Ukraine war: Drone strike ‘wipes Russian arms depot off face of the Earth’, says Kyiv

Artillery shells sold by Indian arms makers have been diverted by European customers to Ukraine and New Delhi has not intervened to stop the trade despite protests from Moscow, officials said.

At least 11 Indian and European government and defence industry officials, as well as a Reuters analysis of commercially available customs data, confirmed the trade of weapons, Reuters reported.

The transfer of munitions to support Ukraine’s defence against Russia has occurred for more than a year, according to the sources and the customs data. Indian arms export regulations limit the use of weaponry to the declared purchaser, who risks future sales being terminated if unauthorised transfers occur.

The Kremlin has raised the issue on at least two occasions, including during a July meeting between Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov and his Indian counterpart, three Indian officials said.

The foreign and defence ministries of Russia and India did not respond to questions. In January, Indian foreign ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal told a news conference that India had not sent or sold artillery shells to Ukraine.

One elderly woman was killed and two other women were wounded by Russian strikes in Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia region, governor Ivan Fedorov said today.

Russian forces shelled the region 161 times over the past 24 hours, damaging infrastructure facilities and residential buildings, he said on Telegram.

Russians lashed out against their own authorities online on Wednesday after the town of Toropets was hit in a Ukrainian drone attack yesterday, blowing up a critical ammunition depot.

“Why wasn’t the ammunition underground?! What are you doing???? In Kudino, houses were blown away! Why is the forest burning and no one is there… What kind of negligence is this!!!!” one woman posted on a Toropets chatroom on the social media sit VK.

Some war bloggers asked how drones could trigger such large blasts at what was thought to be a highly fortified facility.

“Russian milbloggers largely criticised Russian authorities for poorly constructing the facility and accused Russian forces of possibly mishandling missiles and artillery ammunition stockpiles at the facility,” the Institute for the Study of War said.

Messages of support from other parts of the country and offers of help to people fleeing the town were also there.

Some people were asking whether buildings at specific addresses were still standing. “People, does anyone know what’s happened to Kudino village??? They told me nothing is left of our house,” posted one woman.

Another woman replied: “It’s horror there.” Kudino is a village 4.5km (2.8 miles) northeast of Toropets.

US Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris plans to meet Volodymyr Zelensky in Washington next week, a person familiar with the matter said.

Donald Trump has also said he will “probably” meet Volodymyr Zelensky, who will be in the US next week to address a meeting of the United Nations Security Council on Russia’s war in his country.

“Probably, yes,” Mr Trump said in response to a question from a reporter about whether he will meet the Ukrainian leader. Trump did not provide further details.

In recent months, some other world leaders who have visited the US for summits and meetings with president Biden have ended up meeting with Trump as well. Trump faces Democratic vice president Kamala Harris in the 5 November election.

Mr Zelensky said in August he wanted to present a peace plan to Mr Biden, Ms Harris and Mr Trump. While Mr Trump and Mr Zelensky talked over the phone in July, they have not talked in person since the Republican leader’s 2017-2021 term.

Volodymyr Zelensky says his “victory plan”, intended to bring peace to Ukraine while keeping the country strong and avoiding all “frozen conflicts”, was now complete after much consultation.

“Today, it can be said that our victory plan is fully prepared. All the points, all key focus areas and all necessary detailed additions of the plan have been defined,” Mr Zelensky said in his nightly video address.

“The most important thing is the determination to implement it.

There was, he said, no alternative to peace, “no freezing of the war or any other manipulations that would simply postpone Russian aggression to another stage”.

Mr Zelensky pledged last month to present his plan to Joe Biden, presumably next week when he attends sessions of the UN Security Council and General Assembly.

While providing daily updates on the plan’s preparation, he has given few clues of the contents, indicating only that it aims to create terms acceptable to Ukraine, now locked in conflict with Russia for more than two and a half years.

Russian activist Vladimir Kara-Murza shook his head in disbelief as he addressed politicians and diplomats in a US Senate hearing room on Tuesday, just weeks after he was released from prison in Siberia in a major prisoner swap.

“The word surreal doesn’t even come close to describing what I feel now,” the dissident said at an event intended to highlight what participants described as the plight of hundreds of prisoners still detained in Russia for their political beliefs.

Coinciding with Kara-Murza’s visit, Democratic Senator Ben Cardin, who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, will introduce this week the Bridge Act, legislation intended to protect Russians and Belarusians working to support democracy in their home countries.

More than 100 domestically produced exploding drones were deployed in the attack on the Russian arms depot in Tver, a Ukrainian intelligence official told the Associated Press.

Russian state news agency RIA Novosti earlier quoted regional authorities as saying air defence systems were working to repel a “massive drone attack” on Toropets.

Among the ammunition destroyed in the attack on the Tver arms depot were North Korean KN-23 short-range ballistic missiles, a Ukrainian intelligence source has told the Associated Press.

Russia and North Korea signed a landmark pact in June that envisioned mutual military assistance between Moscow and Pyongyang.

The UK has summoned Russia’s ambassador following what it described as an “unprecedented and unfounded public campaign of aggression” by Moscow, including accusations against Foreign Office staff.

Russia’s FSB security service said last week it had revoked the accreditation of six British diplomats in Moscow after accusing them of spying and sabotage work, accusations Britain described as “malicious and completely baseless”.

“This pattern of behaviour is completely unacceptable, deeply unprofessional, and beneath the standards of conduct between states,” a spokesperson for the Foreign Office said, calling on Russia to “stop this activity immediately”.

“This is the latest development in a deliberate campaign by Russia to undermine and threaten UK security and democracy and deter our support for Ukraine, through disinformation, acts of sabotage in Europe and direct harassment and restrictions against our diplomatic missions in Russia,” they added.

Nasa satellites picked up intense heat sources emanating from an area of about five square miles at the site of the blast in Russia’s Tver region, while earthquake monitoring stations picked up what sensors thought was a small earthquake in the area.