Live Updates: Russia's War In Ukraine
Live Updates: Russia's War In Ukraine https://digitalalabamanews.com/live-updates-russias-war-in-ukraine-2/
1 min ago
Ukraine’s nuclear operator says power units at Zaporizhzhia plant remain in cooling mode
From CNN’s Julia Kesaieva in Kyiv
The Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant on September 11. (Stringer/AFP/Getty Images)
The president of Ukraine’s state nuclear company — Energoatom — told CNN that the power units at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant remain in a cooling state while work continues to restore power lines from the plant.
Speaking to CNN via Skype, Petro Kotin, said all seven lines connecting to the plant were damaged, and it had switched to what he called the “island mode” — where the plant supplied electricity solely for itself.
“We tried to prolong the operation of one of our power units for as long as possible, even in the conditions when it was operating in island mode. It worked for us for three days,” he told CNN.
Kotin said just one of the six power units remained working, and was supplying the needs of the plant — the electricity necessary for the pumps that cool the nuclear material. The reactors “are full of nuclear material, fuel and also there are six pools that are located near the reactors at each power unit. They need to be constantly cooled,” he said.
“The hazard is that if there is no power supply, the pumps will stop and there will be no cooling, and in about one and a half to two hours you will have a meltdown of this fuel that is in the reactor,” he added.
Kotin reiterated that when there is no external power supply, the diesel generators could kick in. “As of today the diesel generators can work there for ten days.”
“We are also doing our best to secure additional supplies. But we understand that it is very difficult to bring anything in there. The railway is damaged, so it can only be done by vehicles,” he said.
“If there is now a loss of external power, then we will have only one option. The diesel generators,” he added.
Kotin said representatives of the UN’s nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), remained at the plant. “They have meetings with the plant management twice a day, so they have all the current information on the plant’s operation,” he said.
As for the IAEA proposal for a safety zone around the plant, Kotin said: “We don’t fully understand what this safety zone means exactly.”
He repeated the Ukrainian government’s line that the plant should be returned to Ukrainian control and the power plant itself and zone around it should be demilitarized.
59 min ago
CNN on the ground: Here’s how Ukrainians in Kharkiv villages describe Russia’s retreat
From CNN’s Saskya Vandoorne, Melissa Bell, Olga Voitovych, Victoria Butenko and William Bonnett
CNN was given exclusive access to the town of Kupiansk in the Kharkiv region, just a day after pictures emerged showing soldiers hoisting the Ukrainian flag on the roof of the town’s municipal building.
Far from being a town under full Ukrainian control, CNN found one still being bitterly fought for.
At the edge of the town, Vasyl – who declined to give his last name for security reasons – tells us that for days “they (the Russians) were shelling and shelling” in the ongoing fight in Kharkiv.
On Sunday afternoon, the dull thud of outcoming artillery fire was punctuated by the more infrequent boom of incoming fire. Russian forces were still fighting for Kupiansk, a town that is crucial to their supply lines, connecting their military base across the northern border in Russia’s Belgorod to Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region and the frontlines of the Donbas.
Ukraine’s top military commander General Valeriy Zaluzhnyi claimed Sunday that the country’s military had retaken more than 3,000 square kilometers (around 1,158 square miles) of territory since the beginning of the month, much of that believed to be in the Kharkiv region.
But on the ground, the fate of Kupiansk appears far from certain, indicating that maintaining Ukrainian control over newly liberated territory in the area could prove difficult.
Further west, some villages have seen calm entirely restored such as in the Kharkiv region’s Zaliznychne, liberated last week, as the eastern counteroffensive picked up speed. There, the fight appears to have been far less painful.
“I didn’t even expect it would be so fast”, says 66-year-old Oleksandr Verbytsky, who witnessed the Russians retreating. “I went to the store and when I came back, everybody was running away. The Russians drove through the cemetery to get away. Can you imagine?”
Read more about what CNN saw in eastern Ukraine over the last few days here.
2 hr 36 min ago
Ukrainian prosecutor begins investigation into killings of civilians by Russian forces in Kharkiv
From CNN’s Denis Lapin
The Ukrainian Prosecutor’s office in Kharkiv says it has begun an investigation into reports that civilians were murdered by Russian occupying forces in a village in Kharkiv region.
In a statement on Facebook, the prosecutor said local residents in Zaliznychne had reported that Russian forces had killed several of their fellow villagers.
“On September 11, law enforcement officers discovered four corpses. All of them have traces of torture,” the Prosecutor’s Office said.
“Three of them are buried on the territory of their homes, another one was buried on the territory of the asphalt plant,” it said.
“According to the preliminary version of the investigation, the victims were killed by the Russian military,” the Prosecutor’s Office said.
3 hr 25 min ago
2 Russian aircraft detected in Alaskan defense identification zone but remained in international airspace
From CNN’s Ellie Kaufman
Two Russian maritime patrol aircraft were “detected, tracked and positively identified,” by North American Aerospace Defense Command “operating within the Alaskan and Canadian Air Defense Identification Zones (ADIZ),” on Sept. 11, NORAD said in a statement Monday.
NORAD is part of the US military that oversees the US military presence in North America.
The two airplanes “remained in international airspace and did not enter American nor Canadian sovereign airspace,” the release said.
The ADIZ is international airspace adjacent to Alaska that extends in places more than 100 miles (more than 160 kilometers) from US territory. The US military initiates identification procedures for aircraft in the ADIZ in the interest of national security.
NORAD said the recent Russian activity was “not seen as a threat” or seen as a “provocative,” move the release added.
“NORAD tracks and positively identifies foreign military aircraft that enter the ADIZ, and routinely monitors foreign aircraft movements and as required, escorts them from the ADIZ,” the release added.
NORAD detected Russian military aircraft flying into the Alaskan Air Defense Identification Zone three times in the same week last month, CNN previously reported. The three incidents occurred sometime between Aug. 8 and Aug. 10, NORAD said at the time.
3 hr 44 min ago
Ukraine retakes town in eastern Donetsk region after forces cross Siverskiy Donets river
From CNN’s Tim Lister and Denis Lapin
In a further sign of the ongoing Ukrainian counteroffensive in the east, geolocated images and video show that Ukrainian units have crossed the Siverskiy Donets river to take control of the town of Svyatohirsk in Donetsk region.
One geolocated image shows the damaged administrative building in the town with the Ukrainian flag hung above the entrance. Other images show Ukrainian soldiers on the streets of the town. The Ukrainians had held on to the south bank of the river in this area during the Russian offensive.
Why this matters: The capture of Svyatohirsk will further complicate any attempt by the remaining Russian-backed forces in the area to withdraw.
Some militia units of the self-declared Donetsk People’s Republic continue to hold out in the town of Lyman, but any retreat to the east would be difficult if Ukrainian advances continue.
3 hr 32 min ago
German weapons are making a difference in eastern Ukraine, chancellor says
From CNN’s Inke Kappeler in Berlin and Allegra Goodwin
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, left, and Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid speak at the House of the Wannsee Conference in Berlin, on Monday. (Annegret Hilse/AFP/Getty Images)
Germany supplied “very efficient weapons that are making the difference right now in the current battle” in eastern Ukraine, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said during a joint news conference with Israel’s Prime Minister Yair Lapid on Monday in Berlin.
“What we have delivered with our Gepard anti-aircraft tank, the self-propelled Howitzer 2000, the multiple rocket launcher MARS, are the weapons that are actually contributing to the fact that it is now also possible in the eastern battle to change the results as we see it at the moment,” Scholz said.
Germany has committed to deliver the Iris-T air defense system to Ukraine and the country had decided to order more of these systems, he said.
More context: Despite Kyiv’s increasingly urgent demands for modern battle tanks, the German defense minister Christine Lambrecht continues to refuse the delivery of Marder or Leopard tanks to Ukraine.
“No country has delivered Western-built infantry fighting vehicles or battle tanks so far,” Lambrecht explained during a panel discussion on Germany’s national security strategy at the German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP).
Germany had delivered weapon systems like the Howitzer-2000 that required training, the minister said but added it was a matter of urgency to deliver “Soviet-designed tanks which can be used for immediate combat in Ukraine.”
Germany will not act unilaterally, but the German Chancellor underlined ongoing support for Ukraine “for as long as that is necessary.”
4 hr 41 min ago
Municipal deputies from Moscow and St. Petersburg call for Putin’s resignation
From CNN’s Uliana Pavlova
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