Yevgeniy Prigozhin’s Wagner Group will pause hiring mercenaries for a month as its forces move to Belarus, scaling down the group’s activities after it aborted a mutiny attempt outside Moscow last month. A Telegram channel the company uses for hiring said Wagner’s forces won’t fight in Ukraine as they shift operations from Russia.
Meanwhile, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez visited Kyiv this weekend as his country took the helm of the rotating European Council presidency. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky hailed the visit as symbolic, saying it showcased a “new reality” amid the Russian invasion.
Here’s the latest on the war and its ripple effects across the globe.
Ukraine says Putin is planning a nuclear disaster. These people live nearby: Fears that fighting around the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant could cause a catastrophic meltdown have risen sharply in recent weeks, after a breach this month of the nearby Kakhovka dam unleashed a massive flood and jeopardized the water supply needed to cool the plant’s reactors and spent fuel.
Those concerns are most poignant for the people living near the plant, Fredrick Kunkle and Kostiantyn Khudov report from Tomakivka, Ukraine. Vita Lyashenko, 47, a nurse, said she has been gathering rainwater, recycling water for household chores and going longer without showers since the municipal water system went down after the dam breach. She has also set aside iodine tablets, extra water and tape to seal her windows in the event of a radioactive fallout.