Tag Archives: Black Sea

World

On Snake Island, the rocky Black Sea outcrop that became a Ukraine war legend

Leave a comment


Snake Island, Ukraine
CNN
 — 

Snake Island has a special place in Ukraine’s folklore, now more than ever. Its defiant defense – when a Russian warship was famously told to “go f*** yourself” – and then reconquest rallied a nation in the early months of the conflict with Russia, puncturing the myth of the invaders’ superiority.

Now, whipped by winter winds, it remains firmly in Ukrainian hands – a speck of rock that has both symbolic and strategic significance.

A CNN team became the first foreign media to visit the island since it was recaptured in June, and to speak with the commander of the operation that led to its liberation.

A few acres of rock and grass, treeless and difficult to access, Snake Island, also known as Zmiinyi Island, lies around 30 miles (48 kilometers) off the Ukrainian coast, near its maritime border with Romania.

Getting there proved challenging: An hour being pitched from wave to wave in a small boat, showered with spray, in sub-freezing temperatures. The Black Sea can be unforgiving, and so can its hazardous coastline. On the way back our dirigible boat got stuck on a sandbar, and it took six hours before we were transferred, one-by-one, to another vessel in the darkness.

Snake Island is now a desolate place, strewn with wreckage, its few buildings reduced to shells, its half-sunken jetty battered by the tide. It’s a graveyard of expensive military hardware – and is littered with unexploded ordnance and mines. This is not a place to be careless.

The CNN team saw at least four different kinds of landmines, Russian Pantsir surface-to-air missile systems, and an almost intact Tor anti-air missile complex. There was also the carcass of a Russian military helicopter that was hit.

Wondering among the wreckage, in a surreal scene, were dozens of cats, probably the descendants of the lighthouse pets from a more peaceful time.

Ukraine keeps a small military presence on the island as an observation mission. One of that detachment is actually Russian, a volunteer with the Ukrainian forces who goes by the call-sign Fortuna.

He’d been living with his family in Ukraine. “And here comes Russia attacking us. If some other country had attacked us we’d fight too.”

Nowadays, he says, the Russians aren’t doing much attacking, at least in this corner of Ukraine.

“At this stage the Russians only perform air strikes,” Fortuna told CNN. “So we can hear them coming. Plus we have observers all along the perimeter and we receive intelligence. So usually we are warned about a possible attack.”

Occasionally they will see a Russian warship in the distance.

“We need to be on guard 24/7 so we never get bored. There is always something to get busy with,” Fortuna says.

The troops here can’t communicate with their families. Even when there is a signal, turning on your phone invites a strike. The small boats used to ferry supplies are often unable to make the trip, so a rotation here can get extended by the elements, sometimes for a week.

Snake Island fell in the first few days of the invasion in February, as Ukraine struggled on multiple fronts against Russian forces. But before it did, there was a show of defiance that immediately became a meme for Ukraine’s determined resistance.

Ordered to surrender by an approaching Russian vessel, one of the small detachment there responded by radio: “Russian warship: Go f*** yourself.”

Those words were echoed on everything from T-shirts to postage stamps and road signs.

One of the small detachment on the island told CNN it was a pivotal moment, encouraging people to fight and volunteer.

The man who led the operation to expel the Russians from the island, after they occupied it for several months, cannot reveal his real name. As an officer in military intelligence he goes by the call-sign Shakespeare.

“There are just four or five officers like me in Ukraine,” he told CNN. “if I give any details, everybody will recognize me.”

But he did provide a detailed account of the plan to retake the island, which was successful by the end of June.

Much of the hard work was done in May, when exposed Russian positions were targeted. “It was all about choosing the right kind of artillery and combination of artillery,” Shakespeare said.

“The Russians made a mistake in estimating we cannot reach them there. They thought we could only fire multiple rocket launchers at them, so they installed anti-air systems on the island. They were able to intercept our rockets, but we used complex strikes.”

“They just lost manpower and lots of expensive vehicles for nothing. This was their main mistake.”

French-made CAESARS as well as Grad rocket launchers were used, he said, though he was less complimentary about the Ukrainian-developed Bogdana howitzer, which has a range of 40 kilometers (25 miles).

“It was breaking more than firing,” Shakespeare told CNN.

They were plenty of challenges, particularly as launching artillery across the sea is nothing like firing it across land. “Different conditions, so aiming is complicated,” he added. Reconnaissance drones helped make the artillery fire more accurate.

The Ukrainians also used the Turkish-supplied Bayrakhtar drone before the Russians introduced electronic warfare measures and air defenses on the island.

But the Russians had to ship equipment from Sevastopol in Crimea to defend the island. And that was their second mistake, Shakespeare said. This was a long and exposed supply line vulnerable to Ukrainian anti-ship missiles.

Shakespeare recalled the initial landing at the end of June, after Russian positions had been pummeled.

“It was a unit from Special Ops Forces and deminers from the marine corps. Combat swimmers, divers. They checked water for the mines. Then others could approach the island on the vessels.”

What they found was a deserted scrap yard.

“There was nobody there … They left in a hurry leaving behind ammunition and equipment.”

That included the nearly intact Tor complex. “If they’d had the time, they would have blown it up,” Shakespeare added.

Besides the huge boost to Ukrainian morale, the recapture of Snake Island had a strategic purpose.

“Controlling Snake Island allows you to control the mouth of Danube. Without securing (the) island signing the grain deal would have been impossible,” Shakespeare said, referring to the UN-brokered grain initiative agreed in July that allowed Ukraine to restart exports through the Black Sea.

Our visit is necessarily brief. Our hosts don’t want Russia to have the time to plan something and the weather is deteriorating. In the slate-gray of the winter afternoon we are whisked away for our rendezvous with the sandbar.

But the mystery of the island stays with you. It is reputed to be the burial place of Achilles and once had a Greek temple. It was fought over by the Russian and Ottoman empires. It seems that every crag and cave hides a story.

Now there is a modern legend to add to those fables.

Read original article here

World

Oil tankers are getting stuck in the Black Sea. That could become a problem

Leave a comment



CNN
 — 

A bottleneck is building across an important trading route for oil, which if left unresolved could knock global supply and boost prices at a fragile moment for energy markets.

As of Thursday, 16 oil tankers traveling south from the Black Sea were waiting to cross the Bosphorus strait into the Sea of Marmara, an increase of five from Tuesday, according to a report from Istanbul-based Tribeca Shipping Agency. A further nine tankers were waiting to cross southbound from the Sea of Marmara through the Dardanelles strait into the Mediterranean.

The snarl-up in waterways controlled by Turkey, which Turkish officials said is mostly affecting crude oil shipments destined for Europe, has caught the attention of UK and US government officials who are now in talks with Ankara to resolve the growing impasse.

The snag is linked to a Western price cap on Russian oil that came into effect on Monday. The cap is supposed to limit the Kremlin’s revenues without adding to stress on the global economy by reducing supply. But Turkey is insisting that vessels prove they have insurance that will pay out in light of the new sanctions, before allowing them to pass through the straits linking the Black Sea and Mediterranean.

Although currently causing no disruption to global oil supply and thus prices, the hold-up could become a problem if left unresolved, said Jorge Leon, senior vice president for oil market analysis at Rystad Energy. “This is a very popular route around the world for global trade and specifically for crude,” he told CNN Business.

Countries including Russia, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan use the Turkish straits to get their oil to world oil markets.

The traffic jam in the Turkish straits arose following the imposition this week of the price cap on Russian oil. The cap bars ship owners carrying Russian oil from accessing insurance and other services from European providers unless the oil is sold for $60 a barrel or less.

In light of the cap, Turkish maritime authorities are concerned about the risk of accidents or oil spills involving uninsured vessels, and are preventing ships from passing through Turkish waters unless they can provide additional guarantees that their transit is covered.

In a notice issued last month by Turkey’s government ahead of the price cap, maritime director general Ünal Baylan said that given “catastrophic consequences” for the country in the event of an accident involving a crude tanker, “it is absolutely required for us to confirm in some way that their [protection and indemnity] insurance cover is still valid and comprehensive.”

The International Group of P&I Clubs, which provides protection and indemnity insurance for 90% of the goods shipped by sea, has said it cannot comply with the Turkish policy.

The Turkish government’s requirements “go well beyond the general information that is contained in a normal confirmation of entry letter” and would require P&I Clubs to confirm coverage even in the event of a breach of sanctions under EU, UK and US law, the UK P&I Club said in a statement.

Turkish officials say this position is “unacceptable” and on Thursday reiterated demands for letters from insurers. “The majority of the crude oil tankers waiting to cross the strait are EU ships and a majority of the petrol is destined for EU ports,” the Turkish maritime authority said in a statement.

“It is difficult to understand why EU-based insurance companies are refusing to provide this letter… for ships that belong to the EU, carrying crude oil to [the] EU when the sanctions in question have been set forth by the EU,” it added.

Western officials, clearly worried about potential disruption to oil supply, say they are in talks with Turkey’s government to resolve the situation.

US Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo told Turkish Deputy Foreign Minister Sedat Onal on a call that the price cap only applies to Russian oil and “does not necessitate additional checks on ships” passing through Turkish waters.

“Both officials highlighted their shared interest in keeping global energy markets well supplied by creating a simple compliance regime that would permit oil to transit the Turkish straits,” the Treasury Department said in a statement.

“The UK, US and EU are working closely with the Turkish government and the shipping and insurance industries to clarify the implementation of the Oil Price Cap and reach a resolution,” according to a statement from the UK Treasury.

“There is no reason for ships to be denied access to the Bosporus Straits for environmental or health and safety concerns,” it added.

Despite the backlog of tankers, the average waiting time to cross the Bosphorus strait is still well below where it was this time last year, according to Leon of Rystad Energy. “Given the reaction from UK and US officials, my hunch is that this is going to be resolved very soon,” he said.

-— Gül Tüysüz in Istanbul contributed to this article.



Read original article here

World

Heavy Russian barrage on Ukraine, no water for much of Kyiv

Leave a comment

KYIV, Ukraine — A massive barrage of Russian cruise missile and drone strikes hit critical infrastructure in Kyiv, Kharkiv and other Ukrainian cities early Monday, knocking out water and power supplies in apparent retaliation for what Moscow alleged was a Ukrainian attack on its Black Sea Fleet.

Russia has intensified its attacks on Ukraine’s power plants and other key infrastructure as the war enters its ninth month. Large parts of Ukraine are already experiencing rolling power cuts as a result.

“The Kremlin is taking revenge for military failures on peaceful people who are left without electricity and heat before the winter,” Kyiv region Gov. Oleksii Kuleba said.

Russia’s Defense Ministry said its forces carried out “strikes with long-range, high-precision air- and sea-based weapons against the military command and energy systems of Ukraine.”

“The goals of the strikes were achieved. All designated targets were hit,” the ministry said in a statement.

Meanwhile, 12 ships with grain left Ukrainian ports on Monday despite a Russian threat to reimpose a blockade that threatened hunger across the world, Ukraine’s Ministry of Infrastructure said. One vessel carried Ukrainian wheat to Ethiopia, where a severe drought is affecting millions of people.

Ukraine’s air force said it shot down 44 of more than 50 cruise missiles that Russia launched.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said Russian missiles and drones hit 10 Ukrainian regions and damaged 18 sites, mostly energy facilities.

Hundreds of localities in seven Ukrainian regions were left without power, he said in a Facebook post, adding that “the consequences could have been much worse” if the Ukrainian forces hadn’t shot down most of the Russian missiles.

Thirteen people were wounded as a result of the morning attacks, the head of National Police, Ihor Klymenko, said on national television.

Loud explosions were heard across the Ukrainian capital as residents prepared to go to work. The emergency services sent out text message warning about the threat of a missile attack, and air raid sirens wailed for three hours during the morning commute.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said 80% of consumers in the city of 3 million were left without water because of damage to a power facility. By Monday evening, workers had reduced the percentage to 40% and the number of apartments without electricity from 350,000 to 270,000. To cut power consumption, Kyiv authorities extended intervals between subway trains and replaced electric trolleybuses and trams with buses, Klitschko said. Subway service resumed Monday night.

Across Kyiv, hundreds lined up, often for more than an hour, to pump water by hand from wells to fill plastic bottles and cans.

“It has an influence on our lives, it is really inconvenient,” one 34-year-old resident, who agreed to provide only his first name, Denis, said as he collected water. “But the truth is, it’s not a problem. The problem is we have a war.”

Smoke rose from the left bank of the Dnieper River in Kyiv, either from a missile strike or where Ukrainian forces shot it down.

Associated Press reporters saw soldiers inspecting a crater and debris from where one of the missiles landed on the outskirts of Kyiv. The missiles flew fast and low and sounded like bombs exploding, according to witnesses.

“It was scary, actually,” said Oleksandr Ryabtsev, 28, who was on his way to work. “I raised my head and it was flying there. You could see this cruise missile, I didn’t even go to work. I went home.”

Prime Minister Shmyhal said that in the Kyiv, Zaporizhzhia, Dnipropetrovsk and Kharkiv regions, emergency power shutdowns were underway. “Today, just like in previous weeks, it is important that Ukrainians consume energy mindfully and reduce the load on the grid,” the official said.

In the eastern city of Kharkiv, two strikes hit critical infrastructure facilities, according to authorities, and the subway ceased operating.

Critical infrastructure sites were also hit in the Cherkasy region southeast of Kyiv. In the Kirovohrad region of central Ukraine, an energy facility was hit, according to local authorities. In Vinnytsia, remnants of a missile that was shot down landed on civilian buildings, resulting in damage but no casualties, according to regional Gov. Serhii Borzov.

Power was cut to parts of Ukraine’s train network, the Ukrainian Railways reported.

The attacks come two days after Russia accused Ukraine of a drone strike against Russia’s Black Sea Fleet off the Russia-annexed Crimean Peninsula. Ukraine has denied the attack, saying that Russia mishandled its own weapons, but Moscow still announced it was retaliating by halting its participation in a U.N. and Turkey-brokered deal to allow safe passage of ships carrying grain from Ukraine.

Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar urged his Russian counterpart, Sergei Shoigu, in a phone call Monday to “reconsider” Moscow’s suspension of its participation in the grain deal, which has allowed more than 9 million tons of grain to be exported from Ukraine. According to a statement, Akar hailed the deal as an example of how problems can be solved through “cooperation and dialogue” and argued it’s a “completely humanitarian activity” that should be kept separate from the conflict.

Monday’s strikes were the third time this month that Russia unleashed massive attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure. On Oct. 10, a similar attack rocked the war-torn country following an explosion on the Kerch Bridge linking Crimea to mainland Russia — an incident Moscow blamed on Kyiv.

One of the Russian missiles Ukraine shot down landed on a Moldovan border city, causing damage but no casualties.

Moldova’s interior ministry released photos showing a thick plume of smoke rising over the northern city of Naslavcea, on the border with Ukraine, as well as broken house windows.

In another development, Russia’s Defense Ministry on Monday reported completing a partial mobilization of troops, ostensibly fulfilling a promise to end the call-up at 300,000 men. Some human rights lawyers, however, warned that only Putin can end the call-up by signing a decree.

———

Suzan Fraser in Ankara, Turkey; Karel Janicek in Prague; and Sabina Niksic in Sarajevo, Bosnia, contributed to this report.

———

Follow the AP’s coverage of the war at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

———

This story has been corrected to show that Monday’s strikes were the third major Russian barrage against Ukrainian infrastructure this month, not the second.

Read original article here

US

2 Russian villages evacuated after fire at munitions depot

Leave a comment

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A fire at a munitions depot near the Russian village of Timonovo has led to the evacuation of two villages in Russia’s Belgorod region on Ukraine’s northeastern border, an official said Friday. The blaze was the latest in a series of destructive incidents on Russian-occupied territory in Ukraine or inside Russia itself.

Roughly 1,100 people reside in the villages of Timonovo and Soloti, around 15 miles (25 kilometers) from the Ukrainian border. There were no casualties in the blaze late Thursday, Belgorod regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said.

The fire came days after another ammunition depot exploded on the Crimean Peninsula, a Russian-occupied territory on the Black Sea that was annexed by Moscow in 2014.

Last week, nine Russian warplanes were reported destroyed at an airbase on Crimea, demonstrating both the Russians’ vulnerability and the Ukrainians’ capacity to strike deep behind enemy lines. Ukrainian authorities have stopped short of publicly claiming responsibility.

But President Volodymyr Zelenskyy alluded to Ukrainian attacks behind enemy lines after the blasts in Crimea, which Russia has blamed on “sabotage.”

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said in televised remarks Friday that statements from Ukrainian officials about striking facilities in Crimea mark “an escalation of the conflict openly encouraged by the United States and its NATO allies.”

Ryabkov said Russian officials had warned the U.S. against such actions in phone calls with high-level members of the Biden administration, adding that “deep and open U.S. involvement” in the war in Ukraine “effectively puts the U.S. on the brink of becoming a party to the conflict.“

“We don’t want an escalation,” Ryabkov said. “We would like to avoid a situation where the U.S. becomes a party to the conflict, but so far we haven’t seen their readiness to deeply and seriously consider those warnings.”

In spite of the latest incidents, a Western official said the war is at a “near operational standstill,” with neither side able to launch major offensives.

“The whole tempo of the campaign has slowed down, partly because both sides have become more conscious that this is a marathon not a sprint and that expenditure rates and conserving their munitions is important,” said official said who spoke on condition of anonymity because he’s not authorized to discuss intelligence matters publicly.

Meanwhile, Kyiv and Moscow continued to accuse each other of shelling Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, stoking international fears of a catastrophe on the continent.

The Kremlin said Friday that Russian President Vladimir Putin told French counterpart Emmanuel Macron in their first phone conversation since May 28 that Ukrainian shelling around the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant “raised the threat of a large-scale catastrophe that could lead to radioactive contamination of large territories.”

The Zaporizhzhia nuclear facility in Ukraine’s south has been controlled by Russian forces since shortly after the invasion began on Feb. 24. Ukraine has accused Russia of storing troops and weapons at the plant and using its grounds to launch strikes against Ukrainian-controlled territory. Ukrainian officials and military analysts say Moscow’s forces have cynically employed the plant as a shield, knowing that the Ukrainians would be hesitant to fire back.

Russia has denied the accusations and, in turn, accused Ukrainian forces of repeatedly shelling the plant.

The French presidency said in a statement that Macron “underlined his concerns” regarding the situation at the Zaporizhzhia plant and expressed his support for the deployment of a International Atomic Energy Agency mission to the site “as soon as possible.”

Putin agreed to the mission’s deployment under the discussed terms, according to the French statement. The Kremlin said that “the Russian side reaffirmed its readiness to offer the necessary assistance to the agency’s experts.”

Yevgeny Balitsky, the Moscow-backed chief of temporary administration for the Russia-controlled part of the Zaporizhzhia region, said Friday that an IAEA mission could approach the plant from Ukrainian-held territory, a shift in Moscow’s position which previously had suggested that the mission should travel to the plant from Crimea.

“I believe they may also come from the side of Ukraine,” Balitsky said in televised remarks. “We can safely bring them to the plant and show where the fire is coming from and who is shooting.”

Mikhail Ulyanov, the Russian envoy to international organizations in Vienna where the IAEA is based, said he believes a visit by the agency could realistically take place in early September.

Following a Thursday visit to Ukraine, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that Zelenskyy had asked him to ensure that Russia remove weapons stored at the plant as an “important step for world peace.”

“Zelenskyy asked this of us especially: that Russia remove all mines and similar (weapons) there and for the issue to rapidly cease to be frightening. Because it is a threat,” Erdogan said.

Erdogan, whose country has maintained close relations with both Ukraine and Russia, said he would discuss the issue with Russian President Vladimir Putin, saying that “Russia must do its part in this regard.”

The Turkish president made the comments to a group of Turkish journalists on his return from a visit with Zelenskyy and U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres in Ukraine late on Thursday. His comments were reported by Turkey’s state-run Anadolu Agency and other media on Friday.

At that meeting in the western city of Lviv, far from the front lines, the leaders discussed expanding exchanges of prisoners of war and arranging for U.N. atomic energy experts to visit and help secure the nuclear power plant.

IN OTHER DEVELOPMENTS:

— U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres visited a port in the coastal Ukrainian city of Odesa, where he praised ongoing efforts to maintain a shipping corridor on the Black Sea allowing for the export of vital Ukrainian grain shipments. Guterres said that 25 ships have departed from Odesa and other Ukrainian ports since Russia and Ukraine signed a four-month grain export deal in July. Those ships have carried over 600,000 tons of grain and other food supplies like wheat, corn, sunflower oil and soy beans, Guterres said, adding that getting more food and fertilizer out of Ukraine and Russia is crucial to further calm global commodity markets and lower prices. Gutteres also urged unimpeded access to global markets of Russian food and fertilizer, which aren’t subject to sanctions. “Without fertilizer in 2022, there may not be enough food in 2023,” he said.

— At least five people were killed and 10 others wounded by the Russian shelling of towns and villages in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, according to regional authorities. Russian shelling of the city of Kharkiv also killed at least one civilian early Friday. Russian missiles again struck port facilities and a university building in the southern port city of Mykolaiv.

___

Jill Lawless in London contributed.

___

Follow the AP’s coverage of the war at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

Read original article here

World

Large explosions rock Russian military air base in Crimea

Leave a comment

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Powerful explosions rocked a Russian air base in Crimea and sent towering clouds of smoke over the landscape Tuesday in what may mark an escalation of the war in Ukraine. At least one person was killed and several others were wounded, authorities said.

Russia’s Defense Ministry denied the Saki base on the Black Sea had been shelled and said instead that munitions had blown up there. But Ukrainian social networks were abuzz with speculation that it was hit by Ukrainian-fired long-range missiles.

Videos posted on social networks showed sunbathers on nearby beaches fleeing as huge flames and pillars of smoke rose over the horizon from multiple points, accompanied by loud booms. Crimea Today News said on Telegram that witnesses reported fire on a runway and damage to nearby homes as a result of what it said were dozens of blasts.

Russia’s state news agency Tass quoted an unidentified ministry source as saying the explosions’ primary cause appeared to be a “violation of fire safety requirements.” The ministry said no warplanes were damaged.

Ukraine’s Defense Ministry said sarcastically on Facebook: “The Ministry of Defense of Ukraine cannot establish the cause of the fire, but once again recalls the rules of fire safety and the prohibition of smoking in unspecified places.”

A presidential adviser, Oleksiy Arestovych, said cryptically in his regular online interview that the blasts were caused either by a Ukrainian-made long-range weapon or were the work of partisans operating in Crimea.

During the war, Russia has reported numerous fires and explosions at munitions storage sites on its territory near the Ukrainian border, blaming some of them on Ukrainian strikes. Ukrainian authorities have mostly remained mum about the incidents.

If Ukrainian forces were, in fact, responsible for the blasts at the air base, it would be the first known major attack on a Russian military site on the Crimean Peninsula, which the Kremlin annexed in 2014. A smaller explosion last month at the headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet in the Crimean port of Sevastopol was blamed on Ukrainian saboteurs using a makeshift drone.

Russian warplanes have used the Saki base to strike areas in Ukraine’s south on short notice.

One person was killed, said Crimea’s regional leader, Sergei Aksyonov. Crimean health authorities said nine people were wounded, one of whom remained hospitalized. Others were treated for cuts from shards of glass and released.

Officials in Moscow have long warned Ukraine that any attack on Crimea would trigger massive retaliation, including strikes on “decision-making centers” in Kyiv.

For his part, Ukraine’s president vowed to retake Crimea from Russia.

“This Russian war against Ukraine and against all of free Europe began with Crimea and must end with Crimea — its liberation,” President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Tuesday in his nightly video address. “Today it is impossible to say when this will happen. But we are constantly adding the necessary components to the formula for the liberation of Crimea.”

Earlier Tuesday, Ukrainian officials reported at least three Ukrainian civilians were killed and 23 wounded by Russian shelling in 24 hours, including an attack not far from the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant.

The Russians fired over 120 rockets at the town of Nikopol, across the Dnieper River from the plant, Dnipropetrovsk Gov. Valentyn Reznichenko said. Several apartment buildings and industrial sites were damaged, he said.

Ukraine and Russia have accused each other of shelling the power station, Europe’s biggest nuclear plant, stoking international fears of a catastrophe.

The governor of the region where the plant is situated, Oleksandr Starukh, said Tuesday that radiation levels were normal. But he warned that an accident could spread radiation whichever way the wind blows, carrying it to Moscow and other Russian cities.

A Russian-installed official in the partially occupied Zaporizhzhia region said an air defense system at the plant would be reinforced in the aftermath of last week’s shelling. Evgeny Balitsky, head of the Kremlin-backed administration, told Russian state TV that power lines and other damaged portions of the plant were restored.

The Ukrainians in recent weeks have been mounting counterattacks in Russian-occupied areas of southern Ukraine while trying to hold off the Kremlin’s forces in the industrial Donbas region in the east.

Also Tuesday, a U.S. official said Iran has agreed to supply Russia with drones for use in the war in Ukraine. The official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive information, said “during the last several weeks, Russian officials conducted training in Iran as part of the agreement for UAV transfers from Iran to Russia.”

The White House released satellite images in mid-July indicating that Russians had visited an Iranian airbase to see weapons-capable drones. But U.S. officials said later that month that they had seen no evidence yet of Iran supplying Russia with the drones.

Ukrainian officials this month said Iran has transferred drones to Russia and some have been used in combat.

___

Associated Press writer Chris Megerian in Washington contributed to this report.

___

Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

Read original article here

World

Shift in war’s front seen as grain leaves Ukraine; plant hit

Leave a comment

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Six more ships carrying agricultural cargo held up by the war in Ukraine received authorization Sunday to leave the country’s Black Sea coast as analysts warned that Russia was moving troops and equipment in the direction of the southern port cities to stave off a Ukrainian counteroffensive.

Ukraine and Russia also accused each other of shelling Europe’s largest nuclear power plant.

The loaded vessels were cleared to depart from Chornomorsk and Odesa, according to the Joint Coordination Center, which oversees an international deal intended to get some 20 million tons of grain out of Ukraine to feed millions going hungry in Africa, the Middle East and parts of Asia.

Ukraine, Russia, Turkey and the United Nations signed the agreements last month to create a 111-nautical-mile sea corridor that would allow cargo ships to travel safely out of ports that Russia’s military had blockaded and through waters that Ukraine’s military had mined. Implementation of the deal, which is in effect for four months, has proceeded slowly since the first ship embarked on Aug. 1.

Four of the carriers cleared Sunday to leave Ukraine were transporting more than 219,000 tons of corn. The fifth was carrying more than 6,600 tons of sunflower oil and the sixth 11,000 tons of soya, the Joint Coordination Center said.

Three other cargo ships that left Friday passed their inspections and received clearance Sunday to pass through Turkey’s Bosporus Strait on the way to their final destinations, the Center said.

However, the vessel that left Ukraine last Monday with great fanfare as the first under the grain exports deal had its scheduled arrival in Lebanon delayed Sunday, according to a Lebanese Cabinet minister and the Ukraine Embassy. The cause of the delay was not immediately clear.

Ukrainian officials were initially skeptical of a grain export deal, citing suspicions that Moscow would try to exploit shipping activity to mass troops offshore or send long-range missiles from the Black Sea, as it has done multiple times during the war.

The agreements call for ships to leave Ukraine under military escort and to undergo inspections to make sure they carry only grain, fertilizer or food and not any other commodities. Inbound cargo vessels are checked to ensure they are not carrying weapons.

In a weekend analysis, Britain’s Defense Ministry said the Russian invasion that started Feb. 24 “is about to enter a new phase” in which the fighting would shift to a roughly 350-kilometer (217-mile) front line extending from near the city of Zaporizhzhia to Russian-occupied Kherson.

That area includes the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Station which came under fire late Saturday. Each side accused the other of the attack.

Ukraine’s nuclear power plant operator, Energoatom, said Russian shelling damaged three radiation monitors around the storage facility for spent nuclear fuels and that one worker was injured. Russian news agencies, citing the separatist-run administration of the plant, said Ukrainian forces fired those shells.

Russian forces have occupied the power station for months. Russian soldiers there took shelter in bunkers before Saturday’s attack, according to Energoatom.

Rafael Grossi, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, recently warned that the way the plant was being run and the fighting going on around it posed grave health and environmental threats.

For the last four months of the war, Russia has concentrated on capturing the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine, where pro-Moscow separatists have controlled some territory as self-proclaimed republics for eight years. Russian forces have made gradual headway in the region while launching missile and rocket attacks to curtail the movements of Ukrainian fighters elsewhere.

The Russians “are continuing to accumulate large quantities of military equipment” in a town across the Dnieper River from Russian-held Kherson, according to the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington think tank. Citing local Ukrainian officials, it said the preparations appeared designed to defend logistics routes to the city and establish defensive positions on the river’s left bank.

Kherson came under Russian control early in the war and Ukrainian officials have vowed to retake it. It is just 227 kilometers (141 miles) from Odesa, home to Ukraine’s biggest port, so the conflict escalating there could have repercussions for the international grain deal.

The city of Mykolaiv, a shipbuilding center that Russian forces bombard daily, is even closer to Odesa. The Mykolaiv region’s governor, Vitaliy Kim, said an industrial facility on the regional capital’s outskirts came under fire early Sunday.

Over the past day, five civilians were killed by Russian and separatist firing on cities in the Donetsk region, the part of Donbas still under Ukrainian control, the regional governor, Serhiy Haidai, reported.

He and Ukrainian government officials have repeatedly urged civilians to evacuate.

___

Andrew Wilks contributed reporting from Istanbul.

___

Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

Read original article here

World

Inspectors OK 1st Ukraine grain ship but no sign yet of more

Leave a comment

ISTANBUL (AP) — The first grain ship to leave Ukraine and cross the Black Sea under a wartime deal passed inspection Wednesday in Istanbul and headed on to Lebanon. Ukraine said 17 other vessels were “loaded and waiting permission to leave,” but there was no word yet on when they could depart.

A joint civilian inspection team spent three hours checking the cargo and crew of the Sierra Leone-flagged ship Razoni, which left Odesa on Monday carrying Ukrainian corn, a U.N. statement said.

The Joint Coordination Center team included officials from Ukraine, Russia, Turkey and the United Nations, who signed deals last month to create safe Black Sea shipping corridors to export Ukraine’s desperately needed agricultural products as Russia’s war upon its neighbor grinds on.

Ukraine is a major global grain supplier but the war had blocked most exports, so the July 22 deal aimed to ease food security around the globe. World food prices have been soaring in a crisis blamed on the war, supply chain problems and COVID-19.

Although U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken called Razoni’s journey a “significant step,” no other ships have left from Ukraine in the past 48 hours and no explanations have been given for that delay.

A U.N. statement said inspectors “gained valuable information” from the Razoni’s crew about its voyage through the Black Sea maritime humanitarian corridor and the coordination center was “fine-tuning procedures.”

The Turkish Ministry of National Defense tweeted a picture of an inspector reaching into the Razoni’s hold and touching some of its 26,527 tons of corn for chicken feed. The Razoni’s horn rang out as the inspectors left the ship, and then it headed off to Lebanon.

The checks seek to ensure that outbound cargo ships carry only grain, fertilizer or food and not any other commodities, and that inbound ships are not carrying weapons.

An estimated 20 million tons of grain — most of it said to be destined for livestock — has been stuck in Ukraine since the start of the 6-month-old war. Ukraine’s top diplomat said Wednesday that more ships are ready to carry much-needed grain and food out of the country’s Black Sea ports.

“Further ships are already ready for departure. They will depart from the ports that are part of the grain initiative in accordance with the agreed schedule, and we hope that everything will work out and the Russian Federation will not take any steps that would destroy these agreements,” Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said at a joint press conference in Kyiv with his Estonian counterpart.

Kuleba said the U.N.-backed deal “is beneficial to Ukrainian farmers, it is beneficial to the Ukrainian economy, and it is beneficial to the world.”

″ It is now Ukraine that is, literally, saving the world from further growth in food prices and from hunger in individual countries,” he said.

Still, a Black Sea voyage entails significant risks because of the war. Two civilian ships hit explosive devices there last week near the Danube River’s Bystre estuary, according to Bridget Diakun, a data reporter at Lloyd’s List, a global shipping publication.

Analysts say authorities’ first priority is bringing out vessels that have been stuck for months at the three Ukrainian ports covered by the deal. Sixteen ships loaded with grain have been stuck at the ports of Odesa and Chernomorsk since Russia’s invasion, according to Lloyd’s List.

Even slower than that is the effort to bring ships into Ukraine’s ports to extract the millions of tons of grain in storage.

Insurance brokers are being “cautious, slow, so far,” said David Osler, insurance editor at Lloyd’s List. “At this stage, everyone’s hesitant.”

Grain stockpiles are expected to keep growing. Despite the war, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal estimated his country would harvest up to 67 million tons of grain this year, up from 60 million tons last year.

A senior official from a leading Ukrainian farm association reckoned Ukraine would have about 50 million tons of grain for export this year.

Before the war, Ukraine exported around 5-6 million tons of grain per month, according to Denys Marchuk, the deputy head of the All-Ukrainian Agrarian Council. He said Ukrainian authorities are hoping to include more Black Sea ports in the export deal.

In other news Wednesday:

__ Russian forces kept up their bombardment of the southern Ukrainian port city of Mykolaiv. Regional governor Vitaliy Kim said the shelling damaged a pier, an industrial enterprise, residential buildings, a garage cooperative, a supermarket and a pharmacy. The mayor of Mykolaiv, Oleksandr Sienkevych, told The Associated Press that 131 civilians have died so far in the city from Russian shelling and 590 others have been seriously injured.

__ The Ukrainian military said Ukrainian forces pushed back over a dozen Russian assaults in the key eastern province of Donetsk and claimed that none of the Russian attempts to advance over the previous 24 hours were successful. Still, Russian shelling killed at least four civilians in Donetsk province, Ukraine’s presidential office said. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has ordered all those in the embattled province to evacuate as soon as possible.

__ The U.N. chief says he’s appointing a fact-finding mission in response to requests from Russia and Ukraine to investigate an explosion at a POW prison in a separatist region of eastern Ukraine that reportedly killed 53 Ukrainian prisoners of war and wounded another 75. U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told reporters that he doesn’t have authority to conduct criminal investigations but does have authority to conduct fact-finding missions. Both sides said the assault last Friday was premeditated with the aim of covering up atrocities.

__ Moscow has drastically cut how much gas it sends to Europe, igniting fears that it could stop sending the much-needed fuel. All across Europe, nations are rushing to cut energy use this summer so they can fill up gas storage tanks for the cold winter ahead.

___

Robert Badendieck and Mehmet Guzel in Istanbul, Aya Batrawy in Dubai, Joanna Kozlowska in London and Edith Lederer in New York contributed to this report.

___

Follow AP’s coverage of the Russia-Ukraine war at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

Read original article here

World

Drone explosion hits Russia’s Black Sea Fleet headquarters

Leave a comment

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A small explosive device carried by a makeshift drone blew up Sunday at the headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet on the Crimean Peninsula, wounding six people and prompting the cancellation of ceremonies there honoring Russia’s navy, authorities said.

Meanwhile, one of Ukraine’s richest men, a grain merchant, was killed in what Ukrainian authorities said was a carefully targeted Russian missile strike on his home.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the drone explosion in a courtyard at the naval headquarters in the city of Sevastopol. But the seemingly improvised, small-scale nature of the attack raised the possibility that it was the work of Ukrainian insurgents trying to drive out Russian forces.

A Russian lawmaker from Crimea, Olga Kovitidi, told Russian state news agency RIA-Novosti that the drone was launched from Sevastopol itself. She said the incident was being treated as a terrorist act, the news agency said.

Crimean authorities raised the terrorism threat level for the region to “yellow,” the second-highest tier.

Sevastopol, which was seized along with the rest of Crimea from Ukraine by Russia in 2014, is about 170 kilometers (100 miles) south of the Ukrainian mainland. Russian forces control much of the mainland along the Black Sea.

The Black Sea Fleet’s press service said the drone appeared to be homemade. It described the explosive device as “low-power.” Sevastopol Mayor Mikhail Razvozhaev said six people were wounded. Observances of Russia’s Navy Day holiday were canceled in the city.

Ukraine’s navy and an adviser to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the reported drone attack underlined the weakness of Russian air defenses.

“Did the occupiers admit the helplessness of their air defense system? Or their helplessness in front of the Crimean partisans?” Oleksiy Arestovich said on Telegram.

If such an attack is possible by Ukraine, he said, “the destruction of the Crimean bridge in such situations no longer sounds unrealistic” — a reference to the span that Russia built to connect its mainland to Crimea after the annexation.

Elsewhere in Ukraine, the mayor of the major port city of Mykolaiv, Vitaliy Kim, said shelling killed one of Ukraine’s wealthiest men, Oleksiy Vadatursky, and his wife, Raisa. Vadatursky headed a grain production and export business.

Another presidential adviser, Mykhailo Podolyak, said Vadatursky was specifically targeted.

It “was not an accident, but a well-thought-out and organized premeditated murder. Vadatursky was one of the largest farmers in the country, a key person in the region and a major employer. That the exact hit of a rocket was not just in a house, but in a specific wing, the bedroom, leaves no doubt about aiming and adjusting the strike,” he said.

Vadatursky’s agribusiness, Nibulon, includes a fleet of ships for sending grain abroad.

In the Sumy region in Ukraine’s north, near the Russian border, shelling killed one person, the regional administration said. And three people died in attacks over the past day in the Donetsk region, which is partly under the control of Russian-backed separatist forces, said regional Gov. Pavlo Kyrylenko.

Podolyak said on Twitter that images of the prison where at least 53 Ukrainian prisoners of war were killed in an explosion on Friday indicated that the blast came from within the building in Olenivka, which is under Russian control.

Russian officials have claimed the building was attacked by Ukraine with the aim of silencing POWs who might be giving information about Ukrainian military operations. Ukraine has blamed Russia for the explosion.

Satellite photos taken before and after show that a small, squarish building in the middle of the prison complex was demolished, its roof in splinters.

Podolyak said those images and the lack of damage to adjacent structures showed that the building was not attacked from the air or by artillery. He contended the evidence was consistent with a thermobaric bomb, a powerful device sometimes called a vacuum bomb, being set off inside.

The International Red Cross asked to immediately visit the prison to make sure the scores of wounded POWs had proper treatment, but said Sunday that its request had yet to be granted. It said that denying the Red Cross access would violate the Geneva Convention on the rights of POWs.

___

Follow AP’s coverage of the Russia-Ukraine war at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

Read original article here

World

New Russian airstrikes target Black Sea regions of Ukraine

Leave a comment

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia targeted Ukraine’s southern Black Sea regions of Odesa and Mykolaiv with airstrikes Tuesday, hitting private buildings and port infrastructure with missiles fired from long-range bomber aircraft, the Ukrainian military said.

In the Odesa region, buildings in coastal villages were hit and caught fire, Ukraine’s Operational Command South said on Facebook. A Ukrainian air force spokesman said long-range Russian Tu-22M3 bombers and Su-30 and Su-35 fighter jets launched the strikes from the Black Sea. In the Mykolaiv region, port infrastructure was targeted despite agreements intended to allow grain grain shipments to resume from Ukraine’s Black Sea ports.

Hours after the strikes, a Moscow-installed official in southern Ukraine said the Odesa and Mykolaiv regions would soon be “liberated” by Russian forces, just like the already occupied Kherson region further east.

“The Kherson region and the city of Kherson have been liberated forever,” Russian state news agency RIA Novosti quoted the region’s Russia-appointed official, Kirill Stremousov, as saying.

On the diplomatic front, Russia’s top diplomat repeated his insistence that Moscow was ready to hold talks with Ukraine on ending the war, though he once again claimed that Kyiv’s Western allies oppose a deal.

“We never refused to have talks, because everybody knows that any hostilities end at the negotiating table,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Tuesday during a trip to Uganda.

He said negotiations have gone no further since a meeting between the two sides in Istanbul at the end of March.

While Ukrainian officials have spoken of a possible counteroffensive in the south, the British Defense Ministry said Tuesday there was no indication a Ukrainian warship and a stockpile of anti-ship missiles were at Odesa’s port, as Moscow claimed when it struck the site over the weekend.

The British ministry said Russia sees Ukraine’s use of anti-ship missiles as “a key threat” limiting its Black Sea Fleet.

“This has significantly undermined the overall invasion plan, as Russia cannot realistically attempt an amphibious assault to seize Odesa,” the ministry said. “Russia will continue to prioritize efforts to degrade and destroy Ukraine’s anti-ship capability.”

It added that “Russia’s targeting processes are highly likely routinely undermined by dated intelligence, poor planning, and a top-down approach to operations.”

In other military developments, Russian shelling over the previous 24 hours killed at least three civilians and wounded eight more in Ukraine, the Ukrainian president’s office said Tuesday.

In the eastern Donetsk region, where the fighting has been focused in recent months, shelling continued along the entire front line, with Russian forces targeting some of the region’s largest cities, Bakhmut, Avdiivka and Toretsk, the presidential office said.

Donetsk regional governor Pavlo Kyrylenko accused Russian troops of using cluster munitions and repeated his call for civilians to evacuate.

“There is not a single safe place left. Everything is being shelled,” Kyrylenko said in televised remarks. “But there are still evacuation routes for the civilian population.”

The Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, reported that Moscow was using mercenaries from the shadowy Wagner Group to capture the Vuhledar Power Plant on the northern outskirts of the Bakhmut region village of Novoluhanske.

But Russian forces have made “limited gains” there, according to Ukraine’s General Staff.

The main regional Russian focus for the moment is on capturing Bakhmut, which the Russian military needs to press its eastern offensive on the Ukrainian strongholds in Donetsk, the cities of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk.

“Russian forces made marginal gains south of Bakhmut but are unlikely to be able to effectively leverage these advances to take full control of Bakhmut itself,” the Institute for the Study of War said.

Russian forces continued to strike civilian infrastructure in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, and the surrounding region in the country’s northeast.

Kharkiv Gov. Oleh Syniehubov said the strikes on the city resumed around dawn Tuesday and damaged a car dealership.

“The Russians deliberately target civilian infrastructure objects — hospitals, schools, movie theaters,” Syniehubov told Ukrainian television. “Everything is being fired at, even queues for humanitarian aid, so we’re urging people to avoid mass gatherings.”

The Moldovan foreign ministry said Tuesday said a Moldovan citizen was killed and another wounded in what it claimed was a Ukrainian attack on Russia’s border with Ukraine. The unconfirmed report said the attack occurred at a border checkpoint in Russia’s Bryansk region.

Responding to Lavrov’s comment Monday that Moscow’s overarching goal in Ukraine is to free its people from its “unacceptable regime,” German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said that Moscow wants “the complete subjugation of Ukraine and its people.”

“We must be prepared for this war — which Russia is conducting with absolute brutality, and is conducting in a way that no one else would — to last months,” Baerbock said during a visit to Prague.

In other developments Tuesday:

— European Union governments agreed to ration natural gas this winter to protect against Russian supply cuts. EU energy ministers approved a draft law designed to lower demand for gas by 15% from August through March. The legislation entails voluntary national steps to reduce gas consumption and, if they yield insufficient savings, a trigger for mandatory actions. Russian energy corporation Gazprom said it would cut gas flows through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline to Germany to 20% of capacity starting Wednesday.

— Russia’s space chief said the country will opt out of the International Space Station after 2024 and focus on building its own orbiting outpost. Yuri Borisov, appointed earlier this month to lead the state-controlled space corporation Roscosmos, said Russia would fulfill its obligations at the space station before it leaves the project. The move is part of a broader disengagement trend stemming from soaring tensions between Russia and the West over the Kremlin’s military action in Ukraine.

— Britain imposed sanctions on two national Russian government officials overseeing justice and two top regional officials in Russian-occupied eastern Ukraine. Also facing sanctions are several Syrian military figures accused of recruiting Syrians to fight for Russia in Ukraine.

— German Defense Minister Christine Lambrecht said her country has delivered previously announced Mars II multiple-launch rocket systems, along with three more howitzers, to Ukraine. Lambrecht said Germany also has delivered five of a pledged 30 Gepard self-propelled armored anti-aircraft guns, German news agency dpa reported.

— The Russian military announced plans to hold large-scale drills in Russia’s east, noting that it continues regular troop training despite the action in Ukraine. The Russian Defense Ministry said Tuesday the Vostok 2022 (East 2022) exercise is scheduled for Aug. 30-Sept. 5. It added that airborne troops, long-range bombers and military cargo planes will participate.

___

Follow the AP’s coverage of the war at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

Read original article here

World

Russia says it wants to end Ukraine’s `unacceptable regime’

Leave a comment

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia’s top diplomat said Moscow’s overarching goal in Ukraine is to free its people from its “unacceptable regime,” expressing the Kremlin’s war aims in some of the bluntest terms yet as its forces pummel the country with artillery barrages and airstrikes.

The remark from Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov comes amid Ukraine’s efforts to resume grain exports from its Black Sea ports —something that would help ease global food shortages — under a new deal tested by a Russian strike on Odesa over the weekend.

“We are determined to help the people of eastern Ukraine to liberate themselves from the burden of this absolutely unacceptable regime,” Lavrov said at an Arab League summit in Cairo late Sunday, referring to Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelenskyy’s government.

Apparently suggesting that Moscow’s war aims extend beyond Ukraine’s industrial Donbas region in the east, Lavrov said: “We will certainly help the Ukrainian people to get rid of the regime, which is absolutely anti-people and anti-historical.”

Lavrov’s comments followed his warning last week that Russia plans to retain control over broader areas beyond eastern Ukraine, including the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions in the south, and will make more gains elsewhere.

His remarks contrasted with the Kremlin’s line early in the war, when it repeatedly emphasized that Russia wasn’t seeking to overthrow Zelenskyy’s government, even as Moscow’s troops closed in on Kyiv. Russia later retreated from around the capital and turned its attention to capturing the Donbas. The war is now in its sixth month.

Last week, Russia and Ukraine signed agreements aimed at clearing the way for the shipment of millions of tons of desperately needed Ukrainian grain, as well as the export of Russian grain and fertilizer.

Ukraine’s deputy infrastructure minister, Yury Vaskov, said the first shipment of grain is planned for this week.

While Russia faced accusations that the weekend attack on the port of Odesa amounted to reneging on the deal, Moscow insisted the strike would not affect grain deliveries.

During a visit to the Republic of Congo on Monday, Lavrov repeated the Russian claim that the attack targeted a Ukrainian naval vessel and a depot containing Western-supplied anti-ship missiles. He said the grain agreements do not prevent Russia from attacking military targets.

In other developments:

— Russia’s gas giant Gazprom said it would further reduce the flow of natural gas through a major pipeline to Europe to 20% of capacity, citing equipment repairs. The move heightened fears that Russia is trying to pressure and divide Europe over its support for Ukraine at a time when countries are trying to build up their supplies of gas for the winter.

Zelenskyy accused Moscow of “gas blackmail,” saying, “All this is done by Russia deliberately to make it as difficult as possible for Europeans to prepare for winter.”

— Ukraine’s presidential office said Monday at least two civilians were killed and 10 wounded in Russian shelling over the preceding 24 hours. In the Kharkiv region, workers searched for people believed trapped under the rubble after 12 rockets hit the town of Chuhuiv before dawn, damaging a cultural center, school and other infrastructure, authorities said.

Kharkiv Gov. Oleh Sinyehubov said: “It looks like a deadly lottery when no one knows where the next strike will come.”

— Ukraine charged two former cabinet ministers with high treason over their role in extending Moscow’s lease on a navy base in Crimea in 2010. Prosecutors said Oleksandr Lavrynovych and Kostyantyn Hryshchenko conspired with then-President Viktor Yanukovych to rush a treaty through parliament granting Moscow a 25-year extension, leaving Crimea vulnerable to Russian aggression.

— Russia said it thwarted an attempt by Ukrainian intelligence to bribe Russian military pilots to turn their planes over to Ukraine. In a video released by Russia’s main security agency, a man purported to be a Ukrainian intelligence officer offered a pilot $2 million to surrender his plane during a mission over Ukraine. The Russian claims couldn’t be independently verified.

Read original article here