Ukraine war latest: Putin will meet mothers of Russians fighting on frontline, says Kremlin

Millions of lives are at risk in Ukraine this winter as the nation’s health system faces its “darkest days” of the war, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has warned.

While the WHO has counted more than 700 direct attacks on Ukraine’s health infrastructure – in alleged breaches of international humanitarian law and the rules of war – the country’s health system is now also a victim of the energy crisis,” said Hans Kluge, WHO regional director for Europe

Hundreds of Ukrainian hospitals and healthcare facilities are no longer fully operational – lacking fuel, water and electricity to meet people’s basic needs, Mr Kluge warned, following a visit to Ukraine.

Polish president Andrzej Duda’s office is investigating how Russian pranksters managed to speak with him by phone while posing as Emmanuel Macron – on the night that fears were briefly sparked of a wider escalation in the war when a missile killed two people on Nato territory.

Alan Charlish has more details:

Ukrainians who have come to the UK are having trouble renting because they do not have a guarantor or references, experimental research by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) suggests.

Some 3,148 people took part in the survey between 17 October and 7 November, which saw a sample of adults questioned who had arrived in the UK in June under Ukraine visa schemes.

According to the findings, 45 per cent of respondents “experienced barriers to accessing private rented accommodation” and the most common challenge was not having a guarantor or references (59 per cent).

One in four respondents had changed address since June. When asked why, the most common reason was because they could now afford to live without a host. However, one in six (16 per cent) said they had “relationship difficulties with their sponsor”.

Kyiv has said it will summon the Hungarian ambassador as it seeks an apology after prime minister Viktor Orban was filmed wearing a scarf depicting some Ukrainian territory as part of Hungary.

Ukrainian media showed images of Mr Orban meeting a Hungarian footballer while wearing a scarf which the outlet Ukrainska Pravda said depicted a map of “Greater Hungary”, including territory that is now part of the neighbouring states of Austria, Slovakia, Romania, Croatia, Serbia and Ukraine.

“The promotion of revisionism ideas in Hungary does not contribute to the development of Ukrainian-Hungarian relations and does not comply with the principles of European policy,” Ukrainian ministry spokesperson Oleg Nikolenko said.

Ukraine is seeking an apology and a rebuttal of any Hungarian claims on Ukrainian territory, Mr Nikolenko said.

In a Facebook post, Mr Orban did not directly address the controversy over the scarf, saying: “Soccer is not politics. Do not read things into it that are not there. The Hungarian national team belongs to all Hungarians, wherever they live.”

The two countries have repeatedly clashed in recent years over what Hungary said were curbs on the right of ethnic Hungarians living in Ukraine to use their native tongue, especially in education, after Ukraine passed a law in 2017 restricting the use of minority languages in schools.

A Russian prankster impersonating Emmanuel Macron spoke with Polish president Andrzej Duda on the night that a blast killed two people on Nato territory near the Ukrainian border, initially sparking fears of a wider escalation of the war.

In a seven-minute recording of the call posted on the internet by Russian comedians Vovan and Lexus, Mr Duda can be heard speaking in English to the caller, who attempts to put on a French accent.

“Emmanuel, believe me, I am extra careful,” Duda tells the caller. “I don’t want to have war with Russia and believe me, I am extra careful, extra careful.”

Mr Duda’s office said on Twitter today: “After the missile explosion in Przewodow, during the ongoing calls with heads of state and government, a person claiming to be French president Emmanuel Macron was connected.”

“During the call, President Andrzej Duda realised from the unusual way the interlocutor conducted the conversation that there might have been an attempted hoax attempt and ended the conversation.”

Mr Duda’s office said it was investigating how the callers managed to get through to him together with the relevant services.

It is the second time the pranksters have managed to reach the Polish president, having previously pretended to be UN secretary general Antonio Guterres in 2020 – raising questions about security and call screening in the president’s office.

Vladimir Putin will meet the mothers of Russian soldiers who are fighting in Ukraine in time for the country’s celebration of Mother’s Day this weekend.

It comes as Russia has faced monumental setbacks in their invasion of Ukraine following the humiliating withdrawal of troops from the strategic southern region of Kherson earlier this month.

The Kremlin confirmed the meeting that was first reported by the Vedomosti newspaper. Mother’s Day takes place on November 27 in Russia.

In a key battlefield development, a Ukrainian official acknowledged that Kyiv’s forces are attacking Russian positions on the Kinburn Spit, which is a gateway to the Black Sea basin and parts of the southern Kherson region that are still under Russian control.

Despite an information blackout around the operation, Natalya Humenyuk, a spokesperson for the Ukrainian army’s Operational Command South, said in televised remarks that Ukrainian forces are “continuing a military operation” in the area.

The Kinburn Spit is Russia‘s last outpost in Ukraine‘s southern Mykolayiv region, directly west of Kherson. Ukrainian forces recently liberated other parts of the Kherson and Mykolaiv regions.

Moscow has used the Kinburn Spit as a staging ground for missile and artillery strikes on Ukrainian positions in the Mykolaiv province, and elsewhere along the Ukrainian-controlled Black Sea coast.

Ukraine recently recaptured the city of Kherson, on the western bank of the Dnieper River, and surrounding areas in a major battlefield advance.

Capturing the Kinburn Spit could help Ukrainian forces push into territory Russia still holds in the Kherson region “under significantly less Russian artillery fire” than an attempt at a direct crossing of the Dnieper would likely unleash, a Washington-based think tank said late Monday.

The Institute for the Study of War added that control of the area would help Kyiv alleviate Russian strikes on Ukraine‘s southern seaports and allow Ukraine to increase its naval activity in the Black Sea.

The Russian Orthodox Church said on Tuesday that searches conducted by Ukrainian security services at an Orthodox monastery in the capital Kyiv were an “act of intimidation”.

“Like many other cases of persecution of believers in Ukraine since 2014, this act of intimidation of believers is almost certain to go unnoticed by those who call themselves the international human rights community,” Vladimir Legoida, a spokesperson for the church said.

Ukraine said it carried out the searches at the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra complex as part of counter-intelligence measures, and that they were conducted within the law. Russia invaded Ukraine in February. Patriarch Kirill, the head of Russia‘s church, has given his support for what Moscow calls its “special military operation” in Ukraine.

Canada said on Tuesday it will slap more sanctions on Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko’s administration for supporting Russia‘s war in Ukraine.

The foreign ministry in Ottawa said it would sanction 22 more Belarusian officials as well as 16 Belarusian companies involved in military manufacturing, technology, engineering, banking and railway transportation.

It said the officials included some who were “complicit in the stationing and transport of Russian military personnel and equipment involved in the invasion of Ukraine.”

Canada is among several countries that have imposed steep financial penalties on Russia for its Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent war, for which it has used Belarus as a staging ground.

The country has imposed sanctions on more than 1,500 individuals and groups, including from Belarus, according to the foreign ministry.

While Kyiv and the West describe Russia‘s actions as an unprovoked war of aggression, Moscow calls it a “special military operation” to rid Ukraine of nationalists and protect Russian-speaking communities.

Russian president Vladimir Putin will in the coming days meet the mothers of reservists called up to fight in Ukraine, the Kremlin said on Tuesday.

The war in Ukraine has killed and wounded tens of thousands of soldiers on both sides, according to the United States, and the Russian invasion has triggered the biggest confrontation between Moscow and the West since the 1962 Cuban Missile crisis.

Hundreds of thousands of Russian soldiers have been sent to fight in Ukraine – including some of the more than 300,000 reservists who were called up as part of a mobilisation announced by Putin in September.

The meeting with soldiers’ mothers, first reported by the Vedomosti newspaper, was confirmed by Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov. Russia celebrates Mother’s Day on Nov. 27.

“Indeed, such a meeting is planned, we can confirm,” Peskov told reporters when asked if Putin was to hold a meeting with families of the mobilised. “Such a meeting is in preparation.”

“The president often holds such meetings, they are not all public. In any case, the president receives first-hand information about the real state of affairs.”