By This has been CNBC’s live blog tracking developments on the war in Ukraine. [Follow the latest updates here.]
Ukraine’s air defenses shot down 23 drones during overnight attacks on the Kyiv and Odesa regions from Russia, the country’s military authorities said, while Russia struck ports and grain stocks in the country’s south, creating raging fires.
“The Russians attacked warehouses and grain elevators – almost 40,000 tons of grain were damaged, which was expected by the countries of Africa, China, and Israel,” Ukrainian infrastructure minister Oleksandr Kubrakov said, warning that such attacks were a threat to the world.
Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny gave a closing statement to a Russian court after facing trial, during which he said that Russia was “floundering in a pool of either mud or blood,” and that the invasion of Ukraine was “the most stupid and senseless war of the 21st century.” Navalny is currently serving a nine-year sentence and could face up to 20 more years in prison on charges that his supporters say are purely political.
The Kremlin may struggle to deal with more frequent attacks on its cities while continuing to refrain from fully mobilizing its population for war, the Institute for the Study of War said in its daily report.
Russian drone strikes on ports in southern Ukraine early Wednesday morning destroyed or damaged nearly 40,000 tons of grain that was set for export to several African countries as well as China and Israel, Ukraine’s minister of infrastructure said.
“The Russians attacked warehouses and grain elevators — almost 40,000 tons of grain were damaged, which was expected by the countries of Africa, China, and Israel,” Oleksandr Kubrakov said in a Telegram post.
“The world must resist. Attacks on Ukrainian ports are a threat to the world,” he added, calling on the international community for more support as well as more provisions of air defense technology.
— Natasha Turak
The U.S. State Department approved a potential foreign military sale worth $395 million to Finland for an upgrade package for M270A2 Multiple Launch Rocket System, or MLRS.
The State Department said the principal contractors are Lockheed Martin in Grand Prairie, Texas; Chelton Inc., in Marlow, United Kingdom; Leonardo DRS in Arlington, Virginia; and Loc Performance Products, Inc., in Plymouth, Michigan.
“The proposed sale will improve Finland’s capability to meet current and future threats, and will enhance interoperability with U.S. forces and other allied forces,” the State Department wrote in a release.
“Finland will have no difficulty absorbing this upgrade into its armed forces,” the release added.
— Amanda Macias
The deputy head of Ukraine’s presidential office responded to comments by a Polish official who suggested that Ukraine was ungrateful for all of Poland’s support, saying that aiding Ukraine was not charity.
“We categorically reject the attempts by some Polish politicians to impose on Polish society the baseless idea that Ukraine does not appreciate the help from Poland,” Andrii Sybiha said in a Facebook post that was translated to English. “Supporting us with weapons is not charity, but an investment in Poland’s own security.
Sybiha said that financial and military aid to Ukraine is an investment and supports what is a fight to defend the Western world as a whole.
“It is Ukrainians who are protecting the values and security of our region, and they also do it in the interests of Poland and the entire free world,” he said.
— Natasha Turak
Russia attacked Ukraine’s main inland port across the Danube River from Romania on Wednesday, sending global food prices higher as it ramps up its use of force to prevent Ukraine from exporting grain.
The attacks destroyed buildings in the port of Izmail and halted ships in their tracks as they prepared to arrive there to load up with Ukrainian grain in defiance of a de-facto blockade Russia reimposed in mid-July.
The port, across the river from NATO-member Romania, is the main alternative route out of Ukraine for grain exports, since Russia’s blockade halted traffic at Ukraine’s Black Sea ports in mid-July.
— Reuters
The identification of Russian forces who carried out various forms of torture and sexual violence on prisoners in the Ukrainian city of Kherson is “well underway,” according to a team of international lawyers investigating alleged war crimes.
“It is important that we are assisting the Ukrainian Office of the Prosecutor General not only with bringing the perpetrators of these severe sexual crimes to justice but also with building successful cases against those who gave the orders,” Wayne Jordash, an international human rights lawyer and managing partner of the law firm Global Rights Compliance, told CNBC.
“The pattern that we are observing is consistent with a cynical and calculated plan to humiliate and terrorize millions of Ukrainian citizens in order to subjugate them to the diktat of the Kremlin,” added Jordash, who leads a Mobile Justice Team, a group of international lawyers and investigators supporting Ukraine’s prosecutor general’s office.
In March, the Mobile Justice Team reported that at least 20 torture sites in Kherson were directly financed by the Kremlin and managed by various Russian security agencies, including Russia’s Federal Security Services, known as the FSB, the successor to the KGB.
Read the full story here.
— Amanda Macias
Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny gave his closing statement in a Russian court, as he serves a nine-year prison sentence and faces up to 20 more years over charges that his supporters say are punishment for his political activism and challenges to Russia’s leadership.
Navalny criticized Russian President Vladimir Putin and the invasion of Ukraine, which was followed by an intense crackdown on dissent in the country. He described Russia as “floundering in a pool of either mud or blood” and condemned the death and destruction the war had caused.
“Around it lie tens of thousands of people killed in the most stupid and senseless war of the 21st century,” he told the court.
Russian prosecutors are demanding a 20-year prison sentence for Navalny on charges of inciting and financing “extremist activity” and “rehabilitating Nazi ideology,” charges he and his supporters reject.
The court will deliver its verdict on Friday.
— Natasha Turak
Russian President Vladimir Putin has agreed to visit Turkey, Turkish state media agency Anadolu said Wednesday on the X social media platform, previously known as Twitter, according to a Google translation.
This followed a conversation with his Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has been striving to persuade Putin to return Russia to the Ukraine grain deal that Moscow abandoned in July. The agreement, previously brokered by the U.N. and facilitated by Turkey, instated a humanitarian corridor that allowed the export of Ukrainian agricultural goods to the global markets to abate a food crisis.
Erdogan described the initiative as a “bridge of peace” and emphasized it would not benefit any party to discontinue it. Russia has previously said that it would not rejoin the deal until its demands — dealing with restrictions on its own exports — are met.
— Ruxandra Iordache
The leaders of Turkey and Saudi Arabia have led negotiations between Ukraine and Russia on large prisoner swaps and maritime safety agreements like the Black Sea grain deal, and are continuing to take a spearheading role when it comes to mediation between Ukraine and Russia.
For Riyadh and Ankara, both their alliances with the West and positive relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin render them well-positioned to engage with all sides. Taking up such roles is good for increasing political clout and enabling dialogue, highlighting the rise of “middle powers” that maintain their independence amid a shifting world order.
Saudi Arabia plans to hold a Ukraine peace summit in Jeddah and has invited Ukraine, the U.S., European nations, China, India, and Brazil, among many others. Expectations for diplomatic breakthroughs at the summit or anytime soon are still low, however.
Read the full story here.
— Natasha Turak
Despite putting on a united front at all times in public, the relationship between Ukraine and its international partners has been awkward and strained at times.
Ukraine has to tread a fine line with its international friends. It is reliant on its partners for billions of dollars’ worth of military hardware but it also insists that it is fighting the West’s war as it confronts a hostile and unpredictable Russia.
Kyiv has repeatedly thanked its partners for their help but, behind the scenes, frustrations have also come to a head and Ukraine’s ongoing needs and demands — and the military and political considerations of its allies — have clashed at times, prompting uncomfortable encounters.
Read the full story: Ukraine has tested its allies’ patience with its military strategy and demands
Editor’s note: The following post contains graphic material detailing reports of torture of people in Ukraine.
The Mobile Justice Team — a collaboration between human rights law firm Global Rights Compliance and Ukraine’s Office of the Prosecutor General — found that nearly 50% of Ukrainian detainees were subjected to torture in Kherson detention centers.
The abuse included sexual violence, electrocution, waterboarding, suffocation, severe beatings and threats of rape.
The Mobile Justice Team analyzed 320 cases of detention in war-battered Kherson across more than 35 detention centers. At least 43% of these victims reported torture.
Kherson is one of four Ukrainian regions illegally annexed by Russia since the start of its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Read CNBC’s full coverage of the report.
The Kremlin may struggle to juggle domestic security concerns with its mobilization strategy, amid Ukrainian hostilities, the Institute of War said in its latest update on Aug. 1.
“Russian authorities will likely struggle to balance the need to quell domestic concern over continuing drone attacks deep within the Russian rear with Russian President Vladimir Putin’s continued refusal to fully mobilize Russian society for the war and its corresponding consequences,” it noted.
Russia had reported a drone offensive that its defense ministry deemed an “attempted terrorist attack,” which hit a skyscraper in capital city Moscow’s business district. It claimed to have downed two other drones.
Ukrainian presidential advisor Mykhailo Podolyak warned that hostilities will move to Russia’s grounds.
“Moscow is rapidly getting used to a full-fledged war, which, in turn, will soon finally move to the territory of the “authors of the war” to collect all their debts,” he said on Aug. 1 on the X social media platform, previously known as Twitter.
“Everything that will happen in #Russia is an objective historical process. More unidentified drones, more collapse, more civil conflicts, more #war…”
— Ruxandra Iordache
More than 10 drones were detected and destroyed by Ukrainian forces in a Russian overnight attack against Ukrainian capital city Kyiv, said Serhiy Popko, head of the Kyiv city military administration, in a Google-translated post on Telegram.
Moscow deployed Iranian-made Shahed drones in the offensive, he added.
A non-residential building in the capital was damaged, but no injuries or death casualties were sustained as a result of the attack, Kyiv Mayor Vitaliy Klitschko said in Google-translated comments on Telegram.
Ukraine’s air defense force on Telegram said it took down 23 drones in the Odesa and Kyiv region last night, according to a Google translation.
CNBC could not independently verify developments on the ground.
— Ruxandra Iordache
Médecins Sans Frontières confirmed it has a partnership with a hospital in the port city of Kherson that was shelled on Tuesday.
According to regional officials, the strike killed a doctor and injured five medical workers. CNBC has not independently verified the report.
“Our teams have been working in the hospital supplying medical equipment and providing mental health consultations to people displaced by the destruction of the Kakhovka Dam,” the medical charity said in a statement.
The strategically important dam was blown up in June, causing widespread flooding.
“Our logistical teams were also supporting the hospital by refurbishing the emergency bunker for the patients and medical staff — a sad reminder that even hospitals aren’t spared by the ongoing strikes,” MSF said.
“The shells were reportedly fired by Russian forces. This hospital caters largely to stroke victims, patients with cardiac issues, and the provision of general surgical care. Our teams continue to support the hospital … We unequivocally condemn this disgraceful attack on a medical facility and extend our condolences to the family of the doctor who died.”
— Jenni Reid
The United States will take the helm of the United Nations Security Council for the month of August, a scheduled presidency that is expected to grapple with the fallout of the Black Sea Grain Initiative.
The landmark U.N.-brokered agricultural initiative between Ukraine and Russia collapsed last month triggering global food insecurity concerns.
U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield slammed Moscow’s exit from the deal calling it “another blow to the world’s most vulnerable.”
The diplomatic choreography of assuming the role — largely seen as procedural — gives the U.S. the opportunity to set the agenda for debates over the next month.
Thomas-Greenfield will detail U.S. objectives for the next month during a briefing at 2 p.m. ET, though she is expected to focus on the defense of human rights and ways to mitigate food insecurity.
She is also expected to announce a signature high-level debate on Thursday that will be chaired by Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
Read the full story here.
— Amanda Macias
Ukraine and Russia struck by drones; West-led peace talks in the pipeline
