- Ukrainian troops are mounting a long-awaited counteroffensive in the southern region of Kherson, military officials have said. “Today we started offensive actions in various directions, including in the Kherson region,” Ukraine’s southern command spokesperson, Natalia Humeniuk, said on Monday. She declined to provide more details about the new offensive but said Ukraine’s recent strikes on Russia’s southern logistical routes had “unquestionably weakened the enemy”. Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, added in a Monday evening address: “If they want to survive, it is time for the Russian military to flee. The occupiers should know: we will oust them to the border. To our border, the line of which has not changed.”
- Kyiv’s forces have broken through Russian defences in several sectors of the frontline near the city of Kherson, a senior adviser to Zelenskiy claimed. Oleksiy Arestovych said Ukrainian forces were also shelling the ferries in the Kherson region that Moscow is using to supply Russian-occupied territory on the west bank of the Dnieper river. A seperate Ukrainian military source told CNN that its forces have taken back four villages near the city of Kherson after breaking through the frontline in three places, with the main “target” being Kherson. The operation began with heavy shelling of Russian positions and the rear, forcing them to flee, the source was quoted as saying.
- A Ukrainian barrage of rockets left the Russian-occupied town of Nova Kakhovka in the Kherson region without water or power, officials at the Russian-appointed local authority told Russia’s RIA news agency. The town lies just to the east of the city of Kherson.
- A team of inspectors from the UN nuclear watchdog arrived in Kyiv on Monday night en route to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in southern Ukraine. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief, Rafael Grossi, said a team will visit the plant from Wednesday to Saturday. “We must protect the safety and security of Ukraine’s and Europe’s biggest nuclear facility,” Grossi tweeted. Missiles and shells are frequently hitting areas around the power station and nearby towns, prompting fears it may be too dangerous for the mission to proceed.
- The Kremlin said the IAEA mission was “necessary” but has ruled out vacating the site. Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, said Ukraine expects the IAEA delegation to “state the facts” regarding the violation of all nuclear safety protocols, adding that Russia “is putting not only Ukraine but also the entire world at threat of risk of a nuclear accident”.
- Russian forces fired at Enerhodar, the city where the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant is located, according to Ukraine’s armed forces. Zelenskiy’s chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, also appeared to confirm the reports on his Telegram channel alongside a video of firefighters dousing burning cars.
- Russia is struggling to find more soldiers to fight in Ukraine and has expanded recruitment efforts by eliminating the upper age limit and by tapping into prisons. “Many of these new recruits have been observed as older, unfit and ill-trained,” a Pentagon official told journalists on Monday. Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, decreed last week that his army would increase by about 10%, to 1.15 million servicemen, starting January next year.
- Ukrainian officials have warned politicians, experts and opinion leaders not to speculate about the progress of a military counteroffensive. Spokesperson for Ukraine’s southern command, Nataliya Humenyuk, said the operation in Kherson needed “silence” as media attention could affect the results. Ukraine’s presidential adviser, Mykhailo Podolyak, added it was necessary to wait for official statements from Ukraine’s Ministry of Defence and army. “I understand our wishes and dreams … But war is not ‘content’. Let’s filter information and work professionally out of respect for our defenders,” he wrote on Telegram.
- Russia has alleged a second Ukrainian was involved in the killing of Darya Dugina. Russia’s FSB security service accused without evidence a second Ukrainian citizen of acquiring fake documents and preparing the car bomb that killed the daughter of an ultranationalist Russian ideologue this month.
- Gas shortages across Europe are likely to last for several winters to come, the chief executive of Shell has said, raising the prospect of continued energy rationing as governments push to develop alternative supplies. Speaking at a press conference in Norway on Monday, Ben van Beurden said the situation could persist for several years.
Warning that Afghanistan faces deepening poverty with 6 million people at risk of famine, the U.N. humanitarian chief on Monday urged donors to restore funding for economic development and immediately provide $770 million to help Afghans get through the winter as the United States argued with Russia and China over who should pay.
Martin Griffiths told the U.N. Security Council that Afghanistan faces multiple crises -- humanitarian, economic, climate, hunger and financial.
Conflict, poverty, climate shocks and food insecurity “have long been a sad reality” in Afghanistan, but he said what makes the current situation “so critical” is the halt to large-scale development aid since the Taliban takeover a year ago.
More than half the Afghan population -- some 24 million people -- need assistance and close to 19 million are facing acute levels of food insecurity, Griffiths said. And “we worry” that the figures will soon become worse because winter weather will send already high fuel and food prices skyrocketing.
But he said $614 million is urgently required to prepare for winter including repairing and upgrading shelters and providing warm clothes and blankets -- and an additional $154 million is needed to preposition food and other supplies before the weather cuts access to certain areas.
Griffiths stressed, however, that “humanitarian aid will never be able to replace the provision of system-wide services to 40 million people across the country.”
The Taliban “have no budget to invest in their own future,” he said, and “it’s clear that some development support needs to be started.”
With more than 70 percent of Afghan’s living in rural areas, Griffiths warned that if agriculture and livestock production aren’t protected “millions of lives and livelihoods will be risked, and the country’s capacity to produce food imperiled.”
He said the country’s banking and liquidity crisis, and the extreme difficulty of international financial transactions must also be tackled.
“The consequences of inaction on both the humanitarian and development fronts will be catastrophic and difficult to reverse,” Griffiths warned.
He claimed they did nothing to build up the Afghan economy and their presence only strengthened the country’s status “as a hotbed of terrorism” and narcotics production and distribution.
Nebenzia also accused the U.S. and its allies of abandoning Afghans to face “ruin, poverty, terrorism, hunger and other challenges.”
“Instead of acknowledging their own mistakes and supporting the reconstruction of the destroyed country,” he said, they blocked Afghan financial resources and disconnected its central bank from SWIFT, the dominant system for global financial transactions.
As for Afghan frozen assets, President Joe Biden announced in February that the $7 billion in the U.S. was being divided -- $3.5 billion for a U.N. trust fund to provide aid to Afghans and $3.5 billion for families of American victims of the 9/11 terror attacks in the United States.
“No country that is serious about containing terrorism in Afghanistan would advocate to give the Taliban instantaneous, unconditional access to billions in assets that belong to the Afghan people,” Thomas-Greenfield said.
To Russia’s claims that Afghanistan’s problems are the fault of the West and not the Taliban, Thomas-Greenfield asked, “What are you doing to help other than rehash the past and criticize others?”
She said Russia has contributed only $2 million to the U.N. humanitarian appeal for Afghanistan and China’s contributions “have been similarly underwhelming.”
“If you want to talk about how Afghanistan needs help, that’s fine. But we humbly suggest you put your money where your mouth is,” Thomas-Greenfield said.
Virginia's ambitious governor, Republican Glenn Youngkin, is under fire from Democrats in that state for his plan to visit Lewiston next week to raise money for Paul LePage's bid to reclaim Maine's governorship for the GOP.
The possible presidential candidate, who has been traveling widely to share the stage with Republicans, "is once again ignoring his duties as governor to stump for extreme candidates across the country," Democratic Party of Virginia Spokesperson Gianni Snidle said Monday.
"If the GOP thinks sending Gov. Youngkin around the country will help them win the election, they're dead wrong," Snidle said. "He's just another far-right cultural warrior who wears a sweater vest to hide his out-of-touch, outdated views."
Youngkin is among the Republicans increasingly touted as a presidential possibility, especially if former President Donald Trump doesn't run. Among the others often named are former Vice President Mike Pence, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, who served as Trump's ambassador to the United Nations.
In a Monday email to supporters, LePage announced the fundraiser as "great news" and hailed Youngkin for shocking the political world to defeat a "an entrenched, former Democrat governor and turning Virginia RED" in last year's election in the Old Dominion.
"Youngkin gave a strong voice to thousands of parents frustrated by a broken school system which ignored scientific data, relied on political theater, and aggressively shut down in-school instruction," LePage added.
"You won't want to miss this incredible campaign fundraiser!" LePage told backers.
The $50-a-person meet-and-greet with Youngkin and LePage is slated for 6 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 7, at the Republican headquarters in the Peck Building, 184 Main St.
There is also an hourlong, $500-a-person private reception beforehand for high rollers.
Virginia Democrats on Twitter blasted Youngkin online for tying himself to LePage, a man "who has said blatantly racist things" they found in a collection of the former Maine governor's commentary compiled by the Portland Press Herald.
China has charged dozens of people, including police officials, after a violent attack on female diners at a restaurant reignited debate on gender inequality in the world’s second-largest economy.
A group of 28 people were facing prosecution, officials in the northern province of Hebei said in a statement on Monday. The charges included direct involvement in the attack in Tangshan in June and others related to criminal activities such as running casinos and robbery dating back to 2012.
Snidle said LePage is trying this year "to hide his anti-abortion extremism to trick voters" in the same way that Youngkin did last year.
"Like Youngkin, LePage is no moderate, and given the chance, he would ban abortion in Maine just like Youngkin is trying to do in Virginia," Snidle said.
Eight police officials have also been detained on allegations they provided protection for the criminal activities of the people who carried out the attack and also took bribes, the official Xinhua News Agency reported, citing the graft-fighting agency in Hebei.
People across China were outraged in June, when video clips appeared online showing the men beating female diners at a barbecue restaurant, with one woman getting dragged by her hair outside and then beaten. Nine suspects were arrested afterward, and the government of Tangshan pledged to “severely punish” anyone involved.
Attack on Chinese Women Revives #MeToo Anger Xi Can’t Extinguish
That vow did little to quell public anger or silence a renewed debate about gender inequality that the nation’s ruling Communist Party has in the past repeatedly suppressed, viewing it as a vehicle for spreading liberal Western values.
Maine House Speaker Ryan Fecteau said on Twitter that it is interesting to see Youngkin, "a guy who avoided Trump during his gubernatorial campaign" in Virginia, is now coming to campaign with Maine's version of Trump.
LePage has said in the past that he was "Trump before Trump."
Youngkin has plans to campaign with Republican candidates for governor in other states as well, including Oregon, Kansas and New Mexico.
Over the weekend, Youngkin campaigned in Michigan for Tudor Dixon, the GOP's standard-bearer in its quest to unseat Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.
"Helping extreme Republicans is now the governor's full-time job," the Arlington County Democrats in Virginia said in a statement on Twitter.
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