Russia-Ukraine war live updates: Russia a ‘terrorist state’, says Ukraine at ICJ

In the same claim, Ukraine has also asked the Hague-based court to order Russia to halt discrimination against the Tatar ethnic group in Crimea, a Ukrainian peninsula occupied by Russia since 2014. Russia will have an opportunity to respondon Thursday.

Ukraine on Tuesday called Russia a terrorist state at the top UN court as hearings began in a case over Moscow’s backing of pro-Russian separatists blamed for shooting down Malaysian Airlines Flight MH17 in 2014. It was the first time lawyers for Ukraine and Russia met at the International Court of Justice, also know as the World Court, since Moscow launched an invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Russia has controlled the dam since early in its 15-monthold invasion, although Ukrainian forces recaptured the Dnipro’s northern bank last year. Both sides had long accused the other of plotting to destroy thedam. “Russian terrorists,” President Zelensky said. Russians had “carried out an internal detonation of the structures”, he claimed. Nato secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg called it “ outrageous act”. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov blamed “deliberate sabotage: by Ukraine. Earlier, Russian-installed officials had given conflicting accounts, some saying the dam had been hit by Ukrainian missiles overnight, others saying it had burst on its own due to earlier damage.

Ukrainian emergency crews rushed to evacuate the most vulnerable on the western side of the river, while conservationists warned that a long-lasting environmental disaster was unfolding. It was more difficult to assess what was happening on the eastern bank of the river under Russian control. The disaster came one day after US and Russian officials said a planned Ukrainian counteroffensive might have begun east of the Dnipro in the Donetsk region.

A major dam in southern Ukraine collapsed Tuesday, triggering floods, endangering crops in the country’s breadbasket and threatening drinking water supplies as both sides in the war scrambled to evacuate residents. Ukraine accused Russia of blowing up the Nova Kakhovka dam on the Dnipro River in a deliberate war crime. The Kremlin said it was Ukraine that had sabotaged the dam, to distract attention from the launch of a major counteroffensive Moscow says is faltering. Neither side offered immediate evidence of who was to blame. The Geneva Conventions explicitly ban targeting dams in war, because of the danger to civilians.

The water level around southern Ukraine's Nova Kakhovka dam, which was blown up overnight, is up by five metres, with several downstream islands already entirely flooded, Russian state-owned news agency RIA reported, citing local authorities.

"Russian terrorists. The destruction of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant dam only confirms for the whole world that they must be expelled from every corner of Ukrainian land," he wrote on the Telegram messaging app. "Not a single meter should be left to them, because they use every meter for terror."

There was no "critical danger" yet to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant due to the collapse of the Nova Kakhovka dam, Russia's TASS state agency cited a Moscow-backed official in the Zaporizhzhia region as saying on Tuesday.

The Nova Kakhovka dam in the Russian-controlled parts of Ukraine's Kherson region was blown up by Russian forces, the South command of Ukraine's Armed Forces said on Tuesday. "The scale of the destruction, the speed and volumes of water, and the likely areas of inundation are being clarified," the command said on its Facebook page.

The mayor of Nova Kahhovka, a city in Russia-controlled parts of the Ukrainian region of Kherson, denied social media reports that the Kakhovka Dam on the Dnipro River was blown up, Russia's state RIA news agency reported early on Tuesday. Russian and Ukrainian social media reported widely in early hours on Tuesday that the dam was destroyed. Reuters could not independently verify the reports.

Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Monday that U.S.-built F-16 fighter jets can 'accommodate' nuclear weapons and warned that supplying Kyiv with them will escalate the conflict further. "We must keep in mind that one of the modifications of the F-16 can 'accommodate' nuclear weapons," Lavrov said in a speech at a military base in Dushanbe in Tajikistan, according to a transcript on the ministry's website.

Ukrainian forces stepped up their artillery strikes and ground assaults in a flurry of offensive military activity that by Monday was raging along multiple sectors of the frontline, US and Russian officials said. The American officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the surge in attacks was a possible indication that Kyiv’s long-planned counteroffensive against Russian forces had begun. They based their assessment in part on information from US military satellites, which detected an uptick in action from Ukrainian military positions.

The European Union will extend to September 15 restrictions on imports of Ukrainian agricultural products imposed by five member states seeking to protect their farmers, the commission said on Monday. Major grain producer Ukraine was forced to export more of its produce by land through EU neighbours after Russia blockaded its Black Sea ports following the invasion that began in February last year. The EU suspended import duties on Ukrainian agricultural products in May 2022 in a sign of solidarity with its war-torn neighbour.

President Joe Biden thanked Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen on Monday for Denmark's role in a Western alliance “standing up" for Ukraine as it tries to fend off Russia’s 15-month-old invasion. The Oval Office visit was the first of a pair of critical meetings Biden is holding with European allies this week that will focus heavily on what lies ahead in the war in Ukraine — including the recently launched effort to train, and eventually equip, Ukraine with American-made F-16s fighter jets. Biden will meet Thursday with British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Monday praised his troops for advances claimed near the devastated city of Bakhmut, while Russia said it had repelled a large-scale attack. The contrasting claims came as Pope Francis's peace envoy, Italian Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, arrived in Kyiv for two days of talks. "Well done, warriors! We see how hysterically Russia reacts to any step we take there, all positions we take. The enemy knows that Ukraine will win," Zelenskyy said in a video message published on social media.

Ukrainian forces were making a major effort to end a battlefield stalemate and punch through Russian defensive lines in southeast Ukraine for a second day Monday, in what may herald the start of a long-anticipated counteroffensive after 15 months of war. Russian officials seemed to be trying to portray the Ukrainian attacks as the start of the counteroffensive, saying that Moscow's forces foiled at least one assault. While not explicitly confirming such a large-scale effort, Kyiv authorities said their forces were indeed increasing offensive operations and making gains, but suggested some of the Russian announcements were misinformation.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy welcomed on Monday what he called "the news we have been waiting for" from troops fighting in and around the shattered eastern city of Bakhmut, but gave no further details. "I am grateful to each soldier, to all our defenders, men and women, who have given us today the news we have been waiting for. Fine job, soldiers in the Bakhmut sector!" Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address. He said Russia was reacting "hysterically" to any action undertaken by Ukrainian forces and singled out two units who "skillfully, decisively and effectively defend our positions, destroy the occupiers and, most importantly, move forward".