Ukraine-Russia war latest: Putin’s strategy in tatters after Kyiv reclaims swathes of territory – UK Times

Hungary has sent a fact-finding mission to Ukraine to investigate the suspension of oil transit through the Druzhba pipeline, a deputy minister said on Wednesday, as a long-running row between Kyiv and Budapest deepened with the outbreak of conflict in the Middle East.

Ukraine has denied that Hungary has any official standing to conduct an investigation.

Russian oil flows through the Druzhba pipeline to Hungary and Slovakia have been suspended since late January following damage that Kyiv says will take time to repair.

The issue has become the focus of a diplomatic clash between Budapest and Kyiv, with hostile rhetoric towards Ukraine taking centre stage in veteran nationalist prime minister Viktor Orbán’s campaign ahead of today’s election.

Last month, Hungary vetoed new European Union sanctions on Russia and also blocked a large loan for Ukraine over the dispute.

“The government has set up a delegation that is expected to conduct a fact-finding mission on the Druzhba pipeline,” Hungarian deputy energy minister Gábor Czepek said in a video posted on his official Facebook page showing him at the border with Ukraine.

“Our job is to assess the status of the pipeline and create the conditions for its restart.

”Ukraine’s foreign ministry said the Hungarian fact-finding mission had no official status and its members entered as tourists.

“This group of people does not have an official status or scheduled official meetings on the territory of Ukraine, so it is definitely incorrect to call them a ‘delegation’,” spokesperson Heorhii Tykhyi said.

Hungary and Slovakia, the only EU countries still importing Russian oil, have accused Ukraine of deliberately delaying the resumption of oil flows for political reasons.

Volodymyr Zelensky said three Ukrainian teams have travelled to the Middle East, made up of experts, military personnel and engineers.

He said the military teams had already begun communication and work on the ground.

Ukraine’s national security and defence council secretary, Rustem Umerov, has also arrived in the United Arab Emirates to discuss areas of cooperation and is expected to visit several other countries, including Saudi Arabia.

Zelensky’s comments came ahead of his meeting with the president of the German Bundestag, Julia Klockner.

Kyiv has sought to leverage its experience in intercepting Russian drones to assist Gulf countries that are facing attacks from the same Iranian-designed Shahed drones used by Russia against Ukraine.

Ukraine has received deliveries of crucial Patriot missiles from Germany, according to reports.

Kyiv’s allies agreed to provide the air defence missiles at the latest meeting of the Ukraine Defence Contact Group in the Ramstein format last month, and Berlin delivered its share on 10 March, Zelensky said ahead of a meeting with Julia Klockner, president of Germany’s Bundestag.

Zelensky also highlighted Germany’s financial support for Ukraine’s military, describing Berlin as the largest supporter of the country’s armed forces.

German outlet Der Spiegel reported on 10 March that Ukraine is expected to receive 35 PAC-3 interceptor missiles in the coming weeks.

German defence minister Boris Pistorius secured an agreement with European allies to deliver 30 PAC-3 missiles to Ukraine, in addition to five PAC-3 missiles Berlin will provide from its own stockpiles, the outlet reported.

“While the world is looking towards Iran, we Germans are looking towards Ukraine; we have not forgotten you. And that’s why I deliberately came here this time — to clearly say that, in the fifth year of the war of aggression you are enduring, we are not growing tired. And we know this is not just Ukraine’s fight,” Klockner said.

Russia confirmed on Wednesday that Ukraine had carried out a strike on the western Russian city of Bryansk and accused it of using UK-provided missiles in the attack.

Bryansk regional governor Alexander Bogomaz said one more person had died in the attack, bringing the total number of fatalities to seven, with 42 people injured.

Ukraine said it had targeted a key plant producing missile components, while Moscow called it a “terrorist attack”, accusing Kyiv of deliberately targeting civilians.

Russia’s foreign ministry condemned the attack and accused Britain of overstepping international legal norms by providing the missiles in question.

The Russian Investigative Committee said at least eight missiles struck Bryansk, including seven UK-made Storm Shadow missiles, damaging more than 70 infrastructure facilities and vehicles.

In a statement, the ministry claimed the attack was intended to derail efforts toward a peace process and fuel an escalation of the conflict.

The Kremlin has always swiftly dismissed any claims that the Russian president has a severe illness.

Joe Middleton and Bryony Gooch look at a history of Putin’s rumoured health issues below.

Ukraine struck a plant in Russia’s Bryansk region that makes control systems for Russian missiles, President Volodymyr Zelensky said.

“An operation has just successfully taken place — a plant in Bryansk was hit. This plant manufactures control systems for all types of missiles of the Russian Federation,” Zelensky told an online media briefing on Wednesday.

The Kremniy El plant is a major Russian microelectronics manufacturer.

The strike used air-launched British Storm Shadow missiles.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said capping the oil price would help limit Russia’s revenues and that now was not the time to relax sanctions against Russia.

“This is not the moment to relax sanctions on Russia,” she said in a post on X, after she took part in a call with G7 leaders to discuss the impact of the Iran war on oil and gas markets.

She added that, along with the European Council’s President Antonio Costa, they had both reiterated the immediate priority is to keep energy flows moving, especially through the Straits of Hormuz, and that they both backed the International Energy Agency’s decision to release 400 million barrels of oil.

“We both welcomed today’s decision by the IEA make 400 million barrels of emergency reserve oil available to ease tensions in global energy supply,” added Von der Leyen.

A Russian delegation led by President Vladimir Putin’s special envoy Kirill Dmitriev met with a U.S. delegation in Florida on Wednesday, U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff said.

He added that the teams discussed a “variety of topics” and agreed to stay in touch.

Naval drones have been used in at least two attacks on oil tankers in the Gulf region since war erupted between the US, Israel and Iran, according to maritime authorities and analysts, demonstrating a dangerous new threat in the key shipping lane.

The emergence of the use of explosive-laden unmanned surface vessels, which Ukraine has used with great effect in its war with Russia, comes as Iran threatens to block oil shipments from transiting the key Strait of Hormuz, the chokepoint for one-fifth of the world’s oil.

The first sea-based drone attack was on March 1 when a crude oil tanker, the MKD VYOM, was hit about 44 nautical miles off Oman, killing one crew member, Britain’s maritime agency said.

The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) agency said in a public advisory that an unmanned surface vessel struck the Marshall Islands-flagged tanker just above the waterline, triggering an explosion and fire in the engine room.