Here are the latest developments in the war in Ukraine.
Just hours after President Vladimir V. Putin celebrated Russian military might in Moscow, Russian forces pounded Ukraine with missile strikes on Odesa, a large southern port city critical for the country’s economic survival, and — Russia’s defense ministry said on Tuesday — made gains in its push for the east.
But Russia and Ukraine continued to jockey for gains over small areas as a top United States official said Mr. Putin was preparing for “a prolonged conflict.”
If Russia can hold on to, or expand, the territory it occupies in the south and the east, and maintain its dominance at sea, it could further undermine Ukraine’s already battered economy, improve its leverage in any future negotiated settlement and potentially expand its capacity to stage broader assaults. Those efforts, though, are coming at a heavy cost.
The war has dealt a devastating blow to the economies of both Russia and Ukraine. The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development said on Tuesday that Ukraine’s economy would shrink 30 percent this year, with 30 to 50 percent of Ukrainian businesses having already shut down operations, while 10 percent of the population has fled the country and another 15 percent has been displaced within the country.
The bank also forecast that Russia’s economy would contract 10 percent this year and be stagnant next year, with a bleak outlook unless a peace agreement leads to the relaxing of Western sanctions.
In other developments:
United Nations investigators said on Tuesday that they had recorded the unlawful killing of 300 civilian adults and children in areas north of the Ukrainian capital since the withdrawal of Russian forces in April.
Two remaining Russian battalion tactical groups are leading the continued assault on the Azovstal steel plant, the last redoubt for Ukrainian fighters in Mariupol, according to a senior Pentagon official. Ukrainian officials said that more than 1,000 Ukrainian troops, many of them wounded, were still stuck in the plant, along with at least 100 civilians.
President Biden signaled a vast increase in America’s commitment to defeating Russia in Ukraine on Monday by signing a modern-day Lend-Lease Act, decades after the original version helped pull the country into World War II.
The House could consider as soon as Tuesday an emergency $39.8 billion package of military and humanitarian aid to Ukraine, $7 billion more than what Mr. Biden had requested.
Ukraine says it will stop transporting some Russian gas.
The prospect of a key natural gas artery cutoff sent shivers through the markets, which were already on edge because of Russia’s recent stopping of gas flows to Poland and Bulgaria.
The prospect of a key natural gas artery cutoff sent shivers through the markets, which were already on edge because of Russia’s recent stopping of gas flows to Poland and Bulgaria.Credit…Nikolay Doychinov/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Ukraine’s natural gas grid operator said on Tuesday that it would stop transporting Russian gas through an eastern border entry point called Sokhranivka, raising fears of a cutoff of flows to Europe.
The Gas Transmission System Operator of Ukraine said that, beginning Wednesday, it would quit accepting Russian gas at the entry point because the Russians were interfering in technical processes at gas facilities and endangering “the stability and safety of the entire Ukrainian gas transportation system.”
