War in Ukraine: Latest developments
A photograph shows a destroyed storage facilities in a port of a private company, Nika-Tera, in the southern city of Mykolaiv on June 12, 2022, which was bombed on June 4, according to the military administration. AFP
KYIV—Here are the latest developments in the war in Ukraine:
Second Briton killed in Ukraine fighting
A British former soldier has been shot and killed in Ukraine, his family says.
Jordan Gatley is the second Briton reported to have died fighting alongside Ukrainian forces against Russian invaders.
Gatley’s father Dean says his son was killed in the city of Severodonetsk, in eastern Ukraine, which has been under heavy Russian attack.
“He truly was a hero and will forever be in our hearts,” Gatley’s father says.
Article continues after this advertisementForeigners’ death sentences upheld
A pro-Russian separatist leader in eastern Ukraine says he will not alter the death sentences handed to two Britons and a Moroccan for fighting with the Ukrainian army.
Article continues after this advertisement“They came to Ukraine to kill civilians for money. That’s why I don’t see any conditions for any mitigation or modification of the sentence,” Denis Pushilin, the leader of the separatist Donetsk region, which tried them, tells reporters.
The United Nations has expressed concern over the death sentences handed down against the prisoners by pro-Russian rebels.
Russian strike wounds at least 22
At least 22 people were wounded when Russia struck the western Ukrainian town of Chortkiv on Saturday, its regional governor says.
Volodymyr Trush adds all 22 people wounded, who included seven women and a 12-year-old, had been taken to hospital.
The strike was a rare attack in the west of the country.
Russia’s defence ministry says the strike on Chortkiv destroyed a “large depot of anti-tank missile systems, portable air defence systems and shells provided to the Kyiv regime by the United States and European countries”.
‘Very difficult battles’
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Ukrainian officials say their country’s forces are involved in “very difficult battles”, including in the eastern Donbas region where Russia has focused its firepower.
The Russian army has destroyed a second bridge into Severodonetsk and is heavily bombarding the last one, the key eastern city’s governor reports.
“Ukrainian troops are doing everything to stop the offensive of the occupiers,” Zelensky adds.
The Ukrainian leader adds in his address that Ukraine must “not allow the world to divert its attention away from what is happening on the battlefield”.
Ministers at crucial WTO meet
More than 100 ministers are meeting at the World Trade Organization in Geneva to tackle pressing issues including global food security, threatened by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Top of the agenda as the four-day meeting kicks off is the toll Russia’s war in Ukraine — traditionally a breadbasket that feeds hundreds of millions of people — is having on food security.
Russia renames McDonald’s
Former McDonald’s restaurants in Russia have been renamed “Vkusno i tochka” (“Delicious. Full Stop”), the new owner says.
With a new logo to replace the Golden Arches, the restaurant on Moscow’s Pushkin Square — where the very first McDonald’s opened its doors to long queues and great fanfare in January 1990 — is due to open its doors again on Sunday.
US fast-food giant McDonald’s announced on May 16 that it would exit Russia in the wake of Moscow’s Ukraine offensive.
Ukraine to get word on EU hopes
Ukraine’s bid to become a candidate to join the EU will get a clear signal next week, the bloc’s chief Ursula von der Leyen announces in a surprise visit to Kyiv.
Von der Leyen says talks she held with President Zelensky “will enable us to finalise our assessment by the end of next week”.
It is the first time the EU has publicly given timing on when the commission will deliver its opinion. The bloc’s 27 member countries need to decide whether to allow Ukraine to start accession negotiations.
Zelensky warns of food crisis
Volodymyr Zelensky has urged international pressure to end a Russian naval blockade of Black Sea ports that has choked off his country’s grain exports, threatening a global food crisis.
“The world will face an acute and severe food crisis and famine, in many countries of Asia and Africa,” Zelensky says in a video addressed to the Shangri-La Dialogue security summit in Singapore.
Ukrainians get Russian passports
Authorities in the Moscow-occupied city of Kherson in southern Ukraine have handed out Russian passports to local residents for the first time, news agencies reported.
Russia’s TASS agency says 23 Kherson residents received a Russian passport at a ceremony through a “simplified procedure” facilitated by a decree signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin in May.
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