Ukraine war latest: Four killed as Putin bombards Kyiv with new wave of airstrikes

The foreign secretary has said he was “deeply saddened” by the death of a former British soldier in Ukraine.

Ryan Evans, 38, had been working as a safety advisor for the Reuters news agency and died after a missile strike on a hotel in Ukraine.

Mr Lammy offered his condolences to Mr Evans’s family and condemned the “cowardly” tactics used by Vladimir Putin’s Russia against Ukraine.

A senior ally of Russian president Vladimir Putin said that Washington was behind the French arrest of Pavel Durov, the founder and CEO of the Telegram messaging platform that plays a key role communicating the war in Ukraine.

Mr Durov, a Russian-born entrepreneur, was arrested in France over the weekend as part of an investigation into crimes related to child pornography, drug trafficking and fraudulent transactions on the platform, French prosecutors said on Monday.

Without providing evidence, Vyacheslav Volodin, the chairman of Russia’s State Duma lower house of parliament, said that the United States, through France, attempted to exert control over Telegram.

“Telegram is one of the few and at the same time the largest internet platforms over which the United States has no influence,” Mr Volodin said in a post.

“On the eve of the US presidential election, it is important for (president Joe) Biden to take Telegram under control.”

The White House has not commented on Mr Durov’s arrest. French president Emmanuel Macron has said that the arrest was “in no way a political decision”.

The Kremlin on Monday said it had yet to see any official French accusations against Mr Durov.

The encrypted Telegram app, based in Dubai, has close to 1 billion users and is particularly influential in Russia, Ukraine and the republics of the former Soviet Union.

Russia attacked Ukraine with more than 200 missiles and drones on Monday, killing seven people and striking energy facilities nationwide, Kyiv said.

Those strikes have been followed by another wave on Tuesday morning, killing at least four people.

At least 47 people were injured, including four children, in the Monday attacks, emergency services said.

The regions that reported strikes on power or critical infrastructure included Volyn and Rivne in the northwest, Khmelnytskyi, Lviv and Ivano-Frankivsk in the west, Zhytomyr in the north, Dnipropetrovsk, Kirovohrad and Vinnytsia in central Ukraine, Zaporizhzhia in the southeast and Odesa in the south.

Volodymyr Zelensky said some civilian facilities were attacked with cluster munitions.

Neighbouring Moldova, whose grid is linked to that of Ukraine, reported small disruptions to its power network.

Ukraine’s foreign ministry official said a hydropower plant in the Kyiv region had been targeted. A video posted on social media and verified by Reuters showed a damaged dam and a fire after an apparent strike at a plant. A separate clip, also verified, showed a missile hitting a water reservoir.

In the northeastern Sumy region, from where Ukraine launched its incursion into Russia on 6 August, authorities said a railway infrastructure facility had been struck, but did not say which one or give further details.

A 69-year-old man in the Dnipropetrovsk region and a farmer in the Zaporizhzhia region were among at least seven people confirmed dead, local officials said. The others were in the regions of Kharkiv, Zhytomyr and Volyn.

In Lutsk, an apartment block was damaged, the mayor said after reporting explosions.

Blasts also shook central Kyiv and air defences engaged incoming targets on the outskirts.

At least 11 TU-95 strategic bombers were used during the attack, the air force said.

Both Russia and Ukraine deny deliberately targeting civilians. Each says its attacks are aimed at destroying infrastructure critical to the other’s war effort.

Russia has launched a major barrage of missiles and drones across Ukraine, killing four people, injuring more than a dozen and damaging energy facilities in what has been called its biggest attack of the war.

The bombardment, condemned as “vile” by Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky, involved the firing of more than 100 missiles and a similar number of drones at more than half the country on Monday, with Ukraine’s air force commander describing it as Moscow’s biggest air assault of the war so far.

In attacks that began at around midnight and continued through daybreak, Ukraine’s air force said swarms of Russian drones fired at eastern, northern, southern and central regions were followed by volleys of cruise and ballistic missiles.

“Like most previous Russian strikes, this one was just as vile, targeting critical civilian infrastructure,” Mr Zelensky said, adding that most of the country was targeted, from the Kharkiv region and Kyiv to Odesa and the west.

My colleague Tara Cobham reports:

Volodymyr Zelensky on Monday also redoubled his call for allies to join the country in shooting down missiles and drones over Ukrainian airspace.

Top Kyiv officials again urged their allies and arms suppliers to allow long-range strikes into Russia.

Ukraine had no powerful long-range weapons at the start of the invasion, but has since developed many models of long-range attack drone and used them to hit targets deep inside Russia, ranging from oil refineries to military airfields.

Over the weekend, Mr Zelensky said Ukraine had developed a new “drone missile” that had been used to attack Russia and was more powerful and faster than other hardware in Kyiv’s arsenal.

Russia and Ukraine have each exchanged more than 100 prisoners of war as Kyiv marked its third Independence Day since Moscow’s full-scale invasion.

Ukraine said the 115 Ukrainian servicemen who were freed were conscripts, many of whom were taken prisoner in the first months of Russia’s invasion. Among them were nearly 50 soldiers captured by Russian forces from the Azovstal steelworks in Mariupol.

The Russian defence ministry said the released 115 Russian soldiers had been captured in the Kursk region, where Ukrainian forces launched their surprise offensive into Russia two weeks ago.

Our foreign affairs reporter Tom Watling has more details here:

Foreign secretary David Lammy said he was “deeply saddened” by the death in Ukraine of a former British soldier who had been working as a safety adviser for the Reuters news agency.

Ryan Evans, 38, died after a missile strike on a hotel in Ukraine, where he was helping the news organisation cover the war.

Mr Lammy offered his condolences to Mr Evans’s family and condemned the “cowardly” tactics used by Vladimir Putin’s Russia against Ukraine.

Mr Evans was part of the reporting crew staying at the Hotel Sapphire, in Kramatorsk, eastern Ukraine, which was hit by a strike on Saturday.

He had been working with Reuters since 2022.

The agency said it was “devastated” by the incident which also injured two of its journalists.

The Reuters statement added: “We are urgently seeking more information about the attack, including by working with the authorities in Kramatorsk, and we are supporting our colleagues and their families.

“We send our deepest condolences and thoughts to Ryan’s family and loved ones.

“Ryan has helped so many of our journalists cover events around the world; we will miss him terribly.”

Nato strongly condemned Russia’s ongoing attacks against Ukrainian civilians and civilian infrastructure after Poland said a drone likely entered its airspace during a Russian attack on Ukraine early on Monday.

“Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russian drone fragments and missiles have been found on allied territory on several occasions,” Nato spokesperson Farah Dakhlallah said.

“While we have no information indicating an intentional attack by Russia against allies, these acts are irresponsible and potentially dangerous.”