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Rocket fire on Ukraine from Russia's Belgorod region (June 4)
Photo: Vadim Belikov / dpa
What happened in the past few hours
In the Belgorod region of Russia, an energy plant caught fire in a drone strike, according to the governor of the region. "In the Belgorod region, one of the energy plants is on fire. The preliminary cause of the fire was an explosive device dropped from a drone," Vyacheslav Gladkov wrote on Telegram. There were no casualties."
At the same time, Gladkov agreed to negotiate with pro-Ukrainian Russian fighters who had claimed responsibility for attacks in the border region in order to free "our people" from their hands. The governor's remarks were the first confirmation from the official Russian side that pro-Ukrainian fighters had taken prisoners on Russian territory.
The partisans themselves stated that during a cross-border raid they seized seven Russian soldiers. The group, called the "Russian Volunteer Corps", announced in a video on Telegram that it now wants to hand over the soldiers to the Ukrainian authorities. The reason for this is that Governor Gladkov did not appear at a planned meeting with the Russian partisans. This was supposed to be about the release of the Russian soldiers.
According to the local authorities, the Russian border region of Belgorod has been under fire for days, and several civilians have been killed. Gladkov called on residents of villages in the Shebekino district to leave their homes and get to safety. More than 4000,<> people have already been accommodated in temporary shelters in the region, the governor said.
International reactions
According to Polish media reports, Poles are also involved in the fighting in the Belgorod region. These are mercenaries who fought under the name "Polish Volunteer Corps" on the side of the Ukrainian army, the online news portals Polsatnews.pl and Wprost.pl reported on Sunday. They cited the group's own messages on the Telegram messaging service and a video that is supposed to show soldiers on their way to Belgorod.
According to information from Polsat, the Polish Volunteer Corps was founded in February. Initially, it fought alongside the Ukrainian army as an independent unit consisting only of Poles. In the meantime, the troops are also acting together with a "Russian Volunteer Corps". It was not clear from the reports how many Poles are supposed to be involved.
This is what Kiev says
According to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, at least 485 children have been killed since the beginning of the Russian war of aggression. These were exclusively victims whose data had been officially recorded, Zelensky said in his evening address on Sunday. In reality, the number is much higher. Zelenskyy also referred to the more than 19,500 Ukrainian children who have been deported from occupied territories to Russia. So far, it has only been possible to bring back the "little Ukrainians" in around 370 cases, said the head of state.
In view of reports of deportations of Ukrainian children, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants against Russian President Vladimir Putin and the Russian Commissioner for Children's Rights Maria Lvova-Belova in mid-March this year. The legal charge is "war crimes".
According to Zelensky, Russia is circumventing international arms sanctions. In his video message, he said that some countries and companies are helping Russia acquire technology with a focus on rocket production. Russia has fired hundreds of missiles at Ukrainian targets since last October. Russia is succeeding in circumventing the punitive measures with a network of suppliers.
Ukraine is aware of all Russian efforts to circumvent the sanctions. Kyiv will ensure that "there are no products of the free world in Russian missiles." In April, a senior adviser to Zelenskyy said that Ukrainian forces had found an increasing number of Chinese components in Russian weapons used in Ukraine.
Statements from Russia
Russian forces have thwarted a major Ukrainian offensive in the southern Ukrainian region of Donetsk, killing hundreds of Ukrainian forces, according to the Russian Defense Ministry. "On the morning of June 4, the enemy launched a large-scale offensive in five sectors of the front in the direction of South Donetsk," the ministry said on Telegram on Sunday. "The enemy did not achieve his goals, he did not succeed."
Around 250 Ukrainian soldiers were killed. The Ukrainian infantry vehicles, as well as 16 tanks and 21 armored combat vehicles, were destroyed. The ministry released a video showing several Ukrainian armored vehicles exploding in a field after shelling. Initially, there was no comment from the government in Kiev.
The head of the Russian mercenary group Wagner, Yevgeny Prigozhin, has once again made serious accusations against the regular Russian army. In mid-May, soldiers mined a road on which his fighters wanted to drive out of the now conquered eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut, Prigozhin said on Telegram on Sunday evening.
He also published a document purporting to be an operational protocol from mid-May, which also mentions exchanges of fire between Wagner mercenaries and soldiers. These allegations could not be verified. The Ministry of Defense in Moscow did not comment.
Prigozhin had already made similar accusations a few days ago. The U.S. Institute for the Study of War (ISW) sees it as a possible attempt by the 62-year-old to distract from recent tensions between his troops and fighters of Chechnya's ruler Ramzan Kadyrov through the dispute with the Ministry of Defense.
More than 15 months after the invasion of Ukraine, power struggles are raging in Russia's military leadership, which are clearly becoming apparent. Again and again, Prigozhin has recently railed against Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, whom he accused of poor warfare and a lack of ammunition for the Wagner fighters.
What's happening today
Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock (Greens) and Labor Minister Hubertus Heil (SPD) will start a three-day visit to Brazil this Monday. Baerbock's talks are likely to focus on Russia's war of aggression on Ukraine as well as climate and environmental issues. Together with Heil, she also wants to try to recruit nurses in South America's largest country.
jok/dpa/Reuters