Closing summary
Ukraine’s commander-in-chief said the war with Russia was moving to a new stage of positional warfare involving static and attritional fighting, a phase he warned could benefit Moscow.
The Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, told a prank caller posing as an African leader that there was “a lot of tiredness” over the war in Ukraine and that she had some ideas up her sleeve on how to “find a way out”.
More than 260 civilians have been killed in Ukraine after stepping on mines or other explosives during the 20-month-old war with Russia, Ukraine’s military said.
Russia has shelled more than 100 settlements within the last 24 hours, more than in any single day so far this year, Ukraine said on Wednesday.
A Russian attack on Kherson in eastern Ukraine killed one person and injured two others, the region’s governor said earlier, with a Russian drone strike reportedly killing another civilian in Nikopol. These claims have not been independently verified.
South Korea’s top spy agency believes North Korea sent more than a million artillery shells to Russia since August to help fuel Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukraine, according to a lawmaker.
Russia launched a score of drones and a missile in an overnight attack that targeted military and critical infrastructure, Ukraine’s air force said, while regional officials said the Kremenchuk oil refinery was hit.
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Ukraine needs new military capabilities as war moves to attritional fighting, says army chief
Ukraine’s commander-in-chief has said the war with Russia was moving to a new stage of positional warfare involving static and attritional fighting, a phase he warned could benefit Moscow and allow it to rebuild its military power.
In an article for the Economist, top general Valerii Zaluzhnyi said the Ukrainian army needed key new military capabilities and technology, including air power, to break out of that kind of war.
He also called for Ukraine to build up its army reserves and expand the categories of Ukrainian citizens who can be called up for training or to be mobilised.
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Russia’s defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, has said that Ukraine is losing the war despite supplies of new weapons from Nato, BBC News reports.
He reportedly said that Ukraine was suffering heavy losses as it tried to push into Russian-held areas of Zaporizhzhia, Kherson and Donetsk. These claims have not been independently verified.
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The ministry of foreign affairs of Ukraine has said that H&M will be returning to the country in November.
It posted on Telegram:
This week, our diplomats in Stockholm received final confirmation that Ukrainian H&M stores, which were closed in connection with the full-scale invasion of Russia, will begin to resume operations already in November of this year.
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Corruption, along with low salaries and pensions, ranks as the top concern of Ukrainians besides Russia’s ongoing war, a poll released by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology has found, according to the Kyiv Independent.
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The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, will visit Turkey on Sunday, according to a Turkish diplomatic source.
Blinken will be in the Turkish capital of Ankara on 5 November, the source said, Reuters reports.
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‘Tiredness on all sides’ over war in Ukraine, Italian PM tells prank caller
The Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, told a prank caller posing as an African leader that there was “a lot of tiredness” over the war in Ukraine and that she had some ideas up her sleeve on how to “find a way out”.
Meloni’s office confirmed she had been “misled” into the phone call – reportedly by two Russian comedians – that took place on 18 September “by an impostor who passed himself off as the president of the African Union Commission”.
According to reports in the Italian press, the callers were two Russian comedians, Vladimir Kuznetsov and Alexei Stolyarov, jointly known as Vovan and Lexus, one of whom presented himself to Meloni as “an African politician”.
Vovan and Lexus, who are strongly pro-Russia, have been accused of having links to Russian intelligence services, although there is no evidence to substantiate the allegation.
A recording of the call was published on the Canadian video-sharing platform Rumble before being picked up by the Russian state-owned news agency Ria Novosti.
“There is a lot of tiredness on all sides,” Meloni is heard saying regarding Russia’s war in Ukraine. “The moment is approaching when everyone will understand that we need a way out.
You can read the full story here:
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The Democratic majority leader, Chuck Schumer, has said the US Senate will vote on Wednesday on three bills laying out funding plans for agriculture, military and veterans affairs, and transportation, for the fiscal year ending 30 September 2024.
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More than 260 civilians killed after stepping on mines or other explosives
More than 260 civilians have been killed in Ukraine after stepping on mines or other explosives during the 20-month-old war with Russia, Ukraine’s military has said.
Kyiv estimates that 174,000 sq km (67,000 sq miles) of the country – about a third of its territory – is potentially strewn with mines or dangerous war detritus, Reuters reports.
At least 571 people have been injured in more than 560 incidents involving mines or explosive objects left behind during the conflict, the general staff said on social media. Almost a quarter of the incidents occurred in fields, it added.
Станом на 01.11.2023
— Генеральний штаб ЗСУ (@GeneralStaffUA) November 1, 2023
З початку повномасштабного вторгнення, серед населення в Україні відбувся 561 інцидент, пов’язаний з мінами та вибухонебезпечними залишками війни.
Серед цивільного населення постраждало 835 осіб, з яких 264 загинули і 571 людина отримала травми pic.twitter.com/peLD4L2lQd
In August, Ukraine’s former defence minister, Oleksii Reznikov, said Ukraine was the most heavily mined country in the world, with its army then suffering from a critical shortage of men and equipment able to clear the frontlines.
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The EU’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, has said that attention will not be diverted from Ukraine. Posting to X, formerly Twitter, he wrote:
Russian aggression against #Ukraine has reached a new peak of ruthlessness, with more than 100 towns and villages targeted in 24 hours.
— Josep Borrell Fontelles (@JosepBorrellF) November 1, 2023
Moscow should have no illusions: other crises will not divert our attention from Ukraine.
Our support continues, as long as needed
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Ukraine reports most extensive Russian shelling this year
Russia has shelled more than 100 settlements within the last 24 hours, more than in any single day so far this year, Ukraine said on Wednesday.
Moscow has fired millions of shells on cities, towns and villages since it launched its full-scale invasion last February, reducing several to rubble across the eastern part of the country, according to Agence France-Presse.
“Over the last 24 hours, the enemy shelled 118 settlements in 10 regions,” Ukraine’s interior minister, Igor Klymenko, said on social media.
“This is the highest number of cities and villages that have come under attack since the start of the year,” he added.
These claims have not yet been independently verified.
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Ukraine exported 3m metric tonnes of food in October from its Black Sea ports and ports of the Danube River, according to Spike Brokers, which regularly tracks and publishes export statistics in Ukraine.
The commercial agent gave no comparative figures. Agriculture ministry data showed that 2.3m tonnes of agricultural goods left Ukrainian ports in September, Reuters reports.
Ukraine is trying to build up a new shipping lane along the north-western coast of the Black Sea to Romanian territorial waters to revive its vital seaborne exports.
This comes after Russia quit a UN-brokered deal in July that allowed Ukraine to export grain from its Black Sea ports, despite the war.
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Investigators in Moscow said they had opened a criminal investigation into an editor at a news outlet that has regularly angered the authorities on suspicion of “publicly justifying terrorism”.
Moscow’s Investigative Committee, which handles serious crimes, said in a statement that it had begun a probe of Anna Loiko, a journalist with Sota, an online outlet that is independent of the state and publishes mostly on the Telegram messaging app.
Sota, whose founder and editor-in-chief have been branded “foreign agents” by the Russian authorities, has often covered protests and the trials of Kremlin critics that state media sometimes ignores, Reuters reported.
Investigators said that an article written by Loiko in 2021 about the Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir, which is banned in Russia, had caught their attention because it had justified the ideology of an organisation Moscow regards as “terrorists”.
Loiko, who is outside Russia, said on Sota that she denied justifying terrorism and would study investigators’ expert conclusions about her alleged wrongdoing “with pleasure”.
Sota, which said the apartment of Loiko’s mother had been searched by investigators, said:
The editorial board notes that, given the date of the article, the approaching presidential election, and the numerous threats we have received from various supporters of the authorities, we are talking about political pressure on the media.
Russia, which is due to hold a presidential election next year and is still waging its war in Ukraine, has conducted a sweeping crackdown on media it regards as hostile to the country’s interests, and on political opposition it sees as dangerous and foreign-backed.
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The Wagner group has allegedly resumed recruiting in the Russian cities of Perm and Novosibirsk as a unit of Rosgvardia, Russia’s National Guard, local news sites have reported, according to the Kyiv Independent.
At its peak, Wagner had tens of thousands of men (at least 50,000 convicts were offered their freedom if they survived the battles in Ukraine) and tens of thousands of Russian volunteers, including many former special forces troops, according to Reuters.
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Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, has discussed the Israel-Hamas conflict with envoys of Arab countries in Moscow, Russia’s Tass news agency reported on Wednesday.
You can follow our live coverage of the Israel-Hamas war here:
A Russian drone attack set ablaze the Kremenchuk oil refinery in central Ukraine and knocked out power supply in three villages, Reuters reports officials having said.
The fire at the refinery, which Moscow has targeted many times during the war and Kyiv says is not operational, was quickly put out, Filip Pronin, head of Poltava region’s military administration, said.
Ukraine’s air force said air defences shot down 18 of 20 drones and a missile fired by Russia overnight before they reached their targets.
“The focus of the attack was Poltava region, it was attacked in several waves,” air force spokesperson Yuriy Ihnat said.
Three villages in the region of Poltava lost electricity supply after power lines and an unnamed infrastructure facility were damaged, the energy ministry said on Telegram.
“Ten legal entities and almost 500 household consumers were disconnected,” it said.
Railway power lines were damaged by falling debris in central Kirovohrad region, but the damage was quickly repaired, governor Andriy Raikovych said.
A Dutch court has sentenced a Russian citizen to 18 months in prison and fined his company €200,000 (£174,000) for breaching trade sanctions against Russia that the EU imposed over the war in Ukraine, Reuters reports.
The 56-year-old man, named Dmitri K by prosecutors, was tried in absentia and is believed to have fled to Russia after being released from custody last year pending his trial.
In its ruling, the court said the man had been trading in microchips and other electronic goods for six years and had been fully aware of the sanctions against Russia.
The man was in charge of a company that channelled “dual use” goods – which can serve both civilian and military purposes – via foreign countries to firms in Russia to bypass EU restrictions, it said.
To do so, the man allegedly forged invoices and statements about the end user of the products to make it look as if they were shipped to the Maldives and in some cases even to a nonexistent company in Ukraine, the district court in Rotterdam said.
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Here are some of the latest images coming out from the newswires:
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Two people killed in Russian attacks, say officials
A Russian attack on Kherson in eastern Ukraine killed one person and injured two others, the region’s governor has said, with a Russian drone strike reportedly killing another civilian in Nikopol.
Russian forces seized Kherson early in the war but then abandoned it a year ago.
“Again, an apocalyptic picture is all around: broken glass, torn window frames, mutilated houses. People talk about their experiences with trembling in their voices,” the regional governor, Oleksandr Prokudin, posted on Telegram on Wednesday.
In Nikopol, a 59-year-old woman was killed in a drone strike that injured four people, according to the regional governor, Serhiy Lysak. These claims are yet to be independently verified.
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The UK’s Ministry of Defence (MoD) has said Russia’s Lancet small one-way-attack uncrewed aerial systems (OWA UAVs) “have highly likely been one of the most effective new capabilities that Russia has fielded in Ukraine” over the last year.
In its latest intelligence update, the MoD wrote on X, formerly Twitter:
It is designed to be piloted over enemy territory, waiting until a target is identified, before diving towards it and detonating.
Lancets are manufactured by the ZALA Aero Group. ZALA also make the small, unarmed Orlan 10 UAV which Russia often deploys alongside Lancet to spot targets. Ukraine has also experienced success with small OWA UAVs.
Russia deploys Lancets to attack priority targets and they have become increasingly prominent in the key counter-battery fight, striking enemy artillery.
Traditionally, Russia has used small UAVs mainly for reconnaissance. With its attack capability, Lancet has been a step change in how Russia uses this category of weapons.
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Morning summary
Russia launched a score of drones and a missile in an overnight attack that targeted military and critical infrastructure, Ukraine’s air force said, while regional officials said the Kremenchuk oil refinery was hit. On the Telegram messaging app, the air force said 18 of the 20 Russian-launched Shahed drones were destroyed before reaching their targets, as was the missile. However, a repeated target of earlier Russian attacks, the Kremenchuk oil refinery in the central region of Poltava, was struck, setting it ablaze, according to Filip Pronin, head of the region’s military administration.
US senators from both parties indicated support for funding for Ukraine, voicing doubts on Tuesday about a House Republican plan to split Joe Biden’s request for a $106bn (£87bn) aid package. The package combines funding for Israel and Ukraine, but also includes money to boost competition with China in the Indo-Pacific, as well as security along the US border with Mexico. On Monday, in the first major legislative action under the new House speaker, Mike Johnson, a standalone supplemental spending bill was unveiled for Israel only. That bill seeks to provide $14.3bn in aid to Israel by cutting Internal Revenue Service funding – and does not provide aid to Ukraine.
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said in his nightly video address on Tuesday: “The modern world is set up in such a way that it becomes accustomed to success too quickly. When the full-scale aggression began, many in the world did not think Ukraine would endure.” Zelenskiy has previously rejected criticism, mainly from western sources, that the counteroffensive against Russia was proceeding too slowly, saying the war was not akin to a Hollywood movie set. Ukraine’s military said Russian forces were gearing up for fresh attacks in different sections of the front, but there has been little movement along the approximately 1,000km (600-mile) frontline in recent months.
Ukraine will introduce mandatory registration of food export companies in an aim to prevent abuses such as tax avoidance in the export of key agrarian goods, the government said in a resolution published on Wednesday. Ukraine is one of the world’s leading food producers and exporters, but officials estimate that up to a third of goods for subsequent export are bought in cash and without paying the necessary taxes.
The Swiss government has decided not to lift its protection status for Ukrainians fleeing war before 4 March 2025, it said in a statement. “The situation in Ukraine is not expected to change in the foreseeable future,” the statement from the Federal Council said. The Swiss government also set a target for labour market integration, aiming to get 40% of people with protection status S capable of work into employment by the end of next year, Reuters reported.
Opera singers in the north-eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv hope to return to the stage more than 20 months into Russia’s war by performing in the basement of their theatre to be safe from the threat of Russian airstrikes. Ukraine’s second largest city, which banned mass public events when Russia invaded in February 2022, is regularly targeted by missiles that can hit as little as 45 seconds after they are fired from across the Russian border 30km (19 miles) away.
North Korea is in the final stages of preparations for the launch of a spy satellite and the chances of its third attempt succeeding are high, South Korea’s intelligence agency said in a briefing on Wednesday, according to a lawmaker present. North Korea has also sent more than 10 shipments of munitions to Russia for use in the war against Ukraine, including more than 1 million artillery rounds, the National Intelligence Service (NIS) was quoted as saying.
A senior UN official said Russian strikes were inflicting “unimaginable suffering” on the people of Ukraine and that more than 18 million Ukrainians – 40% of the population – needed humanitarian assistance. Ramesh Rajasingham, the director of coordination in the UN humanitarian office, told the UN security council on Tuesday that thousands of civilians had been killed in strikes on homes, schools, fields and markets since Russia’s invasion in February 2022. The UN human rights office has formally verified 9,900 civilians killed, but “the actual number is certainly higher”, he said.
The US defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, said Russia would be successful in Ukraine unless Washington’s support for Kyiv continued. “I can guarantee that without our support, Putin will be successful,” Austin said during a Senate hearing on Joe Biden’s request for $106bn to fund plans for Ukraine, Israel and American security.
Russia has reportedly imposed additional currency controls in an attempt to prop up the falling rouble, restricting western companies that sell their Russian assets from taking the proceeds in dollars and euros. International companies that want to exit Russia after its invasion of Ukraine have to sell their assets in roubles under new government restrictions, according to the Financial Times, which cited people familiar with the matter.
Three Russians were arrested in New York for evading US sanctions to ship electronic components for weapons used by Moscow in its war in Ukraine, authorities said. The trio are accused of evading sanctions to dispatch, over the course of a year, “over 300 shipments of restricted items, valued at approximately $10m, to the Russian battlefield”, said Ivan Arvelo, a special agent with the US Department of Homeland Security, in a statement. The three defendants are yet to enter a plea.
Nato’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, said he was certain Sweden would join the defence alliance but declined to predict an exact time for when this would happen, Reuters reported.
Two Russian soldiers have been arrested on suspicion of killing a family of nine, including two young children, in their home in the Russian-occupied eastern Ukrainian town of Volnovakha.
Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) has detained an accomplice in the attempted killing of the former Ukrainian politician and pro-Russian politician and businessman Oleg Tsaryov, Russian state news agencies reported.
The UN human rights office has found “reasonable grounds” to conclude a missile strike that killed 59 people in a cafe in the Ukrainian village of Hroza was launched by Russia’s armed forces, the office said.
Police in France have detained the Russian tycoon Alexey Kuzmichev and raided two of his properties in connection with alleged tax evasion, money laundering and sanctions violations.
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The Swiss government has decided not to lift its protection status for Ukrainians fleeing war before 4 March 2025, it said in a statement.
“The situation in Ukraine is not expected to change in the foreseeable future,” the statement from the Federal Council said.
The Swiss government also set a target for labour market integration, aiming to get 40% of people with protection status S capable of work into employment by the end of next year, Reuters reported.
Protection status S, which allows people to travel abroad as well as work in Switzerland, is generally limited to one year but can be extended.
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South Korea's intelligence agency says North Korea shipped more than a million artillery shells to Russia
South Korea’s top spy agency believes North Korea sent more than a million artillery shells to Russia since August to help fuel Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukraine, according to a lawmaker.
According to Yoo Sang-bum, the South Korean National Intelligence Service believes the North shipped more than a million artillery shells to Russia since early August to help boost Russia’s warfighting capabilities in Ukraine, the Associated Press reports.
Those shells would roughly amount to two months’ worth of supplies for the Russians, Yoo said.
The agency believes North Korea has been operating its munitions factories at full capacity to meet Russian munition demands and has also been mobilising residents to increase production, Yoo added.
Both Pyongyang and Moscow have denied US and South Korean claims that the North has been transferring arms supplies to Russia.
Kim visited key military and technology sites during his trip to Russia to meet Putin in September.
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Opera singers in the north-eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv hope to return to the stage more than 20 months into Russia’s war by performing in the basement of their theatre to be safe from the threat of Russian airstrikes.
Ukraine’s second largest city, which banned mass public events when Russia invaded in February 2022, is regularly targeted by missiles that can hit as little as 45 seconds after they are fired from across the Russian border 30km (19 miles) away.
The Kharkiv State Academic Opera and Ballet theatre, which stopped performing on stage because of the risks, has kitted out its basement with a stage, a makeshift orchestra pit and rows of seats, Reuters reported.
It plans to ask city officials to allow them to perform regularly, as the basement essentially serves as a bomb shelter. It held a dress rehearsal in front of theatre staff, friends and family on Friday.
“We missed performing on stage,” said troupe member Olena Starikova.
“We sang at many places – garages, forests, schools, kindergartens, hospitals – but there’s nothing like the stage. Opera is a fairytale. All of us, the ballet troupe, the opera troupe, we are all incredibly happy.”
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Ukraine will introduce mandatory registration of food export companies in an aim to prevent abuses such as tax avoidance in the export of key agrarian goods, the government said in a resolution published on Wednesday.
Ukraine is one of the world’s leading food producers and exporters, but officials estimate that up to a third of goods for subsequent export are bought in cash and without paying the necessary taxes.
An additional problem is the illegal concealment or delay of foreign currency proceeds on accounts outside of Ukraine, Reuters reported.
According to the new procedure, only companies that are registered in the State Agrarian Register, are value added tax payers and have no tax debts or delays in the return of foreign currency proceeds may engage in exports.
“The purpose of the pilot project is to create conditions for preventing abuses and violations of the law during the export of goods,” the government said.
It said the move would also “ensure the protection of the rights of agricultural entities that carry out economic activities without violating the law”.
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Russia launched a score of drones and a missile in an overnight attack that targeted military and critical infrastructure, Ukraine’s air force said, while regional officials said the Kremenchuk oil refinery was hit.
On the Telegram messaging app, the air force said 18 of the 20 Russian-launched kamikaze Shahed drones were destroyed before reaching their targets, as was the missile.
But a repeated target of earlier Russian attacks, the Kremenchuk oil refinery in the central region of Poltava, was struck, setting it ablaze, according to Filip Pronin, head of the region’s military administration.
“[The fire] has been extinguished. The situation is under control,” he said on Telegram, adding that there were no reports yet of casualties as officials sought to gather more details of the destruction.
It was not immediately clear how the refinery was hit.
The refinery, which Pronin said was not operating, has been attacked repeatedly since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine 20 months ago.
Reuters could not independently verify the reports. There was no immediate comment from Russia.
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US senators from both sides of politics indicate support for Ukraine funding
US senators from both parties indicated support for funding for Ukraine, voicing doubts on Tuesday about a House Republican plan to split US president Joe Biden’s request for a $106bn aid package.
The package combines funding for Israel and Ukraine, but also includes money to boost competition with China in the Indo-Pacific, as well as security along the US border with Mexico.
On Monday, in the first major legislative action under new Speaker Mike Johnson, a standalone supplemental spending bill was unveiled for Israel only. That bill seeks to provide $14.3bn in aid to Israel by cutting Internal Revenue Service funding – and does not provide aid to Ukraine.
Top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer said the Republican bill would be dead on arrival in the upper chamber, even if it passed the House. “The bottom line is it’s not a serious proposal,” Schumer told reporters. Biden threatened to veto the bill if it were to pass.
Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader in the Senate, said “We need to treat all four of these areas, all four of them, Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan and the border,” he told reporters.
Meanwhile, the secretary of state, Antony Blinken, met with the new speaker Mike Johnson on Tuesday, after testifying in the Senate. Blinken told reporters: “It was a very good meeting. I appreciate the opportunity. I’ll leave our conversation at that.”
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Ukraine president warns against expecting too much success too quickly
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said: “The modern world is set up in such a way that it becomes accustomed to success too quickly. When the full-scale aggression began, many in the world did not think Ukraine would endure,” in his nightly video address on Tuesday.
Zelenskiy has previously rejected criticism, mainly from western sources, that the counteroffensive against Russia was proceeding too slowly, saying the war was not akin to a Hollywood movie set.
Ukraine’s military said Russian forces were gearing up for fresh attacks in different sections of the front, but there has been little movement along the 1,000km frontline in recent months.
Ukraine’s president applauded Ukrainian offensive moves that have restricted the operations of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, but he said no one should expect rapid success stories in repelling Russia’s 20-month-old invasion.
Zelenskiy also said a meeting with senior commanders had looked at sectors engulfed by the fiercest fighting, including the key areas of Avdiivka and Kupiansk where Russia has been on the offensive in recent weeks.
Vitaliy Barabash, the head of the military administration in Avdiivka, said the shattered eastern city was bracing for another wave of the attacks it had been withstanding since mid-October.
Russian accounts of the fighting said Moscow’s forces had conducted successful attacks near the town of Bakhmut – an area largely destroyed and captured by Russian forces in May. Reuters could not verify accounts of fighting from either side.
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Welcome and summary
Hello and welcome to today’s live coverage of the war in Ukraine. My name is Tom Ambrose and I’ll be with you for the next few hours.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has warned against expecting too much success too quickly in Ukraine’s campaign to reclaim occupied lands. Despite Kyiv’s gruelling months-long offensive, the vast frontline in Ukraine’s east and south has moved little in the past year. “We live in a world that gets used to success too quickly. When the full-scale invasion began, many people around the world did not believe that Ukraine would survive,” Zelenskiy said in his nightly video address on Tuesday.
More on this shortly. In the meantime, here are the other key recent developments:
A senior UN official says Russian strikes are inflicting “unimaginable suffering” on the people of Ukraine and that more than 18 million Ukrainians – 40% of the population – need humanitarian assistance. Ramesh Rajasingham, the director of coordination in the UN humanitarian office, told the UN security council on Tuesday that thousands of civilians have been killed in strikes on homes, schools, fields and markets since Russia’s invasion in February 2022. The UN human rights office has formally verified 9,900 civilians killed, but he said “the actual number is certainly higher”.
The US defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, said Russia would be successful in Ukraine unless Washington’s support for Kyiv continued. “I can guarantee that without our support Putin will be successful,” Austin said during a Senate hearing on President Joe Biden’s request for $106bn to fund plans for Ukraine, Israel and American security.
Russia has reportedly imposed additional currency controls in an attempt to prop up the falling rouble, restricting western companies that sell their Russian assets from taking the proceeds in dollars and euros. International companies that want to exit Russia after its invasion of Ukraine have to sell their assets in roubles under new government restrictions, according to the Financial Times, which cited people familiar with the matter.
Three Russians were arrested in New York for evading US sanctions to ship electronic components for weapons used by Moscow in its war in Ukraine, authorities said. The trio are accused of evading sanctions to dispatch, over the course of a year, “over 300 shipments of restricted items, valued at approximately $10m, to the Russian battlefield”, Ivan Arvelo, special agent with the US Department of Homeland Security, said in a statement. The three defendants are yet to enter a plea.
Nato’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, said he was certain Sweden would join the defence alliance but declined to predict an exact time for when this would happen, Reuters reported.
Two Russian soldiers have been arrested on suspicion of killing a family of nine, including two young children, in their home in the Russian-occupied eastern Ukrainian town of Volnovakha.
Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) has detained an accomplice in the attempted killing of the former Ukrainian politician and pro-Russian politician and businessman Oleg Tsaryov, Russian state news agencies reported.
The UN human rights office has found “reasonable grounds” to conclude a missile strike that killed 59 people in a cafe in the Ukrainian village of Hroza was launched by Russia’s armed forces, the office said.
Police in France have detained the Russian tycoon Alexey Kuzmichev and raided two of his properties in connection with alleged tax evasion, money laundering and sanctions violations.
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