Blinken warns Ukraine’s gains will unravel without new US funding; European parliament investigates report that Latvian member is Russian spy
Welcome back to the Guardian’s live coverage of the Russian war against Ukraine. Here are the developments:
Twenty-one Ukrainian drones reached Crimea and several Russian regions, Russian media have said this morning. Sevastopol in illegally Russian-held Crimea was targeted, along with the Bryansk, Kaluga and Tula regions, according to Russian officials, who as usual claimed all drones were intercepted and/or destroyed.
The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, warned on Monday that Ukraine’s gains over two years of fighting were in doubt without new US funding, as Nato’s chief visited to lobby Congress.
The European parliament is investigating claims that one of its members spied for Russia’s FSB since at least 2004. Tatjana Ždanoka, a Latvian MEP, has denied allegations published by the Insider, a Russian investigative newspaper, which put together the story along with Estonia’s Delfi, Latvia’s Re:Baltica and Sweden’s Expressen.
Insider alleged emails between Ždanoka and Russian case officers included reports on her work as a European legislator including fostering pro-Kremlin sentiment. In March 2022, Ždanoka was one of 13 MEPs – out of 705 in the parliament – who voted against condemning Russia’s war on Ukraine.
Politico quoted a European parliament official as saying “investigations … have been opened” into the allegations, which were taken “very seriously”. In a video on Facebook, Ždanoka said: “I have never been associated with the KGB … and I have not cooperated with any other intelligence agencies.”
Russia’s defence ministry said on Monday that its forces had taken control of the village of Tabaivka in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region, but Ukraine denied this. Volodymyr Fityo, the head of communications for Ukraine’s ground forces, said: “This does not correspond to reality. There are battles taking place near this locality.”
Representatives of the EU member states will meet on Monday evening to discuss funding for Ukraine as pressure mounts on Viktor Orbán to agree. An aide to Orbán said the Hungarian PM said he was open to a proposed €50bn ($54bn) aid package and had sent a proposal with “caveats” to Brussels. The Ukrainian foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, met his Hungarian counterpart, Péter Szijjártó, in western Ukraine on Monday.
