Putin orders Wagner mercenaries to sign oath of allegiance after Prigozhin death – Ukraine-Russia war live

Vladimir Putin has ordered Wagner mercenaries to sign an oath of allegiance to the Russian state after a plane believed to be carrying their leader Yevgeny Prigozhin crashed near Moscow.

With immediate effect on Friday, Russia’s president signed the decree, published on the Kremlin website, which obliges anyone carrying out work on behalf of the military or Moscow’s war in Ukraine to swear a formal oath of allegiance to Russia.

The oath includes a line in which those who take it promise to strictly follow the orders of commanders and senior leaders.

It comes after the Kremlin insisted that claims Prigozhin had been killed on its orders were an “absolute lie”, as Mr Putin euologised the mercenary chief as a “talented businessman” who had made some “serious mistakes.”

Meanwhile, Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko claims to have warned Prigozhin to “watch out” for threats to his life during his troops mutinous march on Moscow in June, to which he said Prigozhin had answered: “To hell with it – I will die.”

Key Points

• Vladimir Putin forces Wagner fighters to sign oath of allegiance to Russian state

• Belarus president says he warned Wagner chief on threats to life

• Russia says Biden’s jibe about Putin was ‘unacceptable’

• Prigozhin plane crash caused by explosion, US spy chiefs suspect

• Putin says Yevgeny Prigozhin made ‘serious mistakes'

• Ukraine ‘pressing towards Russia’s second line of defence' near Robotyne

• Russia accuses Ukraine of huge drone attack on Crimea

Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin confirmed dead in plane crash by Russian investigators

11:54 , Maryam Zakir-Hussain

Russia’s Investigative Committee has confirmed Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin was killed in a plane crash.

The committee said in a statement Sunday that after forensic testing, all 10 bodies recovered at the site of the crash were identified, and their identities “conform to the manifest.”

Russia’s civil aviation authority earlier this week said Prigozhin, along with some of his top lieutenants, were on the list of those on board the plane that crashed Wednesday.

Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin confirmed dead in plane crash by Russian investigators

Wagner mercenary chief Prigozhin confirmed dead in plane crash

11:50 , Maryam Zakir-Hussain

Russia‘s Investigation Committee said on Sunday the results of genetic tests had confirmed the identities of the 10 people who died in a plane crash last Wednesday and that they included the founder of the Wagner mercenary group, Yevgeny Prigozhin.

Putin orders Wagner fighters to sign oath of allegiance following Prigozhin plane crash

11:30 , Maryam Zakir-Hussain

Vladimir Putin has ordered Wagner fighters to sign an oath of allegiance to the Russian state, amid anger in the mercenary group’s ranks over their leader’s apparent assassination in a plane crash near Moscow.

The decree was published on the Kremlin’s website and signed with immediate effect by Mr Putin, as his spokesperson Dmitry Peskov insisted that claims Prigozhin had been killed on the Russian president’s orders were an “absolute lie”.

The wording of the oath includes a line in which those who take it promise to strictly follow the orders of commanders and senior leaders, as questions hang over the fate of the mercenaries – many of whom had already relocated to Belarus following their mutinous march on Moscow in June.

Putin orders Wagner fighters to sign oath of allegiance after Prigozhin death

Old video sparks wild theories on fate of Russia’s Prigozhin- part two

10:45 , Maryam Zakir-Hussain

Hundreds of responses had been posted on Grey Zone within a few hours.

“But he knew,” a Telegram user whose name translates to “outpost” wrote in the first response.

Some posts speculated Prigozhin was alive. One said he would “soon jump out of a snuffbox and make the devils crap themselves.”

Another said it would be cool if Prigozhin and Sergei Surovikin, the former commander of Russia‘s war effort, reportedly removed as head of the air force the day of the crash, “are sitting in Jamaica, drinking pina colada and taking a drag on a huge joint.”

Some posts pointed to the Kremlin, with one comment saying the crash was the handiwork of President Vladimir Putin, adding, “You have to be an amoeba not to understand this.”

Some posts blamed France, others Ukraine. One post said Ukraine had killed Prigozhin by order of US special services “and the Anglo-Saxons” and added, “it is inconvenient for us to lose such a hero,” to which someone responded with three crying-laughing emojis.

Old video sparks wild theories on fate of Russia's Prigozhin

10:20 , Maryam Zakir-Hussain

A 40-second clip of an old interview in which Russian mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigozhin said he would rather be killed than lie to his country, and talked about a plane disintegrating in the sky, unleashed a flood of online theorizing on Sunday about his presumed death.

Russia‘s aviation authority said the Wagner group chief was on a private jet that crashed northwest of Moscow with no survivors on Wednesday, exactly two months after he led a failed mutiny against army chiefs. The Kremlin said Western suggestions he had been killed on its orders were an “absolute lie.”

In the clip, taken from an interview originally published on April 29 with Russian military blogger Semyon Pegov, Prigozhin said Russia was on the brink of disaster because the defence establishment was gradually kicking out truth-tellers who refused to suck up to upper management.

“Today we have reached the boiling point,” he said in the clip published on Grey Zone, Wagner’s Telegram channel. “Why am I speaking so honestly? Because I don’t have the right, before those people who will live on in this country. They are now being lied to. Better kill me.”

He added, “But I will not lie, I must say honestly that Russia is on the brink of disaster. And if these cogs are not adjusted today, then the plane will fall apart in the air.”

Putin’s hit list: from poisoned tea to mysterious falls, the grisly fate of the Kremlin’s enemies

09:30 , Maryam Zakir-Hussain

The methods are many and varied: poisoning, shooting, plane crashes and, the simplest of them all, the mysterious falling out of a window. John Kampfner on how Putin transformed state assassinations of his foes and political opponents onto an industrial scale:

‘‘The reason why it all happened is one man’s hatred and fear – one man hiding in a bunker. I mortally offended him by surviving an attempt at my life he ordered. And then I committed an even more serious offence: I didn’t go into hiding. And that’s driving this thieving little man in his bunker out of his mind.’’

Putin’s hit list: inside the Kremlin’s killing machine

Ukraine forces 'break through Putin's strongest line of defence'

08:57 , Maryam Zakir-Hussain

Ukrainian forces believe they have broken through the most difficult line of Russian defences in the south and will now be able to advance more quickly, a commander fighting in the south has said.

Ukrainian forces said on Wednesday they had raised the national flag in the settlement of Robotyne in the southern Zaporizhzhia region, about 10 km (six miles) south of the frontline town of Orikhiv.

“We don’t stop here,” said a commander who led some of the troops into Robotyne and who uses the callsign “Skala,” eponymous with the battalion which he leads.

“Next we have (the town of) Berdiansk, and then more. I made it clear to my fighters at once: our goal is not Robotyne, our goal is (the Sea of) Azov.”

Robotyne is about 100 km from Berdiansk, a port on the shores of the Sea of Azov, and 85 km from the strategic city of Melitopol. Both are occupied by Russian forces following Moscow’s full-scale invasion in February last year.

“We have passed the main roads that were mined. We are coming to those lines where we can go (forward). I’m sure we’ll go faster from here,” Skala said.

He said two houses were still under Russian control in Robotyne: “We’re fighting for them, and then we’ll have full control (of Robotyne).”

‘Gangster’ Putin committed ‘most ostentatious’ act of savagery in our lifetimes, says Boris

08:45 , Maryam Zakir-Hussain

Boris Johnson has said that Vladimir Putin’s “mask is now fully off”, as world leaders and commentators continue to question his role in the death of Russian mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigozhin.

The former prime minister has described the downing of the Wagner chief’s plane as “violent liquidation” and claimed that Putin was “being transformed before our eyes into an Asiatic despot”.

“I cannot think of another example of such ostentatious and uninhibited savagery by a world leader – not in our lifetimes,” he said.

‘Gangster’ Putin committed ‘most ostentatious’ act of savagery, says Boris

I warned Wagner chief to watch out for threats to his life, says Belarus president Lukashenko

08:00 , Maryam Zakir-Hussain

Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko has said that he warned the Wagner mercenary chief, Yevgeny Prigozhin, to “watch out” for threats to his life before the plane crash in which he is believed to have died.

Mr Lukashenko helped broker a deal between Prigozhin and the Kremlin that ended an attempted mutiny by Wagner forces against Moscow in June – an uprising that marked the most significant challenge to Vladimir Putin’s authority in more than two decades in power.

Two months to the day after that revolt was halted, an aircraft believed to be carrying Prigozhin and a number of other members of Wagner’s senior leadership crashed on Wednesday.

Mr Putin had called the Wagner mutiny treason, and had initially vowed to crush it. A number of world leaders have suggested that he would not let the embarrassment of that incident stand.

I warned Wagner chief to watch out, says Belarus president Lukashenko

Ukraine says it destroyed four cruise missiles during overnight Russian air strike

07:20 , Maryam Zakir-Hussain

The Ukrainian military destroyed four cruise missiles over northern and central Ukraine during an overnight Russian air strike, Kyiv’s air force reported early today.

It said Ukrainian forces had detected up to eight airborne targets but that there were no immediate reports of strikes, adding that the rest of the targets were “probably false”.

The air force also said the attack involved five Russian strategic bombers.

Moscow airports forced to close after ‘drone strikes'

06:58 , Andy Gregory

A new drone attack on Moscow forced all three major airports serving the Russian capital to temporarily close on Saturday morning, Russian state media reported, in the latest of near-daily drone strikes on the city and surrounding region.

Russia’s defence ministry and Moscow mayor Sergey Sobyanin claimed a drone was shot down over the Moscow region’s Istra district, some 50 kilometres west of Red Square. Mr Sobyanin said there were no immediate reports of any casualties or damage.

According to Russia’s state Tass agency, the Sheremetevo, Domodedovo and Vnukovo airports all suspended flights for over an hour early on Saturday.

Russian Telegram channels posted videos, some of them apparently from home security cameras, of what they claimed was Russian air defence downing the drone. One video shows a car parked outside what appears to be suburban home, its alarm beginning to blare seconds after two loud blasts sound in the distance.

Air attacks resume between Ukraine and Russia after Wagner chief’s death

06:08 , Arpan Rai

Russia’s defence ministry claimed its forces shot down two drones overnight in two regions bordering Ukraine.

One drone was shot down over the Bryansk region in Russia’s west and another in the Kursk region, just south of it, the defence ministry said on the Telegram messaging channel.

There was no further information about possible damage or casualties.

The warfare resumed between Ukraine and Russia alongside the dramatic likely death of Russian mercenary group Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin earlier this week.

Russian military pilot ‘defects’ to Ukraine – and brings helicopter with him

05:53 , Andy Gregory

Ukraine claims that a Russian helicopter pilot defected to Ukraine after reportedly being “lured” during a six-month intelligence operation, my colleague Matt Drake reports.

Ukraine’s GUR military intelligence agency said an Mi-8 helicopter landed at a Ukrainian airfield with the pilot and his unsuspecting crew members, without specifying when.

It comes after a Russian military blogger claimed in recent weeks that a helicopter crossed the border with three people on board after it had lost its way, but Ukraine now claims this was a deliberate move.

“This was a GUR operation,” spokesperson Andriy Yusov said on Wednesday. “The aircraft moved according to the plan. You will need to wait a bit, work is being conducted, including with the crew. Everything is fine, there will be news.”

Ukrainian media outlet Ukrainska Pravda cited unnamed intelligence sources saying the agency worked for months to convince the pilot to cooperate and fly the aircraft to Ukraine. The report said the helicopter landed in eastern Ukraine with the pilot. Two other crew members who were unaware of the plan were subsequently "liquidated".

Russian military pilot ‘defects’ to Ukraine - and brings helicopter with him

Watch: Ukraine shares footage of ‘Armageddon’ explosion destroying missile defence system in Crimea

04:47 , Andy Gregory

If the Wagner mercenary chief is dead, he got the death he deserved

04:45 , Arpan Rai

It is not surprising that Russian authorities have declared Yevgeny Prigozhin dead. Given the attempted mutiny he led with the Wagner mercenary group against Moscow, the assumption was that he may not be long for this world. When it comes to the iron-grip President Vladimir Putin has on his nation – if you come for the king, as the adage goes, you best not miss.

But as the speculation swirls about the end of Prigozhin and the embarrassment that Putin could not let stand, it can be easy to brush past the terrible things Progozhin’s mercenaries are believed to have done. Let’s get this straight, Prigozhin deserved the end that all signs point to him having met.

It is Putin’s invasion of Ukraine that pushed Prigozhin truly into the public consciousness, with the group having been at the vanguard of some of the bloodiest fighting of the war around the eastern city of Bakhmut.

Chris Stevenson writes:

Zelensky condoles deaths of 3 Ukrainian pilots

04:27 , Arpan Rai

President Volodymyr Zelensky has condoled the death of three Ukrainian pilots who died on Friday when two L-39 combat training aircraft collided over a region west of Kyiv.

The three Ukrainian military pilots included a “mega talent” with callsign “Juice” who yearned to fly F-16s.

“Yesterday, a disaster occurred in the sky over Zhytomyr region. Three pilots died. Among them was Andriy Pilshchykov, call sign Juice. He was a Ukrainian officer, one of those who helped our country a lot. A lot! My condolences to the family and friends, to everyone who knew the guys,” Mr Zelensky said in his nightly address.

He added: “The investigation into what happened is ongoing. It’s too early to talk about the details. Of course, all the circumstances will be clarified. Of course, Ukraine will never forget anyone who defended Ukraine’s free sky. May they always be remembered!”

Putin orders Wagner fighters to sign oath of allegiance after Prigozhin killed

04:05 , Arpan Rai

Vladimir Putin has ordered Wagner fighters to sign an oath of allegiance to the Russian state, amid anger in the mercenary group’s ranks over their leader’s apparent assassination in a plane crash near Moscow.

The decree was published on the Kremlin’s website and signed with immediate effect by Mr Putin, as his spokesperson Dmitry Peskov insisted that claims Prigozhin had been killed on the Russian president’s orders were an “absolute lie”.

The wording of the oath includes a line in which those who take it promise to strictly follow the orders of commanders and senior leaders, as questions hang over the fate of the mercenaries – many of whom had already relocated to Belarus following their mutinous march on Moscow in June.

Putin orders Wagner fighters to sign oath of allegiance after Prigozhin death

Old video sparks wild theories on fate of Prigozhin

03:53 , Arpan Rai

An old interview of Russian mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigozhin wherein he said he would rather be killed than lie to his country, and talked about a plane disintegrating in the sky has sparked a flood of online theorising about his presumed death.

In the clip, taken from an interview originally published on 29 April with Russian military blogger Semyon Pegov, Prigozhin said Russia was on the brink of disaster because the defence establishment was gradually kicking out truth-tellers who refused to suck up to upper management.

“Today we have reached the boiling point,” he said in the 40-second clip published on Grey Zone, Wagner’s Telegram channel.

“Why am I speaking so honestly? Because I don’t have the right, before those people who will live on in this country. They are now being lied to. Better kill me.”

He added, “But I will not lie, I must say honestly that Russia is on the brink of disaster. And if these cogs are not adjusted today, then the plane will fall apart in the air.”

Hundreds of responses had been posted on Grey Zone within a few hours.

“But he knew,” a Telegram user whose name translates to “outpost” wrote in the first response.

Russia’s aviation authority has claimed the Wagner group chief was on a private jet that crashed northwest of Moscow with no survivors on Wednesday, exactly two months after he led a failed mutiny against army chiefs.

The Kremlin said Western suggestions he had been killed on its orders were an “absolute lie.”

Civilians killed in Ukraine’s northeast amid fears of Russian takeover

03:47 , Arpan Rai

At least two civilians were killed and a third was injured in Ukraine’s northeastern frontline area where Russian forces struck a cafe yesterday, regional officials said.

Russian shells struck the cafe in Podoly, an eastern suburb of Kupiansk, regional governor Oleh Syniehubov said in a Telegram post. He added that rescue teams were working at the site.

The shelling near the city of Kupiansk came as UK officials said that Russia may try to retake the area, which was captured by Kyiv in a lightning counteroffensive last September after more than six months of Russian occupation. Fierce fighting there earlier this month had already prompted mandatory evacuations and fears of a second Russian takeover.

Top EU official urges Russia to return to grain deal

03:41 , Andy Gregory

A senior European Union official has urged Russia to renew the Black Sea grain deal, after Moscow quit the UN-brokered agreement last month.

European Commission executive vice president Valdis Dombrovskis said Russian restrictions on shipping of Ukrainian grains via the Black Sea were creating problems not only for Kyiv but for many developing countries as well.

Russia is using “grain as a weapon”, said Dombrovskis, who is in India to participate in a G20 trade ministers’ meeting. “We support all efforts by United Nations, by Turkey on Black Sea grain initiative,” he said, adding that the bloc was providing alternative trading routes to Ukraine.

Air attacks in Kyiv, Ukraine air defences repelling strikes

03:34 , Arpan Rai

Ukraine’s air defence systems were repelling a Russian air attack on Kyiv’s outskirts early on Sunday, Kyiv’s military administration said on Telegram as all of the war-hit nation was covered under air-raid alerts at 5am local time.

A Reuters witness reported the sound of blasts.

Ukrainian pilot killed in mid-air crash hailed as a ‘mega talent’

02:35 , Andy Gregory

One of the three Ukrainian pilots killed as two training aircraft collided in Ukraine’s Zhytomyr region, west of Kyiv has been described as a “mega talent”.

President Volodymr Zelensky confirmed in his nightly address that Andriy Pilshchykov, a Ukrainian officer well-known to broadcast audiences and whose callsign is Juice, was among the dead.

Air force spokesperson Yuriy Ihnat described Pilshchykov – who was no older than 30 – as a “mega talent” and leader of reforms.

“You can’t even imagine how much he wanted to fly an F-16,” Mr Ihnat wrote on his Facebook page. “But now that American planes are actually on the horizon, he will not fly them.”

What is the Wagner mercenary group led by Yevgeny Prigozhin?

01:28 , Andy Gregory

Russian soldiers fighting in Ukraine have been supported on the battlefield by tens of thousands of mercenaries from a shadowy group led by a businessman and longtime ally of president Vladimir Putin.

The Wagner Group is a private military company that was under the control of Yevgeny Prigozhin until his reported death in a plane crash on Wednesday 23 August.

The unit cut its teeth in deployments to Crimea – illegally annexed by Russia in 2014 – and eastern Ukraine’s Donbas region in the aftermath of that act and has since dispatched troops to several conflicts in the Middle East and Africa, including the Syrian Civil War.

In Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Wagner has been a key part of Moscow’s fighting force, but a power struggle between the Kremlin and the outspoken Prigozhin threatened – for 24 hours at least – to drag Russia towards a civil war of its own.

My colleagues Liam James and Joe Sommerlad have more in this report:

What is the Wagner mercenary group led by Yevgeny Prigozhin?

Putin’s hit list: from poisoned tea to mysterious falls, the grisly fate of the Kremlin’s enemies

00:31 , Andy Gregory

Yevgeny Prigozhin’s apparent punishment was relatively swift, as it usually is when politicians, journalists or former spooks uncover inconvenient truths, writes John Kampfner, the executive director at Chatham House.

“The methods are many and varied: poisoning, shooting, plane crashes and, the simplest of them all, the mysterious falling out of a window. Sometimes they are carried out discreetly, but more often in the open, to send a signal about the dangers of defiance.

“To be fair, targeted killings began before Putin came to power in 2000. In the 1990s, incidents such as these often had the imprimatur of the Chechen leadership. Or else it was criminal gangs (and their political masters) settling scores. What Putin did was to transform state assassinations onto an industrial scale.”

You can read more on Putin’s hit list in this long read:

Putin’s hit list: inside the Kremlin’s killing machine

Watch: Ukrainian troops evacuate civilians from Robotyne as troops gain foothold

23:41 , Andy Gregory

Iran claims several European countries are interested in its Shahed attack drones

22:54 , Andy Gregory

Iran’s defence ministry has claimed that several unnamed “Western and European countries” are interested in acquiring its Shahed attack drones, amid claims the US is seeking to stop Tehran from selling them to Russia.

Russia began using the Iranian-made Shahed drones to attack deep inside Ukraine last year. The so-called kamikaze unmanned drones do not need a runway to launch and explode on impact.

As Russia’s deputy foreign minister insisted that Moscow and Tehran would not “succumb to the dictates of the United States and its satellites”, Iran’s defence ministry said: “None of the transactions (regarding drones) that we have had ... with other countries, such as Russia, have been cancelled.”

A White House official said in June that Iran had transferred several hundred drones to Russia since last August.

Russia and Iran’s military cooperation ‘will not succumb to dictates of US’, says Moscow minister

22:09 , Andy Gregory

Russia’s military cooperation with Iran will not succumb to geopolitical pressure, Russian deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov has said, following a report that Washington has asked Tehran to stop selling drones to Moscow.

“There are no changes, and cooperation with Iran will continue,” Mr Ryabkov was quoted as saying by Russian state news agency RIA. “We are independent states and do not succumb to the dictates of the United States and its satellites.”

The Financial Times reported this month that the US is pressing Iran to stop selling the so-called kamikaze Shahed drones, which Russia is using in the war in Ukraine, citing an Iranian official and another person familiar with the talks.

Further Ukrainian gains reported in Zaporizhzhia region

21:26 , Andy Gregory

Ukraine has made further gains near the Zaporizhzhia village of Robotyne, analysts have said, where Kyiv’s troops have passed Russia’s first line of defence.

The Institute for the Study of War think-tank said that geolocated combat footage published on Friday indicated that Ukrainian forces had moved southward by 1.5 kilometers to a tree line northeast of Novopokropivka.

The ISW’s Russia analyst George Barros said Ukraine’s troops are “now geolocated to be within 2.5 km of the great anti-vehicle ditch – the next major military engineering obstacle within the Russian layered defence”.

Voices: If the Wagner mercenary chief is dead, he got the death he deserved

20:46 , Holly Bancroft

Following the news of the reported death of Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin, The Independent’s international editor Chris Stevenson has shared his thoughts on the mercenary chief.

He argues that readers should not let Prigozhin’s mutiny against Putin cloud their thinking about a man who was nothing more than a monster.

He writes: “It is not surprising that Russian authorities have declared Yevgeny Prigozhin dead. Given the attempted mutiny he led with the Wagner mercenary group against Moscow, the assumption was that he may not be long for this world. When it comes to the iron-grip President Vladimir Putin has on his nation – if you come for the king, as the adage goes, you best not miss.

But as the speculation swirls about the end of Prigozhin and the embarrassment that Putin could not let stand, it can be easy to brush past the terrible things Progozhin’s mercenaries are believed to have done. Let’s get this straight, Prigozhin deserved the end that all signs point to him having met.

It is Putin’s invasion of Ukraine that pushed Prigozhin truly into the public consciousness, with the group having been at the vanguard of some of the bloodiest fighting of the war around the eastern city of Bakhmut.”

Read more here:

Opinion: If the Wagner mercenary chief is dead, he got the death he deserved

Ukrainian president Zelensky says investigation ongoing into pilot deaths

20:08 , Holly Bancroft

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said an investigation is ongoing into the death of three pilots who died after two trainer aircraft collided on Friday.

President Zelensky, who is counting on swift training of Ukrainian crews to fly up to 61 F-16 fighter jets promised by his Western allies, said the three men included Andriy Pilshchykov, “a Ukrainian officer, one of those who greatly helped our state.”

The investigation is ongoing, he added in his nightly video address. “It is too early to discuss details. Certainly, all circumstances will be clarified.”

The air force said the one of the pilots who died used the callsign “Juice”. The pilot had become well known after giving numerous interviews to international media, it said.

Memorial appears in Moscow to honour Wagner chief Prigozhin

19:25 , Holly Bancroft

An informal memorial has appeared to Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin in Moscow, Russia.

Here are some pictures from today of the memorial and those who came to lay flowers at it.

Russian forces struck a cafe in Ukrainian front-line, killing two

18:48 , Holly Bancroft

Russian forces struck a cafe in a key front-line area in north-eastern Ukraine, killing two civilians and wounding a third, regional officials said.

The shelling near the city of Kupiansk came as UK officials said that Russia may try to retake the area, which was captured by Kyiv in a lightning counteroffensive last September after more than six months of Russian occupation.

Fierce fighting there earlier this month prompted mandatory evacuations and fears of a second Russian takeover.

Regional governor Oleh Syniehubov said in a Telegram post that Russian shells on Saturday struck the cafe in Podoly, an eastern suburb of Kupiansk.

He added that rescue teams were working at the site.

WSJ reporter appeals decision to extend his pretrial detention until December

18:10 , Andy Gregory

Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich has appealed a Moscow court’s decision to extend his pretrial detention in Russia until the end of November, documents on the court’s website show.

Mr Gershkovich is the first US journalist held on espionage charges in Russia since the Soviet era, after he was arrested in March during a work trip to the city of Yekaterinburg, nearly 1,200 miles east of Moscow. Washington has declared him to be wrongfully detained.

An order that authorised keeping Mr Gershkovich in jail before his trial was set to expire on 30 August. The Moscow City Court extended the custody order on Thursday by three months, drawing objections from US government officials and the Wall Street Journal.

The court’s website showed on Saturday that Gershkovich’s defence team had filed an appeal. The court in June rejected his appeal of the earlier ruling to keep him behind bars until the end of August.

‘Gangster’ Putin committed ‘most ostentatious’ act of savagery in our lifetimes, says Boris Johnson

17:39 , Andy Gregory

Boris Johnson has stated that Vladimir Putin’s “mask is now fully off”, as world leaders and commentators continue to question his role in the death of Russian mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigozhin.

The former prime minister has described the downing of the Wagner chief’s plane as “violent liquidation” and claimed that Putin was “being transformed before our eyes into an Asiatic despot”.

“I cannot think of another example of such ostentatious and uninhibited savagery by a world leader - not in our lifetimes,” he said.

‘Gangster’ Putin committed ‘most ostentatious’ act of savagery, says Boris

Russian journalist ‘poisoned’ in Germany says she had believed she was ‘safe’ in Europe

17:21 , Andy Gregory

Exiled Russian journalist Elena Kostyuchenko has said she believed she would be safe in Europe – as Berlin prosecutors investigate whether she was poisoned last October.

“When you work as an investigative reporter in Russia you are always careful,” she told Reuters. “You have lots of protocols you’re following all the time. But when I found myself in Europe I totally forgot all these security measures ... Somehow I was thinking that in Europe, I’m safe.”

Having worked as a foreign correspondent who exposed alleged Russian war crimes in Ukraine with the Novaya Gazeta newspaper before it was forced to close under threat from Moscow, Ms Kostyuchenko’s symptoms started with disorientation and stomach ache on a train journey from Munich to Berlin.

“I had to take off my rings because my fingers looked like sausages,” she said, describing the swelling that was among her symptoms. Months later, she is still exhausted and only able to work three hours a day.

When doctors told her she had likely been poisoned her initial reaction was to laugh.

She was one of three Russian independent woman journalists who were apparently poisoned while abroad in a similar period. All three suffered similar symptoms.

You can read more about her story here.

Ship becomes second to leave Odesa since collapse of grain deal

17:05 , Andy Gregory

The second ship to leave Odesa since Moscow’s withdrawal from the Black Sea grain deal has set sail for Bulgaria, according to Ukrainian MP Oleksiy Honcharenko, who posted a photograph of what he said was the ship leaving the port.

The Liberia-flagged bulk carrier Primus is moving from Odesa to the port of Varna in Bulgaria, news agency Interfax Ukraine reported citing the MarineTraffic database.

Odesa’s three seaports shipped tens of millions of tons of grain during Russia’s invasion under a UN-brokered deal which collapsed in July after Moscow withdrew.

Russian forces have since targeted Ukrainian ports with volleys of missiles and kamikaze drones.

Bizarre moment Vladimir Putin addresses conference in ‘altered’ voice

16:40 , Rachel Flynn

This is the bizarre moment Vladimir Putin’s voice appeared to be ‘altered’ as he addressed a summit this week.

The pre-recorded video of his opening speech raised eyebrows when it was shown to delegates at the BRICS Business Forum in South Africa.

Russian journalists posted a 30-second clip of the video on Telegram, with the caption: “Putin addressed the BRICS Business Council via video link, but not with his own voice.”

The original clip, which features his regular speaking voice, was posted on the Russian government’s website. It is unclear whether the altered video was a technical fault or had been changed on purpose.

Bizarre moment Vladimir Putin addresses conference in ‘altered’ voice

Berlin probing ‘attempted murder’ of exiled Russian journalist who fell ill on train in Germany

16:20 , Andy Gregory

Germany has launched an investigation into the suspected attempted murder of a Berlin-based Russian journalist after she suffered symptoms consistent with poisoning.

Elena Kostyuchenko exposed allegations of Russian war crimes in Ukraine while working for the Nobel Prize-winning Novaya Gazeta newspaper, until it was forced to close as part of Moscow’s harsh information crackdown.

The 35-year-old – who left Ukraine last March after being told Chechen units at Russian checkpoints had been ordered to kill her – recently revealed that she had experienced extreme disorientation, abdominal pain and swollen extremities while on a train journey from Munich to Berlin last October.

Riga-based investigative website The Insider, which helped link the alleged Salisbury Novichok attackers with Russia’s FSB security service, reported that Ms Kostyuchenko was one of three exiled Russian journalists to have fallen ill with poisoning symptoms in European capitals over the same period.

Read more details here:

Germany investigating suspected poisoning of Russian journalist in Berlin

Ukrainian commander claims troops have broken through toughest defence line in Zaporizhzia

15:58 , Andy Gregory

Ukrainian forces believe they have broken through the most difficult line of Russian defences in the southern Zaporizhzhia region and will now be able to advance more quickly, a commander told Reuters.

Well-prepared Russian defence lines reinforced by minefields have slowed Ukraine’s counteroffensive, including their southward advance towards the Sea of Azov aimed at breaking Russia’s land bridge with annexed Crimea.

A commander who led troops into Robotyne, whose callsign “Skala” is eponymous with the battalion he leads, said just two houses in the village remained under Russian control, adding: “We don’t stop here. Next we have Berdiansk, and then more. I made it clear to my fighters at once: our goal is not Robotyne, our goal is [the Sea of] Azov.”

Berdiansk is a port of the Sea of Azov, situated roughly 100km from Robotyne, and 85 km from the strategic city of Melitopol. Both are occupied by Russia.

“We have passed the main roads that were mined. We are coming to those lines where we can go [forward]. I’m sure we’ll go faster from here,” Skala said.

Skala said Ukrainian troops had now entered territories where there were only “Russian logistics” groups, and where he made clear he did not expect Russian defences to be as difficult to break through, adding: “We are moving on to liberate all our territories.”

Three Ukrainian pilots dead after two training aircraft collide in skies west of Kyiv

15:41 , Andy Gregory

Three Ukrainian pilots have died after two L-39 trainer aircraft collided in mid-air in central Ukraine, Kyiv’s air force has said.

The loss of three pilots will be a blow to Ukraine, which is about to undertake a huge effort to quickly train up its air crews on Western-donated F-16 fighter jets, up to 61 of which have been pledged to Kyiv.

The crash occurred on Friday over the Zhytomyr region, which lies west of Kyiv. The air force said one of the pilots killed, using the callsign “Juice”, had become well known after giving numerous interviews to international media.

“We express our condolences to the families of the victims. This is a painful and irreparable loss for all of us,” the air force wrote on Telegram, adding that an investigation into the circumstances of the crash was taking place.

Putin orders Wagner mercenaries to sign oath of allegiance

15:17 , Andy Gregory

Vladimir Putin has ordered Wagner mercenaries to sign an oath of allegiance to the Russian state after a plane believed to be carrying their leader Yevgeny Prigozhin crashed near Moscow.

With immediate effect on Friday, Russia’s president signed the decree, published on the Kremlin website, which obliges anyone carrying out work on behalf of the military or Moscow’s war in Ukraine to swear a formal oath of allegiance to Russia.

Described in the decree as a step to forge the spiritual and moral foundations of the defence of Russia, the wording of the oath includes a line in which those who take it promise to strictly follow the orders of commanders and senior leaders.

Mr Putin's introduction of a mandatory oath for employees of Wagner and other private military contractors appears to be clearly intended to bring such groups under tighter state control.

UK warning over Russian plans to retake shelled area

14:55 , Sam Rkaina

Shelling near the city of Kupiansk that left two dead this morning came as UK officials warned Russia may try to retake the area, captured by Kyiv last September after more than six months of Russian occupation.

Fierce fighting there earlier this month prompted mandatory evacuations and fears of a second Russian takeover.

Russian shells on Saturday morning struck the cafe in Podoly, an eastern suburb of Kupiansk, regional governor Oleh Syniehubov said in a Telegram post. He added that rescue teams were working at the site.

UK military intelligence on Saturday assessed that Russia may “increase the intensity of its offensive efforts” around Kupiansk and nearby Lyman in an attempt to take pressure off its forces near Bakhmut and in the Zaporizhzhia region, where a Ukrainian counteroffensive has reportedly made gradual gains.

Earlier this month, Ukrainian authorities ordered a mandatory evacuation of nearly 12,000 civilians from 37 towns and villages around Kupiansk, citing a concerted effort by Russian troops to punch through the front line.

After the Russian occupiers left Kupiansk last year, Ukrainian authorities said they found torture chambers and mass graves in the region.

Ukrainian officials have so far reported limited advances in Kyiv’s large-scale counteroffensive launched in early June, including in the southern Zaporizhzhia region and on the outskirts of Bakhmut, the eastern city that became the site of the war’s longest and bloodiest battle before falling to Moscow in May.

Who is Yevgeny Prigozhin?

14:00 , Sam Rkaina

Once a businessman with a catering empire friendly with Vladimir Putin, Yevgeny Prigozhin manoeuvred himself into a position so powerful that, as Russia’s war in Ukraine progressed, he could openly question his paymasters’ strategy.

The owner of the Kremlin-allied Wagner Group, the mercenary force that has fought some of the Russian military’s toughest battles in Ukraine – most notably the drawn-out pursuit of Bakhmut – the 62-year-old stepped into his most dangerous role yet this summer: preaching open rebellion against his country’s military leadership.

Now, two months after his men’s attempted uprising ended in uneasy peace talks, Prigozhin is presumed dead in a suspicious plane crash just outside of Moscow.

Click here for the full story.

Prigozhin ‘death’ won’t stop Russia’s African mission

13:20 , Sam Rkaina

Niger’s residents say Prigozhin’s presumed death won’t stop Russia from trying to expand its influence.

“Our belief is that Russia wants to get a base here and to be popular. It’s obvious they want to be here,” Niamey tailor Baraou Souleimanin told The Associated Press. Since the coup, he said he’s sewn more than 150 Russian flags in a month.

“We pray that Allah strengthens the relationship with (Wagner) to continue the deal. If the relationship is good and strong, it’s possible they’ll continue with the deal even after his death,” he said Thursday.

In neighboring Mali, a military junta that seized power in 2020 expelled French troops, diplomats, and media, and ordered an end to a decade-long U.N. peacekeeping mission.

Though not officially recognized by Malian authorities, Wagner forces have been known to operate in the rural north, where rebel and extremist groups have eroded state power and tormented communities.

Human Rights Watch says Mali’s army, together with suspected Wagner mercenaries, committed summary executions, looting, forced disappearances and other abuses.

“What we have experienced through Wagner is the massacre of our people,” said Ali Nouhoum Diallo, former president of the national assembly.

Putin ‘will try and bring Africa closer'

13:00 , Sam Rkaina

But some in the Central African Republic denounce the mercenaries, and the U.N. peacekeeping mission there criticized them in 2021 for human rights abuses.

“A state’s security is its sovereignty. You can’t entrust the security of a state to a group of mercenaries,” said Jean Serge Bokassa, former public security minister.

Nathalia Dukhan, senior investigator at The Sentry, predicted the Kremlin will try to bring Africa closer into its orbit.

“Wagner has been a successful tool for Russia to expand its influence efficiently and brutally,” she said. “In the midst of all the turmoil between Putin and Prigozhin, the Wagner operation in Central Africa only deepened, with increased direct involvement by the Russian government.”

High-ranking Wagner operatives have built relationships in Mali and the Central African Republic and understand the terrain, said Lou Osborn of All Eyes on Wagner, a project focusing on the group.

“They have a good reputation, which they can sell to another Russian contender. It wouldn’t be surprising if a new organization took them over,” Osborn said, noting that Russian military contractors in Ukraine, such as Redut and Convoy, have recently expressed a desire to do business in Africa.

Redut was created by the Russian Defense Ministry, which has sought to put Wagner under its control. Following the June mutiny, Putin said the mercenaries could sign contracts with the ministry and keep serving under one of the group’s top commanders, Andrei Troshev. It wasn’t clear how many troops accepted, but media reports put the number at a few thousand.

Africa ‘vitally important to Russia — economically and politically'

12:40 , Sam Rkaina

This summer, Wagner helped secure a national referendum in the Central African Republic that cemented presidential power; it is a key partner for Mali’s army in battling armed rebels; and it contacted the military junta in Niger that wants its services following a coup.

Expanding ties and undercutting Western influence in Africa is a top priority as the Kremlin seeks new allies amid its war in Ukraine, where Wagner forces also helped win a key battle. Africa’s 54 nations are the largest voting bloc at the U.N., and Moscow has actively worked to rally their support for its invasion.

Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., said Friday that Wagner’s forces “are destabilizing, and we’ve encouraged countries in Africa to condemn their presence as well as their actions.”

On Thursday, the Republican Front in the Central African Republic, allied with the ruling party, reiterated its support for Russia and Wagner, saying they were “determined to fight alongside the African people as they struggle for self-determination.”

Wagner forces have served as personal bodyguards for President Faustin Archange Touadera, protecting the capital of Bangui from rebel threats and helping secure a July 30 constitutional referendum that could extend his power indefinitely.

Central African activist and blogger Christian Aime Ndotah said the country’s cooperation with Russia would be unaffected by new leadership with Wagner, which has been “well-established” there for years.

Russia's Wagner mercenaries face uncertainty after the presumed death of its leader

12:20 , Sam Rkaina

The Wagner Group’s presence extends from the ancient battlegrounds of Syria to the deserts of sub-Saharan Africa, projecting the Kremlin’s global influence with mercenaries accused of using brutal force and profiting on mineral riches they seized.

But that was under Yevgeny Prigozhin, who in what could have been his final video released earlier this week appeared in military fatigues and held an assault rifle from an unidentified dry and dusty plain as he boasted that Wagner is “making Russia even greater on all continents and Africa even more free.”

On Wednesday, a private jet carrying Prigozhin and his top lieutenants of the mercenary group crashed northwest of Moscow, two months after he led an armed rebellion that challenged the authority of President Vladimir Putin. There is wide speculation that Prigozhin, who is presumed dead, was targeted for his uprising, although the Kremlin has denied involvement.

That crash has raised questions about the future of the Wagner Group.

In African countries where Wagner provided security against groups like al-Qaida and the Islamic State, officials and commentators predict Russia will likely maintain its presence, placing the forces under new leadership.

Others, however, say Prigozhin built deep, personal connections that Moscow could find challenging to replace quickly.

Two people killed by Russian shelling in east Ukraine

11:59 , Sam Rkaina

Two people were killed and another wounded on Saturday when Russian shelling hit a cafe in the village of Podoly in the eastern Ukrainian region of Kharkiv, local governor Oleh Synehubov said.

“The enemy hit a civilian object - a cafe where local residents were during the day,” Synehubov wrote on Telegram.

Podoly was occupied shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, but the village was retaken by Kyiv in a counteroffensive last September.

Russian forces have been attempting to push forward on the Kharkiv region frontline in recent weeks. The Ukrainian army has acknowledged fighting there has become more difficult but says it is holding the line

Moscow reports another drone attack

11:41 , Sam Rkaina

Russia has reported a new drone attack on Moscow overnight, which again forced the temporary closure of three major airports serving the capital, and another in a southern region bordering Ukraine.

Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said that a drone was brought down by air defence systems over the Istra district of the Moscow region. The district is some 31 miles west of the Kremlin.

Moscow’s Sheremetyevo, Domodedovo and Vnukovo airports suspended flights for couple of hours, TASS news agency said.

In the Belgorod region bordering Ukraine, governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said air defences shot down a drone near the village of Kupino, with no reported damage or casualties.

But he said four people were wounded by Ukrainian shelling of another village, Urazovo. He posted photos showing damage to buildings, one with its roof smashed in.

Russia says 10 bodies and flight recorders recovered from scene of Prigozhin jet crash

10:15 , Sam Rkaina

Russia has recovered 10 bodies and flight recorders from the ill-fated plane carrying Wagner chief and his allies which crashed on Wednesday, officials said.

An investigative committee is carrying out molecular genetic testing to identify the bodies from the crash site, officials said on Friday.

The jet crashed soon after taking off from Moscow for St Petersburg. It was believed to be carrying the powerful mercenary group’s chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, six other Wagner members, and a crew of three, Russia’s civil aviation authority said.

Rescue workers found 10 bodies at the spot of the jet’s remains, the Russian media reported citing anonymous sources from Wagner group which confirmed that their top leader was dead.

The officials have not confirmed the identities of the 10 bodies recovered from the wreckage.

Click here for the full story.

‘Gangster’ Putin committed ‘most ostentatious’ act of savagery in our lifetimes, says Boris

09:45 , Sam Rkaina

Boris Johnson has stated that Vladimir Putin’s “mask is now fully off”, as world leaders and commentators continue to question his role in the death of Russian mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigozhin.

The former Prime Minister has described the downing of the Wagner chief’s plane as “violent liquidation” and claimed that Putin was “being transformed before our eyes into an Asiatic despot”.

“I cannot think of another example of such ostentatious and uninhibited savagery by a world leader - not in our lifetimes,” he said.

Click here for the full story.

On the ground in the battle for Robotyne

09:10 , Sam Rkaina

Defending Ukraine’s strategy this week, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy dismissed suggestions that his country’s troops were spread too thinly and repeated his belief that Kyiv would regain all Ukrainian territory that has been seized by Moscow.

“We have passed the main roads that were mined. We are coming to those lines where we can go (forward). I’m sure we’ll go faster from here,” Kombat said.

He said two houses were still under Russian control in Robotyne: “We’re fighting for them, and then we’ll have full control (of Robotyne).”

Kombat said Ukrainian troops had now entered territories where there were only “Russian logistics” groups, and where he made clear he did not expect Russian defences to be as difficult to break through.

“We are moving on to liberate all our territories,” he said.

Ukrainian ‘has broken through most difficult line of Russian defences in the south'

08:38 , Sam Rkaina

Ukrainian forces believe they have broken through the most difficult line of Russian defences in the south and will now be able to advance more quickly, a commander fighting in the south has said.

Kyiv forces launched a counteroffensive in June, but well-prepared Russian defence lines reinforced by minefields have slowed their southward advance towards the Sea of Azov.

Ukrainian forces said on Wednesday they had raised the national flag in the settlement of Robotyne in the southern Zaporizhzhia region, about six miles south of the frontline town of Orikhiv.

“We don’t stop here,” said a commander who led some of the troops into Robotyne and uses the nom de guerre “Kombat”.

“Next we have (the town of) Berdiansk, and then more. I made it clear to my fighters at once: our goal is not Robotyne, our goal is (the Sea of) Azov.”

Robotyne is about 100 km from Berdiansk, a port on the shores of the Sea of Azov, and 85 km from the strategic city of Melitopol. Both are occupied by Russian forces following Moscow’s full-scale invasion in February last year.

Moscow has not confirmed that Ukraine has advanced into Robotyne.

Putin’s troops likely to scale up attacks in eastern Ukraine soon, says UK MoD

07:18 , Arpan Rai

The British Ministry of Defence has said there is a realistic possibility Russia will increase the intensity of its offensive efforts on the Kupiansk-Lyman axis in the next two months in the eastern part of Ukraine.

This will probably with be the objective of advancing west to the Oskil River and creating a buffer zone around Luhansk Oblast, the ministry said in its latest intelligence update today.

“As Ukraine continues to gradually gain ground in the south, Russia’s doctrine suggests that it will attempt to regain the initiative by pivoting back to an operational level offensive. Kupiansk-Lyman is one potential area for this,” the MoD said.

It added: “The Ukrainian counter-offensive has put Russian forces under pressure in Bakhmut and southern Ukraine. Despite this, Russia’s Western Group of Forces has continued small-scale attacks in the north-east, in the Kupiansk-Lyman sector, and has made some limited local advances.”

Russia to resume offensive in east Ukraine after regrouping, Kyiv says

06:50 , Arpan Rai

Russia is regrouping its forces in the Moscow-controlled eastern part of Ukraine in order to resume an offensive, Ukrainian Colonel-General Oleksandr Syrskyi, commander of the military’s ground forces, said.

“After a month of fierce fighting and significant losses in the Kupiansk and Lyman directions, the enemy is regrouping its forces and means, simultaneously throwing newly formed brigades and divisions from the territory of the Russian Federation,” Colonel-General Syrskyi said in his Telegram channel.

He said the main goal of these measures was to “increase the level of combat potential and resume active offensive operations”.

The top commander did not provide details of the Russian regrouping but said the forces continued heavy artillery and mortar shelling and air assaults.

“Under such conditions, we must promptly take all measures to strengthen our defences on the threatened lines and advance where possible,” the general said.

Kupiansk, a town with a pre-war population of around 27,000, was seized by Russia in the early days of the February 2022 invasion before Ukrainian troops recaptured it in a lightning offensive last September that embarrassed Moscow.

Belarus president says he warned Wagner chief to watch out for threats to his life

06:04 , Arpan Rai

Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko has said that he warned the Wagner mercenary chief, Yevgeny Prigozhin, to “watch out” for threats to his life before the plane crash in which he is believed to have died.

Mr Lukashenko said Prigozhin had twice dismissed concerns raised by the Belarusian leader about possible threats to his life.

Mr Lukashenko said that during the mutiny he had warned Prigozhin that he would “die” if he continued to march on Moscow, to which he said Prigozhin had answered: “To hell with it – I will die.” Then, Mr Lukashenko said, when Prigozhin and his right-hand man, Dmitry Utkin, who was also listed as a passenger on the Embraer Legacy 600 which crashed, had come to see him, he had warned them both: “Lads – you watch out.”

I warned Wagner chief to watch out, says Belarus president Lukashenko

Kremlin denies role in plane crash that likely killed Prigozhin

05:27 , Arpan Rai

The Kremlin on Friday rejected allegations it was behind a plane crash that is presumed to have killed mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin.

Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters during a conference call: “Right now, of course, there are lots of speculations around this plane crash and the tragic deaths of the passengers of the plane, including Yevgeny Prigozhin.”

“Of course, in the West those speculations are put out under a certain angle, and all of it is a complete lie.”

The 62-year-old former convict and mercenary chief was listed among those aboard the plane.

Prigozhin, whose brutal fighters were feared in Ukraine, Africa and Syria, was eulogised Thursday by Vladimir Putin, even as suspicions grew that the Russian leader was behind the crash that many saw as an assassination.

A preliminary US intelligence assessment concluded the plane was downed by an intentional explosion.

One of the US and Western officials who described the assessment said it determined that Prigozhin was “very likely” targeted and that the explosion falls in line with Mr Putin’s “long history of trying to silence his critics.”

Prigozhin’s likely death could destabilize his private army, says UK

05:05 , Arpan Rai

Britain’s defense ministry has said the presumed death of Russian mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin in a plane crash could destabilise the Wagner Group, whose brutal fighters were feared in Ukraine, Africa and Syria and conducted a brief but shocking mutiny in Russia.

Prigozhin, who was listed among those on board, was eulogized by Russian resident Vladimir Putin, even as suspicions grew that the Russian president was behind a Wednesday crash that many saw as an assassination.

The British ministry wrote that “It is highly likely that he is indeed dead.” However, it noted that “he is known to exercise exceptional security measures.”

“The demise of Prigozhin almost certainly would have a deeply destabilizing effect on the Wagner Group. His personal attributes of hyperactivity, exceptional audacity, a drive for results and extreme brutality permeated Wagner and are unlikely to be matched by any successor,” the ministry wrote in a statement.

UK: Russian mercenary chief's likely death could destabilize his private army

Russia downs drone near Moscow, suspends flights

04:20 , Arpan Rai

Russia reported a new drone attack on Moscow in the early hours today, which forced authorities to temporarily shut down all three major airports serving the capital.

A drone was brought down by air defence systems over the Istra district of the Moscow region, Moscow mayor Sergei Sobyanin said. The district is some 50km (31 miles) west of the Kremlin.

Three major Moscow airports, Sheremetyevo, Domodedovo and Vnukovo, suspended flights for couple of hours yesterday as well, TASS news agency reported.

Aerial attacks on Moscow and other Russian-held territory have intensified in recent weeks, including 42 drones intercepted over the Russia-held Crimean Peninsula on Friday - one of the biggest reported air assaults since the war began.

Russia has blamed Ukraine for the Friday attack and all the previous assaults that intensified after two drones were destroyed over the Kremlin in early May.

Ukraine says it attacked Russian military base in annexed Crimea

03:55 , Arpan Rai

Ukraine’s intelligence officials have said the country has successfully attacked a Russian military base deep inside annexed Crimea, as residents reported casualties, explosions and a road closure.

Ukrainian intelligence officials said the attack struck Russia’s 126th Coastal Defence Brigade based in Perevalnoye, a town more than 200km (120 miles) from Ukraine-controlled territory.

“We confirm that there was a hit,” said GUR spokesman Andriy Yusov, according to Ukrainian media outlet Liga.Net.

Russia reported one of the biggest coordinated Ukrainian air raids yet over Russian-controlled territory yesterday but said air defence systems had downed all 42 drones attacking Crimea before they could hit their targets.

“People – not only on the Ukrainian mainland but also in Crimea – need to remember and believe that our victory and their liberation are not far away,” Ukraine‘s military intelligence chief Kyrylo Budanov said of Friday’s strike.

The illegally annexed territory claimed by Russia in 2014 saw locals in Perevalnoye confirming blasts from the military base and cited casualties.

Perevalnoye residents, posting on the Telegram messaging app, reported hearing blasts from the military base and cited casualties.

“Two people died on a firing range, one was taken to a hospital in a severe condition. This is information from above, from the firing range,” said a user nicknamed Abdul Has, whose profile picture shows a man in camouflaged uniform.

Russian military pilot ‘defects’ to Ukraine - and brings helicopter with him

03:37 , Arpan Rai

A Russian helicopter pilot defected to Ukraine after reportedly being “lured” during a six-month intelligence operation, Ukraine claims.

Ukraine’s GUR military intelligence agency said an Mi-8 helicopter landed at a Ukrainian airfield with the pilot and his unsuspecting crew members, without specifying when.

It comes after a Russian military blogger claimed in recent weeks that a helicopter crossed the border with three people on board after it had lost its way, but Ukraine now claims this was a deliberate move.

Russian military pilot ‘defects’ to Ukraine - and brings helicopter with him

Russian investigators claim 10 bodies recovered from plane crash

03:00 , Matt Drake

Flight recorders and 10 bodies were discovered at the scene of a plane crash that is believed to have killed Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin, Russian investigators said on Friday.

Russia’s Investigative Committee said on social media: "In the course of initial investigative work, the bodies of 10 victims were found at the site of the plane crash.”

The plane crash came exactly two months after Wagner's failed rebellion against Moscow's military leadership.

Some experts believe the crash was a deliberate hit.

Ukraine aid faces a stress test as some GOP 2024 presidential candidates balk at continued support

02:00 , Matt Drake

For President Joe Biden, strong backing for Ukraine’s effort to repel Russia’s invasion has been a rare issue where he’s mustered bipartisan support.

But this week’s first GOP presidential debate — and recent comments on Ukraine by the 2024 GOP polling leader and former president, Donald Trump — show that unusual unity will face a stress test as the 2024 presidential campaign intensifies and the leading Republican contenders show antipathy toward the American backing of Ukraine.

There long has been an isolationist strain in the United States, particularly in the Republican Party, but rarely has it been shared by so many candidates for president.

On the debate stage in Milwaukee, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said he would make additional U.S. aid “contingent” on European allies increasing contributions. Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy called it “disastrous” that the U.S. government was “protecting against an invasion across somebody else’s border” and argued Ukraine funding would be better spent on the “invasion of our own southern border.”

Read the full report by Aamer Madhani below.

Ukraine aid faces a stress test as some GOP 2024 presidential candidates balk at continued support

What is the Wagner mercenary group led by Yevgeny Prigozhin?

01:00 , Matt Drake

Russian soldiers fighting in Ukraine have been supported on the battlefield by tens of thousands of mercenaries from a shadowy group led by a businessman and longtime ally of president Vladimir Putin.

The Wagner Group is a private military company that was under the control of Yevgeny Prigozhin until his reported death in a plane crash on Wednesday 23 August.

The unit cut its teeth in deployments to Crimea – illegally annexed by Russia in 2014 – and eastern Ukraine’s Donbas region in the aftermath of that act and has since dispatched troops to several conflicts in the Middle East and Africa, including the Syrian Civil War.

In Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Wagner has been a key part of Moscow’s fighting force, but a power struggle between the Kremlin and the outspoken Prigozhin threatened – for 24 hours at least – to drag Russia towards a civil war of its own.

Read the full report by Liam James and Joe Sommerlad below.

What is the Wagner mercenary group led by Yevgeny Prigozhin?

Turkish foreign minister says Black Sea deal must be renewed

Friday 25 August 2023 23:00 , Matt Drake

The Turkish and Ukrainian foreign ministers said the Black Sea grain deal which ended after Russia quit last month must be renewed.

The deal brokered by Turkey and the United Nations last year allowed the safe Black Sea export of Ukrainian grain. Ankara has been trying to persuade Moscow to return to the agreement.

In a news conference during his visit to Kyiv, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said renewing the grain deal was a priority for Ankara and that Russia must be included in the equation for a functioning agreement.

“Reviving this initiative is a priority for Turkey... I hope we’ll get a successful result,” he said, adding that alternative solutions would not be effective in replacing the deal.

“I have been thinking from the beginning that Russia should be included back into this equation,” Fidan added.

Russia to resume offensive in east Ukraine after regrouping

Friday 25 August 2023 22:00 , Matt Drake

Russia is regrouping in the Moscow-controlled eastern part of Ukraine in order to resume an offensive, Colonel-General Oleksandr Syrskyi, commander of the Ukrainian military’s ground forces, said on Friday.

“After a month of fierce fighting and significant losses in the Kupiansk and Lyman directions, the enemy is regrouping its forces and means, simultaneously throwing newly formed brigades and divisions from the territory of the Russian Federation,” Syrskyi said in his Telegram channel.

Syrskyi said that the main goal of these measures was to “increase the level of combat potential and resume active offensive operations”.

Syrskyi did not provide details of the Russian regrouping but said the forces continued heavy artillery and mortar shelling and air assaults.

“Under such conditions, we must promptly take all measures to strengthen our defences on the threatened lines and advance where possible,” the general said.

Berlin probing ‘attempted murder’ of exiled Russian journalist who fell ill on train in Germany

Friday 25 August 2023 21:00 , Matt Drake

Germany has launched an investigation into the suspected attempted murder of a Berlin-based Russian journalist after she suffered symptoms consistent with poisoning.

Elena Kostyuchenko exposed allegations of Russian war crimes in Ukraine while working for the Nobel Prize-winning Novaya Gazeta newspaper, until it was forced to close as part of Moscow’s harsh information crackdown.

The 35-year-old – who left Ukraine last March after being told Chechen units at Russian checkpoints had been ordered to kill her – recently revealed that she had experienced extreme disorientation, abdominal pain and swollen extremities while on a train journey from Munich to Berlin last October.

“When I got out at the train station, I realized I couldn’t figure out how to get home,” Ms Kostyuchenko wrote two weeks ago in the literary journal n+1. “I knew that I needed to transfer to the subway, but I couldn’t figure out how.”

Read the full report by Andy Gregory below.

Germany investigating suspected poisoning of Russian journalist in Berlin

Second Russian plane reportedly linked to Prigozhin had no connection to Wagner group

Friday 25 August 2023 20:30 , Matt Drake

A second plane linked to Wagner mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin by some Russian media has no connection to the mercenary group and never has had, the CEO of the aircraft operator company said.

Russia’s aviation authority has said Prigozhin was on board a private Embraer jet which crashed on Wednesday evening northwest of Moscow with no survivors.

An investigation has yet to definitively identify the 10 people on board but Russian President Vladimir Putin has sent condolences to their families.

Russian media, mainly associated with the Wagner group’s Telegram channel Grey Zone, had linked a second business jet with the tail number RA-02748 with the mercenary group, and had reported that it was also in the air at the time of the crash.

But the jet operator, Russian company Jetica LLC, denied any such link.

“Neither the plane itself nor its passengers are related to Wagner and never have been,” Jetica’s CEO Sergey Trifonov said.

Wagner group is a spent force, Ukraine defence minister claims

Friday 25 August 2023 20:00 , Matt Drake

Ukrainian defence minister Oleksii Reznikov told German newspaper Welt am Sonntag that mercenary group Wagner is no longer a "serious fighting force".

He said: "There is actually no longer a Wagner group left as they were a year ago, as a serious fighting force.

"They are broken.”

It comes after Wagner group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin was allegedly killed in a plane crash in the Tver region

I warned Wagner chief to watch out for threats to his life, says Belarus President Lukashenko

Friday 25 August 2023 19:30 , Matt Drake

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has said that he he warned the Wagner mercenary chief, Yevgeny Prigozhin, to “watch out” for threats to his life before the plane crash said to have killed him.

Mr Lukashenko helped broker a deal between Mr Prigozhin and the Kremlin that ended an attempted mutiny by Wagner forces against Moscow in June – an uprising that marked the most significant challenge to Mr Putin’s authority in more than two decades in power. Two months to the day after that revolt was halted, with fighters 125 miles from the Russian capital, a plane believed to be carrying Mr Prigozhin and a number of other members of Wagner’s senior leadership crashed on Wednesday evening.

Mr Putin had called the Wagner mutiny treason, and had initially vowed to crush it, and a number of world leaders have suggested that he would not let the embarrassment of that incident stand.

Mr Lukashenko said on Friday that Mr Prigozhin had twice dismissed concerns raised by the Belarusian leader about possible threats to his life. Mr Lukashenko said that during the mutiny he had warned Mr Prigozhin that he would “die” if he continued to march on Moscow, to which he said Mr Prigozhin had answered: “‘To hell with it - I will die’.” Then, Mr Lukashenko said, when Mr Prigozhin and his right-hand man, Dmitry Utkin, who was also listed as a passenger on the plane which crashed, had come to see him, he had warned them both: “Lads – you watch out”.

Read the full report by Chris Stevenson below.

I warned Wagner chief to watch out, says Belarus President Lukashenko

Who is Yevgeny Prigozhin? Wagner Group chief presumed dead in plane crash

Friday 25 August 2023 19:00 , Matt Drake

Once a businessman with a catering empire friendly with Vladimir Putin, Yevgeny Prigozhin manoeuvred himself into a position so powerful that, as Russia’s war in Ukraine progressed, he could openly question his paymasters’ strategy.

The owner of the Kremlin-allied Wagner Group, the mercenary force that has fought some of the Russian military’s toughest battles in Ukraine – most notably the drawn-out pursuit of Bakhmut – the 62-year-old stepped into his most dangerous role yet this summer: preaching open rebellion against his country’s military leadership.

Now, two months after his men’s attempted uprising ended in uneasy peace talks, Prigozhin is presumed dead in a suspicious plane crash just outside of Moscow.

On 23 August, it was reported that a private plane he had boarded was brought thudering to earth in the Tver region after taking off from the capital en route to St Petersburg, killing 10 people on board.

Read the full report by Ellen Knickmeyer, Joe Sommerlad and Jane Dalton below.

Who is Yevgeny Prigozhin? Wagner chief presumed dead in plane crash

US sees viable routes to export Ukrainian grain

Friday 25 August 2023 18:30 , Matt Drake

The United States sees viable routes to export Ukrainian grain through the country’s territorial waters and overland after Russia withdrew from the grain deal, a senior U.S. official said.

James O’Brien, head of the State Department’s Office of Sanctions Coordination, said the US aims to return to exporting at prewar averages from Ukraine over the next months.

He added: “I think we see there are viable routes through Ukraine‘s territorial waters and overland, and we are aiming ... over the next couple of months to return to exporting at kind of prewar averages from Ukraine.”

Ukraine is a global major grain grower and exporter and normally ships millions of metric tons of food from its deep-water Black Sea ports of Odesa and Mykolaiv, but has had to rely on its Danube River ports after Russia pulled out of the deal last month.

A senior agricultural official said on Monday that Ukraine is considering using its newly tested wartime Black Sea export corridor for grain shipments after other cargo ships follow the first successful evacuation of a vessel on the route last week.

Russia has blockaded Ukrainian ports since it invaded its neighbour in February 2022, and has threatened to treat all vessels as potential military targets after pulling out of a UN-backed safe passage deal.

Flight records found at site of private jet crash

Friday 25 August 2023 18:08 , Matt Drake

The flight recorders from the jet crash in Tver where Yevgeny Prigozhin was allegedly killed, Russia's Investigative Committee has said.

According to Russian authorities, the private jet crashed on Wednesday, killing all 10 people on board.

Although, experts have doubted the Kremlin's official line and many suspect it was a state-sanctioned hit after the Wagner chief challenged Putin's authority.

German security official hopes someone is indicted for the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines

Friday 25 August 2023 18:00 , Matt Drake

Germany’s top security official says she hopes prosecutors will find sufficient evidence to indict whoever carried out an attack on the Nord Stream gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea last year.Pipelines were damaged after explosions on September 26, 2022. The pipelines were built to carry Russian natural gas to Germany.

The sabotage added to tensions over the war in Ukraine as European countries moved to wean themselves off Russian energy sources, but the culprit remains a mystery.Germany, Sweden and Denmark have investigated the attack though been tight-lipped about their findings.In an interview with Der Spiegel magazine published Friday, German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said: “I hope that the (German) federal prosecutor will find enough clues to indict the perpetrators.“We must bring such crimes to court,” she said. “It also strengthens citizens’ confidence in the state of law when it succeeds in clearing up such complex cases.”

Pictured, debris recovered at plane crash site

Friday 25 August 2023 17:30 , Matt Drake

Pictures have emerged of workers removing the debris of a private jet that crashed near the village of Kuzhenkino, Tver region that supposedly had Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin onboard.

US intelligence assessment has found that the plane crash was intentionally caused by an explosion.

The Kremlin said that Western suggestions that Prigozhin had been killed on its orders were an "absolute lie" while declining to definitively confirm his death, citing the need to wait for test results.

I urged mercenary Prigozhin to ‘watch out’ says Belarus leader

Friday 25 August 2023 17:00 , Matt Drake

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said on Friday that he had warned Russian mercenary chiefs Yevgeny Prigozhin and Dmitry Utkin to watch out for possible threats to their lives, and he insisted that Wagner fighters would remain in Belarus.

Yevgeny Prigozhin had twice dismissed concerns raised by the Belarusian leader about possible threats to his life, Lukashenko said.

Lukashenko said that during the mutiny he had warned Prigozhin that he would “die” if he continued to march on Moscow, to which he said Prigozhin had answered:

“‘To hell with it - I will die’.”

The Belarus president dismissed claims that Putin was responsible for the plane crash that reportedly killed Prigozhin.

Lukashenko, both an old acquaintance of Prigozhin and a close ally of Russia, said: “I know Putin: he is calculating, very calm, even tardy.

“I cannot imagine that Putin did it, that Putin is to blame. It’s just too rough and unprofessional a job.”

Air raid alerts issued across Ukraine

Friday 25 August 2023 16:50 , Matt Drake

The whole of Ukraine has been issued an air raid alert, it has been reported.

According to Sky News, the sirens were first sounded over an hour ago before the all-clear was given.

Now the whole country has been issued an alert.

Pictured, memorial for Dmitry Utkin in Moscow

Friday 25 August 2023 16:30 , Matt Drake

A makeshift memorial has appeared in Moscow for Dmitry Utkin, who was a fellow passenger believed to be onboard a plane that crashed in Tver along with Yevgeny Prigozhin.

Utkin was a shadowy figure who managed the Wagner Group's operations. He also allegedly served in Russian military intelligence and was renowned for his brutality and has been implicated in several war crimes.

Wagner was named after his codename, which he named in honour of Adolf Hitler's favourite composer. He had prominent Nazi emblems tattooed on his neck and other parts of his body including the swastika and the SS symbol.

Utkin served in two wars in Chechnya in 1994-2000 and is believed to have been in the mercenary Wagner group since its early days in 2014.

In recent years, Utkin was said to have been Prigozhin's right-hand man.

Dutch brewer Heineken sells its Russian operations for 1 euro, taking a 300-million-euro hit

Friday 25 August 2023 16:00 , Matt Drake

Dutch brewer Heineken has completed its withdrawal from Russia, 18 months after Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

The business in Russia sold for just 1 euro, the company announced Friday. Heineken said it would incur a total loss of 300 million euros ($325 million) for the sale to Russian manufacturing giant the Arnest Group.

Heineken had faced criticism for the slow pace of its exit in the wake of the outbreak of war, but insisted it was seeking to look after its local employees in Russia.

In March last year, Heineken had said it was quitting Russia as its business there was “no longer sustainable nor viable in the current environment,” but added that it wanted to ensure an “orderly transfer” to a new owner.

“While it took much longer than we had hoped, this transaction secures the livelihoods of our employees and allows us to exit the country in a responsible manner,” Heineken CEO Dolf van den Brink said in a statement.

I urged mercenary Prigozhin to ‘watch out’ says Belarus leader

Friday 25 August 2023 15:46 , Matt Drake

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said on Friday that he had warned Russian mercenary chiefs Yevgeny Prigozhin and Dmitry Utkin to watch out for possible threats to their lives, and he insisted that Wagner fighters would remain in Belarus.

Yevgeny Prigozhin had twice dismissed concerns raised by the Belarusian leader about possible threats to his life, Lukashenko said.

Lukashenko said that during the mutiny he had warned Prigozhin that he would “die” if he continued to march on Moscow, to which he said Prigozhin had answered:

“‘To hell with it - I will die’.”

The Belarus president dismissed claims that Putin was responsible for the plane crash that reportedly killed Prigozhin.

Lukashenko, both an old acquaintance of Prigozhin and a close ally of Russia, said: “I know Putin: he is calculating, very calm, even tardy.

“I cannot imagine that Putin did it, that Putin is to blame. It’s just too rough and unprofessional a job.”

Estonia PM Kallas under pressure to quit over husband's Russia ties

Friday 25 August 2023 15:30 , Matt Drake

Estonia’s Prime Minister Kaja Kallas faced pressure to resign on Friday after reports that her husband has part ownership of a company that has kept operations in Russia since Moscow invaded Ukraine.

Two major Estonian newspapers called on her to resign and two opinion polls found a majority of respondents thought she should step down. Kallas has said she does not believe her husband’s companies have done anything wrong, while her husband said he was selling his stake in the company in question.

Kallas, who has urged European businesses to cut ties with Moscow, has been a leading critic of Russia in the European Union and Nato, and was considered by some to be a potential future secretary general of the military bloc.

Estonian public broadcaster ERR reported this week that Stark Logistics, an Estonian company in which Kallas’ husband Arvo Hallik indirectly owns a 25% share, has been supplying an aerosol container factory in Russia, owned by another Estonian company.

It has earned 1.5 million euros from serving the factory since the beginning of the war, Estonian daily Eesti Paevaleht reported.

Ukraine's Zelenskiy and Turkish minister discuss Black Sea grain corridor

Friday 25 August 2023 15:00 , Matt Drake

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy met Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan in Kyiv on Friday to discuss the Black Sea grain export deal that Russia quit last month.

Zelenskiy wrote on the Telegram messaging app: “Many important issues were discussed. (Ukraine’s) Peace Formula. Preparations for the Global Peace Summit (planned by Ukraine). Risks posed by the Russian blockade of the Black Sea grain corridor.”

The deal brokered by Turkey and the United Nations had allowed the safe Black Sea export of Ukrainian grain. Ankara has been trying to persuade Moscow to return to the agreement.

Wagner channels say Russian citizen arrested in Finland is top fighter

Friday 25 August 2023 14:30 , Matt Drake

Social media channels linked to Russia’s Wagner Group mercenaries said on Friday a top fighter in one of the group’s subunits had been detained in Finland at Ukraine’s request.

Rusich, a Wagner subunit, identified him as Yan Petrovsky, a founding member and leader of the unit who has been under European Union and United States sanctions since last year.

It said on the messaging app Telegram that Petrovsky, who has fought in Ukraine since 2014, was arrested a month ago and could now be extradited to Ukraine.

Wagner, which has fought for Russia in Ukraine and runs mercenary operations in several African nations, has had sanctions imposed on it by a number of Western countries for alleged atrocities.

Its leader Yevgeny Prigozhin and several other top figures are presumed to have died in a plane crash this week, although the Kremlin has not definitively confirmed it.

Ukraine uncovers corruption scheme involving food and humanitarian aid

Friday 25 August 2023 14:00 , Matt Drake

Two high-ranking Ukrainian officials have been named as suspects in an embezzlement scheme involving the procurement of humanitarian aid, according to reports.

Ukrainian anti-corruption authorities have found evidence that Ukraine's first deputy minister of agrarian policy and food and the former deputy minister of economy reportedly misappropriated £1.3million.

According to Politico, the scheme involved the purchase of food which was intended as humanitarian aid for regional military administrations as well as for the people of Donetsk, Kherson, Sumy, Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv, Khmelnytsky, Dnipropetrovsk and Poltava.

The investigation is ongoing. It comes as part of a wave of corruption that has swept Ukraine since the war with Russia started.

Death of pilot 'confirmed' by Russian investigators

Friday 25 August 2023 13:29 , Matt Drake

Russian investigators, the pilot of the plane that crashed in Tver, reportedly killing Yevgeny Prigozhin, has been confirmed dead, according to a source with knowledge of the matter.

They have yet to confirm a genetic match, the source added.

An Embraer executive jet on which Prigozhin was listed as a passenger crashed in Tver region north of Moscow on August 23, according to Russia’s Federal Air Transport Agency.

Six other passengers were listed along with a crew of three, including pilot Alexei Levshin.

A source close to the situation, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the matter, said investigators had told Levshin’s family that they had “documentary proof” he had been on the crashed plane.

Levshin’s family are due to undergo a DNA test later on Friday to establish that they are his relatives, the source said.

Many experts have speculated about whether the crash was actually a state-sanctioned hit because of Mr Prigozhin’s challenge to Vladimir Putin’s authority during his failed June coup.

Germany investigating possible poisoning of exiled Russian journalist

Friday 25 August 2023 13:25 , Andy Gregory

German prosecutors are investigating the attempted murder of Berlin-based Russian journalist Elena Kostyuchenko – one of three exiled Russian journalists who have experienced symptoms consistent with poisoning.

Kostyuchenko, a foreign correspondent with Meduza and formerly Novaya Gazeta – who exposed alleged Russian war crimes in Ukraine – experienced extreme disorientation, abdominal pain and swollen extremities on a train journey from Munich to Berlin last October.

“When I got out at the train station, I realized I couldn’t figure out how to get home,” she wrote two weeks ago in the literary journal n+1. “I knew that I needed to transfer to the subway, but I couldn’t figure out how.”

A fortnight ago, The Insider reported that doctors they had consulted had said her symptoms were consistent with poisoning, with two other Russian journalists – Natalia Arno, president of the Free Russia Foundation, and radio journalist Irina Babloyan – experiencing poisoning symptoms in Prague and Tblisi respectively.

“We can confirm that an investigation into the attempted murder of Elena Kostyuchenko is pending,” a spokesperson for Berlin prosecutors said on Friday.

Russia claims more than 70 Ukrainian drones shot down in past day

Friday 25 August 2023 13:22 , Matt Drake

Russia's defence ministry claims to have destroyed 73 Ukrainian drones over the past 24 hours.

It comes after reports that Ukraine launched dozens of drones at the southern Crimea peninsula in the early hours of this morning.

Opinion | If the Wagner mercenary chief is dead, he got the death he deserved

Friday 25 August 2023 13:11 , Andy Gregory

In this Independent Voices piece, our international editor Chris Stevenson suggests that “it is not surprising that Russian authorities have declared Yevgeny Prigozhin dead”. He writes:

“Given the attempted mutiny he led with the Wagner mercenary group against Moscow, the assumption was that he may not be long for this world. When it comes to the iron-grip President Vladimir Putin has on his nation – if you come for the king, as the adage goes, you best not miss.

“But as the speculation swirls about the end of Prigozhin and the embarrassment that Putin could not let stand, it can be easy to brush past the terrible things Progozhin's mercenaries are believed to have done. Let's get this straight, Prigozhin deserved the end that all signs point to him having met.”

You can read his analysis in full here:

Opinion: If the Wagner mercenary chief is dead, he got the death he deserved

Prigozhin’s suspected death shows Putin’s ‘back is against the wall’, says Tory MP

Friday 25 August 2023 12:56 , Andy Gregory

Vladimir Putin’s “back is against the wall” and his days are “very much numbered”, a senior UK politician has suggested, following the suspected death of Yevgeny Prigozhin.

Tobias Ellwood, who chairs the Commons defence select committee, told Sky News that the lengths tow which Mr Putin appears to have gone to eliminate dissenting voices shows that “trust in the Kremlin inner circle has disappeared”.

Mr Putin is now “leading through fear rather than loyalty”, having been “deeply humiliated on a number of fronts”, Mr Ellwood said, adding: “Prigozhin may be dead, but the damage is done because he lifted the lid on how badly Putin’s invasion of Ukraine was actually going.”

“When a Russian leader loses popularity among elites, then Russian history demonstrates that weakness is quickly and ruthlessly exploited,” said the Conservative MP. “And I suspect that he’ll be replaced, perhaps not in the short term, but certainly the ball is now in motion.

“I suspect Putin’s days are very much numbered.”

Watch: Prigozhin says Wagner Group make ‘Russia greater’ in last video before plane crash

Friday 25 August 2023 12:40 , Andy Gregory

Russian spending on online censorship soars in wake of Ukraine invasion

Friday 25 August 2023 12:24 , Andy Gregory

Russia’s online censorship agencies have increased their spending by more than 60 per cent since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last February, analysis by a monitoring firm showed – soaring by as much as 865 per cent in regions bordering Ukraine.

The research, published this week by Top10VPN, analysed almost 4,000 documents, including those found on state procurement website zakupki.gov.ru, and details more than £45m in spending by state communications regulator Roskomnadzor and its subsidiaries since the war began.

Roskomnadzor’s spending increased in Russia’s southern federal district and north Caucasus federal district, both of which border Ukraine, by 865 per cent and 338 per cent respectively, the research found.

Demand for virtual private networks (VPNs) in Russia also skyrocketed after Moscow restricted access to Meta Platforms’ Facebook and Instagram platforms, the research suggests.

Roskomnadzor has since blocked access to thousands of online resources, particularly Russian-language independent news.

Moscow ‘considering’ US request for consular visit to jailed Wall Street Journal reporter

Friday 25 August 2023 12:10 , Andy Gregory

Moscow is considering a US request to make a consular visit to jailed Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich but has not yet made a decision, Russia’s deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov has said.

The 31-year-old US citizen was detained in March on charges of espionage, which both he and the Wall Street Journal deny, and for which Russia has provided no evidence. Washington has declared him to be wrongfully detained.

Gershkovich, who attended a hearing to extend his detention yesterday, is the first American reporter to to face espionage charges in Russia since September 1986.

My colleague Bevan Hurley has more about his case here:

Evan Gershkovich fell in love with Russia. He faces 20 years in prison for espionage

Wagner has no formal legal existence, says Kremlin

Friday 25 August 2023 11:56 , Andy Gregory

The Wagner Group has no formal legal existence, the Kremlin has said.

In a call with reporters, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Wagner exists as a group that has made a “big contribution” to Russia’s military campaign in Ukraine, and he praised its fighters’ “heroism”.

He claimed that suggestions the Kremlin ordered Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin’s death was a “complete lie”.

The Wagner mercenaries in June briefly attempted to march on Moscow in a mutiny aimed at ousting Prigozhin’s rivals in the defence establishment, which president Vladimir Putin publicly condemned as a treacherous “stab in the back”.

Putin will soon meet with Erdogan, Kremlin says

Friday 25 August 2023 11:44 , Andy Gregory

There is “an understanding” that the presidents of Turkey and Russia will meet soon, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov has said.

Turkey’s Tayyip Erdogan has invited counterpart Vladimir Putin to visit Turkey this month but no date has yet been confirmed. Mr Peskov, who was speaking to reporters, also did not say where the leaders were expected to meet.

Turkey is trying to persuade Russia to return to the deal Ankara and the United Nations helped to broker last summer allowing grain shipments from Ukrainian ports on the Black Sea – which Mosow exited last month.

While Mr Putin is subject to an International Criminal Court warrant over suspected war crimes, Turkey does not recognise the court’s authority and therefore would not be required to detain the Russian president.

Russia ‘shoots down drone over Kaluga region'

Friday 25 August 2023 11:27 , Andy Gregory

Russian air defences shot down a drone over the Kaluga region on Friday, the region’s governor has claimed.

Earlier, the Russian defence ministry said a modified S-200 missile had also been shot down over the Kaluga region, which borders the Moscow region. The city of Kaluga is less than 200 km 124 miles from Moscow.

Kremlin calls accusations it killed Wagner boss Yevgeny Prigozhin an 'absolute lie'

Friday 25 August 2023 11:21 , Andy Gregory

The Kremlin has insisted that Western suggestions Wagner mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigozhin had been killed on its orders were an “absolute lie”.

In a call with reporters, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said an investigation into the plane crash on Wednesday evening was ongoing.

Vladimir Putin had not met Prigozhin recently, Mr Peskov added.