Ukraine updates: Kyiv pushes for tribunal for Russians
Published September 10, 2023last updated September 10, 2023
What you need to know
Ukraine has condemned what it said is a lack of progress in creating a tribunal to prosecute Russia's leaders and transfer frozen Russian assets.
"Unfortunately, we are in a kind of deadlock on both because we have divisions on the first issue and there is clearly a lack of will on the second issue," Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said.
He said the G7 group supported a hybrid tribunal which would be based on Ukrainian legislation.
Ukraine and others hope that this would make trying Russian President Vladimir Putin, Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin or Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov possible. However, it's unclear how any of these officials would ever end up in Ukrainian or Western custody, and Russia extraditing them seems highly improbable.
"It's impossible to explain to Ukrainians that we could have a tribunal without Putin on the defendant's bench," Ukraine's Prosecutor General Andriy Kostin said.
Meanwhile, Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko said Ukrainian air defense systems were engaged in repelling a Russian aerial attack on the capital.
Here are the headlines concerning Russia's war in Ukraine on Sunday, September 10:
Putin's party leads vote in occupied regions: Moscow
As Russia tallies results for local elections decried elsewhere as a sham, the Central Election Commission said that Vladimir Putin's United Russia party was in the lead in the four Ukrainian regions currently occupied by Russian forces.
Authories set up mobile polling booths in the annexed regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia.
Russian electoral officials reported attempts to sabotage voting in the occupied regions on Sunday.
Denis Pushilin, the Russian-installed head of the Donetsk region, said that staff at a polling station had been "wounded and injured" without providing details.
In the Zaporizhzhia region, authorities said a drone strike destroyed a polling station hours before it opened. Nobody was injured, according to the reports.
Meanwhile, a Russian-appointed official in the neighboring Kherson region said a live grenade was discovered in the bushes outside a polling station on Saturday.
Voting also took place in Crimea, which Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014.
Ukrainian security services said they had compiled a list of "collaborators" helping to organize the vote and vowed retribution.
UN observer accuses Russia of torturing Ukrainians
A United Nations observer has accused Russia of torturing Ukrainians as part of its state policy.
The UN Special Rapporteur on torture and inhuman treatment, Alice Jill Edwards, visited Ukraine on a week-long fact-finding mission where she collected testimonies from Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war.
Some of these individuals reported that Russian soldiers had given detainees electric shocks, for instance on their ears and genitals, beaten them, carried out mock executions, and threatened them with rape and death.
"The volume of credible allegations of torture and other inhumane acts that are being perpetrated against civilians and prisoners of war by Russian authorities appears to be unabating," Edwards said Sunday.
"These grievous acts appear neither random nor incidental, but rather orchestrated as part of a state policy to intimidate, instill fear, punish, or extract information and confessions," she added.
Edwards also visited Ukrainian facilities for Russian prisoners of war. She praised the care and respectful treatment of those soldiers.
Kyiv blames Russia for NGO worker deaths
Ukraine's Defense Ministry has blamed Russia for the killing of two foreign aid workers on Sunday.
The ministry said Russian forces killed Spanish national Emma Igual and Canadian Anthony Ihnat, who both worked for the NGO Road to Relief.
It also said two Germans working for the aid group were injured in the incident, which happened in the east of the Donetsk region.
The charity they were working for, Road To Relief, said on Instagram that the vehicle the four aid workers were traveling in "came under Russian attack" in Chasiv Yar early on Saturday. In a "direct hit, the vehicle flipped over and [caught] fire," it said.
Igual was the director of Road To Relief and one of its cofounders. The charity was established last March, soon after Russia's invasion.
Romania sends protest note to Russia over drone debris
Romania has sent a note of protest to the Russian government following Russian drone attacks near the Ukrainian border, local media reported on Sunday.
The Romanian Defense Ministry previously confirmed the discovery of drone fragments near the village of Plauru, directly opposite the Ukrainian port of Izmail on the Danube.
"The state secretary for strategic affairs, Iulian Fota, urged the Russian side to stop actions against the Ukrainian population and infrastructure, including those that would in any way endanger the security of Romanian citizens in the region," Romanian media reported, citing a Foreign Ministry press release.
South Korea announces new aid package
South Korea's President Yoon Suk Yeol announced an additional $2.3 billion (roughly €2.15 billion) in financial assiance to Ukraine at the end of the G20 summit on Sunday.
The first $300 million is to be provided next in the form of humanitarian aid.
The remaining $2 billion will start in 2025 in the form of long-term, low-interest loans through the Economic Development Cooperation Fund (EDCF).
As recently as May, Yoon promised Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy goods Ukraine needs, including mine-clearing equipment and ambulances.
Spanish aid worker killed near Bakhmut
Shelling near the town of Bakhmut has killed a Spanish aid worker, according to the Spanish government.
"A vehicle has been hit by a projectile in which the Spanish citizen was travelling, working there for a non-governmental organization (NGO) and providing humanitarian aid in Ukraine," Foreign Minister Jose Manuel Albares said on the sidelines of the G20 summit in New Delhi.
"We have verbal confirmation that she was killed," Albares said.
Spanish newspaper El Mundo reported that the Spanish woman was the head of an NGO.
The newspaper reported that a Canadian was also killed and a German and a Swedish national were injured after their vehicle came under fire.
The paper said the group of humanitarian volunteers had been on their way to the region near the battle-scarred city of Bakhmut to help care for civilians.
Ukraine says over 2 dozen drones downed over Kyiv overnight
Ukrainian air defense forces have downed over two dozen drones targeting the capital Kyiv overnight, authorities said.
"Drones entered the capital in groups and from different directions," Sergiy Popko, head of the Kyiv City Military Administration, wrote on the messaging platform Telegram.
The exact number of drones, or Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), destroyed would be announced by Ukraine's air force, Popko added, estimating the number to be over two dozen.
Several blasts were heard across the Ukrainian capitalearly on Sunday, with Kyiv's mayor announcing that air defense systems were engaged in repelling a Russian air attack.
"Drones are still heading towards Kyiv!" mayor Vitali Klitschko wrote on Telegram.
A Reuters news agency journalist reported hearing at least five blasts, whereas another from the French AFP news agency reported hearing ten.
Drone debris fell into the districts of Sviatoshynskyi, Shevchenkivskyi and Podil, the mayor said. He added that one person was injured, citing preliminary information.
Ukraine attacks on Russia target military, intelligence chief says
Ukrainian strikes on Russian territory are mainly aimed at military targets, intelligence chief Kyrylo Budanov said on Saturday.
"All [the targets] are enterprises of the military-industrial complex," said Budanov. "This is the difference that distinguishes us from Russians."
Speaking at a rare public appearance during a Kyiv meeting, Budanov vowed that "people do not suffer" due to Ukrainian attacks on Russia. Meanwhile, "enterprises burn, high-tech machines burn, there are explosions, there are very deep sabotage measures," he said.
Russian authorities have, meanwhile, reported that some Ukrainian attacks caused civilian casualties.
Kyiv's attacks on Russian territory were rare at the start of the war, but they have been intensifying recently.
Ukraine condemns lack of progress on Russian tribunal
Ukraine has condemned what it said is a lack of progress in creating a tribunal to prosecute Russian leaders, similar to the post-World War II Nuremberg tribunal, and transfer Russian assets to Kyiv.
"Unfortunately, we are in a kind of deadlock on both because we have divisions on the first issue and there is clearly a lack of will on the second issue," Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said.
He said the G7 group supported a hybrid tribunal which would be based on Ukrainian legislation.
Ukraine and others hope that this would make trying Russian President Vladimir Putin, Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin or Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov possible. However, it's unclear how any of these officials would ever end up in Ukrainian or Western custody, and Russia extraditing them seems highly improbable.
"It's impossible to explain to Ukrainians that we could have a tribunal without Putin on the defendant's bench," Ukraine's Prosecutor General Andriy Kostin said.
Ukraine is also pushing for the transfer of Russian assets to Ukraine, to help with reconstructing the country. Kuleba cited a "lack of will" regarding the asset transfer.
90% of Ukrainians believe occupied territories can be recaptured — survey
Some 90% of Ukrainians surveyed by a polling institute believe that Kyiv can recapture all of the Ukrainian territory occupied by Russia, with only 6% believing it is not possible.
The survey, conducted for German newspaper Bild am Sonntag, also revealed that 83% of the respondents wanted another counteroffensive next year, should this year's offensive fail to achieve sufficient success.
Only 30% of the respondents were open to direct negotiations with Russia, whereas 63% rejected them.
rmt/sri (AFP, Reuters)