Ukraine-Russia battle – reside: Moscow could have used guided bomb in Kharkiv assault as Putin denies Nato battle plans | EUROtoday

Russia fired drones and missiles in a single day at southern and japanese areas of Ukraine, authorities stated, injuring greater than a dozen folks because the Kremlin’s forces persevered with attritional assaults designed to put on down Ukrainian defenses.

The common bombardment of Ukraine by the Kremlin’s forces throughout the battle has just lately gained momentum, with missile barrages of the capital Kyiv and strikes on vitality amenities throughout the nation. The assaults additionally intention to weaken Ukrainian morale and act as retribution for Ukrainian long-range strikes on Russian soil.

Russia has no designs on any NATO nation and won’t assault Poland, the Baltic states or the Czech Republic but when the West provides F-16 fighters to Ukraine then they are going to be shot down by Russian forces, President Vladimir Putin stated late on Wednesday.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 has triggered the deepest disaster in Russia’s relations with the West because the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.

Speaking to Russian air power pilots, Putin stated the U.S.-led army alliance had expanded eastwards in direction of Russia because the 1991 fall of the Soviet Union however that Moscow had no plans to assault a NATO state.

“We have no aggressive intentions towards these states,” Putin stated, in keeping with a Kremlin transcript launched on Thursday. “The idea that we will attack some other country – Poland, the Baltic States, and the Czechs are also being scared – is complete nonsense. It’s just drivel.”

The Kremlin, which accuses the US of combating in opposition to Russia by supporting Ukraine with cash, weapons and intelligence, says relations with Washington have most likely by no means been worse.

Asked about F-16 fighters which the West has promised to ship to Ukraine, Putin stated such plane wouldn’t change the scenario in Ukraine.

“If they supply F-16s, and they are talking about this and are apparently training pilots, this will not change the situation on the battlefield,” Putin stated. “And we will destroy the aircraft just as we destroy today tanks, armoured vehicles and other equipment, including multiple rocket launchers.”

The Polish and Ukrainian governments meet in Warsaw on Thursday for talks to defuse a row over grain imports that has prompted mass protests by farmers, however a prime Polish official stated a breakthrough was unlikely.

Farmers in Poland and elsewhere within the European Union have been protesting to demand the re-imposition of customs duties on agricultural imports from Ukraine that have been waived after Russia’s invasion in 2022.

They say Ukraine’s farmers are flooding Europe with low cost imports that depart them unable to compete.

“It is difficult to expect any breakthrough after these talks, any specific agreement, for example on agricultural issues,” Jan Grabiec, head of the prime minister’s workplace, informed state information company PAP. “We are still in dialogue and both sides – at least for today – are not fully satisfied.”

Poland has been eyeing a licensing deal for agricultural commerce with Ukraine just like one agreed with Kyiv by Romania and Bulgaria.

On Wednesday Polish Agriculture Minister Czeslaw Siekierski stated talks have been ongoing a couple of system of licensing exports, however that there have been variations over the vary of merchandise that may be lined.

Ukrainian Farm Minister Mykola Solsky stated the discussions with Poland have been “complicated but frank”.

“It is important that we have already discussed solutions that will soon be announced. At the same time, the issue is difficult for all parties and requires additional time,” he wrote on social media platform X.

The reporter, the WSJ and the US authorities all deny Mr Gershkovich is a spy and he has been falsely imprisoned. He has had his pre-trial detention prolonged 5 instances, the most recent in a court docket listening to earlier this week that added three months till at the least 30 June. If convicted, he might withstand 20 years in jail.

Leading Russian human rights group Memorial has warned that the well being of its jailed 70-year-old head, Oleg Orlov, is deteriorating, accusing jail authorities of subjecting him to inhumane therapy.

Orlov, a frontrunner of Memorial which gained a share of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2022, was sentenced final month to 2-1/2 years in jail for “discrediting the armed forces” after he took half in anti-war demonstrations and revealed an article through which he stated Russia had descended into fascism.

He has since filed an attraction.

Memorial stated on Wednesday that Orlov’s well being was struggling on account of a strict weight-reduction plan of “dry rations” added to boiling water. He can be compelled on the request of the choose to make day by day journeys between the detention centre and the court docket to overview the case supplies for his attraction, travelling in an unheated and smoke-filled police van, the group stated.

It additionally stated he’s not being granted common and confidential entry to his legal professionals.

“Orlov’s constant trips to court, as well as the conditions of transportation and detention during trips, together constitute cruel and degrading treatment and violate Orlov’s rights,” his defence staff wrote in official complaints it filed to the court docket and posted on Memorial’s web site.

“The current situation gives me serious fears for the life and health of my client,” the criticism says.

Russia could have used a brand new kind of guided bomb in airstrikes on the northeastern Ukrainian metropolis of Kharkiv that killed at the least one individual on Wednesday, native officers stated.

The officers stated 4 youngsters together with a three-month-old child have been amongst 19 folks wounded in Kharkiv within the newest strikes since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, a few of which have prompted blackouts, together with in Kharkiv.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy condemned the assault as “Russian terror” and Volodymyr Tymoshko, head of the Kharkiv regional police, stated Moscow could have used a brand new kind of guided bomb which he described because the UMPB D-30.

“This is something between a guided aerial bomb which they (the Russians) have used recently, and a missile. It’s a flying bomb so to say,” Tymoshko stated on the website of the strike.

Regional governor Oleh Synehubov additionally urged Moscow could have used a brand new kind of bomb, saying: “It seems that the Russians decided to test their modified bombs on the residents of the houses.”

Russia didn’t instantly touch upon their remarks. It denies concentrating on civilians though the battle has killed 1000’s of individuals, uprooted tens of millions and destroyed cities and cities.

Two residential buildings and a medical establishment have been partially destroyed, and a complete of 14 buildings, together with an academic facility, have been broken, Synehubov stated on the Telegram messenger.

Ukrainian forces shot down 26 out of 28 assault drones launched in a single day by Russia, Kyiv’s army stated on Thursday.

The Iranian-made drones have been destroyed over components of japanese, southern and southeastern Ukraine, the air power added.

The Zaporizhzhia area’s governor stated on Telegram that two ladies had been wounded when particles struck a residential neighbourhood within the regional capital.

Prosecutors within the japanese Kharkiv area stated a restaurant, a retailer and places of work have been broken by particles from three drones.

The air power added that Russia’s in a single day assault included a number of varieties of missiles. The army’s southern command reported on Telegram that these launched from planes over the Black Sea had “lost their combat capability”.

Odesa area governor Oleh Kiper stated Russia carried out a separate missile strike later within the morning however that no accidents had been reported. He didn’t specify the goal.

Russia has launched common air strikes on inhabitants centres far behind the strains of its two-year-old full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

In the weeks main as much as the tragedy at a Moscow music venue on Friday night time, warnings had been relayed to Russia {that a} terror assault perpetrated by extremists was imminent.

At least 137 folks have been killed, whereas over 100 extra have been wounded with the jihadist group ISIS-Okay claiming accountability in a sequence of movies and messages.

In the month after his return to parliament, described as a “dark day” for Britain’s Jewish group, Mr Galloway espoused conspiracy theories concerning the Princess of Wales being useless and likened Israel to Nazi Germany.