Evening summary
The time in Kyiv is almost 9pm. Here is a roundup of the day’s headlines:
Ukraine’s military vowed on Tuesday not to give up the eastern city of Bakhmut as it prepares to launch a counteroffensive against Russian forces. Gen Oleksandr Syrskyi, the commander of Ukrainian ground forces, underlined the importance Kyiv attaches to holding Bakhmut as preparations continue for a counterattack that it hopes will change the dynamic of the war.
Russia’s defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, said his country was inflicting heavy blows to Ukraine across the entire frontline, but that the supply of weapons was crucial to ensuring the success of what Moscow calls its “special military operation”. In a meeting with Russia’s top military officials, Shoigu said Russian forces were engaged in combat operations “along the entire line of contact” and were fighting not only Ukraine but also “unprecedented military assistance from the west”.
The Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, said German-supplied weapons were already being used in the Donbas region, which Russia has declared its own, a step that Ukraine and the west have dismissed as illegal. The German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, said on Monday that Germany had insisted, like other Nato member countries, that the weapons it was supplying to Ukraine must not be used against Russian territory, Reuters reported.
Russia’s military has sustained 100,000 casualties in the past five months in fighting against Ukraine, mostly in the Bakhmut region, the White House has estimated. The national security spokesperson John Kirby said the figure, based on US intelligence estimates, included more than 20,000 dead.
Kirby did not detail how the US calculated Russia’s losses, but he said about half of those who died were fighting under the Wagner group rather than with the Russian military. They were being sent into battle without proper training or leadership, he said.
The Kremlin rejected the US assessment of Russian military casualties in Ukraine as having been “plucked from thin air” and said Washington had no way of obtaining the correct data.
All parties in the Black Sea grain initiative will meet for talks on Wednesday, according to a senior Ukrainian source. Additionally, the senior UN trade official Rebeca Grynspan is expected to travel to Moscow this week.
At least six Russian regions have scrapped 9 May Victory Day parades to mark the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany amid fear of Ukrainian strikes, with the governor of a region 400 miles from the border the latest to cancel. The governor of Saratov announced on Tuesday that its parade would not go ahead because of “safety concerns”. The string of cancellations act as a glaring admission of the country’s military vulnerability more than 14 months into the war.
Suspilne, Ukraine’s state broadcaster, reported that overnight three apartment buildings and a school were damaged in Kramatorsk in a strike by Russian S-300 missiles that caused one injury.
Oleh Synyehubov, the governor of Kharkiv, reported that a woman was injured in the shelling of the village of Petropavlivka, which is close to Ukraine’s border with Russia.
Ukrainian forces shelled a village in Russia’s Bryansk region early on Tuesday, the local governor said in a social media post, a day after an explosion derailed a freight train in the region.
That’s it from me, Tom Ambrose, and indeed the Ukraine live blog for today. Thanks for following along.
Updated
The UK’s attention has “not been taken off the Wagner group at any point”, the government said, amid questions about whether the Russian mercenary outfit has had any involvement in Sudan’s uprising.
Julian Lewis, the Conservative MP who chairs the intelligence and security committee, asked of the Foreign Office minister Andrew Mitchell in the Commons:
Is there any evidence that the Wagner group’s links with the Rapid Support Forces had anything to do with the uprising, bearing in mind that the attention of our government and no doubt others has been taken away from the Ukraine crisis by this crisis?
And does he agree that if we don’t wish to see a flood of refugees coming into western Europe, such humanitarian aid we give must be focused on those surrounding countries nearer to where this crisis is playing out?
Mitchell replied:
Well, [Lewis] is entirely right on the final point.
I have nothing that I can say about the work of Russia and Wagner in Sudan, but I can assure him that our attention has not been taken off the Wagner group at any point.
Updated
Ukrainian army snipers change their position facing Russian troops near Bakhmut, Donetsk region.
Russian regions scrap Victory Day parades amid fear of Ukraine strikes
At least six Russian regions have scrapped 9 May Victory Day parades that mark the Soviet victory over Nazi Germany amid fear over Ukrainian strikes, with the governor of a region 400 miles from the border the latest to cancel.
The governor of Saratov announced on Tuesday that its parade would not go ahead because of “safety concerns”. The string of cancellations act as a glaring admission of the country’s military vulnerability more than 14 months into the war.
Earlier, the heads of Belgorod, Kursk, Voronezh, Oryol and Pskov regions, as well as the Russian-occupied Crimean peninsula, similarly cancelled their annual military parades.
“There won’t be a parade in order to not provoke the enemy with large numbers of equipment and service members in central Belgorod,” that region’s head, Vyacheslav Gladkov, said last month.
Updated
A monument created as a “symbol of hope” for Ukraine has gone on display in Liverpool as the city prepares to host the Eurovision song contest on behalf of the country.
The Ukraine Peace Monument was unveiled at Strawberry Field, the former children’s home made famous by the Beatles’ song Strawberry Fields Forever, on Tuesday.
PA Media reports that the 16ft statue, depicting a man holding a book, a dove and a Ukrainian flag, will be on display for Eurovision fans visiting the city before the contest’s final on 13 May.
It will be kept in the gardens of the Salvation Army-owned visitor attraction, where John Lennon played as a boy, before being moved to Ukraine to become a permanent monument when it is safe.
Kathy Versfeld, the mission director at Strawberry Field, said:
The Ukrainian Peace Monument invites our guests to make a stand for peace, whoever they are, wherever they are – sentiments that John Lennon lived and breathed throughout his life.
The monument is a beautiful new symbol of hope for Ukraine, and it will be a reminder to the rest of the world of the path to peace: serve, share, forgive, dialogue. Strawberry Field is honoured to be the custodian of the monument until it can make its final journey to Ukraine.
The statue was created by 16-year-old Osbelit Garcia-Morales, from Mexico, who was awarded the commission last year by a California-based artist coalition, the Global Peace Initiative.
Lennon’s sister, Julia Baird, was among those who gathered to see the monument unveiled.
Updated
Suspilne, Ukraine’s state broadcaster, reports that Pavlohrad city council has allocated 9m hryvnias (£200,000) to help victims of rocket attacks on the night of 1 May. It posted to its telegram channel:
The decision was made by deputies at an extraordinary session. The executive committee will decide what the amount and procedure for receiving the money will be.
Updated
Denmark will donate 1.7bn Danish crowns (£200m/$249m) to Ukraine for military purposes, the country’s acting defence minister Troels Lund Poulsen said on Tuesday, Reuters reports.
Updated
Russia’s relations with Poland have worsened, with state news agencies reporting today that Poland’s chargé d’affaires has been summoned in protest at what Moscow has called the “seizure” of its embassy school in Warsaw.
Reuters reports Russia has pledged a “harsh” response after Polish police shut down the school on Saturday, saying that the premises belonged to the Polish state.
Updated
Kremlin accuses Germany of increasing 'direct and indirect involvement' in Ukraine conflict
The Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, has said German-supplied weapons were already being used in the Donbas region, which Russia has declared its own, a step Ukraine and the west have dismissed as illegal.
The German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, said on Monday that Germany had insisted, like other Nato member countries, that the weapons it was supplying to Ukraine must not be used against Russian territory, Reuters reported.
But Peskov told reporters:
First, Germany doesn’t have a way to check. Second, the weapons supplied by Germany to the Kyiv regime are already firing at Russian territory, because the Donbas is a Russian region.
He said Germany’s “direct and indirect involvement” in the conflict was increasing, adding:
The German chancellor should take that as his starting point.
Updated
Kremlin rejects US assessment of military casualties
The Kremlin has also rejected a US assessment of Russian military casualties in Ukraine as having been “plucked from thin air” and said that Washington had no way of obtaining the correct data.
The White House estimated on Monday that Russia’s military had sustained 100,000 casualties in the past five months, including more than 20,000 dead.
Russia last publicly revealed its tally of losses in the campaign in September, when the defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, said 5,937 Russian soldiers had been killed in the conflict.
Updated
The Kremlin said on Tuesday that the window to extend the Black Sea grain deal was shrinking, and that ongoing talks between the parties were continuing, but without any results.
Russia has repeatedly indicated it is prepared to walk away from the deal on 18 May if its demands to ease restrictions on its own agricultural exports are not addressed.
The Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters that part of the deal concerning Russia’s interests was not being implemented.
Updated
Ukraine vows not to give up on defending Bakhmut as it prepares for counteroffensive
Ukraine’s military vowed on Tuesday not to give up the eastern city of Bakhmut as it prepares to launch a counteroffensive against Russian forces.
Gen Oleksandr Syrskyi, commander of Ukrainian ground forces, underlined the importance Kyiv attaches to holding Bakhmut as preparations continue for a counterattack which it hopes will change the dynamic of the war in Ukraine.
The battle for Bakhmut has symbolic importance for both sides, with Ukraine still holding on to some parts of the city after months of fierce fighting against regular Russian troops and fighters from the Wagner mercenary force, Reuters reported.
“Together with the commanders, we have made a number of necessary decisions aimed at ensuring the effective defence and inflicting maximum losses on the enemy,” Syrskyi said in remarks released after a visit to troops fighting in Bakhmut.
“We will continue, despite all the forecasts and advice, to hold Bakhmut, destroying Wagner and other most combat-capable units of the Russian army,” he told soldiers in video footage of his visit. “We give our reserves an opportunity to prepare and we are preparing for further actions ourselves.”
Updated
Russia’s defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, said his country was inflicting heavy blows to Ukraine across the entire frontline, but that the supply of weapons was crucial to ensuring the success of what Moscow calls its “special military operation”.
In a meeting with Russia’s top military officials, Shoigu said Russian forces were engaged in combat operations “along the entire line of contact” and were fighting not only Ukraine but also “unprecedented military assistance from the West”.
However, he said Russia was successfully attacking Ukrainian depots storing western-supplied weapons, Reuters reported.
Shoigu said Moscow had taken steps to boost its arms production to support the war, as he said Russian forces’ success on the battlefield would “largely depend on the timely replenishment of weapons” and other military equipment.
“The country’s leadership has set defence enterprises the task of increasing the pace and volume of production in a short time,” Shoigu said, according to a transcript of his remarks published by his ministry.
Shoigu said the army had all the ammunition it needed for use on the battlefield this year, but called on a major rocket producer to urgently double its output of high-precision missiles.
Russia has in recent days killed and injured dozens of people in its largest strikes on Ukraine for weeks.
Updated
Summary of the day so far …
Russia’s military has suffered 100,000 casualties in the past five months in fighting against Ukraine, mostly in the Bakhmut region, the White House has estimated. National security spokesperson John Kirby told reporters the figure, based on US intelligence estimates, included more than 20,000 dead.
Kirby did not detail how the US calculated Russia’s losses, but said about half of those who died were fighting under the Wagner mercenary group, rather than with the Russian military. They were being sent into battle without proper training or leadership, he added.
All parties in the Black Sea grain initiative will meet for talks on Wednesday, according to a senior Ukrainian source. Additionally top UN trade official Rebeca Grynspan is expected to travel to Moscow this week
Suspilne, Ukraine’s state broadcaster, reports that overnight three apartment buildings and a school were damaged in Kramatorsk after a strike by Russian S-300 missiles which caused one injury.
Oleh Synyehubov, governor of Kharkiv, has reported that a woman has been injured in the shelling of the village of Petropavlivka, which is close to Ukraine’s border with Russia.
Ukrainian forces shelled a village in the Russian Bryansk region bordering Ukraine early on Tuesday, the local governor said in a social media post, a day after an explosion derailed a freight train in the region.
Key event
Top UN trade official Rebeca Grynspan is expected to travel to Moscow this week, a spokesperson said on Tuesday, amid a diplomatic push to ensure a deal allowing for the safe export of Ukrainian grain from Black Sea ports is renewed, Reuters reports.
Russia has repeatedly said it will not allow the deal to be extended beyond 18 May unless western countries removes obstacles to Russian grain and fertiliser exports.
Updated
Suspilne, Ukraine’s state broadcaster, reports that overnight three apartment buildings and a school were damaged in Kramatorsk after a strike by Russian S-300 missiles, which caused one injury.
Updated
Oleh Synyehubov, governor of Kharkiv, has reported that a woman has been injured this morning in shelling of the village of Petropavlivka, which is close to Ukraine’s border with Russia. He posted:
According to preliminary data, a 73-year-old woman received a shrapnel wound. Doctors are now providing the victims with all the necessary assistance.
The claim has not been independently verified.
Updated
Reuters has a quick snap to say that all parties in the Black Sea grain initiative will meet for talks on Wednesday, according to a senior Ukrainian source.
The deal is, according to Russia’s timetable, due to expire on 18 May. The Kremlin has been lukewarm about the prospect of it being extended, arguing that restrictions on Russia’s banking and insurance sector have damaged the country’s own agricultural exports.
Ukraine has previously expressed a willingness to extend the deal for a longer time period, and to include additional Ukrainian ports in the arrangement.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy has issued one of his daily social media posts aimed at boosting morale. Ukraine’s president said on Telegram:
Our state has already proven that it can win. We have proven that we can liberate our land from the occupier. All those who ensure the de-occupation have proven that, together with the blue and yellow flag, normal life returns for every person and every family. Our goal is to return this life to the whole of Ukraine, to all those areas that are still temporarily under occupation.
The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, on Tuesday ordered his government to “clarify” the procedure for how Russian companies can make dividend payments to shareholders from so-called “unfriendly countries”.
Russia considers all countries that have hit it with sanctions over its military campaign in Ukraine to be “unfriendly”. It has hit back with its own package of counter-sanctions and capital controls which restrict the ability of companies and investors from these countries to transfer profits or dividends back home.
Reuters reports the Kremlin said proposals on dividend payments should “include conditions that residents expand their production in Russia, develop businesses based on new technologies and invest in the Russian economy.”
Putin asked the government to come up with proposals by 20 May, a document published by the Kremlin said.
Updated
The Russian state-owned news agency Tass is reporting that, according to the emergency services of the Russian Federation, eight soldiers of the armed forces of Ukraine were killed and four were injured when Russian artillery fire destroyed Ukrainian self-propelled guns and a mortar in the Kherson region.
Kherson is one of the partly occupied regions of Ukraine the Russian Federation claimed to have annexed last year.
The claims have not been independently verified.
Updated
Andriy Yermak, the head of the office of the Ukrainian presidency, has posted to Telegram to say that generations of Russians will pay the price for the nation’s actions in the war, citing environmental damage to Ukraine’s territory among other factors. He wrote:
When we talk about the environmental damage that Russia is constantly causing as a result of strikes on Ukraine, we must make it clear to the Russians: they will have to pay for everything. For mining territories, for striking objects, as well as for killing people and abducting children.
Unborn future generations will pay and they won’t have a choice. Moreover, these generations will have a serious problem, because they will go down in history as descendants of Russian terrorists who committed the genocide of the Ukrainian people. And it will not be possible to hide from this in any country in the world.
This is Martin Belam taking over the live blog in London. You can contact me at martin.belam@theguardian.com.
Updated
On a more joyful note, meet 10-year-old Briton Milan Kumar, who devotes hour after hour, day after day to help young people have a safe place to call home.
“One-fifth of young people are homeless,” he said. “This is wrong. We need to make a difference in our home towns.”
An #iwill Young Ambassador, Milan has raised thousands of pounds for charity. He has slept outside to raise awareness of homelessness and abseiled 58ft down the Bolton Wanderers football stadium.
He recently travelled to Poland to give books and stationery to Ukrainian children, donated by companies he persuaded to get involved. There he was thanked personally by the general consulate of Ukraine:
White House national security council spokesperson John Kirby did not detail how the US calculated Russia’s losses, but said about half of those who died were fighting under the Wagner mercenary group, rather than with the Russian military. They were being sent into battle without proper training or leadership, he added.
Founded by a close Putin aide, the group has recruited heavily in prisons, offering convicts who survive six months on the bloody frontlines an amnesty. The US figures underline what a deadly gamble those who accept are making.
Ukrainian forces are still holding out in a corner of Bakhmut. Col Gen Oleksandr Syrskyi, the commander of ground forces, said on Monday “the situation is quite difficult”, but Ukrainian forces are still counterattacking against Russians.
Ukrainian forces reportedly shell village in Bryansk, Russia – local governor
Ukrainian forces shelled a village in the Russian Bryansk region bordering Ukraine early on Tuesday, the local governor said in a social media post, a day after an explosion derailed a freight train in the region.
“In the morning, the Armed Forces of Ukraine shelled the village of Kurkovichi in the Starodubsky municipal district,” Bryansk Governor Alexander Bogomaz said in a post on his Telegram channel.
“There were no casualties. As a result of the shelling, a fire broke out in one of the households. All emergency services are on site.”
Neither the Guardian nor reuters were able to independently verify the report. Ukraine almost never publicly claims responsibility for attacks inside Russia and on Russian-controlled territory in Ukraine. The military, however, reports daily on activities and troops movements in battlefield areas.
On Monday, a locomotive and seven freight wagons were derailed in Bryansk after an unidentified explosive device went off, Bogomaz said.
Russian authorities say the region, which borders both Ukraine and Belarus, has seen multiple attacks by pro-Ukrainian sabotage groups in the 14 months since Russia invaded. On Saturday, the governor said four civilians died when a village was struck by shelling from the Ukrainian side of the border.
Updated
Russia-Ukraine war live: 100,000 Russian troops killed or injured in eastern offensive failures, says US
More than 20,000 Russian soldiers have been killed and more than 80,000 injured in just five months of fighting in Ukraine, an acceleration in already heavy losses for Moscow, US intelligence officials estimate.
Most of the troops were killed in brutal trench warfare for the small eastern city of Bakhmut, which Russia has repeatedly claimed it was on the brink of capturing, White House national security council spokesperson John Kirby said when he revealed the new estimate on Monday.
“Russia’s attempt at an offensive in the Donbas, largely through Bakhmut, has failed … Russia has been unable to seize any really strategically significant territory,” Kirby said.
The losses are an acceleration in Russian casualties even from the bloody first days of the war, and overshadow some of the bloodiest allied battles of the second world war, Kirby added. That includes the Guadalcanal campaign, the first major Allied offensive against Japan, which also lasted five months.
Opening summary
Welcome back to our live coverage of the war in Ukraine.
Our top story this morning: more than 20,000 Russian soldiers have been killed and more than 80,000 injured in just five months of fighting in Ukraine, an acceleration in already heavy losses for Moscow, US intelligence officials estimate.
Here are the other key recent developments in the war:
Russia unleashed a fresh missile attack on Ukraine in the east, killing two people, setting off huge blazes and damaging dozens of homes and other buildings in the city of Pavlohrad. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy announced the two deaths in his video address on Monday night. “Forty other people - women, children, men – were treated for wounds and injuries,” he said. Zelenskiy also said a 14-year-boy was killed near his school when it was hit by a bomb in the Chernihiv region, close to the Russian border.
An explosion in the western region of Bryansk bordering Ukraine derailed a Russian freight train on Monday, the local governor said in a social media post. “An unidentified explosive device went off, as a result of which a locomotive of a freight train derailed,” Bryansk governor Alexander Bogomaz said on Telegram, adding that there were no casualties reported. Russian authorities say the region, which borders Ukraine and Belarus, has seen multiple attacks by pro-Ukrainian sabotage groups in the 14 months since Russia invaded.
Ukrainian counterattacks have ousted Russian forces from some positions in the besieged eastern city of Bakhmut, but the situation remains “quite difficult”, a top Ukrainian general has said. However, Col Gen Oleksandr Syrskyi, the commander of ground forces, added: “At the same time, in certain parts of the city, the enemy was counterattacked by our units and left some positions.” Syrskyi made the remarks while visiting frontline troops on Sunday, the military said.
The head of the Wagner private militia renewed his appeal to Russia’s defence ministry to increase ammunition shipments to his fighters trying to seize Bakhmut. Yevgeny Prigozhin has frequently clashed with Moscow’s defence establishment over the conduct of Russia’s campaign in Ukraine and what he says is insufficient support being provided to his Wagner soldiers. In a video posted on his Telegram channel, Prigozhin said he needs at least 300 tonnes of artillery shells a day for the assault, Reuters reported.
Since last summer Russia has built “some of the most extensive systems of military defensive works seen anywhere in the world for many decades” in the areas it controls in Ukraine as well as in its own border regions, the UK’s Ministry of Defence said in its latest intelligence update.
Poland’s ministry of foreign affairs has issued a statement condemning the former children’s ombudsman of Russia, Pavel Astakhov, for comments he made on Russian state TV that murdering ambassadors is “within the framework of international law”, with specific reference to Poland’s ambassador. Poland called on Russia “to ensure the safety of all diplomats in accordance with the Vienna Convention”.
In Washington, House speaker Kevin McCarthy emphatically stressed his support for military aid to Ukraine on Monday, criticising Russia’s “killing of the children” and distancing himself from some in his party who oppose additional major US aid to repel the Russian invasion.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy has spoken to New Zealand’s prime minister, Chris Hipkins. Ukraine’s president said the pair discussed “further cooperation on defence and humanitarian issues” and “the need for further consolidation of the countries of the Pacific region in supporting Ukraine.”
