October 14, 2022 Russia-Ukraine news

Ukraine says it's developing new technology to combat the waves of attacks by Iranian-made drones that Russia has bought.

Oleksii Reznikov, the Ukrainian defense minister, said Friday that he believed Russia currently had some 300 Iranian-made attack drones, "and they are trying to purchase a few thousand more such drones. We will see whether it happens or not, but we have to be prepared."

The Russians were using Iranian "kamikaze" drones in groups, partly to detect the disposition of Ukrainian air defenses, Natalia Humeniuk, spokesperson for the Ukrainian military in the south, said on Thursday. "Now they are starting to use them almost all over the territory of Ukraine, they are using them from the northern directions, not only from the south."

In the southern region, Ukrainian air defenses shot down 109 drones and 33 had hit targets, Humeniuk added, saying most had been aimed at civilian infrastructure.

"The fact that they are trying to use these drones on critical infrastructure facilities, to deprive us of water, heat, electricity, corresponds to the tactical and technical characteristics and purpose of these kamikaze drones, because they work like matches. [The drone] sets fire to the object and disables it not with an explosion, but more with a fire," she explained.

Russian leader Vladimir Putin said on Friday that there is no need for more “massive” strikes against Ukraine “at least for now.”  

His comments come after a week of deadly strikes on civilian targets in Ukraine, including in the Kyiv region.

When asked if he had regrets about his actions in Ukraine, Putin said: "I have no regrets. I want to make it clear that what is happening now is unpleasant.” 

He went on to stress that Russia actions in Ukraine are right and timely.   

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Russian President Vladimir Putin said that there are no plans to expand the military mobilization and that the drive will be over within two weeks.

Some 222,000 out of the planned 300,000 Russians have already been drafted into the army so far, the Russian leader added.

Some background: Last month, Putin called for “partial mobilization” of Russia’s population to support the war in Ukraine. It came at a time when a sudden counteroffensive from Kyiv recaptured thousands of square miles of territory and put Moscow on the backfoot. Experts have said Russia’s forces have been significantly depleted.

Western sanctions have sharply curtailed Russia's ability to replenish the munitions it is using in Ukraine, according to a new analysis from the US Office of the Director of National Intelligence, forcing Moscow to task its intelligence services with finding ways to evade restrictions and procure the critical technology and parts to sustain its war effort.

Russia has lost more than 6,000 pieces of equipment since the war began nearly eight months ago, the analysis obtained by CNN shows, with the country's military struggling to acquire the microchips, engines and thermal imaging technology required to make new weapons.

Sweeping Western restrictions on exports to Russia have forced the country's defense industrial facilities to periodically go idle. Two of the country's largest domestic microelectronics manufacturers were forced to temporarily halt production because they weren't able to secure necessary foreign components. And a shortage of bearings — a low-tech component — has undermined the production of tanks, aircraft, submarines and other military systems.

Even as early as May, only a few months into the war, the Russian defense industry found itself short of supplies and components for marine diesel engines, helicopter and aircraft parts and fire control systems, according to the analysis. And Russia has turned to Soviet-era tanks, removing them from storage to use in Ukraine.

The details were shared in a presentation with senior finance officials from nearly 30 nations Friday, who gathered at the Treasury Department for an update from Deputy US Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo, Deputy Commerce Secretary Don Graves and Deputy Director of National Intelligence Morgan Muir on the sanctions' effectiveness in choking off Russia's military industrial complex.

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Russian President Vladimir Putin said Friday that Germany is making a mistake by taking NATO's side on the Ukraine conflict. 

"Germany decided that commitments to some international agreements, including NATO, took precedence over domestic interests. I believe that this is a mistake and their economy and citizens are suffering. Otherwise, they would not undermine the Nord Stream gas pipelines," Putin told reporters after the completion of Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) summit in the Kazakh capital of Astana. 

"One branch of Nord Stream 2 pipeline is in working condition. A decision to launch it is not being made and is unlikely to be made, but it's none of our business," he added.

Putin was also asked if he would hold talks with US President Joe Biden.

"You should ask him (Biden) if he wants to hold talks with me. For now, I do not see the need for negotiations with Biden until I see a platform for this," he said.

Even as it loses ground in Ukraine’s southern Kherson and northeastern Luhansk regions, Russian forces have been making slow but steady progress into their assault on the eastern city of Bakhmut, aided in large measure by Wagner mercenaries, or private military contractors.

Bakhmut, located in the Donetsk region, is Ukrainian controlled, but has been bombarded by Russian artillery for months. If Russian forces were able to capture the city, it would enable them to further bombard the populations centers of Kramatorsk and Sloviansk. Russian forces were pushed further away from those cities when Ukraine recaptured Lyman and much of Kharkiv region last month.

“Wagner are carrying on with their advances on the eastern side of Bakhmut,” Semyon Pegov, a pro-Russian analyst who posts under the name WarGonzo, said on Telegram on Friday. “According to some reports the AFU [Armed Forces of Ukraine] units are leaving the area in small groups under the threat of being surrounded. If it is really so we will find out shortly.”

CNN cannot independently verify the claim that Ukraine was withdrawing forces from Bakhmut, and Ukrainian officials have not commented on it. Andrey Marochko, an official in the Russian-back Luhansk People’s Republic, also repeated that claim, as did TASS, the Russian state news agency.

Pegov said that in the past week, Wagner mercenaries were able to capture the towns of Zajtseve and Vesela Dolyna to the southeast of Bakhmut. The UK Ministry of Defense on Friday said that they may also now be contesting the villages of Opytne and Ivanhrad, to the south of Bakhmut.

CNN cannot independently verify those claims, but they would mean that Russia is forming a more complete semi-circle around Bakhmut.

“The Wagner troops pushed the AFU from important road junction to the North-East of Bakhmut,” Pegov said on Wednesday.

Ukrainian officials agree that Bakhmut is being fiercely contested:

Post includes additional translation by Racz.

After a Russian-appointed leader outlined plans for the evacuation of civilians from the occupied Kherson region, Ukraine called it a form of deportation.

Russians are taking "the opportunity to carry out a semi-voluntary deportation of the Ukrainian population ... and then repopulate the Kherson region with zombies who are 100% loyal to Moscow," Yurii Sobolevskyi, deputy head of Kherson regional council, claimed on his Telegram channel. "There were similar processes in Crimea after the annexation. Fortunately, it is not 2014, and no-one intends to give Russia even a centimeter of Ukrainian land."

On Thursday, Oleksandr Samoylenko, head of Kherson regional council, urged people there not to trust "the nonsense and false statements" of the Russian-appointed head of Kherson, Vladimir Saldo, who had appealed to Moscow to help with the evacuation plan.

Remember: Saldo's announcement came as Ukrainian forces exerted growing pressure on Russian defenders in parts of the region.

"The so-called 'evacuation' takes place under the guise of 'rehabilitation' and 'education.' This does not correspond to the real motives of the occupiers," Samoylenko said, adding that the Russians' goal was to get rid of the Ukrainian population in the region by seizing their property and "settle Russians from remote areas of the Russian Federation in your homes and apartments."

He urged Ukrainians in the region to not go to Russia under any circumstances.

"Under no circumstances should you go to the Russian Federation, and also do not send your children to 'rehabilitate'! Because when you leave your native land, you will immediately receive Russian passports. And according to their legislation, it will be very difficult, almost impossible, to return to Ukraine!" Samoylenko said on Facebook.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has said it shares the feeling of “frustration” about not having access to prisoners of war in Ukraine.

The Red Cross added that a lack of “practical arrangements” meant that there are thousands of prisoners it has not been able to visit.

“We share the frustration regarding our lack of access to all prisoners of war (POWs) held in the international armed conflict between Russia and Ukraine,” the ICRC said in a statement Friday.

“We have been able to visit hundreds of POWs but there are thousands more who we have not been able to see.

“We want to stress that our teams are ready on the ground—and have been ready for months—to visit the Olenivka penal facility and any other location where POWs are held.

"However, beyond being granted access by high levels of authority, this requires practical arrangements to materialize on the ground. We cannot access by force a place of detention or internment where we have not been admitted."

The statement came after a top Ukrainian official called on the ICRC to immediately send a delegation to the Russian prisoner of war camp at Olenivka, where more than 50 Ukrainian prisoners died in a fatal rocket attack in July.

A visit to Olenivka could not happen without Russian consent, as the detention center is in Russian-occupied territory in eastern Ukraine. 

As Russia continues its deadly onslaught of strikes across Ukraine, a rocket hit the city of Zaporizhzhia early Friday.

Here are the latest developments: