Russia Ukraine war latest: Anti-Putin armed groups loyal to Kyiv launch fresh cross border attacks

French president Emmanuel Macron warned Western powers against showing any signs of weakness to Russia as he reiterated his position yesterday that sending Western troops into Ukraine shouldn’t be ruled out, though he said today’s situation doesn’t require it.

In an interview on French national television TF1 and France 2, Mr Macron was asked about the prospect of sending Western troops to Ukraine, which he publicly raised last month in comments that prompted pushback from other European leaders who stressed they had no plans to do so.

“We’re not in that situation today,” he said, but added that “all these options are possible.”

Emmanuel Macron said France would never initiate an offensive against Russia, and that Paris was not at war with Moscow, despite the fact that Russia had launched aggressive attacks against French interests in and outside France.

“The Kremlin regime is an adversary,” he said, declining to call Russia an enemy. He also said Vladimir Putin making threats about nuclear strikes was “not appropriate”.

Nato allies are warning Hungary of the dangers of its “close and expanding” relationship with Russia and if this is Budapest’s policy choice “we will have to decide how best to protect our security interests”, the US envoy to Hungary said on Thursday.

Relations between Budapest and Washington have soured because of Hungary’s foot-dragging over the ratification of Sweden’s Nato accession – finally passed by Budapest last month – and also over nationalist premier Viktor Orban’s warm ties with Moscow despite the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

“These legitimate security concerns – shared by Hungary’s 31 allies – “cannot be ignored,” US ambassador David Pressman said in a speech marking the 25th anniversary of Hungary’s membership of Nato. Mr Pressman said Hungary was an ally “that behaves unlike any other”.

“It [this speech] is about a government that labels and treats the United States an ‘adversary’ while making policy choices that increasingly isolate it from friends and allies. This speech is about a long-time friend and ally saying and doing things that undermine trust and friendship,” he said.

Tensions between Orban’s government and president Joe Biden’s administration have worsened in the past weeks as Mr Orban openly endorsed Donald Trump’s bid for the US presidency after meeting the Republican in Florida. Mr Orban praised Mr Trump as the only US presidential candidate who could end the war in Ukraine – by cutting off military aid to Kyiv.

Budapest opposes Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but Orban has refused to send weapons to Kyiv and repeatedly criticised EU sanctions against Russia. His government has kept up close relations with Moscow – partly due to Hungary’s continued energy dependence on Russia.

Emmanuel Macron said Ukraine was in a “difficult” situation on the ground and that stronger support from allies was necessary.

“Peace does not mean the capitulation of Ukraine,” he said. “Wanting peace does not mean defeat. Wanting peace does not mean dropping Ukraine,” he said.

Mr Macron added it was important for Europe not to draw red lines, which would signal weakness to the Kremlin and encourage it to push on with its invasion of Ukraine. He refused to give details on what a deployment to Ukraine might look like.

“I don’t want to do so. I want Russia to stop this war and retreat from its positions and allow peace,” he said. “I’m not going to give visibility to someone who is not giving me any. This is a question for President Putin.”

“I have reasons not to be precise,” he said.

French president Emmanuel Macron called Russia an adversary that would not stop in Ukraine if it defeated Kyiv’s troops in the two-year-old conflict, urging Europeans to not be “weak” and to get ready to respond.

Mr Macron caused controversy last month after he said he could not rule out the deployment of ground troops in Ukraine in the future, with many leaders distancing themselves from that while others, especially in eastern Europe, expressed support.

“If Russia wins this war, Europe’s credibility will be reduced to zero,” Mr Macron said in a television interview mostly directed at a domestic audience, after French opposition leaders criticised his comments as bellicose.

Mr Macron said he “deeply” disagrees with the opposition leaders. “Today, deciding to abstain or vote against support to Ukraine, it’s not choosing peace, it’s choosing defeat. It’s different,” he said.

His main opposition party, the far-right of Marine Le Pen, abstained in parliament on a vote earlier this week about a security pact France signed with Ukraine, while the hard left France Unbowed party voted against it.

“If war spread in Europe, Russia would be to blame,” Mr Macron added. “But if we decided to be weak; if we decided today that we would not respond, it would be choosing defeat already. And I don’t want that.”

Ukraine fired at least eight missiles at Russia’s Belgorod border region, killing two people and wounding 12, local officials said yesterday, as Kyiv’s forces apparently kept up efforts to rattle the Kremlin on the eve of Russia’s presidential election that is taking place amid a ruthless crackdown on dissent.

Ukrainian forces attempted cross-border raids that were repelled in Belgorod and the Kursk region, according to local authorities.

The Russian Defence Ministry claimed its troops killed 195 Ukrainian soldiers and destroyed five tanks and four armoured infantry vehicles, two days after saying it killed 234 Ukrainian troops in another border assault.

It is not possible to independently verify the Russian claims. Cross-border attacks in the area have occurred sporadically since the war began and have been the subject of claims and counterclaims, as well as disinformation and propaganda.

The Ukrainian assaults on Russian territory in recent days, including long-range drone attacks and alleged incursions by Ukraine-based Russian proxies, have come as Russian president Vladimir Putin heads for near-certain reelection.

A Russian drone struck a residential building in the southwestern Ukrainian city of Vinnitsya yesterday, killing one person and injuring three, regional governor Serhiy Borzov said.

Mr Borzov posted a picture online showing a large fire engulfing a residential area.

Reuters could not verify the report independently. Russia says it does not target civilian areas.

Ukraine and the West condemned Russia for holding the vote in Ukrainian regions that Moscow’s forces have seized and occupied.In many ways, Ukraine is at the heart of this election, political analysts and opposition figures say.

They say Vladimir Putin wants to use his all-but-assured electoral victory as evidence that the war and his handling of it enjoys widespread support. The opposition, meanwhile, hopes to use the vote to demonstrate their discontent with both the war and the Kremlin.

“The elections in Russia as a whole are a sham. The Kremlin controls who’s on the ballot. The Kremlin controls how they can campaign. To say nothing of being able to control every aspect of the voting and the vote-counting process,” said Sam Greene, director for Democratic Resilience at the Center for European Policy Analysis in Washington.

The Kremlin banned two politicians from the ballot who sought to run on an antiwar agenda and attracted genuine — albeit not overwhelming — support, thus depriving the voters of any choice on the “main issue of Russia’s political agenda,” said political analyst Abbas Gallyamov, who used to work as Putin’s speechwriter.

Russia’s scattered opposition has urged those unhappy with Mr Putin or the war to show up at the polls at noon on Sunday, the final day of voting, in protest. The strategy was endorsed by Alexei Navalny not long before his death.“We need to use election day to show that we exist and there are many of us, we are actual, living, real people and we are against Putin. … What to do next is up to you. You can vote for any candidate except Putin. You could ruin your ballot,” his widow, Yulia Navalnaya, said.

Ukraine fired at least eight missiles at Russia’s Belgorod border region, killing two people and wounding 12, local officials said on Thursday, as Kyiv’s forces apparently kept up efforts to rattle the Kremlin on the eve of Russia’s presidential election that is taking place amid a ruthless crackdown on dissent.

Also, Ukrainian forces attempted cross-border raids that were repelled in Belgorod and the Kursk region, according to local authorities. The Russian Defence Ministry claimed its troops killed 195 Ukrainian soldiers and destroyed five tanks and four armored infantry vehicles, two days after saying it killed 234 Ukrainian troops in another border assault.

It is not possible to independently verify the Russian claims. Cross-border attacks in the area have occurred sporadically since the war began and have been the subject of claims and counterclaims, as well as disinformation and propaganda.

The Ukrainian assaults on Russian territory in recent days, including long-range drone attacks and alleged incursions by Ukraine-based Russian proxies, have come as Russian President Vladimir Putin heads for near-certain reelection.

Voters headed to the polls in Russia today for a three-day presidential election that is all but certain to extend president Vladimir Putin’s rule by six more years after he stifled dissent.

The election takes place against the backdrop of a ruthless crackdown that has crippled independent media and prominent rights groups and given Putin full control of the political system.It also comes as Moscow’s war in Ukraine enters its third year. Russia has the advantage on the battlefield, where it is making small, if slow, gains.

Ukraine, meanwhile, has made Moscow look vulnerable behind the front line: Long-range drone attacks have struck deep inside Russia, while high-tech drones have put its Black Sea fleet on the defensive.

Voters will cast their ballots Friday through Sunday at polling stations across the vast country’s 11 time zones, as well as in illegally annexed regions of Ukraine. The first polling stations opened in Russia’s easternmost regions, Chukotka and Kamchatka, at 8am local time.

The election holds little suspense since Mr Putin, 71, is running for his fifth term virtually unchallenged. His political opponents are either in jail or in exile abroad, and the fiercest of them, Alexei Navalny, died in a remote Arctic penal colony recently. The three other candidates on the ballot are low-profile politicians from token opposition parties that toe the Kremlin’s line.

Observers have little to no expectation that the election will be free and fair. Beyond the fact that voters have been presented with little choice, the possibilities for independent monitoring are very limited.