Image source, EPA

A new training centre for Ukrainian troops in the central Spanish city of Toledo is set to start operating by the end of November, Spain's Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez told the Nato Parliamentary Assembly.

Spanish police will also be deployed to Ukraine in the next few weeks to aid investigations into alleged Russian war crimes, Sanchez said.

An advance delegation of Spanish police officials has already arrived in Kyiv to meet with representatives of the Ukrainian public prosecutor's office, the Spanish Interior Ministry said.

Speaking at Nato's 68th Parliamentary Assembly in Madrid, Sanchez warned Russian President Vladimir Putin to "leave Ukraine alone" and said that as long as his "absurd war" continues, allied countries will remain united alongside the Ukrainian government.

Adam Easton
Warsaw Correspondent

Image source, Reuters

Poland has accepted Germany's offer to provide Patriot missile defence batteries to help secure its airspace - after a stray missile landed in the country killing two people last week, the Polish defence minister Mariusz Blaszczak has said.

"With satisfaction, I accepted the proposal of the German minister of defence to deploy additional Patriot missile launchers in our country," Blaszczak wrote on Twitter. "During today’s telephone talks with the German side, I will suggest that the system should be located at the border with Ukraine."

Two men were killed last week in the village of Przewodow - about 6km (3.7 miles) away from the Ukrainian border - after a missile struck. An investigation is ongoing but US, Nato and Polish officials have said the missile was probably fired by Ukrainian air defence forces.

On Sunday, Germany's defence minister, Christine Lambrecht, said her country had offered the Patriot missile batteries to help secure Polish airspace.

Italy's government will seek to pass a new law on military and civilian supplies to Ukraine throughout 2023, Defence Minister Guido Crosetto said.

Rome can currently send aid to Ukraine without seeking parliamentary authorisation on the basis of a decree that expires at the end of the year.

"The Defence (ministry) will shortly propose to renew that same measure, extending it to all of 2023," Crosetto told Il Foglio newspaper.

He said Italy would continue supplying arms "in the times and ways that we will agree with our Atlantic allies and with Kyiv".

Giorgia Meloni, the new Italian prime minister, has recently sought to affirm her support for Ukraine - despite political allies in her coalition government having links with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

More than a dozen explosions recorded near the huge, Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant over the weekend prompted an urgent appeal from the head of the UN nuclear watchdog to stop the fighting.

Monitors from Rafael Grossi's organisation, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), witnessed some of the blasts from their windows.

Citing information provided by officials at the Russian-controlled plant, the IAEA team said there had been damage to some buildings, systems and equipment at the site, but nothing so far "critical for nuclear safety and security", and no reported casualties.

"The news from our team yesterday and this morning is extremely disturbing," Grossi said, adding that explosions near this major nuclear power plant were "completely unacceptable".

He reiterated calls for both Ukraine and Russia to agree and implement a nuclear safety and security zone around the plant as soon as possible.

"I'm not giving up until this zone has become a reality," he said. "As the ongoing apparent shelling demonstrates, it is needed more than ever."

The Kremlin says it is concerned by renewed shelling at Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant over the weekend, and is calling on other countries to use their influence to help end attacks on the facility.

The strikes at the plant - which is located in south-eastern Ukraine and is under Russian occupation - drew condemnation from the UN nuclear watchdog, which said such attacks risked a major disaster.

"This cannot but cause our concern," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters this morning.

"We call on all countries of the world to use their influence so that the Ukrainian armed forces stop doing this."

Both Ukraine and Russia have blamed each other for shelling the plant. The BBC has not been able to independently verify which side was responsible.

Image source, .

The Kremlin is not in discussions about calling up more Russian soldiers to fight in Ukraine through a second round of mobilisation, a spokesman has said.

President Vladimir Putin announced plans to draft 300,000 men to fight in Ukraine in September after a string of military defeats, prompting widespread demonstrations across Russia.

Russia's defence ministry said its partial mobilisation efforts had been completed at the end of October.

Asked whether Russia was planning a new round of mobilisation, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said: "I can't speak for the defence ministry, but there are no discussions in the Kremlin about this."

The Kremlin previously admitted that mistakes were made in its first mobilisation effort, with multiple reports saying people with no military experience - or who were too old or disabled - were being called up to fight.

Russian forces are forming defensive positions manned by poorly trained reservists around Svatove in the Luhansk region of north-eastern Ukraine, the UK's Ministry of Defence (MoD) says.

The area is likely now a more vulnerable operational flank for Russia, the MoD's latest report finds.

Moscow could see retaining control of Svatove as a political priority, the update says. But commanders are "likely struggling" with maintaining a credible defence while attempting to resource offensive operations further south in Donetsk.

"Both Russian defensive and offensive capability continues to be hampered by severe shortages of munitions and skilled personnel," the report adds.

Shelling of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant has been likened to a game of "Russian roulette" by a former official from the UN’s nuclear watchdog.

Despite that choice of words, Olli Heinonen cautions that it’s "hard to say" whether Russian or Ukrainian troops have been responsible for dangerous activity at the facility.

But speaking to BBC Radio 4's Today programme, he warns that "one single shell in the wrong place at the wrong time will have far-reaching consequences".

The former deputy director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) clarifies that a single shell is unlikely to cause damage to the reactor itself, which will be encased in metres of concrete and metal.

The risk, he says, is that shelling disrupts the supply of electricity to the cooling system - meaning either the reactor or the spent fuel would get too hot, causing the fuel to melt and a release of radioactivity.

Coupled with that is the fact that staff "may make mistakes" due to the pressure they are under – if they are even able to operate at all.

Heinonen adds: "This is a dangerous game and it should be stopped."

Image source, .

Image source, EPA

Russian forces carried out artillery fire in eastern Ukraine yesterday, launching almost 400 strikes, President Volodymyr Zelensky said.

Speaking in his nightly address, the Ukrainian president said the "fiercest battles" were in the eastern Donetsk area, stating "the number of Russian shelling occasions [remained], unfortunately, extremely high".

"[In the] Luhansk region - little by little we are moving forward with battles," Zelensky said., external

"As of now, there have been almost 400 shelling occasions in the east since the beginning of the day. Thank you to each and everyone who holds positions and helps our defence forces."

Image source, .

It comes after Russia withdrew its forces from the southern city of Kherson this month and moved some of them to reinforce positions in the eastern Donetsk and Luhansk regions.

Russian forces also stepped up their shelling of the recently liberated Kherson region yesterday.

Senior Ukrainian official Kyrylo Tymoshenko said the emergency services were searching for possible victims in the rubble of a residential building.

The city of Kherson remains largely without power or mains water following the withdrawal of Russian troops ten days ago.

Shelling the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant is a Russian tactic aimed at disrupting power supplies to Ukrainians, an official in Kyiv alleges.

Yuriy Sak says strikes on the plant over the weekend amount to a "genocidal campaign to freeze Ukrainians to death, to deprive Ukrainians of electricity".

Moscow is trying to "freeze the front", he tells BBC Radio 4's Today programme, "because [the Russians] are not achieving anything on the battlefield and they're desperately looking for a way to achieve what they call an operational pause on the front."

He goes on to say "there will be no pause from our side" and that Ukraine will continue its recent counter-offensive.

It's worth saying that it's not fully clear who's been shelling the plant – and that both sides have blamed each other.

Catherine Byaruhanga
BBC News, in Kyiv

Image source, Reuters

A team of UN experts based at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in south-eastern Ukraine will conduct an assessment of shelling at the site today.

The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency Rafael Grossi condemned the attacks yesterday, saying it was another "close call" at Europe’s biggest nuclear power plant.

Russia and Ukraine have accused each other of carrying out the explosions.

Grossi said the shelling came within metres of hitting the nuclear safety and security systems at the Zaporizhzhia plant.

He added that whoever was carrying out the shelling was taking huge risks and gambling with many people’s lives.

The facility, which is under Russian control, has come under fire multiple times during the war.

Its reactors are now in shutdown mode and in a cooling state to prevent a meltdown of their nuclear fuel.

Grossi has repeatedly called for a security zone around the plant.

Good morning and welcome to our live coverage.

After renewed shelling near the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, a team of UN experts will today assess damage at the site.

The attacks carried out over the weekend were branded a "close call" by the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency Rafael Grossi.

Elsewhere, fighting continues across eastern and southern Ukraine. Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russian forces had carried out 400 artillery attacks on the east of the country yesterday.