Kyiv tells Putin to expect ‘daily’ attacks after Moscow drone shot down – live

Establishing accurate data on the number of military casualties sustained since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine began on 24 February 2022 is difficult for two reasons.

The severity of the fighting on the ground and the fact that both sides are inclined to keep their cards close to their chests to avoid damaging morale – especially at a time when the war is entering a pivotal new stage.

My colleague Joe Sommerlad has this guide to the varying publicly available estimates of the toll of Russia’s war has taken on its troops:

Ukraine has begun holding consultations with the UK to agree upon security guarantees aimed to be in place the end of the year, a senior Ukrainian official has said.

Kyiv is pushing to secure security guarantees from multiple nations, including the United States, pending what it hopes will be its eventual accession to Nato.

“Our goal is to have the first such agreements in place by the end of the year,” Volodymr Zelensky’s chief of staff Andriy Yermak said in televised comments.

“Our consultations with Britain have begun,” he said.

Washington has said it is open to training Ukrainian pilots to fly F-16 fighter jets in the United States if capacity for such training is reached in Europe.

White House spokesperson John Kirby told reporters that Washington is eager to move forward with the training.

Since Vladimir Putin rose to power as Russia’s president 23 years ago, few things have rocked his leadership as much as Saturday 24 June when Wagner mercenaries barrelled towards Moscow.

The “army within an army” who had been ruthlessly grinding away for months at the vanguard of some of the bloodiest fighting in eastern flanks Ukraine were now on the verge of triggering a war within a war – this time, against the Kremlin.

Prigozhin himself was due to head to Belarus – although he has been pictured in Russia since – with an invitation for Wagner fighters to gather in Belarus. Thousands are set to entered the country since.

The US imposed new sanctions on Friday on four Russians linked to financial and investment conglomerate Alfa Group and a Russian business association, the Treasury Department said in a statement announcing the latest measures targeting Moscow’s financial elite over the war in Ukraine.

The Treasury said it was targeting four men who have served on the supervisory board of the Alfa Group – Petr Olegivich Aven, Mikhail Maratovich Fridman, German Borisovich Khan and Alexey Viktorovich Kuzmichev – one of Russia‘s largest financial and investment conglomerates under sanctions against the country’s financial services sector.

It also imposed sanctions on the Russian Association of Employers the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, Reuters reported.

Wealthy Russian elites should disabuse themselves of the notion that they can operate business as usual while the Kremlin wages war against the Ukrainian people, deputy secretary of the Treasury, Wally Adeyemo said in the statement.

Russia‘s embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to Reuters’ request for comment.

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky said the day “began with the sounds of air defense in the background” in his daily night-time address.

“We worked on rescue operations following Russian strikes, increasing defense production, cleaning up corruption in military recruiting, the Peace Formula, alternative grain export routes, and frontline efforts,” he summarised, alongside his video message on X (formerly Twitter).

Russia attacked the western Ukrainian region of Ivano-Frankivsk with hypersonic missiles on Friday, hitting areas near a military airfield and killing an eight-year-old boy, Ukrainian officials said.

Air defences shot down one of the four Kinzhal missiles near the capital Kyiv as they hurtled towards western Ukraine hundreds of miles from the front, the air force said.

Air Force Colonel Yuriy Ihnat suggested the attack had been aimed at Ukrainian pilots who were about to travel to the West to train to use F-16 fighter jets that Kyiv hopes will eventually be delivered.

In Kyiv’s northern Obolon district, missile fragments crashed into the grounds of a children’s hospital, damaged the roof of a house and also fell on a complex of country homes. Mayor Vitali Klitschko reported no casualties.

Sitting with Olena Zelenska in the fortified presidential complex in Kyiv, her understated delivery belied a strong defiance of Russia’s invasion, writes The Independent‘s Bel Trew.

“Britain’s sanctions against Moscow’s war machine were quickly expanded in the wake of our interview.”

Local media reported that the Russia-appointed head of occupied Lazurne in Kherson allegedly announced residents without Russian passports would be denied insulin and other medicines.

He also reportedly said children who don’t want to study in Russian schools would be “taken to the contact line”.