Nato has said in an ascension plan that “Ukraine’s future” is in the alliance and the country will join when “allies agree and conditions are met” but has failed to provide a timeline for when that will happen. “Allies will continue to support and review Ukraine’s progress on interoperability as well as additional democratic and security sector reforms that are required,” a communiqué published by alliance members said. Nato has said Ukraine cannot join its ranks while the war with Russia continues. Its leaders on Tuesday reiterated a 2008 declaration that Ukraine would join but also made clear it would not happen automatically after the war ended.
Nato’s plans on Ukraine’s membership prompted President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to say he has “faith” but not confidence in the alliance’s decisions. Before Nato published the communiqué, the Ukrainian leader said it would be “absurd” if Ukraine was not offered Nato membership.
Germany found traces of subsea explosives in samples taken from a yacht that it suspects “may have been used to transport the explosives” to blow up the Nord Stream gas pipelines, it told the UN security council in a letter with Sweden and Denmark. A series of unexplained explosions hit the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines connecting Russia and Germany under the Baltic Sea last September in the exclusive economic zones of Germany, Sweden and Denmark.
A senior Russian draft officer and former submarine commander accused by Ukraine of deadly strikes on its territory has been shot dead while jogging in the southern Russian city of Krasnodar. Stanislav Rzhitsky, 42, was killed on Monday by an unidentified gunman during a morning run in a park, police said. Russian FSB security services said on Tuesday that a 64-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of carrying out the attack.
A woman was killed by Russian shelling in the village of Sofiyivka in the Kherson region, the governor said on Telegram. Oleksandr Prokudin also claimed residential quarters in the region had been set on fire by “Russian terrorists” and left two people injured, one of whom was in serious condition.
The British government said on Tuesday it would provide a £50m ($64.65m) support package for equipment repair and establishment of a military rehabilitation centre in Ukraine. Under the new tranche of support, which will be discussed at this week’s Nato summit in Vilnius, Luthuania, the UK and G7 members will provide thousands of additional rounds of Challenger 2 ammunition and more than 70 combat and logistics vehicles.
Rishi Sunak said he hoped there would be “demonstrable progress” towards Ukraine’s eventual membership of Nato, but did not give any timescale or set any conditions the country might have to meet before becoming a member. The British prime minister said that “Ukraine’s rightful place is in Nato” as he flew out to the two-day leaders’ summit. Nato would “stand by the language of Bucharest in 2008”, Sunak added, referring to the summit where Ukraine’s eventual membership was agreed in principle.
France will start supplying Ukraine with long-range Scalp missiles that will allow Kyiv’s forces to defend themselves, President Emmanuel Macron has said. “I have decided to increase deliveries of weapons and equipment to enable the Ukrainians to have the capacity to strike deeply while keeping our doctrine to allow Ukraine to defend its territory,” he said on Tuesday.
The Russian defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, said that if the US supplied cluster bombs to Ukraine, Moscow would be forced to use “similar weapons” against Ukrainian forces.
Nato says it has not seen a change in Russia’s nuclear posture despite its announcement that it is stationing nuclear weapons in Belarus. However, alliance chief Jens Stoltenberg cautioned that “the nuclear rhetoric of Russia is reckless and dangerous” and that Nato allies were closely monitoring what Russia was doing. “So far we haven’t seen any changes in the Russian nuclear deployment posture that requires a change from us, but we will remain vigilant,” he said.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov was critical of the Nato summit in Vilnius and singled out France’s offer of longer-range missiles. He said Sweden’s expected accession to Nato would have clear negative implications for Russia’s security and that Moscow would respond with similar measures to those it took after Finland joined the western military alliance.
Ukraine said it shot down 26 Russian drones overnight on Monday but two got through and caused damage in Odesa. Suspilne reported: “Two kamikaze drones hit the administration building of a port facility in Odesa: two port terminals, including a grain one, caught fire. The fire was extinguished, there were no critical damages or injuries.”
English (US)