Summary
Warren Murray
Hello and welcome back to the Guardian’s live coverage of the Russian war against Ukraine. We begin the day as always with a summary of recent developments …
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Vladimir Putin called the US delivery of long-range tactical ballistic missiles to Kyiv “another mistake by the United States” in his first public comments since an unprecedented Ukrainian strike destroyed helicopters at two airfields in Russian-occupied territory this week. The Russian president also claimed that the delivery of the Atacms missiles, which can strike targets more than 100 miles away and deliver salvoes with cluster munitions, would “simply prolong [Ukraine’s] agony.”
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Images of Hungary’s prime minister shaking hands with Putin were “very, very unpleasant” and defied logic given Budapest’s past history with Moscow, the Estonian prime minister, Kaja Kallas, said. Viktor Orbán and Putin held talks in China on Tuesday, with the Hungarian prime minister telling the Russian president he had never wanted to oppose Moscow and is trying to salvage bilateral contacts.
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Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, arrived in North Korea on Wednesday, Russian news agencies said, with a Kremlin spokesperson telling the Tass news agency that the two-day visit was expected to lay the groundwork for a future trip to the country by Putin. The trip took place days after the US said Pyongyang had transferred munitions to Russia for the war in Ukraine.
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Russian attacks in the past two days have killed at least 10 civilians in Ukraine and damaged the power grid in the north-eastern city of Kharkiv, Ukrainian officials said. Among the targets hit was a residential building in the south-eastern city of Zaporizhzhia.
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The lower house of the Russian parliament has passed the second and third readings of a bill that revokes Russia’s ratification of the comprehensive nuclear test ban treaty. Both were passed unanimously by 415 votes to zero. Ukraine’s foreign ministry later condemned the steps taken, and urged the international community to respond to Moscow’s “provocations”.
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US President Joe Biden is to give a primetime speech to Americans on Thursday on the war in Israel and in Ukraine, the White House said. There have been concerns that the war between Israel and Hamas may divert military and international support from Kyiv.
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French President Emmanuel Macron reaffirmed his country’s support for Ukraine during a phone call on Wednesday with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the French presidency said. “He assured the Ukrainian president that the proliferation of crises would not weaken French and European support for Ukraine, which will be there for as long as it takes,” said Macron’s office.
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Gen Oleksandr Tarnavskyi, in charge of Ukraine’s operations in the south, said Ukrainian forces had had “partial success to the south of Robotyne.” Robotyne is one of a group of villages in the south that Ukraine wants to secure as part of its advance towards the Sea of Azov – aimed at severing a land bridge linking Russian positions in the south and east.
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Biden is reportedly to propose a joint $100bn package for Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan and the migration crisis at the US-Mexico border this week. The package is intended to bypass congressional chaos and bring Democrats, who have sought additional aid for Kyiv for weeks, together with Republicans, who want funds to tighten controls on the southern border.
Key events
Here are some of the latest images from the news wires.
Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov met North Korean leader Kim Jong-un during his visit to Pyongyang, the Russian foreign ministry said on Thursday.
The ministry did not provide any details of the meeting, which, according to state-run Tass news agency, lasted just over an hour.
Lavrov also spoke with North Korean foreign minister, Choe Son Hui, according to Reuters.
Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, thanked North Korea for backing his country’s military actions in Ukraine and pledged Moscow’s “complete support and solidarity” for North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, Russia’s foreign ministry said.
Lavrov’s two-day visit comes a month after North Korean leader Kim made a rare trip to Russia, during which he invited Putin to Pyongyang and discussed military cooperation, according to Reuters.
Speaking at a reception hosted by North Korea on Wednesday, Lavrov said Moscow strongly valued Pyongyang’s “unwavering and principled support” for Russia in the Ukraine war, which it calls a “special military operation”.
Lavrov said:
Likewise the Russian Federation extends its complete support and solidarity with the aspirations of the DPRK [Democratic People’s Republic of Korea].
After talks with North Korean foreign minister, Choe Son Hui, Lavrov later told reporters that increased military activities by the US and its allies Japan and South Korea were a cause for concern, Russia’s state-run RIA news agency reported.
Russia has detained an editor at US-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) for failing to register as a foreign agent while visiting Russia for a family emergency, the broadcaster said.
Russia has tightened its control over the media since the start of the Ukraine war, forcing the closure of leading independent news outlets and designating many journalists and publications as “foreign agents”, Reuters reports.
After the war and the arrest of Wall Street Journal correspondent Evan Gershkovich in March on spying charges, almost all US journalists have left Russia. The state department has repeatedly urged US citizens to leave Russia.
Alsu Kurmasheva, an editor with Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Tatar-Bashkir Service who holds both U.S. and Russian passports, travelled to Russia on 20 May for a family emergency.
As Kurmasheva sought to leave Russia at the end of that trip, she was detained and her passports were confiscated as she awaited her return flight. She was fined for failing to register her US passport with Russian authorities.
Russian authorities announced on 18 October that Kurmasheva, who is based in Prague, had been charged with not registering as a “foreign agent”, RFE/RL said.
RFE/RL acting president Jeffrey Gedmin said:
Alsu is a highly respected colleague, devoted wife, and dedicated mother to two children.
She needs to be released so she can return to her family immediately.
Russia’s Tatar-Inform news agency said Kurmasheva had failed to register as a “foreign agent” while gathering information on Russia’s military activity. She could face up to five years in prison, according to RFE/RL, which called for her release.
The Russian government has yet to comment on her detention.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said the EU must collectively continue to financially support Ukraine in future, but the use of additional funds was not a solution long term.
On Thursday, Scholz said:
We have a clear stance here: This aid for Ukraine, for the financial stability of the country, we will have to provide this jointly as Europeans.
Scholz added “that this cannot all be solved with additional funds”.
Lavrov criticises US, Japan and South Korea on visit to Pyongyang
Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov has criticised the US and its allies Japan and South Korea for pursuing a “dangerous” military policy towards North Korea, as he held talks with officials in Pyongyang.
At a press conference in Pyongyang, he said:
Like our North Korean friends, we are seriously worried about the intensification of military activity of the United States, Japan and South Korea in the region and by Washington’s policies.
We oppose this unconstructive and dangerous line.
He added that the US was placing “strategic infrastructure, including nuclear elements” in the region, AFP reports. He did not elaborate.
Lavrov said Russia backed “a regular negotiating process on security issues in the Korean peninsula”, adding that Moscow, Beijing and Pyongyang were seeking to propose “constructive alternatives” to de-escalate tensions in the region.
The veteran envoy’s meetings in Pyongyang are expected to lay the groundwork for a future visit by Russian leader Vladimir Putin, who was invited by North Korean leader Kim Jong-un last month at a high-profile summit in Russia’s far east.
Russian forces carried out airstrikes overnight on targets in eastern, southern and northern Ukraine, Kyiv’s military said on Thursday.
There were no immediate reports of casualties.
The air force said 17 different weapons, including ballistic and cruise missiles and attack drones, had been used to strike industrial, infrastructure, civilian and military objects, Reuters reports.
Ukrainian forces shot down three drones and one cruise missile, it said.
Russia said it has sent 27 tonnes of humanitarian aid for civilians in the Gaza Strip to be transported from Egypt, Moscow’s emergency situations ministry said.
Ilya Denisov, deputy minister, said in a statement:
A special plane has taken off from the airport at Ramenskoye near Moscow for El-Arish in Egypt. The Russian humanitarian aid will be handed over to the Egyptian Red Crescent to be sent to the Gaza Strip.
Denisov said the aid included “wheat, sugar, rice [and] pasta”.
US President Joe Biden on Wednesday unveiled a deal to allow desperately needed humanitarian aid to enter Gaza, where one million people have fled their homes amid Israeli airstrikes, AFP reports.
After face-to-face talks in Israel and intense telephone diplomacy with Egypt, Biden said a limited number of trucks would be allowed to cross the shuttered Rafah crossing from Egypt into Gaza from Friday.
China is willing to expand trilateral cooperation with Mongolia and Russia, including the building of a trilateral economic corridor, president Xi Jinping told visiting Mongolian president Ukhnaa Khurelsukh on Thursday.
China will, as always, help Mongolia revitalise its economy, advance the construction of land ports in an orderly manner, and open up new channels of connectivity between the two countries, Chinese state media cited Xi as saying during his meeting with Khurelsukh, Reuters reports.
Russia has proposed a China-bound trans-national natural gas pipeline that cuts through Mongolia.
The Russian foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, has arrived in North Korea, the fellow pariah state that Moscow is calling upon for weapons to use against Ukraine.
Lavrov arrived on Wednesday night for a two-day visit.
On Friday, the US said arms shipments from North Korea to Russia were under way, with 1,000 containers of military equipment and munitions arriving in recent weeks. Pyongyang was seeking a range of military assistance from Russia in return, including advanced technologies, White House national security spokesperson John Kirby told reporters.
Kim Jong-un, the North Korean ruler, in September travelled to Russia onboard his specially built bulletproof train for a face-to-face meeting with his fellow regime leader Vladimir Putin, declaring their bilateral ties his country’s “number one priority”.
So far today, more customary blandishments have been exchanged by Lavrov and his hosts. “After the landmark summit … we can say confidently that [Russia-North Korea] relations have reached a qualitatively new, strategic level,” Lavrov reportedly told North Korean foreign minister Choe Son Hui.
North Korea has conducted a series of weapons tests this year and recently enshrined its illegal status as a nuclear weapons state in its constitution. South Korea is supplying ammunition to Ukraine, and has moved to strengthen its alliance with the US while entering a trilateral defence arrangement that also includes Japan.
Summary
Warren Murray
Hello and welcome back to the Guardian’s live coverage of the Russian war against Ukraine. We begin the day as always with a summary of recent developments …
-
Vladimir Putin called the US delivery of long-range tactical ballistic missiles to Kyiv “another mistake by the United States” in his first public comments since an unprecedented Ukrainian strike destroyed helicopters at two airfields in Russian-occupied territory this week. The Russian president also claimed that the delivery of the Atacms missiles, which can strike targets more than 100 miles away and deliver salvoes with cluster munitions, would “simply prolong [Ukraine’s] agony.”
-
Images of Hungary’s prime minister shaking hands with Putin were “very, very unpleasant” and defied logic given Budapest’s past history with Moscow, the Estonian prime minister, Kaja Kallas, said. Viktor Orbán and Putin held talks in China on Tuesday, with the Hungarian prime minister telling the Russian president he had never wanted to oppose Moscow and is trying to salvage bilateral contacts.
-
Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, arrived in North Korea on Wednesday, Russian news agencies said, with a Kremlin spokesperson telling the Tass news agency that the two-day visit was expected to lay the groundwork for a future trip to the country by Putin. The trip took place days after the US said Pyongyang had transferred munitions to Russia for the war in Ukraine.
-
Russian attacks in the past two days have killed at least 10 civilians in Ukraine and damaged the power grid in the north-eastern city of Kharkiv, Ukrainian officials said. Among the targets hit was a residential building in the south-eastern city of Zaporizhzhia.
-
The lower house of the Russian parliament has passed the second and third readings of a bill that revokes Russia’s ratification of the comprehensive nuclear test ban treaty. Both were passed unanimously by 415 votes to zero. Ukraine’s foreign ministry later condemned the steps taken, and urged the international community to respond to Moscow’s “provocations”.
-
US President Joe Biden is to give a primetime speech to Americans on Thursday on the war in Israel and in Ukraine, the White House said. There have been concerns that the war between Israel and Hamas may divert military and international support from Kyiv.
-
French President Emmanuel Macron reaffirmed his country’s support for Ukraine during a phone call on Wednesday with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the French presidency said. “He assured the Ukrainian president that the proliferation of crises would not weaken French and European support for Ukraine, which will be there for as long as it takes,” said Macron’s office.
-
Gen Oleksandr Tarnavskyi, in charge of Ukraine’s operations in the south, said Ukrainian forces had had “partial success to the south of Robotyne.” Robotyne is one of a group of villages in the south that Ukraine wants to secure as part of its advance towards the Sea of Azov – aimed at severing a land bridge linking Russian positions in the south and east.
-
Biden is reportedly to propose a joint $100bn package for Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan and the migration crisis at the US-Mexico border this week. The package is intended to bypass congressional chaos and bring Democrats, who have sought additional aid for Kyiv for weeks, together with Republicans, who want funds to tighten controls on the southern border.
