🔴 Live: Ukraine says its forces shot down 15 Russian drones during overnight attack

Issued on: 19/08/2023 – 11:01Modified: 19/08/2023 – 11:07

3 min

11:15am: Russia shelled centre of north Ukrainian city Chernihiv, say authorities

Russia on Saturday shelled the centre of the north Ukrainian city Chernihiv, spared from large-scale attacks since the first months of Moscow’s invasion last year, local authorities said. 

Chernihiv lies some 150 kilometres (90 miles) north of Kyiv towards the border with Moscow-allied Belarus. 

“The enemy shelled the centre of Chernihiv. Preliminarily, a ballistic missile,” the head of the Chernihiv region, Vyacheslav Chaus, said on Telegram. “Stay in hiding places. Details afterwards.”

11:08am: Zelensky visits Sweden for talks with government, royal family

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced a visit to Sweden on Saturday, saying he had arrived in the Scandinavian country for talks with the government, political parties and the Swedish royal family. 

The visit comes almost a year-and-a-half into the Russian invasion of Ukraine and as Stockholm is set on joining NATO, like its neighbour Finland. 

“Olena and I arrived in Sweden,” Zelensky said on social media, referring to his wife. He said he will hold talks focused on “partnership, defence cooperation, EU integration, and common Euro-Atlantic security.”

“I thank all Swedes who support Ukraine.” 

9:28am: Putin visits generals overseeing Ukraine war in southern Russia, says Kremlin

Russian President Vladimir Putin held a meeting with the commander of Moscow’s war in Ukraine in an army headquarters in the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don, the Kremlin said in the early hours of Saturday. 

“Vladimir Putin held a meeting at the headquarters of the special military operation group in Rostov-on-Don,” the Kremlin said in a statement. 

“The head of state listened to briefings by the Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces Valery Gerasimov, commanders of directions and other senior officers of the group.”

8:18am: Ukraine says it destroyed 15 Russian drones during overnight attack

Ukrainian defences shot down 15 Russian drones during an overnight attack, Ukraine’s air force said Saturday.

It said 17 Iranian-made Shahed drones were used in the aerial assault, and did not specify what happened to the other two.

Russian forces “attacked from the north with ‘Shahed-136/131’ attack UAVs. A total of 17 attack drones were launched from the Kursk region,” the Ukrainian force said on Telegram.

It added that air defences were activated in “northern and central, as well as in the western regions”.

7:37am: F-16 fighter jets will not arrive in Ukraine ‘anytime soon’

Reporting from Kyiv, FRANCE 24 correspondent Emmanuelle Chaze said that people in the Ukrainian capital are “being quite realistic” about Washington’s announcement of its approval for the Netherlands and Denmark to deliver F-16s to Ukraine.

The fighter jets will not come to Ukraine “anytime soon”, Chaze said. “The (Ukrainian) government already acknowledged that it’s not going to happen this autumn, probably not this winter.”

“The pilots need at least six months of training and there are not so many pilots who can be immediately trained […] there are eight pilots who can undergo immediate training while others are first being sent to an English class in England to be able to follow the training in English-speaking countries.”

“All those hurdles mean that the fighter jets will not come to Ukraine anytime soon and that also means that it’s not going to give Kyiv a decisive advantage in its counteroffensive,” Chaze added.

Key developments from Friday, August 18:

Ukraine and neighbouring Romania signed an agreement Friday to work together to boost Kyiv’s exports of grain through Romania after Moscow broke off a key wartime shipping agreement that allowed safe passage through the Black Sea.

The US gave its approval for the Netherlands to deliver F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine, the Dutch defence minister said Friday, in a major gain for Kyiv even though the planes won’t have an immediate impact on the almost 18-month war against Russia.

Read yesterday’s liveblog to see how the day’s events unfolded.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP and Reuters)