Ukraine war: UK Storm Shadow missiles used in attack on Putin’s Crimea fleet – live

UK Storm Shadow cruise missiles were used as part of the attack on the headquarters for Russia’s Black Sea Fleet in occupied Crimea, according to military sources, Kim Sengupta reports.

The UK supplied Ukraine with Storm Shadow missiles earlier this year, In June, the then-defence secretary, Ben Wallace, told parliament that the missiles were having a “significant impact”.

“It is my understanding its accuracy, and ability to deliver successfully the payload as sent and designed by the Ukrainians has been almost without fault,” he said.

Volodymyr Zelensky said he is “especially” grateful to Ukraine’s pilots in his nightly address. Earlier in the day, Russian-backed officials blamed Ukraine for a missile attack on Sevastopol in Crimea.

“One more thing. As always, I want to thank our warriors. Today, I am especially grateful to our pilots. Well done, guys! We are all proud of you,” Mr Zelensky said.

Ukraine said it struck Russian naval targets and port infrastructure early yesterday in the Crimean city of Sevastopol, in what appeared to be the biggest attack of the war on the home of the Russian navy’s Black Sea Fleet.

A Ukrainian intelligence official said a large vessel and a submarine struck in the attack were so badly damaged as to be likely beyond repair.

The strike on Crimea, seized and illegally annexed by Russia in 2014, was confirmed by Moscow. It highlighted Kyiv’s growing missile capabilities as Russia continues to bombard Ukraine from afar with long-range missiles and assault drones.

Russian anti-aircraft units downed drones overnight in two regions of southern Russia, Bryansk and Belgorod, the Russian military and news agencies reported today.

At least five drones had been downed over Bryansk region and one over Belgorod region. No casualties or damage were reported. Both regions border Ukraine, Russian news agencies, quoting local officials and the defence ministry, said.

Traffic has been suspended on the bridge connecting the Crimea peninsula to mainland Russia, the RIA news agency reported today.

No reasons have been given for halting the traffic, it said.

A day earlier, the major Crimean naval city Sevastopol came under heavy missile attack from Ukraine, injuring dozens.

Kim and Putin met together with their delegations and later one-on-one, said Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov. After the talks, there was an official lunch for Kim, Russian state media reported.

Putin told Russian state TV that Kim will visit two more cities in the Far East on his own after the summit, flying to Komsomolsk-on-Amur, where he will visit an aircraft plant, and then go to Vladivostok to view Russia’s Pacific Fleet, a university and other facilities.

Russia and North Korea have “lots of interesting projects” in spheres like transportation and agriculture, Putin said. Moscow is providing its neighbor with humanitarian aid, but there also are opportunities for “working as equals,” he added.

He dodged the issue, however, of military cooperation, saying only that Russia is abiding by the sanctions prohibiting procuring weapons from Pyongyang. “There are certain restrictions, Russia is following all of them. There are things we can talk about, we’re discussing, thinking. Russia is a self-sufficient country, but there are things we can bring attention to, we’re discussing them,” he said.

James O’Brien, head of the Office of Sanctions Coordination at the U.S. State Department, said Russia was “scraping the bottom of the barrel looking for help because it’s having trouble sustaining its military.”

A deal between the countries would violate existing sanctions, O’Brien said, and would trigger the U.S. try to identify the individuals and the financial mechanisms used to “at least limit their ability to be effective.”

North Korea may have tens of millions of aging artillery shells and rockets based on Soviet designs that could bolster Russian forces in Ukraine, analysts say.

Washington has accused North Korea of providing Russia with arms, including selling artillery shells to the Russian mercenary group Wagner. Russian and North Korean officials deny such claims.

But either buying arms from or providing rocket technology to North Korea would violate international sanctions that Russia has previously supported.

It would both underscore and deepen Russia’s isolation in the 18 months after its invasion of Ukraine drew increasing sanctions that have cut off Moscow’s economy from global markets and shrunk the circle of world leaders willing to meet with Putin.

Moscow’s priority is success in Ukraine, “and it would do pretty much anything in order to achieve that.” said James Nixey, director of Russia and Eurasia program at Chatham House, a London-based think-tank.

“Russia possibly wants to settle in for a longer war, but it can’t meet the necessary industrial capacity,” he said. In return, Pyongyang is likely to get food and missile technology from Moscow, “a relatively easy gift” for the Kremlin, Nixey said.

As the leaders toured a Soyuz-2 rocket launch facility on Wednesday, Kim peppered a Russian space official with questions.

Putin met Kim’s limousine, brought from Pyongyang in the North Korean leader’s armored train, at the launch facility, greeting his guest with a handshake of about 40 seconds.

Putin spoke of the Soviet Union’s wartime support for North Korea and said the talks would cover economic cooperation, humanitarian issues and the “situation in the region.”

Kim, in turn, pledged continued support for Moscow, making an apparent reference to the war in Ukraine.

“Russia is currently engaged in a just fight against hegemonic forces to defend its sovereign rights, security and interests,” he said.

“The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea has always expressed its full and unconditional support for all measures taken by the Russian government, and I take this opportunity to reaffirm that we will always stand with Russia on the anti-imperialist front and the front of independence.”

North Korea’s Kim Jong Un vowed “full and unconditional support” for Russia’s Vladimir Putin on Wednesday as the two leaders isolated by the West held a summit that the U.S. warned could lead to a deal to supply ammunition for Moscow’s war in Ukraine.

The meeting, which lasted over four hours at Russia’s spaceport in the Far East, underscores how the two countries’ interests are aligning: Putin is believed to be seeking one of the few things impoverished North Korea has in abundance – stockpiles of aging ammunition and rockets for Soviet-era weapons.

Such a request would mark a role reversal from the 1950-53 Korean War, when Moscow gave weapons to support Pyongyang’s invasion of South Korea — and in the decades that followed, when the Soviet Union sponsored North Korea.

The decision to meet at the Vostochny Cosmodrome, Russia’s most important launch center on its own soil, suggests Kim is seeking Russian help in developing military reconnaissance satellites. He has previously said that is crucial to enhancing the threat of his nuclear-capable missiles, and North Korea has repeatedly failed to put its first military spy satellite into orbit.

Discussions lasted several hours, both with their ministers and then one-on-one, followed by an opulent lunch of Russian “pelmeni” dumplings made with Kamchatka crab and then sturgeon with mushrooms and potatoes.

So what are the main things we should takeaway from this rare meeting between the two leaders?

The U.S. ambassador to Russia has met with imprisoned American Paul Whelan, serving a 16-year sentence on an espionage conviction that Washington and Whelan dispute.

Ambassador Lynne Tracy traveled to the prison colony about 220 miles east of Moscow where Whelan is held, State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said.

“We believe Paul continues to show tremendous courage in the face of his wrongful detention. Ambassador Tracy reiterated to him that President Biden and Secretary (of State Antony) Blinken are committed to bringing him home,” he added. “Secretary Blinken had a call with Paul Whelan around a month ago, a little under a month ago, and delivered that same message to him: that we are working very hard to bring him home and we will continue to do so.”

The 53-year-old Whelan, a corporate security director and former Marine, was detained in Moscow in 2018 and convicted in 2020.

The Biden administration had hoped to secure Whelan’s release during the negotiations on the prisoner exchange that eventually freed American basketball star Brittney Griner from a Russian prison in December.

Analysts have pointed out that Moscow may be using jailed Americans as bargaining chips in soaring U.S.-Russian tensions over the Kremlin’s military operation in Ukraine.

Another American jailed in Russia is Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, who was arrested March 29 and accused of trying to obtain classified information.

Gershkovich is the first U.S. correspondent since the Cold War to be detained in Russia on spying charges, which his family and the newspaper vehemently deny.