President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Saturday (August 13th) that Russian soldiers who fired on the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant or used it as cover would become a “special target”, as the two sides again accused each other of bombing the ‘facility. During his address to the nation, the Ukrainian head of state reiterated accusations that Moscow was using this infrastructure as nuclear blackmail. Volodymyr Zelensky said that every day of Russian occupation of the nuclear power plant greatly increases the nuclear threat to Europe. Bombings are said to be underway in the direction of the nuclear power plant. According to British intelligence, the reorganization of Russian forces is expected to strengthen in southern Ukraine.
Ukraine has warned: it will target Russian soldiers who fire on the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, occupied by Russia, while the two countries have accused each other, for several days, of bombing the installation.
“Limit your presence in the streets of Energodar! We have received information about new provocations from the Russian occupiers”, the Ukrainian nuclear agency Energoatom said on Telegram, republishing the message of a local leader of Energodar – city in which the plant is located – remained loyal to kyiv.
“According to the testimonies of the inhabitants, shelling is again in progress in the direction of the nuclear power plant in Zaporizhia (…) The interval between the departure and the arrival of the shots is 3-5 seconds”, adds the message . At the end of the day, Ukrainian military intelligence confirmed that “the (Russian) occupiers are bombing the nuclear power plant (…) from the village of Vodiané, located in the immediate vicinity, on the right bank of the Dnieper”, the river which separates areas in Russian hands from those controlled by the Ukrainian authorities.
Hungary, a member of the European Union, announced on Saturday that Russia has started delivering more natural gas to it than planned in their previous trade deals, after a visit by its foreign minister to Moscow in July.
The Hungarian Foreign Ministry explained that the trade negotiations with Moscow “made it possible to reach an agreement”. Result: the Russian company Gazprom began to deliver on Friday “volumes higher than those mentioned in the contract”. “It is the duty of the Hungarian government to ensure a secure gas supply for the country, and we are up to it,” senior ministry official Tamas Menczer wrote on Facebook. Until the end of August, an additional daily volume of 2.6 million cubic meters per day will arrive from the south via the Turkstream gas pipeline, he said, adding that negotiations were underway regarding September deliveries.
President Emmanuel Macron signed on Saturday, on behalf of France, the ratification protocol for the accession of Finland and Sweden to NATO, which had been adopted by the French Parliament on August 2. “This sovereign choice of Finland and Sweden, two European partners, will strengthen their security in the face of the current threat in their immediate neighborhood and will make a significant contribution, given the capabilities of these two partners, to the collective posture and to our European security,” said the Elysée on Saturday.
Sweden and Finland renounced their traditional neutrality due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. “Twenty allies” have “already ratified the protocols”, had indicated, during the adoption by the French Parliament, the Minister of Foreign Affairs Catherine Colonna. The two countries need a ratification of the thirty member states of the organization to benefit from the protection of article 5 of the NATO Charter in the event of an attack.
The UK Ministry of Defense said in its latest update that Russia has likely prioritized the reorganization of its forces over the past week to reinforce southern Ukraine, but that in the Donbass region , to the east, Russian-backed forces continued to attempt attacks on the northern city of Donetsk.
Russian forces have taken full control of Pisky, a village on the outskirts of Ukraine’s Donetsk region, Interfax said on Saturday, citing the Russian Defense Ministry. The Ukrainian military command later said “fierce fighting” continued in the village.
