Ukraine launches air attack on Snake Island: Updates

The Ukrainian forces announced on Tuesday evening that they launched air strikes on Snake Island in the Black Sea, which resulted in “significant losses” for the Russian forces.

The Ukrainian Army’s Southern Operational Command said in a Facebook post that it had inflicted “significant losses” on Russian forces “using various forces”. The Washington Post reported. The New York Times reported that the military said that Russian air defense system destroyed As well as the vehicles on the island.

Satellite images released by US space technology company Maxar Technologies show the island on June 17 and again on June 21, depicting newly charred areas. Snake Island, also known as Zmini Island, was the place where Ukrainian soldiers lived Refusal to surrender to a Russian warship In the early days of the war.

Meanwhile, the Russian Defense Ministry said On her Telegram channel That Ukraine made “another crazy attempt” to take back the island and that Russia had undermined the attack and “destroyed all enemy weapons” that were targeting the island.

The Russian-occupied island plays an important role in controlling shipping lanes in the Black Sea, including grain distribution lanes into and out of Ukraine and access to the port of Odessa.

The latest developments

Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration, Olha Stefanichina, said on Wednesday she was “100%” sure that all EU countries would agree to Ukraine’s candidacy for membership as early as Thursday, the first day of an EU leaders summit in Belgium. .

Russian forces continue to target and overtake villages in eastern Ukraine in an advance towards Lysichansk, the last city in the Luhansk region still under Ukrainian control. The Russian army currently controls about 95% of the region.

Attorney General Merrick Garland made an unannounced visit to Ukraine on Tuesday to meet with Attorney General Irina Venediktova. announced garland Establishment of the War Crimes Accountability Team Within the US Department of Justice to provide legal advice and expertise in evidence collection and forensics.

A Ukrainian photojournalist and a soldier who was accompanying him when they were killed in the early weeks of the Russian invasion appear to have been “quietly executed” as they searched the Russian-occupied forests for the drone captured by the missing photographer, according to reporters. no limits.

12-year-old Ukrainian refugee Yeva Skalitska publishes a book with daily entries recounting her experiences during the war and her flight from the country.

Titled “You Don’t Know What War: The Diary of a Young Girl from Ukraine,” the book begins with her twelfth birthday, shortly before Russian forces attack Ukraine on February 24. She was living in Kharkiv with her grandmother when the bombing started.

The book is scheduled to be released on October 25. And the publisher – Union Square & Co., which is owned by Barnes & Noble – will donate a portion of its proceeds to Ukrainian refugee organizations.

– News agency

for weeks, Russian forces deployed in eastern UkraineLittle by little land acquisition. Western countries sent an influx of weapons into Ukraine, but the forces there were still outnumbered by Russian forces in the Donbass region.

Now, some are questioning whether the West’s alliance and war strategy is splintering.

French President Emmanuel Macron drew criticism earlier this month when he said the West should not “humiliate” Russian President Vladimir Putin in Ukraine, and recently warned British Prime Minister Boris Johnson to “stress Ukraine”.

But President Joe Biden said Tuesday he had no fears of a splitting of the Western alliance.

“No, I’m not afraid,” he told reporters, according to CNN. “But what I think is there – at some point, this will be kind of a waiting game: what the Russians can keep and what Europe will be willing to put up with.”

Biden is due to attend the G7 summit in Germany this week, followed by a NATO meeting in Spain.

The US State Department confirmed Tuesday that Steven Zabelsky, 52, is the second US citizen known to have died in the war in Ukraine.

The State Department did not say exactly when or how he died, but The obituary was published in The Recorder In his hometown of Amsterdam, New York, he says he died on May 15 “while going to war in the village of Doroghniank, Ukraine.”

Zabelsky is survived by his wife and five stepson children, according to the obituary.

His family said in early May that Willie Joseph Kansel, 22, was the first known American to be killed in Ukraine while fighting alongside Ukrainian forces. Cancel, who was a corrections officer in Tennessee, had joined a private military contracting company to fight Russian forces.

He left behind a baby and a wife.

The official Kyiv Pride Parade was canceled this year after a decade of relentless efforts to get more LGBT people accepted.

Before Russia’s invasion, Ukraine – a largely religious country with a long history of oppression against sexual and gender expression – had become a rare bright spot for LGBT rights and a sanctuary of sorts for Eastern Europe. Ex-Soviet LGBTQ people would travel to experience the gay nightclub scene, particularly in big cities like Kyiv, Kharkiv, and Odessa, where they could feel safer to open up.

Now, what would have been the 10th anniversary of the Kyiv Equality March this month has been carried over to Poland by the ongoing war.

We had a lot and I hope we can rebuild it,” said Yuriy Dvizhon, UKRAINEPRIDE Creative Director. Read more here.

– Tami Abdullah, USA TODAY