Hundreds attend the funeral of a Ukrainian soldier who fought in the Battle of Andriivka
Ukrainian soldiers, family members and mourners gathered in Shostka, a small town in northeastern Ukraine, for the funeral of Andrii Grinchenko, a soldier who fought in the Battle of Andriivka near Bakhmut in the Donetsk region. (AP Video/Vasilisa Stepanenko)
AP
Russia bombed several Ukrainian provinces on Thursday in a multi-pronged attack that killed at least 51 civilians in a rocket attack on a village cafe and market in the northeast and flooded southern and central regions with drones – just as President Volodymyr Zelensky was about to make his case for a united front against Moscow’s aggression towards European leaders.
The attack in the village of Hroza in Kharkiv province, where about 60 people attended a memorial service for a local fallen soldier, was one of the deadliest in the war in months, Ukrainian authorities said. Zelensky called it “terrorism” and said it was a “demonstrably brutal Russian crime.”
Emergency workers cleared debris while bodies and body parts were scattered at a nearby children’s playground in Hroza, less than 20 miles west of Kupiansk and a focus of the Russian military effort. Before Zelensky traveled to southern Spain early Thursday for a summit with other European leaders, he had visited the region on Tuesday to meet with troops and inspect equipment supplied by the West.
He called for more force after Thursday’s attack, which included a barrage of 29 drones targeting Odessa and Mykolaiv in the south, as well as the central province of Kirovohrad. The Ukrainian Air Force said it intercepted 24 of the drones, but one of the five that got through damaged an infrastructure facility in Kirovohrad, said Andriy Raykovych, head of the regional administration.
“The key for us, especially before winter, is strengthening air defense, and there is already a basis for new agreements with partners,” Zelensky said in Telegram.
Developments:
∎ Russia has successfully tested an experimental nuclear-powered cruise missile, President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday, warning that the country’s parliament could revoke ratification of a treaty banning nuclear tests.
∎ Germany and Spain respond to Zelensky’s request for help with air defense and each promise a fourth Patriot system and six additional Hawk air systems.
∎ The British government announced a fourth $500 million loan guarantee for Ukraine to “provide life-saving winter support payments to three million households,” in anticipation that Russia will again try to leave Ukrainians out in the cold. by attacking the country’s energy supply system.
∎ Marina Ovsyannikova, a former state television journalist who warned viewers on camera that they were being lied to about the war, was sentenced in absentia to 8 1/2 years in prison for her protest. She fled to France with her daughter.
At a time when support for Ukraine appears to be waning in the United States and other parts of the West, the roughly 50 European leaders who met in the Spanish city of Granada on Thursday vowed to keep their support steadfast .
The exclusion of military aid to Ukraine in the funding agreement that averted a U.S. government shutdown last weekend, as well as the election of pro-Russian candidate Robert Fico in Slovakia and weak support from Hungary have raised questions about the commitment of Ukraine’s allies , as the Kremlin continues its relentless assault.
“The biggest challenge we have is to save unity in Europe,” Zelensky said.
President Joe Biden on Tuesday called on other world powers to coordinate on the Ukraine issue in a deliberate show of U.S. support and said he was looking for alternative ways to fund the deal amid growing Republican opposition and unrest in the House of Representatives Security assistance. One of those options is a State Department grant program for foreign military financing, Politico reported Thursday.
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said the push to boost Ukraine’s war effort would not succeed without U.S. involvement.
“Anyone who doesn’t want Putin to win this war needs to look for ways the U.S. can get back on this issue and continue to support Ukraine,” Borrell said. “Certainly we can do more. But the US is indispensable in supporting Ukraine.”
Putin said an investigation into the plane crash that killed Yevgeny Prigozhin and senior lieutenants of his mercenary group Wagner had found no signs of a sustained “external impact,” suggesting that something that happened inside caused the private jet to crash could have brought.
Putin said hand grenade fragments were found in the bodies. All 10 people on board died in the Aug. 23 crash northwest of Moscow, which U.S. officials concluded was an intentional explosion. The Kremlin called the claim that Putin was behind the crash an “absolute lie.”
Prigozhin’s mercenaries played a key role in Russia’s war in Ukraine, particularly in the months-long bitter battle to capture the eastern city of Bakhmut. But after constantly berating the Russian Defense Ministry, he took action against Putin by leading an uprising on June 23 that lasted about 36 hours.
Prigozhin and his fighters were granted asylum in Belarus as part of an agreement to end the uprising. Ultimately, like previous Putin opponents, he died prematurely.
Contribution: The Associated Press