As the Russia-Ukraine war enters its 159th day, we take a look at the main developments.
Here are the key events so far on Monday, August 1.
Get the latest updates here.
Diplomacy
- The first ship carrying Ukrainian grain departed the port city of Odesa for Lebanon, according to Turkey’s defence ministry.
- A statement from the United Nations said the Sierra Leone-flagged cargo ship, Razoni, was carrying more than 26,000 tonnes of corn.
Fighting
- Mykolaiv Mayor Oleksandr Senkevych said more than 12 missile strikes, probably the most powerful on the city in five months of the war, hit homes and schools, with two people confirmed killed and three wounded.
- Grain tycoon Oleksiy Vadatursky, founder and owner of agriculture company Nibulon, and his wife were killed in their home, Mykolaiv Governor Vitaliy Kim said on Telegram.
- In Russian-occupied Sevastopol, five Russian navy staff members were wounded in an explosion after a presumed drone flew into the courtyard of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, the Crimean port city’s governor, Mikhail Razvozhayev, told Russian media.
- The Sevastopol attack coincided with Russia’s Navy Day, which President Vladimir Putin marked by announcing that the navy would receive what he called “formidable” hypersonic Zircon cruise missiles in the coming months.
- The southern Ukrainian city of Nikopol also came under heavy attack, the governor of Dnipropetrovsk, Valentyn Reznichenko, wrote on Telegram.
- Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called for the evacuation from the eastern Donetsk region.
- The United Kingdom says Russia continued to attempt tactical assaults on the Bakhmut axis in eastern Ukraine over the last four days, but managed only to make slow progress.
Economy
- Zelenskyy said Ukraine’s harvest could be half its usual size this year due to the Russian invasion.
- The UK says foreign companies holding property in the country must identify their true owners in an official register as part of a crackdown on Russian oligarchs and corrupt elites laundering illicit wealth.