Russia-Ukraine war: Ukraine restricts power use; ‘abundant evidence’ Russia using Iranian drones, says US – live | Ukraine

European Union members have agreed on new measures against Iran over its supply of drones to Russia, the Czech presidency of the EU has said:

Russian forces have continued to hit military and energy targets in Ukraine over the last 24 hours, the country’s defence ministry has claimed.

According to Reuters, the ministry also said Russian units have repelled a Ukrainian counteroffensive in the southern Kherson region, from which local Russian-installed officials are currently evacuating tens of thousands of residents.

British defence secretary Ben Wallace, who has returned from a visit to see his US counterpart in Washington, will make a statement to parliament on Ukraine later today.

Nato allies will act if Sweden or Finland come under pressure from Russia or another adversary before they become full members of the alliance, Nato secretary general Jens Stoltenberg said on Thursday.

“It is inconceivable that allies would not act should Sweden and Finland come under any form of pressure,” Reuters reports Stoltenberg said at a news conference with Swedish prime minister Ulf Kristersson.

A Russian airstrike that hit a major thermal power station in the city of Burshtyn in western Ukraine on Wednesday has caused “quite serious” damage, the region’s governor said this morning.

“Unfortunately there is destruction, and it is quite serious,” Reuters reports Svitlana Onyshchuk, Ivano-Frankivsk’s governor, said on Ukrainian television.

Scholz: ‘Scorched earth tactics will not help Russia win the war’

In the UK, Tobias Ellwood, a Conservative MP who is chair of the House of Commons defence committee, has been speaking about how the unfolding chaos in the British government may have an impact on Ukraine, and also talked about defence secretary Ben Wallace’s visit to Washington. He told Sky News viewers:

They are watching this, and we should remember that there isn’t just a domestic audience, but the rest of the world takes a huge interest in what Britain does. They like to see leadership from us, not least in what’s going on in Ukraine at the moment, which can get very bumpy indeed, with Putin’s back against the wall.

I understand [Ben Wallace is] going to be briefing the House of Commons today, but clearly it’s moved into a very dangerous chapter.

It’s quite incredible what Ukraine has done, who ever thought six months ago, that they’d push back the third largest army in the world? But with Putin in a corner now, calling for martial law in those areas where he had that sham referenda, we must now ask the very difficult questions that perhaps we’ve avoided in the last 77 years – what do we do if a state uses a nuclear weapon? And I’m not sure we’re quite in that mindset yet.

But I understand that these conversations are happening behind the scenes.

In fairness, we cannot rely on Nato because the consensus would suggest that both Turkey Hungary would not agree with a consensus approach. It would require the coalition of the willing to stand up to Russia.

Firstly, to provide a deterrent to prevent that happening in the first place. And secondly, what would our reaction be to make sure that if this precedent is crossed, that we punish that reaction, that we retaliate in the necessarily right way?

Here are some images taken yesterday which have been sent to us from Kharkiv, showing the damage to residential buildings and the construction of concrete bomb shelter facilities.

Vitaliy Kim, governor of Mykolaiv, has posted to Telegram at 10am local time (8am BST) in Ukraine to say that there have been S-300 missile strikes on the city. He said “no casualties or destruction” and that “only lawns spoil”.

Maksym Kozytskyi, governor of Lviv, has said that industrial electricity consumers in his region have already been informed of a schedule for limiting power usage.

He said “Those industrial consumers who were included in the schedule have already been informed about the situation. They must perform proven reduction volumes.”

For domestic consumers, he said “there is currently no information about the introduction of a shutdown schedule.”

Kirill Stremousov, one of the Russian-imposed leaders in Ukraine’s occupied Kherson, has posted to Telegram quotes he gave to Radio Krym.

In them he asserted that Ukraine was losing morale and running out of troops in southern Ukraine, where a counteroffensive to retake the city of Kherson has been anticipated.

He claims “there are a lot of mercenaries – they are recognised in radio intercepts by the word ‘Russians’, because the Ukrainians do not call us that – they say ‘rashists’, ‘orcs’. They will not be able to break through the line of defence, and I don’t believe there are 60,000 servicemen of the armed forces of Ukraine in the south, the maximum is 30,000 who don’t want to die.”

He said that the terrain makes it difficult for Ukrainians to dislodge the defensive positions taken up by pro-Russian forces, saying “this is the steppe, where everything is as you can see on a silver platter.”

Stremousov offered no evidence to back up his claims. Kherson is one of the regions that Russia partially occupies and has claimed to “annex” after holding sham referendums. Authorities in Kherson have announced their intention to transport up to 60,000 civilians out of the city of Kherson south, to the left bank of the Dnipro.