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In today’s newsletter: As the crisis in the Middle East shifts resources away from the Russian invasion, Zelenskiy is calling for more money, weapons and attention• Sign up here for our daily newsletter, First EditionGood morning.As soon as Iran launched its aerial attack on Israel, western allies coordinated a rapid, united military and diplomatic response. The US, Britain, France and others intercepted more than...

International Atomic Energy Agency warns about safety after Russia says Ukrainian drone detonated at nuclear power plantSee all our Ukraine war coverageThe International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was informed on Sunday by authorities at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant that a drone detonated on site today.“IAEA experts have been informed by ZNPP that a drone detonated on site today. Such detonation is consistent with...

Kyiv’s forces shoot down 26 drones overnight as Russian president says suggestion of attacks on nearby Nato states is ‘drivel’Russian president Vladimir Putin’s foreign intelligence chief paid a visit to North Korea this week to deepen bilateral cooperation between Moscow and Pyongyang and discuss broader regional security, Russia’s spy service said on Thursday according to Reuters.Sergei Naryshkin, the head the SVR, Russia’s foreign intelligence...

Head of Ukrainian air force says they were able to shoot down 10 out of 13 drones launched overnight by Moscow’s forcesKyrgyzstan’s foreign ministry has urged citizens of the central Asian nation to put off unnecessary travel to Russia following the Crocus City Hall terror attack, Reuters reports.The massacre has increased existing anti-immigrant sentiment in Russia, especially towards migrant labourers from the predominantly Muslim...

Footage of gunmen reinforces Islamic State’s claim to have masterminded worst terror attack on Russia in two decadesFour suspects have appeared in court in Moscow charged over the terrorist attack on the Crocus City concert hall on Friday that left 137 people dead.The men were officially identified as citizens of Tajikistan, the Tass state news agency said, and were remanded in custody for two...

Russian president uses victory speech to say war in Ukraine and strengthening military will be his main tasksVladimir Putin has claimed a landslide victory in Russia’s presidential vote, as thousands in the country and around the world protested against his deepening dictatorship, the war in Ukraine and a stage-managed election that could have only one winner.In a vote denounced by the United States as...

Re-elected Russian president makes first public comment on death of opposition leader, which he calls ‘sad event’Vladimir Putin has claimed he had agreed to a prisoner swap involving Alexei Navalny before the opposition leader’s sudden death in an Arctic prison last month.Speaking in central Moscow after early results indicated he had won Russia’s presidential election in a landslide, Putin said unnamed people made an...

Voters turn out at midday from the UK to Latvia and Turkey to Thailand in action Alexei Navalny endorsed before his deathThe queue to vote at the Russian embassy stretched for more than half a mile along Kensington Gardens on Sunday as hundreds of Russians arrived at midday as part of a worldwide act of protest to show their opposition to Vladimir Putin and...

Longtime Russian leader faces no meaningful opposition after death in Arctic penal colony of Alexei NavalnyVoters in Russia headed to the polls across the country’s 11 time zones on Friday in a three-day presidential election that is all but certain to extend Vladimir Putin’s 24-year rule until at least 2030.The longtime Russian leader is facing no meaningful opposition after the Russian authorities barred two...

Three days of voting begin in Russia and occupied regions of Ukraine amid claims Russia repelled attempt to land Ukrainian troops in BelgorodSergei Naryshkin, chief of Russia’s foreign intelligence service, said on Friday that French president Emmanuel Macron’s remarks about the possibility of sending soldiers from Nato countries to Ukraine were “crazy and paranoid dreams”, Reuters reportsSuspilne, Ukraine's state broadcaster, is reporting an explosion...

Members of the Siberia, Freedom of Russia Legion and RDK battalions work closely with the Ukrainian armyThree pro-Ukrainian battalions made up of recruits from Russia have launched a fresh incursion into southern Russia in a cross-border raid meant to sow chaos before Vladimir Putin’s widely expected re-election this weekend.The three armed groups of Russian exiled fighters, who operate in close coordination with Ukraine’s military,...

Russian foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova says war could expand geographically. This live blog is closedLeonid Volkov told Reuters hours before an assailant attacked him with a hammer and tear gas outside his home in Lithuania that he and other exiles feared for their lives.Volkov, the top aide to Alexei Navalny, said leaders of the late Russian opposition leader’s organisation knew they were facing...

Baltic country’s state security says assault on Leonid Volkov was probably to stop Russian opposition influencing electionLithuania has blamed Moscow for the bloody hammer attack on a longtime aide to the late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny outside his home in Vilnius.Leonid Volkov, 43, was in hospital briefly after he was attacked with a hammer by an unknown assailant on Tuesday night in the...

Ukraine president issues response after comments from pope as foreign minister says only flag country will raise is ‘yellow and blue’A cryptocurrency firm transferred digital assets worth more than $4.2m to a crypto wallet belonging to a member of an alleged Russian arms-dealing network who was later hit with US sanctions, it can be revealed.Details of the transactions involving Copper Technologies raise questions about...

As Russians prepare to give the president another six-year term this week, an ex-rival has gone from protest candidate to grotesque war hawkTwo election cycles ago, in 2012, Sergei Mironov was loudly playing the role of opposition to Russia’s ruling party, wearing the white ribbon of the protest movement in the State Duma and claiming his run against Vladimir Putin was “serious”.If made president,...

Overnight Russian artillery and mortar attacks kill two women and a man in the Kharkiv region; Andiy Yermak meets Chinese representatives Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the Ukrainian president, is expected to visit Turkey today for talks with the country’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.A Turkish diplomatic source told Reuters that Turkey is expected to underscore its continued support for Ukraine’s territorial integrity and “it is planned to...

Jim Himes says comparisons between Trump’s attitude to Putin and 1930s PM’s stance on Hitler ‘give Trump way too much credit’Donald Trump is a worse appeaser in his attitude to Vladimir Putin and Russia than the 1930s British prime minister Neville Chamberlain was towards Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany, a senior Democrat on the House intelligence committee said.Jim Himes of Connecticut, the ranking Democrat...

Two people killed, eight injured and six missing after Russian drone crashed into apartment block in southern port city, authorities sayRussia’s state news agency says a drone crashed into an apartment building in St Petersburg.The Associated Press cited a report by RIA Novosti, which said six people received medical help after an explosion on Saturday morning, citing the press service of the city’s health...

G7 leaders urge ‘additional support to close Ukraine’s remaining budget gap for 2024’Here are some of the latest images coming out of Ukraine:In a new bookshop opened in Kyiv on the street where Putin planned a conquerors’ parade two years ago, the mood is sombre. Continue reading...

Spokesperson for the Russian opposition politician, who died in prison last week, said funeral arrangements are still to be determinedKing Charles III praises the “determination and strength” of the Ukrainian people in a message marking the second anniversary of Russia’s invasion. The monarch said he was “greatly encouraged” by the UK’s efforts to support Ukraine and commended their “true valour”. He has said:The determination...

Joe Biden declines to give details but says sanctions will coincide with second anniversary of Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine The US will announce a major package of sanctions against Russia on Friday prompted by the death of political opposition leader Alexei Navalny but also devised as retaliation for the two-year war Vladimir Putin initiated against Ukraine, Joe Biden said on Tuesday.The US president...

Ilya Yashin says Vladimir Putin ordered murder of Alexei Navalny, as Russian state opens new criminal case against latter’s brotherA jailed member of Russia’s opposition has said he fears for his life after the death of Alexei Navalny, as the Putin critic’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya, demanded the Kremlin release his body so he can be “buried with dignity”.Yet as the appeals came, the Russian...

Widow of Alexei Navalny says she wants to ‘build a free Russia’ and says she will reveal why ‘Putin killed him’Yulia Navalnaya has published a video address in which she vowed to continue her late husband’s political work and called on Russians to rally around her as Alexei Navalny’s family were told they would not get access to his body for another two weeks.“I...

With Ukraine retreating and western sanctions having little impact, the Russian president is growing bolder and may embark on more reckless moves Vladimir Putin smiled and looked unusually festive on Friday as he praised factory workers and joked with state reporters at an industrial plant in the Ural city of Chelyabinsk.Putin’s confidence was unmistakable – a sign of his full belief that he would...