Ukraine

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russian forces began an assault Saturday on two key cities in the eastern Donetsk region and kept up rocket and shelling attacks on other Ukrainian cities, including one close to Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, Ukraine’s military and local officials said.

Both cities of Bakhmut and Avdiivka have been considered key targets of Russia’s ongoing offensive across Ukraine’s east, with analysts saying Moscow needs to take Bakhmut if it is to advance on the regional hubs of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk.

KYIV, Aug 3 (Reuters) - Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Wednesday branded as "disgusting" the behaviour of ex-German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder,who said Russia wanted a "negotiated solution" to the war.

Schroeder, who is a friend of President Vladimir Putin, said he met the Kremlin leader last week, adding there was even the possibility of slowly reaching a cease-fire.

"It is simply disgusting when former leaders of major states with European values work for Russia, which is at war against these values," Zelenskiy said in a late-night video address.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia’s Supreme Court on Tuesday declared Ukraine’s Azov Regiment a terrorist organization, a designation that could lead to terror charges against some of the captured fighters who made their last stand inside Mariupol’s shattered steel plant.

Scores of Azov fighters are being held prisoner by Moscow since their surrender in mid-May. Russian authorities have opened criminal cases against them, accusing them of killing civilians. The addition of terrorism charges could mean even longer prison sentences.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — The first cargo ship to leave Ukraine since Russia invaded its neighbor more than five months ago has run into bad weather in the Black Sea and is set to arrive later than scheduled in Istanbul, a Turkish official said Tuesday.

The Sierra Leone-flagged Razoni, which set sail from the Ukrainian port of Odesa on Monday, is now expected to reach Istanbul early Wednesday, according to Rear Admiral Ozcan Altunbulak, a coordinator at the joint center established to oversee the grain shipments.

Aug 1 (Reuters) - Ukraine has received more German and U.S.-made multiple rocket launcher systems, part of a series of deliveries of the high-precision heavy weapons promised by its allies, its defence minister said on Monday.

The government in Kyiv has repeatedly pleaded with the West to send more long-range artillery as it tries to turn the tide on Russia's Feb. 24 invasion and attack Russian supply lines and ammo dumps.

KIEV, Aug. 1 (Xinhua) -- Ukraine has received 500 million euros (about 512 million U.S. dollars) as the first tranche of financial assistance from the European Union (EU), Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said on Monday.

"We are grateful to the European Union for such a contribution. It is a significant investment in our common economic and financial stability and secure future," Shmyhal wrote on Telegram.

He said that his country will get another tranche of aid worth 500 million euros on Tuesday.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A drone-borne explosive device detonated Sunday at the headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, injuring six people, officials said.

The explosion at the headquarters in the city of Sevastopol on the Crimean peninsula that Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014 caused cancellation of observances of Russia’s Navy Day holiday.

The Black Sea Fleet’s press service said the drone appeared to be homemade. It described the explosive device as “low-power” but Sevastopol mayor Mikhail Razvozhaev said six people were injured in the blast.

KYIV, July 30 (Reuters) - The Ukrainian military said on Saturday it had killed scores of Russian soldiers in fighting in the south, including the Kherson region that is the focus of Kyiv's counter-offensive in that part of the country and a key link in Moscow's supply lines.

Rail traffic to Kherson over the Dnipro River had been cut, the military's southern command said, potentially further isolating Russian forces west of the river from supplies in occupied Crimea and the east.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia launched nighttime attacks on several Ukrainian cities, Ukrainian officials said Saturday as they and Moscow blamed each other for the deaths of dozens of Ukrainian prisoners of war in a separatist-controlled area of the country’s east.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross have a duty to react after shelling of a prison complex in Donetsk province killed the POWS.

ODESA, Ukraine (AP) — President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited one of Ukraine’s main Black Sea ports Friday, a week after a deal was struck with Russia, Turkey and the United Nations to create safe corridors for ships to export grains that have been trapped in the country since the war began five months ago.

His visit to a port in the Odesa region comes as workers were seen preparing terminals for grain exports, which are relied on by millions of impoverished people worldwide facing hunger.