Ukraine-Russia latest: War casualties reach 1 million as Russian ammo depot town hit

Finland’s president Alexander Stubb has called for expansion of the UN security council, abolition of its single-state veto power, and suspension of any member engaging in an “illegal war” such as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Mr Stubb, who leads the Nordic nation’s foreign policy, said he would add his voice to reform calls at next week’s UN General Assembly in New York which is to discuss composition of the global body’s security council.

Consisting of five permanent and 10 rotating member states, the council’s brief is to keep global peace, but geopolitical rivalries have deadlocked it on issues from Ukraine to Gaza.

Mr Stubb said he would propose the number of permanent members be expanded from five to 10, with one more from Latin America, two from Africa and two from Asia, telling Reuters: “No single state should have veto power in the UN Security Council.”

• A giant blast has forced the partial evacuation of a Russian town in the Tver region after a major Ukrainian drone attack was reported, officials said
• The attack targeted the site of a large Russian arsenal, according to war bloggers and Ukrainian journalists
• Nasa satellites picked up several sources of fires emanating from the site in the early hours of today
• Earthquake monitoring stations picked up what sensors thought was a minor earthquake in the area
• Videos of the explosion showed a huge ball of flame blasting high into the night sky and detonations thundering across a lake in the region that lies northwest of Moscow and not far from the border with Belarus.
• Fire fighters were trying to contain the fire, said Igor Rudenya, the governor of the Tver region
• Russia was building an arsenal for the storage of missiles, ammunition and explosives in Toropets, a 1,000-year-old town
• Russian state media in 2018 had suggested it was a major arsenal for conventional weapons.
• The impact of the explosions and whether there are any casualties is not immediately clear
• Size of the main blast shown consistent with 200-240 tons of high explosives detonating, according to George William Herbert of the Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey in California
• Schools and kindergartens were moved online in the Zapadnodvinsky district, which borders the Toropetsky district

Russia’s air defence units destroyed 54 drones that Ukraine launched overnight targeting five Russian regions, its defence ministry said.

Of these, half of the drones were destroyed over the border Kursk region, while the rest were downed over the Bryansk, Smolensk, Oryol and Belgorod regions, the Russian defence ministry said.

The defence ministry did not mention the Tver region where reports suggest a Ukrainian drone attack has sparked a massive fire at an ammo depot, forcing the partial evacuation of the town of Toropets.

Undisputed heavyweight world champion Oleksandr Usyk has been released after he was detained by police at Poland’s Krakow airport, Volodymyr Zelensky said today.

“I was outraged by this attitude towards our citizen and champion,” he said on Telegram. “Our champion was released and no one is detaining him anymore.”

It was not immediately clear why the 37-year-old Usyk was detained. The WBC, WBO and WBA champion, who also won gold at the 2012 London Olympics, has become a national hero and supports Kyiv’s war efforts with fundraising.

Usyk also confirmed his release from detention by Polish authorities. “Friends, everything is fine,” Usyk said in an Instagram post. “There was a misunderstanding that was quickly resolved. Thank you to everyone who was concerned.”

He added: “Respect to the Polish law enforcement officers who perform their duties regardless of height, weight, arm span, and titles.”

Ukrainian foreign minister Andrii Sybiha said on X that his ministry will contact the Polish foreign ministry, as it considered the detention “disproportionate and unacceptable in relation to our champion.”

A Ukrainian drone attack has forced the partial evacuation of the town of Toropets, deep inside Russian territory, the site of a large ammunition depot.

This is likely the biggest attack of its kind successfully targeting Russia’s ammunition stockpiles.

According to an RIA state news agency report from 2018, Russia was building an arsenal for the storage of missiles, ammunition and explosives in Toropets, a 1,000-year-old town, which has a population of just over 11,000.

The massive explosion also forced schools and kindergartens to be closed in the region, with classes moved online in the Zapadnodvinsky district near Toropetsky, local officials said.

A regional governor said fire fighters were trying to contain the fire but did not mention what was burning or the cause. There was no information about casualties as a result of the Wednesday attack on Tver.

Russia says its air defence units destroyed 54 drones that Ukraine launched overnight targeting five western Russian regions.

Antony Blinken has been briefed on elements of a Ukrainian plan to push Russia to end the war, US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said last night.

The plan has been touted as “nothing impossible” with “90 per cent of it already laid out” by Volodymyr Zelensky.

Speaking at a regular press briefing, State Department’s Miller said Blinken shared the ambassador’s assessment but declined to say more on it for now.

“I think I ought to let President Zelensky, whose plan ultimately this is, speak to the details of it,” Mr Miller said.

Mr Zelensky first spoke of his “victory plan” last month, saying he wanted to discuss it with Joe Biden. He is expected to present it on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly meeting in New York next week that he said he hopes to attend.

Earlier yesterday, US ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield said Washington had seen the plan. “We think it lays out a strategy and a plan that can work,” she said.

Huge explosions rocked Russia’s Toropets city this morning, amid reports that an ammunition warehouse was struck by a Ukrainian drone.

Photos and videos shared on social media showed the massive explosion from a distance, as a thick cloud of smoke and flames rose into the sky.

The explosion was also captured today on Nasa’s orbital monitoring Fire Informations and Resource Management System.

“Russian authorities have announced ‘partial evacuation’ of the city of Toropets. The depot can have up to around 30,000 tons of munitions in store,” said Illia Ponomarenko, a Ukrainian journalist and author.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has killed or injured roughly one million people on both sides of the conflict, according to fresh estimates based on Western intelligence.

While there are no precise tolls available and neither Russia nor Ukraine publicly reveals how many losses they have suffered, the Wall Street Journal collated the latest estimates to show the total casualties had passed the million mark.

Ukraine is believed to have had 80,000 troops killed and 400,000 wounded, according to a confidential estimate produced by Kyiv earlier this year.

Russian casualties have varied in Western intelligence estimates but its dead are expected to number nearly 200,000 and wounded to be around 400,000, the WSJ report added.

In July, leaked Pentagon estimates of Russian losses were reported to be even greater, with the highest estimate for the number of killed, injured or captured troops up to 728,000.