Ukraine updates: Zelenskyy attends Ramstein meeting

Thousands of mourners attended funeral services on Friday in the Ukrainian city of Lviv, some 70 kilometers (43 miles) east of the Polish border, for victims of a Russian missile attack that killed seven people.

Among the dead were a mother and her three daughters.

The pre-dawn blasts earlier this week in the historic center also injured dozens, sending shock waves across Ukraine as the western city has largely been spared since Russia launched its full-scale attack in February 2022.

The city came to a virtual standstill on Friday as the mourners gathered outside a church in the center of the city.

The European Union will provide Ukraine with a €40 million (roughly $ 44.4 million) package to support battered energy infrastructure ahead of the winter.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen made the announcement on X, formerly Twitter.

"Russia is relentlessly targeting Ukraine's energy infrastructure," von der Leyen wrote. "Temperatures will soon go down, so we are stepping up our humanitarian aid to Ukrainians in need."

She added that the new package will cover repair works, electricity, heating and shelter.

Berlin has pledged to supply Ukraine with 12 additional self-propelled howitzers.

German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius made the announcement on Friday on the sidelines of a meeting of the so-called Ramstein group of nations that supply arms to Kyiv.

Speaking at the US air base in western Germany, Pistorius said the howitzers would come from industry rather than from the country's military inventories.

Six of the howitzers are due to arrive by the end of the year, he added, while the rest will be delivered in 2025.

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said during Friday's talks in Germany that the US would provide Ukraine with another package of security assistance valued at $250 million (€224 million). 

"I'm pleased to say that President [Joe] Biden will announce today an additional $250 million security assistance package for Ukraine. It will surge in more capabilities to meet Ukraine's evolving requirements," Austin said. 

The talks come as Ukraine is gradually losing ground in the area around Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region and facing continued aerial attacks on towns and cities, and amid its incursion into Russia's border region of Kursk.

Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said he had arrived at the US' Ramstein Air Base in western Germany and that he was "working with partners for the strength of Ukraine." 

Writing on Telegram early on Friday, he said he would be calling on allies to do more to help Kyiv attain "the means to stop Russian aerial terror." 

"It is necessary that all the weapons from the already announced support packages finally get to the combat brigades," said Zelenskyy. "And strong long-range decisions by partners are needed to bring the just peace we seek closer."

Ukraine is appealing to NATO members to endorse it using Western weaponry to attack targets like air bases not just a short distance inside Russia — which most now say is valid — but also further across the border.

Zelenskyy said he would attend the group meeting in Ramstein and hold talks with German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius and US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. 

"I will hold separate negotiations with Chancellor Olaf Scholz," he said. 

The president added that he would then travel on to Italy to attend an economic forum and for talks with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. 

"We are coordinating positions with all G7 allies," he said.

The UK will provide Ukraine with 650 lightweight multi-role missiles to help Kyiv protect itself against Russian drones and bombing, the British government said on Friday.

The missiles to be sent are worth £162 million (roughly $213.13 million; €192 million) and have a range of 6 kilometers (3.73 miles). They can be fired from a variety of platforms on land, sea and air.

The first batch is due to arrive by the end of the year, the Defense Ministry said.

The missiles package is expected to be formally announced by British Defense Secretary John Healey during a meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, an ad hoc coalition of some 50 nations, in Germany on Friday. 

"This new commitment will give an important boost to Ukraine's air defenses," Healey said in a statement.

A meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group is scheduled to take place on Friday at the United States' Ramstein Air Base in the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate. 

Defense ministers and senior military officials will meet from 9:30 a.m. local time (0730 GMT) at the invitation of US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will attend, according to media reports. A government spokesman in Berlin said Zelenskyy would also have a one-on-one meeting with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Frankfurt in the afternoon.

At the Ramstein meeting, which will also be attended by German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius, Zelenskyy is expected to personally ask the allies for more weapons to counter Russia. The focus would be on long-range missiles and increased air defenses. 

London has already announced that the UK will send 650 new special missile systems to Ukraine to strengthen its air defenses.

The US unveiled charges against five members of Russia's military intelligence agency on Thursday.

The US Justice Department accused five officers of the Russian agency, known as the GRU, of engaging in "destructive" computer attacks on civilian computer systems in Ukraine and around the world.

The five officers, along with a civilian who was already under indictment for conspiracy to commit computer intrusion, allegedly "engaged in a conspiracy to hack into, exfiltrate data from, leak information obtained from and destroy computer systems associated with the Ukrainian government in advance of the Russian invasion of Ukraine," the Justice Department said in a statement.

Ukrainian government systems and data were targeted, as well as countries that supported Ukraine, including the US and 25 other NATO countries, the Justice Department said.

The US is offering a reward of up to $10 million (€9 million) for information about the defendants.

Ukraine's incursion into Russia's southern Kursk region is working and there have been no Russian advances in a key sector of the eastern front for six days, Ukrainian top military commander Oleksandr Syrskyi said in an interview broadcast by CNN on Thursday.

"Over the last six days, the enemy hasn't advanced a single meter in the Pokrovsk direction. In other words, our strategy is working," he said.

The Kursk incursion, he said, had "significantly improved the morale of not only the military but the entire Ukrainian population."

Meanwhile, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in his nightly video address, said Ukrainian troops were holding their positions in Kursk "and with each day of the operation we are proving to the world that Russia can lose this war."

dh/sms (AP, AFP, dpa, Reuters)