On Thursday, June 5, 2018, this is how things are going.
Fighting
- At least nine people were hurt when Russian drones struck apartment buildings in Kharkiv, the second-largest city in Ukraine, early on Thursday, according to the city’s mayor.
- According to Russian-installed officials, new Ukrainian drone attacks have affected energy infrastructure in southern Ukraine’s Zaporizhia and Kherson regions. Vladimir Saldo, the newly appointed Russian-appointed Kherson region governor, claimed the attacks left 97 settlements without power and with 68, 000 people living in them.
- According to the Russian Ministry of Defense, the settlements of Ridkodub in eastern Ukraine and Kindrativka in the Sumy region of Ukraine are under Russian control.
- The Kremlin said that despite an explosion, the Crimean bridge, a major Russian-built rail and road bridge connecting Russia and the annexed Crimean Peninsula, was still intact.
talks on a ceasefire
- After accusing Ukraine’s leaders of ordering a bombing attack in Western Russia on Saturday, which left seven people dead and 115 others injured, Russian President Vladimir Putin said he doesn’t believe they want peace.
- The attack, which crossed a railroad line carrying passenger trains, was viewed by Putin as a “terrorist” plot to scuttle the peace talks.
- Putin also stated in a phone call to Donald Trump that he would have to react to Ukraine’s Sunday drone attacks, which targeted Russia’s far-northern and Siberia-area bomber fleet.
- Putin’s foreign policy adviser, Yuri Ushakov, claimed that in spite of Ukrainian attempts to “disrupt” them, the Russian leader said on the phone that the ceasefire talks “on the whole were useful.”
- About 20 Russian warplanes were hit by a drone attack in Siberia, according to two unnamed US officials, about 10 of which were destroyed by Ukraine, according to Volodymyr Zelenskyy, president of Ukraine.
- Following Ukraine’s drone attack over the weekend, Trump’s Ukraine envoy, Keith Kellogg, stated that the risk of an escalation was “going way up.”
- A ceasefire should be in place until a meeting with Putin, according to Zelenskyy. At a briefing in Kyiv, he said, “I think our partners can support” agreeing a ceasefire with the Russians until the leaders meet.
- According to the Vatican, Pope Leo urged Russia to stop its hostility of Ukraine when he for the first time phoned Putin, according to the Vatican.
International diplomacy
- Sergei Shoigu, the head of North Korea, and Kim Jong Un, the head of Russia’s Security Council, met and pledged to support Moscow’s position on Ukraine without condition.
- The military bloc’s head, Mark Rutte, stated that Ukraine will be invited to the NATO summit in The Hague.
- German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul has stated that German Chancellor Friedrich Merz will inform Trump when he travels to show that Europe is firmly on Ukraine’s side and that no chance for peace should be overlooked.
- Wadephul also claimed that Germany is urging Russia to impose new sanctions on Moscow, and that this should be coordinated with the US, because he claimed Russia is not seriously engaging in peace talks.
- By the end of the year, Ukraine and the US have discussed how to make a minerals fund operational. Yulia Svyrydenko, the country’s deputy prime minister, stated during her visit to Washington, DC that the first meeting of the fund is scheduled for July.
- Andriy Yermak, Zelenskyy’s chief of staff, met with Marco Rubio, the US secretary of state, in Washington, DC, during his stay there.
- After meeting with Western counterparts at the Ukraine Defence Contact Group, the Ukrainian Minister of Defense Rustem Umerov stated that Kyiv’s allies have expressed a willingness to pay for Ukrainian companies to manufacture defense in allies.
- With a goal of sending 100 000 drones to Ukraine, United Kingdom Defense Secretary John Healey announced that the country would increase by tenfold the number of drones it would supply there.
Source: Aljazeera
Leave a Reply