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Crimea
Jul 26, 2023 19:42:36 GMT
Post by Admin on Jul 26, 2023 19:42:36 GMT
What is the latest from the war in Ukraine? Russia dealt a major blow when they pulled out of the Ukraine grain deal and pummelled a depot in the Black Sea Port of Odessa, with the city itself coming under almost nightly attack.
Russian drones have also destroyed grain storage in Ukrainian ports on the River Danube. This puts the focus on Russia's ability - militarily, economically and politically - to sustain its attack level. Meanwhile Ukrainian forces claim to have made gains near the city of Bahkmut which was captured by the Russian army in May. So what does the "battlefield" look like now? Newsnight’s Mark Urban explains.
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Crimea
Aug 2, 2023 14:10:51 GMT
Post by Admin on Aug 2, 2023 14:10:51 GMT
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russian drones on Wednesday hit a Ukrainian port city along the border with Romania, causing significant damage and a huge fire at facilities that are key to Ukrainian grain exports.
The attacks followed the end of a deal with Russia that had allowed Ukrainian shipments to world markets from the Black Sea port of Odesa.
Since scrapping the deal, Russia has hammered the country’s ports with strikes, compounding the blow to the key industry. In the past two weeks, dozens of drones and missile attacks have targeted the port of Odesa and the region’s river ports, which are being used as alternative routes.
The head of the Ukrainian president’s office, Andriy Yermak, said the city of Izmail was hit in the strikes. Izmail is on the Danube River that forms part of the Ukraine-Romania border.
Russia says Moscow and Crimea hit by Ukrainian drones while Russian forces bombard Ukraine’s south Video obtained by The Associated Press showed explosions and a large fire in the distance on the Danube, captured by fishermen in Romania, a NATO member, on the other side of the river.
Three Ukrainian ports along the Danube are currently operating.
“The goal of the enemy was clearly the facilities of the ports and industrial infrastructure of the region,” Ukraine’s South operational command wrote in an update on Facebook. As a result of the attack, a fire broke out at industrial and port facilities, and a grain elevator was damaged.
Ukraine’s air force intercepted 23 Shahed drones over the country overnight, mostly in Odesa and Kyiv, according to a morning update.
All 10 drones fired at Kyiv were intercepted, said Serhii Popko, the head of Kyiv City Administration. Numerous loud explosions were heard overnight as air defense systems were activated. Debris from felled drones hit three districts of the capital, damaging a nonresidential building, Popko said.
“Russian terrorists have once again targeted ports, grain facilities and global food security,” President Volodymyr Zelenskyy posted Wednesday morning on Telegram. “The world must respond.”
He confirmed that some drones hit their targets, with the most “significant damage” in the south of Ukraine.
Wheat prices rose about 3% and corn prices were up nearly 2% on Wednesday following the new attacks, showing the continued volatility in world markets as Russia targets Ukraine’s ports and agricultural infrastructure.
Ukraine is a major supplier of wheat, corn, vegetable oil and other agricultural products important to the Middle East, Africa and parts of Asia where people are struggling with high food prices and hunger.
Ukraine also can export by road and rail through Europe, but those routes are more costly than going by the Black Sea and have stirred divisions among nearby countries.
Russia and Ukraine agreed a year ago on a deal brokered by the United Nations and Turkey that reopened three Ukrainian Black Sea ports blocked by fighting and provided assurances that ships entering the ports would not be attacked. Russia declined to renew the agreement last month, complaining that its own exports were being held up.
In a telephone conversation Wednesday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan told Russia’s Vladimir Putin that he would seek to restore the Black Sea initiative to export Ukrainian grain, according to his office.
Referring to the deal as a “bridge of peace,” Erdogan told Putin that Turkey would “continue to carry out intensive efforts and diplomacy for the continuation of the Black Sea initiative.”
The statement said the two leaders had agreed on Putin visiting Turkey but did not provide a date. Erdogan has previously said Putin would come during August.
A Kremlin statement about the call said “readiness was confirmed to return to the Istanbul agreements as soon as the West actually fulfills all the obligations to Russia recorded in them.” It said preparations were continuing for “a possible meeting” of Putin and Erdogan.
Two civilians were wounded in shelling of the city of Kherson during the night, regional Gov. Oleksandr Prokudin said Wednesday. A summary from Zelenskyy’s office said a doctor was killed and five medical personnel were wounded in an attack on a city hospital in Kherson, but didn’t specify if the attack was on Wednesday or Tuesday.
A 91-year-old woman died in an attack on a village in the Kharkiv region, the presidential office said.
In the eastern region of Donetsk, four people were wounded in Russian shelling over the past day, according to Gov. Pavlo Kyrylenko.
The area around the city of Nikopol, across the river from the Russian-held Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, was shelled three times, Gov. Serhiy Lysak said.
___ Associated Press writers Courtney Bonnell in London, and Jim Heintz in Tallinn, Estonia, contributed to this report.
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Crimea
Aug 7, 2023 6:18:58 GMT
Post by Admin on Aug 7, 2023 6:18:58 GMT
Ukrainian forces have again damaged a key bridge linking Russian-controlled Crimea to mainland Ukraine using Western-supplied Storm Shadow missiles, according to a Russian-backed official in southern Ukraine.
Ukraine fired NATO Storm Shadow missiles at the Chonhar Bridge, which links the Russian-controlled Crimean peninsula with Ukraine's contested southern Kherson region, the Moscow-backed Kherson regional governor, Vladimir Saldo, said on Sunday.
"The enemy launched a missile strike in the area of the Chonhar bridge in the north of Crimea," Sergey Aksyonov, the Russian-installed Crimea governor, said on Telegram.
Kyiv also targeted a bridge stretching across the nearby Henichesk Strait, firing a total of 12 missiles, Saldo said.
Of these, nine were intercepted by Russian air defenses, he said in a statement, adding that one civilian was wounded in the attack.
Traffic was stopped on both bridges, and there are "three holes" in the Chonhar Bridge, Saldo said.
Repair work has already begun, Aksyonov added.
Both Paris and London have provided the Anglo-French Storm Shadow, or SCALP, missiles to Ukraine in recent months. The long-range weapons give Kyiv the ability to strike hardened Russian targets at a greater distance.
Russia annexed Crimea in 2014 but Ukraine has reiterated promises to reclaim the territory from Moscow's control. Kyiv has previously targeted the Chonhar Bridge, along with the Kerch Bridge connecting mainland Russia to the peninsula.
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Crimea
Aug 7, 2023 18:04:22 GMT
Post by Admin on Aug 7, 2023 18:04:22 GMT
Ukrainian forces have hit critical road bridges linking occupied Crimea with parts of the Kherson region under Russian control.
Kyiv has claimed responsibility for attacks on two bridges - one in Russian-annexed Crimea and one near the Ukrainian port city Henichesk.
Our military analyst Sean Bell discusses these latest developments and what they mean for the future of the war.
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Crimea
Aug 8, 2023 22:06:15 GMT
Post by Admin on Aug 8, 2023 22:06:15 GMT
Russian ports and ships on the Black Sea — including tankers carrying millions of barrels of oil to Europe — could justifiably be attacked by the Ukrainian military as part of efforts to weaken Moscow's war machine, a senior Kyiv official warned Monday in the wake of two recent attacks on Russian vessels. "Everything the Russians are moving back and forth on the Black Sea are our valid military targets," Oleg Ustenko, an economic adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, told POLITICO, saying the move was retaliation for Russia withdrawing from the U.N.-brokered Black Sea grain deal and unleashing a series of missile attacks on agricultural stores and ports. “This story started with Russia blocking the grain corridor, threatening to attack our vessels, destroying our ports,” Ustenko said. “Our maritime infrastructure is under constant attack." Over the weekend, Ukraine declared the waters around Russia’s Black Sea ports a “war risk area” from August 23 “until further notice.” The zone includes major Russian ports like Novorossiysk, Anapa, Gelendzhik, Tuapse, Sochi and Taman. That's causing insurance rates for ships to skyrocket and could imperil one of Russia's main export routes for oil and oil products — key in ensuring the Kremlin has enough cash to keep waging war against Ukraine. “After this weekend, the Black Sea feels like a more dangerous place for international shipping, and it was already very dangerous,” said Byron McKinney, director with S&P Global Market Intelligence. “Many vessels simply don’t go to the area. Insurance is pretty much nonexistent. Where there are insurance rates they’re very high and that’s only going to increase.” On Saturday, Russia’s federal maritime agency, Rosmorrechflot, reported that a Russian tanker, the Sig, had been hit in an apparent strike by Ukrainian forces while sailing close to Ukraine’s occupied Crimean peninsula. “The tanker received a hit on its engine room, close to the waterline on the starboard side, presumably as a result of an attack by a sea drone,” officials said. Ukraine’s defense ministry said that as long as Russians “terrorize peaceful Ukrainian cities and destroy grain condemning hundreds of millions to starvation,” there would be “no more safe waters or peaceful harbors for you in the Black and Azov Seas.” Crude crisis Last month, Russia shipped almost 59 million barrels of crude oil, a third of its overall exports, from the strategic Black Sea port of Novorossiysk, according to intelligence firm Kpler. Of that, 32 million barrels went to EU countries. The port also handles other fuels like diesel, gasoil and naphtha in addition to grain destined for the global market. Novorossiysk is also where the Caspian Pipeline Consortium oil conduit terminates, bringing up to 1.3 million barrels a day of oil from Kazakhstan — from where it is shipped on to world markets.
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