Ukraine-Russia war latest: Nato says Putin wants to ‘wipe Ukraine off map’ as Russia targets its energy grid

Three emergency workers have been injured in eastern Ukraine after Russian forces fired glide bombs at a town near the frontline.

Ukraine’s state emergency service say the trio were hospitalised with mine and blast injuries, as well as shrapnel wounds. They were hit in the village of Stepnohirsk, less than three miles from the frontline.

Glide bombs – known as KABs in Ukraine – are modified Russian warheads often carrying between a 500kg and 1,500kg payload. They have been nicknamed “building destroyers”.

Ukraine’s energy minister German Galuschenko has described the latest Russian attack as a “massive” assault on the country’s energy infrastructure.

“The enemy continues its terror. Once again, the energy sector across Ukraine is under massive attack,” Mr Galushchenko wrote in a post on Facebook.

Ukraine’s air force has not yet issued a summary of the latest strikes overnight but they posted missile and drone warnings on their Telegram channel roughly every few minutes from midnight to 8am GMT, indicating the size of the attack.

Ukraine’s energy system has already suffered 11 Russian attack waves this year, which have caused widespread damage and lengthy power cuts all over the country.

Friday’s attack prompted additional restrictions on power usage for consumers, according to the national grid operator Ukrenergo.

All of Ukraine was under air raid alarms.

Local authorities reported multiple explosions in the southern city of Odesa and Kyiv regional authorities said air defence systems were operating.

Ukrainian foreign minister Andrii Sybiha has called on partners to deliver more air defence systems urgently as Russia once more bombarded Ukraine‘s energy system.

Ukraine’s defence ministry unveiled a new state agency for its armed forces last year. It was the government’s answer to the rampant corruption within the ministry’s procurement companies, and meant to be a driver of reform on the elusive path toward Nato membership.

The enterprise, in charge of purchasing nonlethal military goods such as food, clothes and fuel, has already contracted 95 per cent of the products requested for supply, and saved 25 per cent in the process, says Arsen Zhumadilov, the CEO of the State Logistics Operator, known by the local abbreviation DOT. Soon, he says, DOT also will begin procuring drones.

The fall of the Assad regime in Syria has led to questions over Russia’s ability to sustain its military adventures abroad. Russia had supported Assad militarily for over a decade, building on longstanding ties between Moscow and Damascus. But the rapid advance of anti-government forces this month saw Russia apparently powerless to influence the situation beyond a number of airstrikes (as always, apparently mostly delivered on civilian targets) in support of government forces.

That has inevitably led people to draw conclusions about Russia’s ability to project power overseas, and what it may mean for the course of the war in Ukraine.

Russia launched a large-scale attack on Ukraine’s energy facilities this morning, the war-hit country’s minister of energy German Galushchenko said.

The entire country was under an air alert after the Ukrainian Air Force issued warnings about Russia launching missiles in the attack.

Military bloggers in Russia claim Putin’s forces are just 1.5km (1 mile) outside the Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk after pushing up from the south.

The battles near the road and rail hub in eastern Ukraine have been “extremely fierce” according to Ukraine’s own admission.

But why does the Ukrainian city’s control matter to Kyiv?

The fall of Pokrovsk, an important logistics centre for the Ukrainian military, would be one of Ukraine’s biggest military defeats in months.

Control of the city, which the Russian media call “the gateway to Donetsk”, would allow Moscow to severely disrupt Ukrainian supply lines along the eastern front and boost its campaign to capture the city of Chasiv Yar, which sits on higher ground offering potential control of a wider area.

Squeezing the Ukrainian military’s access to the road network in the vicinity would make it harder for Kyiv’s troops to hold pockets of territory either side of Pokrovsk, which could allow Russia to consolidate and advance the frontline.

The city also hosts a mine which is Ukraine’s only domestic coking coal supplier for its once-giant steel industry.

Ukrainian steelmaker Metinvest BV has halted some operations at the mine because of its proximity to advancing Russian troops, an industry source said yesterday.

Russian state-owned oil firm Rosneft has signed a deal worth $13bn (£10bn) a year selling oil to Indian refiner Reliance in a blow to sanctions against Vladimir Putin’s government.

Russian forces are reportedly just 1.5km (1 mile) outside the Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk, a road and rail hub in eastern Ukraine.

The latest Russian movements were reported by Yuri Podolyaka, a prominent Ukraine-born but pro-Russian war blogger.

He claimed Russian forces were now just 1.5km from the city, which had a pre-war population of 60,000, after a push from the south.

Russia controls a chunk of Ukraine about the size of the American state of Virginia and is advancing at the fastest pace since the early days of the 2022 invasion, according to open source maps.

Ukraine’s military said that Russian troops destroyed or captured several Ukrainian positions near the city in recent days.