Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy has attended the meeting of Nato defence ministers in Brussels, appearing before the media in a joint briefing with Nato secretary general Jens Stoltenberg.
Zelenskiy cautioned that he expected Russia to use winter as a weapon and again target Ukraine’s energy infrastructre, and he asked for increased air defence. He appealed again for confiscated Russian assets to be released to pay for reconstruction in Ukraine.
Stoltenberg said that Nato would continue to support Ukraine, because “your fight is our fight”. He said support for Ukraine from Nato would be “about air defence. It’s about artillery, it’s about ammunition”. He added that Nato had ramped up production of armaments
US defense secretary Lloyd Austin said on Wednesday his nation would continue to support Ukraine for as long as it takes, even amid the unfolding political chaos in Congress and despite the escalating violence in the Middle East. “We’re here to dig deep to meet Ukraine’s most urgent needs – especially for air defence and ammunition,” he added.
Belgium will send F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine from 2025, Belgian defence minister Ludivine Dedonder said on Bel RTL radio.
US Treasury secretary Janet Yellen on Wednesday said a G7-led price cap on Russian oil had sharply reduced Russian revenues over the past ten months, and that it was critical to keep imposing severe and increasing costs on Russia over its war in Ukraine.
Alexander Bogomaz, the Bryansk regional governor, has claimed that Russia has shot down at least three Ukrainian drones over his region in the last few hours.
Netherland’s defence secretary Kajsa Ollongren has said outside the Nato headquarters in Brussels that Sweden should be admitted into the alliance as swiftly as possible. She said “I’ve also talked about this issue to my Turkish colleague. I think it is vital for the strength of Nato, especially in northeastern part of Nato. And I really hope that Turkey as soon as possible will take the right decision”. Turkey and Hungary remain the only two members of the alliance yet to ratify Sweden joining.
Vladimir Putin will visit Kyrgyzstan on Thursday, the presidential office of the Central Asian country said, in what would be the Russian leader’s first known trip abroad since the international criminal court issued a warrant for his arrest.
Extensive damage to an undersea gas pipeline and communications cable connecting Finland and Estonia “could not have occurred by accident” and appears to be the result of a “deliberate … external act”, Finnish authorities said Tuesday. Local media cited unnamed government sources as saying Russian sabotage was suspected, while regional security experts said a Russian survey vessel had recently been observed making repeated visits to the vicinity of the Balticconnector pipeline.
Stoltenberg said on Wednesday of the pipeline damage that “if it is proven to be a deliberate attack on a Nato critical infrastructure, then this will be of course serious, but it will also be met by a united and determined that response from Nato.”
Rafael Grossi, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said on Tuesday Volodymyr Zelenskiy had promised him that Ukraine would not attack Europe’s biggest nuclear plant as part of its counteroffensive against Russia. In an interview with the Guardian, the nuclear watchdog chief said he was most concerned about the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant becoming engulfed in fighting between the two sides, but insisted he had obtained a commitment from the Ukrainian president.
Russia was defeated in its bid to return to the UN’s human rights council, with Albania and Bulgaria winning more votes at the general assembly, which voted last year to suspend Moscow after its invasion of Ukraine.
Russian forces are closing in on Avdiivka, which has been hit by intense shelling since Tuesday morning, officials said. The eastern Ukrainian town is symbolically and strategically important to Kyiv, lying just north of the Moscow-controlled city of Donetsk that was seized by separatist forces in 2014.
Ukraine said on Tuesday that it was holding two senior defence ministry officials on suspicion of embezzling $7m (£5.7m) earmarked for buying bulletproof vests. The state bureau of investigation said the two officials, which it did not name, ordered “low-quality body armour” from abroad.
A Russian court on Tuesday dismissed a complaint by the Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich against the extension of his pre-trial detention, more than six months after his arrest on spying charges. Judge Yuri Pasyunin at Moscow city court ruled to “keep the detention without changes” until 30 November, an Agence-France Presse reporter at the court said.
