Ukraine updates: Russian assaults kill 3, together with little one

The United Nations said the population in Ukraine has seen a decline of around 8 million since Russia launched its invasion in February 2022.

The UN Population Fund (UNFPA) said that while there had been no census, there had been a clear decline in population seen in Ukraine.

“Overall, Ukraine’s population has declined by an estimated 10 million since 2014 and by an estimated eight million since the beginning of the full-scale invasion in 2022,” the UNFPA’s regional director for Eastern Europe and Central Asia Florence Bauer said in comments sent to journalists.

The agency said that Ukraine’s population stood at around 45 million in 2014 when Russia began occupying the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea.

The population currently stands at around 35 million according to a combination of government and UNFPA data.

Bauer said that Ukraine already had one of the lowest birth rates in Europe but that the Russian invasion had led to an exodus, with many young people leaving.

European lawmakers on Tuesday backed a plan to use frozen Russian assets to loan Ukraine up to €35 billion ($38 billion).

The European Parliament voted overwhelmingly in favor with 518 votes for the measures to 56 against, with 61 abstentions.

The Russian assets were frozen shortly after Moscow launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal thanked the European Parliament on Tuesday for approving the plan.

“This critical contribution from the EU is part of the G7’s $50 billion loan … It will help address Ukraine’s urgent financing needs in the face of Russia’s brutal full-scale war,” he said on X.

South Korea said that it would consider supplying Ukraine with weapons as part of a response following allegations Pyongyang has sent troops to fight for Moscow.

“We would consider supplying weapons for defensive purposes as part of the step-by-step scenarios, and if it seems they are going too far, we might also consider offensive use,” the presidential official told reporters.

South Korean officials in recent days said that North Korea had shipped 1,500 special forces personnel to Russia‘s Far East for training.

South Korea’s UN representative Hwang Joon-Kook meanwhile said that Seoul “will mobilize various means to address this major development in full cooperation with its allies and friends.”

“Russia may be in a desperate military situation but even so bringing in the forces of another country, especially from a notorious rogue state, is exceedingly dangerous,” Hwang said and added: “It is hard to believe that a permanent member of the security council would take such a gamble and shift the course of the war.”

North Korea has denied the allegations.

“As for the so-called military cooperation with Russia, my delegation does not feel any need for comment on such groundless stereotyped rumors,” a North Korean representative said at a committee meeting during the UN General Assembly.

A Ukraine drone strike has killed one person in the occupied city of Energador, according to a Russian-installed official. 

The city is home to Europe’s largest nuclear power plant and is situated in southern Ukraine on the occupied bank of the Dnipro River.

“As a result of a drone attack by the enemy on Energodar, a cylinder tanker caught fire,” Yevgeny Balitsky — the Moscow-installed head of the occupied part of the Zaporizhzhia region —said on Telegram.

It fell into Russian hands shortly after the invasion began in February 2022 and has regularly been at the center of safety violation allegations from both sides.

At least three people have been killed in an overnight Russian attack in Ukraine‘s eastern Sumy region.

“Three people, including one child, died as a result of a nighttime attack by enemy drones on residential buildings,” regional authorities said.

Authorities went on to say that more than two dozen Iranian-designed attack drones were downed over the region.

The air force meanwhile said 60 drones had been detected in Ukrainian airspace and 42 were destroyed.

Sumy is situated directly across the border from Kursk in Russia and has been under continuous Russian bombardment since the start of Moscow’s invasion.

Ukrainian forces launched a major offensive in Kursk in August and managed to capture large swathes of territory.

Chinese President Xi Jinping was on his way on Tuesday to the BRICS summit in Russia’s Kazan, state news agency Xinhua reported. 

The Chinese leader is expected to individually meet with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, at the summit. 

China’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said at a regular press briefing on Monday that this year’s summit would focus on the expanded BRICS.  

Xi and Putin are close allies. China and Russia described their ties as having “no limits,” shortly before Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Western leaders have urged Xi to use his influence on the Russian president to end the war in Ukraine.

On Monday, Lin reiterated China’s stance on Russia’s war in Ukraine. 

“China’s position on the Ukraine crisis is consistent and clear. We hope that all parties will work for de-escalation and be committed to political settlement,” he said.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said early on Tuesday that he had departed for the BRICS summit in Russia’s southwestern city of Kazan. 

“India attaches immense importance to BRICS, and I look forward to extensive discussions on a wide range of subjects. I also look forward to meeting various leaders there,” he said. 

In a slightly longer press release, Modi also made reference to his visit to Moscow in July this year and said he hoped to further deepen bilateral ties. 

“Building upon the Annual Summit held in July 2024 in Moscow, my visit to Kazan will further reinforce the Special and Privileged Strategic Partnership between India and Russia,” the statement from Modi’s office said. 

Modi also visited Kyiv in late August. In both countries, he expressed a willingness to help broker any potential negotiations or efforts to stop the conflict.  

Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, India has maintained economic ties with Moscow, and began purchasing more Russian oil at a discount after Western sanctions closed off other markets. 

Despite accusations of funding Putin’s war machine, New Delhi justified the increase in oil purchases by citing India’s traditional “stable and friendly” ties with Moscow.

India has maintained a neutral position on the Ukraine war, and has not condemned Russia’s invasion outright, while trying to balance strong ties with Ukraine’s allies in the West. 

During a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in August, Modi stressed that his government championed respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity.

Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry criticized UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres for his reported plan to attend the talks in Kazan, after he skipped Kyiv’s summit seeking a way to end the war with Russia.

“The UN Secretary-General declined Ukraine’s invitation to the first global peace summit in Switzerland,” Kyiv’s Foreign Ministry wrote online.

“He did, however, accept the invitation to Kazan from war criminal Putin. This is a wrong choice that does not advance the cause of peace. It only damages the UN’s reputation.” 

However, it’s not entirely clear whether Guterres will attend in Kazan this week.

Russian officials said earlier this month that the UN chief had told Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov that he would be in Kazan. 

But deputy UN spokesman Farhan Haq told reporters on Monday that Guterres’ future travel plans were not yet set. 

Ukraine’s “peace summit” in Switzerland in June involved representatives of dozens of countries, but perhaps crucially, none from Russia. Moscow denounced it as meaningless.

Russian President Vladimir Putin‘s government has invited two dozen world leaders to Kazan for a summit of the recently expanded BRICS grouping that starts on Tuesday and is set to last for three days.

Russia’s major international partners like Chinese leader Xi Jinping, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan are scheduled to join the summit.

The acronym BRICS stands for the five countries Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, a grouping of emerging economies that is fashioned as an alternative to the Western-led economic order epitomized by the Group of 7 (G7) wealthy western countries. 

The group decided at its 2023 summit to try to expand its ranks. 

Argentina, Ethiopia, Egypt, Iran, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia were all invited to join, although Argentine President Javier Milei declined after winning the election, saying he wanted to take more of a pro-Western course.

The Kremlin likely hopes the meeting in Kazan will show that any political isolation of Russia amid its invasion of Ukraine does not extend far past NATO’s borders. 

jsi,dvv/wmr (AFP, AP, dpa, Reuters)