The night of the war at a glance: Zelenskyj wants to control Western weapons more - Putin blames Kyiv

During his flying visit to Tehran, Kremlin chief Putin warns Europe of a further fall in gas supplies.

The night of the war at a glance: Zelenskyj wants to control Western weapons more - Putin blames Kyiv

During his flying visit to Tehran, Kremlin chief Putin warns Europe of a further fall in gas supplies. Meanwhile, in the Donbass, his troops continue to push forward and are closing in on the nearest Ukrainian line of defense. After the restructuring of the secret service, President Zelenskyj now wants to have the use of Western weapons monitored by a parliamentary committee.

Putin threatens further gas restrictions

During his visit to Iran, Russian President Vladimir Putin drew attention to the fact that gas supplies via Nord Stream 1 could fall further at the end of July. If Russia doesn't get back the turbine repaired in Canada, the pipeline's daily throughput capacity threatens to drop significantly, he said, according to Tass. "We still have a finished route - that's Nord Stream 2. We can put it into operation," Putin offered at the same time.

The Nord Stream 1 pipeline - the most important gas pipeline from Russia to Germany - was put into operation in 2011 and has a capacity of around 55 billion cubic meters per year. Since June, however, Russia's state energy giant Gazprom has reduced gas deliveries to Germany by more than half the daily maximum to 67 million cubic meters. This was justified with the missing turbine from Siemens Energy. The pipeline, which is more than 1,200 kilometers long, is currently completely shut down for annual maintenance work - until Thursday as planned. Putin justified the possible renewed throttling with another unit that was in need of repair.

Putin: Kyiv has no interest in a peace solution

He accused Ukraine of not being interested in a peace solution. At the negotiations in Istanbul at the end of March, both sides "actually reached an agreement, it just had to be signed," said Putin. Since then, however, Kyiv has refused to implement the solution that was reached. During the March negotiations, both sides reached rapprochement on the issue of Ukraine's non-aligned status. However, Russia is also insisting that Ukraine recognize Crimea, which Moscow has annexed since 2014, as Russian and cede the Donetsk and Luhansk regions.

Russians advance further in Donbass

At the front, meanwhile, fighting in Ukraine continues uninterrupted. Fighting is taking place in the south and east of the country. Neither of the two parties to the conflict was able to achieve strategically important advances. However, according to Ukrainian information, the Russian armed forces made further gains in the fighting for the Donbass in eastern Ukraine.

"The enemy carried out an storm in the Pokrovske area, was partially successful and is establishing itself on the southern outskirts of the village," the Ukrainian general staff said in its situation report on Tuesday evening. Pokrovske is a settlement ten kilometers east of the important transport junction of Bakhmut in the Donetsk region. The Siwersk-Soledar-Bakhmut line is considered to be Ukraine's next line of defense in front of the conurbation around the cities of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk.

Commission to control western weapons

President Zelenskyy has announced the creation of a new parliamentary commission in Ukraine to monitor the use of western weapons. In a video speech, Zelensky emphasized that there were no allegations of improper use of weapons from the West. "But in order to eliminate all manipulations by Russian propagandists and those who help them in Ukraine or elsewhere, such an additional parliamentary control instrument will be established," he said.

After the recent dismissals of the head of the secret service and other executives in the security organs, Zelenskyj wants to push ahead with the realignment of these agencies. He appointed new heads of the SBU secret service in five regions and reported on the dismissal of another SBU deputy head. Most recently, there had been criticism of possible secret betrayal in the authorities and ongoing corruption.

That's going to be important today

You can read all further developments in our live ticker on the Ukraine war.