Moscow’s military lacks manpower needed to stop rapid Ukrainian gains in the Luhansk region, a correspondent embedded with Russian troops says

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday signed a decree that puts the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine under Russian state control — and amends the country’s constitution by admitting new regions into the Russian Federation.

Putin also instructed the cabinet to determine how to regulate and operate the Zaporizhzhia plant — which has been under Russian military control since March — through 2028.

Remember: The annexation of Zaporizhzhia and three other regions has been widely condemned by the international community as “a sham”, and the vast majority of governments have described it as against international law.

The confrontation over the status of the plant, and shelling that has damaged some installations there, has led the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to intervene.

Just as Putin was signing the decree, the Ukrainian state nuclear operator, Energoatom, said its president would assume the duties of the plant’s director general. 

Petro Kotin, Energoatom president, said in a video address to the employees of the plant: “In accordance with the current legislation, approval and regulatory documents, I have decided to take up the duties of the director general of the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant.”

He said the administration of the plant would be transferred directly to Kyiv following the detention by Russian officials of the plant’s general director, Ihor Murashov. The official also noted that operational issues at the plant would be resolved by the technical staff by agreement with the central office of the company.

“Undoubtedly, our work, our destiny, our homes and our future are with Ukraine, as always. We will continue to work in accordance with Ukrainian legislation, in the Ukrainian energy system, in Energoatom. Don’t doubt it!” Kotin noted.

Some more context: On Tuesday, the IAEA said that Murashov will not continue his duties at the nuclear power plant following his release from Russian detention.

The nuclear plant, with six reactors, is the largest in Europe. It continues to be run by Ukrainian technicians, but the forcible annexation of Zaporizhzhia means that according to Russian law it is now on Russian territory.  

Social media images from Wednesday showed Ukrainian troops in at least one village in the eastern Luhansk area, after crossing from the neighboring Donetsk region.

One photograph showed a Ukrainian unit kneeling and standing around a road sign at the village of Hrekivka, just inside Luhansk region.

It is the first time since the beginning of the conflict in March that Ukrainian troops have advanced into Luhansk.  

More on Ukraine’s advances: All of Luhansk region is claimed as Russian territory by the Kremlin, following its forcible annexation. But in recent days Ukrainian forces have been approaching the region from several directions, building on their successful offenses in Kharkiv and Donetsk. 

Social media video also showed Ukrainian troops in the town of Terny in Donetsk region, about 20 kilometers (about 12 miles) from the town of Kreminna in Luhansk, which analysts believe is a critical defensive line for the Russians now that they have lost ground in both Donetsk and Kharkiv regions.

The Ukrainian advances in the northeast come within days of the so-called referendums held by pro-Russian local authorities that led to the annexation by Moscow of Donetsk and Luhansk as well as much of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson. Since the annexation measures were approved by Russian President Vladimir Putin last Friday, Russian forces have lost hundreds of square kilometers of territory in Donetsk and Kherson. 

Russian President Vladimir Putin said he was pleased and surprised by the results of the so-called referendums in four regions of Ukraine that have since been annexed by Russia.

“The results of the referendums, frankly speaking, not only pleased me, but also surprised me — after all, people lived in such difficult conditions, and still continue to live,” Putin said during a televised meeting with Russian teachers on Wednesday. “This result, I assure you, I think the election observers know this as well, there was no desire to correct something, clean something up, add something.”

Remember: The votes are illegal under international law and have been universally dismissed as “a sham” by Ukraine and Western nations. In all four regions that have subsequently been annexed by Russia, the declared vote in favor of joining the Russian Federation was more than 90%. The “votes” – and the results that Russia and its local allies have claimed – are an important step in Russia’s faltering effort to seize control in Ukraine.

Addressing a teacher from the Donbas region, Putin said that these regions will be stabilized and developed while “helping strengthen the country as a whole.”

“We always, despite the tragedy of today, have had great respect for the Ukrainian people and Ukrainian culture, and the Ukrainian language, literature, and so on,” Putin said. “We have never allowed the sort of things that Ukraine allows against Russian culture or the Russian language.”

Kyiv’s forces continue to press forward with territorial gains in the south and east of the country, including in the regions Russia claims it is annexing.

Here’s how the state of control looks right now:

The Russian military lacks the manpower necessary to hold off a further Ukrainian advance into the Luhansk region, a correspondent embedded with the Russian military in the occupied city of Svatove said on Tuesday evening.

“The Russian troops do not have enough manpower to stop the enemy attacks,” Alexander Kots, for Russian pro-government tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda said in a video posted to Telegram. “The recent Russian losses are directly connected to that. It’s a very difficult period of time on the front line at the moment.”

He said that “we expect a serious fighting here very soon,” and that “it remains to be seen if it could stop the enemy advances.”

Kots confirmed that Russian forces were trying to fortify their defense at the line connecting the occupied cities of Kreminna and Svatova. Yuriy Podolyaka, a pro-Russian military blogger said on Monday that Russian troops had withdrawn to the Zherebets River, which runs just west of Kreminna and Svatova.

“The enemy is concentrating its forces to attack Svatove from two directions,” Kots said on Tuesday. “The enemy artillery is reaching and working over the Kreminna-Svatove road and its sabotage and reconnaissance groups can operate there. This area is being fortified by the Russian troops who dig trenches and place land mines.”

He said that Ukrainian forces are “on the high and enjoying a numeric advantage.”

“They don’t have problems with the intelligence data or high precision weapons which they are constantly using. We are just waiting for our reserves to become fighting fit and join the battle.”

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov attends the Victory Day military parade at Red Square in central Moscow, Russia on May 9.

Moscow refrained from giving a concrete answer when asked how the borders of the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions should be defined under the Kremlin’s newly-signed claimed illegal annexations.

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said “certain territories there are still to be returned,” following rapid advances by Ukrainian forces in the south. 

When asked by CNN how he would interpret the language of the laws signed by Putin earlier Wednesday, which refers to the borders of the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions as “the territory which existed on the day of its adoption in the Russian Federation,” Peskov said: “I will leave this question unanswered.”

When asked by CNN if he can provide any comment at all for better understanding, Peskov said: “You should read the decree, there is a legal wording there. On the whole, of course, we are talking about the territory in which the military-civilian administration operated at the time of its adoption (as part of the Russian Federation).”

When asked again by CNN if this should to be read as the territory captured by Russian troops as of September 30, Peskov said: “(You should stick to) what is written in the decree. But I repeat once again: Certain territories there are still to be returned, and we continue to consult with those populations that will express a desire to live with Russia.”

Asked one more time by CNN whether any additional laws would be required to include those areas into the Russian Federation, or whether they would automatically be included as part of the regions under the signed laws, if and when they are “returned,” Peskov said: “For now, I have nothing to add.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin signed into law the documents on the illegal annexation of four Ukrainian regions on Wednesday, completing the last step of the annexation process, based on the Russian legal system. The annexation is illegal under international law. 

Putin’s move comes as Ukrainian forces continue to press forward with territorial gains in the south and east, including in the regions Russia claims it is annexing.

A man walks past a residential building in Lysychansk, the city controlled by pro-Russian troops in the Luhansk region, Ukraine, on September 21.

The “de-occupation” of Ukraine’s eastern Luhansk region “has begun,” according to a regional official.

“Several settlements have already been liberated from the Russian army, from the Russian occupiers,” Serhiy Hayday, head of the Luhansk region’s Ukrainian military administration, said on national television Wednesday.

“All those soldiers realize that a counterattack is just inevitable, they are being defeated.”

After regaining the key eastern city of Lyman, in the Donetsk region, over the weekend, Ukrainian forces have continued their counteroffensive, pushing into the Luhansk region, pro-Russian officials and propagandists said on Monday. 

Russia controls nearly all of Ukraine’s Luhansk region. Ukrainian forces liberated the Luhansk village of Bilohorivka at the end of September.

Hayday urged residents who fled their homes earlier this year not to try to return. 

“I’d like to appeal to everyone,” he said. “First, do not get ahead of yourselves, do not rush to bring stuff and come back. We will let you know when and where exactly you can return. Because it is necessary that the Armed Forces of Ukraine move the front line further, and only then it will be possible to enter certain settlements. The territory must be demined.”

He also urged residents in occupied areas of Luhansk to try to evacuate away from the front line, or to stay in shelters.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday met with his top military and security staff, and considered plans for “further liberation of Ukrainian territories,” according to the president’s office.

“Those present heard information from the intelligence, the headquarters of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and the commanders of the operational directions about the situation at the front and the latest actions of the enemy,” the readout of the meeting read.

“They also discussed the issue of stabilizing the situation in the newly de-occupied areas. Plans regarding further liberation of Ukrainian territories were also considered.”

The participants also “focused on the issue of countering new types of weapons used by the Russian army.”

Among those present were Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov, Commander-in-Chief Valerii Zaluzhny, and Head of the Main Intelligence Directorate Kyrylo Budanov.

Ukrainian forces are making gains in the east as well as in the south, where they are piercing through Moscow’s defenses in the Kherson region.

Earlier Wednesday, Zelensky said that in the Kherson region the towns of Liubymivka, Khreshchenivka, Zolota Balka, Biliaiivka, Ukraiinka, Velyka, Mala Oleksandrivka and Davydiv Brid had all been liberated, “and this is not a complete list.”

Kherson is one of the four regions in Ukraine that Russia has announced it is annexing, in violation of international law.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed into law measures that claim to annex four Ukrainian regions, in violation of international law.

Ukrainian forces have gained ground in the south, pushing even further toward the Russian-occupied city of Kherson.

Here are the latest developments:

• Kremlin signs illegal annexations: Putin signed into law measures that claim to illegally annex the four Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson into the Russian Federation. He also designated “acting heads” of four illegally annexed Ukrainian regions, according to Russian state news agency TASS. The four newly appointed leaders will govern until official heads for the regions are elected in accordance with Russian law, TASS reported Wednesday. 
• Kyiv sweeps the south: The Ukrainian military has liberated multiple towns in the southern Kherson region as part of “the ongoing defensive operation,” according to President Volodymyr Zelensky. Meanwhile, Russian troops are leaving mines in southern Ukrainian villages as they retreat along the western bank of the Dnieper River, the Ukrainian military said on Wednesday.
• Western allies bolster support for Ukraine: US President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky Tuesday and said the US “will never recognize Russia’s annexations.” European Union member states have also agreed on a fresh round of sanctions against Russia, the Czech Presidency of the EU Council announced Wednesday. The EU’s eighth package of sanctions against Russia – which was proposed by the European Commission last week – will include an oil price cap, among other measures.
• Zelensky proposes “special tribunal” for Russian leaders: Zelensky on Wednesday called for the creation of a “special tribunal” to pursue Russian political and military leaders for their role in the invasion of Ukraine. “We must bring to justice those whose decisions started all this,” he told a conference in Paris.
• Miss Crimea fined for singing Ukrainian song: The winner of Miss Crimea 2022, Olga Valeeva, has been fined 40,000 Russian rubles ($680) by occupying Russian authorities for singing a patriotic Ukrainian song, according to Russian state media and pro-Russia regional authorities. Olga Valeeva was spared a jail sentence because she has young children, Russian state news agency TASS reported. A friend who sang with her was sentenced to 10 days in detention.

Marina Ovsyannikova, a former Russian state TV journalist speaks to the press as she arrives for a hearing in a court in Moscow, Russia, on July 28.

Marina Ovsyannikova, the Russian journalist who held up an anti-war poster on Russian state TV, has confirmed that she has left her court-ordered house arrest.

“I consider myself absolutely not guilty and because of our country’s refusal to execute its own laws, I refuse as of 30 September 2022 to observe my pre-trial restriction in a form of a house arrest and I free myself from all that,” Ovsyannikova said in a statement on her Telegram channel. 

A court in August placed her under house arrest until October 9, charging her with disseminating false information about the Russian Armed Forces, TASS reported.

Ovsyannikova, a former employee of Russia Channel One, interrupted a broadcast in March holding up a sign that read: “NO WAR. Stop the war. Do not believe propaganda they tell you lies here.”

At the time, Ovsyannikova told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour that many Russian journalists see a disconnect between reality and what is presented on the country’s television channels, saying “it was simply impossible to stay silent.”

“Dear law enforcers, please put this type of bracelet on Putin as it’s he who should be isolated from society and not me. Putin should be put on trial for the genocide against the people of Ukraine and mass murder of Russia’s male population,” Ovsyannikova said in a separate video on Telegram on Wednesday while pointing to a monitoring bracelet on her ankle.

Russia’s military leadership has “no idea about the number of victims among the civilian population” in Ukraine,” Ovsyannikova added.

“Мaybe some judge’s, prosecutor’s or investigator’s conscience will wake up and they will stop calling the children who died in Ukraine fakes,” she said. “And they will stop prosecuting me for telling the truth.”

“I’ve spent almost two months under house arrest,” she continued, adding that the whole time investigators have been referring to the words of Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and his spokesperson Major-General Igor Konashenkov, “trying to pretend that not a single child died during the war in Ukraine.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin has designated “acting heads” of four illegally annexed Ukrainian regions, according to Russian state news agency TASS. 

The four newly appointed leaders will govern until official heads for the regions are elected in accordance with Russian law, TASS reported Wednesday. 

All four acting heads are the same officials who led the regions under Russian occupation before Putin signed into law the annexation documents, which are in violation of international law. 

Denis Pushilin became acting head of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) and Leonid Pasechnik is now acting head of the Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR), according to TASS. Yevgeny Balitsky will be the acting governor in the Zaporizhzhia region, and Vladimir Saldo is now the acting governor in the Kherson region.

The four officials signed the so-called treaties on the accession of the four respective regions into Russia on September 30 during a ceremony in the Kremlin.

European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell delivers a speech during a debate on the Russian invasion of Ukraine, during a plenary session at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, eastern France, on October 5.

European Union member states have agreed on a fresh round of sanctions against Russia, according to the Czech Presidency of the EU Council.

“Ambassadors reached a political agreement on new sanctions against Russia – a strong EU response to Putin’s illegal annexation of Ukrainian territories,” the Czech Presidency tweeted Wednesday.

The eighth package of sanctions against Russia – which was proposed by the European Commission last week – will include an oil price cap, among other measures.

The package will include prohibition of maritime transport of Russian oil to third countries above the oil price cap, an extended import ban on goods and a ban on providing IT, engineering and legal services to Russian entities, the presidency added.

It will also include new criteria for sanctions circumvention.

“Ambassadors have been working hard on this. Last night they were working, and the committee continued this morning,” the bloc’s top diplomat Josep Borrell said at the EU Parliament earlier Wednesday.

The package is expected to be published later today.

The agreement follows a proposal from the European Commission last week, ahead of Moscow’s illegal annexation of four regions in Ukraine.

Other Western allies have also leveled new sanctions against Russia in the wake of Putin’s announcement.

The White House announced it was imposing “swift and severe costs” on Russia on Friday, including sanctions against the head of Russia’s central bank, Elvira Nabiullina, a figure the Biden administration said is key to the country’s economy.

The UK has unveiled new bans on exports of goods and services to Russia. On Tuesday, it also added Sergei Vladimirovich Yeliseyev, the deputy prime minister of the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad and the head of Moscow-backed authorities in Kherson, to its list of sanctioned individuals.

The Russian-appointed deputy leader in the occupied Kherson region has sought to explain Ukraine’s rapid advance in recent days by saying that the Russian military was “regrouping.”

“The Russian army is conducting maneuvers,” Kirill Stremousov told Russian state news RIA Novosti. “The regrouping of the front in the current conditions allows us to gather strength and strike.”

The Russian Defense Ministry also used the phrase “regrouping” in September to describe the retreat of the Russian military in response to Ukraine’s military operation that recaptured the key city of Izyum, in the northeastern Kharkiv region.

Stremousov on Wednesday claimed that Ukraine’s advance had been stopped, and that it was “impossible” for them to enter the occupied city of Kherson.

Earlier Wednesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed into law measures that claim to annex Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson into the Russian Federation.

The annexations are illegal under international law and have been dismissed by world leaders as the result of “sham” referendums held at gunpoint.

Moscow does not fully control the regions it claims to have annexed, as Kyiv punctures Russia’s defenses and makes key territorial gains amid a sweeping offensive across Ukraine’s south and east.

CNN’s Mick Krever, Josh Pennington and Rob Picheta contributed reporting.

Russian President Vladimir Putin with Ukrainian separatist leaders Vladimir Saldo, left, Yevgeniy Balitsky, second left, Leonid Pasechnik, right, and Denis Pushilin, second right, during the annexation ceremony of four Ukrainian regions at the Kremlin on September 30.

A top Ukrainian official on Wednesday urged Western leaders to stop thinking about Russia through a lens of “normality,” in which negotiations are a possibility.

“Western politicians must get rid of ‘RF’s normality’ illusion, with the negotiating possibility,” said Mykhailo Podolyak, adviser to the head of the office of the Ukrainian President, referring to the Russian Federation.

“Listen to Putin’s speeches. Imbued with contempt for Western world, traditional system of international relations and international law. His dream is Europe under the ‘Russian boot.’”

Earlier on Wednesday, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed into law measures that claim to annex four Ukrainian regions into the Russian Federation. The claimed annexations of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson are illegal under international law.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky delivers an address via video link to the participants of the public debate “War and Law” in Paris, France, on October 4.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday called for the creation of a “special tribunal” to pursue Russian political and military leaders for their role in the invasion of Ukraine.

“We must bring to justice those whose decisions started all this,” he told a conference in Paris. “Those who committed the original crime. A crime in which all the evil shown by the Russian occupiers is concentrated.

“And we still do not have such an institutional basis to hold the Russian political and military leadership accountable for the crime of aggression.”

Zelensky praised the work of the International Criminal Court for investigating alleged crimes committed by Russian troops on Ukrainian territory. But he added that “for the original crime of armed aggression to receive a fair answer as well, we must supplement the activities of the International Criminal Court.”

“A special tribunal should be established for the crime of aggression against Ukraine. So that it can punish those who, unfortunately, cannot be reached by the International Criminal Court and all other available judicial institutions of the world,” Zelensky said.

“You all know how the leadership of Russia, hiding behind false stories about state sovereignty, avoids fair responsibility for what it has done. We have to overcome that.”

The winner of Miss Crimea 2022 Olga Valeeva poses for an Instagram selfie.

The winner of Miss Crimea 2022 has been fined 40,000 Russian rubles ($680) by occupying Russian authorities for singing a patriotic Ukrainian song, according to Russian state media and pro-Russia regional authorities.

Olga Valeeva was spared a jail sentence because she has young children, Russian state news agency TASS reported. Her friend was sentenced to 10 days detention.

“In Crimea, no one is punished for normal Ukrainian songs,” Oleg Kriuchkov, adviser to the Russian administration head of occupied Crimea, said on Telegram. 

“But! No one will allow nationalist hymns to be sung here! If you want to sing ‘Chervona Kalyna’ or ‘Our father is Bandera…’ we will provide a platform – we will take you to neutral territory to Nikolaev or Zaporozhzhia. Sing all you want!”

What she sang: “Chervona Kalyna” is a patriotic Ukrainian song that has gained virality over the course of Russia’s full-scale invasion, including a cover version by Pink Floyd. The lyrics urge the Ukrainian nation to rise up and “rejoice” like a red kalyna shrub (“chervona kalyna”) that has drooped in the field.

The Ukrainian region of Crimea was illegally annexed by Russian in 2014.

A spokesperson for the Ministry of Internal Affairs in Crimea said that it identified a video online in which “two girls sang a song that is the battle anthem of an extremist organization.”

The two were detained on suspicion of “committing illegal actions aimed at discrediting the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, as well as publicly displaying prohibited symbols,” the spokesperson added. They were subsequently found guilty by a court, the ministry said.

Correction: An earlier version of this post misstated the reason why Valeeva was spared jail. According to Russian state media, it is because she has young children.

Russian war correspondent Alexander Sladkov at the Ostankino TV Center in Moscow on June, 23, 2021.

A top Russian war correspondent on Tuesday conceded on state television that Russian forces had endured significant losses at the hands of Ukraine’s counteroffensive, saying “we are still learning.”

“In the Kherson region, we have lost 17 settlements,” Alexander Sladkov said, placing the blame on “fat” US weapons deliveries and “intelligence gathered via satellite reconnaissance.”

Sladkov is one of several Russian reporters in recent days to convey the losses Moscow is suffering in Ukraine.

War correspondent Alexander Kots told his Telegram followers Tuesday that the military was in “operational crisis,” while state media reporter Evgeniy Poddubnyy said, “for the time being it will become even harder.”

Sladkov, however, tried to put a positive spin on things.

“This doesn’t mean that we’ve collapsed like a house of cards. These mistakes aren’t gigantic strategic failures. We are still learning,” he said. “I know this is hard to hear in our eighth month of the special operation. But we are reporters. We are waiting for reinforcements,” he added, referring to Russian men conscripted as part of a “special mobilization” declared by President Vladimir Putin last month.

Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks in Moscow on September 30.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed into law measures that claim to annex four Ukrainian regions into the Russian Federation.

The claimed annexations of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson are illegal under international law.

Leaders around the world have said they are the result of “sham” referendums held at gunpoint, and will never be recognized.

However, the move is an important step in Russia’s faltering effort to seize control in Ukraine, with Putin claiming that the will of occupied Ukrainians is to belong to Russia — offering a false pretext to his efforts to claim the occupied territories as Moscow’s.

Western officials have previously suggested that Putin will likely seek to reframe Ukraine’s counteroffensive in the four regions and any others as an attack on Russia sovereignty.

Some context: Russia does not fully control the regions it claims to have annexed and Moscow is losing territory to the Ukrainian military in the south and east of the country by the day. In some areas, such as Kherson, those losses are coming at a rapid pace.

The Kremlin does not even appear to be clear on the borders of the territory it is annexing. Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov on Monday said “we will continue consulting with the population of these regions.”

A regional Ukrainian official in the Zaporizhzhia region said on Tuesday that Russia was trying to establish a “state border” at the Vasylivka checkpoint, which separates Russian-held territory from the rest of Ukraine, including the regional capital of Zaporizhzhia.

Russian troops are leaving mines in southern Ukrainian villages as they retreat along the western bank of the Dnieper River, the Ukrainian military said on Wednesday.

“Leaving the settlements in the Kherson region, the enemy mines infrastructure facilities and private houses, prohibits any movement of local residents,” the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said in its morning briefing. 

It comes as Ukrainian forces have made additional gains in the south, pushing toward the occupied city of Kherson and capturing the town of Zolota Balka on the western bank of the Dnipro river, according to a regional official and pro-Russian military blogger.

Conscription claims: The Ukrainian Armed Forces also claimed Wednesday that pro-Russian authorities in occupied areas of Ukraine were “trying to compensate for the loss of personnel” on the battlefield by conscripting Ukrainians into the Russian military.

“According to the available information, men from Luhansk, without conducting a medical commission and training, after mobilization are immediately sent to replenish the units that suffered the greatest losses,” the General Staff said.

Ukrainian officials have been warning for some time that Russia planned to use its claimed annexations as a pretext to draft Ukrainians in occupied areas.

On Monday, the Ukrainian military said Russian troops were carrying out “door-to-door” checks in occupied areas of Ukraine, looking for young men of conscription age, adding that Moscow had stepped up document inspections at checkpoints.

Governor of the Kyiv region, Oleksiy Kuleba, speaks during an interview in Kyiv on March 8.

Russian forces on Wednesday launched repeated attacks with Iranian-supplied “kamikaze drones” against targets in Ukraine’s Kyiv region and to the south in Odesa, killing at least one person, according to Ukrainian officials. 

“There have been a repeated series of kamikaze drone strikes on Bila Tserkva infrastructure,” Oleksiy Kuleba, head of the Kyiv region state administration, posted on Telegram. “There are fires at infrastructure facilities. There is one victim.”

Kuleba added emergency crews were responding and asked all Kyiv residents “to remain in their shelters.”  

“The danger is still present,” Kuleba warned, as air raid sirens sounded in the region.

Kirilo Tymoshenko, deputy head of Ukraine’s presidential office, said Russian forces had also launched an attack on the southern port city of Odesa with a “Shahed-136” kamikaze drone. 

Tymoshenko said Ukrainian air defense forces were able to “detect and destroy the enemy’s drone over the sea,” in a post on his Telegram account.

Unverified videos posted on social media Wednesday showed fire and plumes of smoke in the night sky following the attack on Bila Tserkva south of Kyiv.

Some context: US intelligence warned in July that Tehran planned to send Russia “hundreds” of bomb-carrying drones for use in the war in Ukraine. In August, a US official told CNN Russian troops were believed to have been training on the Iranian built drones for several weeks.

Iran began showcasing the Shahed-191 and Shahed-129 drones, also known as UAVs or Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, to Russia at Kashan Airfield south of Tehran in June, US officials told CNN. 

Both types of drones are capable of carrying precision-guided missiles. 

Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno attends a news conference in Tokyo on August 24.

Japan will reopen its embassy in Ukraine’s capital Kyiv on Wednesday following a seven-month closure due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

“After careful consideration, we have decided to reopen the Japanese embassy in Kyiv while taking sufficient safety measures into account,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno told reporters at a news conference. 

Japan temporarily closed its embassy in Kyiv in early March, transferring staff members and operations to a temporary liaison office in the western city of Lviv. Embassy staff left Ukraine later that month as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine intensified.

Japan’s move Wednesday comes as other Group of Seven nations also resume diplomatic operations in Ukraine.

Ukrainian police on Tuesday claimed to have uncovered a “torture chamber” in the formerly Russian-occupied town of Pisky-Radkivski in the northeastern Kharkiv region.

Among the items found, according to police, was a container full of extracted gold teeth.

“After the liberation of the village of Pisky-Radkivski, local residents reported to the police that in the basement of one of the houses captives were kept — local residents, ATO [Anti-Terrorist Operation] soldiers and POWs from the Armed Forces of Ukraine,” Serhiy Bolvinov, head of the investigation department of the National Police in the Kharkiv region, said in a statement on Facebook.

Bolvinov said local residents heard constant screaming from the building.

“Investigators and prosecutors are working to establish all the facts that took place in this torture chamber,” he said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky speaks during his evening video message on Tuesday, October 4.

Ukrainian forces have pushed even further toward the Russian-occupied city of Kherson, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Tuesday.

“The Ukrainian army is making a rather fast and powerful advance in the south of our country in the course of the ongoing defensive operation,” Zelensky said in his evening address. “Dozens of settlements have already been liberated from the Russian pseudo-referendum this week alone.”

In the southern Kherson region, he said the towns of Liubymivka, Khreshchenivka, Zolota Balka, Biliaiivka, Ukraiinka, Velyka, Mala Oleksandrivka and Davydiv Brid had all been liberated, “and this is not a complete list.”

Kherson is one of the four regions in Ukraine that Russia has claimed it is annexing in violation of international law.

US military aid to Ukraine is hastening the possibility of a “direct military clash” between Russia and NATO, a Russian diplomat said on Tuesday.

“The US continues to pump more weapons into Ukraine, facilitating the direct participation of its fighters and advisers in the conflict,” Konstantin Vorontsov, the head of the Russian delegation to the United Nations Disarmament Commission, said at the UN General Assembly’s First Committee.

The diplomat’s comments come as the US announced an additional $625 million in security assistance to Ukraine. In a statement Tuesday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken cited Ukrainian forces effectively using US support to push ahead with their “successful counteroffensive to take back their lands seized illegally by Russia.” 

US President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky Tuesday morning — days after Russian President Vladimir Putin declared Moscow would annex four Ukrainian territories following so-called referendums that were universally dismissed as “a sham” by Ukraine and Western nations. 

Biden and Harris underscored “that the United States will never recognize Russia’s purported annexation of Ukrainian territory” and Biden “affirmed the continued readiness of the United States to impose severe costs on any individual, entity, or country that provides support to Russia’s purported annexation,” a White House readout said.

Biden reiterated his country’s commitment to supporting Ukraine and the leaders discussed a new $625 million security assistance package, which includes four more rocket systems, known as the High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS), as well as additional howitzers and ammunition, as CNN reported previously.

They also discussed a grain export agreement and “ongoing efforts of the United States to rally the world behind Ukraine’s efforts to defend its freedom and democracy, as enshrined in the United Nations Charter,” the readout said.

A map used by the Russian Defense Ministry in its daily briefing on Tuesday confirmed significant Russian losses in Ukraine’s Kherson region, compared to a map of the same region used during its briefing on Monday.

The map confirms reports from Ukrainian and pro-Russian officials, as well as pro-Russian military analysts, of significant Ukrainian advances toward the occupied city of Kherson, down the western bank of the Dnipro River. 

Lt. Gen. Igor Konashenkov, who spoke while the map was shown full-screen, did not mention the losses. But he did say the Russian military destroyed Ukrainian armor and killed Kyiv’s forces in the area of several towns that are now understood to be under Ukrainian control — a tacit acknowledgement of Ukraine’s advance.

As Vladimir Putin lost more of the Ukrainian territory he is seeking to annex, his government on Tuesday sought to finalize the formalities of its claim to four Ukrainian regions, none of which are fully controlled by Russia anymore.

The upper house of Russia’s rubber-stamp legislature, the Federation Council, on Tuesday unanimously approved the decision to annex the Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia in defiance of international law and a day after the lower chamber had done the same. President Putin was expected to sign the legislation later in the day, his spokesman said.

Kyiv’s military, however, has continued to advance into several of the areas Russia now claims as its own, spurring questions about whether the Kremlin can hold the parts of those territories it currently controls — and even what Russia would consider its new border after the annexation. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday that Moscow needed to “continue consulting” with the local populations before establishing its boundaries.

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