Europe
1 in 4 Europeans say they are in financially 'precarious' situation: Survey
Many Europeans are now facing hard choices due to a difficult financial situation and more than one in four of them said they are in a "precarious" situation and over half see a serious risk it will become so over the coming months, with an unexpected expense that could push them into poverty, according to a survey.
This feeling is particularly strong in Greece and France.
As the cost of living, driven by higher energy prices, raging inflation and war in Ukraine, tightens their grip, Pollster Ipsos and French anti-poverty NGO Secours Populaire have set up a "European Barometer of Precariousness and Poverty" for the first time to observe the social situation, opinions, and concerns of people in France, the UK, Germany, Greece, Italy and Poland.
Half of more than 6,000 people polled in the six countries, from June 17 to July 6, told Ipsos that their purchasing power had shrunk over the past three years – mainly due to soaring food, fuel, heating and rent bills.
Read: Soaring inflation threatens to unleash political turmoil across Europe
In this "very difficult context, Europeans do not feel secure." Across Europe, rising inflation is behind a wave of protests and strikes that underscores growing discontent with the spiralling cost of living and threatens to unleash political turmoil.
Europeans have seen their energy bills and food prices soar because of the war in Ukraine. Despite natural gas prices falling from record summer highs and governments allocating over $566 billion in energy relief to households and businesses since September 2021, it is not enough for some protesters, according to the think tank Bruegel.
Energy prices have driven inflation in the 19 countries that use the euro currency to a record 9.9 percent, making it harder for people to buy what they need.
"Many Europeans have declared falling into financial difficulties. This situation is particularly difficult in Greece, where 51 percent of respondents said they are in this situation," Ipsos said.
Around 55 percent of Europeans feel that there is a significant risk that they will find themselves in an unstable financial situation in the coming months, with inflation continuing to rise in the continent.
Read: Europe sees fastest pace of rate hikes since euro launched
They have little financial wiggle room, with 64 percent of respondents indicating they are unsure of which expense to cut back on because they have already done so. This anxiety is growing in Italy and Greece and now concerns seven out of 10 people.
"More than one in three Europeans said they have had to restrict their travel recently. More than one in five said they have been cold recently and have not turned up the heating at home. One in seven has even had to ask for the help of relatives or take several jobs," Ipsos said.
"Beyond their own situation, the Europeans see the precariousness around them, particularly in their neighbourhoods, with 41 percent observing that there are many precarious people in their neighbourhoods and 30 percent in their close circle or at work. This difficult situation is particularly worrying in Greece, Italy and Poland."
Kyiv prepares for worst winter with no heat, water or power
The mayor of Kyiv, Ukraine's capital, is warning residents that they must prepare for the worst this winter if Russia keeps striking the country's energy infrastructure — and that means having no electricity, water or heat in the freezing cold cannot be ruled out.
“We are doing everything to avoid this. But let’s be frank, our enemies are doing everything for the city to be without heat, without electricity, without water supply, in general, so we all die. And the future of the country and the future of each of us depends on how prepared we are for different situations," Mayor Vitali Klitschko told state media.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address to the nation Sunday that about 4.5 million people were without electricity. He called on Ukrainians to endure the hardships and “we must get through this winter and be even stronger in the spring than now.”
Read more: Russia rejoins key deal on wartime Ukrainian grain exports
Russia has focused on striking Ukraine's energy infrastructure over the last month, causing power shortages and rolling outages across the country. Kyiv was having hourly rotating blackouts Sunday in parts of the city and the surrounding region.
Rolling blackouts also were planned in the Chernihiv, Cherkasy, Zhytomyr, Sumy, Kharkiv and Poltava regions, Ukraine’s state-owned energy operator, Ukrenergo, said.
Kyiv plans to deploy about 1,000 heating points, but it's unclear if that would be enough for a city of 3 million people.
As Russia intensifies its attacks on the capital, Ukrainian forces are pushing forward in the south. Residents of Ukraine's Russian-occupied city of Kherson received warning messages on their phones urging them to evacuate as soon as possible, Ukraine's military said Sunday. Russian soldiers warned civilians that Ukraine's army was preparing for a massive attack and told people to leave for the city's right bank immediately.
Russian forces are preparing for a Ukrainian counteroffensive to seize back the southern city of Kherson, which was captured during the early days of the invasion. In September, Russia illegally annexed Kherson as well as three other regions and subsequently declared martial law in the four provinces.
The Kremlin-installed administration in Kherson already has moved tens of thousands of civilians out of the city.
Russia has been “occupying and evacuating” Kherson simultaneously, trying to convince Ukrainians that they're leaving when in fact they're digging in, Nataliya Humenyuk, a spokeswoman for Ukraine's Southern Forces, told state television.
“There are defense units that have dug in there quite powerfully, a certain amount of equipment has been left, firing positions have been set up,” she said.
Read more: As winter approaches, Ukraine struggles with power outage
Russian forces are also digging in in a fiercely contested region in the east, worsening the already tough conditions for residents and the defending Ukrainian army following Moscow's illegal annexation and declaration of martial law in Donetsk province.
The attacks have almost completely destroyed the power plants that serve the city of Bakhmut and the nearby town of Soledar, said Pavlo Kyrylenko, the region's Ukrainian governor, said. Shelling killed one civilian and wounded three, he reported late Saturday.
“The destruction is daily, if not hourly,” Kyrylenko told state television.
Moscow-backed separatists have controlled part of Donetsk for nearly eight years before Russia invaded Ukraine in late February. Protecting the separatists' self-proclaimed republic there was one of Russian President Vladimir Putin's justifications for the invasion, and his troops have spent months trying to capture the entire province.
Between Saturday and Sunday, Russia's launched four missiles and 19 airstrikes hitting more than 35 villages in nine regions, from Chernihiv and Kharkiv in the northeast to Kherson and Mykolaiv in the south, according to Zelenskyy's office. The strikes killed two people and wounded six.
In the Donetsk city of Bakhmut, 15,000 remaining residents were living under daily shelling and without water or power, according to local media. The city has been under attack for months, but the bombardment picked up after Russian forces experienced setbacks during Ukrainian counteroffensives in the Kharkiv and Kherson regions.
The front line is now on Bakhmut's outskirts, where mercenaries from the Wagner Group, a shadowy Russian military company, are reported to be leading the charge.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, founder of the group who has typically remained under the radar, is taking a more visible role in the war. In a statement Sunday he announced the funding and creation of “militia training centers” in Russia’s Belgorod and Kursk regions in the southwest, saying that locals were best placed to “fight against sabotage” on Russian soil. The training centers are in addition to a military technology center the group said it was opening in St. Petersburg.
In Kharkiv, officials were working to identify bodies found in mass graves after the Russians withdrew, Dmytro Chubenko, a spokesperson for the regional prosecutor's office, told local media.
DNA samples have been collected from 450 bodies discovered in a mass grave in the city of Izium, but the samples need to be matched with relatives and so far only 80 people have participated, he said.
In one sliver of good news, the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant was reconnected to Ukraine’s power grid, local media reported Sunday. Europe’s largest nuclear plant needs electricity to maintain vital cooling systems, but it had been running on emergency diesel generators since Russian shelling severed its outside connections.
13 killed in Russian cafe fire
A fire in a cafe in the Russian city of Kostroma killed at least 13 people and injured five others on Saturday, local authorities said.
The governor of the Kostroma region, Sergei Sitnikov, said 13 people died in the fire and five more were slightly injured. Russian news agency Interfax cited local emergency officials as saying that the death toll stood at 15. The contradicting numbers couldn’t be immediately reconciled.
Read: Tragedies in Asia: Over 400 die in one month
The blaze erupted in the early hours after someone apparently used a flare gun, according to the authorities. The Russian state news agency RIA Novosti reported that a brawl erupted in the cafe shortly before the fire, but it wasn’t immediately clear if it had anything to do with the use of a flare gun.
Russia rejoins key deal on wartime Ukrainian grain exports
Diplomatic efforts salvaged a wartime agreement that allowed Ukrainian grain and other commodities to reach world markets, with Russia saying Wednesday it would stick to the deal after Ukraine pledged not to use a designated Black Sea corridor to attack Russian forces.
The Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement that Ukraine formally committed to use the established safe shipping corridor between southern Ukraine and Turkey “exclusively in accordance with the stipulations” of the agreement.
“The Russian Federation believes that the guarantees it has received currently appear sufficient, and resumes the implementation of the agreement,” the ministry said, adding that mediation by the United Nations and Turkey secured Russia’s continued cooperation.
Russia suspended its participation in the grain deal over the weekend, citing allegations of a Ukrainian drone attack against its Black Sea fleet in Crimea. Ukraine did not claim responsibility for the attack, which some Ukrainian officials blamed on Russian soldiers mishandling their own weapons.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the renewed deal would again come on stream Wednesday, prioritizing shipments to African nations, including Somalia, Djibouti and Sudan. That’s in line with Russia’s concerns that most of the exported grain had ended up in richer nations since Moscow and Kyiv made separate agreements with Turkey and the U.N. in July.
Read more:As winter approaches, Ukraine struggles with power outage
U.N. humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths said Monday that 23% of the total cargo exported from Ukraine under the grain deal went to lower or lower-middle income countries, which also received 49% of all wheat shipments.
The U.N. and Turkey brokered separate deals with Russia and Ukraine in July to ensure Africa, the Middle East and parts of Asia would receive grain and other food from the Black Sea region during Russia’s now eight-month-old war in Ukraine.
Ukraine and Russia are key global exporters of wheat, barley, sunflower oil and other food to developing countries where many are already struggling with hunger. A loss of those supplies before the grain deal pushed up global food prices and helped throw tens of millions into poverty, along with soaring energy costs.
The grain agreement brought down global food prices about 15% from their peak in March, according to the U.N. Losing Ukrainian shipments would have meant poorer countries paying more to import grain in a tight global market as places like Argentina and the United States deal with dry weather, analysts say.
After the announcement of Russia rejoining the deal, wheat futures prices erased the increases seen Monday, dropping more than 6% in Chicago.
At least a third of the grain shipped in the last three months was going to the Middle East and North Africa, while plenty of corn was sent to traditional buyer Europe, said Joseph Glauber, senior research fellow at the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington.
He added that more wheat was going to sub-Saharan Africa and Asian markets that have become increasingly important buyers of Ukrainian grain.
Meanwhile in Ukraine, thousands of homes in the Kyiv region and elsewhere remained without power, officials said Wednesday, as Russian drone and artillery strikes continued to target the country’s energy infrastructure.
Read more:Russia halts grain deal over Ukrainian drone attack
Kyiv region Gov. Oleksiy Kukeba said 16,000 homes were without electricity and drones attacked energy facilities in the Cherkasy region south of the capital, prompting power outages.
Although power and water were restored to the city of Kyiv, Kuleba didn’t rule out electricity shortages lasting “weeks” if Russian forces continue to hit energy facilities there. In a Telegram post, he accused Russian forces of trying to prompt a serious humanitarian crisis.
Power outages were also reported in the southern cities of Nikopol and Chervonohryhorivka following “a large-scale drone attack,” Dnipropetrovsk Gov. Valentyn Reznichenko said.
The two cities are located across the Dniper River from the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, Europe’s largest nuclear facility. Russia and Ukraine have for months traded blame for shelling at and around the plant that the U.N.’s nuclear watchdog warned could cause a radiation emergency.
In a development easing such fears, Ukraine’s state nuclear company Energoatom said the Zaporizhzha plant has been reconnected to the country’s power grid after Russian shelling forced the facility to rely on generators to cool its spent nuclear fuel.
Energoatom’s press service told the Associated Press in a written statement that some of the eight power lines serving the Russian-held plant have been restored, but wouldn’t specify the number citing fears of renewed Russian shelling.
With its six reactors inoperative, the plant relies on outside electricity to cool its spent fuel. Although Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree transferring the plant to Russian ownership, Ukrainian staff continues to run it.
Energoatom has repeatedly called for the withdrawal of Russian from the plant and for the creation of a demilitarized zone around it.
The company also said Russian soldiers have cordoned off the plant’s spent nuclear fuel storage facility and began unspecified construction there. It alleged that inspectors from the U.N. nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, who have been present at the site since early September have been barred from the area.
“The Russians are building incomprehensible things at the nuclear fuel storage facility. They don’t let anyone in, they don’t report anything,” the company said.
On a visit to Kyiv Wednesday, Spain’s Foreign Minister José Albares pledged a new military aid package to help Ukraine’s air defenses. Speaking after talks with Kuleba, Albares didn’t disclose specifics about the arms or when they’ll be delivered, citing security concerns.
Continued Russian shelling across nine regions in southern and eastern Ukraine caused at least four civilian deaths and wounded 17 others between Tuesday and Wednesday, according to the office of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
The shelling also pounded cities and villages retaken by Ukraine last month in the northeastern Kharkiv region, wounding seven people.
Russian fire damaged a hospital and apartment buildings in the Donetsk region city of Toretsk. Donetsk Gov. Pavlo Kyrylenko said Wednesday Ukrainian and Russian forces continued to fight for control of the cities of Avdiivka and Bakhmut, both key targets of a Russian offensive in the region.
In southern Ukraine, Russian-installed authorities in the occupied Kherson region relocated civilians some 90 kilometers (56 miles) further into Russian-held territory in anticipation of a major Ukrainian counterattack to recapture the provincial capital of the same name. Russian forces dug trenches to prepare for the expected ground assault.
The Kherson region’s Kremlin-appointed officials on Tuesday expanded an evacuation area to people living within 15 kilometers (9 miles) of the Dnieper River. They said 70,000 residents from the expanded evacuation zone would be relocated this week, doubling the number moved earlier.
As winter approaches, Ukraine struggles with power outage
The decorative candles Yaroslav Vedmid bought more than a year ago were never meant to be lit, but the dried wax that now clings to them attests to how they’ve been used almost nightly — a consequence of power cuts across Ukraine.
Seated at the dinner table with his wife in a village on the outskirts of the capital, Kyiv, the two can’t count the number of times they’ve eaten in the dark since Russian attacks triggered the blackouts beginning in early October. Moscow has openly declared its intention to target the country’s energy infrastructure and drive the nation into the cold.
“When you’re relying on electricity, the worst thing is that you can’t plan … Psychologically it’s very uncomfortable,” said Vedmid, a 44-year-old business owner in Bilohorodka. The cuts are getting longer — nearly 12 hours of outages a day, he said.
So far, Russia has destroyed about 40% of Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, affecting 16 regions, according to the Ukrainian government.
The latest assault came Monday, when a massive barrage of Russian cruise missile and drone strikes hit Kyiv, Kharkiv and other cities, knocking out water and power supplies in apparent retaliation for what Moscow alleged was a Ukrainian attack on its Black Sea fleet.
Read: Russia halts grain deal over Ukrainian drone attack
The unpredictable rolling blackouts are increasing as the government scrambles to stabilize the energy grid and repair the system ahead of winter. The cuts add another layer of angst and uncertainty to a population already struggling with the stress of nearly nine months of war.
To try to ease people’s burdens, energy companies are publishing daily schedules of when neighborhoods won’t have power. But it’s not consistent, especially as strikes intensify. Last week a power station in the central region was damaged, causing an emergency shutdown and prompting the government to warn citizens of tougher and longer outages.
“Unfortunately, the destruction and damage are serious,” Kyiv region Gov. Oleksiy Kuleba said in a Telegram post. “It is necessary to prepare for emergency power outages for an indefinite period,” he said.
Across the capital, residents are stocking up on heaters, blankets, warm clothing and power banks to charge electronics. While most say they’re willing to bear the brunt of the blackouts for the sake of the war, the frequency and fluidity of the outages are taxing.
Starting Tuesday, the government plans to change the schedule of the Kyiv subway to include longer wait times to save energy.
All you need to know about Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline
Nord Stream 2 is a gas pipeline designed to deliver Russian natural gas from Russia to Germany through the waters of the Baltic Sea.
The gas artery's construction ended in September 2021. The project is controlled by the operating company Nord Stream AG office in Switzerland's Zug.
Last year, Nord Stream 2's certification was delayed by Germany, with the process halted indefinitely in February 2022.
Just six months later, a major breakdown hit the gas artery, with underwater blasts detected on the pipeline. The European Union saw the incident as "sabotage," and Moscow called it an act of "international terrorism."
Read more: Despite Russian supply cuts German gas storage over 90% full
Designed to carry Russian "blue fuel" to Germany through the Baltic Sea, Nord Stream 2 was founded by Russia's Gazprom.
The project's cost stands at about $9.2 billion. European companies chipped in to pay half the sum. Among these companies are France's Engie, Austria's OMV, Holland-UK's Shell, and Germany's Uniper and Wintershall.
Initial plans stipulated that Gazprom would receive 51 percent of the company's shares, while the rest should have been granted to its above-mentioned European partners.
In 2017, however, Gazprom bought out all 100 percent shares of Nord Stream 2 AG, with the European companies starting to act as the project's investors.
In June 2021, Famil Sadygov, deputy chairman of Gazprom's board of directors, pointed out that "the project is fully provided with financing to complete its investment stage and move to the operational one."
Where is Nord Stream 2 Pipeline situated?
The 1,234km project passes through the territories of Russia, Germany, Denmark, Finland, and Sweden.
Nord Stream 2 bypasses transit countries, including Ukraine, Belarus, and Poland.
Why is US against Nord Stream 2?
The US, along with its allies in Eastern Europe, especially Poland and Ukraine, has repeatedly opposed the construction of Nord Stream 2.
Washington previously imposed two rounds of sanctions on the project, arguing that once Nord Stream 2 is operational, Europe will become even more dependent on Russia's energy resources, something the White House claims will help Moscow obtain political leverage.
Former US Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell described Nord Stream 2 as "an unceremonious attempt" by Russian authorities to increase the strangulation of European allies and partners in terms of energy supply in 2019.
Last year, the Biden administration decided to waive sanctions against Nord Stream 2, citing its understanding of the fact that the sanctions would not work and referring to its unwillingness to alienate Berlin, one of Washington's key allies.
Moscow has repeatedly underscored that the project is purely economic and that the way the White House opposes it is an example of unfair competition.
Read more: Russia’s Gazprom keeps gas pipeline to Germany switched off
How expensive would gas be for Germany without Nord Stream 2?
On September 16, Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung newspaper сited the German Public Utilities Association as reporting that next year may see a 60 percent increase in gas prices in the country due to a reduction in supplies from Russia amid the suspension of the Nord Stream 2 project.
According to the newspaper, with electricity prices in Germany increasing by more than 10 percent, the so-called ultimate consumers now have to pay 30-60 percent more for gas than before the beginning of the ongoing Russian special military operation in Ukraine, which was launched on February 24 and followed by western countries slapping packages of "severe sanctions" on Moscow.
Klaus Ernst, head of the Bundestag's Committee for Economics and Energy, said it is worth considering launching Nord Stream 2 due to what he called the absence of other alternatives.
According to him, "In general, it does not matter through which pipeline the gas is delivered to Germany because the fuel remains Russian anyway. In this sense the issue of Nord Stream 2 is rather symbolic."
Difference between Nord Stream 1 and 2
Both pipelines are parts of the single Nord Stream gas transportation network.
Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline, which entered into service in 2011, starts its route in the northern Russian town of Vyborg, while Nord Stream 2, which has yet to start running, begins its path near Russia's northwestern Ust-Luga.
Most recently, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that one Nord Stream 2 branch was in working condition, adding that "the decision to launch it is not being made and is unlikely to be made, but this is not our (Russia's) business."
Russia halts grain deal over Ukrainian drone attack
Russia announced Saturday that it will immediately suspend its implementation of a U.N.-brokered grain deal that has seen more than 9 million tonnes of grain exported from Ukraine during the war and has brought down soaring global food prices. Ukraine accused Russia of creating a world "hunger games.”
The Russian Defense Ministry cited an alleged Ukrainian drone attack Saturday against Russia’s Black Sea Fleet ships moored off the coast of occupied Crimea as the reason for the move. Ukraine has denied the attack, saying that the Russians mishandled their own weapons.
The Russian declaration came one day after U.N. chief Antonio Guterres urged Russia and Ukraine to renew the grain export deal, which was scheduled to expire on Nov. 19. Guterres also urged other countries, mainly in the West, to expedite the removal of obstacles blocking Russian grain and fertilizer exports.
The U.N. chief said the grain deal — brokered by the United Nations and Turkey in July — helps "to cushion the suffering that this global cost-of-living crisis is inflicting on billions of people,” his spokesman said.
U.N. officials were in touch with Russian authorities over the announced suspension.
“It is vital that all parties refrain from any action that would imperil the Black Sea Grain Initiative, which is a critical humanitarian effort that is clearly having a positive impact on access to food for millions of people,” said Guterres' spokesman, Stephane Dujarric.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called the Russian move “predictable.” He accused Moscow of “blockading” ships carrying grain since September. Currently, he said, 176 vessels are backed up at sea, carrying more than 2 million tons of food.
“This is a transparent attempt by Russia to return to the threat of large-scale famine in Africa and Asia,” Zelenskyy said Saturday in his nightly video address. He called for a tough response against Russia from international bodies like the U.N. and the G-20.
Ukraine’s Foreign Minister, Dmytro Kuleba, accused Russia of playing “hunger games” by imperiling global food shipments.
In Washington, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the suspension was regrettable and urged “all parties to keep this essential, life-saving Initiative functioning.”
“Any act by Russia to disrupt these critical grain exports is essentially a statement that people and families around the world should pay more for food or go hungry,” Blinken said in a statement Saturday night. “In suspending this arrangement, Russia is again weaponizing food in the war it started, directly impacting low- and middle-income countries and global food prices, and exacerbating already dire humanitarian crises and food insecurity.”
Russia's Foreign Ministry on Saturday accused British specialists of being involved in the alleged attack by drones on Russian ships in Crimea. Britain’s Defense Ministry had no immediate comment on the claim.
“In connection with the actions of Ukrainian armed forces, led by British specialists, directed, among other things, against Russian ships that ensure the functioning of the humanitarian corridor in question (which cannot be qualified otherwise than as a terrorist attack), the Russian side cannot guarantee the safety of civilian dry cargo ships participating in the Black Sea initiative, and suspends its implementation from today for an indefinite period,'' the Russian statement said.
Ukraine’s Ministry of Infrastructure said that Ukraine has never threatened the Black Sea grain corridor which “is exclusively humanitarian in nature,” and would continue to try to keep shipments going. It said since the first ship left Odesa on Aug. 1, more than 9 million tons of food have been exported, including more than 5 million tons to African and Asian countries. As part of the U.N. World Food Program, it said, 190 thousand tons of wheat have been sent to countries where there is hunger.
Russia also requested a meeting Monday of the U.N. Security Council because of the alleged attack on the Black Sea Fleet and the security of the grain corridor, said Dmitry Polyansky, Russia’s first deputy representative to the U.N.
Russia's agriculture minister said Moscow stands ready to “fully replace Ukrainian grain and deliver supplies at affordable prices to all interested countries.” In remarks carried by the state Rossiya 24 TV channel, Dmitry Patrushev said Moscow was prepared to “supply up to 500,000 tons of grain to the poorest countries free of charge in the next four months,” with the help of Turkey.
Earlier Saturday, Ukraine and Russia offered differing versions on the Crimea drone attack in which at least one Russian ship suffered damage in Sevastopol, a key port on the Ukrainian peninsula annexed by Moscow in 2014.
The Russian Defense Ministry said a minesweeper had “minor damage” during an alleged pre-dawn Ukrainian attack on navy and civilian vessels docked in Sevastopol, which hosts the headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet. The ministry claimed Russian forces had “repelled” 16 attacking drones.
The governor of the Sevastopol region, Mikhail Razvozhaev, claimed the port saw a “massive attack” by air and sea drones. He provided no evidence, saying all video would be seized for security reasons.
But an adviser to Ukraine’s Interior Ministry claimed that “careless handling of explosives” had caused blasts on four warships in Russia’s Black Sea Fleet. Anton Gerashchenko wrote on Telegram that the vessels included a frigate, a landing ship and a ship that carried cruise missiles used in a deadly July attack on a western Ukrainian city.
In other developments on Saturday, Russian troops moved large numbers of sick and wounded comrades from hospitals in Ukraine's southern Kherson region and stripped the facilities of medical equipment, Ukrainian officials said as their forces fought to retake the province.
Kremlin-installed authorities in the mostly Russian-occupied region have urged civilians to leave the city of Kherson, the region's capital — and reportedly joined the tens of thousands who have fled to other Russia-held areas.
Zelenskyy said the Russians were “dismantling the entire health care system” in Kherson and other occupied areas.
“The occupiers have decided to close medical institutions in the cities, take away equipment, ambulances. just everything," Zelenskyy said.
Kherson is one of four regions in Ukraine that Russian President Vladimir Putin illegally annexed last month and where he subsequently declared martial law. The others are Donetsk, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia.
As Kyiv's forces sought gains in the south, Russia kept up its shelling and missile attacks in the country's east. Three more civilians died and eight more were wounded in the Donetsk region, as Russian soldiers try to capture the city of Bakhmut, an important target in Russia's stalled eastern offensive.
Russian shelling also hit an industrial building in Ukraine’s southern Zaporizhzhia region.
In the latest prisoner exchange, 50 Ukrainian soldiers, including two former defenders of the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol, and two civilians were released Saturday as part of a swap with Russia, who received 50 Russian soldiers, both sides reported.
Russia to suspend UN-brokered grain deal with Ukraine
Russia announced Saturday that it will move to suspend its implementation of a U.N.-brokered grain deal that has seen more than 9 million tons of grain exported from Ukraine during the war and has brought down soaring global food prices.
The Russian Defense Ministry cited an alleged Ukrainian drone attack against Russia’s Black Sea Fleet ships moored off the coast of occupied Crimea, which Russia says took place early Saturday, as the reason for the move. Ukraine has denied the attack, saying that the Russians mishandled their own weapons.
The Russian declaration came one day after U.N. chief Antonio Guterres urged Russia and Ukraine to renew the grain export deal. Guterres also urged other countries, mainly in the West, to expedite the removal of obstacles blocking Russian grain and fertilizer exports.
The U.N. chief said the grain deal — brokered by the United Nations and Turkey in July and which expires on Nov. 19 — helps “to cushion the suffering that this global cost-of-living crisis is inflicting on billions of people,” his spokesman said.
A Guterres spokesman said U.N. officials were in touch with Russian authorities over the announced suspension.
“It is vital that all parties refrain from any action that would imperil the Black Sea Grain Initiative, which is a critical humanitarian effort that is clearly having a positive impact on access to food for millions of people,” said the spokesman, Stephane Dujarric.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry on Saturday accused British specialists of being involved in the alleged attack by drones on Russian ships in Crimea.
“In connection with the actions of Ukrainian armed forces, led by British specialists, directed, among other things, against Russian ships that ensure the functioning of the humanitarian corridor in question (which cannot be qualified otherwise than as a terrorist attack), the Russian side cannot guarantee the safety of civilian dry cargo ships participating in the Black Sea initiative, and suspends its implementation from today for an indefinite period,″ the Russian statement said.
Britain’s Defense Ministry had no immediate comment.
Ukraine’s Foreign Minister, Dmytro Kuleba, accused Russia of playing “hunger games” by imperiling global food shipments.
“We warned about Russia’s plans to destroy the (grain agreement). Now, under false pretenses, Moscow is blocking the grain corridor that ensures food security for millions of people,” he tweeted Saturday.
The head of the Ukrainian presidential office, Andriy Yermak, denounced the suspension as “primitive blackmail.”
Turkish officials said they haven’t received any official notice of the deal’s suspension.
Russia’s agriculture minister said Moscow stands ready to “fully replace Ukrainian grain and deliver supplies at affordable prices to all interested countries.” In remarks carried by the state Rossiya 24 TV channel, Dmitry Patrushev said Moscow was prepared to “supply up to 500,000 tons of grain to the poorest countries free of charge in the next four months,” with the help of Turkey.
Patrushev also reiterated the Kremlin’s earlier allegations that a disproportionate volume of grain exported from Ukraine’s Black Sea ports was bound for European destinations.
Earlier Saturday, Ukraine and Russia offered differing versions on the Crimea drone attack in which at least one Russian ship suffered damage in the port on the Ukrainian peninsula annexed by Moscow in 2014.
The Russian Defense Ministry said a minesweeper had “minor damage” during an alleged pre-dawn Ukrainian attack on navy and civilian vessels docked in Sevastopol, which hosts the headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet. The ministry claimed Russian forces had “repelled” 16 attacking drones.
The governor of the Sevastopol region, Mikhail Razvozhaev, said the port saw “probably the most massive attack” by air and sea drones. He provided no evidence, saying all video from the area would be held back for security reasons.
But an adviser to Ukraine’s Interior Ministry claimed that “careless handling of explosives” had caused blasts on four warships in Russia’s Black Sea Fleet. Anton Gerashchenko wrote on Telegram that the vessels included a frigate, a landing ship and a ship that carried cruise missiles used in a deadly July attack on a western Ukrainian city.
In other developments on Saturday, Russian troops moved large numbers of sick and wounded comrades from hospitals in Ukraine’s southern Kherson region and stripped the facilities of medical equipment, Ukrainian officials said as their forces fought to retake the province.
Kremlin-installed authorities in the mostly Russian-occupied region had previously urged civilians to leave the city of Kherson, the region’s capital — and reportedly joined the tens of thousands who fled to other Russia-held areas.
“The so-called evacuation of invaders from the temporarily occupied territory of the Kherson region, including from medical institutions, continues,” the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the Russians were “dismantling the entire health care system” in Kherson and other occupied areas.
“The occupiers have decided to close medical institutions in the cities, take away equipment, ambulances. just everything,” Zelenskyy said.
Kherson is one of four regions in Ukraine that Russian President Vladimir Putin illegally annexed last month and where he subsequently declared martial law. The others are Donetsk, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia.
As Kyiv’s forces sought gains in the south, Russia kept up its shelling and missile attacks in the country’s east, Ukrainian authorities said Saturday. Three more civilians died and eight more were wounded in the Donetsk region, which has again become a front-line hotspot as Russian soldiers try to capture the city of Bakhmut, an important target in Russia’s stalled eastern offensive.
Russian shelling also an industrial building in Ukraine’s southern Zaporizhzhia region. Around a quarter of the region — including its capital, also called Zaporizhzhia — remains under Ukrainian military control.
In the latest prisoner exchange, 52 Ukrainians, including two former defenders of the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol, were released Saturday as part of a swap with Russia, according to Yermak. The steelworks in that bombed-out port city now symbolize Ukrainian resistance.
Also released, he said, was a sailor who defended Ukraine’s Snake Island, a strategic Black Sea outpost seized by Russia in the opening hours of the war. Others coming home were Ukrainian soldiers captured by Moscow near the Chernobyl nuclear power plant — the site of the world’s worst nuclear disaster in 1986 — which Russian forces briefly occupied from February to March.
UK’s foreign aid may be suspended for 2 more years under PM Sunak: Reports
According to The Telegraph, the new British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is considering keeping the nation’s foreign aid budget frozen for two more years.
British foreign aid spending is limited to 0.5 percent of national income. Since the country’s public finances had taken a significant hit as a result of the coronavirus pandemic two years prior, the British government reduced its spending on international aid.
By 2024–2025, according to Sunak, who was the finance minister at the time, foreign spending should revert to its previous level of 0.7 percent of GDP.
Read More: Rishi Sunak as UK PM: What are the expectations?
The Telegraph, however, reported that officials are considering extending the cut in foreign aid funding by a further two years, until 2026–2027.
The report also noted that there was room for even larger cuts and the possibility of indexing future foreign aid spending for three years to inflation.
The report is released at a time when the UK is planning expenditure reductions and eliminating tax breaks due to the increasing cost of housing, food, fuel, and heating.
Read More: Rishi Sunak becomes UK's 3rd PM this year by King Charles III
UN nuclear agency to probe Russia claim of `dirty bombs'
The U.N. nuclear chief said Thursday he is sending inspectors to two locations in Ukraine where Russia alleged that activities related to the possible production of “dirty bombs” was taking place and expects them to reach a conclusion “in days — very fast.”
Rafael Grossi said inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency would be traveling this week to the two sites, which are under IAEA safeguards, following a written request from the Ukrainian government.
Russia’s U.N. ambassador alleged in a letter to Security Council members this week that Ukraine’s Institute for Nuclear Research of the National Academy of Sciences in Kyiv and Vostochniy Mining and Processing Plant “have received direct orders from (President Volodymyr) Zelenskyy’s regime to develop such a dirty bomb.”
The envoy, Vassily Nebenzia, said that information was from Russia’s Ministry of Defense. He said the ministry reported that work on a dirty bomb, which uses explosives to scatter radioactive waste in an effort to sow terror, is “at their concluding stage.”
Grossi said: “The purpose of this week’s safeguards visits is to detect any possible undeclared nuclear activities and materials related to the development of `dirty bombs.’”
The IAEA inspected the nuclear research institute in Kyiv a month ago “and no undeclared nuclear activities or materials were found there,” he said.
But Grossi said the inspectors are going to revisit the facility with a different aim.
Normally inspectors look for nuclear material such as enriched uranium, plutonium and thorium, he said, but in this case “there is mention of certain isotopes, cesium and strontium. So, we are going to be performing a different kind of work to determine whether the fuel there has been reprocessed in some way to extract this.”
Grossi came to U.N. headquarters in New York to brief Security Council members behind closed doors on nuclear issues related to Ukraine. The IAEA earlier issued a statement from him and he spoke to reporters after the council meeting.
Russia's Nebenzia said he told Grossi that “he should be vigilant" because the two sites are not the only places where dirty bombs can be produced.
Grossi said he remains “extremely concerned” about the possibility of a nuclear accident.
He said that in the coming weeks the IAEA is going to be deploying more experts at other nuclear power plants in Ukraine — Rivni, Khmelnytskyi South Ukraine and Chernobyl. The latter was the scene of the world's worst nuclear disaster in 1986, and it was occupied by Russian forces soon after their Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine, though they left at the beginning of April.
The nuclear issue was heightened by Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu’s unsubstantiated allegation that Ukraine was preparing to launch a dirty bomb in weekend calls to his British, French, Turkish and U.S. counterparts. Britain, France and the United States rejected the claim out of hand, calling it “transparently false.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin repeated the unsubstantiated claim on Wednesday,
Ukraine dismissed Moscow’s claim as an attempt to distract attention from the Kremlin’s own alleged plans to detonate a dirty bomb.
Energoatom, the Ukrainian state enterprise that operates the country’s four nuclear power plants, said Russian troops have carried out secret construction work over the last week at the occupied Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant.
Russian officers controlling the area won’t give access to Ukrainian staff running the plant or monitors from the U.N.’s atomic energy watchdog that would allow them to see what the Russians are doing, Energoatom said in a statement Tuesday.
Grossi said in the statement that nuclear safety and security at Zaporizhzhia “remains precarious” and engineers have been working “to stabilize the plant’s fragile external power supplies following repeated outages earlier this month that forced it to temporarily rely on its emergency diesel generators for electricity.”
The IAEA chief said he made clear that he considers Zaporizhzhia “a Ukrainian plant” and expressed concern at possibe confusion about the chain of command following Russia’s announcement that it has taken control of the facility.
This “could negatively affect nuclear safety and security,” Grossi's statement said, pointing to plans by senior Ukrainian operating staff to restart a reactor unit that remain on hold because Russian officials haven’t agreed.
Grossi reiterated that establishing a protection zone around Zaporizhzhia “remains of paramount importance.”
He said his consultations “are making progress, although not as fast as I would like,” pointing to the need for agreement on technical and other parameters of the zone.
“I hope to be able to do it in a matter of days if possible,” he said. “I will keep on pushing.”
Zaporizhzhia has seen repeated shelling, which Ukraine and Russia accuse each other of carrying out.