Russia-Ukraine war: Zelenskyy urges ‘firm and decisive’ international response to ‘latest act of Russian madness’ – as it happened | Ukraine

It’s 10pm in Kyiv and 11pm in Moscow. Here’s a recap of the latest developments:

• Vladimir Putin warned that Russia would carry out more tests of its new Oreshnik missile in combat and had a stock ready for use, a day after firing the experimental, nuclear-capable ballistic missile on the Ukrainian city of Dnipro. The Russian leader described the missile’s first use as a successful test, and said more would follow.

• Volodymyr Zelenskyy urged world leaders to “respond firmly and decisively” after Russia’s ballistic missile strike on Thursday. The Ukrainian president said his country was working on developing new types of air defence to counter “new risks” following Russia’s deployment of a new ballistic missile.

• Russia has sent air defence missiles and other military technology to North Korea in return for the deployment of troops from the North to support its war in Ukraine, intelligence officials in South Korea have said. North Korea’s dispatch of troops to fight against Ukraine and weapons from its vast stockpiles has been repaid with Russian oil and advanced military technology, experts believe.

• The Kremlin said Thursday’s strike on Ukraine using a newly developed hypersonic ballistic missile was designed to warn the west that Moscow will respond to moves by the US and the UK to let Kyiv strike Russia with their missiles. The Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, was speaking a day after Putin said Moscow had fired the new missile – the Oreshnik or ‘hazel tree’- at a Ukrainian military facility.

• Ukraine’s parliament cancelled Friday’s session, lawmakers said, citing the risk of a Russian missile attack on the district of Kyiv where government buildings are located. “The hour of questions to the government has been cancelled,” Yevgenia Kravchuk, an MP from the ruling party told Agence France-Presse (AFP). Kravchuk said: “There are signals of an increased risk of attacks on the government district in the coming days.”

• Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán, said Russia’s threat of more strikes with new weapons should be taken seriously, warning “there will be consequences”. Russia “bases its policy and its place in the world on military force” and cherishes its status as “one of the most powerful militaries in the world, with some of the most modern and destructive weapons,” he added.

• The UK home secretary, Yvette Cooper, said that “we will continue” to see “aggressive language” from Putin after the Russian leader threatened to strike the UK. Cooper told Sky News that there has been an “aggressive, blustering tone” from Putin throughout the conflict, which she called “completely unacceptable”. Meanwhile, the UK’s foreign secretary, David Lammy, vowed to continue to “do everything that is necessary” to help Ukraine combat Russia.

• Germany’s foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, has said supporting Ukraine’s self-defence is the “best protection” for peace in Europe. Germany’s chancellor, Olaf Scholz, who held an hour-long call with Putin last week, has resisted calls to support Ukraine’s longer-range strike capabilities against Russia, after the UK and US approved Ukraine’s use of Storm Shadow missiles and similar American Atacms weapons inside Russia.

• Poland’s prime minister, Donald Tusk, said recent events show that there is a real risk of a global conflict breaking out. “The war in the east is entering a decisive phase, we feel that the unknown is approaching,” Tusk told a teachers conference.

• A Russian drone attack on the north-eastern Ukrainian city of Sumy killed two people and injured 12 on Friday morning, regional authorities said. Twelve apartment buildings, five private residences, a store and three cars were damaged after three drones attacked the city at about 5am local time (3am GMT), the national police said.

• Ukraine accused Russian forces of executing five Ukrainian prisoners of war during a single incident in eastern Ukraine last month. The prosecutor general’s office claimed Russian troops shot and killed five unarmed Ukrainian soldiers after capturing them during an assault on their position on 2 October on the outskirts of Vuhledar, a town in the east of the country.

• A British man has pleaded guilty to an arson attack on a Ukraine-linked business and accepting pay from a foreign intelligence agency. Jake Reeves, 23, admitted aggravated arson in relation to a fire in March at an east London warehouse belonging to a man only referred to in court as Mr X. He pleaded guilty to an offence under the National Security Act 2023 of obtaining a material benefit from a foreign intelligence service.

North Korean technical advisers have arrived in the Russian-occupied port city of Mariupol wearing Russian uniforms, CNN is reporting, citing a Ukrainian security source.

The North Korean troops in Mariupol remain detached from the Russian units they are supporting, the source told the outlet.

While other foreign fighters in Russian ranks are blended into the units, the North Koreans are kept separate with their own quarters, food, music and films, they added.

North Korean troops have also been spotted in the eastern Kharkiv region, a Ukrainian military spokesperson told CNN.

Another Ukrainian military official reported that North Korean troops in Kharkiv “dividing into units, strengthening their combat units, and accumulating small numbers (of forces) on the frontline”.

A Norwegian student in his 20s has been arrested on suspicion of spying for Russia and Iran while working as a guard at the US embassy in Oslo, according to authorities.

Norway’s domestic intelligence agency PST said the man, who has not been identified, was arrested on Wednesday on suspicion of having damaged national security with his intelligence-related activity, Associated Press reported.

According to the arrest warrant, police found records of the man’s assignment dialogue with a person who was apparently guiding his espionage activity, it said.

The man has admitted to collecting and sharing information with Russian and Iranian authorities, the court order said.

His attorney told Norwegian public broadcaster NRK that the man admits he worked for a foreign country but does not plead guilty of espionage.

AP writes that the man is studying for a bachelor’s degree in security and preparedness at Norway’s Arctic University, UiT. It is reportedly the second such case at UiT in recent years.

The US and French presidents, Joe Biden and Emmanuel Macron, also held a call today where they discussed developments in Ukraine as well as the Middle East.

The two leaders spoke on a “number of global and bilateral matters”, and “reviewed developments in Ukraine”, according to a readout from the White House.

Germany’s foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, has said supporting Ukraine’s self-defence is the “best protection” for peace in Europe.

Asked whether Berlin was reconsidering allowing Ukraine to use long-range Taurus missiles, Baerbock said Vladimir Putin used “missiles which hadn’t been used before” with the aim of discouraging European countries from supporting Ukraine, the BBC reported.

“Playing with fear was a recipe which Putin used already,” she said, adding:

The best protection of our European peace is to support Ukraine in its self-defence until Putin stops this horrible war.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has been urging Germany to support Ukraine’s longer-range strike capabilities against Russia, after the UK and US approved Ukraine’s use of Storm Shadow missiles and similar American Atacms weapons inside Russia.

But Germany’s chancellor, Olaf Scholz, who held an hour-long call with Putin last week, has been hesitant to provide the Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in his nightly video address, has urged world leaders to “respond firmly and decisively” after Russia launched an experimental, nuclear-capable ballstic missile at the Ukrainian city of Dnipro on Thursday.

As we reported earlier, the Ukrainian president said he has directed his defence minister to meet with western partners to secure updated air defence systems that are “capable of protecting lives against these new threats.”

He said he was “grateful” to those who have responded to this “latest act of Russian madness”, but that “worlds alone are not enough – action is required”. Zelenskyy said:

The world must respond firmly and decisively so that Putin fears expanding this war and faces real consequences for his actions. True peace can only be achieved through strength — there is no other way.

The UK prime minister, Keir Starmer, held a call with the Nato secretary general, Mark Rutte, on Friday where they discussed the situation in Ukraine.

Starmer and Rutte “reiterated the importance” of putting Ukraine “in the strongest possible position going into the winter,” according to a readout by Downing Street.

They also discussed the recent deployment of North Korean troops to Russia, and agreed that this “only served to further underline the indivisibility of Euro-Atlantic and Indo-Pacific security”, it said. The readout continues:

The prime minister underscored the need for all Nato countries to step up in support of our collective defence and updated on government’s progress on the strategic defence review. His government would set out the path to 2.5% in the spring, he added.

Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Ukraine was working on developing new types of air defence to counter “new risks” following Russia’s deployment of a new medium-range missile in the 33-month war, Reuters reports.

In his nightly video address, Ukraine’s president also said on Friday that the world needed a “serious response” to the deployment so that Russian president Vladimir Putin would be afraid to expand the war and feel the real consequences of his actions.

He said using another country to “test new weapons for terror” was clearly an international crime.

Good evening. It is approaching 8pm in Kyiv and 9pm in Moscow. Here are the latest developments:

• President Vladimir Putin says that Russia will keep testing the hypersonic Oreshnik missile it fired at Ukraine yesterday and begin serial production of the new system. Putin claims the missile is immune to being intercepted by an enemy. “I will add that there is no countermeasure to such a missile, no means of intercepting it, in the world today.” he said.

• A British man has pleaded guilty to an arson attack on a Ukraine-linked business and accepting pay from a foreign intelligence agency. Jake Reeves, 23, admitted aggravated arson in relation to a fire in March at an east London warehouse belonging to a man only referred to in court as Mr X. He pleaded guilty to an offence under the National Security Act 2023 of obtaining a material benefit from a foreign intelligence service.

• The Kremlin said on Friday that a strike on Ukraine using a newly developed hypersonic ballistic missile was designed to warn the west that Moscow will respond to moves by the US and the UK to let Kyiv strike Russia with their missiles. The Kremlin spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, was speaking a day after Russian president, Vladimir Putin, said Moscow had fired the new missile – the Oreshnik or ‘hazel tree’- at a Ukrainian military facility.

• Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the use of an experimental ballistic missile by Russia amounted to “a clear and severe escalation” in the war and called for strong worldwide condemnation, as Nato accused Putin of seeking to “terrorise” civilians and intimidate Ukraine’s allies.

• The Russian missile that struck the Ukrainian city of Dnipro on Thursday reached a top speed of more than 13,000km/h (8,000mph) and took about 15 minutes to reach its target from its launch, Ukraine said on Friday in its first public assessment of the new weapon.

• A Russian drone attack on the north-eastern Ukrainian city of Sumy killed two people and injured 12 on Friday morning, regional authorities said. Twelve apartment buildings, five private residences, a store and three cars were damaged after three drones attacked the city at about 5am local time (3am GMT), the national police said.

• Ukraine’s parliament has cancelled Friday’s session, lawmakers said, citing the risk of a Russian missile attack on the district of Kyiv where government buildings are located. “The hour of questions to the government has been cancelled,” Yevgenia Kravchuk, an MP from the ruling party told Agence France-Presse (AFP). Kravchuk said: “There are signals of an increased risk of attacks on the government district in the coming days.”

• US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, will attend a meeting of the G7 in Italy at the weekend, the state department said on Friday, amid rising tensions in the war in Ukraine. G7 leaders last Saturday reiterated a pledge to keep imposing severe costs on Russia for its invasion of Ukraine through sanctions, export controls and other measures, and vowed to support Kyiv for as long as it takes.

• Russia has sent air-defence missiles and other military technology to North Korea in return for the deployment of its troops to support the Kremlin’s war in Ukraine, intelligence officials in South Korea have said. In a TV interview on Friday, South Korea’s top security adviser, Shin Won-sik, suggested the Kremlin had started to fulfil its side of a deal to provide the regime in Pyongyang with technology and aid as “payment” for the deployment of more than 10,000 North Korean troops to Ukraine.

• Russian forces have taken control of the settlement of Novodmytrivka in eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk region, the RIA state-owned news agency reported on Friday, citing the defence ministry. The claim has not been independently verified.

• The UK home secretary has said that “we will continue” to see “aggressive language” from Vladimir Putin after the Russian leader threatened to strike the UK. Yvette Cooper told Sky News that there has been an “aggressive, blustering tone” from Putin throughout the conflict, which she called “completely unacceptable”. Meanwhile, the UK’s foreign secretary vowed to continue to “do everything that is necessary” to help Ukraine combat Russia.

• Recent events show that there is a real risk of a global conflict breaking out, Polish prime minister, Donald Tusk, said on Friday, after Russia fired a hypersonic intermediate-range ballistic missile at a Ukrainian city. “The war in the east is entering a decisive phase, we feel that the unknown is approaching,” Tusk told a teachers conference.

Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban says Russia’s threat of more strikes with new weapons should be taken seriously, warning “there will be consequences”.

Yesterday, President Putin said the conflict in Ukraine was looking more and more like a “global” war and said he would not rule out attacking Western countries.

Orban warns that Russia “bases its policy and its place in the world on military force” and cherishes its status as “one of the most powerful militaries in the world, with some of the most modern and destructive weapons”

“When they say something in this matter, it should be taken at face value,” the nationalist premier said in his weekly interview on public radio.

Russia recently scaled back their red lines for using nuclear weapons, a move the United States dismissed as “irresponsible” rhetoric. However, Orban cautions that the Kremlin is not just blowing hot air.

“So I just want to say that when the Russians modify the rules for the use of their nuclear force… it is not a communication ploy, it is not a trick, it has been modified and there will be consequences,” the Hungarian leader added.

President Vladimir Putin says that Russia it will keep testing the hypersonic Oreshnik missile it fired at Ukraine yesterday and begin serial production of the new system.

Putin claims the missile is immune to being intercepted by an enemy.

“I will add that there is no countermeasure to such a missile, no means of intercepting it, in the world today. And I will emphasize once again that we will continue testing this newest system. It is necessary to establish serial production,” he said.

A British man has pleaded guilty to an arson attack on a Ukraine-linked business and accepting pay from a foreign intelligence agency.

Jake Reeves, 23, admitted aggravated arson in relation to a fire in March at an east London warehouse belonging to a man only referred to in court as Mr X.

He pleaded guilty to an offence under the National Security Act 2023 of obtaining a material benefit from a foreign intelligence service.

Reeves, who appeared at Woolwich crown court via video link, denied a further charge under the law of engaging in preparatory conduct for an act involving serious violence and endangering life in the UK.

Reeves, from Croydon, was charged with the offences as part of the first case conducted under the new espionage legislation.

The Ukrainian military says their air defences downed 64 out of 114 Russia drones during Moscow’s latest air strike.

They add that an additional 41 drones had been “locationally lost”, probably due to signal jamming.

The Ukrainian Prosecutor General’s Office accuses Russian forces of executing five Ukrainian prisoners of war during a single incident in eastern Ukraine last month.

The Prosecutor General’s Office claims that Russian troops shot and killed five unarmed Ukrainian soldiers after capturing them during an assault on their position on the 2nd of October on the outskirts of Vuhledar, a town in the east of the country.

Senior prosecutor Taras Semkiv told Ukrainian television on Friday that a war crimes investigation into the incident is underway. Russia has not commented on the allegations and has previously denied committing war crimes.

Ukraine’s foreign minister Andriy Sybiga says he hopes emergency talks with Nato in Brussels next Tuesday will reach “concrete and meaningful outcomes” against Russia.

On Russia’s unprecedented attack on the Ukrainian city of Dnipro yesterday, Sybiga told a press conference in Kyiv: “This is a serious scaling up of the war, a serious escalation of Russian aggression”.

“Next week’s meeting will be held in the Nato-Ukraine format, and we hope for concrete and meaningful outcomes.”

Russia says Ukraine has returned 46 Russian citizens who were taken after Ukrainian forces seized a chunk of Russia’s western Kursk region in August, Reuters reports.

Kursk regional governor Alexei Smirnov wrote on his Telegram channel:

The painstaking and lengthy negotiations for the return of our fellow countrymen to their homeland have brought results.

They are receiving all necessary assistance.

Smirnov said the civilians were from the Sudzha district, which borders northeast Ukraine, and had returned via Belarus. It was not immediately clear where they had been held in Ukraine.

Russia’s human rights commissioner, Tatyana Moskalkova, published video showing families with toddlers and elderly people receiving humanitarian aid after disembarking from buses.

She said the negotiations had involved Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and the International Committee of the Red Cross.

There was no immediate comment from Ukraine.

The UK will not be put off supporting Ukraine by the “irresponsible rhetoric” of Vladimir Putin, a defence minister has said.

Maria Eagle’s comments came after Sir Keir Starmer said the UK is “not at war” in relation to the conflict between Ukraine and Russia.

Russian president Putin has said he is entitled to target the military facilities of countries which have supplied weapons to Ukraine, allowing Kyiv’s forces to strike deep inside Russia.

Eagle spoke to journalists as she opened an office for Rolls-Royce Submarines in Glasgow.
She said:

We’ve heard this kind of irresponsible rhetoric from him (Putin) before.

He’s trying to stop nations supporting Ukraine, whilst he doesn’t seem to mind that much about the support he’s getting from North Korea and other nations.

We can’t allow ourselves to be put off from supporting Ukraine, and we won’t be.

The Russian ruble has slumped to its lowest level against the US dollar since March 2022, a day after Moscow fired a hypersonic missile on Ukraine and Washington sanctioned a key Russian bank.

The Russian currency has been highly volatile throughout Moscow’s near three-year military offensive on Ukraine, reacting dramatically to developments on the battlefield and Western sanctions.

AFP reports that the central bank set its official exchange rate for the ruble at 102.58 against the US dollar, data published on its website showed, the lowest level since 24 March 2022, a month after the start of the conflict.