War in Ukraine: What to remember on the 462nd day of the Russian invasion

Europe 1 with AFP // Photo credit: Vladimir Aleksandrov / ANADOLU AGENCY / Anadolu Agency via AFP 11:20 am, May 31, 2023

A night bombing of a poultry farm in the occupied Luhansk region of eastern Ukraine killed at least five people and wounded 19, Russian authorities said Wednesday, accusing Kiev of carrying out the strike. "The bombing of the village of Karpaty (located 35 kilometers west of Lugansk, editor's note) by Ukrainian armed groups (...) caused 24 casualties - five killed and 19 wounded," Russia's Center for Monitoring the Security Situation in the Luhansk Region said on Telegram.

The poultry farm and a site where workers temporarily lived were damaged, according to the same source, which did not specify whether the victims were military or civilians. But in a first assessment, published a few hours earlier, she had indicated that four workers had been killed.

Brussels considers extension of restrictions on Ukrainian grain imports

The European Commissioner for Agriculture, Janusz Wojciechowski, deemed it necessary on Tuesday to extend "at least" until the end of October the restrictions imposed by five EU states on the import of Ukrainian cereals, despite the opposition of Kiev and the resistance of some of the Twenty-Seven.

While the lifting of customs duties in May 2022 has boosted the influx of Ukrainian agricultural products into the EU, several riparian countries (Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, Bulgaria) unilaterally banned the import of grain from Ukraine in mid-April in the face of the saturation of silos on their territory and the collapse of local prices.

Guardian of the EU's trade policy, the European Commission concluded at the end of April with these four States and Romania an agreement providing until 5th June for "safeguard measures" to enable them to block the marketing of Ukrainian wheat, maize, rapeseed and sunflower on their soil, provided that they do not prevent their transit to other countries. "It is necessary to extend (these restrictions) at least until the end of October, and ideally until the end of the year, after the harvest, otherwise we will have a huge problem," Wojciechowski said after a meeting of EU agriculture ministers.

One killed in Ukrainian bombing of centre for displaced people in border region

One person was killed and two others wounded Tuesday in a Ukrainian shelling of a center for displaced people in the Belgorod border region, Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said. "The Ukrainian armed forces fired artillery at a centre for displaced persons housing elderly civilians and children ... one security guard was killed and two people wounded," Vyacheslav Gladkov said on Telegram. According to him, the two injured are "in a serious condition in intensive care" with "penetrating wounds to the abdomen" for one, chest for the other.

He accompanied his message with photographs of a damaged building with destroyed windows, a ditch caused by an impact near the security guard's cabin, as well as adults and children being evacuated in buses. The Belgorod region, bordering Ukraine, has been repeatedly targeted by Ukrainian shelling, as well as by attempted incursions by armed groups from Ukraine.