Key events
Russia’s security service, the FSB, has claimed to have thwarted an attempt by Ukrainian intelligence services to induce a crew member on the aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov in Murmansk to sabotage the ship.
It says the crew member was contacted by Ukrainian intelligence, and promised money and transit to Finland once an attack was successfully carried out. Tass reports that the FSB has opened up a criminal case on the matter.
Nimo Omer
In today’s First Edition, Nimo Omer has spoken to Chris York, news editor of the Kyiv Independent, about the initial aftermath of the strike on Okhmatdyt children’s hospital:
Chris York was walking to work when he heard air raid sirens. It did not particularly trouble him as sirens are a fairly regular occurrence in the capital. Over the past few weeks in particular they have been more frequent, going off daily.
“There were still people walking around, going about their day. It’s been two and a half years now of the war so people are slightly less apprehensive than they once were,” York says. The noise that accompanies their daily lives is often of air defences keeping Russian missiles out. “So even when there are explosions, while they are still frightening and loud and people jump, it sounds weird to say, people don’t get completely terrified or worried because they’re the sounds of the air defences working.”
It was only when York noticed a column of smoke that he realised a building was hit. Once the first reports started coming in about what had been struck, he says “there was just this silence – a state of almost pure shock – that it was a children’s hospital that had been hit. Of all the things that you can target in a city, I can’t think of a single thing worse.”
Read more here: Wednesday briefing – How Kyiv is handling the aftermath of a strike on a children’s hospital
Russian foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova, speaking on Sputnik radio, has said again that accusations Russia targets civilians are a “provocation” by Kyiv.
Tass quotes her saying “This is yet another provocation that the Kyiv regime has resorted to, allegedly finding a reason to accuse Russia of striking civilian targets. This is not true.”
She claimed, despite the large number of civilian casualties, that Russian strikes are “exclusively at military facilities”.
The UN has estimated that over 10,000 civilians have been killed in Ukraine by Russian military action since it launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022.
Russia-launched drones attacked an energy facility in Ukraine’s Rivne region, national grid operator Ukrenergo said on Wednesday.
Reuters reports the Rivne regional governor Oleksandr Koval said fire had been contained at the site, and there were no reports of any casualties.
The attack caused temporary power cuts in the region.
Two killed in Russian missile attack on Odesa region
A Russian missile attack on the Odesa region killed two people and damaged port infrastructure on Wednesday, the region’s governor said.
The attack damaged warehouses, trucks and a civilian ship, the governor said. One person was also injured, Reuters reports he said.
Summary
Welcome to the Guardian’s latest coverage of Russia’s war on Ukraine.
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Joe Biden has welcomed Nato member states to a Washington summit warning that “[Vladimir] Putin wants nothing less, nothing less, than Ukraine’s total subjugation … and to wipe Ukraine off the map. Ukraine can and will stop Putin.”
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Biden announced Nato will provide Ukraine with five new strategic air defence systems, the promise coming just a day after a deadly missile strike against a paediatric cancer hospital and other civilian targets
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Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy has arrived in Washington with the summit expected to focus heavily on helping Kyiv fight Russian aggression in the war in Ukraine. He said he would “fight” for Nato to strengthen Ukrainian air defences and furnish it with more F-16 fighter jets
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On Wednesday morning the Ukrainian air force announced Russian attacks with one Iskander-M ballistic missile and four KH-59/69 guided air missiles fired from occupied Crimea, and 20 Shahed drones from the Kursk region inside Russia
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Russian drones attacked energy facilities in Ukraine’s Rivne region, the Ukrainian national grid operator said on Wednesday morning
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On Tuesday India’s prime minister Narendra Modi told Russian President Vladimir Putin that the death of innocent children was painful and terrifying, a day after a lethal strike on a children’s hospital in Kyiv
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Modi had arrived in Russia on Monday, shortly after Russian missiles struck across Ukraine, killing at least 41 people nationwide, including some children, officials said. The Czech foreign minister, Jan Lipavský, on Tuesday said he summoned the Russian ambassador in response to the strikes
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Zelenskiy said on Tuesday he could not predict what Donald Trump would do if he regained the US presidency in November, but the whole world, including Putin, was awaiting the outcome. Zelenskiy said he hoped Trump would not quit Nato and that America would keep supporting Ukraine in its defence against Russia’s invasion