Russia Ukraine war live: Boy dead and several injured after Moscow uses new ‘guided bombs’ in Kharkiv attack

In the weeks leading up to the tragedy at a Moscow music venue on Friday night, warnings had been relayed to Russia that a terror attack perpetrated by extremists was imminent.

At least 137 people have been killed, while over a hundred more have been wounded with the jihadist group ISIS-K claiming responsibility in a series of videos and messages.

In the month after his return to parliament, described as a “dark day” for Britain’s Jewish community, Mr Galloway espoused conspiracy theories about the Princess of Wales being dead and likened Israel to Nazi Germany.

Ukraine needs any edge it can get to repel Russia from its territory. One emerging bright spot is its small but fast-growing defense industry, which the government is flooding with money in hopes that a surge of homemade weapons and ammunition can help turn the tide.

The effort ramped up sharply over the past year as the U.S. and Europe strained to deliver weapons and other aid to Ukraine, which is up against a much bigger Russian military backed by a thriving domestic defense industry.

The Ukrainian government budgeted nearly $1.4 billion in 2024 to buy and develop weapons at home — 20 times more than before Russia’s full-scale invasion.

The suspects, identified by Russian authorities as being from Tajikistan, a Central Asian nation bordering Afghanistan, were allegedly picked up in the Bryansk region about 210 miles southwest of Moscow hours after the attack. Without providing any evidence, Russian president Vladimir Putin claimed they were heading for Ukraine.

Both Ukraine and its western allies, including the US, have denied any involvement in the attack.

Russia may have used a new type of guided bomb in airstrikes on the northeastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv that killed at least one person on Wednesday, local officials said.

The officials said four children including a three-month-old baby were among 19 people wounded in Kharkiv in the latest strikes since Russia‘s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, some of which have caused blackouts, including in Kharkiv.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy condemned the attack as “Russian terror” and Volodymyr Tymoshko, head of the Kharkiv regional police, said Moscow may have used a new type of guided bomb which he described as the UMPB D-30.

“This is something between a guided aerial bomb which they (the Russians) have used recently, and a missile. It’s a flying bomb so to say,” Tymoshko said at the site of the strike.

Regional governor Oleh Synehubov also suggested Moscow may have used a new type of bomb, saying: “It seems that the Russians decided to test their modified bombs on the residents of the houses.”

The death toll from the Moscow concert hall attack has increased to 143, Russian officials said.

Around 80 other people wounded in the siege by gunmen remain in hospital.

The Friday night massacre in Crocus City Hall, a sprawling shopping and entertainment venue on the north-western outskirts of Moscow, was the deadliest terror attack on the Russian soil in nearly 20 years. At least four men armed with automatic rifles shot at thousands of concertgoers and set the venue on fire.

An affiliate of the so-called Islamic State group (IS) claimed responsibility for the violence, while US intelligence said it had information confirming the group was responsible. French President Emmanuel Macron said France also has intelligence pointing to “an IS entity” as responsible for the attack.

The updated fatalities from Russia‘s Emergencies Ministry did not state the number of wounded, but health minister Mikhail Murashko said earlier on Wednesday that 80 people were in hospitals and another 205 had sought medical treatment from the attack.

Russia‘s Federal Security Service (FSB) said it had arrested 11 people the day after the attack, including four suspected gunmen.

The 32-year-old US citizen was arrested in late March 2023 while on a reporting trip and has spent nearly a year behind bars. His arrest was extended until June 30.

Gershkovich and his employer have denied the allegations, and the US government has declared him to be wrongfully detained.

In a sign of the Kremlin’s increasing desperation to drag its invasion of Ukraine into the Moscow concert hall attack, the director of Russia’s powerful Federal Security Service (the FSB) has claimed that Kyiv, the US and the UK were behind the incident.

The bizarre claim comes despite a branch of the Isis terror group having claimed responsibility for the attack and published graphic video footage of the shooting, and the US, France and a number of other nations saying they believed the jihadists were behind it.

Russia says 139 people were killed when four armed men burst into the Crocus City Hall concert complex on Friday evening. Another 22 remain in a serious condition, including two children, officials say.