July 20, 2023 - Russia-Ukraine news

The United Kingdom is disputing reports that Russia summoned the interim British chargé d’affaires to the foreign ministry in Moscow on Thursday.

Russian state news agency RIA Novosti reported earlier today that the foreign ministry summoned the official, Tom Dodd, to condemn his country’s support of “terrorist actions” by Ukraine.

He was also notified, Russia’s government said, of a new policy requiring employees of British diplomatic missions to inform the Russian government in advance of certain travel in the country.

Dodd spent over an hour at the ministry, according to RIA. As he walked into the building, Dodd told journalists: “We want peace in Ukraine and for Russian troops to leave Ukraine.”

Responding to the report Thursday, the UK government said Dodd was not “summoned,” but went for a scheduled meeting requested by the British Embassy.

The diplomatic row comes after the UK recently sanctioned numerous Russian nationals for their alleged roles in the Wagner private military group or the forced deportation of Ukrainian children.

The British government is treating reports that Dodd was summoned as disinformation by the Russian government. UK officials did not elaborate on why its embassy is said to have requested the meeting.

More on the UK sanctions: The UK on Thursday sanctioned people and groups with links to Russia’s Wagner Group operating in Central African Republic and Mali. On Monday, the UK imposed 14 sanctions on Russian individuals allegedly connected to the forced deportation of Ukrainian children. Last month, the UK introduced new legislation allowing Russian sanctions to remain in place until Moscow pays compensation to Kyiv.

Russian foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova on Tuesday condemned the sanctions connected to the deportation of Ukrainian children, saying “we consider London’s openly hostile actions as new manifestations of unabashed hypocrisy, which has become a hallmark of the British foreign policy,” according to TASS.

Correction: An earlier version of this post misspelled the first name of UK Chargé d’Affaires Tom Dodd.

Te White House is “deeply concerned” about ongoing Russian attacks against the Ukrainian southern port city of Odesa. It said it is also worried about the Kremlin’s targeting of grain infrastructure and supplies following its withdrawal from a crucial deal that allowed the export of grain from Ukraine to the rest of the world.

The collapse of the deal now poses a massive challenge to the global food supply and threatens to spike prices, especially for low-income economies. 

She also noted that the United States has seen indications that Russia may attack civilian vessels carrying grain in the Black Sea.  

“We’ve seen indications that they are essentially preparing to, as you noted, potentially attack civilian vessels carrying grain through the Black Sea. They alluded to the fact that they would consider any civilian vessel in the Black Sea, a possible shipment containing military cargo so we can elucidate from that what they might intend to do. We’re deeply concerned about that,” she said.

Ukrainian troops have started using US-provided cluster munitions in their counteroffensive against Russia, according to two US officials and another person briefed on the matter.

The US is still waiting for updates from the Ukrainian military about how effective the munitions have been on the battlefield, one of the officials said.

The Washington Post first reported the cluster munitions have been used in combat by Ukraine.

Remember: The US announced on July 8 that it would send the munitions, and they were delivered to Ukraine about a week later. The weapons are controversial because of the way they scatter smaller “bomblets” across a large area, potentially posing a long-term threat to civilians if they go unexploded.

Russia has vowed to retaliate: Russian President Vladimir Putin said last Sunday that Moscow has a stockpile of cluster munitions and will consider using them against Ukraine “if they are used against us.” But Russia has already used the munitions several times in Ukraine, CNN has previously reported, including in densely populated areas.

In March, the United Nations said it had compiled credible reports that Russian forces had used cluster munitions in populated areas at least 24 times. A CNN investigation last year found that the Kremlin fired 11 cluster rockets at Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, during the war’s opening days.

Ukraine has also previously used cluster munitions, according to the UN-partnered Cluster Munition Monitor civil society group, including in populated areas.

Stretching limited supplies: The wide spread of bomblets will allow the Ukrainian military to target larger concentrations of Russian forces and equipment with fewer rounds of ammunition.

CNN reported earlier this week that the US and Europe are struggling to provide Ukraine with the large amount of ammunition it will need for a prolonged counteroffensive against Russia, and Western countries are racing to ramp up production.

It is not clear whether the heavy amount of artillery ammunition the Ukrainians have been expending day-to-day would have been sustainable long-term without the cluster munitions, officials and military analysts said. 

Brig. Gen. Oleksandr Tarnavsky told CNN in an interview in central Ukraine last week that the munitions “can radically change (the battlefield).” 

“The enemy also understands that with getting this ammunition, we will have an advantage,” Tarnavsky said.

Read more about the US-provided cluster munitions here.

Ukrainian rescuers carry a body from a destroyed residential building after a missile strike in the centre of Mykolaiv, Ukraine, on July 20.

Two people have been found dead in Mykolaiv after an overnight Russian attack on the southern Ukrainian city.

Mykolaiv Mayor Oleksandr Sienkievych said that the victims were a married couple.

He said that the attack, which occurred around 3 a.m. local time (Wednesday 8 p.m. ET) damaged 65 residential buildings, as well as three schools, a women’s clinic, and an administrative building.

Sienkievych said nine people were hospitalized.

One person was also killed Thursday in Odesa as a result of a Russian attack on that city.

The Biden administration took further action Thursday to sanction companies and suppliers that have helped fuel Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine by providing dual-use items, as well as targeting importers, suppliers and other companies helping Russia evade Western sanctions, and going after manufacturers supporting Russia’s energy, metals, and mining industries. 

“Today’s actions represent another step in our efforts to constrain Russia’s military capabilities, its access to battlefield supplies, and its economic bottom line,” Treasury Deputy Secretary Wally Adeyemo said in a written statement.

The actions Thursday include sanctions by both the US Treasury and State Department aimed to:

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a written statement that his department and the US Treasury is imposing sanctions on nearly 120 individual and entities “to further hold Russia accountable for its illegal invasion of Ukraine and degrade its capability to support its war efforts.”

“These sanctions will restrict Russia from accessing critical materials, inhibit its future energy production and export capabilities, curtail its use of the international financial system, and crack down on those complicit in sanctions evasion and circumvention,” Blinken added.

Specifically, the Treasury sanctioned at least 66 entities across a range of sectors and jurisdictions, and two individuals. The companies include banks, suppliers, importers, and manufacturers. While the majority of the entities sanctioned today are based in Russia, there are several Kyrgyzstan-based companies as well as one Serbian and one UAE-based company. 

The main building of the Russian Foreign Ministry in Moscow, Russia, on November 23, 2017.

Russia is introducing a notification procedure for movement through the territory of Russia for employees of British diplomatic missions, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Thursday. 

It will be mandatory for personnel of the British Embassy in Moscow and the Consulate General in Yekaterinburg to send a notice of travel outside the 120 kilometers (75 miles) free movement zone at least five working days in advance. The document should contain information about the timing, purpose, type of trip, planned business contacts, transportation and route of the trip.

UK Chargé d’Affaires Tom Dodd was summoned to the agency on Thursday and spent over an hour at the Foreign Ministry, according to RIA. While walking into the building Dodd told journalists: “We want peace in Ukraine and for Russian troops to leave Ukraine.”

According to the ministry, he was told that it was “inadmissible to support the terrorist actions of the Kyiv regime.”

The diplomatic department added that any efforts by London to continue “the destructive line against Moscow, demonize Russia and complicate the work of its foreign agencies will receive a decisive response.”

Images emerged early Monday, April 18 2022, on social media showing Russia's guided-missile cruiser, the Moskva, badly damaged and on fire in the hours before the ship sunk in the Black Sea on Thursday.

While Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry accused Russia of “grossly violating” its international obligations by threatening civilian ships traveling to Ukrainian ports, the Ukrainian military on Thursday issued a warning to Russian ships in the Black Sea — saying they could face the same fate as the guided-missile cruiser Moskva, which Ukraine sank in the Black Sea in April 2022.

“The Kremlin has turned the Black Sea into a danger zone, primarily for Russian vessels and vessels sailing in the Black Sea towards Russian seaports and Ukrainian seaports located on the territory of Ukraine temporarily occupied by Russia,” the Ukrainian Defense Ministry said in a statement.

After Russia’s withdrawal from the Black Sea Grain Initiative, the Russian Foreign Ministry on Wednesday said that all ships sailing in the Black Sea to Ukrainian ports would be considered potential carriers of military cargo.

The Ukrainian Defense Ministry said Thursday that Russia had created a Black Sea danger zone “by openly threatening civilian vessels transporting food from Ukrainian ports, launching missile attacks and drone attacks on civilian infrastructure in peaceful cities, (and) deliberately creating a military threat on trade routes.”

Echoing the language of Russia, the Ukrainian Defense Ministry said starting Friday, “all vessels sailing in the Black Sea in the direction of the seaports of the Russian Federation and Ukrainian seaports located on the territory of Ukraine temporarily occupied by Russia may be considered by Ukraine as carrying military cargo with all the relevant risks.” 

CNN’s Katharina Krebs contributed reporting to this post.

The southern Ukrainian port of Odesa has suffered a third successive night of Russian airstrikes. Russia has bombarded the city since Monday, when Ukraine struck the key Crimea bridge and Russia allowed the Black Sea grain deal to lapse.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said Russia is trying to cripple his country’s port infrastructure, making any grain shipments impossible. And the EU’s top diplomat has called the Russian tactics “barbarian.” Moscow says the strikes on Odesa are in retaliation for Ukraine’s attack on the vital Crimea bridge.

Meanwhile, the day after Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin seemed to appear in a video for the first time since launching his failed insurrection in Russia, Belarus says it is preparing to stage a joint military exercise with Wagner troops on the Polish border.

Here are the latest developments:

People carry their belongings as emergency service personnel work at the site of a destroyed building after a missile attack in Odesa, Ukraine, on July 20.

Russia’s Defense Ministry said Thursday that its third consecutive night of attacks on Odesa is continued retaliation for Ukraine’s attack on the Crimea bridge, and claimed that the its strikes targeted facilities associated with Ukraine’s seaborne attack drones.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian officials say that Russia’s strikes destroyed civilian infrastructure associated with grain exports at Odesa’s port. One Ukrainian, a security guard, was killed when a civil administration building in the city was destroyed.

“They destroyed an administrative building in the center of Odesa, where the blast wave damaged several other buildings, including residential ones.”

The Russian Defense Ministry also claimed that it destroyed fuel infrastructure facilities and ammunition depots of the Ukrainian military near the city of Mykolaiv.

Some background: Ukrainian officials have claimed Kyiv’s responsibility for Monday’s strike on the key bridge linking the annexed Crimean peninsula to the Russian mainland – a vital supply line for Russia’s war effort in Ukraine and a personal project for President Vladimir Putin.

The nearly 12-mile crossing, also known as the Kerch Bridge, is the longest in Europe and holds huge strategic and symbolic importance for Moscow. Monday’s attack was the second on the bridge since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine, after a fuel tanker exploded while crossing it in October.

A fighter from Russian Wagner mercenary group and a Belarusian service member take part in a joint training at the Brest military range outside Brest, Belarus, in this still image from a video released on July 20.

The Belarusian military on Thursday praised the “unique experience” its troops were gaining from “joint combat training” with Wagner troops at a camp near Brest, close to the border with Poland. 

“During the training sessions, emphasis is made on the organization of interaction between different branches of the army during fire attack, the use of unmanned aerial vehicles for reconnaissance and fire attack, tactical techniques of movement on the battlefield, taking into account the high intensity of fire, the use of strike drones, techniques of hiding troops and objects, as well as psychological training of servicemen,” the Belarusian military said on Telegram.

The military released a video of Wagner and Belarusian soldiers flying a consumer-type drone, practicing assault along a treeline, and moving with an armored personnel carrier.

The European Council will extend sanctions over Russia’s military aggression against Ukraine, through the beginning of next year, it said Thursday. 

The measures were first introduced in 2014 “in response to Russia’s actions destabilizing the situation in Ukraine, were significantly expanded since February 2022, in response to Russia’s unprovoked and unjustified military aggression against Ukraine,” the EU Council said in a press release.

The sanctions currently include restrictions on trade, finance, technology and dual-use goods, industry, transport and luxury goods.

Anti-tank obstacles are pictured by the metal wall constructed at the Polish-Belarussian border on July 8, 2023 in Bialowieza, Poland.

Poland’s defense ministry said it is monitoring its border with Belarus and is prepared for “various scenarios,” after Minsk announced Thursday that its forces will hold exercises with Wagner fighters in the area.

“Both Deputy Prime Minister Jarosław Kaczyński and the head of the Ministry of National Defense Mariusz Błaszczak emphasized that the Wagner Group could be used to destabilize the Polish-Belarusian border,” it continued.

The statement added that joint actions between Poland’s army and border guard involving almost 200 units of equipment were happening as a response. The country is fully willing and able to immediately respond to any attempts at destabilization on the border, it added.

Some background: The Belarusian Defense Ministry said Thursday that its forces will hold exercises with Wagner fighters on the Polish border.

At the beginning of July, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko invited Wagner forces into Belarus to help train his country’s military.

That invitation came shortly after the failed armed insurrection by Wagner forces against Moscow, which Lukashenko was credited with helping diffuse. 

The announcement of a joint military exercise comes a day after a video appeared to show Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin in Belarus – his first public sighting since the mutiny.

This undated photograph handed out by French military shows Russian mercenaries boarding a helicopter in northern Mali.

The United Kingdom has added individuals and groups with links to Russia’s Wagner Group who are operating in the Central African Republic (CAR) and Mali to its sanctions list, its foreign ministry said Thursday.

In the latest update of the UK sanctions list, the ministry added seven new designations under CAR sanctions regime, five new designations under the Sudan sanctions regime and one new designation under the Mali sanctions regime. 

Among those sanctioned were Vitalii Viktorovitch Perfilev, head of the Wagner Group in the CAR, and Ivan Aleksandrovitch, the head in Mali. Both will be subject to an asset freeze and travel ban.

Wagner’s African footprint: As Joyce M. Davis, president and CEO of the World Affairs Council of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, wrote in an opinion piece for CNN:

Since it first emerged in 2014 during Russia’s annexation of Crimea, the Wagner Group has operated in at least a half-dozen African countries, with a presence of some 5,000-strong across the continent, including fighting forces, former convicts and foreign nationals.

Much more than a mere contingent of mercenary troops, Wagner is a complicated network of businesses intertwined with fighting forces, with operations intricately linked with Russia’s military and intelligence community. But for the past several days, the whereabouts of the mercurial man who leads the vast operation have been unknown.

On Wednesday, a video emerged that appeared to show Prigozhin greeting his fighters in Belarus, in what would be his first public appearance since he led an armed rebellion in Russia last month.

The question remains however, what will now become of Wagner’s immense Africa operation that provided security services and paramilitary assistance and launched disinformation campaigns for troubled regimes in the CAR, Libya, Mali and Sudan?

Read the full opinion piece here:

Emergency service personnel work at the site of a destroyed building after a Russian attack in Odesa, Ukraine, on July 20.

Ukraine’s Air Force has asked for better air defense systems for its southern regions, after reportedly destroying just five of 19 Russian cruise missiles fired at the country overnight.

“Of course, we would like to shoot down more.”

Russia’s third consecutive night of attacks on Odesa has left one person dead. At least 19 were also injured by an overnight Russian attack on Mykolaiv.

Ihnat said that it is “no possibility” to shoot down Russia’s Oniks and Kh-22 missiles with Ukraine’s current air defense systems because of how fast they fly.

The Oniks missile, he said, “is designed to destroy watercraft, ships. It flies at a speed of more than 3,000 km per hour… When entering the target, the missile can fly at an altitude of 10-15 meters above the water to destroy the ship, which makes it difficult to detect and, accordingly, shoot down by the air defense means.”

Firefighters work at a site of an administrative building heavily damaged by a Russian missile strike in Odesa, Ukraine, on July 20.

Russia’s third consecutive night of attacks on Odesa killed one person, as Ukraine’s military only managed to shoot down just over a quarter of Russian cruise missiles fired overnight.

Ukraine’s Air Force said that it had “destroyed” five of 19 cruise missiles fired at the country overnight. Just two of the five destroyed cruise missiles were in Odesa, according to Oleh Kiper, head of Odesa’s regional military administration.

The Air Force also said it had destroyed 13 of 19 Shahed attack drones.

“Unfortunately, not all missiles were destroyed, including supersonic missiles such as the Kh-22 and Oniks, which are extremely difficult to destroy,” Kiper said in a separate update on Telegram.

“While attacking the ports of the grain deal, causing damage to the port infrastructure, the terrorists also hit civilian infrastructure that was not related to the ports. They destroyed an administrative building in the center of Odesa, where the blast wave damaged several other buildings, including residential ones. 4 local residents were injured, including 1 child.”

Rescuers work at a site of a building heavily damaged by a Russian missile attack in central Odesa, Ukraine, on July 20.

The mayor of Odesa, Hennadii Trukhanov, posted a video to Facebook on Thursday standing in the destruction caused by a Russian munition near a nursery.

“Another terrorist attack by non-humans, creatures, on the peaceful city of Odesa,” Trukhanov says in the video. “Look at what they are doing. This is a nursery. There is a kindergarten nearby. Civilians live nearby. They destroyed everything. We are looking for a person under the rubble. A person was injured and taken to the hospital in a serious condition.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin will “make a regional trip today” to an unnamed location in the country, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a Thursday conference call.

It was confirmed Wednesday that Putin will not attend the BRICS summit hosted by Johannesburg, South Africa, in late August, halting months of speculation triggered by an arrest warrant issued against the Kremlin leader for alleged war crimes in Ukraine.

Read the full story here:

Vladimir PUTIN (President of Russia). Journey to Dagestan on 04.07.2023. Photo by: The Kremlin Moscow/picture-alliance/dpa/AP Images

Related article Putin will not attend BRICS summit in South Africa, as ICC arrest warrant overshadows key talks | CNN

US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin gives a press conference at the NATO headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, on June 15.

The US has committed to providing Ukraine with more air defense systems and attack drones in a $1.3 billion aid package announced Wednesday, according to the Department of Defense. 

The package includes four more National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems (NASAMS), which are medium-range air defense batteries that have already helped Ukraine withstand ongoing Russian barrages of missiles and drones. It is the same system used to protect Washington, DC, and the area around the nation’s capital. 

The latest commitment will give Ukraine a total of 12 NASAMS from the United States. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said last November that the NASAMS had a 100% success rate in intercepting Russian attacks. 

The latest package falls under the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative (USAI), which is part of the long-term US commitment to provide aid to Ukraine. Unlike drawdown packages, which are pulled directly from Defense Department stocks and can be sent in relatively quickly, USAI packages are contracted with industry, a process which can take months or more. 

On Tuesday, following an international meeting of countries providing aid to Ukraine, Austin said, “Make no mistake: We are determined to support Ukraine’s fight for freedom for as long as it takes.”

The package also includes Phoenix Ghost and Switchblade attack drones, as well as counter-drone equipment. 

The sizable Ukraine aid package comes during Ukraine’s ongoing counter-offensive, which has faced stiff Russian resistance and widespread minefields, which have slowed its progress. 

The US is also expected to announce a separate aid package of about $400 million that will include more ammunition for the NASAMS, according to two US officials, as well as ammo for Patriot missile defense systems and HIMARS rocket launchers. 

The package will also contain more artillery ammunition, which officials have warned is in short supply, especially with the possibility of a prolonged Ukrainian counteroffensive that will drain current stockpiles. 

In addition, the package includes anti-tank and anti-armor weapons such as Javelins and TOW missiles, the officials said.

The officials cautioned the package has not been finalized yet and could still change. It could be announced as early as this week, one of the officials said.

Notably, the package is not expected to include more of the controversial cluster munitions, the officials said, which the US provided for the first time in the previous drawdown package announced earlier this month. 

The Biden administration decided to provide cluster munitions, known officially as dual-purpose improves cluster munitions, in part to meet the Ukrainian need for more artillery ammunition as the US and other countries ramp up their ammo production.

This picture shows a grain terminal in a sea port damaged during Russian missile and drone strikes, in Odesa region, Ukraine on July 19.

Russian attacks in the Ukraine’s southern port city of Odesa are causing large scale destruction of grain storage, the EU’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, has warned.  

Speaking to reporters ahead of an EU Foreign Affairs Council meeting in Brussels on Thursday, Borrell described the attacks as “a barbarian attitude, which will be taken into consideration by the council today.”

Borrell also told reporters that he had presented a plan “to ensure the financial support for Ukraine in the next years, which will amount to quite an important amount on money,” which he said he hoped ministers will support. 

Some context: Russia said Monday it was suspending its participation in a crucial deal that allowed the export of Ukrainian grain, raising fears over global food supplies.

Under the deal brokered by the United Nations and Turkey, Russia allowed ships to leave several Ukrainian ports in and around Odesa and travel through an agreed corridor to Turkey’s Bosphorus Strait to reach global markets.

But with Odesa under attack by Russia for three consecutive days, grain exports are expected to stall.

A firefighter works at a site of a residential building heavily damaged by a Russian missile strike in Mykolaiv, Ukraine on July 20.

Russia launched 38 air attacks on southern Ukraine overnight into Thursday morning, including nearly two dozen cruise missiles and kamikaze drones combined, according to a statement from the Ukrainian Air Force.

Russian forces attacked “ports, piers, residential buildings and retail chains” in the southern cities of Odesa and Mykolaiv, it added.

Ukraine’s air defense destroyed 18 of the projectiles, it said, including 13 Shahed drones, two sea-launched Kalibr cruise missiles and three Iskander-K land-based cruise missiles, according to the statement.

The Ukrainian Air Force claimed Russian forces fired seven Oniks cruise missiles from the Bastion coastal missile system in Crimea, four Kh-22 air-launched cruise missiles from eight Tu-22M3 aircraft, three sea-launched Kalibr cruise missiles “allegedly from a submarine” in the Black Sea and five Iskander-K land-launched cruise missiles from Crimea.

The Ukrainian Air Force also said Russia launched 19 Shahed-136/131 attack drones from Crimea and Kursk. 

Ukraine fires back:  The Ukrainian Air Force also said it carried out more than 20 air strikes on “objects, places of concentration of equipment and personnel of the Russian occupiers” in recent days, the statement said. 

A fighter from Russian Wagner mercenary group and a Belarusian service member take part in a joint training at the Brest military range outside Brest, Belarus, in this still image from a video released on July 20.

Belarusian forces will hold exercises with Wagner fighters near its border with Poland, Belarus’ Defense Ministry said in a statement on Thursday. 

The ministry didn’t say when exactly the exercises would take place.

Some context: At the beginning of July, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko invited Wagner forces into Belarus to help train his country’s military. The invite came shortly after the failed armed insurrection by Wagner forces against Moscow, which Lukashenko was credited with helping diffuse. 

A video emerged on Wednesday that appears to show Wagner chief Yevgeny Prigozhin greeting his fighters in Belarus, in what would be his first public appearance since he led an armed rebellion in Russia last month. CNN geolocated the video to a previously disused military base in Asipovichy, roughly 80 kilometers (49 miles) southeast of the capital Minsk.

Natalia Humeniuk attends a briefing in Odesa, southern Ukraine on May 4.

Russia’s attack on the southern port city of Odesa on Thursday damaged an administrative building and warehouses in the region, with a Ukrainian military spokesperson saying at least 20 missiles and drones targeted the city.

At least four people were injured in the blast at the administrative building in Odesa city center, said Natalia Humeniuk, head of the Joint Press Centre of the Defense Forces of Southern Ukraine.

Humeniuk claimed a submarine in the Black Sea, aircraft and Kh-22 missiles were involved in the attack. She said the total number of missiles and drones aimed at targets in southern Ukraine overnight was well over 20, but that final results are still being summarized. 

The Russian-backed leader of Crimea, Sergey Aksyonov, claimed on Thursday that a Ukrainian drone hit an area in the occupied Crimea and killed a teenage girl.

Four administrative buildings were damaged in one of the settlements in the northwest of Crimea as a result of a drone strike from Ukraine, Aksyonov said in a post on Telegram.

CNN has reached out for comment to the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine, which has yet to respond.

Rescuers work at a site of an administrative building heavily damaged by a Russian missile strike, in Odesa, Ukraine on July 20.

Russia attacked Odesa early Thursday for a third straight night, according to Ukrainian authorities.

It comes after Russian forces launched airstrikes on Odesa Tuesday in what Moscow said was retaliation for Kyiv’s attack on the Crimean bridge linking the annexed peninsula to Russia.

Meanwhile, series of explosions were reported at a Russian ammunition dump in occupied Crimea, forcing thousands of people to evacuate.

Here’s what else you should know to get up to speed:

A building is seen on fire in Mykolaiv, Ukraine on early Thursday.

Russia struck the city center of Mykolaiv in southern Ukraine on Thursday, according to Vitaliy Kim, the head of the Mykolaiv regional military administration.

At least 18 people were wounded, Kim said in the latest update on Telegram.

Among the injured people are five children, including a baby less than a year old, and 3-year-old child.

Kim reported fatalities but did not specify how many. He also did not provide more details on the nature of the attack.

Russia attacked the southern port city of Odesa for the third night in a row, according to Ukrainian authorities.

At least two people were injured in the attacks, the head of the region’s military administration Oleh Kiper said in a post on Telegram.

At least eight Russian Tu-22M3 aircraft were “flying in the direction of the Black Sea,” the Ukrainian air force said early Thursday.

The air force warned that Russian supersonic anti-ship cruise missiles “were launched in the direction of the Odesa region.”

A CNN team on the ground witnessed a large explosion and heard the sound of other explosions.

Some background: Russian attacks over the previous two nights damaged the port infrastructure in the city, officials said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Wednesday the attacks were the largest since the war began, and he accused Russia of trying to weaponize hunger and destabilize the global food market.

The president linked the strikes with Russia’s decision to pull out Monday of the UN-brokered Black Sea Grain Initiative, which allowed Ukraine to export its grain via the contested body of water.

Russia could target civilian ships in the Black Sea and blame Ukraine following the Kremlin’s decision to leave the Black Sea Grain Initiative, according to a spokesperson for the National Security Council.

Russia has laid additional sea mines in the approach to Ukrainian ports, spokesperson Adam Hodge said in a statement Wednesday. Earlier in the day, Russia’s Defense Ministry said any ship sailing toward a Ukrainian port would be considered as potentially carrying military cargo. 

The Black Sea Grain Initiative, a deal brokered one year ago by Turkey and the United Nations, which allowed for the export of Ukrainian grain, expired Monday at midnight. The agreement guaranteed safe passage for ships carrying Ukrainian grain through the Black Sea to Turkey’s Bosphorus Strait.

In the days since the grain deal expired, Russia has targeted the port city of Odesa with missiles and drones, destroying agricultural infrastructure and 60,000 tons of grain, Hodge said. 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the attacks on Odesa were the largest since the war began, and he accused Russia of trying to weaponize hunger and destabilize the global food market.

Vladimir Putin attends a forum in Moscow on July 13.

Russian President Vladimir Putin appears to have declared open season on Ukraine’s consequential grain exports, targeting the port city of Odesa with a new ferocity and jeopardizing worldwide food prices.

With the strikes on Odesa, Putin says he wants payback for damage to a nearly 12-mile bridge that connects annexed Crimea to the Russian mainland.

But they also coincide with Russia’s retreat from a yearlong deal known as the Black Sea Grain Initiative to keep Ukrainian grain flowing to the world.

Wheat and corn prices on global commodities markets jumped Monday after Russia pulled out of the deal, and they spiked again Wednesday after attacks on the ports in Odesa and as hope faded for Russia to rejoin the grain deal.

Turkey brokered previous versions of the grain deal, and it plans to host Putin for talks in August.

Without a new grain deal, the options are to use railroads to ship Ukrainian grain to ports in Romania or in southeastern Europe. The problems in both of those scenarios are time and money, according to Simon Evenett, a professor of international trade and economic development at the University of St. Gallen in Switzerland. He told CNN’s Rosemary Church that ports in Romania are being expanded.

Church noted that China has come to rely on grain from Ukraine and wondered if Beijing could lean on Russia to reenter the deal.

Evenett said it’s true that China has also suffered from droughts that have affected its domestic production.

Read more here.