Russia-Ukraine war live: Kyiv receives Patriot missile systems from US and Germany | Russia
Patriot air defence systems in use in Ukraine
The Patriot air defence systems the Ukrainian government had called for to help the country defend itself from air attacks have arrived, according to Ukraine’s defence minister.
Oleksii Reznikov posted on Twitter that “our beautiful sky becomes more secure because Patriot air defence systems have arrived in Ukraine”.
“Patriots” for patriots
Do you know how to visualize a dream? We must tell about it to the world and give it life! This is exactly what happened with the Patriots, even before the large-scale war, even before my appointment to the most important position of my life at the most… pic.twitter.com/m6H63erV6Z
— Oleksii Reznikov (@oleksiireznikov) April 19, 2023
He thanked the US, German and Dutch governments for providing them. Reznikov said he had first lobbied for the Patriots in August 2021, before the invasion, in a visit to the US.
The lack of a considerable Ukrainian air force since the early stages of the invasion has meant Ukraine has been laid bare to Russian air attacks by jets.
Ukrainian government ministers were still urging foreign powers to provide the missile systems as recently as December, as the US drew up plans to supply them.
The Dutch government then agreed in January to also send the batteries.
Key events
US announces new aid package for Ukraine
The United States announced a new military aid package for Ukraine on Wednesday to help the Ukrainian military in its war against Russia, Reuters reports.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told the daily press conference the package will include more ammunition and artillery rounds. It is the 36th security package since the war began in February 2022, she told reporters.
Details were to come later from the Pentagon.
The package, “as part of our ongoing efforts to help Ukraine defend itself against Russia’s brutal invasion,” will “include more ammunition for US-provided HIMARS rocket systems and anti-armor systems, as well as additional artillery rounds,” Jean-Pierre said according to Agence France Presse (AFP)
The US is one of the countries leading an unprecedented effort by Nato and other allied countries to supply Ukraine with weaponry and other aid as the country pushes back against a Russian onslaught that began in February 2022.
Ukraine is preparing an attempt at a counter-offensive driving Russians back from swaths of occupied territory in the east and south of the country.
The Ukrainian army is reporting that the Russian forces in Bakhmut are taking “heavy losses” after seven strikes throughout Wednesday.
An update by the general staff of the armed forces of Ukraine said that two areas which included soldiers, weapons and military equipment and ammunition depots were hit.
The reports have not been independently verified by the Guardian.
Further news on air defences being delivered to Ukraine as German officials have reportedly confirmed it has sent another Iris-T air defence systems to the country.
Ukrinform reported that the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung had spoken to German government sources who said they had been received.
No official announcements have been made by either Berlin or Kyiv. Germany has pledged to transfer four systems to Ukraine, the first arriving in October.
Ukrainian police have arrested a man who they claim worked with a pro-Russian news outlet and spread “fake” news amid Moscow’s invasion.
“A local resident, who helped the enemy spread fake information about the socio-political situation in the capital, was detained in Kyiv,” Ukraine’s SBU security service said in a statement on Telegram, according to Agence France Presse.
The SBU described the man as a “fixer” for Bel.ru, a pro-Kremlin media outlet that covers news developments in the region of Belgorod, near the Ukrainian border.
“He gave Russian ‘journalists’ fabricated and distorted information about Ukraine,” the statement said.
The detained man, whose identity was not revealed, is under investigation for “justifying the Russian aggression in Ukraine” and “glorifying its participants”, the SBU said.
The security service said the man “publicly supported the actions of the Russian occupiers and denied their crimes in Bucha, Irpin and Izium.”
The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, said on Wednesday that delivering goods to regions of Ukraine that Russia unilaterally annexed last year was “problematic”, and ordered the government to address the problem, Reuters reports.
Putin visited Russian-controlled territory in Ukraine’s Luhansk and Kherson regions on Monday, according to the Kremlin.
European Commission proposes compensation for farmers affected by grain oversupply
Jennifer Rankin
The European Commission is proposing €100m (£88m) in compensation for EU farmers affected by the recent influx of Ukrainian grain as well as restrictions on selling wheat and maize in affected countries, in a move to calm tensions with central and eastern Europe.
Ursula von der Leyen, the head of the commission, has written to the leaders of Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland, Romania and Slovakia, setting out support measures after four of those countries banned the import or sale of grain and other food products inside their borders earlier this week.
The commission wants member states to approve a further €100m in compensation payments for farmers in affected countries, on top of €56.3m that has already been shared between Poland, Bulgaria and Romania. It is also considering banning the sale of grain in the five affected countries until the end of June: instead, wheat, maize, rapeseed and sunflower seeds would only be able to enter affected countries en route to another country.
Jack Douglas Teixeira, 21, the member of the US air national guard who is facing criminal charges for leaking top-secret military intelligence records online – including documents pertaining to the war in Ukraine – will remain in jail for now, according to court filings, Reuters reports.
He was due to appear in court on Wednesday for a hearing to determine whether he would remain jailed pending trial, but his team of federal public defenders have filed a request asking the judge to delay the detention hearing for two weeks because they needed “more time to address the issues presented by the government’s request for detention”.
The US defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, said on Wednesday during a visit to Sweden that the US looks forward to welcoming Sweden as a Nato member before the alliance’s summit in July, and will encourage Turkey and Hungary to ratify accession.
Along with Finland, Sweden applied to join Nato in May last year. Finland’s application was processed in record time and it became the 31st member of the alliance earlier this month.
“We look forward to soon welcoming Sweden as the 32nd. To be clear, we look forward to that happening before the summit in July,” Austin told a news conference, Reuters reports.
“We encourage our allies, Turkey and Hungary, to ratify Sweden’s accession as soon as possible.”
Austin was in Sweden to hold talks with the defence minister, Pål Jonson, about the war in Ukraine and Sweden’s Nato application, in a visit that coincides with Sweden’s biggest military exercise for more than a quarter century.
Romania will seal and monitor Ukrainian grain cargoes transiting the country and conduct quality controls on food products at border checkpoints, the agriculture ministry said on Wednesday, while stopping short of banning imports.
Bulgaria joined Poland, Hungary and Slovakia in temporarily banning Ukrainian grain imports as central and eastern European states come under domestic pressure to shield local farmers, Reuters reports on Wednesday,
In Romania, the agriculture minister, Petre Daea, held talks over video link with his Ukrainian counterpart, Mykola Solsky, and asked him to “quickly identify solutions to restrict grain and oilseeds exports to Romania”. The two will meet in Bucharest on Friday.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy has visited the Volyn region of Ukraine which borders with Belarus and Poland, where he praised the work of border guards.
In a video posted on Telegram he said: “There are many important issues – equipment and protection of the state border, socioeconomic and current security situation in the region, arrangement of fortification and defence engineering structures.
“It is an honour for me to be here today to thank our border guards for protecting the state border,” Ukraine’s president wrote under footage showing him meeting and addressing border guards.
The Kremlin critic Ilya Yashin has lost an appeal against what his supporters say was a politically motivated decision to jail him for eight and a half years for criticising Moscow’s assault on Ukraine – in a case that has echoes of Monday’s jailing of Vladimir Kara-Murza.
The former Moscow councillor’s appeal was rejected as authorities continue to repress freedoms in Russia, with independent media shut down and leading opposition figures behind bars or in exile.
Speaking in court, Yashin said he had been put behind bars for “speaking the truth” over Moscow’s actions in Ukraine and Russia. “The sentence delivered against me is amazing: eight and a half years for a 20-minute speech on the internet,” he said, according to Agence France Presse.
“In prison, I met murderers, rapists, and robbers who have received lesser sentences for their crimes.”
Last year, Yashin, 39, described the murder of Ukrainian civilians in Bucha as a “massacre”, referring to a town near the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, where civilians were found killed after Russian forces pulled back.
In December 2022, Yashin was sentenced to eight and a half years in prison for spreading “false information” about Russia’s offensive in Ukraine.
On the topic of air defence systems, Ukraine will ask for urgent supplies of surface-to-air missiles at the Rammstein military meeting on Friday, according to the Financial Times.
It reports that Ukrainian officials fear that a shortfall in defence systems could lead to Russia launching a campaign of bombing attacks. This report comes on the day that the Ukrainian defence minister has announced the Patriot air defence systems have arrived in Ukraine.
“Short-range air defence has been a topic that has been raised increasingly by the Ukrainians,” one European official said. “If they use them all up, it opens the space up for air forces.”
“If Russia can get in with dumb bombers, Ukraine will be in trouble,” they added, referring to unguided munitions dropped from planes. “It’s looking grim.”
Patriot air defence systems in use in Ukraine
The Patriot air defence systems the Ukrainian government had called for to help the country defend itself from air attacks have arrived, according to Ukraine’s defence minister.
Oleksii Reznikov posted on Twitter that “our beautiful sky becomes more secure because Patriot air defence systems have arrived in Ukraine”.
“Patriots” for patriots
Do you know how to visualize a dream? We must tell about it to the world and give it life! This is exactly what happened with the Patriots, even before the large-scale war, even before my appointment to the most important position of my life at the most… pic.twitter.com/m6H63erV6Z
— Oleksii Reznikov (@oleksiireznikov) April 19, 2023
He thanked the US, German and Dutch governments for providing them. Reznikov said he had first lobbied for the Patriots in August 2021, before the invasion, in a visit to the US.
The lack of a considerable Ukrainian air force since the early stages of the invasion has meant Ukraine has been laid bare to Russian air attacks by jets.
Ukrainian government ministers were still urging foreign powers to provide the missile systems as recently as December, as the US drew up plans to supply them.
The Dutch government then agreed in January to also send the batteries.
Russia has said it summoned the UK ambassador Deborah Bronnert on Tuesday after she criticised the 25-year jail term given to Vladimir Kara-Murza on Monday.
She spoke to reporters outside Moscow city court alongside the US and Canadian ambassadors. She described the sentence as “shocking” and called for Kara-Murza, who holds joint UK and Russian citizenship, to be released immediately.
Kara-Murza’s sentence is the longest given to a dissident yet. He was arrested in April 2022 and charged with spreading false information about the Russian army in Ukraine.
A statement by the Russian foreign ministry said it regarded her comments as “gross interference in the internal affairs of Russia”.
They also criticised the UK’s “lectures” on human rights.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2023/apr/19/russia-ukraine-war-live-drone-strikes-hit-infrastructure-facility-in-odesa-region-causing-fire Russia-Ukraine war live: Kyiv receives Patriot missile systems from US and Germany | Russia
