White House says missile attack on Kharkiv village cafe is "horrifying" The White House press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, described the missile attack that hit a cafe in the village of Hroza in the Kharkiv region as “horrifying”. Speaking during her briefing with reporters, she said the attack was “incredibly horrifying for the people of Ukraine”. “This is what is happening in Ukraine every day,” she said. Closing summary It’s just past midnight in Kyiv. Here’s where we stand: At least 51 people including a six-year-old boy were killed during a missile attack on a cafe during a wake service in a village of Hroza in the Kharkiv region on Thursday, according to Ukrainian officials. According to preliminary findings, the Russians targeted the cafe with an Iskander ballistic missile, Ukraine’s minister of internal affairs, Ihor Klymenko, said. Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, accused Russia of “brutal” and “genocidal aggression” after the missile attack in the village of Hroza, in the Kupiansky district of the north-eastern Kharkiv province. He described it as “a demonstrably brutal Russian crime – a rocket attack on an ordinary grocery store, a completely deliberate act of terrorism”, later saying it was “no blind strike”. European leaders rallied around the Ukrainian president in the face of US jitters over defence funding. The gathering at the European Political Community (EPC) summit in Granada, Spain, gave leaders including the French president, Emmanuel Macron, the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, and the British prime minister, Rishi Sunak, a chance to restate their commitment to Ukraine after political turbulence in the US and Europe raised questions about continued support. Slovakia will not send more military aid to Ukraine for now, prime minister Ľudovít Ódor said. Instead, the decision will be delayed until a new government is formed following last week’s election, which saw a victory for Robert Fico, a populist, pro-Russian three-time former prime minister who campaigned on a promise to end military aid to Ukraine. The US president, Joe Biden, wants to give a “major” speech on support for Ukraine, the White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said, without specifying when that would happen. She described the Hroza missile attack as “horrifying”. Vladimir Putin ramped up his nuclear rhetoric, saying his country had successfully tested the nuclear-powered, nuclear-capable Burevestnik strategic cruise missile, as he suggested Russia could resume nuclear testing for the first time in more than three decades. Putin also suggested that the plane crash that killed Wagner mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin in August was caused by hand grenades detonating inside the aircraft, not by a missile attack. “Fragments of hand grenades were found in the bodies of those killed in the crash. There was no external impact on the plane – this is already an established fact,” he said. That’s it from me, Léonie Chao-Fong, and the Russia-Ukraine war blog today. Thank you for following, we’ll be back tomorrow. Slovakia freezes military aid for Ukraine after pro-Russian election win Slovakia will not send more military aid to Ukraine for now, prime minister Ľudovít Ódor said on Thursday. Instead, the decision will be delayed until a new government is formed following last week’s election, Reuters reported. Slovakia’s president has asked Robert Fico, a populist, pro-Russian three-time former prime minister who campaigned on a promise to end military aid to Ukraine, to try to form a coalition government after his party came top in weekend elections. Before falling apart last year, the country’s previous government was a staunch backer of Ukraine, donating arms, including its fleet of Soviet-era MiG-29 fighter jets. But Fico has vowed to withdraw Slovakia’s military support for Ukraine, and his pro-Moscow stance has sparked fears Slovakia will join Hungary and its authoritarian leader Viktor Orbán in challenging the EU’s consensus on support for Kyiv. Speaking on the sidelines of an EU summit in Granada, Ódor said his administration would leave the question of more military aid to the next government. He added: In what form will depend on the government, but I do not think that, at the least, anyone will stop the commercial part of aid. Biden to deliver "major" speech on Ukraine support, says White House The US president, Joe Biden, wants to give a “major” speech on support for Ukraine, the White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said during her briefing today. “He wants to give a major speech on this,” Jean-Pierre said, without specifying when that would happen. She added: We are going to continue to make sure that we meet the battlefield needs that Ukraine has, using existing resources and using those resources provided by Congress. Biden on Wednesday said he would deliver a “major” speech about funding for Ukraine and “why it’s critically important for the United States and our allies that we keep our commitment”, in response to an NBC question. He told reporters: I’m going to make the argument that it’s overwhelmingly in the interest of the United States of America that Ukraine succeed. The Biden administration is considering using US state department grants to send additional military aid to Ukraine, according to a Politico report. The White House is weighing a range of options as it scrambles to find funds after Congress on Saturday approved a last-minute spending bill that did not include the $6bn in military assistance that Ukraine said it urgently needed. The administration has warned for weeks that funds allocated for aid to the Ukrainian war effort have nearly been exhausted. On Wednesday, President Joe Biden said “there is another means by which we may be able to find funding for that” but did not elaborate. The report states: One option under consideration is using foreign military financing — a program run by the State Department that provides grants or loans to help partner countries purchase weapons and defense equipment — intended for Ukraine and other countries impacted by Russia’s full-scale invasion, said the two officials. The US ambassador to Ukraine, Bridget Brink, has called the Hroza strikes “barbaric acts of violence”. In a tweet on Thursday, Brink echoed White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre’s condemnation of the strikes on the village cafe as “horrifying” and said: Russia’s horrific attack today on a village store in Hroza has killed over 50 civilians, including a 6 year old child. We will support Ukraine in holding Russia accountable for such barbaric acts of violence. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy says Hroza attack was "no blind strike" Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy condemned the Russian missile attack in Hroza on Thursday, saying that it was “no blind strike”. “A deliberate missile strike on a village in Kharkiv region on an ordinary store and cafe,” Zelenskiy said while attending the European Political Community in Granada, Spain, Reuters reports. ‘Russian troops could not have been unaware of where they were hitting. This was no blind strike,’ he said. Earlier at the summit, Zelenskiy warned that other European countries will be at risk if Russia wins the war. “We have to win in Ukraine so that Putin cannot scale this aggression to someone, someone else, and it is realistic. That’s why the key things are our unity, the unity and solidarity of all of Europe must be unwavering,” he said. The UN high commissioner for human rights has condemned the attack on the village of Hroza that killed at least 51 people Volker Türk said that he was “shocked and saddened by today’s attack – one of the deadliest in 20 months – which struck the village of Hroza in Kharkiv region”. “Dozens dead, including a child. Our human rights monitors will visit the site to gather information. Accountability is key,” he added. Russian president Vladimir Putin has called Canada’s former parliament speaker an “idiot” after the parliament gave a standing ovation to a veteran who fought in Ukraine with a Nazi military unit that has been accused of war crimes “If the speaker of the Canadian parliament says that during World War II this Canadian-Ukrainian or Ukrainian-Canadian Nazi fought against the Russians, he cannot help but understand that he fought on the side of Hitler,” Putin said, Agence France-Presse reports. “Let’s assume he doesn’t know this,” Putin added, saying, “But if he doesn’t know that Hitler and his minions fought against Russia during the war, then he’s an idiot. It means he just didn’t go to school.” “It looked absolutely disgusting that everyone applauded this Nazi, especially the president of Ukraine, who has Jewish blood in his veins,” Putin said. Following the incident, which occurred during the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s visit to Canada last month, the Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau apologized, saying, “It was a horrendous violation of the memory of the millions of people who died in the Holocaust.” White House says missile attack on Kharkiv village cafe is "horrifying" The White House press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, described the missile attack that hit a cafe in the village of Hroza in the Kharkiv region as “horrifying”. Speaking during her briefing with reporters, she said the attack was “incredibly horrifying for the people of Ukraine”. “This is what is happening in Ukraine every day,” she said. Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has posted a video showing his meeting this afternoon with the British prime minister, Rishi Sunak. The pair were seen embracing as they met at the European Political Community summit in Granada in southern Spain. Speaking to reporters after the meeting, Sunak said they discussed the “horrific” attack in Hroza, which he said “illustrates Russia’s barbarity”.