A summary of today's developments
Explosions were reported in Kerch near the Crimean Bridge that connects Russian-occupied Crimea with Russia. The Russian-appointed head of Crimea said Russian air defence was able to shoot down two missiles in the first attack, and then another one, and that there was no damage. Footage and photos show smoke billowing up from the bridge, which Russian officials said was a smokescreen for workers. This comes after an explosion in October shut down both the road bridge and rail bridge for months.
The Russian foreign ministry decried Ukraine’s attacks on the Crimean Bridge as “terrorist attacks” on “civilian infrastructure” – even though Russian forces have repeatedly targeted civilian infrastructure since the beginning of the invasion, conducting air strikes on power grids, dams, parks, schools, private homes, churches and hotels.
The attacks on the Crimean Bridge took place hours after Russian forces said they downed 20 Ukrainian drones targeting the Crimean peninsula. This comes amid a new campaign of drone strikes targeting Moscow in recent days as Kyiv works to keep the Kremlin’s war in the hearts and minds of the Russian elites and others seeking to ignore the invasion.
Two people were injured by Russian forces today in the Kherson oblast, where “the shelling has not stopped since morning”, said the regional governor, Oleksandr Prokudin. A 70-year-old man suffered multiple injuries after a projectile hit a residential building in Poniativka, while a 72-year-old man was seriously injured from explosives dropped from a drone in Odradokamyanka, Prokudin said.
A Su-30 fighter jet crashed during a training flight in Russia’s Kaliningrad region, killing the two pilots on board, according to the RIA news agency.
Two people have been killed in Russian attacks in the Zaporizhzhia and Kharkiv oblasts. A police officer was killed and 12 people were injured in a guided Russian aerial bomb attack on Orikhov, while an elderly woman was killed early on Saturday morning due to shelling by Russian troops on Kupiansk-Vuzlovyi village in Kupiansk district.
In the village of Lazurne in the Russian-occupied part of the Kherson oblast, residents will not be able to receive medicines like insulin or humanitarian aid if they do not apply for a Russian passport.
Odesa, a Black Sea city famed for its beautiful shoreline, has opened several beaches for the first time since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. Throughout the past year, suspicious objects and mines were routinely washing up along the coast, creating a hazard for beachgoers.
Updated
Updated
Ukrainian forces fired three missiles at the bridge connecting occupied Crimea to Russia, forcing Russian authorities to cover the structure in white smoke to deter further attacks and prompting a furious threat of retaliation.
Updated
Ukraine has started registering ships willing to use the newly established “humanitarian corridor” in the Black Sea aiming to facilitate safe shipping routes.
“Registration is now open and the coordinator is already working,” news agency Interfax Ukraine quoted Ukrainian navy spokesperson Dmytro Pletenchuk as saying.
“Of course, everything will take place under the supervision of the Ukrainian armed forces. We are doing everything we can to ensure security.”
An industry source told Reuters news agency yesterday that no ships had yet passed through the corridor.
Updated
Ukrainian forces fired three missiles at the bridge connecting occupied Crimea to Russia, forcing Russian authorities to cover the structure in white smoke to deter further attacks and prompting a furious threat of retaliation.
In the latest example of Kyiv taking the war to Russia, multiple guided S-200 rockets were fired at Kerch Bridge but they were seemingly shot down by local air defences.
A further 20 Ukrainian unmanned drones attacked targets in Crimea, the Ukrainian territory illegally annexed by the Kremlin in 2014, but Russian officials said they had also been successfully neutralised.
Russia’s foreign ministry condemned what they described as a “terrorist attack” and warned that it would not go “unanswered”.
Updated
Today so far
Explosions were reported in Kerch near the Crimean Bridge that connects Russian-occupied Crimea with Russia. The Russian-appointed head of Crimea said Russian air defence was able to shoot down two missiles in the first attack, and then another one, and that there was no damage. Footage and photos show smoke billowing up from the bridge, which Russian officials said was a smokescreen for workers. This comes after an explosion in October shut down both the road bridge and rail bridge for months.
The Russian foreign ministry decried Ukraine’s attacks on the Crimean Bridge as “terrorist attacks” on “civilian infrastructure” – even though Russian forces have repeatedly targeted civilian infrastructure since the beginning of the invasion, conducting air strikes on power grids, dams, parks, schools, private homes, churches and hotels.
The attacks on the Crimean Bridge took place hours after Russian forces said they downed 20 Ukrainian drones targeting the Crimean peninsula. This comes amid a new campaign of drone strikes targeting Moscow in recent days as Kyiv works to keep the Kremlin’s war in the hearts and minds of the Russian elites and others seeking to ignore the invasion.
Two people were injured by Russian forces today in the Kherson oblast, where “the shelling has not stopped since morning”, said the regional governor, Oleksandr Prokudin. A 70-year-old man suffered multiple injuries after a projectile hit a residential building in Poniativka, while a 72-year-old man was seriously injured from explosives dropped from a drone in Odradokamyanka, Prokudin said.
A Su-30 fighter jet crashed during a training flight in Russia’s Kaliningrad region, killing the two pilots on board, according to the RIA news agency.
Two people have been killed in Russian attacks in the Zaporizhzhia and Kharkiv oblasts. A police officer was killed and 12 people were injured in a guided Russian aerial bomb attack on Orikhov, while an elderly woman was killed early on Saturday morning due to shelling by Russian troops on Kupiansk-Vuzlovyi village in Kupiansk district.
In the village of Lazurne in the Russian-occupied part of the Kherson oblast, residents will not be able to receive medicines like insulin or humanitarian aid if they do not apply for a Russian passport.
Odesa, a Black Sea city famed for its beautiful shoreline, has opened several beaches for the first time since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. Throughout the past year, suspicious objects and mines were routinely washing up along the coast, creating a hazard for beachgoers.
Updated
A Russian missile struck Kryvyi Rih today. While authorities said there were no casualties, volunteers distributing school supplies to children caught on video the fear that comes with each attack.
Volunteers were distributing backpacks and school supplies to first graders in Kryvyi Rih this morning when there was an explosion in the city - a Russian missile attack.
— Anton Gerashchenko (@Gerashchenko_en) August 12, 2023
Look at the kids' fear. This is awful.
📷: Svoi. Kryvyi Rih pic.twitter.com/MGHuYIscOv
Updated
In Kyiv today, mourners attended the funeral of Daria Filipieva, a Ukrainian army combat medic who was killed in the Donetsk oblast.
Updated
The Russian foreign ministry has decried Ukraine’s attacks on the Crimean Bridge as “terrorist attacks” on “civilian infrastructure”.
“The Crimean Bridge is an object of purely civilian infrastructure, attacks on which are unacceptable,” spokesperson Maria Zakharova said on Telegram.
Russian forces have repeatedly targeted civilian infrastructure since the beginning of the invasion, conducting air strikes on power grids, dams, parks, schools, private homes, churches and hotels.
Давеча в Запорожье. pic.twitter.com/7axr8gkr9D
— olexander scherba🇺🇦 (@olex_scherba) August 12, 2023
Updated
Two people were injured by Russian forces today in the Kherson oblast, where “the shelling has not stopped since morning”, said the regional governor, Oleksandr Prokudin.
A 70-year-old man suffered multiple injuries after a projectile hit a residential building in Poniativka, while a 72-year-old man was seriously injured from explosives dropped from a drone in Odradokamyanka, Prokudin said.
Russian forces also shelled the city of Kherson, but there were no casualties.
Updated
Russia: another missile shot down over Kerch Strait
Shortly after Russian air defence shot down two missiles in the area of the Crimean Bridge in Kerch, Sergey Aksyonov, the Russian-appointed head of Crimea, said air defence has shot down another missile over the Kerch Strait.
More explosions reported at/near the Kerch Bridge - at least 8, locals say. pic.twitter.com/kFcySOU48W
— Ukraine Front Lines (@EuromaidanPR) August 12, 2023
The Crimean Bridge, also called the Kerch Bridge, spans the Kerch Strait and connects Russian-occupied Crimea to Russia. It was built after Russia illegally annexed Crimea in 2014, and has been a frequent target of Ukrainian forces since the start of the Russian invasion in February 2022. In October, an explosion caused parts of the road bridge to collapse. In February, however, Moscow announced that the road bridge had been reopened to traffic. The rail bridge was fully reopened in May.
Updated
The Guardian has put together a map of Ukraine showing the current Russian-occupied territories as well as the areas where Ukrainian forces have regained control.
Updated
Reuters reports that a Su-30 fighter jet crashed during a training flight on Saturday in Russia’s Kaliningrad region, killing the two pilots on board, according to the RIA news agency.
“The Su-30 aircraft crashed in a deserted area. The flight was being carried out without ammunition. The crew of the aircraft died,” the ministry said in a statement cited by RIA.
It said the likely cause of the crash was a technical malfunction but gave no further information.
Kaliningrad is a Russian exclave sandwiched between Poland and Lithuania, both Nato member states, on the Baltic Sea.
Updated
Russia’s defence ministry has said that Ukraine had tried unsuccessfully to strike the Crimean Bridge across the Kerch Strait with S-200 rockets, but that no damage or casualties had been caused.
Reuters reports:
The 12-mile (19-km) bridge, which links Russian-annexed Crimea to Russia, has come under repeated attack from Ukrainian forces since Moscow launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022.
“The Ukrainian missile was detected in a timely manner and was intercepted in the air by Russian air defence systems. No damage or casualties were reported,” the ministry said in a statement.
In a statement posted earlier on the Telegram messaging app, Russian-installed Crimea governor Sergei Aksyonov said two rockets had been downed by anti-aircraft defences near the bridge. He also said the bridge was undamaged.
Footage circulating on Russian social media on Saturday appeared to show the bridge wreathed in smoke. Reuters could not verify the footage. Interfax news agency reported that the bridge was briefly shut to traffic but that it later reopened.
Separately, Russian forces destroyed 20 Ukrainian drones launched onto the Crimean Peninsula earlier on Saturday, Russia’s Defence Ministry said.
There were no casualties and no damage as a result of the drone attacks, the ministry said on Telegram. It said 14 drones were destroyed by air defence systems and six were suppressed by electronic warfare.
Reuters could not independently verify the report.
It was not immediately clear what was targeted in those reported attacks on the Black Sea peninsula, which Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014.Drone attacks on Russian-controlled territories in Ukraine and deep inside Russia have increased since a drone was destroyed over the Kremlin in early May.
Ukraine almost never publicly claims responsibility for the attacks but has said destroying Russia’s military infrastructure is crucial for Kyiv’s counteroffensive.The Crimean Bridge was badly damaged last October in a powerful blast that Russian officials said was caused by a truck that blew up while crossing the bridge, killing three people.
Summary of the day so far
Explosions were reported in Kerch near the Crimean Bridge that connects the Russian-occupied Crimea with Russia. The Russian-appointed head of Crimea said Russian air defence was able to shoot down two drones, and that there was no damage, but footage and photos show smoke billowing up from the bridge itself. This comes after an explosion in October shut down both the road bridge and rail bridge for months.
Two people have been killed in Russian attacks in the Zaporizhzhia and Kharkiv oblasts. A police officer was killed and 12 people were injured in a guided Russian aerial bomb attack on Orikhov, while an elderly woman was killed early Saturday morning due to shelling by Russian troops on Kupiansk-Vuzlovyi village in Kupiansk district.
Russia has downed 20 Ukrainian drones targeting the Crimean peninsula, the defence ministry in Moscow has said. This comes amid a new campaign of drone strikes targeting Moscow in recent days as Kyiv works to keep the Kremlin’s war in the hearts and minds of the Russian elites and others seeking to ignore the invasion.
Russian forces regained control of Urozhaine in the Donetsk oblast in an overnight counterattack, said Vladimir Rogov, a Russian-installed official in the Zaporizhia region under Moscow’s control.
The general staff of Ukrainian armed forces has estimated that Russian forces lost 510 personnel yesterday. That brings the official Ukrainian estimate of total Russian personnel lost since the invasion began in February 2022 to 253,290.
Wildfires have been destroying the nature reserve on Dzharylhach island in the Kherson oblast for the past week. The island has been under Russian occupation since the early days of the invasion in February 2022, and Ukrainians are expressing frustration and anger that Russia is apparently doing nothing to mitigate the damage. Because it is under Russian occupation, the national park administration can not take action.
In the village of Lazurne of the Russian-occupied part of the Kherson oblast, residents will not be able to receive medicines like insulin or humanitarian aid if they do not apply for a Russian passport.
Odesa, a Black Sea city famed for its beautiful shoreline, has opened several beaches for the first time since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. Throughout the past year, suspicious objects and mines were routinely washing up along the coast, creating a hazard for any beachgoer.
Updated
The Russian defence ministry is now saying that Kyiv attempted to strike the Crimean Bridge with an S-200 anti-aircraft guided missile – not two drones.
”The Ukrainian missile was timely detected and intercepted in the air by Russian air defense systems,” the defence ministry said on Telegram.
Russian officials are still saying there was no damage or casualties.
Traffic over the bridge has reportedly been resumed, suggesting the bridge was not damaged. Russian officials said the smoke was a smokescreen to obscure the bridge https://t.co/jsNKXfKIdY
— Pjotr Sauer (@PjotrSauer) August 12, 2023
Updated
Russian-appointed officials of Russian-occupied Crimea are now saying that the smoke coming off the Crimean Bridge is “smoke cover” created by rescue services.
Locals who were near the beach are reporting seeing something hit the bridge, but Russian officials are saying air defence stopped two drones. Traffic was halted in both directions.
Two missiles shot down over the Kerch Bridge - "head" of Crimea Aksenov.
— Anton Gerashchenko (@Gerashchenko_en) August 12, 2023
The crossing was allegedly not damaged.
Aksenov's "advisor" claims that the smoke on the bridge is a "smoke cover" created by rescue services. He says traffic will resume moving in the nearest future.
By… pic.twitter.com/XOwOT5f3pD
Updated
Here are some more videos from the attack on the Crimean Bridge in Kerch. While the Russian-appointed head of Crimea is saying the bridge was not damaged after air defence shot down two drones, the results of the attack are yet to be determined.
The Crimean Bridge, also called the Kerch Bridge, spans the Kerch Strait and connects Russian-occupied Crimea to Russia. It was built after Russia illegally annexed Crimea in 2014. It has been a frequent target of Ukrainian forces – in October, an explosion caused parts of the road bridge to collapse. In February, however, Moscow announced that the road bridge had been reopened to traffic. The rail bridge was fully reopened in May.
Another attack on the Crimean Bridge is reported. pic.twitter.com/hC5B0FhuOM
— Anonymous (@YourAnonOne) August 12, 2023
Another day, another Ukrainian strike on the Crimea bridge. Degree of damage unknown so far. Russia claims it shot down two Ukrainian missiles. pic.twitter.com/j0EAyOcV5N
— Yaroslav Trofimov (@yarotrof) August 12, 2023
Updated
Two drones shot down near Crimean bridge
Following reports of explosions and the activation of the air raid siren in Kerch in Russian-occupied Crimea, Russian-appointed officials are now saying that two drones were shot down.
Though officials briefly stopped traffic on the Crimean bridge to Russia, they say the bridge was not damaged. Video of the bridge shows smoke billowing off the structure.
This comes after Russian troops shot down 20 drones over Crimea overnight.
Russian appointed head of Crimea says the two drones have been shot down and bridge not damaged https://t.co/jsNKXfKIdY
— Pjotr Sauer (@PjotrSauer) August 12, 2023
CRIMEAN BRIDGE... BAVOVNA 🔥🔥🔥
— MAKS 23 👀🇺🇦 (@Maks_NAFO_FELLA) August 12, 2023
IT'S NOT TRAINING 👀 pic.twitter.com/yyKEDjJwmV
Updated
Explosions reported in Crimea
There are reports of explosions around Kerch in Russian-occupied Crimea, the location of the bridge to Russia.
Officials have halted traffic over the bridge.
Something big happening on the Crimean bridge. Officials announced that traffic over the bridge has been stopped pic.twitter.com/y8d2piYlZ2
— Pjotr Sauer (@PjotrSauer) August 12, 2023
Updated
Explosions heard in occupied Zaporizhzhia oblast
Residents are reporting hearing explosions and seeing plumes of smoke coming from Berdyansk in the Zaporizhzhia oblast, which is currently under Russian occupation. Some have reported seeing a Ukrainian drone flying overhead.
Explosions reported in occupied Berdyansk, Zaporizhzia region. pic.twitter.com/3qAMPv1DPR
— NOELREPORTS 🇪🇺 🇺🇦 (@NOELreports) August 12, 2023
Updated
Odesa, a Black Sea city famed for its beautiful shoreline, has opened several beaches for the first time since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.
Throughout the past year, suspicious objects and mines were routinely washing up along the coast, creating a hazard for any beachgoer.
Updated
Alexander Dudka, the Russian-appointed head of the village of Lazurne in the Russian-occupied part of the Kherson oblast, is on video telling residents that they will not receive medicines like insulin or humanitarian aid if they do not apply for a Russian passport.
“There’s now an official document stating that medicine purchased using Russia’s budget by foreign nationals, that is, Ukrainian citizens, will not be possible,” he said. “This primarily concerns insulin-dependents who already felt what it means to be a citizen of another country.
“The same will apply to the distribution of humanitarian aid,” Dudka continued. “To those who have not received the passport of the country they live in, the country that is feeding them, giving them benefits and provides their security on this territory: things that the so-called ‘waiters’ (those who have not gotten a Russian passport) are doing are beyond all limits now, not just lawfully but in terms of common sense.”
A collaborator official tells Ukrainians who live in the occupied Lazurne in Kherson Oblast that they won't get medicines if they do not apply for a Russian passport. This includes INSULIN. The collaborator cites issues with "waiters" i.e. those waiting for Ukraine to liberate… pic.twitter.com/5VjPomBX7z
— Dmitri (@wartranslated) August 12, 2023
Updated
Kyiv has repeatedly accused Russia of not protecting its people. As Kyiv ups its drone attacks on Moscow, Ukrainian officials are also criticising Russia’s air defences for not being able to handle the onslaught.
Here, a video shows a Ukrainian drone flying through the Russian capital, with no air raid signals.
BEAUTIFUL DAY IN MOSCOW 🇷🇺
— Jason Jay Smart (@officejjsmart) August 12, 2023
⚡️⚡️⚡️ Russian Telegram is upset that there is a 🇺🇦 drone flying, peacefully and without any air defense disturbing it, towards downtown Moscow.
Like yesterday: 🇷🇺 air raid signals are silent. pic.twitter.com/ymnkGUfXd8
Dzharylhach island in the Kherson oblast has been under Russian occupation since the early days of the invasion in February 2022.
Wildfires have been destroying the nature reserve on the island for the past week, and Ukrainians are expressing frustration and anger that Russia is apparently doing nothing to mitigate the damage. Because it is under Russian occupation, the national park administration can not take action.
For a week wildfires at the russian-occupied Dzharylhach island have been destroying the unique ecosystem of the protected zone, its flora & fauna are significantly endangered. russians use the island in the Kherson region as a military base. It's the outright ecocide pic.twitter.com/tbWzavRoho
— Olena Halushka (@OlenaHalushka) August 11, 2023
A fire in a nature reserve on Dzharylhach Island in Kherson region has been burning for a week, destroying the entire protected area of more than 1,500 ha. The main rare species of animals and plants in the reserve were concentrated there. The fire on the island can be seen from… pic.twitter.com/vlRvRVWBFY
— Гюндуз Мамедов/Gyunduz Mamedov (@MamedovGyunduz) August 11, 2023
For 5 days, the steppe area of Dzharylhach island has been engulfed in flames 💔
— UAnimals.ENG 🇺🇦 (@UAnimalsENG) August 5, 2023
This area houses all the rare steppe animals and constitutes the primary part of the island's steppe ecosystems. It's also home to the largest population of ungulates on Dzharylhach.
Since the first… pic.twitter.com/XMSbHglrH2
Updated
Amid air raid sirens, Yuriy Malashko, head of the Zaporizhia regional military administration, is on Telegram urging residents to take shelter, underscoring “the threat of the use of aviation weapons (KAB/KAR) for the front edge of the Zaporizhzhia region”.
Updated
Anton Gerashchenko, an adviser to Ukraine’s minister of internal affairs, has posted a video of Russian soldiers from the Moscow area asking for aid from Russia, detailing how they were sent to the frontlines without training or equipment.
Russian mobilized men from Moscow region complain about being sent to the frontlines without ammunition, food or medical supplies. They ask for help - it seems, from those who sent them to war in the first place. pic.twitter.com/BPOVts215P
— Anton Gerashchenko (@Gerashchenko_en) August 12, 2023
Oleksandr Vilkul, head of the defence council of Kryvyi Rih in central Ukraine has confirmed that there were explosions in the city this morning. On Telegram, he said that so far there were no losses connected to the explosions.
Serhii Lysak, the governor of Dnipropetrovsk oblast, said the explosions were probably a missile attack.
Ukrayna
— Furkan (@Frknwar3) August 12, 2023
Rus ordusu, Kryvyi Rih yerleşim yerini vurdu pic.twitter.com/mcS0LDgZLi
Updated
Police officer killed in air strike on Zaporizhzhia oblast
A police officer was killed and 12 people were injured in a guided Russian aerial bomb attack on Orikhov in the Zaporizhzhia oblast, Ukrainian internal affairs minister Ihor Klymenko said on Telegram.
The police officer killed was a 31-year-old captain. Of the 12 injured, four were police officers, Klymenko said.
Updated
The UK Ministry of Defence has released its latest briefing on the Russian invasion of Ukraine:
Latest Defence Intelligence update on the situation in Ukraine - 12 August 2023.
— Ministry of Defence 🇬🇧 (@DefenceHQ) August 12, 2023
Find out more about Defence Intelligence's use of language: https://t.co/jicui2oblb
🇺🇦 #StandWithUkraine 🇺🇦 pic.twitter.com/cOsGaKFyT0
(1/5) Russia has likely redeployed airborne forces’ (VDV) units from the Kherson region to the heavily contested Orikiv sector in Zaporizhzhia Oblast. The 58th Combined Arms Army (58 CAA) has been in combat facing Ukrainian assaults since 4 June 2023.
— Ministry of Defence 🇬🇧 (@DefenceHQ) August 12, 2023
(2/5) As early as 11 July 2023, the then commander of 58 CAA was sacked, likely partially because of his insistence that elements of his force needed to be relieved.
— Ministry of Defence 🇬🇧 (@DefenceHQ) August 12, 2023
(3/5) Reports suggest that the 70th and 71st Motor Rifle Regiments have faced particularly intense attrition and heavy combat on the front line.
— Ministry of Defence 🇬🇧 (@DefenceHQ) August 12, 2023
(4/5) There is a realistic possibility that the arrival of VDV will finally allow elements of these regiments to be pulled out for rest and recovery.
— Ministry of Defence 🇬🇧 (@DefenceHQ) August 12, 2023
(5/5) However, the redeployment will likely leave Russia’s defences near the east bank of the Dnipro River weaker, where they are increasingly harassed by Ukrainian amphibious raids.
— Ministry of Defence 🇬🇧 (@DefenceHQ) August 12, 2023
The general staff of Ukrainian armed forces has released its daily tally of Russian losses with an estimate of 510 Russian personnel lost yesterday. That brings the official Ukrainian estimate of total Russian personnel lost since the invasion began in February 2022 to 253,290.
Загальні бойові втрати противника з 24.02.22 по 12.08.23 орієнтовно склали / The total combat losses of the enemy from 24.02.22 to 12.08.23 were approximately pic.twitter.com/N7iwb3duWR
— Генеральний штаб ЗСУ (@GeneralStaffUA) August 12, 2023
Russian forces regained control of Urozhaine in the Donetsk oblast in an overnight counterattack, said Vladimir Rogov, a Russian-installed official in the Zaporizhia region under Moscow’s control.
“For attempts to gain a foothold in Urozhaine, and even more so – to move forward, the militants of the armed forces of Ukraine paid a very high price,” Rogov said on Telegram.
Russian air defence systems also knocked out overnight 14 Ukrainian drones that were attempting to destroy Russian equipment on the Crimean peninsula, Rogov said.
Updated
An elderly woman was killed early Saturday morning due to shelling by Russian troops on a settlement in Kharkiv region in eastern Ukraine, a local official said according to Reuters.
This morning, around 5:10, the enemy fired on Kupiansk-Vuzlovyi village in Kupiansk district. A residential building was damaged. A 73-year-old woman died,” Kharkiv governor Oleh Synehubov said on the Telegram messaging app.
Reuters could not independently verify the details of the Ukrainian report.
Eastern parts of the Kharkiv region are directly adjacent to the front line and Ukrainian forces have reported an increase in Russian attacks there in recent weeks.
Kharkiv regional authorities earlier this month announced the mandatory evacuation of civilians from settlements closest to the front line in Kupiansk district.
Russia denies deliberately targeting civilians during its invasion of Ukraine, which is now in its 18th month and has resulted in the deaths of thousands of people, the uprooting of millions and the destruction of Ukrainian towns and cities.
Updated
A new campaign of drone strikes has targeted the Russian capital in recent days as Kyiv has demonstrated its ability to hit Moscow and to keep the Kremlin’s war in the hearts and minds of the Russian elites and others seeking to ignore the invasion of Ukraine, Andrew Roth, Daniel Boffey and Pjotr Sauer have written in a new analysis for the Guardian.
Ministry of defence sources in Kyiv said the drone attacks had the twin aims of raising morale at home at a time when successes at the fronts were scarce and raising a question among the Russian public over whether Putin was able to protect them.
The raids into the bordering Belgorod region, by both dissident Russian units and Ukrainian saboteurs with a loose link to the official military, were said to have the same purpose, with Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, increasingly talking up the reach of his country’s forces.
Ukraine’s western partners, once extremely sensitive to the charge that Nato weaponry was being used in attacks on Russian soil, had come to accept that Kyiv had the right to use its own resources to destabilise Putin’s regime, officials in Kyiv said.
Read on below:
Updated
Russia downs 20 drones over occupied Crimean peninsula, defence ministry says
Russia has downed 20 Ukrainian drones targeting the Crimean peninsula, the defence ministry in Moscow has said.
Fourteen drones were shot down by Russian air defences and another six were electronically jammed, the ministry said in a Telegram post. There were no casualties or damage.
The number of drone attacks on Moscow and Crimea, which Russia illegally annexed in 2014, has increased in recent weeks, after Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy warned that the “war is returning to the territory of Russia”.
Moscow has been the target of such attacks about a dozen times in the past three weeks, leading to the temporary closure of its main airport as well as causing damage to buildings.
Updated
Opening summary
Hello and welcome to the Guardian’s live coverage of the war in Ukraine with me, Helen Livingstone.
Russian air defences shot down 20 Ukrainian drones targeting the Crimean peninsula overnight, the defence ministry has said.
Fourteen drones were destroyed by air defence systems and another six were electronically jammed, the ministry said in a Telegram post, adding that there were no casualties or damage. It blamed the attack on Ukraine.
Although Ukraine rarely acknowledges such attacks, the president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, last month warned that the “war is returning to the territory of Russia”. Drone strikes targeting Moscow and Crimea have since increased in frequency.
In other key developments:
Volodymyr Zelenskiy announced the dismissal of all the heads of Ukraine’s regional military recruitment centres in the latest drive to root out corruption after officials were accused of taking bribes from those seeking to avoid the frontlines. Ukraine’s president described the taking of cash from people who wanted to avoid conscription while others suffered as a form of treachery.
Russia on Friday said it had improved its fighting positions around the north-east Ukraine town of Kupiansk, where its advance has prompted Ukrainian officials to urge residents to evacuate. Kupiansk and the surrounding areas of the north-east Kharkiv region were recaptured by Kyiv’s forces in September but Moscow has since pushed back.
Russian forces fired four Kinzhal hypersonic missiles on western Ukraine early Friday, targeting an airfield but killing an eight-year-old boy who lived nearby, Ukraine said. Of the missiles fired from southern and central Russia, one was shot down over the Kyiv region by air defences, but the rest struck close to an airfield in the western Ivano-Frankivsk region, the Ukrainian air force said.
The US has imposed new sanctions on four “prominent members of Russia’s financial elite”, the US treasury department said in a statement on Friday. All four have served on the supervisory board of the Alfa Group Consortium, one of Russia’s largest financial and investment conglomerates.
The European Union has delivered 223,800 shells to Ukraine under the first part of a plan to provide a million artillery rounds to aid Kyiv’s fight against Russia, a spokesperson said on Friday.
At least 499 children have been killed and 1,097 injured so far in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Ukraine prosecutor general’s office said on Friday. The office, tasked with tallying Russia’s war crimes, counted at least 81 new crimes registered this week, bringing the total to 102,849.
Belarus president Alexander Lukashenko said he had ordered “contact” with Poland and that he was ready to talk amid rising border tensions between the Nato member and the Moscow ally. “We need to talk to the Poles. I ordered the prime minister to contact them,” Lukashenko said on Friday, according to state news agency Belta.
Russian media have reported that the Kremlin is considering closing some or all Moscow airports as Kyiv continues its drone attacks on the Russian capital.
Repairs to the Chonhar Bridge that links Crimea to Kherson will take at least a month, the Russian-imposed acting governor of the occupied portion of Kherson, Vladimir Saldo, was quoted as saying. The bridge was damaged in a Ukrainian strike on 6 August.
Russian authorities have taken Ukrainian teenagers from occupied territories of the country to a military education camp in Russia, where they received military training, Ukraine’s Centre of National Resistance said. The camp opened in the town of Penza on 1 August, it said.
Ukrainian border guards have stopped a number of Ukrainian men attempting to leave the country, apparently to avoid conscription in the war. The State Border Guard Service said that in Odesa, guards found two Ukrainian men of military age hiding in a vehicle after paying two Moldovans $4,500 each to get them to Moldova. In Zakarpattia province in Ukraine’s west, border guards stopped a vehicle in which four men had paid smugglers $4,000 each to cross into Romania.
Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine’s foreign affairs minister, vowed that any Taurus cruise missile supplied to Kyiv would be used only within Ukrainian borders. This has been a point of contention between Kyiv and its western allies – Kyiv has been asking for Taurus missiles, which can travel more than 500km (300 miles), but nations such as Germany have balked at the request over concerns about the long range.
Updated
