Russia Ukraine war live: Kyiv spy boss reveals secret assassination campaign against pro-Kremlin collaborators

Kyrgyzstan’s foreign ministry has urged citizens of the Central Asian nation to put off unnecessary travel to Russia after a deadly shooting that was blamed on migrants from the region.

The developments have increased existing anti-immigrant sentiment in Russia, especially towards migrant labourers from the predominantly Muslim countries of Central Asia.

A Kyrgyzstan-born man was remanded in pre-trial custody by a Russian court on Tuesday, accused of providing accommodation to the four suspected perpetrators, who are of Tajik origin. Those four and three others of Tajik origin suspected of complicity are also in pre-trial detention.

Islamic State has said it was responsible for the attack and has released video footage of the massacre, which killed 139 people and wounded 182. The group has not identified any of the attackers.

Hundreds of thousands of people from Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan work in Russia, and some have already said it has become tougher for them to do so. Some passengers, for example, refuse to board taxis with Tajik drivers.

A Ukrainian spy boss has revealed a secretive assassination campaign which is possibly being carried out by Ukraine’s national spy service to target pro-Kremlin collaborators.

In an hour-long televised interview, Lieutenant General Vasyl Malyuk, an SBU senior officer, said spiekd had targeted “very many” people responsible for Ukrainian war crimes.

This included clandestine operations to kill Ukrainian nationals collaborating with Moscow to arrest other Ukrainians, with the SBU sanctioned to carry out assassinations once their intelligence had been confirmed.

Notable deaths included Vladlen Tatarsky, a Kremlin propagandist and media personality, who was targeted for his calls for the elimination of Ukrainians.

He was handed an explosive-rigged statuette in a St Petersburg cafe in April last year, with Mr Malyuk saying he deserved it given his repeated abuse of Ukrainian prisoners of war.

Former parliament member Ilya Kyva, who was a fugitive from Kyiv authorities after being convicted of treason, was another high-profile execution. He had been collaborating with Russia’s FSB when he was killed by an assassin who shot him at close range in a park in suburban Moscow.

In one assassination attempt that failed, close Vladimir Putin ally Aleksander Dugin had switched cars at the last minute with his daughter, who was killed when the vehicle, which had been rigged with a bomb, exploded in Moscow.

France will soon be able to deliver 78 Caesar howitzers to Ukraine and will boost its supply of shells to meet Kyiv‘s urgent needs for ammunition to fight Russia‘s full-scale invasion, the defense minister said Tuesday.

Defense Minister Sébastien Lecornu said at a news conference that an agreement was reached among France, Ukraine and Denmark to finance the Caesar self-propelled 155 mm howitzers, which will enable France to “quickly deliver” them.

France has also set a goal to deliver 80,000 shells for 155 mm guns to Ukraine this year — up from 30,000 delivered since the beginning of the war on Feb. 24, 2022, he said.

Read the full article here:

Ukraine’s air force chief said on Wednesday that Russia launched 13 Shahed drones at Ukraine overnight, 10 of which were downed in Kharkiv, Sumy and Kyiv regions.

“Anti-aircraft missile units, mobile fire groups, electronic warfare equipment … were involved in repelling the air attack,” Mykola Oleshchuk said.

Ukraine needs any edge it can get to repel Russia from its territory. One emerging bright spot is its small but fast-growing defense industry, which the government is flooding with money in hopes that a surge of homemade weapons and ammunition can help turn the tide.

The effort ramped up sharply over the past year as the U.S. and Europe strained to deliver weapons and other aid to Ukraine, which is up against a much bigger Russian military backed by a thriving domestic defense industry.

The Ukrainian government budgeted nearly $1.4 billion in 2024 to buy and develop weapons at home — 20 times more than before Russia’s full-scale invasion.

The suspects, identified by Russian authorities as being from Tajikistan, a Central Asian nation bordering Afghanistan, were allegedly picked up in the Bryansk region about 210 miles southwest of Moscow hours after the attack.

Both Ukraine and its western allies, including the US, have denied any involvement in the attack.

The 32-year-old US citizen was arrested in late March 2023 while on a reporting trip and has spent nearly a year behind bars. His arrest was extended until June 30.

Gershkovich and his employer have denied the allegations, and the US government has declared him to be wrongfully detained.

Production at a weapons plant in Northern Ireland has doubled, and is set to double again following Russia’s war in Ukraine.

Thales UK operate two sites in the region – with high precision missiles designed and produced at a plant in east Belfast, and final missile assembly at another plant in Crossgar, Co Down.

It designs and produces missiles including Starstreak, Lightweight Multi-role Missile (LMM) systems as well as final assembly of the Saab designed NLAW.

They have also trained UK and Ukraine soldiers in the south of England.

A Moscow court has ordered Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich to remain in jail on espionage charges until at least late June, court officials said.

The 32-year-old US citizen was arrested in late March 2023 while on a reporting trip and has spent nearly a year behind bars. His arrest was extended until 30 June.

Mr Gershkovich and The Journal have denied the allegations from Moscow, and the US government has declared him to be wrongfully detained.

His arrest in the city of Yekaterinburg rattled journalists in Russia, where authorities have not detailed what, if any, evidence they have to support the espionage charges.

Russia has executed at least 32 Ukrainian prisoners of war (POWs) it had recently captured, a report by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights said yesterday.

The executions were carried out between 1 December 2023 and 29 February this year.

OHCHR said it recorded 12 cases of executions of at least 32 captured Ukrainian POWs during the winter, indicating that the Russian officials carried out these killings in groups.

“OHCHR has verified three of these incidents in which Russian servicemen executed seven Ukrainian servicemen hors de combat,” according to the report, which is based on interviews with 60 Ukrainian soldiers released from captivity.

Ukraine has flagged reports of torture or killings of Ukrainian POWs in Russian captivity since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2024.