Russia-Ukraine war updates for July 4, 2023

Ukraine’s counteroffensive against Russian forces has turned “particularly fruitful” over recent days, a senior security official said Tuesday.

Oleksiy Danilov, secretary of Ukraine’s National Security and Defence Council, said the month-old counterattack was succeeding on its predominant task of damaging manpower, equipment and fuel deposits.

“At this stage of energetic hostilities, Ukraine’s Defense Forces are fulfilling the primary task – the utmost destruction of manpower, equipment, fuel depots, military vehicles, command posts, artillery and air defense forces of the Russian army,” Danilov wrote on Twitter.

“The previous few days have been particularly fruitful,” he added, without providing details from the battlefield.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Monday that his troops had been making progress after a “difficult” week.

— Karen Gilchrist

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Tuesday that his country will get up to Western sanctions and “provocations.”

Aiming to reassure Asian allies of Moscow’s strength despite an attempted mutiny in his country 10 days ago, Putin said the Russian people were more united than ever.

“The Russian persons are consolidated as never before,” Putin told a virtual meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation on Tuesday, a gaggle that also includes China and India.

“Russian political circles and the entire of society clearly demonstrated their unity and elevated sense of responsibility for the fate of the fatherland after they responded as a united front against an attempted mutiny,” he added, in accordance with a Reuters translation.

Putin also said that Moscow planned to spice up ties with the group, whilst potential global conflicts and economic crises are on the rise.

— Karen Gilchrist

Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda has called for NATO allies to push ahead with Ukraine’s ambitions to affix the military alliance, arguing that fast-tracked accession would boost Kyiv’s performance in its war with Russia.

Talking to Reuters ahead of a NATO summit in Vilnius next week, Nauseda dismissed concerns that such a move would provoke Moscow, adding that the country views the group’s current caution as an indication of weakness.

“We must always not hesitate to take bolder decisions because otherwise the Putin regime will resolve that the Western allies are too weak, [that they should be] pushed to the corner and they’ll give up,” Nauseda said on Monday.

“Our stronger wording on Ukraine’s [membership] perspective would needless to say increase the fighting spirit of Ukrainian soldiers on the battlefield. And this may be very necessary.”

Ukraine has been urging NATO to make use of next week’s summit to announce that Kyiv would join the group soon after the tip of the war, and to set out a roadmap to membership. Nevertheless, some members have expressed resistance for fear of further aggravating the Kremlin.

NATO’s military expansion is seen as one in all the motivating aspects behind Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 22, 2022.

— Karen Gilchrist

Intensified Russian shelling has increased the variety of casualties on Ukrainian grounds.

The death toll from a Russian drone attack against northeastern Ukrainian city Sumy has risen to 3, Ukrainian public broadcaster Suspilne said on Telegram in accordance with a Google translation, with 21 people injured.

The town has declared July 4 a day of mourning.

The broadcaster individually reported that Russian shelling killed two people in southern city Kherson, damaging residential buildings.

CNBC couldn’t independently confirm developments on the battlefield.

—Ruxandra Iordache

U.S. Ambassador to Russia Lynne Tracy met detained American Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich for the second time since his March arrest on Russian charges of espionage, NBC News reported.

Gershkovich is being held at renown former KGB jailing facility Lefortovo and must remain in prison until Aug. 30, a Moscow court has ruled.

“Ambassador Tracy reports that Mr. Gershkovich is in good health and stays strong, despite his circumstances,” a State Department spokesperson said, stressing expectations that Russian authorities will “provide continued consular access.”

— Ruxandra Iordache

Some flights were temporarily redirected from the Vnukovo Airport that serves Russian capital Moscow on Tuesday, following alleged drone attacks that the Kremlin attributes to Ukraine, Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin said on Telegram, in accordance with a Google translation.

He added that restrictions were lifted as of 8 a.m. local time, after Russian state-owned news agency Tass reported that these measures were in place for roughly three hours and led to 14 flights being rerouted over the period.

Russia’s Ministry of Defense on Telegram said that Russian forces shot down five drones that had targeted Moscow, incurring no casualties.

CNBC couldn’t independently confirm developments on the bottom. The Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs didn’t immediately reply to a CNBC request for comment.

— Ruxandra Iordache

The terms of Ukraine’s accession to the NATO military alliance won’t be discussed while war wages on throughout the country’s borders, German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius told the Polish Rzeczpospolita outlet, in accordance with a Google translation, days ahead of the coalition’s impending summit on July 11-12.

Once the fighting ends, “only then will all of us, and I feel there will probably be 32 allies then, along with Sweden, resolve along with Ukraine on the terms of joining the alliance,” he said.

Ukraine has been vying for fast-tracked entry into NATO and the EU bloc since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February last 12 months, citing security and geopolitical concerns.

— Ruxandra Iordache

The Kremlin casted doubt on the renewal of the Black Sea Grain Initiative, a U.N.-backed deal that established a humanitarian sea corridor for agricultural products amid the continued war in Ukraine.

Under the agricultural deal, greater than 32 million metric tons of foodstuffs have left from three Ukrainian ports for 45 global destinations.

The Black Sea grain deal is slated to run out later this month.

“A part of the agreements [with regards to Russia] remains to be not fulfilled. There remains to be a while before the deadline, but there will not be so many hopes,” Kremlin spokesman Dimitry Peskov told reporters on the Kremlin when asked a few possible extension.

Peskov added that he had nothing further to report on negotiations to renew the deal.

In recent months, Moscow has argued that the Black Sea Grain Initiative only advantages Kyiv and has called on all signatories of the deal to also include the export of Russian fertilizer.

— Amanda Macias

Greater than 6.3 million people from Ukraine have turn into refugees and moved to neighboring countries for the reason that Kremlin launched its full-scale invasion in February of last 12 months, in accordance with U.N. Refugee Agency estimates.

Nearly all of refugees have settled in nearby European countries and about 362,000 have traveled beyond Europe’s borders, in accordance with data collected by the agency.

— Amanda Macias