For the second year in a row, specialized summer camps are being held in Ukraine’s Carpathian Mountains for teens who have witnessed traumatic events during the war. Psychologists say instead of focusing on the trauma, they are helping these kids find friends and inner strength. Omelyan Oshchudlyak visited one such camp. Videographer: Yuriy Dankevych
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berlin — Weeks after topping a state vote for the first time and nearly winning another, Germany’s far-right is taking aim at Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats (SPD) in another regional election that could shape his political future.

Sunday’s tight-looking vote in Brandenburg, the swampy lakeland round the capital Berlin, takes place in a region the SPD has ruled since reunification more than three decades ago.

The Alternative for Germany (AfD), with its nationalist demands for halts to immigration, windfarm construction and arming Ukraine, has a narrow roughly three-point lead in polls with nearly 30% of voting intentions.

The SPD has been battered by the federal government’s unpopularity amid high inflation, the Ukraine war impact and high migrant influxes, but it has closed the gap recently in Brandenburg polling.

“Brandenburg is historically an SPD stronghold,” said Philipp Thomeczek, politics professor at Potsdam University. “If they don’t win here that would be a massive break.”

Coming a year ahead of a national election, the vote could trigger a party backlash against Scholz or, if the SPD holds the state, confirm him as their candidate for 2025.

His conservative opponents are far ahead with their bloc commanding around a third of the vote in most nationwide polls, while the SPD and AfD vie for a distant second.

The conservatives this week settled on their chancellor candidate for next year: Friedrich Merz, a sharp-tongued arch-conservative. But Scholz and many Social Democrats believe the gaffe-prone Merz’s low personal popularity gives them a chance.

Though none will yet say it openly, some in Scholz’s party believe he should follow his idol Joe Biden and step aside for a more charismatic champion like defense minister Boris Pistorius.

But a win in Scholz’s home state — his constituency is in the state capital Potsdam and his wife is a Brandenburg minister — may quell the murmurs against him.

The party has made barely any mention of Scholz in the campaign, relying instead on the popularity of state premier Dietmar Woidke, a trained food chemist. He said that if the AfD wins most votes he would step aside and not even offer himself as a candidate to lead any potential coalition.

“The aim is to stop the AfD from winning,” he said.

‘Mordor’ windmills

Unable to form a coalition despite winning most votes in Thuringia state earlier this month, the AfD has almost no chance of forming a regional or federal government given every other party refuses to work with a movement security services class as extremist. The AfD has faced — and denies — accusations of racism and of harboring agents for China and Russia.

Brandenburg presents a mixed economic picture: it is home to Tesla’s first factory in Europe and has wealthy parts within the Berlin commuter belt. But some of its outlying villages and farmscapes have been shrinking for decades.

As well as concern over Ukraine and migration, the AfD has channeled public anxiety over energy transition: its state head Hans-Christoph Berndt likened windfarms to “unbearable horror landscapes like Mordor,” the fictional land of evil.

He provoked mockery — but also some approval — when in one debate he reinterpreted religious doctrine to say: “As a Catholic I think loving your neighbor means looking out for your own countrymen.”

Should the SPD struggle on Sunday, that could open the way for Merz’s Christian Democrats to form a coalition in Brandenburg, perhaps with the backing of a new party, the socially conservative, economically left Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance, and others.

Unseating the SPD in its stronghold would be a boost for Merz, fresh from his anointment, and could tip an already restive SPD into open revolt against the chancellor.
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Islamabad/Washington — Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Overchuk met with Pakistani officials in Islamabad on Wednesday to deepen economic ties and expand cooperation “across multiple sectors,” as Moscow grapples with U.S. and EU economic sanctions over its war against Ukraine.

Overchuk’s visit comes after two days of meetings between John Bass, U.S. acting undersecretary of state for political affairs, and Pakistani army chief General Asim Munir and Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar in Islamabad.

During a joint press conference with his Russian counterpart Wednesday in Islamabad, Dar said discussions centered on expanding economic ties between the two countries.

Pakistan’s bilateral trade with Russia reached an unprecedented $1 billion last year. The countries are committed to expanding trade ties by addressing logistical and related issues, Dar said.

According to Dar, Pakistan and Russia are expanding ties in many fields, including liquefied natural gas (LNG) purchases. However, sanctions against Russia restrict cooperation between the two countries.

“Even today, we looked at how to expand our relationship, and overcome this constraint of the banking system, which you know are facing sanctions, which obviously constrains our relationship, the volume of our relationship could have been much bigger,” Dar said

Dar said Pakistan and the U.S. Department of State had detailed discussions in October 2023, and American officials agreed to Pakistan’s request to purchase Russian LNG, as long as a committee of U.S. trade officials determines the price.

According to Dar, Pakistan views Russia as an important player in West, South and Central Asia. He said Pakistan aims to work with Moscow toward peace and stability in Afghanistan.

Pakistan’s army media wing said in a statement on Wednesday that Russia’s Overchuk spoke with General Syed Asim Munir, chief of the army staff (COAS), in Rawalpindi.

“Both reiterated Pakistan’s commitment to fostering traditional defense ties with Russia. Both sides reaffirmed their resolve to strengthen security and defense cooperation in multiple domains,” the statement says.

Analysts say the Russian deputy prime minister’s visit and the expansion of cooperation shows Moscow is expanding its influence in the region.

“In my view, a vacuum has emerged after the U.S. exit from Afghanistan, and Russia is positioning itself to fill that void. China is also making efforts in this direction. As a result, Pakistan is working under this policy framework to improve its relations with regional countries, including Russia,” professor Manzoor Afridi, a Pakistani academic on international relations, told VOA.

Muhammad Taimur Fahad Khan, a Pakistani international affairs expert at Institute of Strategic Studies, Islamabad, told VOA, “The primary goal during this period is to enhance trade, strengthen diplomatic ties, and develop infrastructure, particularly in the energy sector. However, the United States has restricted certain aspects of Pakistan’s ballistic missile program, while tensions between Russia and Ukraine have escalated. In this context, Pakistan’s relationship with Russia holds significance.”

Pakistan received its first shipment of Russian liquefied petroleum gas in 2023. Russian President Vladimir Putin and Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif discussed the possibility of liquefied natural gas supplies earlier in July on the sidelines of a Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit at Astana, Kazakhstan.

This story originated in VOA’s Deewa service.
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AVIGNON, France — Gisele Pelicot, who was drugged and raped by dozens of men recruited by her husband, said on Wednesday “forgiveness does not exist,” rejecting claims by him and one of his chief accomplices that they regretted harming the women they loved.

The trial in the southern French town of Avignon of Dominique Pelicot and 50 other men accused of raping his wife has shocked the world. The case has also triggered protests across France in support of Gisele Pelicot, who has become a symbol of the fight against sexual violence.

“These men are degenerates. They committed rape,” Gisele Pelicot, 72, told the court after her now ex-husband Dominique and the accomplice, Jean-Pierre Marechal, gave testimony on Tuesday and Wednesday respectively.

“When they see a woman sleeping on her bed, no one thought to ask themselves a question? They don’t have brains?”

Dominique Pelicot, 71, is also accused of having raped Marechal’s wife at her home after drugging her, with the collaboration of her husband.

Gisele Pelicot insisted on a public trial to expose her former husband and the 50 men he is accused of inviting to rape her in a small village in southern France.

“Today forgiveness does not exist,” Gisele Pelicot told the court as she described how her former husband had taken mistresses without hiding the fact from her, and she defended herself from some of the criticisms leveled against her.

“I have felt humiliated while I’ve been in this courtroom. I have been called an alcoholic, a conspirator of Mr. Pelicot,” she said, adding her life had been “destroyed” for 10 years.

“In the state I was in, I absolutely could not respond. I was in a comatose state; the videos show that.”

The Pelicots’ daughter Caroline, whose photographs were found on her father’s devices along with images of her mother being raped, was on the verge of tears in the courtroom as her mother spoke.

Dominique Pelicot has denied drugging or sexually abusing Caroline. She has told French media that she started publicly campaigning to fight drug-induced sexual assault to cope with the shock following her father’s arrest.

In court, Dominique Pelicot admitted orchestrating the mass rape of his then-wife. He asked for forgiveness and said he ultimately hoped to win back his former partner, who filed for divorce after learning of the rapes from investigators.

Because of a skirmish between some supporters of Gisele Pelicot and some of the accused on Tuesday evening, the court told attendees not to boo the suspects in the case, telling them they were innocent until proven guilty.

But the court also said it was not a problem if supporters applauded Gisele Pelicot when she emerged from the courtroom, as some have been doing.

Earlier on Wednesday, Marechal, 63, admitted to working with Dominique Pelicot to drug and both rape Marechal’s wife, Cilia, after the men met on a now-shuttered website. Marechal blamed his mentor and a troubled childhood for his actions. Marechal is not among those accused of raping Gisele Pelicot.

“I regret my actions. I love my wife,” Marechal said in the courtroom. “If I had not met Mr. Pelicot, I would have never committed this act.”

Marechal met Dominique Pelicot on a website called Coco, where Pelicot shared with him images of the rapes of his wife by the men he had recruited, describing how he had drugged her.

Marechal said in the courtroom he stumbled across the website by accident and initially refused Pelicot’s request to rape his own wife before acquiescing. Prosecutors say Pelicot drugged Marechal’s wife and raped her while Marechal watched.

Gisele Pelicot said Marechal’s explanation of his childhood was insufficient to explain his actions. “I’ve had trauma but I have not committed crimes,” she said.

Dominique Pelicot acknowledged his guilt in raping Marechal’s wife and said he regretted his actions, adding that he cut contact with them after she woke up while he was in her room. Prosecutors say Dominique Pelicot was recorded in at least three of 12 assaults against Marechal’s wife Cilia.
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Lisbon — Deadly wildfires raging in Portugal have forced more people to evacuate their homes as crews battled dozens of blazes on Wednesday in the nation’s north.

Stifling heat and strong winds have fanned a spate of forest fires across the north and centre of the country that have killed seven people dead since the weekend.

Civil protection authorities listed 42 active fires on its website on Wednesday and said they had mobilized around 3,900 firefighters and over 1,000 vehicles.

In the Gondomar municipality, just outside Porto, authorities carried out more evacuations on Tuesday night.

Firefighters battling blazes in Arouca in the hard-hit Aveiro region told local media outlets the situation there was “uncontrollable.”

Around 20,000 hectares (49,400 acres) of vegetation have burned in the region, south of Porto, since Monday, according to data from the European Forest Fire Information System (Effis).

A total of 15 separate fires have passed the 1,000-hectare threshold since the fires began over the weekend, Effis data also showed.

Authorities in Aveiro said Tuesday evening that firefighters were on the verge of bringing one group of fires that had spread across a 100-kilometre (60-mile) perimeter under control.

Three firefighters died on Tuesday when their vehicle was trapped by the flames, civil protection authorities said, bringing the fire-related toll up to seven, with some 50 injured.

A 28-year-old Brazilian who worked for a forestry company died after he become trapped by the flames as he tried to collect some times. Two others suffered heart attacks and a volunteer firefighter died while taking a break from battling the flames.

Lisbon has upped fire prevention funding ten-fold and doubled the budget to fight wildfires since deadly blazes in 2017 claimed hundreds of lives.

The Iberian peninsula is particularly vulnerable to global warming, with heatwaves and drought exposing the region to blazes.

 
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PENTAGON — Russia’s military is bigger and stronger than it was prior to invading Ukraine in February 2022, the commander of United States Air Forces in Europe and Africa cautioned Tuesday.

“Russia is getting larger, and they’re getting better than they were before. … They are actually larger than they were when [the invasion] kicked off,” Air Force General James Hecker told reporters at the Air & Space Forces Association’s annual Air, Space & Cyber Conference.

The improvements come despite heavy casualties inflicted by Ukraine. U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin has estimated that since 2022, more than 350,000 Russian troops have been killed or wounded.

“The rates of casualties that they’re experiencing are staggering,” Pentagon press secretary Major General Pat Ryder told reporters Tuesday in response to a question from VOA.

On Monday, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered that the Russian army grow by 180,000 active-duty troops for a total of 1.5 million soldiers, making Russia’s military the second largest in the world, behind China’s.

“Russia is going to be something that we’re going to have to deal with for a long time, no matter how this thing ends,” Hecker said.

However, William Pomeranz, a senior scholar at the Kennan Institute, told VOA that “this move suggests that Vladimir Putin is losing the war.”

“This is an open signal from Vladimir Putin that his army and his military is in trouble and doesn’t have the resources to maintain troops in the field,” Pomeranz said.

Despite Russian improvements on the battlefield, Ukraine has continued to put chinks in Russia’s armor, shooting down more than 100 Russian aircraft since Moscow began its full-scale invasion, which amounts to dozens more aircraft than Russia has been able to down on the Ukrainian side, according to General Hecker.

“So what we see is the aircraft are kind of staying on their own side of the line, if you will, and when that happens, you have a war like we’re seeing today, with massive attrition, cities just being demolished, a lot of civilian casualties,” he said.

To gain even the slightest advantages in a war where no clear side dominates the skies, Ukraine has turned to low-cost solutions that also appeal to the U.S. military.

“We have to get on the right side of the cost curve with this. Taking down $10,000, $15,000, $20,000 one-way UAVs [drones] with $1 million missiles, we just can’t afford to do that in the long-term,” the general told reporters. 

General Chance Saltzman, the chief of the U.S. Space Force, announced Tuesday that a Space Force pilot program that uses commercial satellite imagery and related analytics to create more situational awareness for military leaders has proven very cost-effective when compared with traditional intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance collection via U.S. MQ-9 drones, which are expensive and limited in number.

AFRICOM was able to use the $40 million Tactical Surveillance, Reconnaissance and Tracking Program to maintain situational awareness during the full withdrawal of U.S. forces from two air bases in Niger in July and August. The drawback, however, was that instead of real-time situational awareness, the data took one to four hours to get to the security team.

“Not as good as real time, right? With MQ-9 that you would have, but it’s better than nothing, right?” Hecker said.

Hecker also said the U.S. was looking into more cost-effective ways to sense incoming threats around bases, including methods like Ukraine’s Sky Fortress system that uses thousands of inexpensive sensors to identify aerial threats. He says the technology has been demonstrated in Romania and other countries.
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Human rights groups have urged Britain not to copy Italy’s approach in trying to reduce the number of migrants arriving on its shores. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer traveled to Rome this week to learn more about its success in tackling migration, as a surge of people arrive on small boats across the English Channel. Henry Ridgwell reports from London.
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LONDON — Less than two months ahead of the COP29 United Nations Climate Summit, the Azerbaijani leadership laid out its plans on Tuesday for what it hoped to achieve, as countries continue to wrestle with how to raise ambitions for a new financing target.

The main task for the November summit is for countries to agree on a new annual target for funding that wealthy countries will pay to help poorer nations cope with climate change. Many developing countries say they cannot upgrade their targets to cut emissions faster without first receiving more financial support to invest in doing this.

With countries remaining far from agreement on the financing goal, the COP29 presidency this week outlined more than a dozen side initiatives that could raise ambitions, but do not require party negotiation and building consensus which can hamper progress. These take the form of new funds, pledges, and declarations that national governments can adopt.

Notably, this includes a fund with voluntary contributions from fossil fuel producing countries and companies for the public and private sectors working on climate issues, as well as grants that can be doled out to assist with climate-fueled natural disasters in developing countries.

Such side agendas use “the convening power of COP and the hosts’ respective national capabilities to form coalitions and drive progress,” said Mukhtar Babayev, who holds the rotating COP presidency, in a letter to all parties and stakeholders.

Over 120 countries pledged at last year’s COP28 summit in Dubai, for example, to triple renewable energy capacity by 2030.

The COP29 presidency also hopes to build support around a pledge to increase global energy storage capacity six times above 2022 levels, reaching 1,500 gigawatts by 2030. This would include a commitment to scale up investments in energy grids, adding or refurbishing more than 80 million km by 2040.

Babayev, who is Azerbaijan’s minister of ecology and natural resources, said the agenda would “help to enhance ambition by bringing stakeholders together around common principles and goals.”

“We hope to address some of the most pressing issues while also highlighting remaining priorities,” he said.

Another declaration would see countries and companies create a global market for clean hydrogen, addressing regulatory, technological, financing and standardization barriers.

COP29 leaders have also appealed for a “COP Truce” that would highlight the importance of peace and climate action.

Despite countries’ existing climate commitments, carbon dioxide emissions from burning fossil fuels hit a record high last year, and the world just registered its hottest summer on record as temperatures climb.
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geneva — Seven candidates are competing for one of the biggest and best jobs in world sports that traditionally becomes available only every 12 years.

The International Olympic Committee announced on Monday which of its members in a most exclusive and discreet club have entered the race to be its next president. The election by secret ballot is in March.

The winner will replace Thomas Bach, a German lawyer who steps down in June upon reaching the maximum 12 years in office.

The 10th IOC president could be its first female leader, or its first from Africa or Asia. Or even its first from Britain.

They will take over a financially stable organization that demands deft skills in the challenging arenas of sports and real-world politics.

Who are the candidates?

• Prince Feisal al Hussein, an IOC member since 2010, on its executive board since 2019. Founder of the Generations for Peace sports charity. His older brother is King Abdullah II of Jordan.

• Sebastian Coe, IOC member since 2020. President of World Athletics since 2015. Olympic champion in men’s 1,500 meters in 1980 and 1984. Elected lawmaker in British Parliament from 1992 to 1997. Led the 2012 London Olympics organizing committee.

• Kirsty Coventry, IOC member since 2013, on executive board for a second time since 2023. Olympic champion in women’s 200-meter backstroke in 2004 and 2008. Appointed sports minister in Zimbabwe government since 2018. Chairs IOC panel overseeing the 2032 Brisbane Olympics.

• Johan Eliasch, IOC member since August. President of International Ski and Snowboard Federation since 2021. Owner of Head sports equipment brand, CEO until 2021. Swedish-British citizen.

• David Lappartient, IOC member since 2022. President of International Cycling Union since 2017. President of France’s Olympic committee and leader of French Alps bid that will host 2030 Winter Games. Chair of IOC esports panel that steered the Esports Olympic Games to Saudi Arabia.

• Juan Antonio Samaranch Jr., IOC member since 2001, vice president since 2022, and member of the executive board from 2012 to 2020. Founder of a Spain-based investment bank. Created Samaranch Foundation to promote the Olympics in China in honor of his father, who was IOC president from 1980 to 2001.

• Morinari Watanabe, IOC member since 2018. Japanese president of the International Gymnastics Federation since 2017.

When is the election and who votes?

The IOC election meeting is on March 18-21 at a resort hotel in Greece, near the site of Ancient Olympia.

Candidates and their compatriots cannot vote, leaving about 95 eligible to take part in March. Among them, members of European and Asian royal families, including the Emir of Qatar; diplomats and lawmakers, including a former president of Croatia, Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović; businesspeople, including Nita Ambani, whose husband is India’s richest man; leaders of sports bodies; current and former Olympic athletes.

What is the IOC president’s job?

It’s an executive role running a not-for-profit organization that employs hundreds of staff at a modern lakeside headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland.

The IOC earns several billion dollars in revenue every four years from selling broadcasting and sponsor rights for the Summer Games and Winter Games.

Most of the money is distributed to the Olympic family: organizers of upcoming Games, including youth editions, governing bodies of Olympic sports, more than 200 national Olympic bodies, scholarships for potential Olympic athletes and special projects.

The job ideally calls for a deep knowledge of managing sports, understanding athletes’ needs and political skills.

How long can IOC presidents stay in the job?

A maximum of 12 years, with a first term of eight years and the chance for one re-election for a further four.

However, the IOC has an age limit of 70 and complex rules around membership status. It means some of the seven candidates could have to seek a special exemption while in office to complete a full eight-year mandate.

What are the challenges and big decisions ahead?

• Picking a host for the 2036 Summer Games, with India and Qatar as strong contenders.

• Renewing the United States broadcast deal that has typically underwritten Olympic finances. Bach moved quickly in 2014 to renew NBC’s deal through 2032. The next deal starts with the 2034 Winter Games in Salt Lake City.

• Both decisions factor into wider questions in regard to drafting the global sports calendar. July-August has been the optimal Summer Games slot since 2004. But a 2036 Doha Olympics could not be held in those months, and where could Games be comfortably held after another decade of climate change?

• When and how can Russia be reintegrated fully into international sports with no end to its invasion of Ukraine in sight? Coe’s world track and field body currently excludes Russian athletes entirely.
  …

Paris — Thousands of people protested sexual violence across France this past weekend, as two high-profile cases rock the country: one involving a woman who was allegedly drugged and raped by dozens of men for years; the other targeting a once-beloved French clergyman, who fought for the rights of the homeless.  

In French cities like Marseille and Nantes, both men and women took part in demonstrations calling for an end to sexual violence.  

They carried signs with messages like “No, to the culture of rape,” and “Gisele, we believe you” — in support of 72-year-old Gisele Pelicot.  

Pelicot’s former husband is on trial in the southern city of Avignon, accused of drugging her and recruiting dozens of men to rape her over nearly a decade.  

Speaking to reporters on Monday, Pelicot thanked the protesters and other supporters. They have given her force, she said, to fight for all those who are victims of sexual violence.  

The Avignon trial is only the latest of a raft of sexual violence accusations targeting famous French actors and other figures. 

Most recently, the spotlight has been on Abbe Pierre, once a crusader for the homeless. For years one of the most popular personalities in France, the priest died in 2007 at the age of 94. But in recent weeks, multiple allegations have surfaced that he sexually assaulted women in France and other countries over the decades. There are now efforts to strike his name from the charities he founded, as well as from parks and streets named after him.  

Speaking to reporters Friday, Pope Francis said Abbe Pierre did a lot of good, but was also a sinner — and such things must be spoken about, not hidden.  

The head of the French bishop’s association has since said that at least some French bishops had known about the cleric’s alleged abuses for decades. 
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Lausanne, Switzerland — World Athletics chief Sebastian Coe is the highest profile of the seven candidates to have declared on Monday their bid to succeed International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach.

Coe will face stiff opposition from, among others, Kirsty Coventry, bidding to become the first woman and African to head the IOC, and cycling boss David Lappartient.

The election will be at the IOC Session in Athens, which runs from March 18-21 next year.

Bach, 70, is standing down after serving 12 years. The German announced at the end of the Paris Games that he would not be seeking another term. 

The other four candidates include two from Asia  another continent never to have had an IOC president — Jordan’s Prince Faisal al-Hussein and gymnastics chief Morinari Watanabe.

Juan Antonio Samaranch Junior, whose father of the same name was IOC president from 1980-2001 and transformed it into a commercial powerhouse, and a surprise entrant, ski federation president Johan Eliasch, round up the candidates.

First up for the septet is presenting their respective programs to the IOC members at the turn of the year.

“The candidates will present their programs, in camera, to the full IOC membership on the occasion of a meeting to be held in Lausanne (Switzerland) in January 2025,” read a short IOC statement unveiling the candidates.

There will be a transition period post-election — not something Bach enjoyed when he succeeded Jacques Rogge in 2013  with the new president and his team assuming control in June.
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Kyiv, Ukraine — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy once again Sunday urged Western allies to permit Kyiv to strike military targets deep inside Russia, especially air bases, after a deadly attack on Kharkiv.  

“Only a systemic solution makes it possible to oppose this terror: the long-range solution to destroy Russian military aviation where it is based,” Zelenskyy said in his daily address.  

“We are waiting for appropriate decisions coming primarily from the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy.”  

Earlier, a guided Russian bomb struck a residential building in Kharkiv, the latest of a series of attacks on the northeastern city, starting a blaze which firefighters extinguished.  

Rescuers pulled out the dead body of an elderly woman from the rubble, Kharkiv Mayor Igor Terekhov said on Telegram, adding that 42 people were wounded.   

In his speech, Zelenskyy said Russia had also struck the Sumy and Donetsk regions Sunday with guided bombs.   

He said the Russian army carried out “at least 100 such air attacks” daily.

It is to prevent these sorts of attacks that Ukraine is asking for permission to strike military targets deep inside Russia from Western allies, who remain hesitant for fear of an escalation.  

Also Sunday, Russian shelling killed one person in the eastern Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk, local authorities said, as Moscow’s troops inched closer to the key logistics hub.  

More than 20,000 people — almost half of its population — have fled the city since August, while Russian strikes over the past two weeks have cut off water and electricity to many of its remaining residents.  

“Around 11 a.m. (0800 GMT), the enemy shelled the western part of the city… Unfortunately, one person died,” Pokrovsk’s military administration said on Telegram.  

Russia has been advancing toward Pokrovsk for months, getting to within 10 kilometers Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy once again Sunday urged Western allies to permit Kyiv to strike military targets deep inside Russia, especially air bases, after a deadly attack on Kharkiv.  

“Only a systemic solution makes it possible to oppose this terror: the long-range solution to destroy Russian military aviation where it is based,” Zelenskyy said in his daily address.

“We are waiting for appropriate decisions coming primarily from the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy.”  

Earlier, a guided Russian bomb struck a residential building in Kharkiv, the latest of a series of attacks on the northeastern city, starting a blaze which firefighters extinguished.  

Rescuers pulled out the dead body of an elderly woman from the rubble, Kharkiv Mayor Igor Terekhov said on Telegram, adding that 42 people were wounded.   

In his speech, Zelenskyy said Russia had also struck the Sumy and Donetsk regions Sunday with guided bombs.   

He said the Russian army carried out “at least 100 such air attacks” daily.

It is to prevent these sorts of attacks that Ukraine is asking for permission to strike military targets deep inside Russia from Western allies, who remain hesitant for fear of an escalation.  

Also Sunday, Russian shelling killed one person in the eastern Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk, local authorities said, as Moscow’s troops inched closer to the key logistics hub.  

More than 20,000 people — almost half of its population — have fled the city since August, while Russian strikes over the past two weeks have cut off water and electricity to many of its remaining residents.  

“Around 11 a.m. (0800 GMT), the enemy shelled the western part of the city… Unfortunately, one person died,” Pokrovsk’s military administration said on Telegram.  

Russia has been advancing toward Pokrovsk for months, getting to within 10 kilometers (6 miles) of its eastern outskirts, according to the local administration.   

The city lies on the intersection of rail and road routes that supply Ukrainian troops and towns across the eastern front line and has long been a target for Moscow’s army.  

Russian strikes damaged two overpasses in the city earlier this week, including one that connected Pokrovsk to the neighboring town of Myrnograd, local media reported.  

Other eastern cities such as Bakhmut and Mariupol suffered massive bombardment before falling to Russian forces. of its eastern outskirts, according to the local administration.   

The city lies on the intersection of rail and road routes that supply Ukrainian troops and towns across the eastern front line and has long been a target for Moscow’s army.  

Russian strikes damaged two overpasses in the city earlier this week, including one that connected Pokrovsk to the neighboring town of Myrnograd, local media reported.  

Other eastern cities such as Bakhmut and Mariupol suffered massive bombardment before falling to Russian forces.
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