September 11, 2023 Russia-Ukraine news

Our live coverage for the day has ended. Follow the latest Ukraine news here or read through the updates below.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is on his way to Russia on a private train, the country’s state media KCNA reported. Kim will “meet and have a talk” with Russian President Vladimir Putin during the visit, KCNA said.

Discussions about the United States sending long-range missiles to Kyiv have ramped up in recent weeks as Ukraine officials put pressure on the Biden administration, people familiar with the discussions told CNN.

The transfer of the ATACMS – which have a range of up to 186 miles – would mark just the latest instance of the US reversing itself on providing a system after months of pressure by Ukrainian officials. The Biden administration also resisted sending multiple-launch rocket systems, Patriot air defense systems, Abrams tanks, and cluster munitions — all of which were ultimately provided to Kyiv.

Here’s what to know:

A US Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) is during a South Korea-U.S. joint missile drill on July 29, 2017 in East Coast, South Korea. There are discussions about sending similar missile systems to Ukraine.

US President Joe Biden is expected to make a final decision soon on sending long-range missiles to Ukraine for the first time.

It’s a major step recommended by the State and Defense Departments after months of Ukrainian requests, people familiar with the discussions told CNN. 

Discussions about sending the long-range Army Tactical Missile Systems, also known as ATACMS, picked up substantially in recent weeks, the sources said.

No final decision to send the missiles has been made, officials said. But “there’s a much greater possibility of it happening now than before,” one official familiar with the discussions said. “Much greater. I just don’t know when.”  

US officials had been reticent to send the long-range surface-to-surface guided missiles amid fears about escalating the conflict as they could potentially be fired into Russia itself. That concern has largely abated, however, since Ukraine has shown it is not using other US-provided weapons to attack territory inside Russia, officials said.

Ukraine has carried out strikes inside Russia, but those have been conducted using homegrown drones and weaponry, allowing Kyiv to stand by its commitment not to use American weapons inside Russia.

Currently, the maximum range of US weapons committed to Ukraine is around 93 miles with the ground-launched small-diameter bomb. The ATACMS, which have a range of around 186 miles, would allow the Ukrainian military to strike targets twice as far away.

The transfer of the ATACMS would mark just the latest instance of the US reversing itself on providing a system after months of pressure by Ukrainian officials. The Biden administration also resisted sending multiple-launch rocket systems, Patriot air defense systems, Abrams tanks, and cluster munitions — all of which were ultimately provided to Kyiv.

Read more details here

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un left Pyongyang on Sunday afternoon for Russia by private train, North Korean state media KCNA reported Tuesday morning local time.

Kim is accompanied by leading officials of the party, government, and armed forces, KCNA reported.

Some background: Earlier Monday, the Kremlin confirmed Kim will go to Russia “in the coming days” but didn’t specify the exact date of the visit.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Russian journalist Pavel Zarubin that Russia “will continue to strengthen” its “friendship” with North Korea.

Meantime, the White House urged North Korea to “not provide or sell arms to Russia.”

Just last week, the US warned Kim might travel to Russia to discuss a potential deal to provide weapons to the country as it wages its war in Ukraine, and the White House has said arms negotiations between the two countries are “actively advancing.” 

CNN’s Gawon Bae, Anna Chernova and Darya Tarasova contributed reporting to this post.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell called for the United States to continue to support Ukraine as the country defends itself from Russia and tries to take territory back.

“The United States isn’t arming Ukraine out of its sense of charity. We’re backing a fellow democracy because it is in our direct interest to do so,” he said during floor remarks on Monday.

It comes as the White House is putting pressure on Congress to fulfill President Joe Biden’s supplemental funding request, which asks for more than $24 billion in additional funding to support Ukraine and $16 billion in disaster relief funds.

With lawmakers facing an end-of-the-month deadline to avoid a government shutdown, leaders in the Senate want to see the Ukraine aid and disaster relief funding tied to a short-term funding resolution. However, the GOP remains sharply divided on Ukraine aid as some hardliners in the House have demanded it be stripped out.

“If critics of US support for Ukraine disparage the principle that we should oppose adversaries who invade and destroy Western-aligned neighbors, how credible — how credible — is their commitment to defend Taiwan or other allies?” he asked.

McConnell also commemorated the 22nd year since the September 11th attacks, saying they serve as a reminder “of our commitment to confront growing threats from global terror” and tied it to the need now to support Ukraine.

The Kremlin has confirmed North Korean leader Kim Jong Un will visit Russia “in the coming days.”

The statement did not specify an exact date for the visit.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Russian journalist Pavel Zarubin that Russia “will continue to strengthen” its “friendship” with North Korea and said that a meeting “could take place one of these days.”

“These will be negotiations between two delegations and after that, if necessary, the leaders will continue their communication in a one-on-one format,” he told Zarubin, adding that the two sides would discuss bilateral ties.

Peskov said that an “official dinner is also planned on behalf of the President of Russia in honor of the guest from North Korea.”

He said that “like with any neighbor, we consider ourselves obligated to establish good, mutually beneficial relations.”

North Korean state media KCNA reported on Monday that Kim will “meet and have a talk” with Putin during the visit.

It did not say when the meeting between Kim and Putin would take place. 

Earlier, CNN reported that Kim appeared to be on a train heading to Russia, according to a South Korean government official. The source said the train departed from Pyongyang and is en route to Vladivostok, Russia.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un reacts as the civil defense military parade commemorating the 75th anniversary of the founding of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea is held in Pyongyang, North Korea, on September 9.

The White House is urging North Korea to “not provide or sell arms to Russia” as Pyongyang and Moscow said Monday that Kim Jong Un would travel to Russia at the invitation of Vladimir Putin.

Just last week, the US warned Kim Jong Un might travel to Russia to discuss a potential deal to provide weapons to the country as it wages its war in Ukraine, and the White House has said arms negotiations between the two countries are “actively advancing.”

Pentagon press secretary Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder told reporters at a press briefing Monday the US remains “concerned” that North Korea is considering providing arms and equipment to Russia. Ryder could not say when and where the meetings will be held. 

The spokesperson said providing arms and equipment to Russia would “just serve to perpetuate this needless war and result in the death of innocent Ukrainians.”

More context: North Korea is already under United Nations and US sanctions imposed over Pyongyang’s weapons of mass destruction program.

The potential Putin-Kim meeting could lead to Pyongyang getting its hands on the sort of weapons those sanctions have barred it from accessing for two decades, especially for its nuclear-capable ballistic missile program.

It also comes after more than a year and a half of war in Ukraine has left the Russian military battered, depleted and in need of supplies.

CNN’s Jake Kwon, Gawon Bae, Jessie Yeung and Brad Lendon contributed reporting to this post. 

Russian and Ukrainian officials report heavy fighting in a small area of the southern front, with no clear sign as to which side may have the upper hand.

The Russian Defense Ministry claims that its units along the southern front lines have repelled attacks by Ukraine near the village of Robotyne, which has been the focus of fighting for several weeks.

Ukrainian officials paint a different picture. Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Maliar said there was progress in the area south of Robotyne and west of Verbove. Nearly five square kilometers of territory had been won in the previous week, for a total gain of 256 square kilometers (more than 98 square miles) since the counteroffensive began, she said.

CNN is unable to verify most of the claims made by either side, but Ukrainian units are in control of Robotyne, according to geolocated video, and attacking nearby Verbove.

Meanwhile in the east on the Bakhmut front, both sides have said that the village of Andriivka south of the city is the most intense part of the battle. The Ukrainian blogger Bakhmut Demon said that it was too early to celebrate victory there. Russia “artillery is still working, we have pushed the bastards back significantly, but they are not giving up yet,” the blogger said.

Much further east, and close to the Russian-held capital of Donetsk region, Russian blogger Neofitsyalnyi Bezsonov denied claims that Ukrainian units have a foothold in the heavily contested village of Optyne. “The enemy managed to enter the outskirts of the settlement, after which it was immediately knocked out of there. Optyne is fully under our control.”

Another well-known Russian blogger, Voenkor Kotenok, said Russia’s problems in this area remain the same as they were six months ago — shortage of personnel, the lack of competent commanders and assaults.

Residents of Kyiv have been reacting to the warning from President Volodymyr Zelensky that the war against Russia may go on for some time yet.

“I have to be ready, my team has to be ready for the long war, and emotionally I am ready,” Zelensky told the Economist in an interview published Sunday.

Iryna Shpundra, a mother on maternity leave from Kyiv said she and her child had spent a year and a half abroad, but insisted that “Ukrainians are strong in spirit and ready for a long war, because we simply cannot stop it somehow and forget our guys who died or those who are now fighting for us.”

Yuriy Teplenko, a pensioner and former university lecturer, told CNN: “The war will not end tomorrow, that’s for sure. I think it won’t even be over next year. And this is very bad, but on the other hand, the ceasefire is even worse.”

Referring to Russian leader Vladimir Putin, Teplenko said: “We need to crush this bastard, otherwise we simply won’t have any life. There is no other option here. Objectively speaking, I want to believe that the war will end in victory for Ukraine, but anything can happen.”

A soldier with the call sign Red said he agreed with the president. “The offensive is going on, but at a slow pace, gradually our land is being liberated every day. There can be no such thing as an offensive along the entire front line at the same time, because this will lead to even greater losses.”

Kyiv resident, Kateryna Polishchuk, said she understood ”that we should not expect any immediate success in this war. This war has not been going on for 8 or 10 years, it is a struggle that has been going on for 300 years.”

“I have stayed in Kyiv since the first day of the full-scale invasion, I was born here and have lived here all my life, I love my city and although it was scary, I stayed here,” she added.

“I never expected this war to end so quickly, at least given the size of the population of Russia and Ukraine. But in our hearts, of course, we expect victory and ask God for it,” Polishchuk said.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba speaks during a press conference in Kyiv, Ukraine, on September 11.

Ukraine lobbying for longer-range missiles “is not just a whim, but a real need,” said Andriy Yermak, head of President Volodymyr Zelensky’s office. “The effectiveness of the army on the battlefield, as well as the lives of the military and our progress depend on it,” he added.

Ukrainian officials had been working with partners on the issue for a long time, and that Ukraine’s request for ATACMS missile was moving forward, he added.

The ATACMS is a long-range US-guided missile with a range of around 300 kilometers (186 miles). It would extend the range of Ukrainian attacks well beyond the front lines to Russian supply lines and logistics hubs. Acknowledging this missile capability, Yermak said it would “speed up” Ukraine’s victory.

Ukraine is also developing its own longer-range missiles. 

Meanwhile, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba emphasized the critical need for further air defense systems to protect Ukrainian ports used to export grain to the world and to prepare against expected Russian attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure and cities as winter approaches.

At a news conference in Kyiv with the visiting German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, he said discussion on the supply of German long-range Taurus cruise missiles has been under discussion in Berlin for weeks, and expressed frustration at the delay in receiving the weapons. 

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, left, and Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba attend a joint press conference following their talks in Kyiv, Ukraine, on September 11.

Germany is pledging an additional 20 million euros (about $21 million) in humanitarian aid for Ukraine to prepare for winter, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said during a surprise visit to Kyiv Monday.

Baerbock’s visited a transformer substation outside Kyiv which has seen several attacks, as it is playing a major part in the region’s electricity supply.

Ukrainian officials had urged Germany to provide Ukraine with Taurus cruise missiles for the country’s self-defense. “We could have achieved more and saved more lives of Ukrainian soldiers and civilians if we already had Taurus,“ said Kuleba, adding that there was not a single argument against the delivery of the Taurus cruise missiles from Germany.

However, Germany is hesitant about delivering long-range cruise missiles as they could be used for attacks on Russian territory.

Kuleba said Ukraine expects German companies to participate in the defense industries forum that will be held in Kyiv soon.

On the issue of sanctions against Russia, Kuleba resisted the idea of diluting them to enable a revival of the Black Sea grain initiative, as has been demanded by Russia.

“I am aware that there are some forces that support Russia’s concessions in this demand,” Kuleba said, but reconnecting Russian banks to the international SWIFT payments system would allow senior Russian officials to make tens of millions of dollars.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, left, will meet with his North Korean counterpart Kim Jong Un.

The Kremlin has confirmed what until now had only been speculation: North Korean leader Kim Jong Un will visit Russia “in the coming days,” spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Monday. The US government first warned last week that Kim may travel to Russia to meet President Vladimir Putin for discussions on a potential deal to supply Moscow with weapons for its war in Ukraine.

While Peskov did not specify when the meeting would take place, multiple South Korean media outlets reported earlier Monday that Kim appeared to be on a train headed to Russia.

Here are the latest developments:

Unofficial pro-Russian sources in Donetsk region are contesting Ukrainian claims that they have established a foothold in a village north of the eastern city Donetsk.

Donbas Operatsiya ZOV, an unofficial Telegram channel, said the Ukrainians had taken a quarry near the village and positions north of it.

The channel added: “Is it bad that we screwed up the quarry? Yes, it’s not good. The guys from the 1st Sloviansk Brigade are on their way to take it back.”

The comments came after Ukraine’s deputy defense minister Hanna Maliar claimed Monday that Ukrainian units had managed to take part of Optyne village, north of Donetsk airport.

Barabash said Ukrainian soldiers had entered the village, but added that “the fighting is still ongoing. The enemy is constantly putting pressure, the enemy is constantly trying to recapture lost ground.”

He said that “at the beginning of the full-scale war, 44 people stayed in Opytne. Now there are 5-6, and we have no contact with them.”

Members of an electoral commission empty a ballot box to count ballots at a polling station during local elections held by the Russian-installed authorities in Donetsk, Russian-controlled Ukraine, on September 10.

The European Union “strongly” condemned the “illegitimate” elections held over the weekend in Russian-annexed parts of Ukraine, adding that it will not recognize their results.

Borrell urged Russia to “immediately, completely and unconditionally withdraw all of its troops and military equipment from the entire territory of Ukraine within its internationally recognised borders.”

“Sham” elections: Russia staged regional and local elections from September 8-10 in southern and eastern parts of Ukraine it has illegally annexed.

The elections represented another attempt by Moscow to enforce a narrative of Russian legitimacy in the parts of Ukraine it holds — areas of Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kherson and Luhansk regions — even as Kyiv’s counteroffensive makes some progress towards liberating towns in the south.

The international community broadly dismissed the elections as a sham.

A resident of the southern city of Melitopol told CNN “the election results are already well known” — before the vote had even been held.

Read more about the elections here.

The basement of a building which Ukrainian authorities say was a makeshift Russian prison and torture chamber during Russia's invasion in the village of Kozacha Lopan, in Kharkiv region, Ukraine, on September 18, 2022.

Russia’s armed aggression “is becoming synonymous with torture and other inhuman cruelty,” according to the United Nations official responsible for investigating torture.

“These grievous acts appear neither random nor incidental, but rather orchestrated as part of a state policy to intimidate, instil fear, punish, or extract information and confessions,” Edwards said.

Edwards said she had gathered “harrowing testimonies involving electric charges being applied to ears and genitals, beatings of all kinds, mock executions at gunpoint, simulated drowning, being required to hold stress positions, threats of rape or death, and various ceremonies of ridicule and humiliation.”

Edwards also visited places in Ukraine where Russian prisoners of war are held.

“I found that sincere efforts have been made by the Ukrainian authorities to treat Russian prisoners of war respectfully. The barrack-style facilities I visited were hygienic and orderly. Prisoners were being well fed,” she said.

Growing evidence: Edwards’ comments came days after Ukraine’s Prosecutor General Andrii Kostin claimed that roughly 90% of Ukrainian prisoners of war had been subjected to torture, rape and other forms of cruel treatment.

Ukraine found “evidence of these horrors in all the liberated territories,” Kostin said, during a meeting with Edwards last week.

According to Ukrainian government figures, over 103,000 war crimes proceedings have been registered so far.

However, Edwards warned that there are major obstacles to bringing the alleged perpetrators to justice. The inaccessibility of presently-occupied areas, the loss of crucial evidence due to deterioration and lapse of time between the crime and liberation when investigations can begin, and adapting the criminal justice system to be able to process and prosecute international atrocity crimes, will all pose challenges to Ukrainian prosecutors.

Russian President Vladimir Putin chairs a meeting with members of the government via a video conference at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, on August 2.

“No one will be able to compete” with Russian President Vladimir Putin if he decides to run for reelection in 2024, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Monday.

Peskov, quoted by the state-run media Russia-24, claimed Putin “enjoys absolute support from the population.”

Preparations for the presidential elections have not yet begun in the Kremlin, Peskov said.

Russia’s next presidential election is due to be held in March 2024, with a possible second round theoretically being held in April.

In 2020, Russian lawmakers voted in favor of a last-ditch proposal to reset the clock on Putin’s presidential term count in an updated version of the constitution, in effect allowing Putin to remain as president until 2036.

Peskov’s comments about the next presidential election come the day after elections were held in several annexed regions of Ukraine. These elections — expected to deliver victories for Putin’s United Russia party candidates, many of whom ran unopposed — were widely dismissed as a sham by the international community.

Volker Turk, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, attends the Human Rights Council at the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, on September 11.

The United Nations’ High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk said that Russia’s withdrawal from the Black Sea Grain Initiative has put “the right to food far out of reach for many people.” 

Speaking at the opening of the Human Rights Council session in Geneva, Switzerland on Monday, Türk said that global hunger levels have returned to as they were in 2005, with almost 600 million people projected to be “chronically undernourished” by 2030.

Türk said the planet has sufficient financial resources, technology, and land to provide “adequate food for all.”

Despite this, he continued, “climate change, the consequences of the pandemic, and Russia’s war on Ukraine” are some of the reasons behind the continued existence of global hunger and food insecurity.

“All of us need to play our part,” he added.

Some context: Ukraine, often referred to as the “breadbasket of Europe,” is a major exporter of grain, much of which is sent to developing countries in Africa. After Russia launched its full-scale invasion of the country, its navy blockaded Ukraine’s Black Sea ports, preventing Ukraine from exporting its crops to countries in need.

The first UN-chartered vessel MV Brave Commander loads more than 23,000 tonnes of grain to export to Ethiopia, in Yuzhne, Ukraine, on August 14, 2022.

The blockade remained in place for several months, before Russia agreed to the Black Sea Grain Initiative in July 2022 – a major diplomatic breakthrough brokered by the United Nations and Turkey – which allowed the exports of grain to continue.

However, Russia allowed the deal to lapse in July of this year. It has since resumed its blockade of Ukraine’s ports – as well as launching a prolonged bombardment of Ukraine’s port infrastructure and grain storage facilities.

A screengrab from a video released by the Ukraine Defense Intelligence shows Ukrainian special forces during an operation to take control of Bokyo Towers off the northwest coast of Crimea. Portions of this image have been blurred by the Ukraine Defense Intelligence.

Ukrainian forces have regained control of oil and gas drilling platforms off the north-west coast of Crimea, Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence (DI) said Monday.

The platforms, known as the Boyko Towers, have been controlled by Russia since soon after Moscow annexed the Crimean peninsula in 2014.

Ukraine’s DI said the Towers had been used by the Russians as helicopter landing sites and for the deployment of radar equipment.

“During the operation, the special forces managed to capture valuable trophies: a stockpile of helicopter munitions of the UAM type (unguided aircraft missiles), as well as the Neva radar, which can track the movement of ships in the Black Sea,” DI said.

Noting clashes for control of the Towers last month, the UK Defense Ministry said that they could serve “as advanced bases for force deployment, helicopter pads, and sites for the placement of long-range missile systems.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin applauds while visiting the Zvezda Shipbuilding Complex, in Bolshoi Kamen, outside of Vladivostok, Russia, on September 11.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has arrived in the far eastern Russian city of Vladivostok to attend the meeting of the Eastern Economic Forum, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said Monday, according to state TV Russia 24.

Russia has held the annual Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok since 2015, in an attempt to encourage foreign investment in Russia’s far east.

The annual meeting is being held amid reports that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un appears to be on a train heading to Russia, after US officials warned last week that Kim may meet with President Vladimir Putin to strike a potential arms deal between Pyongyang and Moscow.

The New York Times reported that the potential meeting between Kim and Putin may take place on the campus of a university in Vladivostok.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un speaks during his visit to the navy headquarters in North Korea on August 27, in this government hand out image.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un appears to be on a train headed to Russia, according to officials cited in multiple South Korean media outlets on Monday.

The reports come just days after the US government warned that Kim may soon travel to Russia to meet President Vladimir Putin for discussions on a potential deal to supply Moscow with weapons for its war on Ukraine.

The National Security Council said last week that arms negotiations between Russia and North Korea are “actively advancing,” after Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu visited Pyongyang in July in an attempt to convince North Korean officials to sell artillery ammunition to Moscow.

Watson did not say when and where a potential meeting between Kim and Putin in Russia might take place.

Neither Russia nor North Korea have officially confirmed the meeting.

Remember: In 2019, Kim made his first trip to Russia as the leader of North Korea and traveled from Pyongyang to Vladivostok on an armored green train. Going by train is the preferred mode of travel by the reclusive North Korean leader.