Russia-Ukraine latest updates: Zelenskyy vows to retake Crimea

Al Jazeera’s Kristen Saloomey, reporting from the United Nations headquarters, says the UN was “gravely concerned” about the situation at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant as Russia and Ukrainian forces continue fighting near the facility.

“The Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency did say that the situation is highly volatile and fragile and obviously a strike at the wrong part of the plant could be very dangerous,” she said from New York.

“He said in his last briefing to the UN Security Council that the reactors at the plant are well protected and appear to be functioning normally but did warn that their damage would have dramatic consequences, not only for the area, but far beyond it.”

Germany will supply Ukraine with a further 500 million euros ($500m) in military aid, most of it earmarked for delivery next year, a government spokesman has said.

The equipment will include three IRIS-T anti-aircraft systems, “around a dozen armed recovery vehicles, 20 rocket-launchers mounted on pick-ups … precision munition and anti-drone equipment,” the spokesman told AFP news agency.

Most of it will be delivered in 2023, he added.

Ukrainian Member of Parliament Ivanna Klympush Tsintsadze says the support of Kyiv’s Western partners was vital in stopping Russia from occupying its territory, despite noticing a level “tiredness” in some countries as the war goes on.

“We are grateful for everything we have received. But we also see that there is some tiredness kicking in some of the societies, and among some of the political elites in different countries. And I think we have to preclude that from happening,” Tsintsadze told Al Jazeera from Kyiv via Skype.

“It’s our common responsibility to stop this empire … because its appetite will be only growing if we won’t stop this monster here [in Ukraine], and we will not kind of bring him back to the cage – to the territory of the Russian Federation itself.”

The UN nuclear watchdog will visit the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine within days if talks to gain access succeed, it said in a statement.

“I’m continuing to consult very actively and intensively with all parties,” the International Atomic Energy Agency’s statement quoted IAEA chief Rafael Grossi as saying.

“The mission [to Zaporizhzhia] is expected to take place within the next few days if ongoing negotiations succeed.”

KEEP READING

• It’s time we all come together to address the global food crisis
• Europe faces gas supply disruption after Russia imposes sanctions
• Europe’s Russia oil embargo risks flaring already hot inflation

Ukrainian President Zelenskyy has warned that a potential uptick in Russian shelling of Ukraine would not change Kyiv’s approach to the war, as Ukrainian retaliation would only get stronger in the future.

“What will Ukraine do if Russia strikes Kyiv? The same as what we are doing now,” Zelenskyy told reporters.

“If they strike us in these cities, they will receive strikes in return, very powerful strikes in return. I want to say that these retaliatory strikes will grow every day and become more powerful.”

Polish President Andrzej Duda has called for the elimination of the Baltic Sea gas pipeline between Russia and Germany, Nord Stream 2.

There can be no return to normality in relations with Moscow, Duda said at the so-called “Crimea Platform” in Kyiv. Therefore, a new policy is required to dispose of Nord Stream 2, Duda said, according to the Polish Press Agency (PAP).

Poland and other eastern European Union countries long criticised the Russian-German project as giving the Kremlin leverage over Europe and putting the continent’s energy security at risk.

Maryna Holovnova used to enjoy her summer routine in her southeastern Ukrainian city of Mariupol.

Before starting work for the day as a tourist guide, the 28-year-old would wake early, jog along the beach and swim in the Azov Sea at sunrise.

Afterwards, she would take the bus across the city and drink her morning coffee on her favourite bench in a chestnut-tree-filled alley in Mariupol’s historic centre. On the weekends, she would cycle on newly laid roads to remote fishing villages to camp overnight, passing sunflower fields and people selling watermelons along the way.

Read more here.

In late 2021, satellite images emerged showing the build-up of Russian troops on the snowy frontier with Ukraine. Since then, satellite imagery, maps and open-source intelligence (OSINT) have proved pivotal in documenting Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The Russian war, which began six months ago on February 24, has turned into a battle of attrition.

This report uses maps and satellite imagery to break down key events of the war.

Read more here.

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov vows “no mercy” for the killers of Darya Dugina, the daughter of an ultranationalist intellectual, as hundreds gather for her funeral following her death in a car bomb blast over the weekend.

Moscow says Ukrainian intelligence is behind the attack, a claim dismissed by Kyiv.

Alexander Dugin, a vocal supporter of the Kremlin’s military campaign who has claimed to be close to Russian President Vladimir Putin, may have been the intended target of the attack that killed his 29-year-old daughter.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has repeated assurances of British support to Ukraine in its fight with Russia.

Speaking at the Crimea Summit, Johnson also said “we will never recognise Russia’s annexation of Crimea or any other Ukrainian territory”.

He added: “We must continue to give our Ukrainian friends all the military, humanitarian, economic and diplomatic support that they need until Russia ends this hideous war.”

Ukraine’s Zelenskyy in an address to the Crimea Platform Summit has promised to do all he can to win back the Crimean peninsula, annexed by Russia seven years ago and urged international allies to support the effort.

“I know that Crimea is with Ukraine and is waiting for us to return. I want everyone to know that we will be back. When we return and correct everything that the occupiers did on our Ukrainian peninsula,” Zelenskyy said in his address.

“The whole world needs to win in the fight against Russian aggression to overcome terror and return predictability and security to our region in Europe. Therefore, it is necessary to free Crimea from the occupation; where aggression began, there it will end.”

Ukraine has accused Moscow of organised illegal mass adoptions of Ukrainian children after transferring them from occupied territories to Russia.

Since the beginning of the war, Kyiv has been accusing Moscow of “deporting” Ukrainians, saying Ukrainians from occupied territories have been forced to go to Russia rather than other regions of Ukraine.

“The Russian Federation continues to abduct children from the territory of Ukraine and arrange their illegal adoption by Russian citizens,” Ukraine’s foreign ministry said in a statement.

Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov has spoken with his French counterpart Catherine Colonna on the expected visit of independent inspectors to Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant.

They “discussed in detail the situation around the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant and the opportunities available for organising a visit to the station by an IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency] mission”, Russia’s foreign ministry said in a statement following their phone call.

Lavrov said that Ukraine “continues to shell the largest nuclear power plant in Europe and the territory adjacent to it, exposes the entire European population to the danger of a nuclear catastrophe”, it added.

Ukraine has launched the 2022 Premier League season with tributes paid to those fighting in the war, but spectators barred from the stadiums.

The opening match at Kyiv’s Olympic Stadium saw two teams from the war-torn east of the country, Shaktar Donetsk and Metalist 1925, play in an empty 65,000-seat arena, where the game ended 0-0.

Ukraine remains under martial law and large public gatherings have been banned in the capital in advance of the Independence Day holiday on Wednesday due to fears of potential Russian rocket attacks.

A $75m superyacht linked to a sanctioned Russian steel billionaire has been auctioned in Gibraltar, court sources said, in what is understood to be the first sale of its kind since Russia invaded Ukraine in February.

The Axioma was granted entry into Gibraltarian waters and then impounded by the authorities in March after US bank JP Morgan said its alleged owner Dmitry Pumpyansky had reneged on the terms of a $20m loan.

The 72.5-metre (237-foot) vessel is being auctioned by the Gibraltar Admiralty Court. It was listed for one day, with closed bids to be sent electronically by midday on Tuesday, a court spokesman said.

Darya Dugina, the daughter of a prominent Russian ultranationalist thought to be a close ally of President Vladimir Putin, was killed in a car bomb blast outside Moscow in what may have been an assassination attempt on her father.

Dugina, 29, died after an explosive device detonated, destroying the Toyota Land Cruiser she was travelling in late on Saturday, investigators said in a statement.

Read more here.

French President Emmanuel Macron said that the EU’s support for Ukraine as it struggles against Russia’s invasion would continue “for the long term”.

Six months after the conflict erupted, “Our determination has not changed and we are ready to maintain this effort for the long term,” Macron said in a video address to participants in the Crimea Platform conference in Kyiv.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy opened an international conference on Crimea by saying Kyiv would restore Ukrainian rule over the Russia-annexed region.

“To overcome terror, it is necessary to gain victory in the fight against Russian aggression. It is necessary to liberate Crimea. This will be the resuscitation of world law and order,” he told the Crimea Platform summit.

Germany has registered almost a million refugees from Ukraine since the conflict with Russia began in February, the interior ministry said.

A total of 967,546 people fleeing the war have entered Germany at least temporarily, 36 percent of them children, the ministry said in a statement.

Approximately 97 percent are Ukrainian nationals.

Among the adults, three in four are women and around 8 percent are over the age of 64.

“Many in our society have gone above and beyond to help refugees,” said interior minister Nancy Faeser, calling the influx “the largest movement of refugees [in Europe] since World War II”.

The UN refugee agency, UNHCR, says more than 6.6 million Ukrainians have been registered as refugees across Europe since the Russian invasion.

Countries including the Czech Republic, Poland, Romania and Slovakia have opened their borders, homes and wallets to help those fleeing the war.

European Unions members Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Finland, which all share a border with Russia, may stop Russian tourists from entering their countries if the EU does not enact a union-wide ban, Lithuania’s foreign minister said.

“I have talked to ministers from all these countries … I don’t see many differences politically,” Gabrielius Landsbergis told reporters in Vilnius.

“Russian tourists shouldn’t be in the European Union … Their country is undertaking genocide,” he added.

Three people were killed in a series of attacks on Donetsk, which has been under the control of Russian-backed separatists since 2014, the Russian-installed mayor of Donetsk said in a post on his Telegram channel.

Ukrainian forces have also shelled a building housing the local administration headquarters in the centre of separatist-controlled Donetsk with Western-supplied weapons, the TASS news agency reported, citing Russian-installed officials.

A separatist official said at least one of the shells used in the attack was fired from a US-made HIMARS artillery system, Russian state news agencies reported.

The UN human rights office has expressed concern about plans by Russian-backed authorities to try Ukrainian prisoners of war (POWs) in the port city of Mariupol, saying such a process could itself amount to a war crime.

The Russian-backed authorities appear to be installing metal cages in a hall in Mariupol as part of plans to establish what they were calling an “international tribunal”, Ravina Shamdasani, spokeswoman for the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), told a briefing.

“We are very concerned about the manner in which this is being done. There are pictures in the media of cages being built in Mariupol’s philharmonic hall, really massive cages and apparently, the idea is to restrain the prisoners,” Shamdasani said, citing images on social media.

“This is not acceptable, this is humiliating.”

Willfully depriving a prisoner of war of the right to a fair trial would amount to a war crime by Russia, she said, adding that Ukrainian POWs were entitled to protection under the Geneva Conventions.

Al Jazeera’s Teresa Bo said that Ukrainians are concerned and remain guarded ahead of their country’s Independence Day on Wednesday, fearing Russian attacks on civilian infrastructure.

“There are heightened tensions here because of the risks or threats of the possibility of a Russian attack,” Bo said, speaking from the capital Kyiv.

“President Zelenskyy already said that Vladimir Putin was hoping to do particularly vicious and cruel things against this country in coming days. And the US intelligence agency said that Russia could be trying to attack infrastructure or government buildings in the next few days.”

For most people, they are going to have to be very careful, Bo said. The mayor of Kyiv has asked people to stay at home and public gatherings around the capital have been banned.

Curfews have also been enforced in cities like Kharkiv, where fighting is still ongoing.

Hundreds gathered for the Moscow funeral of Darya Dugina, the daughter of a prominent ultranationalist intellectual who was killed in a car bombing that Russia blames on Ukraine.

Alexander Dugin – a vocal supporter of the Kremlin’s military campaign who has claimed to be close to President Vladimir Putin – may have been the intended target of the attack that killed his 29-year-old daughter.

Ukraine denies any involvement.

Mourners – many carrying flowers – paid their respects to Dugina at a hall in Moscow’s Ostankino TV centre where her black-and-white portrait was displayed over an open casket.

Dugin and his wife, both dressed in black, sat next to their daughter’s coffin.

“She died for the people, for Russia, at the front. The front – it is here,” Dugin said at the start of the ceremony.

Dugina was killed on Saturday when a bomb placed in her car went off as she drove on a highway outside Moscow.

Russia says Ukrainian intelligence was behind the attack – a claim dismissed by Kyiv.

The success achieved in integrating refugees from the war in Ukraine should serve as an example for the future, the German government’s commissioner for integration told the Deutsche Presse-Agentur (dpa) news agency.

Immediate access to the labour market and integration courses, coupled with assistance from Germany’s government employment offices, meant that the arrivals had gone well, Reem Alabali-Radovan said.

“This should be a blueprint for our migration and integration polices, so that we become an immigration and integration country in line with the times,” she said.

Many of the refugees would remain in Germany “for months, years or even their entire lives” and needed a reliable outlook, she said.

READ MORE:

• Some 9,000 Ukrainian troops killed during Russian invasion: Kyiv
• Russia-Ukraine war: List of key events, day 181
• Ukraine football season kicks off amid threat of Russian attacks

Taras Stepanenko has played more than 200 times for the Ukrainian football club Shakhtar Donetsk, but Tuesday’s match will be the first that could be interrupted by air raids.

The game in Kyiv, between Shakhtar and FC Metalist 1925 Kharkiv, will kick off the 2022-23 Ukrainian Premier League (UPL) season, and the 33-year-old midfielder, who has more than 70 caps for the national team, says that, despite the threats, he hopes football can give people some respite from the relentless news of death and destruction.

“When I play football, I don’t think about the war,” Stepanenko told Al Jazeera from Kyiv. “We should [play] for our country. It’s our obligation.”

Read more here.

A total of 33 cargo ships carrying about 719,549 tonnes of foodstuffs have left Ukraine under a deal brokered by the United Nations and Turkey to reopen Ukrainian sea ports, the Ukrainian agriculture ministry said.

The Joint Coordination Centre in Turkey that monitors the implementation of the agreement put the total amount of grain and foodstuffs exported from three Ukrainian Black Sea ports since the deal was reached at 721,449 tonnes.

Three Black Sea ports were unblocked under the deal signed on July 22 by Moscow and Kyiv.

In addition to the vessels that have already left Ukraine, the agriculture ministry said a further 18 were now loading or waiting for permission to leave Ukrainian ports.

Here are the key events from Tuesday, August 23.

Fighting

• Russia carried out artillery and air attacks in the Zaporizhia region, where fighting near Europe’s largest nuclear power plant has raised fears of a catastrophic nuclear incident, Ukraine’s General Staff said.
• Russian rockets fired at Nikopol, Kryvyi Rih and Synelnykovsky, all close to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, injured at least four people, Governor Valentyn Reznichenko wrote on the instant messaging service Telegram.

Read more here.

The US State Department has issued a security alert warning that Russia is stepping up efforts to launch attacks against Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure and government facilities in the coming days.

The US Embassy in Kyiv urged US citizens still in Ukraine to depart the country immediately.

“If you hear a loud explosion or if sirens are activated, immediately seek cover,” the State Department said in its alert. “If in a home or a building, go to the lowest level of the structure with the fewest exterior walls, windows, and openings; close any doors and sit near an interior wall, away from any windows or openings.”

Polish President Andrzej Duda has arrived in Kyiv to discuss further support for Ukraine including military aid for the country invaded by Russia, the head of his office, Pawel Szrot, said.

“The visit will include a meeting with President Zelenskyy and talks on military support and defence of Ukraine in the economic, humanitarian and political sense,” Szrot told reporters.

“The presidents will discuss the political support Poland could offer to convince other countries to keep helping Ukraine,” he added.

Duda has met Zelenskyy five times this year, including on three visits he has made to Ukraine since the start of the war last February.

Exports of key Ukrainian agricultural commodities have fallen by almost half since the start of the Russian war earlier this year compared with the same period in 2021, according to data from the agriculture ministry.

As a result of Russia’s war on Ukraine, which began on February 24, Ukrainian seaports were blocked, leaving a vast amount of crops either unharvested or destroyed.

Agricultural exports between February 24 and August 15 this year fell to 10 million tonnes from about 19.5 million in the same period last year, the ministry data showed.

The same period saw Ukraine exporting 3.8 million tonnes of corn, 1.4 million tonnes of sunflower seeds, almost one million tonnes of sunflower oil and about 640,000 tonnes of wheat, the ministry data showed.

The 2022 grain harvest in Ukraine is forecast to fall to about 50 million tonnes from a record 86 million tonnes in 2021.

The country, whose food production, according to the government, is capable of feeding up to 400 million people, also exported barley, soybeans and oil, and sunflower and soybean meals.

Ukraine said Russia fired artillery and conducted air attacks in several towns in the Zaporizhia region.

The two sides have traded blame over frequent shelling at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, where Kyiv accuses Moscow of basing troops and storing military hardware.

Russia, which captured the nuclear power plant shortly after it launched the war on its neighbour on February 24, denies this and has accused Ukraine of targeting the nuclear plant with drones.