Ukraine: Western military aid continues, Russia awaits Turkish mediation offer – 10/13/2022 at 08:01

Ukrainian soldiers handle explosives near Doretsk (Donetsk region), October 12, 2022 (AFP / Yasuyoshi CHIBA )

Ukraine continues to receive military aid from its Western allies to secure its skies in the face of Thursday’s continued Russian strikes, while Moscow hopes for an opportunity for Turkish mediation.

Kyiv, which said it had recaptured several positions from the Russians in the country’s south, welcomed support from its Western allies, who pledged to provide anti-aircraft defenses “as soon as possible” after the wave of bombings.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has pledged that providing these systems, capable of neutralizing Russian missiles in Ukrainian skies, is a “priority”.

The G7 and the IMF reaffirmed on Wednesday that they would support Ukraine “as long as necessary” to deal with the economic consequences of the Russian invasion, amounting to billions of dollars.

“The main issue is covering our budget deficit and quickly rebuilding infrastructure,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his daily address, thanking allies.

– New promises from London and Paris –

Ukraine has come under “massive” missiles, rockets and drones targeting its civilian energy infrastructure since Monday in retaliation for a bomb attack that damaged a Crimean bridge on Saturday and was blamed for a bomb attack through Moscow to Kyiv.

Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksiï Reznikov hailed the upcoming delivery of the “Iris-T system from Germany” and the “American NASAMS” as “a new era of air defense”.

The United Kingdom announced on Thursday that it would supply Ukraine with additional anti-aircraft missiles, including munitions capable of shooting down cruise missiles.

AMRAAM missiles, which will be delivered to Kyiv “in the coming weeks” for use by the US-promised NASAMS air defense system, are London’s first delivery capable of shooting down cruise missiles, the British Ministry of Defense underlined. In a statement.

French President Emmanuel Macron also promised in the evening that anti-aircraft “radar, systems and missiles” would be delivered, without specifying when. He reiterated that France was working with Denmark to send six Caesar guns, in addition to the 18 Caesar guns already delivered.

A couple kisses in front of a ditch in a park in Kew on October 12, 2022 (AFP / Dimitar DILKOFF)

On Tuesday, in a virtual meeting with the G7, Mr. Zelensky had asked for help in building an “air shield,” Mr.

At the same time, 27 members of the European Union agreed to set up a military mission to train Ukrainian forces in several member states. According to two diplomats, around 15,000 soldiers will be affected initially.

– Drones in Kew, bombings in Mykolaiv –

Early Thursday morning, Ukraine’s head of presidential administration, Kyrillo Tymoshenko, said Russia had attacked the capital, Kiev, with Iranian-made drones. “Another attack by kamikaze drones on critical infrastructure,” he said without elaborating.

Mykolaiv’s mayor, Oleksandr Senkevych, said in a telegram on Thursday that the city in southern Ukraine, already heavily bombed by the Russian military, had suffered “heavy shelling” overnight, particularly destroying the top two floors of a five-story residential building.

In the south, the Ukrainian president said on Wednesday that five new positions had been recaptured in the Kherson region, one of four that Moscow claimed annexed, in a new setback for the Russian military. From the beginning of September it retreats in this zone like Northeast and East.

The Russian Defense Ministry assured that he pushed back the Ukrainians in a small pocket of Kharkiv region (northeast) still under Moscow control, in the north of the Kherson region and east of Donetsk and Luhansk.

To the east, Ukrainian authorities have announced the discovery of two mass graves in towns in the Donetsk region recently retaken from Russian troops.

An AFP journalist noted that dozens of bodies were exhumed by forensic teams wearing protective gear at the railway junction in Lyman in early October.

– Putin and Erdogan meeting –

For its part, the Kremlin said on Wednesday that it expects Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to make a concrete offer to mediate in the conflict with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, during a meeting in Kazakhstan on Thursday.

“The Turks are offering their mediation. If (Russian-Ukrainian) contacts happen, they will be made on Turkish territory,” Kremlin diplomatic adviser Yuriy Ochakov told reporters. “Erdogan will come up with something official,” he said, adding that he expected an “interesting and fruitful discussion.”

A destroyed bridge in Bagmouth, Donetsk region on October 11, 2022 (AFP / Yasuyoshi CHIBA )

Worried about the possibility of a nuclear accident, IAEA President Raffaele Croci, Mr. Back in the queue, agreeing with Zelensky, he tweeted, after meeting with Vladimir Putin as part of his efforts to establish a “security zone” around him. Zaporizhia Nuclear Power Plant.

Meanwhile, the UN General Assembly on Wednesday overwhelmingly condemned the “illegal annexation” of Ukrainian territories, sending a “clear message” to Moscow, according to US President Joe Biden.

Russia earlier announced the arrest of eight people suspected of involvement in the attack on the Crimean bridge and said it had foiled two attacks on Russian territory instigated by Ukrainian special services.

Map of the situation in Ukraine as of October 12 at 8 a.m. GMT (AFP /

Vladimir Putin has vowed a “fierce” response to any attacks aimed at Russia and what it considers its territory, while Moscow announced its annexation of Crimea in 2014, followed by four other Ukrainian regions in September.

Kraiyiv has neither confirmed nor denied its involvement in the blast on the bridge linking Russian territory with Crimea, but Ukraine has always insisted it wants to retake the peninsula and all areas occupied by Russia.