Ukraine war live updates: Fighting intensifies in Kharkiv as Blinken makes unexpected visit to Kyiv

Up to 50,000 Russian troops are amassed on the border of Kharkiv amid a potential invasion of the city, Ukraine’s securtiy council said.

“At the moment, Russian actions in the border area are ongoing,” Oleksandr Lytvynenko, the recently appointed secretary of Ukraine’s security council, said.

“We can say that we don’t see any threat of assault on the city of Kharkiv. But there are a lot of Russians, quite a lot. About 50,000 were on the border.”

Vladimir Putin will visit China this week, TASS news agency reports, citing the Kremlin.

The Russian leader is set to visit Beijing and the northeast province of Harbin on 16 and 17 May, according to reports.

The trip is his first foreign trip since his inauguration for a new term as president. He last visited China in October 2023.

Four people were injured in fresh Russian attacks on the battered city of Kharkiv in Ukraine’s northeast, Ukrainian officials said on Tuesday.

A man and three women were injured in shelling by Russian forces early on Tuesday, Oleh Sinehubov, governor of the broader Kharkiv region of which Kharkiv city is the administrative centre, said on the Telegram messaging app.

Sinehubov said that Russia attacked Ukraine’s second largest city with its new UMPB D-30 bombs, Soviet-era retrofitted high-precision guided bombs that behave like a cruise missile.

Both Ukraine and Russia say they do not target civilians in the war which erupted when Russia invaded its smaller neighbour in February of 2022, which Moscow has called a “special military operation”.

Air defence systems destroyed all 18 attack drones that Russia launched overnight at Ukrainian territory, Ukraine’s air force said today.

The drones were downed over several regions, including Kyiv and a number of frontline regions, the air force said.

The air force also said that Russia launched one Iskander-M ballistic missile. It was not clear what happened to the missile.

A fresh wave of Ukrainian air attacks on Russia’s Belgorod damaged a power line and nearly two dozen houses in the early hours today, Russian officials said.

Russia’s defence ministry claimed it destroyed over 25 missiles over the border region.

“There is one casualty – a woman has received a shrapnel wound to her spine,” Belgorod governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said on his Telegram channel.

He said that about 24 houses and a power line were damaged.

The defence ministry confirmed the attack and said its air defence systems destroyed 25 missiles launched by Ukraine from the RM-70 Vampire (MLRS) multiple launch rocket systems.

This comes after an attack on Belgorod where 15 people were killed and scores injured on Sunday when parts of an apartment block collapsed after being struck by falling missile debris, Russian officials said.

Thousands more civilians have fled Russia’s renewed ground offensive in Ukraine’s northeast that has targeted towns and villages with a barrage of artillery and mortar fire, officials said.

The intense battles have forced at least one Ukrainian unit to withdraw in the Kharkiv region, capitulating more land to Russian forces across less defended settlements in the so-called contested “grey zone” along the Russian border.

At least 4,000 civilians have fled the Kharkiv region since Friday, when Moscow’s forces launched the operation, governor Oleh Syniehubov said in a social media statement. Heavy fighting raged on Sunday along the northeast front line, where Russian forces attacked 27 settlements in the past 24 hours, he said.

Four people were injured in fresh Russian attacks on the battered city of Kharkiv in Ukraine’s northeast, Ukrainian officials said today.

The injured include a man and three women, said Oleh Sinehubov, governor of the broader Kharkiv region of which Kharkiv city is the administrative centre.

Mr Sinehubov said that Russia attacked Ukraine’s second largest city with its new UMPB D-30 bombs, Soviet-era retrofitted high-precision guided bombs that behave like a cruise missile.

Ukraine says its forces have managed to prevent invading Russian troops from gaining a foothold in the town of Vovchansk near Kharkiv.

Russia claimed its soldiers had entered the border town on Monday, and Ukraine is asking volunteers to speed up evacuation of civilians in the town that has become the latest flashpoint in the war.

The Ukrainian military, in its Monday evening update, said it “had pushed the enemy back” from the northern outskirts of the town.

It added it had “tactical successes” in several areas and was restoring its old positions.

Volodymyr Zelensky, in his nightly video message, said Vovchansk town and other border areas had been reinforced. Ukraine’s military, he said, understood “how the enemy operates and… the intention to divert our forces”.

Ukraine has sent volunteers from house to house, pounding on doors to persuade residents still in the town to prepare for evacuation.

Vovchansk police chief Maksym Stetsyna said the town had been shelled repeatedly by artillery and mortar. “Some Vovchansk neighbourhoods are not easy to get to due to constant shelling,” Stetsyna told Reuters. “However, the situation is stable and under the control, we are evacuating people, it is fine.”

On Sunday, Russia claimed it had captured nine villages in the Kharkiv region and yesterday, it said its troops had improved their positions and inflicted losses on Ukraine’s defence forces.

From beyond the grave, Yevgeny Prigozhin has had one of the main aims of his attempted coup fulfilled.

Shoigu’s sacking was greeted with elation by Russia’s warhawks, the “Z-Patriots”, with Konstantin Malofeyev, describing it as pure “Easter joy” (Orthodox Easter took place last week) and declaring that the move showed that, for president Putin, defence was “becoming the absolute priority of all state policy”.