Russia-Ukraine war live: Ukraine declares full control of Lyman; European leaders refuse to recognise annexed territories

It looks like the gas leaks on the damaged Nord Stream 1 pipeline have now been stopped. This follows Saturday’s announcement that gas was no longer flowing out of Nord Stream 2.

Reuters reports:

Denmark’s energy agency said on Sunday it had been informed by Nord Stream AG that stable pressure had been achieved in the damaged Nord Stream 1 pipeline and that this indicates the outflow of natural gas from the last leaks had now halted.

A total of four leaks were discovered on the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines in the Baltic Sea near Denmark and Sweden last week.

While neither pipeline was in use at the time of the suspected blasts, they were filled with gas that has been spewing out and bubbling to the surface of the Baltic Sea since Monday.

Denmark has signed a letter of intent with Slovakia, Norway and Germany, to aid Slovakian production of Zuzana-2 artillery systems gifted to Ukraine, the Danish government has announced.

The country is donating 230m krone (30.1m euros) to the effort, which is worth 9.2m euros.

The presidents of nine Nato countries in central and eastern Europe declared on Sunday they would never recognise the annexation by Russia of Ukrainian territory, AFP reports.

Their reaction comes two days after Russian President Vladimir Putin signed treaties to annex four Moscow-occupied regions of Ukraine - Donetsk, Kherson, Lugansk and Zaporizhzhia - following “referendums” the West has dismissed as “sham”.

The presidents issued a joint statement saying they could not “stay silent in the face of the blatant violation of international law by the Russian Federation”.

“We reiterate our support for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine,” they said.

“We do not recognise and will never recognise Russian attempts to annex any Ukrainian territory.”

The statement was issued by the presidents of the Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Poland, Romania and Slovakia.

Four of the signatories - Poland, and the three Baltic states - are on Nato’s eastern flank with Russia.

Two others - Romania and Slovakia - have borders with Ukraine.

Hungary, which also borders Ukraine, was notably absent from the list. Its nationalist prime minister, Viktor Orban, has sought close ties with Putin in recent years and railed against European Union sanctions on the Kremlin.

Also absent were Albania, Bulgaria, Croatia and Slovenia.

The statement, published on the website of the Polish president’s office, said the leaders of the signatory countries had “visited Kyiv during the war and witnessed with their own eyes the effects of Russian aggression”.

“We support Ukraine in its defence against Russia’s invasion, demand Russia to immediately withdraw from all the occupied territories and encourage all (Nato) Allies to substantially increase their military aid to Ukraine,” it said.

“All those who commit crimes of aggression must be held accountable and brought to justice.”

The presidents said they stood by a decision Nato made 14 years ago, supporting Ukraine’s wish to join the transatlantic military alliance at a future date.

They did not comment on Russia’s annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula in 2014, or on Ukraine’s request last Friday for fast-track Nato membership following Russia’s annexation manoeuvre.

Nato members have hesitated at accepting a country at war - which, by treaty, would oblige the alliance to come to its defence.

Nato’s Article 5 says an attack on one member is tantamount to attack on all.

Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said on Sunday that it was technically possible to restore ruptured offshore infrastructure of Nord Streams pipelines, TASS news agency reported.

Novak said:

There have never been such incidents. Of course, there are technical possibilities to restore the infrastructure, it takes time and appropriate funds. I am sure that appropriate possibilities will be found.

Russia’s Defence Ministry has said its forces had destroyed seven artillery and missile depots in the Ukrainian regions of Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhia, Mykolaiv and Donetsk.

It said the guidance radar for a S-300 air defence missile system had also been destroyed near Nova Kaluha in the Kherson region of southern Ukraine, Reuters is reporting.

More detail here on the Pope’s speech today, from AFP.

Pope Francis on Sunday deplored Russia’s annexation of Ukrainian territory and called on the Russian leader to stop the war and on Ukraine’s president to be open to talks.

“I deeply deplore the grave situation that has arisen in recent days, with further actions contrary to the principles of international law. It increases the risk of nuclear escalation, giving rise to fears of uncontrollable and catastrophic consequences worldwide,” he said during the Sunday Angelus prayer.

He implored Russian President Vladimir Putin “to stop this spiral of violence and death” and on Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky “to be open to serious proposals for peace”.

He also urged the international community “to do everything possible to bring an end to the war, without allowing themselves to be drawn into dangerous escalations”, and to support any efforts to resolve the conflict through dialogue.

It is the first time that the Argentine pope has directly addressed the Russian leader in a speech since the start of Moscow’s invasion on February 24.

Francis has been trying since the start of the invasion to open a path of dialogue with Moscow, while condemning a “cruel and senseless war”.

It is 2pm in Kyiv, here’s a rundown of the latest news

• Ukraine is in full control of the eastern logistics hub of Lyman, Kyiv’s most significant battlefield gain in weeks, which a senior official said could provide a staging post for further gains to the east, Reuters reports.

• The Pope has said it is “absurd” that the world is facing a nuclear threat over Ukraine. Calling for a ceasefire “in the name of God”, he appealed to the Russian and Ukrainian presidents to find a way out of the crisis.

• The US defence secretary Lloyd Austin has welcomed the capture by Ukrainian forces of Lyman, a key Russian stronghold in eastern Ukraine. Austin said he was “very encouraged” by the Ukrainian victory on Saturday, which is an embarrassment for Vladimir Putin, who declared on Friday that the city – in the Donetsk region – was Russia’s “for ever”.

• Germany’s defence minister, Christine Lambrecht, made a surprise visit to Ukraine – her first since Russia’s invasion in February – as Kyiv urged Berlin to send it battle tanks. Lambrecht visited the southern port city of Odesa on Saturday and met her Ukrainian counterpart, Oleksii Reznikov, the German defence ministry said.

• Russia has now restricted access to the music-streaming app SoundCloud, Reuters reports. SoundCloud was accused of distributing “false information” about the war by communications watchdog, Roskomnadzor (RKN). It follows existing bans on Facebook and Instagram.

• The Nord Stream 2 pipeline is no longer leaking under the Baltic Sea because an equilibrium has been reached between the gas and water pressure, pipeline spokesman Ulrich Lissek told AFP. The British prime minster, Liz Truss, has said the series of explosions that severely damaged Russia’s gas pipelines were an act of sabotage.

• Belarus is preparing to receive Russian soldiers and equipment, the Kyiv Independent reports. There are about 1,000 Russian soldiers in the country.

• Russia failed to win enough votes for re-election to the ICAO’s governing council. The French representative told the assembly after Saturday’s ballot: “When we have votes in our countries, if we don’t like the result, we don’t ask for another vote.” Russia had a place on the UN aviation agency’s 36-member council as one of the “states of chief importance in air transport”.

• The head of Russia’s region of Chechnya said Moscow should consider using a low-yield nuclear weapon in Ukraine after its battlefield defeat in Lyman. Ramzan Kadyrov said in a message on Telegram addressing Russia’s loss of its stronghold: “In my personal opinion, more drastic measures should be taken, right up to the declaration of martial law in the border areas and the use of low-yield nuclear weapons.”

• Russian authorities informed the International Atomic Energy Agency that the head of Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant was “temporarily detained” for questioning. Ihor Murashov was detained on his way from the Russian-occupied plant – Europe’s largest – to the town of Enerhodar at about 4pm on Friday. Russia is trying to transfer the Zaporizhzhia plant to the Russian energy firm Rosatom, the head of Ukraine’s atomic energy company, Petro Kotin, has told the BBC.

• Turkey, which has been at the centre of mediation between the west and Russia, rejected Russia’s annexations in Ukraine, calling the Kremlin’s move on four regions a “grave violation” of international law.

Ukraine is in full control of the eastern logistics hub of Lyman, Kyiv’s most significant battlefield gain in weeks, which a senior official said could provide a staging post for further gains to the east, Reuters reports.

“As of 1230 (0930 GMT), Lyman is fully cleared,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in a short video clip on his Telegram channel.

There was no comment from the Russian armed forces on Sunday on the status of the city. The Russian defence ministry said on Saturday it was pulling troops out of the area “in connection with the creation of a threat of encirclement”.

The latest stinging setback for Russian President Vladimir Putin came after he proclaimed the annexation of four regions covering nearly a fifth of Ukraine on Friday, an area that includes Lyman.

Kyiv and the West have condemned the proclamation as an illegitimate farce.

Russian forces captured Lyman from Ukraine in May and had used it as a logistics and transport hub for its operations in the north of the Donetsk region.

Losing it is Russia’s largest battlefield loss since Ukraine’s lightning counteroffensive in the northeastern Kharkiv region last month.

Serhiy Gaidai, governor of the Luhansk region that neighbours Donetsk, said control over Lyman could help Ukraine reclaim lost territory in his region, whose full capture Moscow announced in early July after weeks of grinding advances.

“The liberation of this city in the Donetsk region is one of the key factors for the further de-occupation of the Luhansk region,” Gaidai wrote on the Telegram messaging app on Sunday.

Prime Minister Krisjanis Karins’s pro-Western centrist party has won elections in Latvia while parties supported by the Baltic state’s large Russian-speaking minority have suffered major setbacks, AFP reports.

With almost all ballots from Saturday’s vote counted, Karins’s New Unity party was in first place with 18.94 percent while the Harmony party, traditionally backed by Russian speakers, may not have won enough votes to enter parliament.

Harmony came first in the last election in 2018.

The results showed other centrist parties coming second and third and just one party associated with Russian-speakers, Stability!, scraping past the threshold to enter parliament with 6.75 percent.

The Russian-speaking minority in Latvia makes up around 30 percent of the population.

AFP has an interesting report on Germany’s rush to find home-grown energy and escape reliance on Moscow. Here’s a taste of it:

Germany’s most strategically important building site is at the end of a windswept pier on the North Sea coast, where workers are assembling the country’s first terminal for the import of liquefied natural gas (LNG).

Starting this winter, the rig, close to the port of Wilhelmshaven, will be able to supply the equivalent of 20 percent of the gas that was until recently imported from Russia.

Since its invasion of Ukraine, Moscow has throttled gas supplies to Germany, while the Nord Stream pipelines which carried huge volumes under the Baltic Sea to Europe were damaged last week in what a Danish-Swedish report called “a deliberate act.”

In the search for alternative sources, the German government has splashed billions on five projects like the one in Wilhelmshaven.

Altogether the new fleet should be able to handle around 25 billion cubic metres of gas per year, roughly equivalent to half the capacity of the Nord Stream 1 pipeline.

Lyman is now “fully cleared” of Russian forces, Zelenskiy has declared in a short video on his Telegram channel.

The Pope has said it is “absurd” that the world is facing a nuclear threat over Ukraine, Reuters reports.

Calling for a ceasefire “in the name of God”, he appealed to the Russian and Ukrainian presidents to find a way out of the crisis.

This is Robyn Vinter, taking over the Ukraine blog for a while.

Russian shelling of the Kharkiv region is continuing alongside urgent attempts to demine the area, its governor says.

Governor Oleg Sinegubov said on Telegram that shelling had been particularly heavy in the city of Kupyansk and its surrounding area as well as Vovchansk and the village of Gatishche in Chuguyiv district.

A 71-year-old woman was hospitalised with an injury during the day in Kupyan district, he said the regional centre of emergency medical assistance had reported.

He also said that 704 explosive devices had already been neutralised in the last day.

Star Wars actor Mark Hamill has said Ukraine needs more drones to fight off the Russian invasion and compared Moscow to the dark side of the Force in the film series.

Hamill, who played Luke Skywalker in the films, was made an ambassador to the United24 project – which Ukraine set up to elicit donations of drones to the Ukrainian army – by President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

He told the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg that he had discussed parallels with the cult films and the current war in Ukraine with Zelenskiy.

“[Zelenskiy] did reference the movies and it’s not hard to understand why,” Hamill said, “I mean, Star Wars was always a fairy tale for children and fairy tales are morality tales of good versus evil, where good is clearly defined, evil is clearly defined and it’s not hard to extrapolate an evil empire with Russia invading a sovereign nation.”

Asked whether the platform would be used to supply lethal technology, he answered: “Ukraine needs drones. They have some drones, but not nearly as many as the Russians.”

Hamill also paid tribute to President Zelenskiy, saying: “I was really fascinated with this man... because he’s been absolutely heroic. And the Ukrainian people have been inspirational. He’s an amazing man.”

Hamill said participating in the project was “a chance to use [the popularity of the films’] for good and I feel a great responsibility to try and do everything I can to further the Ukrainian cause.”

Luke Harding reporting in Kyiv has contrasted Ukraine’s success in Lyman with the propaganda about the state of the war on the streets of Moscow. He writes in The Observer today:

The banner hanging near Red Square was triumphant. It read: “Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, Kherson, Russia! Together for ever!” On Friday Vladimir Putin formally announced the annexation of these Ukrainian territories and celebrated with a victory concert in Moscow. Russia’s president addressed a cheering crowd waving white blue and red tricolours. “Welcome home,” he said. “Russia! Russia!” they replied.

For ever turned out to mean less than 24 hours. As workmen dismantled the stage, put up on the cobbled square outside the Kremlin, Ukrainian troops marched into the eastern city of Lyman, from where Putin’s army had just made an inglorious retreat. At one point Lyman’s liberators even performed a victory dance, hopping cheerfully from side to side along a sandy forest path.

They were, according to the Kremlin’s version of reality, encroaching on Russia’s sovereign territory. In his angry west-bashing speech on Friday, delivered before Russia’s supine government, Putin had declared that Donetsk province which includes Lyman would be officially incorporated into the Russian federation. It was, he suggested, a restoration of historical Russian lands.

You can read more here

In its continued information war, Russia has now restricted access to the music-streaming app SoundCloud, Reuters reports.

SoundCloud was accused of distributing “false information” about what Moscow calls a “special military operation” in Ukraine by communications watchdog, Roskomnadzor (RKN). It follows existing bans on Facebook and Instagram.

“Roskomnadzor restricted access to the SoundCloud service in connection with placement of materials containing false information regarding the nature of the special military operation on the territory of Ukraine,” the Interfax news agency reported on Sunday, citing RKN.

It said the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office had ordered the blocking of service. The ban-worthy information apparently related to warfare methods, including “attacks on civilians, strikes on civilian infrastructure, about numerous civilian casualties at the hands of Russian soldiers”.