Latest Ukraine updates: Moscow raises ‘dirty bomb’ claim at UN

The Russian and Belarusian ambassadors have been excluded from this year’s Nobel Prize ceremony in Stockholm because of the war in Ukraine.

The private Nobel Foundation, which administers the prestigious awards, normally invites ambassadors stationed in Sweden to the annual ceremony on December 10.

“But due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Nobel Foundation has chosen not to invite the ambassadors of Russia and Belarus to the Nobel Prize ceremony in Stockholm,” it said in a statement.

The foundation also said it would continue its practice of inviting the leaders of all parties in the Swedish Parliament, except the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats.

The new Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Rishi Sunak has promised Zelenskyy that his country’s support for Ukraine would be “as strong as ever”, a Downing Street spokesperson says.

“The prime minister said the United Kingdom’s support for Ukraine would be as strong as ever under his premiership and President Zelenskyy could count on his government to stand in continued solidarity,” the spokesperson said after the two leaders spoke by phone.

“Both leaders agreed on the need to continue to place pressure on Putin’s barbaric regime through continued economic sanctions,” the spokesperson said. “… [Sunak] said he hoped they would see each other in person soon.”

Russia’s occupying forces are establishing a paramilitary guard in the southern Zaporizhia region as they have done in Kherson.

The new Territorial Defence Force was established as Moscow struggles to hold onto territory in the face of a counteroffensive by Kyiv. It will be tasked with guarding roads, bridges, railway tracks, factories and infrastructure objects, administration chief Yevgeny Balitsky said.

If necessary, it will also be deployed “in front-line defence”, Russian news agencies quoted him as saying.

The White House has welcomed Saudi Arabia’s moves to help Ukraine in the war against Russia, as the Biden administration weighs its tough stance against the kingdom for initiating a reduction in oil output.

White House spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters that Biden and his team would take their time to assess what consequences Saudi Arabia should face for a decision by Saudi-led OPEC+ to cut oil output.

“We’ve taken note since the OPEC+ cut that Saudi Arabia voted against Russia at the United Nations and also pledged $4m to support Ukraine’s reconstruction and humanitarian needs,” she said.

Zelenskyy says he has spoken with Rishi Sunak and hopes ties between their countries would grow.

“I believe that the partnership between our states as well as Britain’s … leadership in defending democracy and freedom will continue to strengthen further,” Zelenskyy said after the phone call in his daily address to the nation. The Ukrainian leader also invited his UK counterpart to visit Ukraine.

In a later Twitter post, Zelenskyy added: “In an excellent conversation with @RishiSunak we agreed to write a new chapter in Ukraine-UK relations but the story is the same — full support in the face of Russian aggression.”

More than 100 soldiers from Chechnya have been hit in an artillery barrage in the Russian-occupied Kherson region of southern Ukraine, Ukraine’s military says.

“Precise artillery strikes by the Defence Forces have destroyed 30 occupants in the locality of Kajiry in the Kherson region and left
more than 100 enemy soldiers under the rubble,” the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces said in its evening situation report.

According to several consistent reports, the attack hit soldiers sent by Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, although the information could not be independently verified.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has called rebuilding Ukraine a “generational task” as he opened an international reconstruction conference for Ukraine in Berlin.

Al Jazeera’s Mohammed Jamjoom joins us live from Kyiv for the latest updates.

Russia’s warning that Ukraine is preparing to use a radiation-spewing dirty bomb fits Moscow’s track record of deception when it “accuses others for what they intend to do themselves,” NATO’s chief has told AFP in an interview.

“Russia continues to accuse falsely Ukraine for preparing and making a dirty bomb,” Jens Stoltenberg said during a visit to the US aircraft carrier USS George HW Bush in the Mediterranean. “That is absurd because why should Ukraine use a dirty bomb on the territories they want to liberate?”

Russia has notified the US about its plans to carry out exercises of its nuclear forces, the Pentagon says, declining to offer further details about drills expected to include test launches of ballistic missiles.

“The US was notified, and as we’ve highlighted before, this is a routine annual exercise by Russia,” Air Force Brigadier General Patrick Ryder said. “So in this regard, Russia is complying with its arms control obligations and its transparency commitments to make those notifications.”

Officials working for the city administration and federal authorities in Moscow are fleeing partial mobilisation, according to a media report.

“In some departments [of the Moscow city administration], the number of male employees who have left Russia amounts to 20 percent to 30 percent of all employees,” the Vyorstka webite reported.

IT specialists in particular have fled to Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, the report said. That is because many civil servants, especially at the lower administrative level, are not protected from being called up because they do not count as being “indispensable,” the report said.

Zara owner Inditex has reached an agreement to sell its Russian business to a Lebanese retail and real estate conglomerate, the Spanish fashion giant says in a statement to the country’s competition authorities.

The buyer is Daher Group, and the purchase is pending approval from Russian authorities, Inditex said, without disclosing financial details.

Inditex halted its business in Russia on March 5, shortly after Putin launched the invasion of Ukraine. Following other western brands, the fashion retailer closed its 502 shops and stopped online sales. Tuesday’s announcement marks the end of Inditex’s business in Russia although the retailer said it would consider returning through a franchise collaboration with Daher if market circumstances changed.

US President Joe Biden has warned Russia against using a nuclear weapon in the war with Ukraine, saying such an escalation would be a grave error.

Asked by reporters whether he thinks Russia is preparing a dirty bomb attack that it would then blame on Ukraine, Biden said, “Russia would be making an incredibly serious mistake were it to use a tactical nuclear weapon.”

Russia has taken its accusation that Ukraine is preparing to use a dirty bomb – an explosive device laced with radioactive material – to the United Nations Security Council, voicing its concerns during a closed-door meeting of the 15-nation body.

“We’re quite satisfied because we raised the awareness,” Russian Deputy UN Ambassador Dmitry Polyanskiy said. “I don’t mind people saying that Russia is crying wolf if this doesn’t happen because this is a terrible, terrible disaster that threatens potentially the whole of the Earth.”

Russia has alleged that Kyiv has ordered two organisations to create a dirty bomb, but it has yet to give any evidence for the accusation. Russian UN Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia sent a letter to the world body on Monday about the allegation.

When asked what evidence Russia had to back its claims, Polyanskiy told reporters that it was intelligence information that had been shared with Western counterparts with the “necessary level of clearance”.

Israel’s president says he is sharing intelligence with the US to prove that Iran supplied Russia with drones that have reaped destruction in Ukraine.

President Isaac Herzog urged a tough response in talks with Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Washington. Herzog, who holds a largely ceremonial role, is to meet President Joe Biden on Wednesday.

“Iranian weapons play a key role in destabilising our world, and the international community must learn its lessons, now and in the future,” Herzog said. “The world must speak with Iran in the same language – a tough, united and uncompromising language.”

Chechen strongman Ramzan Kadyrov has repeated his criticism of the progress of Russia’s war on neighbouring Ukraine,
slamming Russia’s leadership as weak.

“We used to say that we were conducting a special military operation on the territory of Ukraine, but the war is already taking place on
our territory,” Kadyrov said on Telegram while also threatening Ukraine’s Western allies with annihilation.

Martial law has been imposed in border regions with Ukraine, Kadyrov said, “but they continue to shoot at peaceful citizens and
civilian objects.” Russia’s response to this has been “weak”, Kadyrov said.

He called for the obliteration of Ukrainian cities in retaliation “so that we can see the distant horizon”.

At an international reconstruction conference for Ukraine in Berlin, Zelenskyy has asked the international community to cover an expected budget deficit of $38bn next year as Russia’s invasion badly hits its economy.

“At this very conference we need to make a decision on assistance to cover next year’s budget deficit for Ukraine,” Zelenskyy said via video link. “It’s a very significant amount of money, a $38bn deficit.”

The General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine reports three missile attacks, 11 air strikes and 25 attacks from multiple-launch rocket systems by Russia so far on Tuesday.

Spokesman Oleksandr Shtupun accused Russia of “violating the norms of international humanitarian law” by continuing to target “critical infrastructure and the homes of the civilian population.”

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz says that Germany will continue to support Ukraine in its war with Russia for as long as it takes.

“In light of the latest [Russian] attacks – now more than ever – recovery of a peaceful and prosperous Ukraine is our joint endeavor,” Scholz said in Berlin at the end of an international conference on rebuilding Ukraine. “I am convinced that we are stronger together.”

Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal, meanwhile, stressed the need to find ways to better protect his country’s critical infrastructure against Russian attacks.

“I think today’s priorities are very natural because, during these two weeks, Russia destroyed our infrastructure, electricity infrastructure, heating infrastructure and water supply infrastructure, creating the biggest humanitarian catastrophe on the European continent,” Shmyhal said. “And to start this, we need united efforts, and we need to create something to resist these intentions of terrorist country Russia.”

The top Turkish and British diplomats have discussed by phone the latest developments concerning the Russian war against Ukraine, according to a Turkish foreign ministry statement.

Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs Mevlut Cavusoglu and UK Foreign Secretary James Cleverly also talked about an agreement that restarted grain exports from Ukraine.

Cleverly later tweeted that he thanked Cavusoglu for “his work on the Black Sea Grain Initiative to tackle food insecurity posed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine”.

Turkey “is a close partner and ally and we’ll continue to work together on shared global challenges,” he said.

Spoke with @MevlutCavusoglu. I thanked him for his work on the Black Sea Grain Initiative to tackle food insecurity posed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Türkiye is a close partner and ally and we’ll continue to work together on shared global challenges.

— James Cleverly🇬🇧 (@JamesCleverly) October 25, 2022

A Belarusian opposition leader living in exile says that her country’s soldiers should lay down their arms if they are deployed to Ukraine under pressure from Russia.

Opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, who has been in exile in Lithuania since 2020, said the leadership of Belarus has become a hostage of powerful allies in Moscow who provide political and economic support. She opposes the direct involvement of Belarus in the war.

“If it happens that under pressure, under threats, Belarusian troops will be deployed, we’re urging our soldiers to lay down their arms, join the guerillas, change sides, join the Ukrainian military,” Tsikhnouskaya said during a visit to Estonia.