The first shipment of grain to leave Ukraine under a deal to ease Russia’s naval blockade has reached Turkey. The Sierra Leone-registered ship, Razoni, set sail from Odesa port for Lebanon on Monday under an accord brokered by Turkey and the United Nations. The ship has been inspected by members of the Joint Coordination Centre, and is now expected to move through the Bosporus strait “shortly”.
The Ukrainian president has dismissed the importance of the first grain export shipment from his country since Russia invaded, saying it was carrying a fraction of the crop Kyiv must sell to help salvage its shattered economy. Volodymr Zelenskiy’s downbeat comments, via video to students in Australia on Wednesday, came as an inspection of the ship was completed in Turkey before it continues to its final destination in Lebanon under a deal aimed at easing a global food crisis.
The German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, has insisted that Russia had no reason to hold up the return of a gas turbine for the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline. The turbine is stranded in Germany, following servicing in Canada, in an escalating standoff that has resulted in flows to Europe falling to a trickle, just 20% of capacity. Standing next to the turbine on a factory visit to Siemens Energy in Mülheim an der Ruhr, Scholz said it was fully operational and could be shipped back to Russia at any time – provided Moscow was willing to take it back.
Russia has started creating a military strike force aimed at Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s hometown of Kryvyi Rih and warned that Moscow could be preparing new offensive operations in southern Ukraine, Ukraine said on Wednesday. Russia holds swathes of Ukraine’s south that it captured in the early phases of its invasion, but Kyiv has said it will mount a counter-offensive. It said on Tuesday it had already recaptured 53 villages in occupied Kherson region, Reuters reports.
The UN has said that there have been over 10m border crossings into and out of Ukraine since Russia launched its latest invasion of the country on 24 February. Data gathered by the UNHCR states that 6,180,345 individual refugees from Ukraine are now recorded across Europe. Ukraine’s neighbours have taken the largest individual numbers. Poland has 1.25 million refugees.
In its latest operation briefing, Russia’s ministry of defence has claimed that its strike on Radekhiv in the Lviv region “destroyed a storage base with foreign-made weapons and ammunition delivered to the Kyiv regime from Poland”. Earlier today, Lviv’s governor acknowledged the strike, and said “one building was damaged. Fortunately, no one was hurt.”
The UK’s Ministry of Defence says there is likely to be an increase in civilians attempting to flee Kherson and the surrounding area as hostilities continue and food shortages worsen, putting pressure on transport routes. They have also said that a Ukrainian strike against a Russian ammunition train in Kherson oblast, southern Ukraine, means it is “highly unlikely” the rail link between Kherson and Crimea is operational.
Mykola Tochytskyi, deputy minister of foreign affairs, has repeated Ukraine’s request for the skies over nuclear installations to be closed to prevent a potential accident and their misuse. He said: “For the first time in history, civil nuclear facilities have been turned into military targets and springboards for the Russian army in breach of the non-proliferation provisions on peaceful use of nuclear energy. The world witnesses how nuclear terrorism, sponsored by the nuclear-weapon state, is arising in reality. The robust joint actions are needed to prevent nuclear disaster at global scale. We ask to close the sky over the nuclear power plants in Ukraine.”
The US embassy in Kyiv has criticised what it says is a decision by Roskomnadzor, the Russian government’s media agency, to block a US government website – share.america.gov.
The Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, has said the US has not offered Russia to resume talks on the New Start nuclear arms reduction treaty.
Gerhard Schröder, a former German chancellor and friend of Vladimir Putin, said the Russian president wanted a negotiated solution to the war in Ukraine and last month’s agreement on grain shipments might offer a way forward. “The good news is that the Kremlin wants a negotiated solution,” Schröder told Stern weekly and broadcasters RTL/ntv, adding he had met Putin in Moscow last week. “A first success is the grain deal, perhaps that can be slowly expanded to a ceasefire.”
Ukraine has said any negotiated peace settlement with Moscow would be contingent on a ceasefire and the withdrawal of Russian troops, brushing off comments by Schroeder. In response on Wednesday, Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak described Schroeder derisively as a “voice of the Russian royal court”.
Schröder has come under fire for a private meeting held with the Russian leader, Vladimir Putin, after he travelled on holiday to Moscow to meet him. Schröder is facing an investigation by the Social Democrats of which he has been a member since 1963, over his Kremlin links and his refusal to distance himself from Putin, and could yet be ejected from the party.
Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s first minister, has been accused of glorifying war after she retweeted a Ukrainian tweet listing Russia’s war dead – described in an embedded graphic as “eliminated personnel”, before she quickly deleted it. The original tweet from the Ukrainian defence ministry quoted a Robert Burns poem saying “tyrants fall in every foe! Liberty’s in every blow! Let us do or die!”
Ukrainian refugees are likely to become victims of rising tensions and disinformation campaigns in their host countries, a report has warned. False reports exaggerating how much aid refugees receive compared with local people, as well as linking refugees with violent crime and political extremism, could cause a breakdown in relations with local communities, the charity World Vision said.
A group of Russian soldiers have accused their commanders of jailing them in eastern Ukraine for refusing to take part in the war. About 140 soldiers were detained and four have filed complaints with an investigative committee, said Maxim Grebenyuk, head of Moscow-based group Military Ombudsman.
Russia has accused the US of being “directly involved” in the war by supplying targeting information for Ukraine’s long-range missile strikes. Vadym Skibitsky, Ukraine’s acting deputy head of military intelligence, denied US officials were providing direct targeting information but acknowledged there was consultation.
The US has imposed sanctions on Vladimir Putin’s purported lover. Alina Kabaeva, 39, landed on the latest update to the Office of Foreign Assets Control’s specially designated nationals list – freezing any of her assets in the US and generally prohibiting Americans from dealing with her.
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Russia’s supreme court has designated the Azov regiment – a former volunteer battalion that was incorporated into Ukraine’s army – a “terrorist” organisation, allowing for lengthy jail terms for its members.
The G7 is threatening to further deprive Russia of revenue by blocking services that enable the transportation of its oil globally if it doesn’t heed the proposed oil price cap. Russia has already stated it will not obey the cap and will ship to nations that don’t support the price ceiling.
Russia has carried out deadly strikes against Ukrainians in the eastern Kharkiv and Mykolaiv regions, according to Reuters, which said it was yet to verify the battle reports.
