Ukrainian forces are finding it hard to stave off Russian attacks in the centre of Sievierodonestk but Moscow does not control the eastern city, regional officials say. Russian forces have seized residential quarters of the key eastern city and are fighting to take control of an industrial zone on its outskirts and the nearby towns, the Russian defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, said. Satellite imagery from Maxar Technologies showed significant damage in Sievierodonetsk and nearby Rubizhne.
Serhiy Haidai, Ukraine’s governor of Luhansk, has said “nobody is going to surrender Sievierodonetsk”. He said that the regional centre of Luhansk was experiencing the most intense fighting, saying: “Fierce battles are taking place in Sievierodonetsk, our defenders are fighting for every inch of the city.”
The Russian ministry of defence claims that “the Ukrainian group in the Donbas suffers significant losses in manpower, weapons and military equipment”. Russia claims to have shot down two MiG-29 aircraft and a Mi-8 helicopter in the Mykolaiv region, and also 11 unmanned drones in the last 24 hours.
The UK Ministry of Defence has said it is unlikely that either side has gained significant ground in the last 24 hours.
800 civilians have taken refuge in a chemical factory in Sievierodonetsk, according to a lawyer for Dmytro Firtash, whose company owns the facility. “These 800 civilians include about 200 out of the plant’s 3,000 employees and approximately 600 inhabitants of the city of Sievierodonetsk,” Lanny Davis, a US lawyer, said in a statement published on the company website.
Russian-installed officials in the occupied part of Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region reportedly plan to stage a referendum later this year on joining Russia. A Kremlin-backed official, Vladimir Rogov, was quoted by the Russian state-owned news agency Tass as saying: “The people will determine the future of the Zaporizhzhia region. The wording of the questions will be presented in the near future. The vast majority of residents of our region want to return to their native harbour as soon as possible and become part of greater Russia.” Ukraine says any referendums held under Russian occupation would be illegal and their results fraudulent.
Dozens of radiation detectors around Ukraine’s Chornobyl nuclear power plant have started transmitting radiation data for the first time since Russia invaded, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Radiation levels in the area surrounding Chornobyl are now back to normal after detectors came back online today, according to the UN nuclear watchdog.
Millions of people could die of hunger unless Russia lifts the blockade on Ukraine’s ports on the Black Sea, Italy’s foreign minister, Luigi Di Maio, has warned. Lebanon’s minister for foreign affairs, Abdallah Bou Habib, told a meeting of Mediterranean ministers that rises in the cost of fuel and basic foodstuffs were exacerbating the crisis in his country.
The Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, said the onus was on Ukraine to solve the problem of resuming grain shipments. Lavrov said no action was required on the Russian side. “We state daily that we’re ready to guarantee the safety of vessels leaving Ukrainian ports and heading for the Bosphorus gulf. To solve the problem, the only thing needed is for the Ukrainians to let vessels out of their ports, either by de-mining them or by marking out safe corridors.”
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said he “simply cannot see the preconditions for ending the war” in an interview with the Financial Times. Victory meant restoring “all” of Ukraine’s territory, including Crimea – annexed by Russia in 2014 – and separatist-held areas, he suggested. “We have to achieve a full de-occupation of our entire territory,” he said.
Ukraine is launching a “Book of Executioners”, a system to collate evidence of war crimes Kyiv says were committed during Russia’s occupation, Zelenskiy said yesterday. Ukraine has filed eight more war crimes cases to court in addition to the three sentences already handed down to Russian soldiers, according to its prosecutor general, Iryna Venediktova.
Russia has handed over to Kyiv the bodies of 210 Ukrainian fighters, most of whom died defending the city of Mariupol from Russian forces at a vast steel works, the Ukrainian military confirmed.
Ukraine and Russia each handed over the bodies of 50 of their deceased soldiers in an exchange that included 37 Ukrainian soldiers killed at Mariupol’s Azovstal steelworks, the Ukrainian ministry for reintegration has confirmed. The exchange took place on the front lines in the southeast Ukrainian region of Zaporizhzhia, the ministry said.
The Kremlin said any meeting between the leaders of Russia and Ukraine must be “productive and well prepared”. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov also said western sanctions must be lifted in order for Russian grain to be delivered to international markets.
More than 1,000 Ukrainian service personnel and foreign mercenaries, who had surrendered in Mariupol, have been transferred to Russia for an investigation there, a law enforcement source told Russian state-owned news agency, Tass.
Norway has donated 22 self-propelled howitzers to Ukraine, including spare parts, ammunition and other gear, the Norwegian defence ministry said.
Laurence Boone, the chief economist at the Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has said the world economy was paying a “hefty price” for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. She said: “As Russia and Ukraine are large commodity exporters, the war has sent energy and food prices soaring, making life much harder for many people across the world.”
Russian proxy fighters in east Ukraine have said they are opening a trial against two Britons, Aiden Aslin and Shaun Pinner, who were captured fighting alongside Ukrainian soldiers in Mariupol. The two men, who are serving in the Ukrainian military, and Ibrahim Saadun, a captive from Morocco, were shown sitting in a courtroom cage reserved for defendants in a video released on pro-Russian social media channels on Tuesday.
The European Union needs to build warehouses and extend railway tracks across the Ukrainian border to help Kyiv in its attempts to move more grain out of the country to those who need it, says the country’s trade representative. Ukraine will not be able to export more than 2m tonnes of grain a month, around a third of prewar levels, as long as its main trade routes through its Black Sea ports remain blockaded by Russia, said Taras Kachka.
The World Bank has approved $1.49bn of additional financing for Ukraine to help pay wages for government and social workers, expanding the bank’s total pledged support for Kyiv to more than $4bn. The latest round of funding is supported by financing guarantees from Britain, the Netherlands, Lithuania and Latvia.
Russia is ramping up oil exports from its major eastern port of Kozmino as it aims to offset the impact of EU sanctions with the surging demand from Asian buyers. Sources told Reuters that Russia has already increased the amount of crude pumped to Kozmino on its main Asian oil route, the East Siberia Pacific Ocean (ESPO) pipeline, by 70,000 barrels a day (bpd).
Moscow’s chief rabbi has reportedly fled Russia, after coming under pressure to support Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. Journalist Avital Chizhik-Goldschmidt tweeted late on Tuesday: “Can finally share that my in-laws, Moscow chief rabbi Pinchas Goldschmidt and Rebbetzin Dara Goldschmidt, have been put under pressure by authorities to publicly support the ‘special operation’ in Ukraine – and refused.”
