Ukraine

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia and Ukraine on Friday accused each other of shelling a prison in a separatist eastern region that reportedly killed dozens of Ukrainian prisoners of war who were captured after the fall of Mariupol in May.

Russia said that Ukraine used U.S.-supplied HIMARS multiple rocket launchers in the attack on the prison in Olenivka, in the Russian-controlled Donetsk region. Officials from Russia and the separatist authorities in Donetsk said the attack killed 53 Ukrainian POWs and wounded 75.

KYIV, July 28 (NNN-AGENCIES) — President Volodymyr Zelensky said Ukraine will up its export of electricity to the European Union as the bloc faces an energy crisis sparked by Russia’s invasion.

“We are preparing to increase our electricity exports to consumers in the European Union,” Zelensky said in his daily address to the nation.

“Our exports would not only allow us to increase our income in foreign currency but will also help our partners to resist Russian energy pressure,” he said after Russia drastically slashed its gas deliveries to Europe.

July 28 (Reuters) - Ukraine's counteroffensive is gathering momentum in the Russian-controlled southern Ukrainian city of Kherson, Britain's defence ministry said on Thursday.

"Ukrainian forces have highly likely established a bridqehead south of the lngulets River, which forms the northern boundary of Russian-occupied Kherson," it said in a regular intelligence bulletin on Twitter.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russian forces launched a missile attack on the Kyiv area for the first time in weeks Thursday and pounded the northern Chernihiv region as well, in what Ukraine said was revenge for standing up to the Kremlin.

Ukrainian officials, meanwhile, announced a counteroffensive to take back the occupied Kherson region in the country’s south, territory seized by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s forces early in the war.

KYIV, July 26 (Reuters) - A tongue-in-cheek petition to give outgoing British Prime Minister Boris Johnson Ukrainian citizenship and make him the country's prime minister has garnered over 2,500 signatures hours after being put up on Ukraine's official petitions site on Tuesday.

Despite losing domestic popularity and eventually having been forced to announce his resignation after dozens of ministerial departures in early July, Johnson remains a cult figure in Kyiv for his vocal support of Ukraine as it fights off Russia's invasion.

KYIV, July 27 (Reuters) - The fate of Ukraine's second biggest power plant was hanging in the balance on Wednesday after Russian-backed forces claimed to have captured it intact, but Kyiv did not confirm its seizure, saying only that fighting was under way nearby.

Seizing the Soviet-era coal-fired Vuhlehirsk power plant in eastern Ukraine would be Moscow's first strategic gain in more than three weeks in what it calls its "special operation" to demilitarise and "denazify" its neighbour.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukrainian artillery hit a strategic bridge essential for Moscow to supply its forces occupying Ukraine’s southern region, using a U.S.-supplied precision rocket system to deliver a morale-lifting punch.

The Ukrainian military struck the Antonivskyi Bridge across the Dnieper River in southern Ukraine late Tuesday, the deputy head of the Moscow-appointed administration for the Kherson region, Kirill Stremousov, said.

He said Wednesday the bridge was still standing but its deck was pierced with holes, preventing vehicles from crossing.

(AP) --- Shipping companies are not rushing to export millions of tons of trapped grain out of Ukraine, despite a breakthrough deal to provide safe corridors through the Black Sea. That is because explosive mines are drifting in the waters, ship owners are assessing the risks and many still have questions over how the deal will unfold.

The complexities of the agreement have set off a slow, cautious start, but it’s only good for 120 days — and the clock began ticking last week.

KYIV, July 26 (Reuters) - Ukraine can save 200 billion hryvnias ($5.45 billion) for priority needs by deferring its external debt repayments, Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said on Tuesday.

Ukraine has launched a formal consent solicitation to holders of its international bonds, proposing a two-year debt freeze on most of its bonds and giving creditors until August 9 to vote on the proposal.

KYIV, July 26 (Reuters) - Russia said it will cut gas supplies to Europe from Wednesday in a blow to countries that have backed Ukraine, while missile attacks in Black Sea coastal regions raised doubts about whether Russia will stick to a deal to let Ukraine export grain.

The first ships from Ukraine may set sail in days under a deal agreed on Friday, the United Nations said, despite a Russian missile attack on the Ukrainian port of Odesa over the weekend, and a spokesman for the military administration in the saying another missile had hit the Odesa region on Tuesday morning.