Ukraine-Russia war: Russian general blown up by landmine on front line

A Russian general has reportedly been blown up by a landmine along the front line in Ukraine.

Major General Vladimir Zavadsky, deputy commander of the 14th Army Corps, was said to have stepped on the explosive on Tuesday.

His death was first reported by Colonel Anatoly Stefan, a Ukrainian military officer.

It was not immediately clear where he was killed.

Several Russian generals have reportedly died in Ukraine since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion in February last year.

03:24 PM GMT

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02:59 PM GMT

Russia bombards Avdiivka with nearly 20 air strikes

Russia has launched nearly 20 airstrikes in a renewed assault on Avdiivka, Ukraine has said.

Oleksandr Tarnavsky, the Ukrainian commander responsible for the territory, said Moscow had “significantly increased its activity” and was  using armoured vehicles.

He said Russian forces had carried out nearly 20 airstrikes, launched four missiles and thrown 56 assault waves at his forces, and fired more than 1,000 artillery rounds.

The industrial town of Avdiivka in the eastern Donetsk region has become a recent flashpoint of Moscow’s invasion.

Russia launched a renewed bid to capture the war-battered town last month and analysts suggest Moscow’s forces have made incremental gains.

02:49 PM GMT

Zelensky visits Odesa

02:22 PM GMT

Pictured: A member of a Ukrainian M109 artillery crew prepares ammunition

02:05 PM GMT

Kremlin warns of tensions if Poland sends troops to Finnish-Russian border

Any decision by Finland to allow a “concentration” of troops on its border with Russia would be viewed by Moscow as a threat, the Kremlin has said, after Poland offered to send military advisers to help Helsinki police the frontier.

The head of the Polish National Security Bureau, Jacek Siewiera, said that Poland would send military advisers to its Nato ally Finland, in response to “an official request for allied support in the face of a hybrid attack on the Finnish border”.

“A team of military advisers will provide on-site knowledge on border security, also in operational terms,” he said.

Finland said on Wednesday it was unaware of the Polish offer. It has closed its entire 1,340 km border with Russia for two weeks in a bid to halt an unusually large flow of asylum seekers that Helsinki says amounts to a “hybrid attack” orchestrated by Moscow, a charge the Kremlin denies.

Asked about the Polish offer to Finland, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said: “This is an absolutely redundant measure to ensure border security because there is no threat there.”

01:45 PM GMT

Truck blockade at Polish-Ukrainian border 'unacceptable,' says EU official

Ukraine and the European Union cannot be “taken hostage” by Polish truckers blockading the Polish-Ukrainian border in protest at competition from Ukrainian hauliers, the European Commissioner for Transport said on Wednesday.

The round-the-clock blockade in Medyka and three other border crossings, which started on Monday, extends a protest that has left over a thousand lorries stranded for days in queues that stretch for miles.

Transport commissioner Adina Valean said the situation was “unacceptable”.

Polish truckers complain they are losing out to Ukrainian companies which offer cheaper prices for their services and which are transporting goods within the EU, rather than just between the bloc and Ukraine.

“There is no good faith in finding a solution... and there is nearly a complete lack of involvement from Polish authorities... who are supposed to enforce the law at that border,” Valean said.

“While I support the people’s right to protest, the entire EU, not to mention Ukraine, a country currently at war, cannot be taken hostage by blocking our external borders.”

01:03 PM GMT

'No sense of fatigue' when it comes to support for Ukraine, Blinken says

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that there was “no sense of fatigue” among Nato allies when it came to helping Ukraine.

“Some are questioning whether the United States and other Nato allies in truth continue to stand with Ukraine as we enter the second winter of (Vladimir) Putin’s brutality,” Mr Blinken said.

“But the answer here today at Nato is clear and it’s unwavering. We must and we will continue to support Ukraine.”

12:18 PM GMT

Russia claims it has 'taken control' of village on outskirts of Bakhmut

Russia’s defence ministry claimed its forces had taken control of a village in eastern Ukraine’s war-torn Donetsk region.

Khromove, which Russia calls Artyomovskoe, is on the western outskirts of Bakhmut, a city which Russia captured last summer after a months-long battle.

Reuters could not independently verify the defence ministry’s assertion and there was no immediate comment from Ukraine.

11:58 AM GMT

Pictured: Ukrainian soldiers fire artillery at their fighting position in the direction of Avdiivka

11:47 AM GMT

Ukrainian drone 'shot down over Moscow'

A Ukrainian drone was shot down over Moscow, Russia has claimed.

Sergei Sobyanin, the mayor of the capital, said Russian air defence forces destroyed a Ukraine-launched drone over the Podolsk district in the region of Moscow.

“According to preliminary information, there was no damage or casualties at the site where the debris fell,” he said.

Meanwhile, Ukraine’s air force said it destroyed 21 drones and two missiles launched by Russia overnight.

11:38 AM GMT

Russia has amassed large missile stockpile ahead of winter, says Nato Secretary General

Russia has amassed a large missile stockpile ahead of winter, Nato’s Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has said.

Russia has been making new attempts to strike Ukraine’s power grid and energy infrastructure, “trying to leave Ukraine in the dark and cold,” he said.

It comes after German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock called on Ukraine’s supporters to create a winter shield over the country to protect it from Russian attacks.

11:03 AM GMT

'There is no stalemate,' says Ukraine's foreign minister

Ukraine’s foreign minister has denied that there is a stalemate in its war with Russia.

Dmytro Kuleba rejected a journalist’s assertion that the war was now at a stalemate, after Ukraine’s summer counter-offensive failed to win back significant amounts of territory occupied by Russia.

“There is no stalemate,” he said before moving on to another question.

Speaking to reporters on the event’s sidelines, he called for greater alignment of Ukraine’s and Nato’s defence industries to ensure Kyiv has the supplies it needs to defeat Russia, which invaded Ukraine in February 2022.

10:21 AM GMT

Pictured: A Ukrainian soldier works on an Avenger AN/TWQ-1 anti-aircraft missile system

10:06 AM GMT

Turkey expects to ratify Sweden's Nato accession 'within weeks'

Turkey has told Sweden it expects to ratify its long-delayed accession to the Nato military alliance within weeks, Sweden’s foreign minister said on Wednesday.

“I had a bilateral with my colleague, the (Turkish) foreign minister ... where he told me that he expected the ratification to take place within weeks,” Swedish Foreign Minister Tobias Billstrom told reporters before the second day of a meeting of Nato foreign ministers.

Turkey and Hungary are the only Nato members yet to ratify Sweden’s bid, more than 18 months after it applied for membership.

Some in Nato had hoped Sweden’s ratification would be completed by now, in time for an accession ceremony to take place on the sidelines of the Brussels meeting.

There was no immediate confirmation or comment by Turkey.

09:43 AM GMT

Ukraine tells Nato it won't 'back down' in fight against Russia

Ukraine’s foreign minister said that it won’t “back down” in its fight against Russia, despite doubts over US support and minimal progress on the front line.

“We have to continue, we have to keep fighting. Ukraine is not going to back down,” Dmytro Kuleba told Kyiv’s Nato backers in Brussels.

“Our strategic goal, which is territorial integrity within internationally recognised borders as of 1991, remains unchanged,” he said.

“The issue here is not just Ukraine’s security it is the security and safety of the entire Euro-Atlantic space.”

09:13 AM GMT

Ukraine has received 300,000 of EU's promised million shells

The European Union has delivered about 300,000 of its promised million shells to Ukraine so far, Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said on Wednesday while visiting a Nato event in Brussels.

Speaking to reporters on the event’s sidelines, Mr Kuleba called for greater alignment of Ukraine’s and Nato’s defence industries to ensure Kyiv has the supplies it needs to defeat Russia.

08:40 AM GMT

German minister calls for protective winter shield over Ukraine

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock called on Ukraine’s supporters to create a winter shield over the country to protect it from Russian attacks.

“Russia again is aiming at civil infrastructure”, Ms Baerbock told reporters on the sidelines of a meeting of Nato foreign ministers in Brussels.

Russian strikes on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure last winter left millions in the cold and dark for extended periods.

08:13 AM GMT

Pictured: A woman stands inside her flat damaged by recent shelling in Donetsk

08:00 AM GMT

ISW: Ukrainian forces 'attacked east bank of Kherson'

07:51 AM GMT

Ukraine 'suspects Russia poisoned spy chief's wife'

Ukraine said it believed Russia had poisoned the wife of its military intelligence chief, in an apparent assassination attempt targeting the heart of Kyiv’s leadership.

Marianna Budanova, who is an advisor to Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko, was hospitalised after a prolonged deterioration in her health, the Babel news outlet reported on Tuesday.

Ukrainian investigators’ “main hypothesis” is that Russia was involved in the poisoning attempt, Ukrainian military intelligence spokesman Andriy Yusov later told AFP.

“The target was the wife,” he added, because “it is simply impossible to reach the commander directly.”

There were no immediate comments from Russian authorities.

07:40 AM GMT

Putin won't 'make peace in Ukraine' before 2024 US election, says US offiicial

Russian President Vladimir Putin will not make peace in Ukraine before he knows the results of the November 2024 US election, a senior US State Department official said on Tuesday.

It comes amid concerns that a potential victory for former President Donald Trump could upend Western support for Kyiv.

Mr Trump, who is seeking reelection in 2024 and is the leading candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, has been sharply critical of US support for Kyiv.

A senior official briefing reporters after a meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Brussels said the alliance reiterated its support for Ukraine knowing that a peace agreement in the next year is unlikely.

“My expectation is that Putin won’t make a peace or a meaningful peace before he sees the result of our election,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the outcomes of the meeting.

Asked whether they were expressing a personal opinion or the view of the US government, the official said it was a “widely shared premise.”

“That was the context in which the allies all expressed strong support for Ukraine” in the Nato meeting on Tuesday, the official added, without mentioning Mr Trump by name or explicitly saying how the election result would affect support for Ukraine.

07:37 AM GMT

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