The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said late on Monday that its representatives had inspected a damaged cooling tower at the Russia-controlled Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant in Ukraine but could not immediately determine the cause of a fire there at the weekend. Moscow and Kyiv have accused each other of starting the fire at the vast dormant nuclear power plant in Ukraine, with Russia blaming a drone attack and Ukraine saying it was likely Russia’s negligence or arson.
Ukraine said on Monday its biggest cross-border assault of the war had captured 1,000 sq km (386 sq miles) of Russia’s Kursk region and that Russian President Vladimir Putin would have to be forced into making peace. “We continue to conduct an offensive operation in the Kursk region. Currently, we control about 1,000 square kilometres of the territory of the Russian Federation,” Ukraine’s top commander Oleksandr Syrskyi told President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in a video briefing that was posted on Zelenskiy’s Telegram account.
Russia’s acting regional governor of Kursk, estimated that Kyiv’s forces had taken control of 28 settlements in an incursion that was about 12 km deep and 40 km wide. Though less than half Syrkyi’s estimate of the Ukrainian gains, Smirnov’s remarks were a striking public admission of a major Russian setback more than 29 months since it launched a full-scale invasion of its smaller neighbour. It was not possible to verify either claim independently.
In a meeting with his national security council Russian President, Vladimir Putin, said the attack was aimed at improving Kyiv’s negotiating position ahead of possible peace talks and at slowing the advance of Russian forces. “The main task, of course, is for the defence ministry to squeeze out, to knock out the enemy from our territories,” Putin said, adding: “The enemy will certainly receive a worthy response.”
Zelenskiy said the Kursk attack was targeting areas from which Russia was launching assaults on Ukrainian territory. “It is only fair to destroy Russian terrorists where they are, where they launch their strikes from,” he said in his nightly address. “Russian military airfields, Russian logistics. We see how useful this can be for bringing peace closer. Russia must be forced into peace if Putin wants to continue waging war so badly. He added: “Russia brought war to others, and now it is coming home.”
Ukrainian forces in Kursk were trying to encircle Sudzha, where Russian natural gas flows into Ukraine, Reuters reported. Major battles were also under way near Korenevo, about 22 km (14 miles) from the border, and Martynovka village.
Putin said on Monday that, despite the attack, “our armed forces are moving forward along the entire line of contact” in Ukraine. Russia’s defence ministry said on Monday its troops had “accelerated the speed of advance” in the eastern Donetsk region and taken the hamlet of Lysychne in their push towards the city of Pokrovsk. It was not possible to verify the claim independently.
Ukrainian prosecutors said on Monday that law enforcement authorities had detained one of the country’s four deputy energy ministers and three other people as they were receiving part of a $500,000 bribe. An investigation revealed that the suspects had organised a scheme to smuggle mining equipment belonging to a state-owned coal mining enterprise out of the combat zone in the Donetsk region, according to the Prosecutor General’s Office of Ukraine. The suspects were not named.
