Russia-Ukraine war: what we know on day 121 of the invasion

The last Ukrainian forces fighting in the heavily contested eastern city of Sievierodonetsk have been ordered to withdraw in order to avoid being encircled, as fears grow that the neighbouring city of Lysychansk could also fall to Russia within days. The anticipated loss of Sievierodonetsk is the latest battlefield reverse for Kyiv after its defeat in the port city of Mariupol. According to some estimates about 12,000 civilians remain in Sievierodonetsk, out of a prewar population of 160,000. All three bridges offering escape routes west over the Siverskyi Donets River to the twin city of Lysychansk have been destroyed in fighting, and the mayor, Oleksandr Striuk, says the humanitarian situation is critical.

The Luhansk governor, Serhiy Haidai, said on Friday: “The situation right now is as such that staying at these destroyed positions just for the sake of being there doesn’t make sense.” He said Ukrainian forces had “received the order to retreat to new positions and continue fighting there”, but did not give further details. Russians were also advancing toward Lysychansk from Zolote and Toshkivka, and Russian reconnaissance units had been conducting forays on the city edges but were driven out by its defenders, he added.

An official in the Russian-installed administration of Ukraine’s occupied Kherson region was killed in an apparent assassination when his car exploded as he got into it. Dmitry Savluchenko was head of the families, youth, and sports department of the Kherson Military-Civilian Administration. The Kremlin has described the attack as “nothing but an act of terrorism”.

European leaders granted Ukraine candidate status late on Thursday, in a historic decision that opens the door to EU membership for the war-torn country and deals a blow to Vladimir Putin. EU leaders meeting in Brussels approved Ukraine’s candidate status nearly four months after the country’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, launched his country’s bid to join the bloc in the early days of the Russian invasion. The European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, declared it was “a good day for Europe”. The French president, Emmanuel Macron, said it was historic decision that sent “a strong signal towards Russia in the current geopolitical context”.

Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, immediately welcomed the move, saying: “Ukraine’s future is in the EU.” “It’s a victory … we have been waiting for 120 days and 30 years,” he added, referring to the duration of the war and the decades since Ukraine became independent on the breakup of the Soviet Union. “And now we will defeat the enemy.”

The UN nuclear watchdog has said it is increasingly concerned about the welfare of Ukrainian staff at the Russian-held Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said: “The IAEA is aware of recent reports in the media and elsewhere indicating a deteriorating situation for Ukrainian staff at the country’s largest nuclear power plant.”

Moscow’s foreign ministry blamed the United States for a Lithuanian ban on sanctioned goods crossing from the Russian mainland to the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad. Lithuania has prevented goods that are banned by EU sanctions from transiting its territory by rail. Russia has threatened repercussions.

G7 foreign ministers called on Russia to “cease its attacks and threatening actions” and to unblock the Ukrainian Black Sea ports for food exports. Russia is exacerbating food insecurity with its blockades and bombing attacks on key infrastructure in Ukraine, they said in a statement.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has said Europe needs to ramp up efforts to cut its dependency from Russian fossil fuel imports.

The US will send another $450m in military aid to Ukraine, including some additional medium-range rocket systems. The latest package includes four high mobility artillery rocket systems (HIMARS) and tens of thousands of rounds of artillery ammunition as well as patrol boats, Pentagon officials announced on Thursday. With the latest shipments, the US contribution to Ukraine’s military will amount to $6.1bn so far, White House spokesperson, John Kirby, added.

More than 150 cultural sites in Ukraine have been partially or totally destroyed, according to a Unesco report. The damage includes 70 religious buildings, 30 historical buildings, 18 cultural centres, 15 monuments, 12 museums and seven libraries.

Zelenskiy addressed crowds at Glastonbury festival in the UK and asked them to “spread the truth about Russia’s war” and “prove that freedom always wins”. In a video message to festivalgoers, Zelenskiy said people in Ukraine wanted to “live the life as we used to, enjoy freedom and this wonderful summer”.

Ukraine is recording 200 to 300 war crimes committed by Russian forces on its territory every day, the prosecutor general has claimed. “War crimes are our trouble. Every day we have 200 to 300 of them … We have a duty: when there is a crime, we have to start an investigation,” Iryna Venediktova told Ukrainian television.

Ukraine has held a preliminary hearing in its first trial of a Russian soldier charged with raping a Ukrainian woman during Moscow’s invasion – the first of what could be dozens of such cases. The suspect, Mikhail Romanov, 32, who will be tried in absentia, is accused of breaking into a house in March in a village in the Brovarsky region outside Kyiv, murdering a man and then repeatedly raping his wife while threatening her and her child.

The Russian navy has been given orders to lay mines at the ports of Odesa and Ochakiv, and has already mined the Dnieper River, as part of a blockade of Ukrainian grain exports, according to newly declassified US intelligence.

The US embassy in Russia has been pressing the Kremlin this week to reveal the whereabouts of two Alabama men captured in Ukraine, according to the mother of one of the taken Americans. Lois “Bunny” Drueke also said that her son, Alexander Drueke, and the other captured US military veteran, Andy Tai Ngoc Huynh, were not mercenaries but volunteers, pushing back on statements from a Kremlin spokesperson who said the American pair were facing execution.