Ukraine and Russia: What you need to know right now
Reuters
October 3, 2022 14:52 MYT
October 3, 2022 14:52 MYT
A service member of Ukraine's National Guard walks on a bridge over the Siverskyi Donets river destroyed during Russia's attack on Ukraine, in the town of Sviatohirsk, Donetsk region, Ukraine. - REUTERS
THOUSANDS of Russians mobilised for military service in Ukraine have been sent home and the military commissar in Russia's Khabarovsk region removed in the latest setback to President Vladimir Putin's chaotic conscription of 300,000 servicemen.
LYMAN
* Ukraine claimed full control of Russia's eastern logistics hub of Lyman, its most significant battlefield gain in weeks, setting the stage for further advances aimed at cutting Russia's supply lines to its battered troops to a single route.
* Ukraine's capture of a city within territory of Putin's declared annexation demonstrates that Ukrainians are making progress and are able to push back against Russian forces, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said.
* The recapture of Lyman in the Donetsk region is a key factor for "further de-occupation" in the neighbouring Luhansk region, Luhansk Governor Serhiy Gaidai said.
* Russia said its troops had withdrawn from Lyman to avoid being surrounded by Ukraine's army.
* Ramzan Kadyrov, a Putin ally and head of Russia's Chechnya region, said on Saturday Moscow should consider using a low-yield nuclear weapon in Ukraine after the loss of Lyman.
RUSSIAN PARLIAMENT
* Russia's parliament is to consider on Monday bills and ratification treaties to absorb the regions, the speaker of the lower house said.
DIPLOMACY
* Germany will deliver the first of four advanced IRIS-T air defence systems to Ukraine in the coming days to help ward off drone attacks.
* EU country leaders will discuss how to step up support for Ukraine and their joint next steps to tame soaring energy prices when they meet on Friday.
* U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan met Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan's chief adviser Ibrahim Kalin in Istanbul and discussed "progress on NATO accession for Finland and Sweden", the White House said.
GAS FLOWS
* Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said it was technically possible to restore the ruptured offshore infrastructure of the Nord Stream gas pipelines, TASS news agency reported.
* Italy's Eni said it would not receive any of the gas it had requested from Russia's Gazprom for delivery on Saturday, but the firms said they were working to fix this.