Russia-Ukraine war live: US accuses Russia of ‘weaponising food’ as EU urges Moscow to rejoin grain deal | Ukraine

Russia’s defence ministry said it has recovered and analysed the wreckage of drones used to attack ships of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet in Crimea yesterday.

The ministry said its analysis showed that the drones were equipped with Canadian-made navigation modules for an attack that it said was carried out by Ukraine under British leadership, a claim Britain has denied.

Russia annexed Crimea in 2014.

Poland and its European Union partners stand ready to provide Ukraine with further help in the transportation of essential goods after Russia pulled out of a grain deal, the foreign ministry in Warsaw said.

Russia’s decision to exit the UN-brokered deal that enabled Ukraine to export grain via the Black Sea offered “yet more proof that Moscow is not willing to uphold any international agreements,” the ministry added on Twitter.

Poland said today that together with its European partners it is ready to provide Ukraine with further help in the transportation of essential goods after Russia pulled out of a grain deal, the foreign ministry in Warsaw said on Sunday.

Russia’s decision to exit the UN-brokered deal that enabled Ukraine to export grain via the Black Sea offered “yet more proof that Moscow is not willing to uphold any international agreements”, the ministry added on Twitter.

The Russian army repelled attacks by Ukrainian forces in the Kharkiv, Kherson and Luhansk regions, Russian news agencies cited the defence ministry as saying on Sunday.

The ministry said Ukrainian artillery had fired near the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, but that the radiation situation remained normal, TASS reported.
Reuters said it could not immediately verify battlefield reports.

Ukrainian electricity supplies were recovering after Russian attack on generating plants, but emergency blackouts may still be needed.

Ministers need to act urgently to prevent a looming homelessness crisis among Ukrainian refugees, council leaders have warned.

More than 100,000 people have become guests of British families under the Homes for Ukraine scheme, but many are coming to the end of their six-month stays and finding there is nowhere for them to go.

The government plan was for Ukrainians to either rent their own homes or “rematch” with other hosts. But local authorities responsible for overseeing the scheme say they are struggling to find people to take in the refugees.

The District Councils Network, which represents 183 mostly rural local authorities, said that it had received many reports of hosts deciding not to rematch.

Read the full report here:

Hong Kong’s Cathay Pacific Airways Ltd will resume using Russian airspace on some flights, the airline said on Sunday, restarting flights it had stopped after Moscow invaded Ukraine in February.

Cathay Pacific will begin flying from New York to Hong Kong using the popular “Polar route” from Tuesday, the company told Reuters in an emailed statement.

Citing strong headwinds and payload issues affecting its flights from the East Coast of North America to Hong Kong, Cathay Pacific said it will overfly the far eastern part of Russia.

“The Polar Route provides a safe, direct and the fastest flight experience to our customers travelling from the East Coast of North America to Hong Kong,” the airline said, adding that there were no sanctions preventing it from doing so.

Cathay Pacific said in March that it was not routing flights through Russia’s airspace, avoiding the area after the invasion of Ukraine despite longer flight times.

Russia this year closed its airspace to European and US airlines, forcing some long-haul flights to Asia to take longer routes.

Bloomberg News was first to report the resumption.

More on the reported Russia-Ukraine exchange of prisoners of war on Saturday: officials in Moscow and Kyiv said both sides had returned about 50 people each.

Ukraine’s military intelligence directorate reported the return of 52 detainees, among them soldiers, sailors, border guards, national guard members and doctors.

Volodymyr Zelenskiy said that since March, Russia had freed a total of 1,031 prisoners.

Reuters reported the Ukrainian president said in a video address:

We remember all those who are held captive in Russia and on occupied territory and will do everything to ensure that each and every one is returned.

Russia’s defence ministry said Ukraine handed over 50 prisoners of war after talks.

Earlier on Saturday, Denis Pushilin, the Moscow-backed head of the Donetsk region – one of four Ukraine regions that Russia proclaimed as its territory last month – also said a prisoner swap with Ukraine was taking place.

He said 50 people from each side were being exchanged.

Michael Gove, the UK’s levelling up secretary, has pointedly declined to deny a report that former prime minister Liz Truss’s personal phone was potentially hacked by Russian agents, as Labour accused the government of “not taking national security seriously enough”, the Guardian’s Peter Walker reports.

You can read Peter’s report here

Russian accusations that Britain participated in attacks against the Nord Stream gas pipeline and Russian navy ships in Crimea are without foundation, France’s foreign ministry said on Sunday.
The accusations formed part of Moscow’s strategy “to turn attention away from its sole responsibility in the war of aggression that it is conducting against Ukraine,” the ministry’s deputy spokesperson said in a statement.

The European Union on Sunday called on Russia to reverse its decision to pull out of a U.N.-brokered deal that enabled Ukrainian grain exports via the Black Sea amid a global food crisis.
“Russia’s decision to suspend participation in the Black Sea deal puts at risk the main export route of much needed grain and fertilisers to address the global food crisis caused by its war against Ukraine,” EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said on Twitter.
“The EU urges Russia to (reverse) its decision.”

The UK government has been urged to launch an urgent investigation after reports that former prime minister Liz Truss’s phone was hacked.

The Mail on Sunday newspaper reported that while Truss was foreign secretary private messages between her and foreign officials, including about the Ukraine war, were hacked.

The paper reported agents suspected of working for Russia had been responsible for the alleged hacking, citing unnamed sources. The BBC and Sky both reported they had not been able to verify this.

The breach was said to have been discovered when then-foreign secretary Truss was running for the Tory leadership in the summer, but details were suppressed by then-prime minister Boris Johnson and Cabinet Secretary Simon Case, The Mail on Sunday claimed.

Opposition parties are demanding a probe into the alleged attack.

A UK government spokesperson told PA Media:

We do not comment on individuals’ security arrangements. The government has robust systems in place to protect against cyber threats. That includes regular security briefings for ministers, and advice on protecting their personal data and mitigating cyber threats.”

Russia’s ambassador to Washington scolded the United States on Sunday for making what he said were false assertions about Moscow’s decision to suspend its participation in a UN-brokered Black Sea grain deal. He repeated claims of British military specialists alleged involvement in a drone attack in Sevastopol.

“Washington’s reaction to the terrorist attack on the port of Sevastopol is truly outrageous,” ambassador Anatoly Antonov said on Telegram. “We have not seen any signs of condemnation of the reckless actions by the Kyiv regime,” Reuters reports.

“All the indications that the British military specialists were involved in organising the massive strike with the use of drones, are disregarded,” Antonov said. Moscow has coffered no evidence for its claim.

Britain has dismissed Russia’s claims as false. Britain’s Ministry of Defence said Russia’s defence ministry was “peddling false claims of an epic scale” after Moscow accused the British Navy of a “terrorist attack” on Nord Stream gas pipelines and claimed British “specialists” aided a drone attack in Sevastopol. Britain’s MoD said: “This latest invented story says more about the arguments going on inside the Russian government than it does about the west.”

Russia has said its decision to pull out of the UN-brokered grain export deal comes after a dramatic attack by Ukrainian airborne and underwater drones on its Black Sea naval base of Sevastopol in the early hours of Saturday.

Social media showed footage of explosions near and in the Crimean harbour, and Russia’s defence ministry said there had been an attack by “nine unmanned aerial vehicles and seven autonomous sea drones” that began at 4.20am.

A ministry spokesperson initially said the Ivan Golubets minesweeper had suffered minor damage, but there was speculation by Russian and Ukrainian sources that the flagship Admiral Makarov may have been hit.

Ukraine has been subject to months of deadly long-range missile strikes, but the attacks have stepped up in the past month as Russia has fired hundreds of Iranian-made Shahed-136 drones into cities and at Ukraine’s infrastructure.

Dan Sabbagh in Odesa has the full story:

United Nations officials have been in touch with Russian authorities over Moscow’s announced suspension of the UN-brokered deal allowing grain exports from Ukrainian ports.

Stephane Dujarric, a spokesman for the UN chief, António Guterres, urged the deal be continued.

He said:

It is vital that all parties refrain from any action that would imperil the Black Sea grain initiative, which is a critical humanitarian effort that is clearly having a positive impact on access to food for millions of people.

The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, called the Russian move “predictable” and accused Moscow of “blockading” ships carrying grain since September. He said 176 vessels were currently backed up at sea, carrying more than 2m tonnes of food.

Zelenskiy called for a tough response against Russia from international bodies such as the UN and the G20.

The United States has accused Russia of ‘weaponising food’ after Moscow announced it was immediately suspending its implementation of a UN-brokered grain deal that has seen more than 8m tonnes of grain exported from Ukraine during the war and brought down soaring global food prices.

Associated Press reported that the Russian defence ministry cited an alleged Ukrainian drone attack on Saturday against Russia’s Black Sea Fleet ships moored off the coast of occupied Crimea as the reason for the move.

Ukraine has denied the attack, saying that the Russians mishandled their own weapon.

The US president, Joe Biden, called Russia’s suspension of the grain deal “purely outrageous” while the secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said Moscow was “weaponising food”.

Blinken said in Washington that the suspension was regrettable and urged “all parties to keep this essential, life-saving initiative functioning”.

He said in a statement Saturday night:

Any act by Russia to disrupt these critical grain exports is essentially a statement that people and families around the world should pay more for food or go hungry. In suspending this arrangement, Russia is again weaponising food in the war it started, directly impacting low- and middle-income countries and global food prices, and exacerbating already dire humanitarian crises and food insecurity.

Ukraine accused Russia of creating a world “hunger games.”

Moscow’s declaration came a day after the United Nations chief, Antonio Guterres, urged Russia and Ukraine to renew the grain export deal, which was scheduled to expire on 19 November.

Hello and welcome back to our live coverage of the Russia-Ukraine war. Here’s a rundown on the latest developments.

• The Russian government has written to the United Nations saying it is indefinitely suspending the Black Sea grain deal that allowed vital exports of Ukrainian food supplies. Moscow also requested a related meeting of the UN security council in New York on Monday. The US president, Joe Biden, said Russia’s actions were outrageous.
• The UN secretary general urged Russia and Ukraine to renew the grain deal that has seen more than 8m tonnes of grain exported from Ukraine and brought down global food prices. The agreement between Ukraine and Russia was due to expire on 19 November.
• Britain’s Ministry of Defence said Russia’s defence ministry was “peddling false claims of an epic scale” after Moscow accused the British navy of a “terrorist attack” on Nord Stream gas pipelines and claimed British “specialists” aided a drone attack in Sevastopol. Britain’s MoD said: “This latest invented story says more about the arguments going on inside the Russian government than it does about the west.”
• Ukrainian electricity supplies were recovering after concerted Russian attacks on generating plants but emergency blackouts may still be needed, Volodymyr Zelenskiy said. “Today there are already significantly fewer stabilisation [measures] and emergency blackouts … but restrictions are still possible in some cities and districts.”
• The European Union has frozen Russian assets worth about €17bn (£14.6bn or $17bn) since Moscow invaded Ukraine, according to the EU justice commissioner, Didier Reynders.
• Up to 100 prisoners of war have reportedly been exchanged between Russia and Ukraine. Russia’s defence ministry said on Saturday that Ukraine handed over 50 prisoners of war after talks. The Ukrainian armed forces account posted on Telegram that “52 Ukrainians returned home” during another “exchange of prisoners”.
• The Ukrainian presidential aide Mykhailo Podolyak has expressed scepticism about the takeover of Twitter by Elon Musk. The billionaire and Tesla boss drew fury from Kyiv and praise from Moscow this month when he posted a Twitter poll proposing Ukraine permanently cede Crimea to Russia, that referendums be held under UN auspices on the fate of Russian-controlled territory, and that Ukraine agree to neutrality.
• Russian-backed forces say they have finished a pull-out of civilians from the key southern Ukrainian city of Kherson. The city had a population of about 288,000 people before the war and was one of the first to fall to Moscow’s troops after the February invasion. A Russian-installed official in Kherson said at least 70,000 people had left their homes in the space of a week.
• A mobile phone app has been developed by Ukrainian volunteers to allow civilians to report sightings of incoming Russian drones and missiles – and, it is hoped, increase the proportion shot down before they hit the ground. The app, ePPO, relies on a phone’s GPS and compass, and a user only has to point their device in the direction of the incoming object and press a button for it to send a location report to the military.