disclosed due to “security” reasons.
Updated
Serbia has denied that it has supplied weapons to Ukraine, its foreign minister said on Friday.
Following Russia’s demand on Thursday to know whether Serbia provided thousands of rockets to Ukraine in its fight against Russia, Serbia foreign minister Ivica Dacic said that zero weapons have been exported from the country to any parties involved in the “conflict.”
Dacic said:
“I can say that because my ministry gives the permission for (arms) exports…Serbia does not deliver military equipment to any country that we believe would be problematic in any way.”
Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova had expressed “deepest concern” about reports that its Balkan ally has delivered thousands of rockets to Ukraine.
“We are following this story,” Zakharova said in a statement posted on the Russian foreign ministry website on Thursday, the Associated Press reports.
Zakharova referred to media reports that said that a Serbian state arms factory recently delivered approximately 3,500 for the Grad multiple rocket launchers that were used by both Russian and Ukrainian forces.
She added that the possible arming of Ukraine represented a “serious question” for Serbian-Russian relations.
Summary of the day so far
It’s 9pm in Kyiv. Here’s where we stand:
The German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, will hold confidential talks with the US president, Joe Biden, in Washington on Friday about the war in Ukraine amid growing concerns that China may provide weapons to Russia. Biden and Scholz will meet for an hour at the White House, including a significant “one-on-one component,” a senior US official said, giving the two men a chance to “exchange notes” on their respective recent meetings with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, and the state of the war.
The US has announced a new military aid package of ammunition and other support for Ukraine worth $400m (£333m). The package will be funded using presidential drawdown authority, which authorises the president to transfer articles and services from US stocks without congressional approval during an emergency, the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said.
Russia is deploying the most experienced units of the mercenary Wagner group and the country’s army in an attempt to seize the besieged eastern city of Bakhmut, the Ukrainian military has said. The commander of Ukraine’s ground forces, Oleksandr Syrskyi, was pictured visiting the frontline city today for briefings with local commanders on how to boost defence capacity.
The chief of the Russian paramilitary group Wagner has said his fighters have “practically encircled” Bakhmut. Only one road remains under Ukrainian control, Yevgeny Prigozhin added in a video posted online in which he called on the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, to abandon the city. His claims could not be verified.
The situation in Bakhmut appeared to be extremely precarious amid evidence that Ukraine was preparing extensive new defensive positions, including around the nearby city of Kramatorsk. Video posted online showed the blowing up of a railway bridge over the Bakhmutka River to the east of the city, while other footage purported to show damage to a small road bridge.
Ukraine has ordered a mandatory evacuation of families and vulnerable residents from the frontline city of Kupiansk and adjacent northeastern territories. The evacuation order was due to the “unstable security situation” caused by Russia’s constant shelling of the town and its surroundings, it said. Russian troops retreated from key cities in the northeastern Kharkiv region, including Kupiansk, and Ukraine recaptured it last September.
Ukraine’s defence minister, Oleksii Reznikov, has said he is confident that western countries will supply fighter jets to Kyiv, and that he is optimistic that the war will end this year. Reznikov, in an interview with the German newspaper Bild, said Ukraine expects to receive “two to three different types” of fighter jets and that he believed it would be “done through a kind of coalition again”, referring to the “tank coalition” of Leopard 2 tanks from western allies.
Foreign ministers of the so-called Quad group denounced Russia’s threat to use nuclear weapons in the Ukraine war as unacceptable, according to a statement issued after a meeting on Friday. The ministers also said they opposed any unilateral actions to increase tensions in the South China Sea, and expressed concerns about the “militarisation” of disputed territories, in a thinly veiled reference to China. The Quad group comprises India, Australia, Japan and the United States.
The EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, said he saw a “small improvement” in diplomacy with Russia after a meeting of G20 foreign ministers in New Delhi. Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, remained in the room when western countries criticised Russia – unlike at the last G20 foreign ministers’ meeting in Bali last year, when he stormed out – said Borrell, the EU’s foreign policy chief.
Mykhailo Podolyak, a Ukrainian presidential adviser, has again issued a denial that Ukraine has mounted any attacks within Russian territory. Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that Russia had been hit by a “terrorist attack” in Bryansk, and vowed to crush what he said was a Ukrainian sabotage group that had fired at civilians. Ukraine accused Russia of staging a false “provocation”. The Kremlin said Friday it would take measures to prevent a repeat of what it described as a border incursion.
Switzerland’s defence ministry has said it received a request from its German counterparts to allow Rheinmetall AG to acquire some of Switzerland’s mothballed Leopard 2 battle tanks. A German defence ministry spokesperson said it would not send Switzerland’s Leopard 2 tanks onwards to Ukraine if Bern agreed to send them to Berlin.
The US has imposed sanctions on a number of Russian individuals connected to the arbitrary detention of the prominent Kremlin critic Vladimir Kara-Murza, who has been jailed in Moscow for nearly a year after speaking out against the war in Ukraine.
Updated
Biden to welcome Scholz with Ukraine at ‘forefront’ of meeting, says White House
The US president, Joe Biden, is expected to meet Germany’s chancellor, Olaf Scholz, shortly for confidential talks in Washington.
The war in Ukraine will be at the “forefront” of the meeting between the two leaders, the White House has said.
Biden and Scholz will meet for an hour at the White House, including a significant “one-on-one component,” a senior US official said, giving the two men a chance to “exchange notes” on their respective recent meetings with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, and the state of the war.
Joe Biden is due to meet the German chancellor as part of continuing efforts to keep the US and Europe aligned in their defence of Ukraine.
It will be a working visit to the White House for Olaf Scholz, stripped of any pomp or protocol. No press conference has been planned for the meeting on Friday afternoon and the chancellor will reportedly not be bringing press with him. A senior administration official predicted it would be short but intense.
“We’re expecting it to be a one-hour meeting or so,” the official said, adding that the “bulk of the meeting” would be about Ukraine.
There will likely be a significant one-on-one component, which I think is a reflection of the close relationship between the two leaders and the opportunity for the two of them to be able to have in-depth and face-to-face conversations.
Part of the US president’s message will be gratitude for Scholz’s agreement to allow the delivery of German-made Leopard tanks to Ukraine, though in a recent interview the US national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, made clear that the White House had to agree to ship US Abrams tanks too in order to convince Scholz to act, a characterisation that Berlin disputes. Washington has also voiced admiration for how quickly Germany has reduced its dependence on Russian gas.
Before the meeting, the US is to signal it will continue to play its part in backing Ukraine, announcing a new package of military aid, including mobile bridges mounted on armoured vehicles that would be critical to any Ukrainian counteroffensive, as well as more Himars, multiple rocket launchers. Biden will be looking for continuing parallel commitments from Germany and Europe in what is likely to be a pivotal few months in the conflict.
“Without question, they’re going to talk about the kinds of capabilities that Ukraine continues to need in the weeks and months ahead,” said the US national security council spokesperson, John Kirby.
Updated
US announces $400m in additional military aid to Ukraine
The US has announced a new military aid package of ammunition and other support for Ukraine worth $400m (£333m).
In a statement, the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said:
This military assistance package includes more ammunition for US-provided Himars and howitzers, which Ukraine is using so effectively to defend itself, as well as ammunition for Bradley infantry fighting vehicles, armored vehicle launched bridges, demolitions munitions and equipment, and other maintenance, training and support.
The package will be funded using presidential drawdown authority, which authorises the president to transfer articles and services from US stocks without congressional approval during an emergency, Blinken said.
The statement continued:
Russia alone could end its war today. Until Russia does so, for as long as it takes, we will stand united with Ukraine and strengthen its military on the battlefield so that Ukraine will be in the strongest possible position at the negotiating table.
Updated
Russia ‘sending most experienced fighters to Bakhmut’, says Ukraine's military
Russia is deploying the most experienced units of the mercenary Wagner group and the country’s army in an attempt to seize the besieged eastern city of Bakhmut, the Ukrainian military has said.
The commander of Ukraine’s ground forces, Oleksandr Syrskyi, was pictured visiting the frontline city today for briefings with local commanders on how to boost defence capacity.
Ukrainian Commander of Eastern Forces Col. Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi visited troops in Bakhmut today, proving there’s still a road into the city. He said Russians increasing forces, including units of Wagner & regular army. “Intense fighting in and around the city.” via Land Forces pic.twitter.com/vbG7MTd83k
— Christopher Miller (@ChristopherJM) March 3, 2023
The post said:
The Russian occupiers have sent the most trained units of the Wagner group and other regular units of the Russian army to capture the city. Intense fighting is taking place in and around the city.
It continued:
In Bakhmut, the commander listened to the reports of the commanders on the situation in their subordinate units, and was informed about the problematic issues of improving the defence capability of our units on the frontline.
Russia was “not giving up its hope of capturing Bakhmut and continues to build up forces to occupy the city,” the press service said.
Updated
The US has imposed sanctions on a number of Russian individuals connected to the arbitrary detention of the prominent Kremlin critic, Vladimir Kara-Murza, who has been jailed in Moscow for nearly a year after speaking out against the war in Ukraine.
Kara-Murza was arrested in April and declared a “foreign agent”, and is currently being held on suspicion of spreading false information about the armed forces. He faces more than 30 years in prison.
The sanctions target Elena Lenskaya, a Moscow judge; Andrei Zadachin, a special investigator; Danila Mikheev, an expert witness for the Russian government on the case against Kara-Murza; Russia’s deputy justice minister Oleg Sviridenko and two judges, Diana Mishchenko and Ilya Kozlov.
In a statement, the US secretary of state Antony Blinken said:
The United States reiterates its call for Kara-Murza’s immediate and unconditional release, and is committed to ensuring that Vladimir Putin’s attempts to silence critics will not succeed.
Kara-Murza, who holds both British and Russian citizenship, was a close aide to Russian opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, who was shot dead in central Moscow in 2015.
He twice fell suddenly ill, in 2015 and 2017, in what he said were poisonings by the Russian security services, on both occasions falling into a coma before eventually recovering.
Here are some of the latest images sent to us over the news wires from Ukraine.
Ukrainian parents in areas that were occupied by Russian forces say they were forced to register their newborn babies as Russian citizens, according to a report.
Residents living in towns and cities in Ukraine’s east and south faced pressure to accept Russian citizenship for their newborns, including being denied free distribution of diapers and baby food, Reuters reports.
Natalia Lukina, 42 from the southern city of Kherson, said:
We told (Russians) that the baby was born in Ukraine and is Ukrainian, not Russian.
She added:
When we asked for diapers, the Russians told us, ‘If you come without Russian birth certificates, we will not give you diapers’.
Most parents of small children, with little income during the war, accepted free diapers from Russians, her partner Oleksii Markelov said. “There wasn’t a penny of money.” Reuters could not independently corroborate their account.
Many parents delayed visiting Russian-controlled registry offices during the occupation, and many registered their babies for Ukrainian citizenship once the occupation ended, according to Olena Klimenko, head of Kherson’s regional registration office.
It is unclear how many babies received Russian citizenship, because Russian officials recorded them and Ukrainian registration workers did not cooperate with them, Klimenko said.
Summary of the day so far
It’s 6pm in Kyiv. Here’s where we stand:
The chief of the Russian paramilitary group Wagner has said his fighters have “practically encircled” Bakhmut, the eastern Ukraine city the Kremlin has been trying to seize for months. Only one road remains under Ukrainian control, Yevgeny Prigozhin added in a video posted online in which he called on the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, to abandon the city. His claims could not be verified.
The situation in the embattled city of Bakhmut appeared to be extremely precarious, amid evidence Ukraine was preparing extensive new defensive positions, including around the nearby city of Kramatorsk. Video posted online showed the blowing up of a railway bridge over the Bakhmutka River to the east of the city, while other footage purported to show damage to a small road bridge.
Ukraine has ordered a mandatory evacuation of families and vulnerable residents from Kupiansk and adjacent northeastern territories, amid fears that Russian forces will retake the frontline eastern city and rail hub.
Ukraine has ordered a mandatory evacuation of families and vulnerable residents from the frontline city of Kupiansk and adjacent northeastern territories. The evacuation order was due to the “unstable security situation” caused by Russia’s “constant” shelling of the town and its surroundings, it said. Russian troops retreated from key cities in the northeastern Kharkiv region, including Kupiansk, and Ukraine recaptured it last September.
Ukraine’s defence minister, Oleksii Reznikov, has said he is “confident” that western countries will supply fighter jets to Kyiv and that he is “optimistic” that the war will end this year. Reznikov, in an interview with the German newspaper Bild, said Ukraine expects to receive “two to three different types ‘'of fighter jets and that he believed it would be “done through a kind of coalition again”, referring to the “tank coalition” of Leopard 2 tanks from western allies.
Foreign ministers of the so-called Quad group denounced Russia’s threat to use nuclear weapons in the Ukraine war as unacceptable, according to a statement issued after a meeting on Friday. The ministers also said they opposed any unilateral actions to increase tensions in the South China Sea, and expressed concerns about the “militarisation” of disputed territories, in a thinly veiled reference to China. The Quad group includes India, Australia, Japan and the United States.
The EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, said he saw a “small improvement” in diplomacy with Russia after a meeting of foreign ministers from the Group of Twenty (G20) major industrialised countries in New Dehli. Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, remained in the room when western countries criticised Russia – unlike at the last G20 foreign ministers’ meeting in Bali last year, when he stormed out – said Borrell, the EU’s foreign policy chief, today.
Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to the head of the office of the president of Ukraine, has again issued a denial that Ukraine has mounted any attacks within Russian territory. President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday Russia had been hit by a “terrorist attack” in Bryansk, and vowed to crush what he said was a Ukrainian sabotage group that had fired at civilians. Ukraine accused Russia of staging a false “provocation”. The Kremlin said Friday it would take measures to prevent a repeat of what it described as a border incursion.
Switzerland’s defence ministry has said it had received a request from its German counterparts to allow Rheinmetall AG to acquire some of Switzerland’s mothballed Leopard 2 battle tanks. A German defence ministry spokesperson said it would not send Switzerland’s Leopard 2 tanks onwards to Ukraine if Bern agrees to send them to Berlin.
The German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, will hold confidential talks on Friday in Washington with the US president, Joe Biden, about the war in Ukraine amid growing concerns that China may provide weapons to Russia. Biden and Scholz will meet for an hour at the White House, including a significant “one-on-one component,” a senior US official said, giving the two men a chance to “exchange notes” on their respective recent meetings with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, and the state of the war.
The US will announce a new military aid package for Ukraine on Friday, worth roughly $400m and comprised mainly of ammunition, two officials and a person familiar with the package have told Reuters.
Good afternoon from London. It’s Léonie Chao-Fong still here with all the latest from Ukraine. Feel free to drop me a message if you have anything to flag, you can reach me on Twitter or via email.
Germany is taking more of a leadership role in organising arms deliveries to Ukraine and has stopped making “excuses” to avoid sending weapons, Ukraine’s ambassador to Berlin, Oleksii Makeiev, has said.
Makeiev, in an interview with Reuters, said:
What has changed in the last few months is we are not just discussing the current order of the day but we are strategically planning according to what is needed and what can be delivered. There are no more excuses now but facts that we talk about.
His remarks were in stark contrast to those by his predecessor, Andriy Melnyk, who regularly chastised Berlin for not doing enough to help Ukraine against Russia’s aggression.
Makeiev said the military items Ukraine needed the most were air defence systems, battle tanks, artillery and ammunition to “destroy Russian supply chains”.
Kyiv was not currently pushing Berlin to send fighter jets, he said, even if it was discussing possible deliveries of jets with other allies. He said:
We discuss what we need with allies in a very precise and content-rich manner. Until this moment, I have not received from our defence ministry any request for a certain type of plane available in Germany.
Updated
Ukraine is managing to generate as much power as it needs despite heavy damage caused by Russian attacks on its energy network, prime minister Denys Shmyhal said on Friday.
Shmyhal told a news conference that just over a year after Russia’s invasion, between 40% and 50% of Ukraine’s energy system had been damaged during waves of missile and drone strikes during the winter.
Though millions of people have at times been left without power, Ukraine has quickly carried out repairs, partly with the help of equipment provided by its allies.
“Ukraine is for now provided with generating and network capacities,” Shmyhal said. “The next step is to secure the network infrastructure for the next season.”
The measures will include constructing concrete and underground shelters to protect power-generating facilities and distribution networks from potential attacks, Reuters reports he said.
Updated
The Russian state-owned news agency RIA Novosti is carrying some video footage from the site of a plane crash near Yenakiieve in the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic in the occupied east of Ukraine. RIA reports the local mayor, Roman Khramenkov, said the pilots ejected and no one was injured on the ground.
Citing Khramenkov, Tass reports that “the aircraft is unambiguously military, but it is still impossible to say who it belongs to” and that the location of the pilots is “currently problematic to establish”.
Unverified video posted to social media appears to show a fighter plane on fire as it falls out of the sky.
Updated
Suspilne, Ukraine’s state broadcaster, reports that its correspondents have heard explosions in Kherson.
Updated
Russia’s foreign ministry press spokesperson Maria Zakharova has accused the US administration of mischaracterising aspects of the brief conversation between US secretary of state Antony Blinken and his Russian counterpart in India yesterday. In a post to Telegram, she wrote:
Oh, how interesting. I checked with Sergei Viktorovich [Lavrov] whether Blinken raised the topic of [Paul] Whelan yesterday. It turned out that the US secretary of state did not even stutter about this. Everything that the state department said yesterday about Blinken expressing concern about the situation around the US citizen is a lie. Incredible behaviour of the American administration.
Two men have been arrested in the US state of Kansas on suspicion of illegally exporting “sophisticated” aviation-related technology to Russia, the US department of justice has said.
Cyril Gregory Buyanovsky, 59, and Douglas Robertson, 55, are charged with conspiracy, exporting controlled goods without a licence, falsifying and failing to file electronic export information and smuggling goods violating US law.
The pair, who owned and operated KanRus Trading Co, conspired to skirt US export laws to sell sophisticated aviation equipment to Russia, the US justice department said.
The US has drastically ramped up sanctions and financial penalties on Russia since its invasion of Ukraine.
Updated
The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, spoke to Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, today in a call where the pair discussed Blinken’s “brief” conversation with Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, in New Dehli yesterday, US state department spokesperson Ned Price has said.
Blinken emphasised to Kuleba the US’ “enduring support for Ukraine as it defends itself against Russia’s brutal attacks", Price added.
Ukraine’s defence minister, Oleksii Reznikov, has said he is “confident” that western countries will supply fighter jets to Kyiv and that he is “optimistic” that the war will end this year.
Reznikov, in an interview with the German newspaper Bild, said Ukraine expects to receive “two to three different types of fighter jets which he said would “depend on the engineers, air fields, maintenance and spare parts”.
He said he believed it would be “done through a kind of coalition again”, referring to the “tank coalition” of Leopard 2 tanks from western allies.
Asked about the German chancellor Olaf Scholz’s pledges to support Ukraine, he said Kyiv “must receive real security guarantees”.
He said:
I am an optimist, I see the situation on the battlefield, I see the development of support and I really see that there is a chance to end this war this year with our victory.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy has thanked Latvia’s president, Egils Levits, for his country’s defence and political support as the pair met in a “meaningful and symbolic” visit to Ukraine.
A meaningful and symbolic visit of President @valstsgriba to Ukraine. Thank you for the principled defense and political support, for the clear understanding that the aggressor cannot be given a single chance. Ukraine and all of Europe will win! pic.twitter.com/2QT4OUO8sr
— Володимир Зеленський (@ZelenskyyUa) March 3, 2023
Zelenskiy and his wife, Olena Zelenska, were pictured earlier today with Levits and his wife, Andra Levite, in Lviv honouring the memory of Ukrainian soldiers fallen during the war.
Updated
Vladimir Putin has signed a decree enabling the Russian state to suspend the directors and shareholders of any companies that fail to meet state defence contracts under conditions of martial law.
The new decree would apply to companies that “violate their obligations under a state contract, including failing to take measures to guarantee production deliveries”, Reuters reports.
The decree would allow the industry ministry to name a new external administrator to take over the running of such companies.
Asked earlier today if martial law could be introduced in certain regions of Russia, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that was the president’s prerogative, but did not say whether Putin planned such a move.
Ukrainian forces blow up railway bridge inside Bakhmut
Ukrainian forces have blown up a railway bridge inside the besieged eastern city of Bakhmut, according to a report.
Video of the controlled explosion, posted on social media and geolocated by CNN, was shared widely today along with unconfirmed reports that it was a sign that Ukraine was preparing to withdraw from the city.
#Бахмут (https://t.co/CvP1o4RLt5), подрыв ж/д моста через речку Бахмутка https://t.co/av2jvu8qWe #RussianUkrainianWar pic.twitter.com/oXvI4CMTi7
— Necro Mancer (@666_mancer) March 3, 2023
Ukraine’s 46th Brigade, which is operating in the city, denied the reports, saying the bridge was already unusable.
The unit said:
The bridge that is now being shown as proof that we are leaving was blown up a long time ago. Those who are in Bakhmut know that. Now it was just a control shot. Don’t spread panic. And yes, one can cross the river there without a bridge.
Updated
The EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, said he saw a “small improvement” in diplomacy with Russia after a meeting of foreign ministers from the Group of Twenty (G20) major industrialised countries in New Dehli.
Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, remained in the room when western countries criticised Russia – unlike at the last G20 foreign ministers’ meeting in Bali last year, when he stormed out – said Borrell, the EU’s foreign policy chief, today.
Speaking at the Raisina Dialogue, a forum in New Delhi, Borrell said:
At least this time he stayed and he listened. This is a small improvement but it’s important. I think it’s better than nothing.
Borrell said he would oppose any effort to boot Russia from the G20 because “we have to keep ways of talking, or at least listening if not talking”.
Lavrov and the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, spoke briefly on the margins of the G20 meeting on Thursday, in what was believed to be the pair’s first one-on-one conversation in person since Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
Updated
Ukraine orders mandatory evacuation of families from Kupiansk
Ukraine has ordered a mandatory evacuation of families and vulnerable residents from Kupiansk and adjacent northeastern territories, amid fears that Russian forces will retake the frontline eastern city and rail hub.
Russian troops retreated from key cities in the northeastern Kharkiv region, including Kupiansk, and Ukraine recaptured it last September.
The Kharkiv regional military administration said in a statement posted on its website on Thursday evening:
Mandatory evacuation of families with children and residents with limited mobility began in Kupiansk community.
The evacuation order was due to the “unstable security situation” caused by Russia’s “constant” shelling of the town and its surroundings, it said.
Those evacuated would be provided with assistance, including accommodation, food, humanitarian aid and medical support, it added.
Here are some of the latest images sent to us over the news wires from Ukraine.
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Germany will not send Switzerland’s mothballed Leopard 2 battle tanks onwards to Ukraine if Bern agrees to send them to Berlin, a German defence ministry spokesperson has said.
Asked at a regular news conference how Berlin could guarantee this, the German spokesperson said:
There are existing and assessed contractual regulations.
Switzerland’s defence ministry earlier confirmed it had received a request from its German counterparts to allow Rheinmetall AG to acquire some of Switzerland’s mothballed Leopard 2 tanks.
The request said the tanks would not be sent to Ukraine but be used to backfill gaps created by the handover of Leopard 2s by Germany and Nato and EU allies, according to a ministry spokesperson.
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Wagner boss calls on Zelenskiy to withdraw from ‘practically surrounded’ Bakhmut
Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of Russia’s mercenary Wagner group, has called on President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to order a withdrawal of Ukrainian troops from the besieged eastern city of Bakhmut.
Bakhmut is “practically surrounded” by Wagner fighters with only one route left for Ukrainian forces, Prigozhin said in a video published today.
Prigozhin, wearing a military uniform in a video posted on his social media channels, said:
Units of the private military company Wagner have practically surrounded Bakhmut. Only one road is left (open to Ukrainian forces) The pincers are getting tighter.
Prigozhin’s claims have not been independently verified. The video has been geolocated to the village of Paraskoviivka, 4.3 miles north of the centre of Bakhmut, Reuters reports. Prigozhin announced the capture of Paraskoviivka on 17 February.
The video then showed what looked like three captured Ukrainians – an older man and two young boys – who asked to be allowed to go home. They looked to be speaking under extreme stress.
Prigozhin added:
The [Ukrainian soldiers] are fighting, but their lives near Bakhmut are short – a day or two. Give them a chance to leave the city. The city is in fact surrounded.
The Wagner boss published another video yesterday claiming to show his fighters inside Bakhmut. The footage was geolocated to the east of Bakhmut, about 1.2 miles from the city centre.
Summary of the day so far …
Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of Russia’s Wagner group, has published a video that he said showed his fighters in the key eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut. In a post on Telegram, uniformed men are seen lifting a Wagner banner on top of a heavily damaged building. The video has been geolocated to the east of Bakhmut, about 1.2 miles from the city centre, where Wagner fighters have been for a while.
Foreign ministers of the so-called Quad group denounced Russia’s threat to use nuclear weapons in the Ukraine war as unacceptable, according to a statement issued after a meeting on Friday. The ministers also said they opposed any unilateral actions to increase tensions in the South China Sea, and expressed concerns about the “militarisation” of disputed territories, in a thinly veiled reference to China. The Quad group includes India, Australia, Japan and the United States.
Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to the head of the office of the president of Ukraine, has again issued a denial that Ukraine has mounted any attacks within Russian territory. President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday Russia had been hit by a “terrorist attack” in Bryansk, and vowed to crush what he said was a Ukrainian sabotage group that had fired at civilians. Ukraine accused Russia of staging a false “provocation”. The Kremlin said Friday it would take measures to prevent a repeat of what it described as a border incursion.
Ten people are considered missing and five people are now known to have died after a missile hit a residential building in Zaporizhzhia in the early hours of Thursday morning.
Volodymyr Litvinov, head of the Beryslav district administration in Kherson, has reported that a tractor driver has been killed by Russian shelling in the area.
Vladimir Rogov, a Russian proxy who operates in the occupied Zaporizhzhia region has claimed on Telegram that Ukrainian forces are shelling Enerhodar, the city which stands next to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant (ZNPP). Russia’s state-owned news agency Tass is also reporting military action at the ZNPP, stating “Employees of the security agencies of the Russian Federation came under aimed fire on the line of contact when meeting International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors who were rotating at the ZNPP.”
Belarus has sentenced the Nobel peace prize-winning dissident Ales Bialiatski to 10 years in prison as part of Alexander Lukashenko’s purge of opponents after the 2020 pro-democracy protests against his rule. Bialiatski, a pro-democracy activist, is the founder of Viasna, the authoritarian country’s most prominent human rights group. He was detained in July last year and charged with smuggling cash into Belarus to fund his group’s activities, but is widely recognised as being persecuted for his opposition to Lukashenko. Bialiatski was awarded the Nobel peace prize alongside the Russian human rights organisation Memorial, and the Ukrainian human rights organisation Center for Civil Liberties, in October.
Joe Biden, the US president, and Olaf Scholz, Germany’s chancellor, will focus their discussions in Washington on Friday on war aid for Ukraine and may also touch on concerns that China may provide lethal aid to Russia, a senior US administration official has said.
The US will announce a new military aid package for Ukraine on Friday, worth roughly $400m and comprised mainly of ammunition, two officials and a person familiar with the package have told Reuters.
Switzerland’s defence ministry on Friday said it had received a request from its German counterparts to allow Rheinmetall AG to acquire some of Switzerland’s mothballed Leopard 2 tanks. The request said the tanks would not be sent to Ukraine, but would be used to backfill gaps created by the handover of Leopard 2s by Germany and Nato and EU allies.
Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said on Friday that Russia “will not let the west blow up gas pipelines again” and said that Moscow would no longer rely on the west as an energy partner.
Mikhail Abdalkin, a member of the Samara regional Duma, has been charged with “discrediting the Russian armed forces” and will go on trial on 7 March. Abdalkin posted a photograph of himself on Telegram on 21 February listening to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s state address with what appeared to be noodles draped over his ears.
That is it from me, Martin Belam, for now. I will be back later. Léonie Chao-Fong will be here shortly to take you through the next few hours of our live coverage.
Updated
Belarus jails Nobel peace prize-winning dissident Alex Bialiatski
Belarus has sentenced the Nobel peace prize-winning dissident Ales Bialiatski to 10 years in prison as part of Alexander Lukashenko’s purge of opponents after the 2020 pro-democracy protests against his rule.
Bialiatski, a pro-democracy activist, is the founder of Viasna, the authoritarian country’s most prominent human rights group. He was detained in July last year and charged with smuggling cash into Belarus to fund his group’s activities, but is widely recognised as being persecuted for his opposition to Lukashenko.
Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, the country’s opposition leader in exile, wrote on Twitter: “The sentencing of Viasna human rights defenders today – including Nobel peace prize laureate Ales Bialiatski – is simply appalling. Ales has dedicated his life to fighting against tyranny. He is a true hero of Belarus and will be honoured long after the dictator is forgotten.”
Bialiatski was sentenced alongside three other Viasna activists, the group said in a statement on Friday. Bialiatski was awarded the Nobel peace prize alongside the Russian human rights organisation Memorial, and the Ukrainian human rights organisation Center for Civil Liberties, in October.
Updated
Volodymyr Litvinov, head of the Beryslav district administration in Kherson, has reported on his Telegram channel that a tractor driver has been killed by Russian shelling in the area. He posted:
Russians fired at a tractor driver near the village of Tomaryne in the Beryslav territorial community. The 33-year-old victim was taken to the nearest medical facility by the military. However, the doctors could not do anything but declare his death. The injuries received due to the Russian shelling turned out to be too severe.
At the same time, Vladimir Rogov, a Russian proxy who operates in the occupied Zaporizhzhia region, has claimed on Telegram that Ukrainian forces are shelling Enerhodar, the city which stands next to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant (ZNPP). He posted to Telegram to say:
Explosions are heard in the city. According to preliminary information, Ukrainian forces fired Nato-style heavy artillery. The sounds of arrivals (at least seven) were most loudly heard by the citizens in the area of the industrial zone, located not far from the ZNPP.
Russia’s state-owned news agency Tass is also reporting military action at the ZNPP, stating “Employees of the security agencies of the Russian Federation came under aimed fire on the line of contact when meeting International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors who were rotating at the ZNPP.”
None of the claims have been independently verified.
Updated
Tass reports that a military adviser to the so-called Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) – an occupied area of Ukraine that the Russian Federation claims to have annexed – has told the news agency that the DPR intends to strengthen checkpoints along the line of contact as a result of yesterday’s incident in Bryansk. Tass reports that according to official figures, two people died and a 10-year-old boy was injured during.
Additionally, Reuters reports that the Kremlin said this morning it would take measures to prevent a repeat of what it described as a border incursion by Ukraine-backed nationalists. It did not specify the additional measures.
President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday Russia had been hit by a “terrorist attack”, and vowed to crush what he said was a Ukrainian sabotage group that had fired at civilians. Ukraine accused Russia of staging a false “provocation”.
Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to the head of the office of the president of Ukraine, has again issued a denial that Ukraine has mounted any attacks within Russian territory.
Explosions at critical facilities; unidentified drones attacking Russian Federation’s regions; clashes of gangs; partisans attacking populated areas – all these are direct consequences of the loss of control inside Russian Federation. And consequences of war. Ukraine is not involved in internal conflicts in the Russian Federation.
Yesterday Russia accused Ukrainian forces of mounting an incursion within its borders which the Kremlin described as terrorism, and earlier this week it dismissed Podolyak’s denial that Ukraine had launched drones against targets within Russia.
Updated
Here are some of the latest images sent to us over the news wires from Ukraine.
Suspilne, Ukraine’s state broadcaster, reports on its Telegram channel on the situation in Donetsk. It writes:
On 2 March, Russian troops carried out 45 strikes on 17 settlements in Donetsk region. They hit Bakhmut nine times with artillery, 18 high-rise buildings and one private house were destroyed and damaged, and there were wounded.
Earlier, Yevgeny Prigozhin, founder of Russia’s Wagner mercenary force, said in a video that Bakhmut was “practically surrounded”
None of the claims have been independently verified.
The air alert that has been in effect across Ukraine is ending.
Reuters reports that Yevgeny Prigozhin, the founder of Russia’s Wagner mercenary force, said in a video published on Friday that the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut was “practically surrounded” by Russian forces and that Kyiv’s forces had access to only one road out.
Prigozhin in the video called on Volodymr Zelenskiy to withdraw his forces from the city, which Russia has been trying to capture without success for months.
Updated
Suspilne, Ukraine’s state broadcaster, offers this summary of news from the past 24 hours on its official Telegram channel:
In Zaporizhzhia, the rubble of a five-story building, which was hit by a Russian rocket the previous night, continues to be dismantled. The number of dead has increased to five, 10 people are considered missing.
In the last day, Russian troops fired more than 360 projectiles in the Kherson region: residential buildings were damaged, one person died, 17 were injured.
In Donbas, the Russian army continues to fire on populated areas along the entire frontline. On 2 March, as a result of shelling in the Donetsk region, two people were killed and five were injured.
The claims have not been independently verified.
Updated
Switzerland’s defence ministry on Friday said it had received a request from its German counterparts to allow Rheinmetall AG to acquire some of Switzerland’s mothballed Leopard 2 tanks.
The request said the tanks would not be sent to Ukraine, but would be used to backfill gaps created by the handover of Leopard 2s by Germany and Nato and EU allies, a ministry spokesperson told Reuters.
Updated
Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said on Friday that Russia “will not let the west blow up gas pipelines again” and said that Moscow would no longer rely on the west as an energy partner.
Reuters reports Lavrov was speaking at an event in India a day after attending a meeting of G20 foreign ministers.
Russia has claimed that western forces were behind the undersea explosions at the Nord Stream gas pipes last September, and has repeatedly insisted it should be included in any investigations of the incident.
The Russian state-owned RIA Novosti news agency reports on its Telegram channel that Mikhail Abdalkin, a member of the Samara regional Duma, has been charged with “discrediting the Russian armed forces” and will go on trial on 7 March.
Abdalkin posted a photograph of himself on Telegram on 21 February listening to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s state address with what appeared to be noodles draped over his ears. He has already been publicly censured by the regional Duma.
In the last few minutes air alerts have been declared again across much of Ukraine.
This is Martin Belam taking over the live blog. You can contact me at martin.belam@theguardian.com
Iryna Viktorivna is serving up free hot food to her neighbours from a trestle table set up in a snowy street in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kupiansk, ladling porridge and meatballs and cabbage salad.
The sound of artillery bounces across the shallow bowl in which the city stands, four or five shells a minute – sometimes more – fired by both Ukrainian and Russian gun crews.
Mostly the shells land far away, but sometimes they fall on the city. A little earlier, one killed a 63-year-old man and damaged a nursery and fire station.
In the queue waiting to be served is 60-year-old Natalia Ivanivna, wrapped up in a winter coat and scarf and carrying a stick.
Ivanivna says she could have been relocated earlier that day but has chosen to stay because she worries about her house being looted. She tells of her concern about the cities further to the south along the eastern front, Bakhmut and Vuhledar and others, that have already been reduced to rubble over months of fighting. “It could happen here,” she says.
Viktorivna interrupts to chide her: “Don’t be pessimistic!”
As both women know, the tides of war have twice washed over Kupiansk already. Now it is threatened by a third inundation:
Updated
The Group of 20 is no longer an economic forum and has become a platform to discuss geopolitical issues, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, said on Friday, according to Reuters.
His comments were prompted by the Russia-Ukraine war dominating two recent meetings of G20 foreign and finance ministers in India, the current president of the bloc.
Neither Washington nor Berlin says they have seen evidence of Beijing’s providing weapons to Moscow, but US officials say they are monitoring the situation closely.
Germany, which has typically taken a much less hawkish stance on China, its top trading partner, than the United States, has suggested China could play a role in bringing about peace – a prospect many China observers view with skepticism.
A second senior US official downplayed suggestions of big strains between Washington and Berlin.
“The relationship is in a rock-solid place,” the official said. “Tomorrow’s meeting will largely focus on what we are doing together next to support Ukraine – a sign of the good footing the relationship continues to be on.”
A major topic of today’s meeting between Scholz and Biden will be the push to deliver fresh western support to Ukrainian forces, which are bracing for new Russian offensive in coming weeks, officials said. Washington is due to announce a new $400m military aid package for the Kyiv government on the day of Scholz’s visit, officials said.
His first trip to Washington since just before the invasion comes days after Biden’s security adviser, Jake Sullivan, told ABC that Biden overrode his military’s advice and agreed to send Abrams tanks to Ukraine because Scholz made it a pre-condition for sending German Leopards. Berlin says Biden came to see it was necessary and the decision was consensual.
The German leader arrives as United States is sounding out close allies about the possibility of imposing sanctions on China if Beijing provides military support to Russia for its war in Ukraine, according to four US officials and other sources.
Biden and Scholz to meet at White House
The German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, will hold confidential talks on Friday in Washington with the US president, Joe Biden, about the war in Ukraine amid growing concerns that China may provide weapons to Russia.
Scholz set off on the one-day trip, which unusually will not include a press delegation, late on Thursday.
Biden and Scholz will meet for an hour at the White House, including a significant “one-on-one component,” a senior US official said, giving the two men a chance to “exchange notes” on their respective recent meetings with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, and the state of the war.
“Both of the leaders wanted this to be a working-level meeting, wanted it to be very much a get down into the weeds, focused on the issues of Ukraine,” the official said.
Updated
Putin’s nuclear war threats ‘unacceptable’ say quad ministers
Foreign ministers of the so-called Quad group denounced Russia’s threat to use nuclear weapons in the Ukraine war as unacceptable, according to a statement issued after a meeting on Friday.
The ministers also said they opposed any unilateral actions to increase tensions in the South China Sea, and expressed concerns about the “militarisation” of disputed territories, in a thinly veiled reference to China.
The Quad group includes India, Australia, Japan and the United States.
Updated
Welcome and summary
Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the war in Ukraine. My name is Helen Sullivan and I’ll be bringing you the latest for the next few hours.
Our top stories this morning: foreign ministers of the so-called Quad group denounced Russia’s threat to use nuclear weapons in the Ukraine war as unacceptable, according to a statement issued after a meeting on Friday.
And German Chancellor Olaf Scholz will hold confidential talks on Friday in Washington with US President Joe Biden about the war in Ukraine amid growing concerns that China may provide weapons to Russia as its invasion of Ukraine grinds into a second year.
More on these stories soon. Here are the other key recent developments:
Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of Russia’s Wagner group, has published a video that he said showed his fighters in the key eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut. In a post on Telegram, uniformed men are seen lifting a Wagner banner on top of a heavily damaged building. The video has been geolocated to the east of Bakhmut, about 1.2 miles from the city centre, where Wagner fighters have been for a while.
Joe Biden, the US president, and Olaf Scholz, Germany’s chancellor, will focus their discussions on Friday on war aid for Ukraine and may also touch on concerns that China may provide lethal aid to Russia, a senior US administration official has said.
Scholz has urged China not to send weapons to help Russia’s war in Ukraine, and instead asked Beijing to exert pressure on Moscow to pull back its forces.
The US will announce a new military aid package for Ukraine on Friday, worth roughly $400m and comprised mainly of ammunition, two officials and a person familiar with the package have told Reuters.
The US is hosting war planning exercises in Germany for Ukrainian military officers to help them think through battlefield decisions in the next phase of the conflict, officials have said.
A meeting of top diplomats from the Group of 20 industrialised and developing nations in New Delhi has ended with no consensus on the war in Ukraine. Most G20 members strongly condemned the Ukraine war, with Russia and China disagreeing, said the G20 president, India.
The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, and Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, spoke for less than 10 minutes on the margins of the G20 meeting in New Delhi, according to a US state department official. Blinken reiterated to Lavrov that Washington was prepared to support Ukraine’s defence for as long as it took, the official said, in what is believed to be their first one-on-one conversation in person since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Blinken said he told Lavrov that Washington would push for the war in Ukraine to end through diplomatic terms that Kyiv agreed to. Blinken said he had also urged Moscow to reconsider its “irresponsible decision” and return to participation in the New Start nuclear treaty, and that he had also urged Russia to release the detained US citizen Paul Whelan.
