July 24, 2023 - Russia-Ukraine news

Wheat prices rose sharply on international markets following the strike by a Russian drone against a Ukrainian port on the Danube River.

One grain silo at the port of Reni was hit and substantially damaged, according to geolocated images and video. 

At 9 a.m. ET, the price of wheat for September delivery on the Chicago exchange was nearly 6% higher than the previous close.

Markets are concerned about a tightening supply situation following the collapse of the Black Sea grain initiative last week and a sequence of Russian drone attacks against Ukrainian port infrastructure.  

The Russian foreign ministry has issued a statement calling on international organizations to condemn the recent Ukrainian drone attacks on Moscow and Crimea. 

“We strongly condemn this yet another crime of the Kyiv regime. We call on international organizations to give it a proper assessment,” it added.

The ministry blamed the West for exacerbating the situation, stating that the actions of Kyiv were influenced by the West's focus on further escalating tensions.

“The Russian side reserves the right to take tough retaliatory measures,” the ministry said, adding that the Investigative Committee of Russia has opened criminal cases in response to these incidents, assuring that all those responsible will be identified and brought to justice.

Some context: The reported attacks come after Russian missiles badly damaged a historic Orthodox cathedral in the southern Ukrainian port city of Odesa, sparking outrage and prompting Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to vow retaliation.

The Odesa strikes killed at least one person and injured several others, Ukrainian officials said, the latest in a wave of attacks on the port city. The attacks also destroyed other historic buildings, Ukraine’s culture ministry said.

Ukrainian intelligence claimed responsibility for a targeted drone attack on Moscow early Monday, according to an official, as the Kremlin launched a barrage of strikes on the southern port city of Odesa amid intensified cross-border attacks from Russian and Ukrainian forces.

Here are the latest developments:

Here's the latest map of control:

Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a law on Monday that raises the age limit by five years for certain categories of citizens to remain in Russia's military reserve, as Moscow intensifies attacks on Ukraine.

The amendments to the Federal Law "On military duty and military service," published on the official portal of legal information, increases the age limits for various categories of servicemen, including soldiers, sailors, sergeants, foremen, warrant officers and midshipmen.

For soldiers, sailors and sergeants, the age limit increases from 35 to 40 years. For foremen and warrant officers, it increases from 45 to 50 years, and for midshipmen, it increases from 50 to 55 years.

Additionally, the law extends the maximum age limit for those in the mobilization reserve.

The new rules will take effect on January 1, 2024, with a transitional period until January 1, 2028 when citizens in the reserve will be gradually transferred to retirement.

Romanian President Klaus Iohannis has criticized Moscow's strikes on Ukraine’s river port infrastructure, calling them an “escalation" in the war.

“I strongly condemn the recent Russian attacks against the Ukrainian civilian infrastructure on Danube, very close to Romania,” Iohannis tweeted on Monday.

Romania, a NATO country, shares a border with Ukraine along the Danube River. The Danube, near the area that was struck overnight, is less that one kilometer wide.

“This recent escalation pose[s] serious risks to the security in the Black Sea,” he added. “It also affects further [Ukrainian] grain transit [and] thus the global food security.”

Russia targeted Ukrainian grain stocks overnight, the Ukrainian Army said earlier, days after Moscow withdrew from a crucial grain deal that allowed for the safe export of Ukrainian wheat to international markets — worsening a global food crisis.

Images shared with CNN by a witness on the Romanian side of the Danube show damage to the Ukrainian port of Reni, just across the river. The damage matches images shared by Ukrainian authorities earlier on Monday. In this area, the Danube River is less than 500 meters wide (1,640 feet). 

Why this matters: From all available information, CNN believes this to be the closest to NATO territory a Russian-fired weapon has landed since the war began. In March 2022, an attack on the Yavoriv military base – which killed dozens – struck roughly ten miles from the Polish border.

In November last year, two people were killed when a Ukrainian S-300 air defense missile landed in Poland.

Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence, an arm of the Ministry of Defense, says it carried out a drone attack on Moscow early Monday morning, a Defense Intelligence official has told CNN.

The official was speaking on condition of anonymity because they had not received authorization to talk publicly about the incident.

Russian authorities said that Ukrainian drones hit two non-residential buildings in Moscow, calling the incident a "thwarted" attack. The Kremlin said later that all the drones targeting the Russian capital had been neutralized.

Russian air defenses successfully neutralized all drones that targeted Moscow on Monday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

“All the drones have been neutralized today, and measures are being taken,” Peskov said. “As for the development of the defense system, ensuring its more intensive work, this is a question for the Ministry of Defense.”

When asked about potential retaliation for the strike, Peskov reiterated Moscow will carry on with what it calls its “special military operation” in Ukraine.

“The special military operation is ongoing, it will continue, and its goals must be accomplished,” he added.

A Ukrainian security official has claimed Kyiv’s responsibility for the drone strikes that hit the Russian capital of Moscow and Crimea overnight.

The Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) claims remnants of explosives were found aboard a bulk carrier crossing the Black Sea, which had made a stop at a Ukrainian river port earlier this year.

“On July 22, in the hold of a foreign dry cargo ship en route from Turkey to the port of Rostov-on-Don to load grain crops, traces of explosives -- dinitrotoluene and tetryl were found,” the FSB said on Monday, according to Russian state news agency TASS.

“Signs of third-party interference in the structural parts of the dry cargo ship were also revealed.”

The vessel allegedly visited the Ukrainian river port of Kiliya, on the Danube River, and in July its 12-sailor Ukrainian crew was swapped out and the name of the vessel changed, the FSB claimed, according to TASS.

“These circumstances may indicate the possibility of using a foreign civilian ship to deliver explosives to the territory of Ukraine,” the FSB added.

The port of Kiliya was not part of the now defunct UN-brokered Black Sea Grain Initiative, which included the ports of Chornomorsk, Odesa and Yuzhny/Pivdennyi, with a much larger export capacity. Moscow announced last week it was pulling out of the grain deal.

The expired grain deal allowed for the safe shipment of grain from docks in southern Ukraine, after Russia barricaded ports and exacerbated a global food crisis.

Russian drone strikes have ramped up in the region along the Danube port, amid threats from Moscow against civilian ships crossing the Black Sea.

Overnight, Russia launched what Ukrainian authorities on Monday described as “4-hour-long attack by Shahed-136 drones” directed at its port infrastructure on the Danube. The attacks hit infrastructure used to export grain, but it was not immediately clear which port was hit.

Three drones were destroyed by air defense forces, although “some got through,” according to military officials in Odesa.

One of the drones spotted in Moscow on Monday was brought down near a Russian Ministry of Defense complex. Social media footage of the aftermath, verified by CNN, showed damage to one of its buildings.

One of the buildings seen damaged in footage geolocated by CNN houses the Russian Ministry of Defense military orchestra. It was not immediately clear if the damage had been caused by the drones.

The area also houses the Russian Foreign Military Intelligence, known as GRU, 26165 unit, which carries out cyber activities, according to multiple Western sources. It’s also in the vicinity of the Russian Ministry of Defense’s National Defense Management Center.

Drones struck two non-residential buildings in Moscow in the early hours of Monday morning and were “suppressed” by defenses there, Russian authorities said, describing the incident a “thwarted” attack.