Ukraine-Russia war live: ‘Powerful explosion’ rocks central Moscow

Chinese defence minister Li Shangfu on Thursday visited Belarus and said his country would increase military cooperation with Russia‘s neighbour and ally, where Moscow is deploying tactical nuclear weapons.

Shangfu met with strongman president Alexander Lukashenko in Minsk and said “the purpose of my visit to Belarus is precisely the implementation of important agreements at the level of heads of state and the further strengthening of bilateral military cooperation.”

A building in central Moscow has been damaged in a drone attack in the early hours today causing a blast heard across the business district of the Russian capital, officials said.

A witness in the area described it as “a powerful explosion”.

Moscow mayor Sergei Sobyanin said the drone was shot down by Russian air defence system but the debris from the exploded drone fell on the city’s Expo Center, less than 5 kilometres (3.1 miles) from the Kremlin.

A video published by Russian media outlets showed thick smoke rising next to skyscrapers.

The Russian defence ministry said that Ukraine was behind the drone attack.

No immediate comment was issued from Kyiv.

Ukraine has rarely claimed responsibility for attacks inside Russia and territories held by Russia.

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

Britain’s sanctions against Moscow’s war machine were quickly expanded in the wake of her interview with The Independent’s International Correspondent Bel Trew.

Allegations of Ukraine’s civilians being snatched from their homes and abused in makeshift detention centres go “way beyond” the actions of rogue Russian soldiers, the UN’s special rapporteur on torture has warned.

Dr Alice Jill Edwards has written to Russian authorities detailing the accounts she has received of harrowing and widespread human rights abuses by Moscow’s troops in Ukraine since Vladimir Putin’s invasion – including electrocutions, mock executions and threats of genital mutilation.

Read Andy Gregory’s report here:

Local independent media group Mediazone, branded a “foreign agent” by the Kremlin, work hard, operating within a tightly-controlled environment, to offer its own running total of Russian casualties in Ukraine based on what its journalists can corroborate from publicly available information, which currently puts the total at just 28, 652 as of its latest update of 28 July.

But there’s more to that story.

From Bucha to the battle for Bakhmut, we track Wagner’s bloody role in Vladimir Putin’s invasion:

A scheduled performance by Russian opera singer Anna Netrebko in the Czech capital has been cancelled over political pressures as Russia wages war on Ukraine, Czech officials said.

The announcement came days after the Prague government said that all its coalition parties “unequivocally” opposed the concert, calling it “insensitive”.

Prague’s Municipal House, where Netrebko’s 16 October performance was to take place, and the Nachtigall Artists Management, an agency that organised it, have agreed on the cancellation.

The soprano will not demand compensation, the organising agency confirmed.

The Czech Republic has been a staunch supporter of Ukraine during the war.

The governing coalition in Prague is made up of the same political parties that comprise the Czech government.

Netrebko sued the Metropolitan Opera in New York City over its decision to cut ties with her last year for refusing to repudiate her support for Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Her 2023-24 season includes engagements with Berlin’s Staatsoper unter den Linden, the Vienna State Opera, Milan’s Teatro alla Scala and the Paris Opera.

Poland is deploying thousands of troops to its border with Belarus, calling it a deterrent move as tensions between the two neighbors ratchet up.

Those tensions between Poland — a NATO and European Union country — and Belarus, which is Russia’s ally in its war on Ukraine, have been building up in recent months on the border.

The Russian authorities have opened a criminal investigation into one of the leaders of a prominent independent election monitoring group, his lawyer said Thursday.

The case against Grigory Melkonyants, co-chair of Russia’s leading election watchdog Golos, is the latest step in the months-long crackdown on Kremlin critics and rights activists that the government ratcheted up after sending troops into Ukraine.

There have been direct contacts between Ukraine and Belarus but Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky put a halt to them, Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko said during an online interview broadcast on Thursday.

The last such contact occurred a few months ago, he said during in the interview with Diana Panchenko, a pro-Russian Ukrainian journalist.

According to Mr Lukashenko, the topics discussed included a potential Belarus involvement in the war on Russian side, potential use of nuclear weapons and Wagner Group mercenaries, now stationed in Belarus.

“These questions accumulated. But we had these contacts, we talked. We don’t mind. And there are still proposals to continue this dialogue.”