Russian bid to return to UN rights body fails after vote Russia has missed out on a bid to return to the UN’s top human rights body, with Albania and Bulgaria winning more votes at the general assembly, Reuters reports. Russia won 83 votes, while Albania received 123 and Bulgaria got 160 in a secret ballot. The election is seen as a crucial test of western efforts to keep Moscow diplomatically isolated over its invasion of Ukraine, for which it was ousted from the Geneva-based human rights council 18 months ago. Russia’s suspension last year made it the first permanent member of the UN security council to have its membership revoked from any UN body. Closing summary Rafael Grossi, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, says Volodymyr Zelenskiy has promised him that Ukraine will not attack Europe’s biggest nuclear plant as part of its counteroffensive against Russia. Russia has missed out on a bid to return to the UN’s top human rights body, with Albania and Bulgaria winning more votes at the general assembly, Reuters reports. Russian forces have been closing in on the eastern Ukrainian town of Avdiivka, which has been hit by intense shelling since the morning, officials said. Extensive damage to an undersea gas pipeline and communications cable connecting Finland and Estonia “could not have occurred by accident” and appears to be the result of a “deliberate … external act”, Finnish authorities have said. Volodymyr Zelenskiy called for steps to ensure Russia does not turn the Black Sea into a “dead zone” for shipping after Moscow quit a deal allowing safe Ukrainian grain exports. On his first trip to Romania since Russia’s invasion, Zelenskiy said after talks with his counterpart, Klaus Iohannis, that he had heard “good news” on artillery and air defence supplies from the Nato and EU member state. Ukraine reportedly said on Tuesday that it was holding two senior defence ministry officials on suspicion of embezzling $7m (£5.7m) earmarked for buying bulletproof vests. A Russian court has dismissed a complaint by the Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich against the extension of his pre-trial detention, more than six months after his arrest on spying charges. Judge Yuri Pasyunin at Moscow city court ruled to “keep the detention without changes” until 30 November, an Agence-France Presse reporter at the court said. The National Police of Ukraine has documented nearly 100,000 war crimes committed by Russian forces in Ukraine, according to the head of the body. Speaking to the Interfax-Ukraine news agency, Ivan Vyhovsky said the evidence being gathered would form the basis of future attempts to prosecute the perpetrators. Russia is unlikely to launch an additional mobilisation drive before the presidential election next year, the UK’s Ministry of Defence has said. In its daily intelligence update, the MoD said Vladimir Putin would “almost certainly” run for re-election in the vote, scheduled to take place on 17 March. Vladimir Putin discussed trade and security with Mali’s leader on Tuesday in their third phone conversation in less than two months, the Kremlin said. The frequency of Putin’s contacts with Mali’s interim president Assimi Goita underlines Moscow’s strong interest in building its influence in the Sahel region of west Africa where it is cultivating strong security ties at the expense of France and the US. The two leaders discussed their “mutual commitment to further strengthening trade and economic ties, security cooperation and the fight against terrorism”, the Kremlin said in a statement. Mali is one of six African countries to which Putin promised to supply free grain at a summit in Russia in July. A senior Russian official accused the US of deploying unmatched efforts to ensure Russia remained out of the human rights council (see earlier post at 16:50 for more details on the vote). “The United States campaigned for Albania,” Maria Zabolotskaya, Russia’s deputy permanent representative to the UN, was quoted as saying by RIA news agency. “Such a campaign directly aimed against us is unprecedented,” she added. Amid some signs of supposed Ukraine war “fatigue”, some diplomats earlier said Russia had a reasonable chance of getting voted back on to the council, according to Reuters. “It was not even that close in the end,” said Richard Gowan, the UN director of the International Crisis Group. “I think western diplomats may have been overstating the risk of a Russian win to keep UN members on their toes.” China and Cuba were also among the winners of Tuesday’s vote. The next three-year term begins on 1 January. Bulgarian police have arrested 12 people accused of illegally exporting dual-use goods to Russia that can be used by the Russian military in the war in Ukraine. The Associated Press reports: The interior ministry chief secretary, Zhivko Kotsev, told reporters on Tuesday the suspects included citizens of Bulgaria, Russia and Belarus. The operation to arrest the suspects was carried out by several agencies after the state agency for national security received information about the illegal transfer of goods with possible dual use, the agency head, Plamen Tonchev, said. Such exports to Russia are banned under EU sanctions imposed on Russia after it launched its war in Ukraine. “An international network has been revealed for the illegal supply of dual-use goods with civilian and military applications from European countries to the Russian Federation,” Tonchev said. He added that the shipments were not intended for the regular Russian army, but for the special forces fighting in Ukraine, like the Wagner group and the Akhmat paramilitary unit. Commenting on Russia’s failure to regain a seat on the human rights council (see earlier post at 16:50), Louis Charbonneau, of international NGO Human Rights Watch, said: UN member states sent a strong signal to Russia’s leadership that a government responsible for countless war crimes and crimes against humanity doesn’t belong on the human rights council. Albanian ambassador Ferit Hoxha, whose country received 123 votes, had said earlier that the UN general assembly “has an important choice” to “demonstrate that it is not ready to take an arsonist for a firefighter.” It comes just days after a Russian missile attack on the Ukrainian village of Hroza was reported to have killed more than 50 people. Zelenskiy pledged not to attack nuclear plant in Zaporizhzhia, says IAEA chief Rafael Grossi, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, says Volodymyr Zelenskiy has promised him that Ukraine will not attack Europe’s biggest nuclear plant as part of its counteroffensive against Russia. In an interview with the Guardian, the nuclear watchdog chief said he was most concerned about the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant becoming engulfed in fighting between the two sides, but insisted he had obtained a commitment from the Ukrainian president. “President Zelenskiy has personally assured me that they will not directly bomb or shell it,” Grossi said, although he added that Zelenskiy had told him “all other options are on the table” in terms of taking it back. That means Ukraine would comply with the first of the five new nuclear safety principles – “do not attack a nuclear power plant” – initially outlined by Grossi at the UN security council at the end of May to avert “a catastrophic accident”. The Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station was captured by Russia in March 2022, the first time any reactor has been captured in war, prompting fears of a fresh incident in the same country where an explosion at Chornobyl spread radioactivity across Europe in 1986. Grossi said the danger was that “anything can happen at any time” given the prevailing military situation. “I’m often asked, is [the power station] safe now? No. It’s in the middle of a war zone with a counteroffensive,” he said. Russian bid to return to UN rights body fails after vote Russia has missed out on a bid to return to the UN’s top human rights body, with Albania and Bulgaria winning more votes at the general assembly, Reuters reports. Russia won 83 votes, while Albania received 123 and Bulgaria got 160 in a secret ballot. The election is seen as a crucial test of western efforts to keep Moscow diplomatically isolated over its invasion of Ukraine, for which it was ousted from the Geneva-based human rights council 18 months ago. Russia’s suspension last year made it the first permanent member of the UN security council to have its membership revoked from any UN body. Ukrainian frontline town of Avdiivka under "severe artillery attack", says police officer Russian forces have been closing in on the eastern Ukrainian town of Avdiivka, which has been hit by intense shelling since the morning, officials said. A local police officer, Pavlo Diachenko, told AFP that Avdiivka, now home to fewer than 2,000 people, was undergoing a “severe artillery attack”. Avdiivka lies less than six miles from the Russian-controlled stronghold of Donetsk and has long been a target for Moscow’s forces. Ukraine has managed to cling on to the frontline town, despite constant strikes that have forced much of its civilian population to flee. “For over a year, there has been the danger that (Avdiivka) can be occupied, but now the situation has worsened rapidly,” Vitaliy Barabash, head of the town’s administration, said. Russian troops launched an artillery attack in the morning and were firing incessantly, he said. These claims are yet to be independently verified. Poland’s two highest-ranking military officers have resigned days before a crucial election and amid the war in neighbouring Ukraine. On Tuesday, the armed forces operational commander, Lt Gen Tomasz Piotrowski, and the chief of staff, General Rajmund Andrzejczak, submitted their resignations, spokespeople for the respective services confirmed to Reuters. National Security Bureau chief Jacek Siewiera said the president had accepted their resignations and new commanders would be appointed later in the day. No reason was given for the departures. “(It is) a complete disgrace for Minister Blaszczak, who has long crossed over the line into using the Polish army in a partisan way,” Tomasz Siemoniak, a former defence minister from the opposition Civic Platform, wrote on X. “This is a Law and Justice party (PiS) disaster in the defence sector at a time of great threats to Poland,” he said. Rattled by Russia’s invasion of neighbouring Ukraine, Poland has increased military spending to about 4% of national output this year and has also moved soldiers to its border with Belarus, a close ally of Moscow. With a closely contested election in Poland on 15 October, some experts have said the pace of military spending and the domestic debate around it were being driven in part by campaigning. Russians who leave the country and support Ukraine should be sent to a far eastern region known for its Stalin-era Gulag prison camps if they ever return home, the speaker of the Russian parliament’s lower house, the state Duma, said. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine last February, and its subsequent mobilisation campaign, prompted at least several hundred thousand Russians to leave their homeland. Vyachelav Volodin, the speaker of the Duma, told lawmakers on Tuesday that those who had left Russia and rejoiced at Ukrainian drone and missile attacks on their country should know that they were no longer welcome in their homeland. Volodin said: Those who left the country and committed despicable acts, rejoicing at the shots fired on the territory of the Russian Federation, wishing victory to the bloody Nazi Kyiv regime, should realise that no one is waiting for them here. But if they do come back, then Magadan will be provided for them. For Russians, Magadan is synonymous with the gulag – a series of forced labour camps where Russians were used as slave labour under Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin. Air force Gen Charles Q. Brown, who took over as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff last month, arrived in Brussels on Tuesday for a monthly meeting of global support for Ukraine, known as the Ukraine Contact Group. He will be joined by the US defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, later this evening, Reuters reports. The general faces the daunting task of assuring allies that the US remains committed to supporting Ukraine, even though the House of Representatives, which holds the key to future aid, is without a leader. The situation has been further complicated by the weekend’s escalation of violence in the Middle East. Joe Biden’s administration has repeatedly stressed its support for Ukraine and will announce a new weapons package for Kyiv while military leaders are in Brussels. “Over the next few days I’ll be having meetings to reassure our partners,” Brown said. “I recognise that what is going on in the US, on the hill. [Allies] will have questions and concerns,” he added. Vladimir Putin hosted Iraq’s prime minister, Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani, in the Kremlin on Tuesday, praising cooperation between their countries at the OPEC+ group of top oil producers. Putin told Sudani at the start of their first ever meeting: We coordinate work within the framework of OPEC+ and do this very successfully with the aim of stabilizing the situation on world markets. Overall, we succeed in this, and I hope we will continue to work with you in the future. Finland: Nato ready to assist investigation into pipeline damaged by "external activity" Here is a press release from the office of the president of Finland, Sauli Niinistö: The damage to the underwater infrastructure has been taken seriously and its causes have been investigated since Sunday. The political leadership has been closely informed of the situation. It is likely that the damage to both the gas pipeline and the data cable is caused by external activity. What specifically caused the damage is not yet known. The investigation will continue in cooperation between Finland and Estonia. We are also in constant contact with our allies and partners. I discussed with Nato secretary general Jens Stoltenberg today. Nato is ready to assist with the investigation. Finland’s level of preparedness is good. These events have no impact on our security of supply. Finland joined Nato in April 2023, having applied after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Reuters has a quick snap that the Nato secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, has said it is sharing information over the damage to underwater infrastructure between Estonia and Finland, and stands ready to support the allies concerned. Leonid Pasechnik, Russian-installed head of the chiefly unrecognised Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR), which the Russian Federation claims to have annexed, has issued a status update on the Telegram messaging service. In it, he claims that in the last week the Russian military has foiled at least 32 attempts by Ukrainian armed forces to take territory in Luhansk region. He claims that “during 26 attempts to cross the airspace of the LPR, the enemy lost 34 drones”. He said: “The complex actions of our motorised riflemen, reconnaissance officers, artillerymen, the competent work of air defence units, electronic warfare and UAV service specialists made it possible to pin down the Ukrainian armed forces’ offensive along the entire frontline.” The claims have not been independently verified. Just a little more here on the damage to a gas pipeline connecting Finland and Estonia. Finland’s public service broadcaster Yle reports that the government is to hold a press conference at 5.30pm local time (3.30pm BST). It says the authorities have located the damaged point, and that there is also damage to a communications cable between the two nations, both of which are Nato members and border Russia. Here are some images released of Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskiy with his Romanian counterpart, Klaus Werner Iohannis, and their delegations in Bucharest. Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said on Tuesday he had “good news” on artillery and air defence supplies after talks with his Romanian counterpart, Klaus Iohannis, in Bucharest, but gave no details. Speaking to reporters in the Romanian capital, he said: My main accent today was air defence. And I’m glad that Ukraine was heard by the Romanian side. Zelenskiy also said everything possible should be done to prevent Russia turning part of the Black Sea or the Danube region into what he described as a maritime “dead zone”. Russia has pulled out of a deal that guaranteed safe shipments of Ukrainian grain via the Black Sea, and has been attacking Ukrainian port infrastructure on the Danube River.