#War #Ukraine #Developments
Here are the latest developments in the war in Ukraine:
– Putin and Erdogan pledge to increase cooperation –
Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan pledge to step up political and economic cooperation, including on energy and trade, in a statement adopted after their second talks in 17 days.
“Despite the current regional and global challenges, the leaders have reaffirmed their common will to further develop Russian-Turkish relations,” the Kremlin said in a statement.
At the start of the meeting in Russia’s Black Sea city of Sochi, Erdogan told Putin he hoped to turn a “different page” in Ankara-Moscow relations.
NATO member Turkey has sought to remain neutral over Ukraine amid Moscow’s historic standoff with the West.
It has hosted peace talks between Russia and Ukraine and brokered a United Nations-backed deal in late July to resume grain shipments from Ukrainian ports.
– Russia accused of strike at nuclear site –
Ukraine has accused Russian forces of striking Europe’s largest power plant near a nuclear reactor at Zaporizhzhia in the south of the country, which has been occupied since the early days of the invasion.
“Three strikes were recorded at the site of the plant, near one of the power plant blocks where the nuclear reactor is located,” says Energoatom, the Ukrainian state operator of the country’s nuclear power plants.
“There is a risk of hydrogen escaping and being sprayed radioactively. The risk of fire is high,” it said, adding that there were initially no injuries.
The global nuclear regulator IAEA has been trying for weeks to send a team to inspect the facility. Ukraine has so far rebuffed efforts that it says would legitimize Russia’s occupation of the site in the eyes of the international community.
– Three more grain ships leave Ukraine –
Three ships loaded with grain for the world market are leaving Ukraine, the second departure under the Moscow-Kyiv agreement reached in Istanbul in July to lift the Russian blockade of the Black Sea.
Ukraine is one of the world’s top grain exporters, and the halt to almost all of its shipments following the February 24 Russian invasion has pushed up global food prices, making imports unaffordable for some of the world’s poorest countries.
“Our main goal is to increase the handling volume in our ports. We have to deal with 100 carriers per month in order to be able to export the necessary amount of food,” says Ukraine’s infrastructure minister, Oleksandr Kubrakov.
– Amnesty to report –
Human rights group Amnesty International tells AFP that it “fully stands by its allegations” that Ukraine is endangering civilians by building bases in residential areas to counter the Russian invasion.
In Thursday’s report, which sparked an angry reaction from Kyiv, Amnesty listed incidents in 19 towns and cities where Ukrainian forces appeared to have put civilians at risk.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy compared the allegations with accusations of victims. In his evening address on Thursday, he said the rights group had sought “to offer the terror state amnesty and to shift responsibility from the aggressor to the victim.”
– Curfew when Mykolayiv pounded –
The southern Ukrainian city of Mykolaiv is placed under curfew by local authorities from 23:00 (2000 GMT) Friday to 05:00 (0200 GMT) Monday after overnight Russian bombardments using widely banned cluster bombs and heavy artillery.
Mykolaiv – which has been attacked frequently – is on the main route to Odessa, Ukraine’s largest Black Sea port, and is the city closest to the southern front.
Shelling also continues in several towns and villages in the east, including Nikopol and Kryvyi Rig in Zaporizhia and Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest city in the northeast.
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