Russia-Ukraine war live: arrest of Russian pro-war blogger likely to trigger fury in military, says UK

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The director of the CIA was yesterday made a cabinet member by the US president, Joe Biden, who said the agency has been providing “good intelligence, delivered with honesty and integrity”.

Biden said:

Bill [William Burns] has always given me clear, straightforward analysis that prioritises the safety and security of the American people, reflecting the integral role the CIA plays in our national security decision-making at this critical time.

Under his leadership, the CIA is delivering a clear-eyed, long-term approach to our nation’s top national security challenges.

CIA directors automatically sat at cabinet in Washington DC until 2005 when the national intelligence director, a post not long created, effectively took its place. Donald Trump put both intelligence directors in his cabinet, but Biden reverted upon taking office. Before then changing it back, now.

Yesterday, Burns – who travelled to Russia before the war began and has since visited Ukraine several times – suggested that the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, is biding his time over deciding what to ultimately do with Yevgeny Prigozhin.

In comments at the Aspen security forum, Burns said:

What we are seeing is a very complicated dance. Putin is someone who generally thinks that revenge is a dish best served cold. In my experience, Putin is the ultimate apostle of payback so I would be surprised if Prigozhin escapes further retribution … If I were Prigozhin, I wouldn’t fire my food taster.

Ukraine attempted to launch a drone attack on the Crimean peninsula today, the region’s Russian-installed governor Sergei Aksyonov has said.

He said the attack targeted infrastructure in the district of Krasnohvardiiske, near the centre of the peninsula, without providing detail. “Emergency workers are on the spot to eliminate possible consequences,” he said.

Also last night, during a video call to international security leaders at the four-day Aspen Security Forum, Zelenskiy said Ukraine’s counteroffensive was about to “gain pace” (as per the FT).

We are approaching a moment when relevant actions can gain pace because we are already going through some mines locations and we are demining these areas.

Jake Sullivan, the US national security adviser, said:

It is at that moment when they make that commitment that we will really see what the results of the counteroffensive will be … The view of our military commanders is that the notion that F-16s would play a decisive role in this counteroffensive given that fundamental reality … They have a different view than what you have heard from some Ukrainian voices.

It is responsible for every member of Nato, including the United States, to think about the Russian reaction when we choose to do something because that matters for our security, it matters for global stability.

However, senator Jim Risch, a senior Republican who sits on the Senate foreign relations committee, said:

I’m tired of hearing about escalation. Stop talking about escalation. If you don’t escalate, you’re gonna lose. I want [Vladimir] Putin to wake up in the morning worried about what he’s going to do that’s gonna cause us to escalate instead of us wringing our hands.

Road traffic on the bridge linking Russia to the Crimean peninsula has been temporarily blocked, an official Telegram channel has said.

“Those on the bridge and in the inspection area are asked to remain calm and follow the instructions of transportation security officers,” it said.

No reason for the halting of traffic was stated, according to Reuters. A suspected Ukrainian drone attack this week on the Crimean bridge killed two civilians and put part of the road bridge out of service, which had only recently returned to full operation after being severely damaged in a similar attack in October, which Ukraine eventually claimed.

The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said last night that the bridge linking the Crimea peninsula to Russia “brings war not peace” and is therefore a military target.

Unesco has condemned Russia’s attack on the historic centre of Odesa, which is protected under the World Heritage Convention.

Last night the city’s residents were told to head to bomb shelters for a fourth successive night, the culmination of a week in which Russian forces pounded the city with hypersonic missiles and drones in repeated attacks aimed at destroying Odesa’s grain exporting facilities.

Unesco said:

A preliminary assessment in Odesa has revealed damage to several museums inside the world heritage property, including the Odesa Archaeological Museum, the Odesa Maritime Museum and the Odesa Literature Museum. They had all been marked by Unesco and local authorities with the Blue Shield, the distinctive emblem of the 1954 Hague Convention.

Mattha Busby here picking up the blog from Adam Fulton. I’m on Twitter here.

Australian farmers are locking in surging grain prices ahead of their imminent harvest after Russian missile strikes on Ukrainian ports and a decision by the Kremlin to pull out of the Black Sea grain deal to allow agricultural exports caused a rally.

For many Australian grain growers, it could represent a fourth consecutive year of healthy harvests backed by strong prices for wheat and other grains.

Rabobank grains analyst Dennis Voznesenski said:

It’s important to tie in the caveat of not being too jolly because horrendous things are happening right now in the Black Sea. But it could lead to another year of possibly elevated pricing and good production.

Tracy Blackburn, who helps run an agricultural operation that includes wheat and other grains in central New South Wales, said the upheaval in the Black Sea should lead to more demand for Australian grain.

The flow-on is that demand for Australian grain will increase because buyers can actually source it from here and that should give things a kick-along.

Russia has been accused at the UN security council of stoking famine by blocking grain exports through the Black Sea, with the aim of profiting from higher global food prices.

Russia’s representative said yesterday that Moscow might consider restarting the scheme if it was given better terms for its own food and fertiliser exports, but was accused by western diplomats of holding the world’s poor to ransom.

The UN head of humanitarian relief, Martin Griffiths, said the Black Sea grain initiative, which Russia ended on Monday, had been a success, allowing the export of 33m metric tonnes of grain from Ukrainian ports to 45 countries on more than a thousand ships, over the course of a year.

The US plans to announce a new military aid package for Ukraine worth up to $400m as Ukraine’s counteroffensive grinds on, Reuters reports three US officials as saying.

The US was not including cluster munitions in this weapons assistance package, said two of the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The package primarily comprised of artillery, air defence missiles and ground vehicles and could be announced as soon as Tuesday, the officials said.

The US first sent dual-purpose improved conventional munitions, a cluster munition fired from a Howitzer cannon, to Ukraine earlier this month.

Included in the coming package are several Stryker armoured personnel carriers, mine-clearing equipment, munitions for national advanced surface-to-air missile systems (Nasams) and for high mobility artillery rocket systems (Himars), anti-tank weapons and munitions for Patriot and Stinger anti-aircraft systems, according to the officials.

The package was still being finalised and could change, they said.

Russia’s arrest of Igor Girkin, a former Russian intelligence officer and leading nationalist military blogger, will probably infuriate elements in the military as well as his fellow bloggers, according to UK intelligence.

The Ministry of Defence said in its latest intelligence update that Girkin had long been a critic of the Russian defence ministry’s conduct of the war in Ukraine, but that in recent days his comments “turned to direct criticism of Russian president Vladimir Putin and his time in power”.

The former former battlefield commander of Russia’s proxy forces in eastern Ukraine, who was convicted by a Dutch court over the 2014 shooting down of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17, was arrested on “extremism” charges on Friday.

The UK ministry said in its update, posted on Twitter, that Girkin’s arrest “is likely to infuriate fellow members of the mil-blogger community – and elements within the serving military – who largely see Girkin as an astute military analyst and patriot”.

Girkin had played a major role in Russia’s war in the Donbas from 2014 and spent months on the frontline last year, it said.

While Girkin is no ally of the Wagner Group, he was likely only prepared to push the limits of public criticism in the context of Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin’s June 2023 abortive mutiny. The taboo against unmasked criticism of the Putin regime has significantly weakened.

Russia has come under pressure at the UN security council from its ally China and developing countries as well as western nations to avert a global food crisis and quickly revive Ukrainian grain shipments.

Associated Press reports that Moscow was also criticised by the UN and council members on Friday for attacking Ukrainian ports after pulling out of the year-old grain deal and destroying port infrastructure.

In response to Russia declaring wide areas in the Black Sea dangerous for shipping, the UN warned that a military incident in the sea could have “catastrophic consequences”.

China’s deputy UN ambassador, Geng Shuang, expressed hope that Russia and the UN would work together to resume exports from both countries “at an early date” in the interest of “maintaining international food security and alleviating the food crisis in developing countries in particular”.

UN political chief Rosemary DiCarlo strongly condemned Russian attacks on Ukraine’s Black Sea ports and urged Moscow to stop them immediately. She said threats to target civilian vessels “are unacceptable” and warned that sea mines could endanger civilian navigation.

She said:

We strongly urge restraint from any further rhetoric or action that could deteriorate the already dangerous situation. Any risk of conflict spillover as a result of a military incident in the Black Sea – whether intentional or by accident – must be avoided at all costs, as this could result in potentially catastrophic consequences to us all.

Russia said it had suspended the Black Sea grain initiative because the UN had failed to overcome obstacles to shipping its food and fertiliser to global markets, the other half of the Ukraine grain deal.

Russia pounded Ukrainian food export facilities for a fourth day in a row on Friday and practised seizing ships in the Black Sea in an escalation of what western leaders say is an attempt to wriggle out of sanctions by threatening a global food crisis.

Reuters reports that the attacks on Ukraine’s grain, a major part of the global food chain, followed a vow by Kyiv to defy Russia’s naval blockade on its export ports after Moscow’s withdrawal this week from a UN-brokered safe sea corridor agreement.

The UN warned that millions of people in poor countries around the world were at greater risk of hunger and starvation from the knock-on effect for food prices.

UN aid chief Martin Griffiths told the security council:

Some will go hungry, some will starve, many may die as a result of these decisions.

In Ukraine, local governor Oleh Kiper said the grain terminals of an agricultural enterprise in Odesa region were hit by air, with 100 tons of peas and 20 tons of barley destroyed.

Photographs released by the emergencies ministry showed a fire burning among crumpled metal buildings that appeared to be storehouses. Two people were injured, Kiper said, while officials reported seven dead in Russian air strikes elsewhere in Ukraine.

Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said the bridge linking the Crimea peninsula to Russia “brings war not peace” and is therefore a military target.

Explosions on the road bridge on Monday killed two civilians and put part of it out of service, after it only recently returned to full operation following damage in a similar attack in October.

Reuters reports that the Ukrainian president said the road and rail bridge was “not just a logistical road”. Zelenskiy told the Aspen security conference in the US via videolink:

This is the route used to feed the war with ammunition and this is being done on a daily basis. And it militarises the Crimean peninsula.

For us, this is understandably an enemy facility built outside international laws and all applicable norms. So, understandably, this is a target for us. And a target that is bringing war, not peace, has to be neutralised.

Ukraine welcomed Monday’s attack on the bridge – built by Russia and brought into service in 2018 – but officials did not directly claim responsibility. Moscow blamed Ukraine.

Welcome back to our continuing live coverage of Russia’s war in Ukraine. This is Adam Fulton and here’s a roundup of the latest key developments.

Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said a road bridge linking the Crimea peninsula to Russia “brings war not peace” and is therefore a military target that “has to be neutralised”.

The Ukrainian president’s comments followed blasts on the bridge that killed two civilians on Monday.

Russia, meanwhile, continued to hit Ukrainian food export facilities for a fourth day on Friday and practised seizing ships in the Black Sea in an escalation of what western leaders say is a bid to get out of sanctions by threatening a global food crisis.

UN political chief Rosemary DiCarlo condemned the Russian attacks on Ukraine’s Black Sea ports, saying: “Any risk of conflict spillover as a result of a military incident in the Black Sea – whether intentional or by accident – must be avoided at all costs, as this could result in potentially catastrophic consequences to us all.”

More on those stories shortly. In other news:

Russia is “waging war on the world’s food supply” and has “upended peace and security around the world”, the US ambassador to the UN has a told a meeting of the security council. Linda Thomas-Greenfield called on Moscow to cease attacking Ukrainian food facilities and reenter the Black Sea grain deal, from which it withdrew on Monday. “Russia has zero legitimate reason to suspend its participation in this arrangement … It is using the Black Sea as blackmail.”

Vladimir Putin has said Russia will use “all means at its disposal” to defend Belarus after Poland and other EU countries voiced concerns about the deployment of Russian paramilitaries near their borders. The Russian president claimed at a meeting of the Russian security council that Poland was seeking to invade Belarus, a Russian ally, after Warsaw moved troops nearer the border with Belarus following Minsk’s commencement of exercises with Wagner trainers.

Russia has arrested Igor Girkin, who was convicted by a Dutch court over the shooting down of MH17, on extremism charges, probably fuelled by his criticism of the Russian war effort in Ukraine. Girkin is a former battlefield commander of Moscow’s proxy forces in eastern Ukraine.

Russia’s navy carried out a live fire “exercise” in the north-west Black Sea, Moscow’s defence ministry said, days after the Kremlin said it would consider ships travelling to Ukraine through the waterway to be potential military targets. The Black Sea Fleet “carried out live firing of anti-ship cruise missiles at the target ship in the combat training range in the north-western part of the Black Sea”, Russia’s defence ministry said in a statement on Telegram.

The Ukrainian president condemned a Russian artillery attack he said killed two children and damaged a school in the Donetsk region. Volodymyr Zelenskiy said a cultural centre and residential buildings were also damaged in the attack on Druzhba village.

An employee of a cultural centre had been found dead after Russian shelling in the Chernihiv region of northern Ukraine, governor Vyacheslav Chaus said. In the Odesa region, governor Oleh Kiper said that out of 21 people wounded in Russian attacks over the past four days, four were still in hospital.

The number of ships looking to pick up grain cargoes from the Black Sea area fell 35% week on week amid growing uncertainty over whether commercial traffic could be hit as Russia continues to pound food facilities in Ukraine.

Bulgaria said it had decided to send about 100 armoured personnel carriers to Ukraine in the Balkan country’s first shipment of heavy equipment to Kyiv. Bulgaria has so far sent only one military aid package to Kyiv, containing mostly flak jackets and helmets, but a pro-EU government took office last month.

The top diplomatic adviser to Emmanuel Macron, the French president, said China was delivering to Russia items that could be used as military equipment, although not on a big scale. French officials told CNN that Macron was referring to dual-use technologies and non-lethal assistance, such as helmets and body armour.

Moscow’s Bolshoi Ballet, grounded by Covid-19 and then shunned in the west since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, will return to international touring next week for the first time since 2020 with a trip to Beijing.