Category: World

Hurricane Helene was a dangerous Category 4 storm when it made landfall over Florida’s Big Bend area late Thursday night but weakened rapidly as it raced inland early Friday and was downgraded to a tropical storm in mere hours, the National Hurricane Center said. Still, Helene was bringing a “life-threatening” storm surge, strong winds and heavy rain, the center said.

As of 5 a.m. EDT, Helen was approximately 40 miles east of Macon, Georgia and 100 miles southeast of Atlanta and was racing north at 30 mph, the Miami-based hurricane center said. It was packing maximum sustained winds of 70 mph, 4 mph below the threshold for a storm to have hurricane status and half what they were when Helene moved ashore over the Big Bend area of Florida’s Gulf Coast.

Helene made landfall about 10 miles west of Perry, Florida, at 11:10 p.m. Eastern Time, according to the hurricane center, with maximum sustained winds of 140 miles per hour.

As of 2 a.m. EDT, its winds had already diminished to 90 mph, making Helene a Category 1 hurricane at the time, the center said.

Some 1.2 million customers in Florida were without power early Friday morning, according to utility tracker PowerOutage.us, along with approximately 734,000 in Georgia and 363,000 in South Carolina. Those numbers were growing rapidly. What’s more, about 87,000 homes and businesses were in the dark in North Carolina, for a total of almost 2.4 million in the four states.

So far, there have been at least three weather-related deaths attributed to Helene. Two people were killed in Wheeler County, Georgia, the county coroner, Ted Mercer, told CBS New by phone. No further details were provided.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis confirmed in a late-night news conference that at least one person was killed in the Tampa area when a traffic sign fell on a vehicle. 

DeSantis said about 3,500 National Guardsmen were standing by to respond to emergencies.

Several airports closed because of the storm, and airlines canceled nearly 1,300 flights Thursday, according to FlightAware. More than 600 U.S. flights were already canceled as of 5:30 a.m.  

Vice President Kamala Harris is set to visit Douglas, Arizona, on Friday, marking her first trip to the U.S.-Mexico border since becoming the Democratic presidential nominee. Harris will deliver remarks to call for tougher border security measures as part of her efforts to address border issues, according to a senior campaign official. 

Harris plans to say that American sovereignty requires setting rules at the border and enforcing them, stressing that Border Patrol agents need more resources.

The vice president will make combating the flow of fentanyl a focal point of her remarks and refer to it as a “top priority” for her presidency. Harris will propose adding fentanyl detection machines to ports of entry along the border and will call on the Chinese government to crack down on companies that make the precursor chemicals utilized in the making of fentanyl. 

While Harris will stress the need for border security and address the lack of current resources, the vice president will also advocate for an immigration system that is “safe, orderly and humane” according to campaign officials granted anonymity to speak freely on the prepared remarks. 

As Harris is set to make her case on the border, the Biden administration will soon move to cement the asylum restrictions it enacted at the southern border over the summer, officials told CBS News. The planned amended proclamation would make it less likely for the asylum restrictions to be lifted in the near future, according to two U.S. officials who requested anonymity to discuss internal government plans. Officials have credited the stringent measure for a sharp drop in illegal border crossings in recent months.

Harris’ first border trip as the Democratic nominee comes as the vice president is looking to make gains on her opponent, former President Donald Trump, on border issues. According to a recent CBS News poll, 58% of likely voters consider the U.S.-Mexico border a major factor in deciding who they will vote for. The poll also found 53% of likely voters would support Trump starting a national program to find and deport all immigrants who are in the U.S. illegally. 

Trump and Republicans have long campaigned on the need for strong border security and have attempted to place blame on Harris for the influx of illegal crossings during the Biden administration. 

During a Thursday press conference in New York, Trump denounced Harris’ border visit, telling reporters “she should save her airfare.”

“She should go back to the White House and tell the president to close the border,” Trump said. “He can do it with the signing of just a signature and a piece of paper to the border patrol.”

Harris will argue, according to a senior campaign official, that Trump was responsible for scuttling a bipartisan border bill that would have enacted permanent asylum restrictions and authorized additional border agents and resources. Trump urged his allies in Congress to reject the bill earlier this year.

“The American people deserve a president who cares more about border security than playing political games,” Harris plans to say, according to excerpts previewed by CBS News.

While Harris has been pushing for Congress to pass the bill from the campaign trail, Trump on Thursday referred to the legislation as “atrocious.”

“It would allow people to come in here at levels that would be incredible and would allow them to get citizenship” Trump told reporters. “It was not a border bill. It was an amnesty bill.”

The measure that failed to garner enough support from Senate Republicans in the spring also included executive authority to turn away migrants during spikes in illegal immigration and would have expanded legal immigration levels. 

KYIV, Ukraine – Ukraine’s air defences battled an overnight Russian aerial attack on the capital Kyiv for five hours, officials said Thursday, as missiles and drones again hammered the Ukrainian power grid.

The Kyiv attack injured at least two people, Ukraine’s Emergency Service said. A kindergarten, a gas pipe and around 20 cars were damaged in the city, said the Kyiv Military Administration.

In western Ukraine, the air force said, Russia fired three Kinzhal hypersonic ballistic missiles — one of Russia’s most advanced weapons — “in the direction of” Starokostiantyniv, a city in the Khmelnytskyi region, on Thursday morning. The air force said it could not make further information public, suggesting the missiles were aimed at a sensitive site.

Long-range strikes have been a hallmark of Russia’s military campaign in Ukraine, now deep in its third year, often hitting civilian areas. Attacks on the electricity network have knocked out around 70 per cent of Ukraine’s energy generation capacity, according to the United Nations, bringing blackouts as winter approaches.

Air defence systems are a critical need for Ukraine, and President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was due to meet President Joe Biden in Washington on Thursday in an effort to ensure continuing U.S. military support for his country.

Energy infrastructure was hit in Ukraine’s western Ivano-Frankivsk region, causing a blackout in parts of the regional capital of the same name, regional Gov. Svitlana Onyshchuk said.

The power grid was also targeted in the southern Mykolaiv region, local authorities said without immediately providing further details.

Russia launched six missiles and 78 Shahed drones at Ukraine overnight from Wednesday to Thursday, Ukraine’s air force said. Defences destroyed four of the missiles and 66 drones in the air, it said.

In the south, a missile killed a 62-year-old woman in the Odesa region, where homes and cars were damaged, regional Gov. Oleh Kiper said.

In the city of Zaporizhzhia, at least eight people were injured in the overnight attack, including a 14-year-old, said regional governor Ivan Fedorov. He published photographs of houses with their windows blown out and walls riddled with shrapnel. The Emergency Service said 12 residential buildings were damaged in the city and 18 people were evacuated.

Meanwhile, in the northeastern Sumy region ordnance experts defused a 500-kilogram (1,100-pound) glide bomb that landed without exploding next to a bridge over the River Psel.

Federal prosecutors have secured criminal charges against multiple Iranian hackers for allegedly targeting members of former President Donald Trump’s presidential campaign as part of a malicious cyber scheme, multiple sources familiar with the investigation confirmed to CBS News. 

The Iranian hackers were indicted by a grand jury on Thursday and the charges could be announced as early as Friday, the sources said. The nature of the allegations and the names of the defendants were unknown as charging documents remain under seal. The exact number of people charged was also not confirmed. 

ABC News and Politico first reported on elements of the charges. 

A Justice Department spokesperson declined to comment on CBS News’ reporting. A spokesperson for the Trump campaign also did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Once publicly announced, the charges will mark an escalation in the federal government’s work to combat Iran’s alleged efforts to interfere in the 2024 presidential election. Federal officials have warned Iran is seeking to undermine Trump’s campaign. 

The FBI launched probes earlier this summer after both the Trump and then-Biden campaigns experienced attempted phishing schemes targeting people associated with the candidates, sources told CBS News in August.  

Last week, federal officials with the FBI and other intelligence agencies released a statement confirming, “Iranian malicious cyber actors in late June and early July sent unsolicited emails to individuals then associated with President Biden’s campaign that contained an excerpt taken from stolen, non-public material from former President Trump’s campaign as text in the emails. There is currently no information indicating those recipients replied.”  

The statement went on to say that “Iranian malicious cyber actors have continued their efforts since June to send stolen, non-public material associated with former President Trump’s campaign to U.S. media organizations…Foreign actors are increasing their election influence activities as we approach November.” 

Iran’s United Nations mission previously denied it had plans to interfere or launch cyberattacks in the U.S. presidential election, telling CBS News in a statement last week that “the Islamic Republic of Iran does not engage in the internal uproars or electoral controversies of the United States,” adding that “Iran neither has any motive nor intent to interfere in the U.S. election; and, it therefore categorically repudiates such accusations.”

Trump’s campaign revealed last month that it had been hacked and said Iranian actors were involved in stealing and distributing sensitive internal documents to members of the press. 

FBI agents worked with both Google and Microsoft — two major tech firms and providers of email services — to dig into the apparent spearphishing attacks targeting those close to both presidential campaigns, according to two people familiar with the probe. A report published by Microsoft earlier this summer revealed Iran is evolving its tactics to affect the upcoming election. 

Trump and former members of his administration have been increased targets of Iranian actors following the killing of Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani in 2020. Some former officials received increased protection because of death threats, and in July, federal prosecutors filed charges against a Pakistani national with ties to Iran for allegedly planning to assassinate American politicians, including possibly Trump. 

Iran is not the only foreign adversary that U.S. officials say is seeking to undermine the upcoming presidential election. Intelligence agencies have warned Russia and China have launched cyber campaigns of their own to sew chaos, with Russia allegedly seeking to damage Vice President Kamala Harris’ bid for the White House. 

Speaking at an event hosted by the Atlantic Council on Thursday, Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco said, “We are seeing more threat actors, more threat actors getting into the game” of election interference, exacerbated by advancements in artificial intelligence. 

The goal, according to Monaco, is to “sow discord, sow distrust in our election system and undermine confidence in our democratic process.” 

NEW YORK – The U.S., France and other allies jointly called Wednesday for an “immediate” 21-day ceasefire to allow for negotiations in the escalating conflict between Israel and Hezbollah that has killed more than 600 people in Lebanon in recent days.

The joint statement, negotiated on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, says the recent fighting is “intolerable and presents an unacceptable risk of a broader regional escalation.”

“We call for an immediate 21-day ceasefire across the Lebanon-Israel border to provide space for diplomacy,” the statement reads. “We call on all parties, including the Governments of Israel and Lebanon, to endorse the temporary ceasefire immediately.”

There was no immediate reaction from the Israeli or Lebanese governments — or Hezbollah — but senior U.S. officials said all parties were aware of the call for a ceasefire and would be speaking for themselves in the coming hours. The officials said Hezbollah would not be a signatory to the ceasefire, but they believe the government of Lebanon would coordinate its acceptance with the group.

While the ceasefire call applies only to the Israel-Lebanon border, senior U.S. officials said they were looking to use a three-week pause in fighting there to restart stalled negotiations for a ceasefire and hostage release deal between Israel and Hamas.

The nations calling for a ceasefire include the United States, Australia, Canada, the European Union, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Qatar.

Work on the proposal came together quickly this week with President Joe Biden’s national security team, led by Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and national security adviser Jake Sullivan, working with allies to get the deal together, according to a U.S. official. The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the private deliberations, said the deal crystallized by late Wednesday afternoon during a conversation on the sidelines of the General Assembly between Biden and French President Emmanuel Macron.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot told the UN Security Council during a meeting that “we are counting on both parties to accept it without delay.”

Barrot said France, a former colonial power to Lebanon, and the U.S. had consulted with the sides on “final parameters for a diplomatic way out of this crisis,” adding that “war is not unavoidable.”

U.S. deputy ambassador to the UN Robert Wood encouraged the council to support the diplomatic efforts but didn’t offer specifics about the plan.

“We are working with other countries on a proposal that we hope will lead to calm and enable discussions to a diplomatic solution,” he said.

Earlier Wednesday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the U.S. administration was “intensely engaged with a number of partners to deescalate tensions in Lebanon and to work to get a ceasefire agreement that would have so many benefits for all concerned.”

U.S. President Joe Biden addresses the 79th session of the United Nations General Assembly, Sept. 24, 2024, at UN headquarters.

Blinken and other advisers to President Joe Biden have spent the past three days at and on the sidelines of the annual UN General Assembly meeting of world leaders in New York lobbying other countries to support the plan, according to U.S. officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomatic conversations.

Americans hope such a ceasefire could lead to longer-term stability along the border between Israel and Lebanon. Months of Israeli and Hezbollah exchanges of fire across the border drove tens of thousands of people from their homes on both sides of the border, and escalated attacks this week have rekindled fears of a broader war in the Middle East.

Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan and senior advisers Brett McGurk and Amos Hochstein have been meeting with Middle East allies in New York and have been in touch with Israeli officials about the proposal, one of the U.S. officials said. McGurk and Hochstein have been the White House’s chief interlocutors with Israel and Lebanon since the Oct. 7 attack on Israel by Hamas, another Iranian-backed militant group.

An Israeli official said Netanyahu has given the green light to pursue a possible deal, but only if it includes the return of Israeli civilians to their homes. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because they were discussing behind-the-scenes diplomacy.

Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati threw his support behind the French-U.S. plan that “enjoys international support and which would put an end to this dirty war.”

He called on the Security Council “to guarantee the withdrawal of Israel from all the occupied Lebanese territories and the violations that are repeated on a daily basis.”

Israel’s UN Ambassador, Danny Danon, told journalists at the United Nations that Israel would like to see a ceasefire and the return of people to their homes near the border: “It will happen, either after a war or before a war. We hope it will be before.”

Addressing the Security Council later Wednesday night, he made no mention of negotiations on a temporary ceasefire but said Israel “does not seek a full-scale war.”

Both Danon and Mikati reffirmed their governments’ commitment to a Security Council resolution that ended the 2006 Israeli-Hezbollah war in Lebanon. Never fully implemented, it called for a cessation of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah, the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Lebanon to be replaced by Lebanese forces and UN peacekeepers, and the disarmament of all armed groups including Hezbollah.

Danon demanded that the resolution be enforced in full without delay: “I make this declaration here today, to remove any doubt: Never again. Never again will the Jewish people hide from the monsters whose purpose in life is to murder Jews.”

Earlier Wednesday, Biden warned in an appearance on ABC’s “The View” that “an all-out war is possible” but said he thinks the opportunity also exists “to have a settlement that can fundamentally change the whole region.”

Biden suggested that getting Israel and Hezbollah to agree to a ceasefire could help achieve a cessation of hostilities between Israel and Hamas in Gaza. That war is approaching the one-year mark after Hamas raids in southern Israel on Oct. 7 killed about 1,200 people. Israel responded with an offensive that has since killed more than 41,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health officials, who do not provide a breakdown of civilians and fighters in their count.

“It’s possible and I’m using every bit of energy I have with my team … to get this done,” Biden said. “There’s a desire to see change in the region.”

The U.S. and other international mediators have tried and failed for months to broker a ceasefire in Gaza that also would release hostages held by Hamas.

The U.S. government also raised the pressure with additional sanctions Wednesday targeting more than a dozen ships and other entities it says were involved in illicit shipments of Iranian petroleum for the financial benefit of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and Hezbollah.

Meanwhile, the chief of Israel’s army said Wednesday that the military is preparing for a possible ground operation in Lebanon as Hezbollah hurled dozens of projectiles into Israel, including a missile aimed at Tel Aviv that was the militant group’s deepest strike yet.

Blinken has been urging both Israel and Hezbollah to step back from their intensifying conflict, saying that all-out war would be disastrous for the region and that escalation was not the way to get people back to their homes on the Israel-Lebanon border.

“It would be through a diplomatic agreement that has forces pulled back from the border, create a secure environment, people return home,” Blinken told NBC News. “That’s what we’re driving toward because while there’s a very legitimate issue here, we don’t think that war is the solution.”

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says Ukraine should be allowed to strike deep inside Russia, despite Moscow threatening that this would draw Canada and its allies into direct war.

“Canada fully supports Ukraine using long-range weaponry to prevent and interdict Russia’s continued ability to degrade Ukrainian civilian infrastructure, and mostly to kill innocent civilians in their unjust war,” Trudeau told reporters at a news conference in Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue, Que., on Friday.

On Thursday, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that the NATO military alliance allowing Ukraine to use weapons it has provided for long-range strikes “would mean that NATO countries, the United States and European countries, are at war with Russia.”

Ukraine and many of its supporters want U.S. President Joe Biden to let Kyiv use the weapons to strike military targets deeper inside Russia.

Trudeau said Ukraine can use this capacity to stop Russia’s frequent strikes on hospitals and daycares across the country.

Putin’s remarks were in line with the narrative the Kremlin has promoted since early in the war, accusing NATO countries of de facto participation in the conflict and threatening a response.

His comments came five weeks after Ukrainian forces stormed the border and put parts of Russian territory under foreign occupation for the first time since the Second World War.

Trudeau told reporters on Friday that Canada is “unequivocal” that Ukraine must win in fighting back against Russia’s invasion, or it will encourage other large countries to try absorbing their neighbours. He said Putin’s actions have consequences for everyone.

“He is trying to deeply destabilize the international rules-based order that protects us all, not just in every democracy around the world, but in all countries around the world,” Trudeau said.

Biden had said on Tuesday that his administration was considering the issue and “working that out.” The issue was also on the agenda Friday as Biden welcomed U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer to the White House.

Yet the White House’s national security communications adviser, John Kirby, said the U.S. doesn’t plan to stray from its policy. 

“There is no change to our view on the provision of long-range strike capabilities for Ukraine to use inside Russia,” Kirby told reporters, adding he wouldn’t expect any major announcement in that regard coming out of Friday’s discussions, “certainly not out of our side.”

As for whether the long-range missiles are a red line for Putin, Kirby also said it’s difficult to take the Russian president at face value, though he added that Putin has proven capable of aggression and escalation.

In May, Washington began allowing Ukraine to use American weaponry to strike inside Russia, but only for targets near the border being used to attack Ukraine’s second-largest city, Kharkiv, which is 20 kilometres from the Russian border.

Democrats are stepping up their outreach to Polish Americans in this year’s presidential election as Kamala Harris and Donald Trump vie for support from a community that could play a decisive role in razor-thin battleground state contests.

Harris hopes to capitalize on Polish Americans’ historic animosity toward Russia and on Trump’s hesitancy to back Ukraine during last week’s debate. The Democratic vice-president’s team organized a national call with Polish American supporters on Wednesday to encourage local networks to hold their own events and spread the campaign’s message.

Although Polish Americans are not a particularly large demographic, many of them live in the so-called “blue wall” states that are critical to victory for either candidate. There are an estimated 784,000 in Michigan, 758,000 in Pennsylvania and 481,000 in Wisconsin, three places that Harris is visiting this week.

“We’re talking about an election where a swing of a few thousand voters in any of those states could make all the difference,” said Tom Malinowski, a Polish-born former Democratic congressman from New Jersey.

Filip Jotevski, the newly hired point person for networking with diaspora and ethnic communities, said on Wednesday’s Harris organizing call that if Trump returns to power “he’ll sell out Ukraine” after spending years “cozying up to Vladimir Putin.”

Trump was originally scheduled to stop by a Polish American shrine in Pennsylvania on Sunday for the unveiling of a monument to the anticommunist Solidarity movement. However, the visit was cancelled, according to a person familiar with the Republican candidates’ plans who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Trump had been expected to be there at the same time as Polish President Andrzej Duda.

The Polish American community was pushed into the spotlight during the Sept. 10 debate in Philadelphia, when Trump twice refused to say whether he wanted Ukraine to win the war against Russia.

“Negotiate a deal,” Trump said. “Because we have to stop all of these human lives from being destroyed.”

Harris fired back that if Trump had been president when the invasion took place, “Putin would be sitting in Kyiv with his eyes on the rest of Europe.”

“Why don’t you tell the 800,000 Polish Americans right here in Pennsylvania how quickly you would give up,” she said.

Some were surprised yet pleased to hear their community mentioned on the debate stage.

“She knew what she was talking about,” said Tony Pol, a 67-year-old retired fire chief in Erie, Pa., who spent a quarter century helping run a Polish American fraternal organization. “I think that’s the concern of everybody — if Ukraine goes down, then Poland goes next, and that’s very concerning.”

Gosia Dodi, originally from Poland and now an American citizen living in western Michigan, said she “absolutely agrees” with Harris that Russia could target Poland if Ukraine loses. The 61-year-old described Trump’s affection for Putin as “dangerous for Poland.”

“I want the war over, but not the way he’s saying,” she said. “He thinks he can fix everything within one day or something, which is ridiculous.”

After Poland was devastated in the Second World War, the country spent decades as a satellite state of the Soviet Union. A revolution ended communist rule in 1989, paving the way for the country’s modern multiparty democracy.

Poland became a NATO member in 1999. Timothy L. Kuzma, a Pittsburgh resident who leads the Polish Falcons of America, a fraternal organization with 19th-century roots in Chicago’s large Polish immigrant community, said his community’s voters want to see a candidate that’s committed to strong transatlantic bonds.

“If either candidate doesn’t give those kinds of assurances, that’s problematic,” he said. “The candidates, both parties, have to pledge their support to Poland, to Ukraine, to NATO and to the overall security of Eastern Europe — and that’s all of Eastern Europe — and Europe as well.”

Trump has previously suggested withdrawing the United States from NATO, which would devastate the alliance, and he’s demanded that allies increase their defence spending to reduce the burden on Washington. If they didn’t, Trump warned, the U.S. would not uphold its treaty obligations and “would encourage them” — meaning Russia — “to do whatever the hell they want.”

Pete Alibali, 53, emigrated from Soviet-controlled Poland when he was 16, because his mother, a chemist, wanted to advance her career without becoming a communist party member.

A lifelong Democrat who now lives in Madison, Wis., Alibali views Putin as a “predator and a continuation of the Soviets.” Beyond his concern for his native Poland, he worries that tiny Baltic nations could also be threatened if Ukraine is defeated.

Alibali acknowledged that many Polish Americans are conservative, growing up reading Polish newspapers, working in Polish-owned businesses, listening to Polish radio and attending their neighbourhood Catholic church. He described his uncle, who lives in Chicago, as a “very rabid Trump supporter.”

“Trump divided my family,” Alibali said.

Polish American voters have swung back and forth between Democrats and Republicans in presidential elections over the years. They supported Trump in 2016 but backed President Joe Biden in 2020.

Malinowski said Trump’s visit to the shrine “shows that he’s nervous that he might be losing ground among a group of voters that he may have taken for granted.” He also downplayed any suggestion of friendship between Trump and Duda, a right-wing politician who once suggested renaming a military base in his country as Fort Trump.

“I know the Poles are nervous,” he said. “The advice they’re getting is, cultivate Trump just in case. They’re doing it with fingers crossed.”

Tom Kolano, a 55-year-old Republican in suburban Pittsburgh whose ancestors were Polish immigrants, said he’s encouraged by Trump’s relationship with Duda.

“I’m not worried that President Trump will abandon Ukraine,” Kolano said. “Here’s one big reason — I think Poland will have a lot to say about that.”

He pointed out that Duda and his political rival, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, used a visit to Washington in March to press a divided Congress to break its impasse over replenishing funds for Ukraine at a critical moment in the war.

John Laka, 66, of Appleton, Wis., believes that Trump will be stronger overall on foreign policy than Harris.

“I just don’t have a lot of confidence in her as a leader or president,” he said. “She’s just really lacking.”

Laka’s parents immigrated to the United States from Poland, and he’s not sure how much the country is really imperiled by Russia.

“The threat of Putin going further is always going to be there unless there’s that idea of deterrence and right now we’re not deterring going anywhere,” he said.

Ukraine made a new call Saturday on the West to allow it to strike deeper into Russia after a meeting between U.S. and British leaders a day earlier produced no visible shift in their policy on the use of long-range weapons.

The renewed appeal came as Kyiv said Russia launched more drone and artillery attacks into Ukraine overnight.

“Russian terror begins at weapons depots, airfields and military bases inside the Russian Federation,” Ukrainian presidential adviser Andriy Yermak said Saturday. “Permission to strike deep into Russia will speed up the solution.”

Ukrainian officials have repeatedly called on allies to greenlight the use of Western-provided long-range weapons to strike targets deep inside Russian territory. So far, the U.S. has allowed Kyiv to use American-provided weapons only in a limited area inside Russia’s border with Ukraine.

Discussions on allowing long-range strikes were believed to be on the table when U.S. President Joe Biden and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer met in Washington on Friday but no decision was announced immediately.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has been pressing the U.S. and other allies to allow his forces to use Western weapons to target air bases and launch sites farther afield as Russia has stepped up assaults on Ukraine’s electricity grid and utilities before winter.

He did not directly comment on the meeting Saturday morning, but said that more than 70 Russian drones had been launched into Ukraine overnight. The Ukrainian air force later said that 76 Russian drones had been sighted, of which 72 were shot down.

“We need to boost our air defense and long-range capabilities to protect our people,” Zelenskyy wrote on social media. “We are working on this with all of Ukraine’s partners.”

Other overnight attacks saw one person killed by Russian artillery fire as energy infrastructure was targeted in Ukraine’s Sumy region. A 54-year-old driver was killed and seven more people were hospitalized, Ukraine’s Ministry of Energy said.

Another three people died Saturday in a Russian strike on an agricultural enterprise in the front-line town of Huliaipole in the Zaporizhzhia region, Gov. Ivan Fedorov said.

Moscow warns Western nations

Meanwhile, officials in Moscow have continued to make public statements warning that long-range strikes would provoke further escalation between Russia and the West. The remarks are in line with the narrative the Kremlin has promoted since early in the war, accusing NATO countries of de-facto participation in the conflict and threatening a response.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told state news agency Tass on Saturday that the U.S. and British governments were pushing the conflict, which began with Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, toward “poorly controlled escalation.”

Biden on Friday brushed off similar comments by Russian President Vladimir Putin, who said on Thursday that allowing long-range strikes “would mean that NATO countries, the United States and European countries, are at war with Russia.”

Asked what he thought about Putin’s threat, Biden answered, “I don’t think much about Vladimir Putin.”

POWs exchanged

Russian and Ukrainian officials also announced on Saturday a prisoner swap brokered by the United Arab Emirates. It included 206 prisoners on both sides, including Russians captured in Ukraine’s incursion in the Kursk region.

The swap is the eighth of its kind since the beginning of 2024, and puts the total number of POWs exchanged at 1,994. Previous exchanges were also brokered by the UAE.

Both sides released images of soldiers traveling to meet friends and family, with Zelenskyy commenting, “Our people are home.”

Elsewhere, Russia’s Defense Ministry said that 19 Ukrainian drones had been shot down over the country’s Kursk and Belgorod regions.

A woman also died Saturday after a Ukrainian shell hit her home in the border village of Bezlyudovka, Belgorod regional Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov said.

WASHINGTON – Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will travel to Washington next Thursday for talks with U.S. President Joe Biden and Vice-President Kamala Harris as he presses for the U.S. to allow Ukraine to use western-provided weapons to strike deeper into Russia.

“I’m looking forward to hosting my friend President Zelenskyy of Ukraine next week at the White House,” Biden said in message posted on X. “During his visit, I’ll reaffirm America’s commitment to supporting Ukraine as it defends its freedom and independence.”

The Biden administration still is not convinced that it should give Ukraine the authority to launch long-range missiles deeper into Russia, and U.S. officials say they are seeking more detailed information about how Kyiv would use the weapons and how they fit into the broader strategy for the war.

U.S. officials said they have asked Ukraine to spell out more clearly its combat objectives should the administration green light loosening restrictions on long-range weaponry.

Administration officials are concerned that loosening restrictions would have limited impact and come with great risk. Russian President Vladimir Putin last week warned that Russia would be “at war” with the United States and its NATO allies if they allow Ukraine to use the long-range weapons.

U.S. defence officials have repeatedly argued that the long-range missiles are limited in number and that Ukraine already is using its own long-range drones to hit targets farther into Russia.

Zelenskyy is notably meeting separately with Harris, who is looking to succeed Biden.

She last met with the Ukrainian president in July at an international gathering in Switzerland to discuss the war, shortly before Biden announced he was abandoning his bid for re-election and endorsed Harris.

Former U.S. president Donald Trump has repeatedly said that he would move to quickly end the war should he win the November election.

His running mate, Sen. JD Vance, said in a recent interview with the “Shawn Ryan Show” that Trump’s plan would include establishing a “demilitarized zone,” and Ukraine would not reclaim territory that Russia occupies and would agree not to join NATO.

Two people died in a missile attack on the Ukrainian Black Sea port city of Odesa, local officials said, as Moscow and Kyiv exchanged drone and missile attacks.

The Ukrainian air force said Sunday it shot down 10 of the 14 drones and one of the three missiles Russia launched overnight.

Oleh Kiper, Odesa’s regional governor, said the two who died in the suburbs of Odesa on Saturday night were a married couple, and that another person was wounded in the attack.

At least 35 people were wounded Sunday afternoon when a Russian aerial bomb struck a multi-story residential building in Kharkiv, Mayor Ihor Terekhov said, adding that the guided bomb hit the 10th floor of the building, with the fire spreading across four stories.

Meanwhile, the Russian Defense Ministry said it downed 29 Ukrainian drones overnight into Sunday over western and southwestern regions, with no damage caused by the falling debris. It also said another Ukrainian drone was shot down Sunday morning over the western Ryazan region.

While Ukraine and Russia regularly launch overnight drone raids on each other’s territory, Ukrainian officials generally do not confirm or deny attacks within Russia’s borders.

The latest attacks came after Ukraine made a new call Saturday on the West to allow it to use the long-range missiles they have provided to strike targets deep inside Russia, as Ukrainian forces struggle to hold back Russian advances in eastern Ukraine.

So far, the U.S. has allowed Kyiv to use American-provided weapons only in a limited area inside Russia’s border with Ukraine.

Kyiv officials argue the weapons are vital to weaken Russia’s ability to strike Ukraine and force it to move its strike capabilities further from the border.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy took to social media on Sunday to again appeal for a shift in the West’s policy on the use of long-range weapons, noting that Russia had launched “around 30 missiles of various types, more than 800 guided aerial bombs, and nearly 300 strike drones against Ukraine” this week.

“Ukraine needs strong support from our partners to defend lives against Russian terror—air defense, long-range capabilities, support for our warriors. Everything that will help force Russia to end this war,” Zelenskyy wrote on X.

An elderly woman is assisted after a Russian aerial bomb struck a multi-story residential building in Kharkiv, Ukraine, Sunday Sept. 15, 2024.