Russia-Ukraine war updates: Kyiv hit as Ukraine admits Kursk incursion

Alexei Smirnov, the governor of the Kursk region, has ordered the evacuation of residents from another district in the border region.

“About the situation in the Belovsky district: The regional command centre has decided to evacuate residents,” Smirnov said on social media, referring to an area with a population of over 14,000 people.

Nikolai Volobuyev, head of the Belovsky district, took to social media as he urged residents of the district to “leave the area due to the tense situation”.

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We will keep you updated on the reported missile strike on Odesa with a news story shortly.

You can read today’s list of key events on day 898 of the Russia-Ukraine war here.

The Ukrainska Pravda media outlet reports that an independent military monitoring project had detected no drones over Belarus two nights ago.

Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko had said on Saturday that a dozen Ukrainian drones were shot down over his country the night before.

Speaking at a news conference in the capital, Minsk, Lukashenko said the drones were detected and destroyed by air defence systems in southern Belarus.

Mikhail Murashko has said eight children are among 69 people undergoing inpatient treatment.

“Seventeen of the victims are in serious condition. Outpatient care was provided to 29 victims, including two children. Eight people were discharged,” the Russian health minister was quoted as saying by the ministry’s press service.

According to him, 11 patients, including four children, continue to receive treatment in federal medical centres and hospitals in Moscow.

Here are some of the main developments over the past day:

• Kyiv’s air force said Ukrainian forces destroyed 53 out of 57 attack drones launched by Russia during an overnight air strike.
• The Ukrainian president said that Russian forces likely used a North Korean missile during the air strike.
• Ukrainian officials said that a four-year-old boy and his 35-year-old father died after debris from a downed Russian weapon fell on the house they were living in near the capital Kyiv.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy acknowledged for the first time that Ukrainian forces are fighting in Russia’s Kursk region.
• Russia’s Defence Ministry said it destroyed 14 Ukrainian drones and four Tochka-U tactical ballistic missiles overnight in the Kursk region and 18 drones over other Russian regions.
• Russia’s army claimed to have halted Ukraine’s advance into its western region of Kursk in several places, hitting soldiers and equipment in areas up to 30km (20 miles) from their shared border.

The president of Ukraine’s Athletic Federation, Olha Saladukha, says Ukraine’s success in securing three Olympic athletics medals “creates an explosive emotional effect” and reminds the world that the war with Russia is still raging.

Ukraine enjoyed a “Super Sunday”, during which Yaroslava Mahuchikh won gold in the high jump and Iryna Gerashchenko claimed bronze. Minutes later, Mykhaylo Kokhan came third in the men’s hammer.

“When there are three victories in one evening, it creates an explosive emotional effect,” Saladukha, the 2011 world triple jump champion, told the AFP news agency.

“Ukraine is fighting a difficult and exhausting war against a brutal enemy. Right now, it’s crucial to feel that we are successful on the battlefield and in peaceful life, including in sports,” Saladukha added.

The population of the region’s border areas with Ukraine have left independently and in organised columns, according to Russia’s Emergency Situations Ministry.

About 6,000 of them are in temporary accommodation centres, the ministry said in a statement on Telegram.

A 58-year-old man has died in hospital of injuries received when Russian forces shelled an apartment building in the Izium district of the Kharkiv region overnight, according to the Kharkiv Regional Prosecutor’s Office, quoted by the Interfax news agency.

Earlier, the agency had reported that a family was trapped under the rubble and two people had died in the shelling.

According to reporters with the news agency AFP, armoured Ukrainian vehicles daubed with a white triangle, an insignia used to identify hardware being used by Ukraine for its offensive in Russia’s western Kursk region, have been seen traversing the border region of Sumy.

Kyiv’s army has mounted its incursion inside Russian territory from the Sumy region, located in northeastern Ukraine.

The news agency Interfax, citing the head of the Kherson regional military administration, Oleksandr Prokudin, reports that a 93-year-old woman died as a result of shelling in the city of Kherson in southern Ukraine.

“I express my sincere condolences to the relatives and friends of the victim,” Prokudin wrote on his Telegram channel.

In March 2022, during the first weeks of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, its forces took control of Kherson. Later that year, Ukraine took the city back and pushed Russian forces onto the Dnipro river’s left bank.

In a post on X, the Ukrainian president has sent his “deepest condolences” to the family and loved ones of the pair who were “tragically killed”.

“Three other people were injured, including a 12-year-old boy”, he said.

“This week alone, the Russian army has launched more than 30 missiles and over 800 guided aerial bombs.”

Zelenskyy also reiterated his calls to Ukraine’s allies for “a full-fledged air shield that can protect all our cities and communities”.

We have reported earlier that Russia’s Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova, said her country would have “a tough response” to the Ukrainian attacks on Russia’s border regions.

We know from her comments published on the ministry’s website that Moscow considers the Ukrainian missile and drone attacks to be “clearly terrorist in nature”.

“We strongly condemn these barbaric terrorist acts aimed at destroying civilian infrastructure, killing and intimidating civilians,” she said.

Zakharova called on international organisations to condemn them.

“Although we are sure that the response will be shameful silence from the relevant structures,” she added.

Russia’s army says it has halted Ukraine’s advance into its western region of Kursk in several places, hitting soldiers and equipment in areas up to 30km (20 miles) from their shared border.

The Defence Ministry said Russian troops had “foiled attempts by enemy mobile groups with armoured vehicles to break through deep into Russian territory”, including near the villages of Tolpino and Obshchy Kolodez.

The spokesman of the State Border Service of Ukraine, Andrii Demchenko, has said that “the situation on the border with Belarus is unchanged and fully controlled; the movement of equipment or personnel has not been recorded”.

The Interfax news agency quoted him after Belarus’s Ministry of Defense claimed that Belarusian tankers advanced to the border with Ukraine to strengthen the troop grouping.

“We see that Belarus is once again starting to inflame the situation in this direction, most likely, in order to continue to play along with Russia in the sphere of influence, in which it has been for a long time,” Demchenko is reported to have said on air during a national telethon earlier today.

“Currently, we do not record the movement of equipment or personnel near our border,” he added.

That’s according to the acting governor of Russia’s Kursk region, Alexei Smirnov.

“As a result of the fall of rocket debris on an apartment building in the regional centre, 15 people were injured. Everyone is receiving the necessary medical care,” he wrote on his Telegram channel.

Earlier, Smirnov reported 13 victims, two of whom were in serious condition.

In a post on X, the US ambassador to Ukraine, Bridget Brink, says the Russian strikes in the Kyiv region were a “terrible reminder that Russia has not stopped its illegal invasion of Ukraine’s sovereign territory”.

Air alerts and explosions sounded all night around Kyiv as Russia launched multiple missile attacks, killing a man and his 4-year-old son. A terrible reminder that Russia has not stopped its illegal invasion of Ukraine’s sovereign territory and its bombing of peaceful civilians. pic.twitter.com/Sj782XuafZ

— Ambassador Bridget A. Brink (@USAmbKyiv) August 11, 2024