Ukraine war briefing: Moscow warns of retaliation after blaming US for deadly Ukrainian attack | Ukraine

The Kremlin on Monday blamed Washington for an attack on Crimea with US Atacmas missiles that killed at least four people and injured 151 a day earlier, and officially warned the US ambassador against retaliation.The Russian Foreign Ministry summoned US Ambassador Lynne Tracy and told her that Washington “is waging a hybrid war against Russia and has become a de facto party to the conflict,” adding: “Retaliatory measures will definitely follow.”

In response, Maj Charlie Dietz, a Pentagon spokesman, said Ukraine “makes its own targeting decisions and conducts its own military operations.” A spokesman for the White House National Security Council said any civilian casualty was a tragedy: “This certainly includes the thousands of innocent Ukrainians killed by Russian forces since the start of this Russian war of aggression.”

The EU will begin accession talks with Ukraine on Tuesday, giving the country a political boost amid its struggle against Russian invasion, even though it still faces a long and tough road before it can join the bloc.The ceremony in Luxembourg is more about symbolism than about concrete negotiations, which cannot really begin until the EU has examined reams of Ukrainian legislation to assess all the reforms needed to meet the bloc’s standards.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has replaced the commander of the Ukrainian Armed Forces Command after a well-known soldier accused him of being responsible for mass casualties in the war with Russia.In his evening video address on Monday, Zelensky said Lieutenant General Yuri Sodol had been replaced by Brigadier General Andriy Hnatov, without giving a reason for the reshuffle.

Sodol was dismissed shortly after Bohdan Krotevych, the commander of the Azov Regiment, which is respected in Ukraine, accused the general of being responsible for significant military setbacks and large losses of personnel. In a post on the messaging app Telegram, Krotevych did not mention Sodol’s name but said an unnamed general had “killed more Ukrainian soldiers than any Russian general.”

Zelensky also said on Monday that Ukraine had hit more than 30 Russian oil processing and storage facilities.“More than 30 oil refineries, terminals and oil depots of the terrorist state were hit,” Zelensky told officers from the Special Operations Center “A” of the State Security Service (SBU) involved in the attacks, without giving further details or a time period.

A Russian twin missile attack – in which two rockets hit the same spot half an hour apart – killed at least five people and wounded 41 others, including four children, in the eastern Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk on Monday, regional officials said.Regional governor Vadym Filashkin said it was one of the largest enemy attacks on civilians in recent times, while Zelensky said Ukraine would respond to the attack “absolutely fairly.”

The EU imposed sanctions on 19 Chinese companies on Monday to counter what the West sees as Beijing’s support for the Russian war in UkraineA list published in the EU’s Official Journal includes several Hong Kong-based companies as well as two global satellite giants. The 14th package of sanctions against Russia added 61 new companies to the list of companies accused of directly supporting “Russia’s military-industrial complex” in the war in Ukraine, bringing the total number of companies to 675.

EU governments also agreed to use 1.4 billion euros ($1.50 billion) in profits from frozen Russian assets to provide weapons and other aid to Ukraine, prompting Hungary to accuse other EU members of “shameless” rule-breaking to circumvent its objections.EU members had already decided in May to use the profits from assets frozen in the EU to support Ukraine, with 90 percent of the funds earmarked for military aid. But Hungary is holding back on agreeing to the necessary legal measures, diplomats say. Hungary has closer ties with Moscow than any other EU country.

The United States is expected to announce on Tuesday that it will send Ukraine another $150 million worth of urgently needed ammunition, two U.S. officials said.The upcoming shipment is expected to include ammunition for the Highly Mobile Artillery Rocket Systems (Himar), which is also capable of firing the long-range missiles of the Army Tactical Missile System (Atacms), which Ukraine used in an attack on Ukraine on Sunday that Russia said would trigger retaliatory strikes.