Ukraine war briefing: Biden scrapes together $300m more for Ukraine weapons

The Pentagon will rush about $300m in weapons to Ukraine after finding cost savings in its contracts, the White House has announced. The replenishment comes under a presidential drawdown authority, or PDA, to send equipment to Ukraine and then sign contracts to order replacements.

As efforts to get new US funds for weapons remained stalled in the House of Representatives, House Democrats are gathering signatures for a “discharge petition”, which can circumvent the speaker, Mike Johnson, who is preventing the House from considering the $95bn package of aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan. A grouping of centrist Republicans has launched a separate discharge petition for a smaller $66bn bill that would include US-Mexico border security provisions.

Poland’s prime minister, Donald Tusk, warned Johnson on Tuesday that “the fate of millions of people” and “thousands of lives” depend on whether Johnson allows the vote. “This is not some political skirmish that [only] matters on the American political scene. Mr Johnson’s failure to make a positive decision will cost thousands of lives. He takes personal responsibility for that,” Tusk said after he and the Polish president, Andrzej Duda, met at the White House with Joe Biden, the US president. Johnson’s office declined to comment, and earlier, after Johnson met Duda, his office issued a statement that did not address Ukraine funding.

Ukraine launched drone attacks on several Russian regions for the second night in a row, officials said on Wednesday. A gas supply line was hit, cutting off power to some villages in the Belgorod region, said the governor, Vyacheslav Gladkov. The town of Shebekino on the Ukraine border came under fire from Ukrainian forces, he said.

Roman Starovoit, governor of the Kursk oblast north of Belgorod, said air defence systems targeted four Ukraine-launched drones. The governor of the Voronezh region in Russia’s south said air defence systems were engaged several times against a drone attack.

Over Monday night and Tuesday morning Ukraine targeted Russian energy facilities in one of its largest cross-border drone and rocket attacks of the war. One attack hit an oil refinery in the Nizhny Novgorod region that produces nearly 6% of Russia’s total refined crude. Another hit an oil depot in the city of Oryol.

Videos online showed a major blaze at the Lukoil Norsi oil refinery near Nizhny Novgorod. An industry source said the main crude distillation unit (AVT-6) at Norsi was damaged, disrupting at least half of the facility’s production. Nizhny Novgorod is nearly 1,000km (620 miles) from the Ukrainian border and lies about 400km (250 miles) to the east of Moscow. The strike is the latest evidence of Ukraine’s growing ability to target critical infrastructure deep into Russian territory.

The attacks on Tuesday came as three pro-Ukrainian battalions made up of recruits from Russia launched an incursion in the Belgorod, Bryansk and Kursk regions in a rare raid meant to bring the two-year-old war to Russian soil, if only for a short time. Members of the Siberia, Freedom of Russia Legion and RDK battalions released footage they said showed a ground assault supported by at least one tank and other armoured vehicles.

Videos showed the troops overrunning Russian border checkpoints and pitched fighting in settlements. The Freedom of Russia Legion claimed to have captured the town of Tetkino in the Kursk region, and the pro-Ukrainian forces also released footage of soldiers they claimed were captive Russians. The Russian ministry of defence claimed that the attacks were repelled but did not provide evidence. Schools in the Russian city of Kursk switched to online classes, local authorities said.

A Russian missile hit two apartment buildings in the central Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rih on Tuesday, killing three people and injuring at least 38 including 10 children. Serhiy Lysak, governor of Dnipropetrovsk region, said: “Two buildings were hit, one five storeys, one nine storeys. The number of injured is constantly rising as is the number of children injured.”

EU countries are close to a deal on a military aid fund for Ukraine that would pave the way for an injection of €5bn, diplomats have said. The European Peace Facility gives EU members refunds for sending munitions to other countries. Diplomats said a compromise had been found on a “buy European” policy pushed for by the French, and Germany’s demand for countries’ contributions to the fund to be offset by their bilateral aid to Ukraine. The deal looked set to be approved by ambassadors from the EU’s 27 member countries at a meeting in Brussels on Wednesday, the diplomats said.

French lawmakers have backed a security accord with Ukraine, after a debate that showed deep divisions over Emmanuel Macron’s policy towards Kyiv. The 10-year security pact with Ukraine includes commitments by Paris to deliver more arms, train soldiers and send up to €3bn in military aid. After a tense debate, French lawmakers backed the pact by a wide margin, with 372 votes in favour and 99 against, while 101 abstained.

Denmark will provide a new military aid package including Caesar artillery systems and ammunition to Ukraine worth about 2.3 billion Danish crowns ($336.6m).

A Russian Il-76 military transport plane crashed in the Ivanovo region north-east of Moscow on Tuesday with 15 people on board, the Interfax news agency cited Russia’s defence ministry as saying. Video from onlookers showed a plane descending with an engine on fire, followed smoke from a large fire on the ground.

The Ukrainian Security Service said it had uncovered one of the largest networks in the country allegedly spreading pro-Russian “informational sabotage”, coordinated by a cleric of the minority Moscow-linked Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC).

Kremlin critic and chess legend Garry Kasparov has called for more military aid to Ukraine against a “terrorist regime that only understands force.”

Thousands of people took to the streets of Slovakia’s capital, Bratislava, on Tuesday to show support for Ukraine and protest against the Slovak government of Robert Fico, whom critics say has pandered to Vladimir Putin and his Russian regime.

Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, said “peace plans excluding Russia will not yield any results” as he spoke at a Ramadan fast-breaking dinner with foreign ambassadors in Ankara. A Ukraine peace summit is planned in Switzerland that Russia will not attend. Erdogan said any steps that would exacerbate the war in Ukraine and possibly spread the conflict to Nato must be avoided, and he would host Vladimir Putin after this month’s Russian elections.