August 22, 2022 Russia-Ukraine news

Our live coverage of Russia’s war in Ukraine has moved here.

Ukraine began a new initiative set to reinforce its ties with Eastern European and Baltic countries, President Volodymyr Zelensky announced Monday in his nightly address. 

“A new diplomatic and security format, ‘Kyiv Initiative.’ was founded today. Ukraine’s European neighbors are already participating in its work. These are Poland, Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, and the Baltic states. We will gradually involve other countries. In the ‘Kyiv Initiative’ format, the work takes place at the level of foreign policy advisors of heads of state,” Zelensky said.

The Ukrainian president described the initiative as “a very promising line of our work in the Euro-Atlantic direction.”

He also called on European countries to add an eighth sanctions package against Russia, saying “the longer the interval between sanctions packages, the greater Russia’s audacity.”

In his address, Zelensky also announced that search operations have ended following a Russian attack against a residential building in Kharkiv last week.

State Department spokesperson Ned Price did not offer a US assessment of who was behind the car bombing that killed the daughter of a Putin ally, saying Monday that he didn’t have anything to share beyond Ukraine’s denial of involvement in the attack. 

Speaking at a State Department briefing, Price said they “unequivocally condemn the targeting of civilians.”

Asked by CNN whether the State Department rejects Moscow’s accusation that Kyiv was behind the attack that killed Darya Dugina, Price said he has “no doubt that the Russians will investigate this” and he also has “no doubt that the Russians will put forward certain conclusions.”

“All I can say from here is that Ukraine has denied any involvement,” he said, adding, “for our part, we condemn the intentional targeting of civilians anywhere.”

Discussions are ongoing to try to secure the release of Americans Brittney Griner and Paul Whelan from Russia, US State Department spokesperson Ned Price said Monday.

“This is something we continue to work with the utmost urgency,” Price said at a State Department briefing.

He declined to offer specifics on the discussions beyond reiterating that the US continues to push the Russians to respond to the “substantial proposal” put forward by the US to free the two Americans, who have been classified as wrongfully detained.

The US has offered to swap convicted Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout as part of that deal. 

A State Department official said in early August that “there was a channel that was established between the two presidents in June of 2021 in Geneva and that is where we’re pursuing these discussions.”

Moscow has also confirmed that discussions on the matter are taking place in that channel. 

Russia’s efforts to weaponize energy policy have backfired as Canada agreed to deliver a key gas turbine set for use in the Nord Stream 1 pipeline that supplies natural gas to Germany, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Monday.

“This was an important decision because it exposed (Russian President) Putin’s strategy, which is aimed at dividing allies, which is aimed at affecting support for Ukraine, and if we stick together, then we can exclude exactly that,“ German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said during a joint press conference with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Monday.

“Russia is no longer a reliable business partner,“ Scholz said. “It has reduced gas supplies all over Europe, always citing technical reasons that never existed. And that’s why it’s important that we don’t fall into Putin’s trap and stick together and stand together,” he added.

 Europe and Germany will continue to be reliant for the coming year or two on Russian imports, specifically on gas, Trudeau said. The Canadian Prime Minister rejected Russia’s efforts to blame Canada. “What we have done by returning that turbine is remove the excuse that Russia had to blame anyone else for their decision to weaponize energy policy,“ the Canadian Prime Minister made clear. 

“What Russia’s goal is, is not to just create division amongst countries that are steadfast in their support for Ukraine, but undermine public support for the strong stands that our countries have taken in support of Ukraine. And in that we chose to take the difficult decision in returning those turbines because we do not want division in our steadfast support for Ukraine or a lack of the political support in our democracies for doing the right things,“ Trudeau said. 

Some more context: The turbine is in Germany waiting to be deployed, according to Scholz. Russian state-owned energy company Gazprom had substantially reduced gas deliveries to Germany in July saying that a faulty gas turbine needed maintenance. In spite having resumed gas deliveries at 20 percent of maximum capacity, Gazprom has announced further maintenance at the end of August leading to another suspension of gas deliveries.

Germany is trying to fill its storage facilities as far as possible with austerity measures in preparation for the coming winter.

Trudeau said that Ukraine was not only “fighting for itself,“ but were also “fighting for the rest of us, for the values that underpin democracies.“

“And that’s why we are unequivocal that Putin must not win. We will continue to be there, to stand up for our democracies,“ Trudeau promised, even if it was “causing hardship around the world, hardship for us.“ But Putin had to be held accountable for this hardship because it was caused by Vladimir Putin himself, Trudeau said.

Russian ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov came to the State Department on Thursday so the United States “could warn Russia against any escalation of its war on Ukraine,” a department spokesperson said Monday.

This included calling on Russia to “cease all military operations at or near Ukraine’s nuclear facilities and to return full control of the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant to Ukraine,” the official added.  

The spokesperson did not offer additional details on the discussions, including with whom Antonov met at the department.

In an interview with a Russian media outlet the day prior to the meeting, Antonov said he would raise “fully-fledged and full-scale participation of the Russian delegation in the [UN] General Assembly work in New York in September.”

The United Nations has a fact finding team ready to investigate the Ukraine prison attack in Olenivka — but for now — it’s going nowhere.

Despite Russia and Ukraine requesting an independent probe, the UN believes the situation around the prison is not safe for access without proper assurances. 

The UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric announced other members of the team Monday. 

Joining a veteran retired police Lieutenant-General from Brazil is a diplomat from Iceland and a police official from Niger. 

The panel would establish facts and report back to the UN Secretary-General.

Some background: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said at the end of July the attack on the prison in separatist-held eastern Ukraine, which resulted in the deaths of at least 50 prisoners, was “a deliberate war crime by the Russians.” Russia, meanwhile, blamed Ukraine for the attack.

Olenivka is in the part of the Donetsk region which has been held by pro-Russian forces for eight years.

The facility has been used to house many of the Ukrainian soldiers who surrendered at the Azovstal plant in Mariupol several months ago. CNN could not independently verify the allegations of either side.

The Russian State Duma Speaker, Vyacheslav Volodin, called for a special session on Thursday to address the situation around the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in eastern Ukraine.

“The meeting will be held on Thursday, Aug. 25, at 15:00 [3:00 p.m. local time]. The main issue is a statement in connection with the threat arising from the shelling of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant by the Kyiv regime,” the State Duma press service told Russian state-run news agency, RIA Novosti. 

According to RIA Novosti, Volodin said that before the end of the week the proposal regarding the nuclear plant will be discussed with the heads of the factions, with the final decision made on Monday.

Kyiv and Moscow have made a barrage of accusations against each other about security and military action at and around the plant, the largest nuclear complex in Europe. But the lack of independent access to the plant, which has been occupied by Russian forces since March, makes it impossible to verify what is happening there.

Recent satellite images from Maxar Technologies of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant show no signs of “systemic shelling,” despite claims by Russian president Vladimir Putin that the Ukrainian military was conducting repeated military strikes at the plant.

The United States does not support a blanket visa ban for Russian citizens, a State Department spokesperson said Monday.

“The US wouldn’t want to close off pathways to refuge and safety for Russia’s dissidents or others who are vulnerable to human rights abuses. We’ve also been clear that it is important to draw a line between the actions of the Russian government and its policies in Ukraine, and the people of Russia,” the spokesperson said in a statement.

The spokesperson added that the US has “worked with Allies and partners to impose costs, including visa restrictions for Kremlin officials and their enablers.”

“Since Feb. 24, 2022, the United States has taken steps to impose visa restrictions on nearly 5,000 individuals in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine,” they said. “We will continue to identify those involved in Russia’s invasion and will promote accountability for their conduct. We are looking at all tools to hold the Kremlin to account.”

Some context: Josep Borrell, the European Union’s top diplomat, on Monday also came out against a blanket visa ban, saying that “to forbid the entrance to all Russians is not a good idea.”

Ukrainian officials have called on nations to stop allowing entrance for Russian citizens, with President Volodymyr Zelensky telling the Washington Post in early August, “the most important sanctions are to close the borders — because the Russians are taking away someone else’s land.”

Several countries, including the Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia, have backed a tourist visa ban for Russians.

Estonia’s Police and Border Guard said Friday it can share information about people crossing the country’s border “only in cases as determined by the law,” and not because of accusations by Russia’s special service in the media.

Estonian Police and Border Guard media representative Ragne Keisk provided a statement in an email to CNN.

The statement come after Russian news agency TASS reported that the Russian security service — the FSB — alleged the woman suspected for Russian political commentator Darya Dugina’s murder was Ukrainian and had fled to Estonia after the attack.

“We can share information about people moving across the border only in cases as determined by the law and the Russian special service accusing them of doing something in the media is not one of them,” Keisk said in the email to CNN.

“We have not received any formal information or request from the Russian authorities on this topic,” Keisk said. 

The Estonian Foreign Ministry could not comment and directed inquiries to the Justice Ministry and the Border Guard. 

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog, continues its consultations with Ukraine and Russia to visit the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant in southern Ukraine where intensified shelling has raised international concerns.

“It is in the midst of a warzone, it’s something that’s never been done before, to send a group of international inspectors,” IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi told CNN’s Becky Anderson.

Grossi said there “is progress” in the difficult negotiations and if the visit goes ahead, he will be leading the team to the nuclear plant, the biggest in Europe.

“To get this operation together, it’s like a jigsaw puzzle,” Grossi said describing the difficulty of the visit in terms of logistics. 

More background: Attacks at the complex, which have ramped up as fighting flares in Ukraine’s south, have sparked concerns about the specter of nuclear disaster, leading the UN’s watchdog and world leaders to demand that a mission be allowed to visit the site and assess the damage. 

The risk for a nuclear accident “exists” and could potentially be “very, very big,” Grossi said.

 “We cannot say what magnitude it could have, but potentially it could be very, very big,” he said.

“The mere fact that there is active conflict, shelling taking place there…the danger that something may go astray or something unexpected may happen is of course unsustainable,” Grossi said.

Ukraine’s National Guard was not involved in a car explosion that killed Darya Dugina, the daughter of an influential ultranationalist Alexander Dugin, the country’s Defense Intelligence said Monday.

“It is a fake that Ukraine is involved in this (killing of Darya Dugina). It is a fake that the National Guard of Ukraine is involved in these events. The National Guard is fulfilling its legal tasks at the territory of Ukraine,” Andriy Yusov, a spokesperson for the Defense Intelligence of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine, said in a statement.

Yusov went on to point to Russia for an answer concerning the murder of Dugina near Moscow on Saturday, saying: “This looks more like sorting things out within Russia. Both Dugin and his daughter are marginal characters and not a point of interest to Ukraine.”

Earlier Monday, Russia blamed an agent with the Ukrainian security service for the car bomb explosion, according to Russian state news agency TASS.

Alexander Dugin, whose daughter Darya was killed Saturday by a car bomb outside of Moscow, is the high priest of a virulent brand of Russian nationalism that has become increasingly influential in Russia’s capital.

At the age of 60, from a family of Russian military officers, his journey has been remarkable: from fringe ideologue to the leader of a prominent strand of thinking in Russia that sees it at the heart of a “Eurasian” empire defying Western decadence. He is the spiritual founder of the term “the Russian world.”

Along the way, this strand has incorporated a deep loathing of Ukraine’s identity outside of Russia.

Dugin helped revive the expression “Novorossiya” or New Russia — which included the territories of parts of Ukraine — before the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014. Russian President Vladimir Putin used the word in declaring Crimea part of Russia in March of that year.

Dugin has long had a visceral loathing of Ukrainians resisting assimilation into “mother Russia.” After dozens of pro-Russian protesters were killed during clashes in Odesa in May 2014, he said: “Ukraine has to be either vanished from Earth and rebuilt from scratch or people need to get it. I think people in Ukraine need total revolt on all levels and in all regions. An armed revolt against junta. Not only in the South-East.

The following year, Dugin was sanctioned by the United States as “complicit in actions or policies that threaten the peace, security, stability, or sovereignty or territorial integrity of Ukraine.”

Read the full analysis here.

Ukraine’s national guard denied reports in Russian state media that the alleged killer of Darya Dugina had previously served in the Ukrainian military as a member of the Azov regiment.

The Russian state news agency RIA Novosti had shared a post from a Telegram channel run by Russian hackers (RaHDit) which claimed that the alleged assailant — a woman — had served in Azov, which is categorized in Russia as a terrorist organization.

With this report, Russian propagandists are “trying to justify among its citizens the previous decision to recognize a unit of the National Guard of Ukraine as a terrorist organization, showing Russians ‘crimes committed by Azov’ on the territory of the Russian Federation,” the National Guard said. 

The woman had not served in the Azov unit of the National Guard, it added.

In a statement, Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence spokesperson Andriy Yusov called the reports of National Guard’s involvement in the car bombing “fake.”

“The National Guard is fulfilling its legal tasks at the territory of Ukraine,” he said. “Both Dugin and his daughter are marginal characters and not a point of interest to Ukraine.”

A senior Ukrainian official has provided the first official comment from Kyiv on the accusation by the Russian Security Service — the FSB — that Ukrainian security services murdered Darya Dugina in a car bomb attack near Moscow on Saturday.

Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to the head of the office of the Ukrainian President, commented on Twitter:

“Ru-propaganda lives in a fictional world: 🇺🇦 [Ukrainian] woman and her 12-year-old child were “assigned” responsible for blowing up the car of propagandist Dugina. Surprisingly, they did not find the “Estonian visa” on the spot,” he said, a reference to the claim by the FSB that the woman had since escaped to Estonia. 

Podolyak added: “Vipers in 🇷🇺 [Russian] special services started an intraspecies fight.”

On Sunday, Podolyak strenuously denied Ukraine’s involvement in the car explosion, saying in a Ukrainian TV interview that “Ukraine definitely has nothing to do with this because we are not a criminal state, which the Russian Federation is, and even more so, we are not a terrorist state,” 

Alexander Dugin has made his first comments about the murder of his daughter Darya Dugina by a car bombing, blaming Ukraine for her death.

Dugin is the high priest of a virulent brand of Russian nationalism that has become increasingly influential in Moscow.

Dugina was killed during an explosion “in front of my eyes” while “returning from the Tradition festival near Moscow,” he said in a statement through his friend Konstantin Malofeev’s Telegram channel.

“She was a beautiful Orthodox girl, a patriot, a military correspondent, an expert on central channels, and a philosopher. Her speeches and reporting have always been profound, grounded and restrained. She never called for violence and war,” he continued. “She was a rising star at the beginning of her journey. The enemies of Russia meanly, stealthily killed her.”

He called for Russian victory in the wake of her death.

“But we, our people, cannot be broken even by such unbearable blows,” his statement read. “Our hearts yearn for more than just revenge or retribution. It’s too small, not the Russian way. We only need our Victory. My daughter laid her maiden life on her altar. So win, please!”

A memorial service will be held for Dugina on Tuesday, he added.

Ukraine on Sunday strenuously denied any involvement in the car explosion, with Mykhailo Podoliak, adviser to the head of the office of the President of Ukraine, saying in a Ukrainian TV interview that “Ukraine definitely has nothing to do with this because we are not a criminal state, which the Russian Federation is, and even more so, we are not a terrorist state.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin has commented for the first time on the murder of political commentator Darya Dugina, who was killed in a car bomb attack near Moscow on Saturday.

Putin on Monday sent his condolences to Dugina’s family, calling her death “a vile, cruel crime.” 

Dugina was the daughter of prominent Russian ultranationalist Alexander Dugin.

The Russian Federal Security Services earlier Monday blamed Ukrainian security services for being behind the attack. Ruslan Muzychuk, spokesperson for the Ukrainian National Guard, told CNN that Ukrainian authorities for now had no response to the claim.

In a statement published on the Kremlin’s Telegram channel, Putin said, “A vile, cruel crime cut short the life of Daria Dugina, a bright, talented person with a real Russian heart – kind, loving, sympathetic and open.”

“A journalist, scientist, philosopher, war correspondent, she honestly served the people, the Fatherland, she proved by deed what it means to be a patriot of Russia,” he added.

CNN’s Tim Lister contributed reporting to this post.

Ireland has reopened its embassy in Kyiv after nearly six months of closure, according to the Irish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. 

“The Embassy of Ireland to Ukraine has resumed operations in Kyiv, having operated remotely since the Russian invasion of Ukraine,” the Department of Foreign Affairs announced in a news release Monday. 

Irish Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney stressed that the embassy team’s priority will be “renewing and building their network of contacts with Ukrainian government officials to better inform Ireland’s provision of support and assistance to the government and people of Ukraine.

Coveney took a trip to Kyiv in April, visiting areas “directly impacted by the war” and meeting Ukrainian officials including his Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Kuleba, according to the news release. 

Foreign countries have gradually reopened their embassies in the Ukrainian capital after shutting their doors following the Russian invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24. The United States reopened its embassy in the city on May 18. 

Russia has blamed an agent with the Ukrainian security service for a car bomb explosion that killed Darya Dugina, a Russian political commentator and daughter of prominent ultranationalist ideologue Alexander Dugin, according to Russian state news agency TASS.

It has been established that “the crime was prepared and committed by the Ukrainian special services,” per TASS.

Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) said that the assailant had arrived in Russia on July 23, 2022, together with her young daughter, TASS reported. The pair attended the festival near Moscow on Saturday where Dugina was a guest of honor.

The FSB said that after remotely detonating explosives planted in Dugina’s Toyota Land Cruiser Prado, the pair drove through the Pskov region to Estonia, a journey of around 12 hours. 

The FSB said that the woman had rented an apartment in Moscow in the same building where Dugina lived. “The criminals used a Mini Cooper car to monitor the journalist,” TASS reported.

The FSB said that the woman had used a variety of identity documents, entering with one issued by the self-declared Donetsk People’s Republic and leaving on a Ukrainian document, the report added.

CNN cannot independently verify the FSB claims cited by the TASS report.

Earlier, a Russian foreign ministry official implied that Ukrainian state structures were responsible for the explosion, a claim that Ukrainian authorities have denied.

“Ukraine definitely has nothing to do with this because we are not a criminal state, which the Russian Federation is, and even more so, we are not a terrorist state,” Mykhailo Podolyak, adviser to the Head of the Office of the President of Ukraine, said in a Ukrainian TV interview.

He also tweeted on Monday, providing the first official comment from Kyiv specifically on the accusation from the Russian security service.

“Ru-propaganda lives in a fictional world: 🇺🇦 [Ukrainian] woman and her 12-year-old child were “assigned” responsible for blowing up the car of propagandist Dugina. Surprisingly, they did not find the “Estonian visa” on the spot,” he said, a reference to the claim by the FSB that the woman had since escaped to Estonia.

As Ukraine prepares for its Independence Day, President Volodymyr Zelensky has warned that Moscow might attempt “something particularly ugly” and events to celebrate the occasion in the country’s two largest cities have been canceled.

Meanwhile, media personalities in Moscow have called for strikes on Kyiv following the murder of Darya Dugina, a Russian political commentator and the editor of a disinformation website called United World International, on Saturday.

On the ground in Ukraine, Russian forces have made limited gains pushing north from the occupied southern city of Kherson, while the Ukrainian military says it continues to target bridges and weapons concentrations in the region.

Here are the latest headlines:

The Ukrainian military says it has continued attacks on Russian-held parts of the southern region of Kherson, including against bridges and weapons concentrations.

“Two strikes were made by our aircraft on a stronghold, a concentration of manpower, weapons and equipment in the areas of Oleksandrivka and Burkhanivka,” which are on the border of Mykolaiv and Kherson regions, Operational Command South said Monday.

The bridge at Nova Kakhovka was also hit, the command said.

“The occupiers are trying to repair the bridge; they have brought additional slabs. However, our armed forces are adjusting these efforts,” said Serhii Khlan, an advisor to the head of the Kherson Civil Military Administration.

Social media reports and images Monday indicated there had been a number of strikes around Kherson city and Nova Kakhovka. One geolocated photograph showed a plume of smoke rising from the area of the Antonivskiy bridge over the river Dnipro. The bridge has been repeatedly hit and is seriously damaged. Russian forces have been trying to arrange pontoon bridges across the river.

“The Antonivskiy railway bridge is not functioning. The occupiers are trying to repair the Antonivskiy road bridge. There is a moving pontoon crossing. The Russians do not have a full supply of needs. Currently, they are installing some kind of engineering structure near the Antonivskiy bridge; fastening the barges to the piers of the bridge,” Khlan added.

For the last six weeks, Ukrainian forces have been using long range weapons to hit Russian concentrations of munitions, transport links and command posts in the south. 

Russian state media personalities have demanded strikes against “decision-making” centers in Ukraine following the murder of Darya Dugina, a Russian political commentator and the daughter of influential ultranationalist Alexander Dugin.

Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) blamed an agent with the Ukrainian security service for the car bomb explosion that killed Dugina on Saturday, Russian state news agency TASS reported, triggering the calls for attacks in the capital Kyiv and elsewhere.

Margarita Simonyan, editor-in-chief of the Kremlin-backed TV network RT, said on her Telegram channel that the targets in Ukraine should be “Decision Centers! Decision Centers!! Decision Centers!!!”

In response to Simonyan’s post on Telegram, a pro-Russian official in an occupied part of Ukraine, Volodymyr Rogov, shared the addresses of the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), the Presidential Administration and the Main Intelligence Directorate.

Another television personality in Moscow, Tigran Keosayan, said on his Telegram channel that he was “tired of all the talking. I don’t understand why not arrest all the creatures that mock Dasha’s death.”

“I don’t understand why our “sleepers” in Kyiv have not yet woken up. I do not understand why in the cities of my country it is possible to openly collect money for the Armed Forces of Ukraine,” he added. “I don’t understand why there are still buildings on Bankova Street in Kyiv.”

CNN cannot independently verify the FSB claims cited by the TASS report. Ukraine has denied any involvement in the death of Dugina.

Events to mark Ukraine’s Independence Day on Wednesday have been banned in the country’s capital, Kyiv, and second-largest city, Kharkiv, as officials warn that Russia may carry out missile attacks. 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned on Saturday that Russia might be planning something “ugly” to coincide with the day, which will mark 31 years since Ukraine broke its ties with the Soviet Union. 

In Kyiv, the city military administration issued a ban on all gatherings between Monday and Thursday, saying “it is forbidden to hold mass events, peaceful meetings, rallies and other events related to a large gathering of people.”

General Mykola Zhyrnov, head of Kyiv’s military administration, said that the order was imposed so that security forces could respond in a “timely manner to threats of missile and bomb attacks by the troops of the Russian Federation on decision-making centers, military facilities, defense industry facilities, critical infrastructure and nearby residential areas.”

Zhynov said he had ordered city authorities to use the minimum necessary number of officials, civil servants and workers to ensure transport and other services.

In Kharkiv, where relentless, indiscriminate Russian attacks killed and injured hundreds of civilians in the first months of the war, authorities announced a curfew from 7 p.m. local time on the eve of Independence Day to 7 a.m. on the day after.

“We ask that you understand such measures and prepare to stay at home and in shelters – this is our safety,” authorities said.

Natalia Humeniuk, a spokesperson for Ukraine’s southern military command, said Sunday that “the date of our independence and the anniversary of the invasion, half a year, coincide – it is the 24th. And there’s Ukrainian flag day, on the 23rd. We are ready for the fact that there will be an increase in some kind of aggression, there will be an increase in missile attacks.”

In the last week, Ukrainian officials have said that more Russian missiles have been deployed at an airbase in Belarus.

The car bomb that killed Darya Dugina, daughter of ultra-nationalist Russian idealogue Alexander Dugin, was detonated remotely, a law enforcement official told Russian state news agency TASS on Monday.

Dugina, a Russian political commentator and the editor of a disinformation website called United World International, died after a bomb planted in a car she was driving went off in the outskirts of Moscow on Saturday evening. 

Details of the explosion are currently being investigated by the Russian Investigative Committee.

Earlier, Russian officials said 400 grams of TNT was used the explosion and that the “explosive device was attached under the Jeep on the driver’s side,” TASS reported Sunday. 

Russian forces have made some progress in pushing north from the occupied southern city of Kherson towards Mykolaiv, according to Ukrainian officials.

The Ukrainian military’s General Staff said Monday that “in the Mykolaiv direction, the occupiers carried out assaults in the area of the settlement of Blahodatne, with partial success.”

On Sunday, the General Staff acknowledged that Russian forces had “occupied the southern outskirts of the settlement of Blahodatne, and hostilities continue.”

The area has seen almost constant combat for three months, but there has been little change in the position of the front lines. In early June, Ukraine said it had liberated the town from Russian occupation. 

The border of the Luhansk and Donetsk regions also saw heavy fighting, according to Ukrainian officials. “Five massive enemy attacks were repelled; battles continue in six other directions,” regional authorities said. 

There were rocket attacks on several settlements in Donetsk, which killed two people. The General Staff said that Russian forces had again tried to push southwards towards the city of Sloviansk, but “did not succeed and withdrew.” A similar offensive in the Bakhmut area further south had been repelled, it added.

Overall, there appears to have been little change in the frontlines running through Donetsk and Kharkiv regions, but CNN is unable to verify claims from either side on territory won and lost.

In the Dnipropetrovsk region, the town of Nikopol, across the Dnipro River from the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, continued to come under fire. Authorities said the area was hit with more than 40 shells and four people were injured.

There was also shelling in the city of Dnipro, according to the regional administration, with as many as 50 properties damaged.

Six months since Russia invaded Ukraine, the West’s response to the crisis has remained strong and largely united — to the surprise of many.

Despite years of fractured relations during the era of former US president Donald Trump and the Covid-19 pandemic, the trans-Atlantic alliance has managed to pull together and reach agreements on financial support and the donation of weapons to Kyiv, agreements to stop using Russian energy as well as sanctions designed to hit President Vladimir Putin and his cronies.

However, as the crisis reaches its half-year anniversary, officials across Europe are worried that the consensus could fall apart as the continent enters a bleak winter of rising food prices, limited energy to heat homes and the real possibility of recession.

For the purposes of this article, CNN spoke with multiple Western officials and diplomats who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

In a possible taste of more draconian measures to come, German capital Berlin turned off the lights illuminating monuments in order to save electricity, while French shops have been told to keep their doors shut while the air conditioning is on, or else face a fine.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who has captured the West’s imagination and put heat on countries to support his war effort, might find it harder to get the attention of his fellow European leaders as the conflict drags on.

“The challenge for Ukraine is the same as it was on day one: keeping the West on side as the costs of supporting Kyiv hit home — not just Putin’s gas and grain blackmail but also the cost of economic and humanitarian support,” says Keir Giles, a senior consulting fellow at think tank Chatham House.
“That may well be why Zelensky said he wanted the war over before Christmas, because the real issues will be getting the West to stick to its promises in the long run.”

Read the full analysis here.

US President Joe Biden and Western leaders on Sunday stressed the need for the United Nations nuclear watchdog to visit the Zaporizhzhia power plant in southeastern Ukraine, where shelling has sparked fears of a disaster, according to a White House statement.

The statement issued Sunday said Biden held a conference call with British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, in which the leaders “affirmed their continued support for Ukraine’s efforts to defend itself against Russian aggression.”

The leaders also reiterated “the need to avoid military operations near the plant” and the importance of a visit by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) “as soon as feasible to ascertain the state of safety systems.”

Some context: Kyiv and Moscow have made a barrage of accusations against each other about security and military action at and around the plant, the largest nuclear complex in Europe. But the lack of independent access to the plant, which has been occupied by Russian forces since March, makes it impossible to verify what is happening there.

Over the past month, a number of rockets and shells have landed on the territory of the plant, according to satellite imagery analyzed by CNN. CNN is unable to verify what strikes occurred, nor who was responsible.

According to a source from the Elysee Palace, Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed during a call with Macron Friday for an IAEA mission to visit the plant via territory controlled by Ukrainian forces.

Russian authorities said Sunday they had opened a murder investigation after the daughter of influential, ultra-nationalist philosopher Alexander Dugin was killed by a car bomb on the outskirts of Moscow.

The Russian Investigative Committee said it believed someone planned and ordered the car explosion that killed Darya Dugina, based on evidence already collected from the blast.

“Taking into account the data already obtained, the investigation believes that the crime was pre-planned and was of an ordered nature,” the investigative committee said in a statement Sunday.

Dugina died at the scene after “an explosive device, presumably installed in the Toyota Land Cruiser, went off on a public road and the car caught fire” at around 9.00 p.m. local time on Saturday, near the village of Bolshiye Vyazemy, according to the press service of the Russian Investigative Committee, as reported by state news agency TASS.

Dugina’s father is a Russian author and ideologue, credited with being the architect or “spiritual guide” to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. He is purported to have significant influence over Russian President Vladimir Putin and was described as “Putin’s Brain” by Foreign Affairs magazine.

Both Dugin and his daughter have been sanctioned by the United States. The United Kingdom sanctioned Dugina in July for being “a frequent and high-profile contributor of disinformation in relation to Ukraine and the Russian invasion of Ukraine on various online platforms,” it wrote.

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Some 27 ships loaded with grain have left Ukraine’s Black Sea ports since August 1 under an export deal brokered by the United Nations and Turkey, which has laid “the groundwork for a permanent peace environment,” Turkey’s Defense Minister said in a speech on Saturday.

“Since August 1, a total of 53 vessels have sailed for grain shipments, 27 of which have departed from Ukrainian ports,” Hulusi Akar said at Istanbul’s Joint Coordination Center (JCC) alongside United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres.

The center is made up of Russian, Ukrainian, Turkish and UN officials overseeing the Black Sea exports of Ukrainian grain and fertilizer.

Guterres, who had earlier inspected the vessel SSI Invincible II Saturday before it sailed to the Ukrainian port of Chornomorsk, said more than 650,000 metric tons of grain and other food “are already on their way to markets around the world.”

Both men stressed the importance of these exports as it would help overcome “the food crisis affecting the whole world, especially to lowering prices,” Akar said.

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Natural gas supplies to Europe via Russia’s Nord Stream 1 pipeline will be suspended from August 31 through September 2, according to a statement Friday from Russian state energy giant Gazprom. 

Friday’s announcement comes after the Nord Stream 1 pipeline was shut down for 10 days in late July for “annual maintenance.”

The crucial pipeline had already been running at less than 40% capacity, prompting concerns that Moscow is deliberately choking supplies of gas to Europe in an energy stand-off following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.