Blasts over Kyiv as Ukraine stops major missile attack as US lifts Azov Brigade ban

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un hailed the country’s expanding relationship with Russia on Wednesday, as reports suggest that Russian President Vladimir Putin will soon visit the country for his third meeting with Kim.

Military, economic and other cooperation between North Korea and Russia have sharply increased since Kim visited Russia last September for a meeting with Putin.

The US, South Korea and their partners believe North Korea has supplied artillery, missiles and other conventional weapons to Russia to support its war in Ukraine in return for advanced military technologies and economic aid.

Russia launched missile and drone attacks on Ukraine early on Wednesday, causing a fire at an industrial facility, damaging residences and injuring several people across six regions, local authorities said.

Ukrainian military said it shot down five out of six missiles and all 24 drones launched during Russia‘s overnight attack.

Ukraine‘s air defence systems destroyed all air weapons on their approach to the capital, Serhiy Popko, head of Kyiv city military administration said on the Telegram messaging app.

The debris damaged an industrial facility in the Kyiv region, causing a fire, Kyiv region governor said. Over 105 people were using 30 pieces of equipment to put out the fire as of Wednesday morning.

The attack injured one resident and damaged a private residence, a garage, a gas station and a storage unit, the governor said.

Dnipropetrovsk governor said the attack injured three people and damaged nine private residences, reporting that Ukrainian military shot down 11 drones over his region.

Air raid alerts lasted several hours across all of Ukraine, starting soon after 0000 GMT and including in regions bordering NATO-member Poland.

The owner of Ukraine’s major agricultural companies Kernel has warned Kyiv against prolonging its dispute with the EU over food exports, saying it risks losing the bloc’s support in the war with Russia, the Financial Times reported on Wednesday.

Kernel is the world’s biggest exporter of sunflower oil and large exporter of other agricultural goods. Owner Andriy Verevskyi said feuding with EU member states at such a critical time was unwise.

“I think Ukraine should not fight with Poland or other European countries over import duties and the protection of the European market,” he said.

The EU curbs on Ukrainian goods announced in April followed extensive protests from farmers in the region, who said they faced unfair competition from producers outside the bloc such as Ukraine who do not face the environment-related regulations and bureaucracy they do.

“We have enough (other export) markets for Ukraine: I’m talking about India, Africa, Asia, China et cetera and I don’t think we should fight and escalate the relationship between Europe and Ukraine because of agricultural supply,” he said.

Overnight Russian forces launched a missile-aviation strike on Ukraine, using air and ground base missiles.

Ukraine’s air force command said they shot down 29 of the 30 in the Kyiv, Dnipropetrovsk, Zaporizhzhia, Poltava, Kharkiv, and Vinnytsia regions and hailed it as “a victory” on Facebook.

Anti-aircraft missile units and electronic warfare units of the Ukrainian Defense Forces were involved in repelling the aerial attack which used rockets, winged and ballistic missiles.

The Netherlands is contributing €60 million to offensive drone capacity for Ukraine.

The amount is intended, among other things, for maritime drones and so-called first-person view drones, where the ‘pilot’ watches from a distance.

Minister Kajsa Ollongren announced this during a visit to Ukraine. She visited the cities of Kyiv and Lviv.

She said: “With every visit I am impressed by the resilience of Ukrainian society and the people who are committed: military and civilian.

“The Netherlands can also learn a lot from the enormous innovative and creative power of the Ukrainian armed forces. It is good to share experiences with each other.”

When the power goes down and the elevator stops working, Ukrainian couple Maryna and Valeriy Tkalich leave the pushchair on the ground floor and carry their two-month-old son up the 12 flights of stairs to their apartment instead.

And once authorities in Kyiv have notified residents of upcoming scheduled electricity outages, the Tkaliches rush to bathe little Marian and prepare food for the family before the lights go out and taps run dry.

Such disruptions are becoming increasingly common for the city’s population of about three million people, after Russia began pummelling the country’s energy system in late March, cutting out half of its generating capacity.

In scenes reminiscent of the winter of 2023, streets are frequently plunged into darkness, the hum of private generators can be heard again across Kyiv streets and people carry flashlights to get around.

“The main challenge is the lack of water,” said Valeriy Tkalich, 34, speaking to Reuters at his Kyiv home where water pumps can’t reach the higher floors without electricity.

“For cooking, we also had to adjust and purchase a small gas camping stove to heat stuff up,” said the IT product manager. “With the baby, it seriously complicates our reality.”

Many Ukrainians fear things will get worse as winter approaches, with Russian forces seizing the initiative on the battlefield and intensifying missile and drone attacks on thermal and hydropower stations.

Russia lost at least 980 troops, including those killed and injured, on the frontline in Ukraine in just the past day, senior Ukrainian military officials said this morning.

Sharing a daily update, the General Staff of the Ukraine Armed Forces said: “Over the past day, the Russians lost 980 servicemen killed and wounded, nine tanks and 46 artillery systems on the battlefield.”

It said the total casualties of those killed and wounded in Russia’s full-scale invasion launched in February 2022 has now risen to 521,830.

Russia has not commented on the daily death toll shared by Ukrainian forces and authorities, nor has it separately issued its own death toll since the full scale invasion of Ukraine.

Additionally, new documents show that Russia’s Wagner mercenary group suffered more battlefield deaths than the Soviet Union lost in the decade-long invasion of Afghanistan, as almost 20,000 of its fighters were killed.

Last month Russian casualties were confirmed to have exceeded 465,000 troops, according to Nicholas Aucott, the senior military adviser of the UK Delegation to the Organisation for Security and Co-Operation in Europe.

China will resolutely oppose all unilateral sanctions following new warnings from G7 countries on small Chinese banks about their links to Russia, the Chinese foreign ministry said on Tuesday.

China will take all necessary measures to firmly safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese enterprises, spokesperson Lin Jin said at a regular press conference.

It was reported yesteday that member countries of the G7 were set to send a tough new warning next week to smaller Chinese banks to stop assisting Russia in evading Western sanctions.

Leaders are gathering for the summit on June 13-15.

Ukraine’s air defence forces destroyed at least five Russian missiles, including hypersonic and ballistic missiles, fired by Russian forces in a major overnight attack, the Ukrainian Air Force has said.

“On the night of 12 June, 2024, the occupiers launched a missile-air strike against Ukraine, using air and ground-based missiles, as well as attack UAVs,” the Air Force Commander Lieutenant General Mykola Oleschuk, said this morning.

He said Ukrainian air-defence intercepted 24 Shahed drones, all four air-launched cruise missiles and one “Kinzhal” hypersonic missile, in a statement this morning.

One Iskander-M ballistic missile was also fired but could not be intercepted, the Air Force Commander said.

The anti-aircraft defence worked in Kyiv, Dnipropetrovsk, Zaporizhzhia, Poltava, Kharkiv, and Vinnytsia regions, he said on his official Telegram channel.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has described his country as an “invincible comrade-in-arms” to Russia in a message to Vladimir Putin, state media KCNA said today, amid speculation over Putin’s impending visit to North Korea.

Congratulating the Russian president on Russia’s National Day, Kim said his meeting with Putin at a Russian space launch facility last year elevated the ties of their “century-old strategic relationship”.

“Thanks to the significant meeting between us at the Vostochney Spaceport in September last year, the DPRK-Russia friendly and cooperative relations developed into an unbreakable relationship of comrades-in-arms and a long-standing strategic relationship and are steadily developing into the higher-level state relations,” he said, reported KCNA.

Putin is expected to visit North Korea and Vietnam in the coming weeks, according to Russia’s Vedomosti newspaper.

The North Korean leader also lauded Russia for achieving results on its efforts to build a strong country despite by “suppressing and crushing all the challenges and sanctions and pressures of hostile forces”. He also called Putin’s leadership “energetic and correct”.

An official in Vietnam said the Vietnam trip was planned for 19-20 June, but has not yet been confirmed.