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Russia launches 'terror' probe in Belgorod as security operations continue
CGTN
Europe;Ukraine
Ukrainian rescuers walk past damaged emergency service trucks at a damaged fire station after a strike in the eastern Ukrainian city of Dnipro. /State Emergency Service of Ukraine/AFP
Ukrainian rescuers walk past damaged emergency service trucks at a damaged fire station after a strike in the eastern Ukrainian city of Dnipro. /State Emergency Service of Ukraine/AFP

Ukrainian rescuers walk past damaged emergency service trucks at a damaged fire station after a strike in the eastern Ukrainian city of Dnipro. /State Emergency Service of Ukraine/AFP

TOP HEADLINES

• Ukraine said fighting had decreased in Bakhmut but shelling continued in the area around it, with its troops keeping a small foothold on the city's edge and Russian forces clearing areas they hold.

• Russia said it had launched a "terror" probe as Moscow's troops were responding to a "sabotage" group that crossed over from Ukraine. "A criminal case has been opened over an attack on settlements in the Belgorod region," the Investigative Committee, which probes major cases, said in a statement. READ MORE BELOW

• Drones struck Russia's border region of Belgorod where security operations pressed into a second day after a cross-border raid blamed on fighters from Ukraine, authorities said. The region, which borders Ukraine, has been repeatedly shelled in attacks that have killed dozens of people since Moscow launched its offensive last year.

Ukrainian outlet Hromadske cited Ukrainian military intelligence as saying two armed Russian opposition groups, the Liberty of Russia Legion and the Russian Volunteer Corps, both consisting of Russian citizens, were responsible for the attack. A Ukrainian presidential adviser said on Twitter that the Kyiv government was watching the situation with interest but "has nothing to do with it."

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited Ukrainian troops on the frontline in the eastern region of Donetsk, where Russian forces have concentrated their efforts to capture territory.

The Kremlin said further pledges of miliary aid to Ukraine by Western countries would not change the situation on the front. In a call with reporters, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said supplying Ukraine with modern F-16 fighter jets came with "obvious risks."

• Western powers are looking at taking measures against Russia at the global chemical weapons body over alleged nerve agent attacks, Joseph Manso, the U.S. ambassador to the watchdog said. Manso also blamed Moscow for the failure last week of the Hague-based Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) to agree a new five-year roadmap.

• Ukraine's foreign minister began a tour of African countries this week, stepping up wartime Kyiv's diplomatic push to challenge Russian influence in the "Global South" and cement the vision laid out by Ukraine as the only path to peace.

The U.S. State Department said Russia's Wagner Group is trying to obscure its efforts to acquire military equipment for use in Ukraine, adding that Washington has been informed the mercenary force is seeking to move those acquisitions through Mali to aid Russia in its military campaign.

The United Nations expressed concern that Ukraine's Black Sea port of Pivdennyi (Yuzhny) has not received any ships since May 2 under a deal allowing the safe wartime export of grain and fertilizer. U.N. spokesman Stephane Dujarric did not say who was to blame for the lack of ships traveling to the port, near Odessa.

This file photo shows a view of a street in central Belgorod, Russia. /Polina Nikolskaya/Reuters
This file photo shows a view of a street in central Belgorod, Russia. /Polina Nikolskaya/Reuters

This file photo shows a view of a street in central Belgorod, Russia. /Polina Nikolskaya/Reuters

IN DETAIL

Drone strikes and fighting in Russia's border region of Belgorod

Drones struck Russia's border region of Belgorod where security operations pressed into a second day after a cross-border raid blamed on fighters from Ukraine, authorities said Tuesday.

The region, which borders Ukraine, has been repeatedly shelled in attacks that have killed dozens of people since Moscow launched its offensive last year.

Several drones struck houses and a government building overnight but did not result in casualties or deaths, Belgorod governor Vyacheslav Gladkov wrote on Telegram.

On Monday, Russia said its troops were battling a "sabotage" group that entered from Ukraine and introduced an "anti-terror regime" in Belgorod, a first since the start of Moscow's campaign in Ukraine in February 2022.

Gladkov said the "defense ministry and law enforcement are continuing to clear the area."

He previously said eight people had been injured, adding that authorities were helping people leave the scene of the fighting.

He added that it was too soon for residents who fled to return to their homes and said that authorities would give the all-clear when it was safe.

Members of the anti-Kremlin Freedom of Russia Legion have claimed responsibility for the incursion into Belgorod, but Kyiv has denied any involvement.

In a video released by a Telegram channel claiming to represent the group, a camoflaged spokesman, surrounded by armed men in fatigues, said: "Russia will be free!" – a slogan frequently used by Russian opposition activists.

Russia launches 'terror' probe in Belgorod as security operations continue

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Source(s): AFP ,Reuters

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