Ukraine war latest: Ukraine hit Russian missile ship - Kyiv officials; Putin sacks minister in new sign of shift in war strategy (2024)

Ukraine's military hit the Russian missile ship Tsiklon in Moscow-occupied Crimea on Sunday, the Ukrainian general staff has said.

No further details on the matter but we'll bring you any updates on this as we get them.

Tens of thousands of Russians who fled to Turkey after Moscow's invasion of Ukraine have moved on to other countries in the past year, according to a new report.

Reuters says those who have moved have been squeezed by residency issues and soaring costs, citing data and interviews, including with nine Russian citizens.

Turkey, Russia's Black Sea neighbour - a NATO member - emerged as a magnet for Russians after the invasion in February 2022, with Istanbul and the Mediterranean resort of Antalya both among the preferred options.

Some of them had opposed the invasion, others were trying to shield themselves and their businesses from a wave of Western sanctions imposed on Moscow - including travel bans on Russians to much of Europe.

Some men feared being drafted into the army.

But this month, the number of Russians with Turkish resident permits fell to 96,000, down by more than a third from 154,000 at the end of 2022, official data shows.

Nine Russian citizens who spoke to Reuters said they and others had left partly due to struggles to get residence permits since early 2023. Many have headed to Serbia and Montenegro, among the few European countries where they are welcome.

Russians are also moving on because of soaring costs - Turkish inflation hit 70% last month - along with the difficulty doing basic banking in Turkey as a result of the sanctions.

"You can't predict your future in Turkey," said Dmitri, 46, an IT sector employee who declined to give his surname.

After Vladimir Putin announced a mobilisation in September 2022 to recruit Russian men to fight in Ukraine, Dmitri left Saint Petersburg and reunited with his wife and four-year-old son in Istanbul.

But in January 2023, a text message appeared on his phone saying his residency application was rejected without explanation, he said. Dmitri left Istanbul a month later.

"I had signed a rental contract for one year but had to leave everything behind," he said.

"We moved to Montenegro because it is economically and politically more stable than Turkey."

Turkey's Presidency of Migration Management said all rejected resident-permit applications include a justification in the foreigners' own language under relevant laws, and that applicants are free to pursue legal remedies.

In an email, it said departures of Russians were not only linked to residency permits.

"Several political, economic and sociocultural factors play a role," the government agency said.

One of the various sources of growing tension between the US and Russia has been the subject of the stationing of weapons in space.

Russia vetoed a US-drafted United Nations Security Council resolution last month that called on countries to prevent an arms race in outer space - prompting Washington to suggest Moscow was hiding something.

Then yesterday, a Russian-drafted resolution that called on all countries to prevent "for all time" the placement, threat or use of any weapons in outer space failed.

The draft failed to get the minimum nine votes needed from the 15-member group, with seven voting in favour and seven against, while one abstained.

A veto can only be cast by permanent members the US, Russia, China, Britain or France if a draft gets at least nine votes.

US ambassador Robert Wood told the Security Council before the vote: "We are here today because Russia seeks to distract global attention from its development of a new satellite carrying a nuclear device."

He also accused Russia of launching a satellite last Thursday into low Earth orbit that the US "assesses is likely a counterspace weapon presumably capable of attacking other satellites in low Earth orbit".

Russia's UN ambassador Vassily Nebenzia responded: "I didn't even fully understand what he was talking about."

The 1967 Outer Space Treaty already bars signatories - including Russia and the US - from placing "in orbit around the Earth any objects carrying nuclear weapons or any other kinds of weapons of mass destruction".

Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova today claimed Washington was to blame for the world missing another opportunity to prevent an arms race in outer space.

"The results of the vote on the draft resolution on preventing an arms race in outer space and on space security that Russia submitted to the UN Security Council for examination and China co-authored causes disappointment," she said.

"The United States and its allies acted against our constructive and comprehensive initiative, despite all steps that we made to take into account their proposals (including formulations of the corresponding American-Japanese draft resolution)," the diplomat said in a commentary.

"Another opportunity to prevent an arms race in outer space has, unfortunately, been missed through the fault of the United States and its allies."

The former commander of Russia's 58th army, Ivan Popov, has been arrested on suspicion of "large scale fraud", state-run TASS agency is reporting.

TASS has not provided any details of the investigation into Popov's activities.

We'll bring you more on this story as we get it.

We reported earlier this morning (see 7.29 post) that Ukrainian officials had said their forces shot down 28 out of 29 drones used by Russian forces in an overnight attack on seven regions.

However, at least seven people were injured in a strike in Kharkiv, which also damaged four private residences and 25 trucks and buses.

Footage from the scene shows firefighters battling flames in the wake of the attack.

We reported in our 12.00 post about the visit to Kyiv of Germany's foreign minister, in an effort to lend support to Ukraine's war on Russia.

However, it now appears Germany is set to offer assistance beyond the symbolic, with a source telling Reuters the country plans to ramp up military aid for Ukraine by another €3.8bn (£3.25 billion).

So far, Berlin has earmarked €7.1bn (£5.98bn) for Kyiv with weapons and ammunition this year, but the money has already been almost completely allocated to projects, Bild newspaper reported

It added that Defence Minister Boris Pistorius had asked for the additional funds and Finance Minister Christian Lindner had signalled his backing, pending final approval by parliament in June.

A finance ministry source did not confirm the exact number but added that support for Ukraine would not fail because of the ministry.

According to the report, Mr Pistorius has requested €15bn (£12.82bn) be allocated for military aid for Kyiv in Germany's 2025 budget, which is being negotiated at the moment.

As Russia continues to establish momentum in its offensives around Kharkiv, the war in Ukraine has entered an important phase.

Readers have been sending in their questions to our senior correspondents and military experts for their take on the changing battlefield environment.

Today, Peter asks:

Would US A10 Warthogs make any difference to the war in Ukraine? The US has excess stock and is decommissioning them now. They are cheaper than the F-16s, with a shorter learning curve. I know the US military was against sending some over at the beginning of the war, but now?

Military analyst Sean Bellhad this to say:

Thank you, Peter, for this interesting question.

History shows that conducting any form of military action without a credible combat air capability is very difficult. Russia is using its air force assets to pound the Ukrainian frontline, and although Ukraine has used Western surface-to-air missiles to great effect - shooting down around 10% of Russia's fighter jets - the Russian fighter air capability presents a formidable threat to any Ukrainian offensive.

The quickest way to provide Ukraine with the air support it requires would be via a NATO or Western-led no-fly zone. However, to date, there has been limited Western appetite to risk an escalation of the war to a direct conflict between NATO and Russia.

Instead, the West has agreed to provide F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine, but only when they have enough pilots trained to operate these Western aircraft, and when the logistics support and weapons are also available.

Providing Ukraine with an F-16 combat capability has taken time, and it is still not clear when the aircraft and supporting logistics will be deployed into battle, or how the F-16s will be used. One reason the F-16s were selected for Ukraine was their availability - it is the most widely used fighter jet of its generation - as that also means there is a ready supply of spares.

Most important, the F-16 is multirole. It is capable of conducting air defence missions - shooting down enemy aircraft - along with bombing missions, and it has the speed and agility to ensure survivability.

The US A-10 Warthog is an immensely capable aircraft, but it is optimised for Close Air Support - close-proximity support of ground forces. At this role it is very effective, but the platform has no air defence capability, and by modern fighter-jet standards, it is very slow - a third of the speed of many Russian fighters. That would make it very vulnerable to Russian attack if deployed into battle without a comprehensive package of air support.

Once the war is over, Ukraine will need to rebuild its own combat air capability, and might benefit from the A-10's unique capabilities. But for now, the F-16 provides Ukraine with the best prospect of a near-term combat-effective combat air capability.

Germany's foreign minister has arrived in Kyiv today in the latest public display of support for Ukraine by its Western partners - although deliveries of promised weapons and ammunition have been slow and have left Ukraine vulnerable to a recent Russian push along parts of the frontline.

Annalena Baerbock renewed Berlin's calls for partners to send more air defence systems, as Russia bombards Ukraine with missiles, glide bombs and rockets.

Germany is the second-biggest supplier of military aid to Ukraine after the United States.

Ukraine's depleted troops are trying to hold off a fierce Russian offensive along the eastern border in one of the most critical phases of the war, as it stretches into its third year.

Germany recently pledged a third US-made Patriot battery for Ukraine, but Kyiv officials say they are still facing an alarming shortfall of air defences against the Russian onslaught.

The Kremlin's forces have used their advantage in the skies to debilitate Ukraine's power grid, hoping to sap Ukrainian morale and disrupt its defence industry.

Ms Baerbock, accompanied by Ukrainian energy minister Herman Halushchenko, toured a thermal power plant in central Ukraine that was heavily damaged in April.

Missiles supplied by the United States were used to strike Russian-occupied Ukranian region Luhansk, a Moscow-installed official has said.

The head of theLuhansk region, Leonid Pasechnik, said today thatUkrainehad attacked it the previous day with ATACMS, wounding eight people.

The claim of the attack on the city of Sverdlovsk could not be independently verified.

Finland's government has proposed emergency legislation today to block asylum seekers entering across its vast and often snow-bound border with Russia.

Helsinki believes Moscow is promoting the migration due to political antagonism since theUkrainewar.

Finland shut the 830-mile frontier last year after increased arrivals from countries including Syria and Somalia, soon after Helsinki joined NATO.

The Kremlin denies weaponising migration, claiming the West is engaged in a smear campaign.

The draft law proposed by the right-wing coalition acknowledges that turning migrants back without processing asylum applications would breach Finland's international rights commitments.

But, Prime Minister Petteri Orpo said, it would be temporary and only activated in exceptional circ*mstances.