Anti-Kremlin activist Eldar Dadin, who was once imprisoned in Russia for protesting against Vladimir Putin, was killed on the front line during fighting on the Ukrainian side, his relatives and Russian media said on Sunday. His friend and former Russian MP Ilya Ponomarev, who lives in exile, said: “It is with great regret that I must inform you that Ildar Dadin – Gandhi’s call sign – died yesterday during fighting in the Kharkiv region” in northeastern Ukraine. Dadin was the first Russian citizen to be convicted under a 2014 law to suppress protests in the country.
A large oil depot in the coastal city of Feodosia in Crimea caught fire on Monday morning after an overnight Ukrainian attack in the region illegally annexed by Russia.
The Ukrainian army said it struck the oil station. “The Feodosia terminal is the largest in Crimea in terms of transporting oil products, which was used, among other things, to meet the needs of the Russian occupation army,” the Ukrainian military said in a statement via the messaging app Telegram.
Russian-appointed officials said a “technical” state of emergency had been imposed in Feodosia due to the fire. The Baza Telegram news channel, which has sources in the Russian security services, reported that several fuel tanks caught fire in Feodosia, which is located on the Black Sea coast.
Dutch Defense Minister Robin Brekelmans said during a surprise visit to Kiev on Sunday that his country will invest 400 million euros in developing advanced drones with Ukraine and deliver more F-16s in the coming months. “Both surveillance drones, more defensive drones, but also offensive drones, because we see that Ukraine needs more offensive drones as well to target military facilities,” Brekelmans said. The Netherlands has pledged 10 billion euros in military support to Ukraine since the beginning of the Russian invasion, and has spent about 4 billion euros so far.
After visiting Kharkiv, which was subjected to Russian bombing, Brekelmans said that attacking military targets in Russia is the only way to defend the city. The Netherlands pushed international partners to provide Ukraine with F-16 aircraft and pledged 24 of them. The first batch is already operating in Ukrainian airspace, according to the minister, while the other batch will be delivered “in the coming months and perhaps the beginning of next year.” The Netherlands announced a plan to assemble the Patriot air defense system for Ukraine. While Brekelmans said she found it difficult to obtain some parts, Ukraine already uses the Patriot radar provided by the Netherlands and “three launchers will be delivered very soon.”
Russian forces attacked Ukraine overnight with 87 Shahed drones and four different types of missiles, officials said on Sunday. The region’s governor, Oleh Sinyhopov, said that a 49-year-old man was killed in the Kharkiv region after his car collided with a drone. Ukrainian officials reported that a gas pipeline was damaged and a warehouse was set on fire in the city of Odessa. The Ukrainian Air Force said that air defenses destroyed 56 out of 87 drones and two missiles over 14 Ukrainian regions, including the capital, Kiev. Another 25 aircraft disappeared from radar screens, “most likely as a result of anti-aircraft missile defence.”
The Russian Defense Ministry said on Sunday that it shot down four Ukrainian drones over the Kursk, Voronezh and Belgorod regions.
Volodymyr Zelensky said he would present his “victory plan” at the October 12 meeting of the Ramstein group of Ukraine’s allies against Russia. The Ukrainian president presented it to Joe Biden in Washington last week, but its content has not been made public. It is known that the plan includes Ukraine’s membership in NATO and the provision of long-range missiles to strike it inside Russia. Biden, the US President, is scheduled to attend the summit on October 12.
