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Ukraine threatens to ‘hit back even harder’ if Russia destroys Kherson’s hydroelectric dam
The office of Volodymyr Zelenskiy has vowed it will “not succumb to peace by coercion” – threatening to hit back harder if Russia destroys a hydroelectric dam in Kherson.
Andriy Yermak, head of the Ukrainian president’s office, claimed that Russia has resorted to destroying the Kakhovska HPP because “nuclear blackmail did not work”.
Yermak tweeted:
Russian terrorists are agonizing. Nuclear blackmail did not work, now they are trying to scare everyone by blowing up the Kakhovska HPP. Their goal is to make us start negotiations on their terms. But they won’t succeed. Ukraine will not succumb to peace by coercion.
— Andriy Yermak (@AndriyYermak) October 21, 2022
There is right response to blackmail. Harder sanctions, further de-occupation of our territories, more weapons, and an even tougher stance on each and every of Russia’s crimes.
They won’t break us. We will hit back even harder.— Andriy Yermak (@AndriyYermak) October 21, 2022
It comes after Zelenskiy accused Russia of planning to destroy the dam (see also 6.16am).
Key events
Russian-appointed official in Kherson denies allegations of mining hydroelectric dam
A Russian-appointed official in occupied Kherson has denied allegations by Kyiv that Russia has started mining a hydroelectric dam in the region.
Citing state-owned news agency RIA, Reuters reported that Kirill Stremousov denied suggestions by the Ukrainian president that Russia is planning to blow up Kakhovska HPP and that claims that it had started mining the dam were “false”.
Ukraine threatens to ‘hit back even harder’ if Russia destroys Kherson’s hydroelectric dam
The office of Volodymyr Zelenskiy has vowed it will “not succumb to peace by coercion” – threatening to hit back harder if Russia destroys a hydroelectric dam in Kherson.
Andriy Yermak, head of the Ukrainian president’s office, claimed that Russia has resorted to destroying the Kakhovska HPP because “nuclear blackmail did not work”.
Yermak tweeted:
Russian terrorists are agonizing. Nuclear blackmail did not work, now they are trying to scare everyone by blowing up the Kakhovska HPP. Their goal is to make us start negotiations on their terms. But they won’t succeed. Ukraine will not succumb to peace by coercion.
— Andriy Yermak (@AndriyYermak) October 21, 2022
There is right response to blackmail. Harder sanctions, further de-occupation of our territories, more weapons, and an even tougher stance on each and every of Russia’s crimes.
They won’t break us. We will hit back even harder.— Andriy Yermak (@AndriyYermak) October 21, 2022
It comes after Zelenskiy accused Russia of planning to destroy the dam (see also 6.16am).
Five weeks after Ukraine’s recapture of Izyum, reconstruction is already under way.
Video footage from AFP shows how construction workers are rapidly trying to rebuild the strategic eastern town and remove signs of Russian occupation.
VIDEO: Five weeks after the recapture of the strategic town of Izyum in eastern Ukraine, a new battle for reconstruction is taking place. An army of construction workers are busy rebuilding what is left of the infrastructure and deleting any sign of Russian occupation. pic.twitter.com/pUbMu77vRZ
— AFP News Agency (@AFP) October 21, 2022
Russia claims to have destroyed Ukrainian equipment depot in Kherson
Russia claims it has destroyed a depot with foreign-made Ukrainian military equipment in the Kherson region, reports Reuters.
The agency was not able to immediately verify the report.
The Kremlin has refused to answer a question over whether or not Vladimir Putin has ordered Russian forces to withdraw from Kherson.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov referred the question to Russia’s defence ministry, reports Reuters.
Russian-installed officials are attempting to move tens of thousands of Kherson residents from the western side of the Dnipro River amid what it describes as a “tense” situation as Ukraine advances.
Commenting on the political upheaval in the UK following prime minister Liz Truss’s resignation, the Kremlin said it did not expect Britain to use “political wisdom” to choose its next leader.
Asked about the potential return of former prime minister Boris Johnson, Peskov said Russia did not want to interfere in other nation’s internal affairs but criticised the Conservatives’ “internal party process”.
For more on the UK, you can also follow the politics blog:
I’ll be looking after the Ukraine blog for the next few hours. Please get in touch with any tips or suggestions: miranda.bryant@guardian.co.uk
Summary of the day so far …
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Six people have been injured on Friday morning in a Russian strike at “an object of industrial infrastructure” in the city of Kharkiv, according to a Telegram post by the regional governor, Oleh Synyehubov. A series of explosions have also been reported in Ukraine’s south-eastern city of Zaporizhzhia, and no casualties were reported after strikes on the coast of the Kutsurub community in Mykolaiv region.
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Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has accused Russia of planning to destroy a hydroelectric dam in the eastern Kherson region, where Ukrainian soldiers have been steadily advancing and Moscow-installed authorities have begun what they call “evacuations” of civilians. Late on Thursday, Zelenskiy accused Moscow of planting mines at a the dam in the Russian-occupied region, posing a threat to a 400km Soviet-built long canal network.
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Moscow-installed authorities in Ukraine’s occupied southern Kherson region said on Friday that Ukrainian armed forces killed four people when they shelled the Antonivskiy Bridge over the Dnipro River.
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The UK Ministry of Defence has claimed Russia orchestrated a distraction campaign by announcing that 70,000 Belarusian troops would be involved in a new Russian-Belarussian group of forces. It is unlikely that Russia has actually deployed a significant number of extra troops into Belarus and the announcement is probably an attempt to convince Ukraine to divert forces to guard the northern border, according to British intelligence.
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A Russian court has ordered the arrest of the television journalist Marina Ovsyannikova, local media reports. Ovsyannikova was under house arrest and has already fled Russia, her lawyer said this week.
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Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the president of Turkey, has said he will meet Sweden’s new prime minister, Ulf Kristersson, to discuss Sweden’s bid to join Nato, which Turkey has opposed. Erdoğan also said he sees no obstacles to extending the UN-brokered deal allowing Ukrainian Black Sea grain exports.
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The European Union must remain united in its support for Ukraine and should start working on holding Russia legally accountable for its activities in the war, the Latvian prime minister, Krišjānis Kariņš, said on his way to the second day of an EU summit. His Estonian counterpart, Kaja Kallas, echoed his words, saying: “We definitely have to discuss the legal response to the crimes of aggression that have been committed in Ukraine. That can only be addressed by a separate tribunal.”
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Iran deepened its involvement in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine by providing technical support for Russian pilots flying Iranian-made drones to bomb civilian targets, the White House confirmed. The US national security council’s John Kirby said on Thursday that it was the US’s understanding that the Iranian advisers were in Crimea to provide training and maintenance – but not to actually pilot the drones – after Russian forces experienced difficulties in operating the unmanned flying bombs.
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Iran’s foreign ministry advised its citizens on Friday to refrain from traveling to Ukraine and asked Iranians there to leave the country.
That is it, from me, Martin Belam for now. I will be back later. Miranda Bryant will be with you shortly.
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, president of Turkey, has made two important statements: that he will meet with Sweden’s prime minister to discuss Nato membership, and that he sees no obstacles to extending the UN-brokered deal allowing Ukrainian Black Sea grain exports.
On the issue of Sweden, Reuters report Erdoğan said Ulf Kristersson sided with the fight against terrorism.
“The new prime minister sides with the fight against terrorism and terrorists. He has statements such as ‘we should not be harbouring terrorism and terrorists’,” he said. “Of course, we will have tested their sincerity on this issue in the meeting that we will hold.”
Turkey has previously said its parliament will not approve Sweden and Finland’s Nato bids if they do not extradite people Ankara deems to be terrorists.
On the grain export deal, Erdoğan is quoted as saying: “There is no obstacle to extending the export deal. I saw this in the talks I held with Volodymyr Zelenskiy last night and also in the talks I held with Vladimir Putin.”
Erdoğan said that more than 8m tonnes of grains and other foods had been exported under the deal signed in July.
The Estonian prime minister, Kaja Kallas, has echoed her Latvian counterpart’s words about needing a tribunal to deal with Russia following its invasion of Ukraine. Speaking to reporters as she attended an EU summit in Brussels, Reuters reports Kallas said:
We have agreed sanctions on Iran because they are participating in the war. We are going to discuss Iran today and we are going to discuss China and developments there. We definitely have to discuss the legal response to the crimes of aggression that have been committed in Ukraine. That can only be addressed by a separate tribunal.
Iran warns against travel to Ukraine and tells Iranians to leave country
Iran’s foreign ministry advised its citizens on Friday to refrain from travelling to Ukraine and asked Iranians there to leave the country.
“Due to the military escalation in Ukraine, all Iranians are strongly advised to refrain from traveling to Ukraine. Also, Iranians living in Ukraine are advised to leave the country for their own safety,” Reuters reports a ministry statement said.
The US has accused Iran of significantly deepening its involvement in Russia’s invasion by providing technical support for Russian pilots flying Iranian-made drones to bomb civilian targets.
Ukrainian regional governors are again urging residents to take care with electricity consumption. Oleksiy Kuleba, governor of Kyiv, said: “Once again I emphasise the importance of the total economy regime. Thanks to this, we will be able to avoid shutdowns in the future.”
Viacheslav Chaus, the Chernihiv governor, has said that “due to a sharp increase in the level of electricity consumption”, the region has “a temporary controlled restriction of electricity consumption”.
The European Union must remain united in its support for Ukraine and should start working on holding Russia legally accountable for its activities in the war, the Latvian prime minister, Krišjānis Kariņš, said on his way to the second day of an EU summit.
“Russia’s war is becoming ever more brutal, now blatantly aimed not only at the Ukrainian military but at Ukrainian citizens and their civilian infrastructure,” Reuters reports Kariņš said on his way to a meeting of EU leaders.
“To figure out how to properly hold Russia also legally accountable for the atrocities that they are committing in Ukraine today,” he said, adding that sanctions against Belarus should also be increased.
Moscow-installed authorities in Ukraine’s occupied southern Kherson region said on Friday that Ukrainian armed forces killed four people when they shelled the Antonivskiy Bridge over the Dnipro River.
“Four people were killed,” one of the leaders of the Russian-installed authorities said. Kirill Stremousov posted to Telegram to say: “The city of Kherson, like a fortress, is preparing for its defence.”
Pro-Russian forces in occupied Kherson have said they aim to transport up to 60,000 residents away from the city for what they claim is safety reasons, a move that Ukrainian authorities have dismissed as a “propaganda show”.
RIA Novosti, the state-owned Russian news agency, quotes Stremousov saying: “Shooting at a peaceful civilian crossing with fragmentation shells is not just blasphemy. This once again says that the Nazis demand victims.” He said that about 10 civilian vehicles were destroyed in the attack.
Ekaterina Gubareva, the Russian-imposed deputy governor of the region, told RIA that two employees of the Kherson TV and radio company Tavria were killed.
None of the claims have been independently verified.
The UK’s ambassador to Ukraine, Melinda Simmons, has reported that it has been a relatively quiet night in the capital, Kyiv, with just one air raid siren before 9am.
Only one air raid siren before 0900 today. Kyiv residents, completely unintimidated, continue going about their day.
— Melinda Simmons (@MelSimmonsFCDO) October 21, 2022
Oleksandr Starukh, Ukraine’s governor of Zaporizhzhia, has posted to say that three people have been injured in attacks on the city this morning. He reports:
The enemy attacked the city with S-300 missiles. A residential building and infrastructure facilities were destroyed. According to preliminary information, there are three wounded.
As a result of the attack, the gas system was damaged in a residential high-rise building, there was a fire, and a wall was destroyed. Specialised services are already working.
The occupier also targeted a school in one of Zaporizhzhia’s districts. The roof of the school was damaged and the windows were broken. There were also hits on infrastructure facilities and open areas.
The claims have not been independently verified.
Six people have been injured this morning in a Russian strike at “an object of industrial infrastructure” in the city of Kharkiv, according to a Telegram post by the regional governor, Oleh Synyehubov.
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