EU foreign ministers voiced their support for Ukraine during a historic meeting in Kiev on Monday, coming after a pro-Russian candidate won elections in Slovakia and the US Congress excluded war aid for Ukraine from the budget bill . Kiev has dismissed concerns that support for its war effort is waning on both sides of the Atlantic. “We do not feel that US support has been shaken … because the United States understands that the stakes in Ukraine are much higher than Ukraine,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said.
Ukrainian soldiers in the Kupyansk areaPhoto: Narciso Contreras / AFP / Profimedia
Main information about the war in Ukraine, day 587, LIVETEXT:
07:41 The eastern Ukrainian metropolis of Kharkiv will build Ukraine’s first fully underground school to protect students from frequent Russian bomb and missile attacks, the city’s mayor said.
“Such a shelter will allow several thousand children in Kharkiv to continue their face-to-face education safely even during missile threats,” Mayor Ihor Terekhov wrote on Telegram.
While many schools in front-line regions were forced to teach online throughout the war, Kharkiv organized around 60 separate classrooms in its metro stations ahead of the school year that started on September 1, creating space for more than 1,000 children to learn there.
Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest city, had a population of over 1.4 million before the invasion. (Reuters)
06:58Italy is working on the eighth package of weapons to be sent to Ukraine. Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani met with Zelenskiy on the sidelines of the EU Foreign Affairs Council in Kyiv.
01:23 Unofficial Telegram channels in Russia say that under the terms of Yevgeny Prigozhin’s will, his assets and control of his business empire were bequeathed to his 25-year-old son, Pavel Prigozhin.
00:41The White House has spoken with allies about possible delays in new funds for Ukraine
Brief recap of recent information:
- Ukraine has removed the Hungarian bank OTP from its list of “international war sponsors” that includes companies accused of financially supporting the Russian invasion, the Ukrainian National Agency for the Prevention of Corruption announced on Monday
- Ukrainian victory depends on cooperation with Europe, Zelenskiy told EU foreign ministers gathered in Kiev on Monday, in an informal meeting not announced in advance.
- Russia is “dedicating an enormous amount of resources” to creating divisions among Kiev’s allies, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said on Monday, hours after Kremlin comments on Western “fatigue” in aid to Ukraine. The Kremlin assured on Monday that the “fatigue” of supporting Ukraine will grow among Westerners, at a time when EU foreign ministers are trying to prove otherwise by meeting in Kiev.
- Russia said on Monday that the decision by the US Congress to pass a law that avoids defunding the US government but lacks aid to Kiev does not indicate that Washington’s multibillion-dollar support for Ukraine will change soon.
- Russians again needed close to 100 rubles to buy a dollar on Monday, the exchange rate before the country’s central bank raised its benchmark interest rate to try to halt the decline.
- A senior Ukrainian official has called for a reassessment of Western anti-aircraft systems supplied to Ukraine, saying simpler, cheaper weapons could be more cost-effective to counter Iran-made Russian Shahed drones
- Slovakia accuses Russia of “interference” in Slovak parliamentary elections held on Saturday and is summoning a diplomat from the Russian embassy in Bratislava.
- The Republic of Moldova will no longer buy gas from Gazprom, the Moldovan Minister of Energy, Victor Parlicov, said on Monday.
- Numerous foreign companies, including from the West, continue to collect billions of rubles in revenue in Russia, despite sanctions and calls to boycott the country led by Vladimir Putin over the war in Ukraine
- A Ukrainian tank commander has called a factory in Russia that makes T-72 tanks to complain about the numerous problems he is having with the vehicle captured by his unit from the Russian army.
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