TOP HEADLINES

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said voting could take place during the country's ongoing conflict with Russia if partners shared the cost, legislators approved, and everyone could get to the polls. READ MORE BELOW

• The passage of a second ship from Ukraine along a temporary Black Sea corridor has nothing to do with the prospects for reviving a grain deal involving Russia, said the Kremlin. READ MORE BELOW

• Ukraine said its troops had liberated the southeastern settlement of Robotyne and were trying to push further south in their counter-offensive against Russian forces.

• Three people were killed in an overnight Russian missile strike on Ukraine, and a fourth was killed in shelling on Monday morning, Ukrainian officials said.

• Poland and the Baltic states will close their borders with Belarus entirely if a 'critical incident' involving Wagner mercenaries takes place, Polish Interior Minister Mariusz Kaminski said. 

• Russian air defenses downed a Ukrainian cruise missile over the Black Sea near Crimea, Russia's defense ministry said. 

• Russia's FSB security service has charged a former employee of the U.S. consulate in the Russian Far East with collecting information on the Ukraine conflict and other issues for Washington, TASS has reported.

• Russia said it scrambled a fighter plane to deter a U.S. air force reconnaissance drone from crossing its borders over the Black Sea.

IN DEPTH

Elections in Ukraine possible despite conflict - Zelenskyy

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, responding to calls by a U.S. senator to announce elections in 2024, said voting could take place during the conflict if partners shared the cost, legislators approved, and everyone could get to the polls.

Elections cannot currently be held in Ukraine under martial law, which must be extended every 90 days. This is due to expire on November 15, after the normal date in October for parliamentary polls but before presidential elections which would normally be held in March 2024.

Top American legislators visited Kyiv a week ago, including Senator Lindsey Graham, who said the country needed to show it was different by holding elections during the conflict.

In a TV interview with the 1+1 Channel, Zelenskyy said he had discussed the issue with Graham, including the question of funding and the need to change the law.

"I gave Lindsey a very simple answer very quickly," he said. "He was very pleased with it. As long as our legislators are willing to do it."

He said it cost 5 billion hryvnia ($135 million) to hold elections in peacetime. "I don't know how much is needed in wartime," he said. "So I told him that if the U.S. and Europe provide financial support."

Zelenskyy added: "I will not take money from weapons and give it to elections. And this is stipulated by the law."

Zelenskyy said Ukraine would also need help setting up additional voting access for millions of people overseas, especially from the European Union. "There is a way out," he said. "I am ready for it."

Grain deal hope?

Meanwhile, the Kremlin insisted on Monday that the passage of a second ship from Ukraine along a temporary Black Sea corridor had nothing to do with the prospects for a new grain deal involving Russia.

Kyiv said on Sunday a vessel carrying steel products to Africa had left Ukraine's port of Odesa through a temporary Black Sea corridor.

This was the second ship to do so since Russia withdrew last month from a U.N.-brokered deal that allowed for grain to be safely exported.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told a briefing that the prospects of reviving the grain deal would depend on whether the West delivered on promises it gave to Moscow regarding Russia's own grain and fertiliser exports.

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