Kremlin: occupied Ukrainian regions ‘will be with Russia forever’ despite retreats
The Kremlin said this morning that there was no contradiction between incorporating Ukrainian territories into the Russian Federation and military retreats, saying that Moscow would press ahead with its plans to annex four Ukrainian regions.
“They will be with Russia forever and they will be returned,” Reuters reports Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told the media.
President Vladimir Putin formalised the annexation of the four Ukrainian regions – around 18% of Ukraine’s territory – this morning despite a series of major battlefield reversals in recent days shrinking the amount of seized territory Moscow can say it actually controls.
Key events
Here are some of the latest images to be sent to us from Ukraine over the news wires.
Kate Connolly
Garry Kasparov, the former World Chess Champion and anti-Putin regime campaigner, has given an interview to the German news magazine Spiegel in which he says that “every Russian who is living in Russia now is part of the war machine” and demands that those who want to stand on the right side of history should leave.
Kasparov tells the magazine that he has spent 20 years fighting against Vladimir Putin. “I always said that his regime would unavoidably become a fascist threat – not only for Russia, not only for its neighbours, but for the entire world. It would have been nice if a few more people would have taken this warning to heart.”
Asked by Spiegel if being abroad – he has lived in political exile since 2013 – he wasn’t in too comfortable a position to be making such demands of those who have yet to leave Russia, he said: “This is war. Either you’re on one side of the front or the other. Every Russian citizen, including me, carries collective responsibility for this war, even if not a personal responsibility. Today Russia is a fascistic dictatorship, which, while we’re speaking here, is carrying out crimes against humanity. And everyone who is still living in Russia now, is a part of this war machinery, whether he wants to be or not.”
Kasparov said Russians who want to be given asylum elsewhere should first have to sign a three-point declaration in which they would “declare the war to be criminal, the Putin regime illegitimate and Ukraine indivisible,” Kasparov said. By signing it, the individual would be liable for prosecution in Russia on three counts according to laws Putin has put in place, he added.
The 59-year old chess grandmaster makes the interesting claim that Putin “never played chess, but poker, and he was good at geopolitical poker. He often played with bad cards and won, because his opponents fell for his bluff.”
The Financial Times is quoting Ihor Romanenko, a former deputy head of Ukraine’s general staff, on how vital it is that Ukrainian forces are able to make swift progress during this phase of their counter-offensive. The newspaper reports he said:
Certainly it is crucial to advance swiftly in liberating occupied territory because there is a sense that changes in the weather will limit further active military actions in this region. If our allies were to help us by providing more of the modern weaponry we are asking for, then the situation would be much swifter and we would not be talking about the factor of weather.
Russian news agency RIA is carrying quotes from the deputy foreign minister of Russia Sergei Vershinin confirming that International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) director general Rafael Grossi will be visiting Moscow. It quotes Vershinin saying:
I confirm reports that Grossi is going to come to Kyiv, and then to Moscow. In terms of time, these will be the next few days.
Vershinin went on to say:
Grossi put forward a number of ideas that are now being discussed with experts. The task is nuclear safety and the exclusion of shelling of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, which is carried out by the Ukrainian side, and the normal functioning of the nuclear power plant.
The IAEA has previously called for a nuclear safety exclusion zone around the plant, which has been occupied by Russian forces since March. Until now it has continued to be operated by staff employed by Energoatom, Ukraine’s state-enterprise which manages the plant.
However, the plant sits on land that has now been claimed to be annexed by Russia, and Vershinin said: “The Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant is now on the territory of the Russian Federation and, accordingly, should be operated under the supervision of our relevant agencies.”
Both Russian and Ukraine have accused the other side of shelling the plant and risking a nuclear accident.
Reuters is reporting some diplomatic tension between Russia and Kazakhstan over the Ukraine war with Kazakh authorities rejecting a demand from Russia that they expel Ukraine’s ambassador over comments about killing Russians, chiding Moscow for what they called an inappropriate tone between “equal strategic partners”.
Ukraine’s ambassador in Astana, Petro Vrublevskiy, said in August in an interview with a local blogger that “the more Russians we kill now, the fewer of them our children will have to kill”.
Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova on Tuesday said Moscow was “outraged” by the fact that Vrublevskiy was still in Astana and had summoned the Kazakh ambassador.
Kazakh foreign ministry spokesman Aibek Smadiyarov on Wednesday called Zakharova’s tone “discordant with the nature of the allied relations between Kazakhstan and Russia as equal strategic partners”, adding that the Russian ambassador would in turn be summoned to the Kazakh ministry.
British PM Truss: there should be no peace deal which ‘trades away Ukrainian land’
The British Prime Minister Liz Truss has said that Ukraine “will win” and that no peace deal should give away Ukrainian territory while addressing the annual conference of the UK’s ruling Conservative party in Birmingham. She said:
The Ukrainian people aren’t just fighting for their security but for all of our security. This is a fight for freedom and democracy around the world.
Putin’s illegal annexation of Ukrainian territory is just the latest act in his campaign to subvert democracy and violate international law.
We should not give in to those who want a deal which trades away Ukrainian land. They are proposing to pay in Ukrainian lives for the illusion of peace.
We will stand with our Ukrainian friends, however long it takes. Ukraine can win. Ukraine must win. And Ukraine will win.
She received one of the warmest rounds of applause of her speech for the section on Ukraine and went on to say that she was sure that Volodymyr Zelenskiy and the Ukrainian people would appreciate “our solidarity with them at this very difficult time”.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov was asked in his regular briefing about the borders of Russia’s claimed annexation. He said:
Read the order. There is a legal wording there. In general, of course, there we are talking about the territory in which the military-civilian administration operated at the time of admission [to Russia]. But I repeat once again: certain territories there will be returned, and we will continue to consult with the population that expresses a desire to live with Russia.
The state-owned Tass news agency reported earlier:
New regions within Russia will retain the status of republics and regions and their former names. According to the documents, the boundaries of the regions will be determined by their borders, which “existed on the day of their formation and acceptance into the Russian Federation”. The territory of the DPR and LPR is defined by the 2014 borders established in their constitutions. Zaporizhzhia is part of the Russian Federation within its administrative boundaries, and Kherson region – with two districts of the Mykolaiv region, explained the head of the State Duma Committee on State Building and Legislation Pavel Krasheninnikov.
Kremlin: occupied Ukrainian regions ‘will be with Russia forever’ despite retreats
The Kremlin said this morning that there was no contradiction between incorporating Ukrainian territories into the Russian Federation and military retreats, saying that Moscow would press ahead with its plans to annex four Ukrainian regions.
“They will be with Russia forever and they will be returned,” Reuters reports Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told the media.
President Vladimir Putin formalised the annexation of the four Ukrainian regions – around 18% of Ukraine’s territory – this morning despite a series of major battlefield reversals in recent days shrinking the amount of seized territory Moscow can say it actually controls.
Russian forces lost a vast numbers of tanks during the first few months of the war, prompting questions over whether they were becoming obsolete. But the tank has previously appeared to have been consigned to the ash heap of history only to rise again to reaffirm its relevance. Josh Toussaint-Strauss examines for the Guardian Russia’s early deployment during the invasion and asks: if tanks aren’t the problem, why did they fail in Ukraine?
Summary of the day so far …
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Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed the four laws ratifying the Russian Federation’s claimed annexation of the occupied Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson. Russian forces do not fully control any of the four areas, and it remains unclear where Russia is attempting to set its new external border.
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Ukraine has made major and rapid advances this week, with President Volodymyr Zelenskiy saying in an address on Tuesday night that “dozens” of towns have been recaptured. Ukrainian forces captured the town of Dudchany on the west bank of the Dnipro River in their major advance in Kherson region, and in the east, Ukrainian forces were advancing after capturing Lyman, the main Russian bastion in the north of Donetsk province.
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Pro-Russian leaders in the occupied regions have claimed that the situation is stabilising this morning. Denis Pushilin, installed as governor in Donetsk by Russia has said “the situation on the front line in the Lyman direction is stabilising, the defence line is being strengthened”, while Kirill Stremousov, part of the occupation administration imposed on Kherson, has been quoted saying that Russian forces were “conducting a regrouping in order to gather their strength and deliver a retaliatory blow” in the region, and “the advance of the armed forces of Ukraine in the Kherson direction has stopped”.
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The UK ministry of defence has said in its daily operational briefing that “Ukraine continues to make progress in offensive operations along both the north-eastern and southern fronts. In the north-east, in Kharkiv Oblast, Ukraine has now consolidated a substantial area of territory east of the Oskil River.”
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Russia’s foreign ministry has said the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant (ZNPP) will operate under the supervision of Russian agencies after the annexation declaration. Rafael Grossi, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, is expected to visit Moscow in the coming days to discuss the situation at the plant, which has been occupied by Russian forces since the earliest days of the war. Energoatom, the Ukrainian state-enterprise that owns the plant, has said it may restart it to ensure safety.
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Oleksandr Starukh, Ukraine’s governor of Zaporizhzhia, said that overnight “the enemy fired rockets at the regional centre and the outskirts of the city. Infrastructure facilities were destroyed.”
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Zelenskiy has posted a series of images of damaged buildings across social media from recently liberated Lyman, with the message: “Our Lyman after the occupier. All basics of life have been destroyed here. They are doing so everywhere in the territories they seize. This can be stopped in one way only: liberate Ukraine, life, humanity, law and truth as soon as possible.”
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Russian TV journalist Marina Ovsyannikova, famous for staging an on-air protest against Russia’s war in Ukraine, confirmed she had escaped house arrest over further charges of spreading fake news, saying she had no case to answer.
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Anatoly Antonov, Russia’s ambassador to the United States, says Washington’s decision to send more military aid to Ukraine poses a threat to Moscow’s interests and increases the risk of a military clash between Russia and the west.
This is Martin Belam in London, and I will be with you for the next few hours. You can contact me at [email protected]
The BBC’s Orla Guerin earlier published some pictures from her recent visit to areas that have been liberated from Russian occupation, saying: “The Russians are gone but there is damage that can never be undone, and the dead cannot be restored to life.”
Some images from our trip – in areas recently liberated by Ukraine. The Russians are gone but there is damage that can never be undone, and the dead cannot be restored to life. pic.twitter.com/dikvQgvmsB
— Orla Guerin (@OrlaGuerin) October 5, 2022
There are another couple of quotes on Telegram from sources within the Russian-occupied Donetsk region from Denis Pushilin, who is Russia’s acting governor in the territory it has claimed to annex there.
He has said that “the situation on the frontline in the Lyman direction is stabilising, the defence line is being strengthened”, and that “we see that Ukrainian armed forces are now seriously supplemented by brigades that were trained in Nato countries, this must be taken into account”.
Russia’s foreign ministry has said the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant will operate under the supervision of Russian agencies after Russia claimed to have formally annexed the wider Zaporizhzhia region, the RIA state-owned news agency reported.
Reuters reports that another state-owned news agency, Tass, carried news that Rafael Grossi, head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, will visit Moscow in the coming days to discuss the situation at the plant, which has been occupied by Russian forces since the earliest days of the war.
Tass is also reporting that Yevgeny Balitsky, the Russian-imposed acting “governor” of Zaporizhzhia said that yesterday “there were about 40 strikes on the outskirts and the city of Enerhodar”, which houses the nuclear power plant. “Yesterday was pretty hot for us,” he added.
Sir Andrew Wood, former British ambassador to Yugoslavia and Russia, and an associate fellow of the Russia and Eurasia programme at Chatham House, was interviewed in the UK on Sky News earlier about the situation in Ukraine.
He said he believed Vladimir Putin had made a “fatal error” with the partial mobilisation, which had bought the war closer to home, and was “chaotically ill-done”.
He said he expected fighting to continue well into next year but raised doubts about whether Russia would escalate the conflict to a nuclear level. He said:
Nobody in the west wants to get involved in a nuclear exchange. I don’t think anybody in the Russian Federation would want to be involved in a nuclear exchange, except possibly President Putin.
The whole trouble with Russia is everything is being decided by one man who hides from discussion, who hides from other possible views, that interferes in military undertakings by issuing direct orders to the commanders on the field and has thoroughly muddled up the whole situation.
Russian TV journalist who staged on-air war protest confirms she has escaped house arrest
Russian TV journalist Marina Ovsyannikova, famous for staging an on-air protest against Russia’s war in Ukraine, confirmed she had escaped house arrest over charges of spreading fake news again, saying she had no case to answer.
“I consider myself completely innocent, and since our state refuses to comply with its own laws, I refuse to comply with the measure of restraint imposed on me as of 30 September 2022 and release myself from it,” Reuters reports she said on Telegram.
Ovsyannikova, 44, was given two months’ house arrest in August over a protest in July when she stood on a river embankment opposite the Kremlin and held up a poster calling President Vladimir Putin a murderer and his soldiers fascists.
She faced a sentence of up to 10 years in prison if found guilty of the charge of spreading fake news about Russia’s armed forces.
Peter Beaumont
If you missed it overnight, my colleague Peter Beaumont has been in the recently liberated city of Lyman, and sent this dispatch:
Occupied until last week by soldiers of the Russian 20th Combined Arms army and Bars-13 troops from the Russian Guard – some of whom had earlier retreated from Kharkiv province – when the attack came they were quickly trapped in a rapidly closing encirclement as the villages outside the city, set among rolling hills, were rapidly rolled up.
What is clear is that Ukraine’s military has found a way of fighting that is far more deft and flexible than the Russians – who are heavily reliant on their creaking supply lines – deploying quickly to cut off, encircle and destroy units piece by piece.
And those Russians who stayed to fight were obliterated by shells and missile fire. Or shot in the forests.
At a junction of a level crossing and a road, the trees around a Russian trench have been swept down as if by a giant hand, the road littered with artillery casings, bits of uniform and human remains.
Surveying the scene, “Flagman”, a Ukrainian officer who has fought in this sector since Russia launched its invasion in February, said that while the Russians relied on the roads, the Ukrainians ambushed them from these woods.
Read more of Peter Beaumont’s report from Lyman: ‘What was it all for?’: recaptured Lyman left shattered by Russian occupation
Russia’s RIA Novosti has some further quotes from Vladimir Rogov, one of the Russian-imposed leaders in occupied Zaporizhzhia. It quotes him saying: “The situation on the line of contact remains stably tense. The counter-battery fight continues.”
Another of the Russian-imposed leaders in the regions the Russian Federation is claiming to annex in occupied Ukraine, Kirill Stremousov of Kherson, has been quoted saying that Russian forces were “conducting a regrouping in order to gather their strength and deliver a retaliatory blow” in the region.
Denis Pushilin, another Russian-imposed leader, has also been reported by RIA as saying that Ukrainian forces are in the retreat in Bakhmut, “without the ability to hold its previously occupied positions”.
None of the claims have been independently verified.
