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(NEW YORK) — As Russia continues its nearly 16-month-long invasion of neighboring Ukraine, political turmoil has erupted in Moscow while Kyiv tries to take back territory.

A feud between Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the Russian paramilitary organization Wagner Group, and Russia’s top military brass escalated as Prigozhin’s forces left the front line in Ukraine and marched across the border to seize a key Russian city. They then marched north toward Russia’s capital, seemingly unopposed, before turning around just hours later. The short-lived rebellion was described by international observers as the most significant challenge to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s authority in his more than 20 years of rule.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian troops are in the early stages of a counteroffensive to reclaim the almost one-fifth of Ukraine’s territory that is under Russian control.

Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern:

Jul 01, 8:39 PM EDT
Ukraine holds disaster drills amid fears Russia could sabotage Zaporizhzhia plant

Amid fears Russia might blow up the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, Ukraine is holding drills to prepare emergency services with how to deal with a potential radioactive disaster.

ABC News was invited to the drills in the city of Zaporizhzhia this week, about 30 miles from the plant, where firefighters in hazmat gear simulated decontaminating people from radiation during an evacuation.

Emergency workers demonstrated scanning civilians with Geiger counters as they disembarked buses, stripping some civilians and hosing them with water as they lay on stretchers. Firefighters in yellow suits sprayed down vehicles and moved them through a large washer system rigged up between fire trucks.

This week, Ukraine’s chief of military intelligence, Kyrylo Budanov, claimed Russia had now completed preparation to potentially sabotage the plant if it chooses.

-ABC News’ Patrick Reevell

Jul 01, 4:46 PM EDT
CIA director says mutiny shows ‘corrosive effect’ of Putin’s war

CIA Director Bill Burns said Yevgeny Prigozhin’s mutiny showed the “corrosive effect” of President Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine during remarks in England on Saturday.

“It is striking that Prigozhin preceded his actions with a scathing indictment of the Kremlin’s mendacious rationale for its invasion of Ukraine, and of the Russian military leadership’s conduct of the war,” Burns said during a lecture to Britain’s Ditchley Foundation. “The impact of those words and those actions will play out for some time, a vivid reminder of the corrosive effect of Putin’s war on his own society and his own regime.”

Burns, who served as U.S. ambassador to Russia from 2005 to 2008, also noted how Russian disaffection will gnaw away at the Kremlin and that the CIA is taking this opportunity to step up its recruitment efforts in Russia.

“Disaffection with the war will continue to gnaw away at the Russian leadership, beneath the steady diet of state propaganda and practiced repression,” Burns said. “That disaffection creates a once-in-a generation opportunity for us at CIA, at our core a human intelligence service. We’re not letting it go to waste.”

-ABC News’ Cindy Smith

Jun 30, 5:45 PM EDT
Too early to tell impact of mutiny on Putin: Gen. Milley

Gen. Mark Milley, the U.S. military’s top general, told reporters Friday that it’s likely too early to tell the impact of the Wagner Group mutiny on Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“We want to know the answer to that question,” Milley said when asked at the National Press Club if Yevgeny Prigozhin’s mutiny had left Putin weakened. “I don’t think we have evidence, conclusive evidence, either way, yet too early to tell.”

Milley acknowledged that Ukraine’s counteroffensive is making steady progress, but moving slowly — something he said was not surprising given how tough of a fight it is.

“At the end of the day, Ukrainian soldiers are assaulting through minefields and in the trenches, and this is literally a fight for their life. So yes, sure, it goes a little slow, but that is part of the nature of war,” Milley said.

He also noted that the U.S. is considering sending cluster munitions to Ukraine, though no decision has been made.

-ABC News’ Luis Martinez

Jun 29, 4:36 PM EDT
Russian Gen. Surovikin detained, US official says

Russian Gen. Sergei Surovikin has apparently been detained, according to a U.S. official. Other details about his status are unclear.

The development follows reports from a senior U.S. official on Wednesday that Surovikin had engaged in discussions with Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin about his plans to mutiny.

Prigozhin is now exiled in Belarus.

-ABC News’ Luis Martinez

Jun 29, 2:56 PM EDT
Pence makes surprise trip to Ukraine

Former Vice President Mike Pence made a surprise trip to Ukraine on Thursday, projecting solidarity against Russia in a way, so far, unmatched by his Republican competitors in the 2024 presidential campaign.

“As I made clear to President [Volodymyr] Zelenskyy today, when I return home, whatever the future holds for me and my family, we’re gonna stand for freedom,” Pence told reporters. “And I’ll do my part to make sure that America continues to stand for the courageous fighters here in Ukraine that are fighting to reclaim their freedom.”

Pence visited the sites of atrocities in the early phase of the war, in Irpin and Bucha, among other stops, before meeting with Zelenskyy inside the presidential palace in the capital of Kyiv.

-ABC News’ Libby Cathey and Guy Davies

Jun 29, 2:41 PM EDT
Ukraine sees ‘largest deterioration’ of peace worldwide: Report

Ukraine recorded the “largest deterioration” of peace worldwide in the latest global peace report from the international think tank Institute for Economics & Peace.

“The war in Ukraine had a significant impact on global peacefulness, with Ukraine and Russia having the largest and fifth largest deteriorations in peacefulness respectively,” the report stated.

Since last year’s report, Ukraine fell 14 places to 157th among the 163 countries covered by the report. Due to the conflict, 65% of men in Ukraine ages 20-24 have fled the country or died, according to the report.

-ABC News’ Emma Ogao

Jun 29, 12:45 AM EDT
Suspect accused of helping Russia direct missile strike arrested

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced Wednesday the Security Service of Ukraine and the police arrested a suspect who they say coordinated with Russian forces in Tuesday’s missile attack on Kramatorsk, a city in the Donetsk region.

The missiles struck a popular pizzeria and killed 12 people, including three children. More than 60 people were injured, the president said in a public address.

The unidentified “spotter” was charged with treason, according to Zelenskyy.

“Anyone in the world who does not understand that one cannot be an accomplice of a terrorist state must be held accountable by the entire international community,” he said.

-ABC News’ Will Gretsky

Jun 27, 10:56 PM EDT
Prigozhin thought he would have help from Russian military: Senior US official

A senior U.S. official tells ABC News that Yevgeny Prigozhin thought he would have help from the Russian military.

Both former Russian military officers and some others in Moscow had conversations with Prigozhin before he started his march, the official said.

The U.S. doesn’t believe Russian President Vladimir Putin realized this beforehand, and the officers sided with Putin in the end, the official said.

According to the official, Prigozhin was shocked he didn’t have support.

-ABC News’ Martha Raddatz

Jun 27, 9:43 PM EDT
Russian missiles strike Donetsk city

Two Russian missiles struck Kramatorsk, a city in Ukraine’s Donetsk region, killing at least four people, according to officials.

At least 47 people were injured in the attack, but the death and injury toll could rise.

One of the deceased victims was a 15-year-old and one of the wounded victims was a child under a year-old, officials said.

One missile struck an eatery downtown and the other one hit the outskirts of the city, Andriy Yermak the head of the Ukrainian Presidential Office said.

A restaurant and a hotel were badly damaged as a result of the strikes, according to officials.

Crews continued to dig through the rubble to search for victims throughout the evening.

“Each such manifestation of terror proves over and over again to us and to the whole world that Russia deserves only one thing as a result of everything it has done – defeat and a tribunal, fair and legal trials against all Russian murderers and terrorists,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a statement.

-ABC News’ Fidel Pavlenko and Ellie Kaufman

Jun 27, 5:55 PM EDT
Russian missiles strike Donetsk city

Two Russian missiles struck Kramatorsk, a city in Ukraine’s Donetsk region, killing at least four people, according to officials.

At least 47 people were injured in the attack, but the death and injury toll could rise.

One of the deceased victims was a 15-year-old and one of the wounded victims was a child under a year-old, officials said.

One missile struck an eatery downtown and the other one hit the outskirts of the city, Andriy Yermak the head of the Ukrainian Presidential Office said.

A restaurant and a hotel were badly damaged as a result of the strikes, according to officials.

Crews continued to dig through the rubble to search for victims throughout the evening.

“Each such manifestation of terror proves over and over again to us and to the whole world that Russia deserves only one thing as a result of everything it has done – defeat and a tribunal, fair and legal trials against all Russian murderers and terrorists,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a statement.

-ABC News’ Fidel Pavlenko and Ellie Kaufman

Jun 27, 2:33 PM EDT
US sanctions alleged illicit gold companies funding Wagner Group

The U.S. announced additional sanctions targeting the Wagner Group, specifically going after gold companies and a Russian man it says are illicitly funding the Wagner Group’s operations in Ukraine and Africa.

Central African Republic based companies Midas Resources SARLU and Diamville SAU, Dubai based company Industrial Resources General Trading and Russia based company Limited Liability Company, re connected to Wagner’s leader Yevgeny Prigozhin, who is already subject to U.S. sanctions along with numerous other entities linked to the Wagner Group, according to the Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control.

Andrey Nikolayevich Ivanov, a Russian national, and an executive in the Wagner Group, allegedly worked closely with Prigozhin’s entity Africa Politology and senior Malian government officials on weapons deals, mining concerns, and other Wagner Group activities in Mali, OFAC said.

“The Wagner Group funds its brutal operations in part by exploiting natural resources in countries like the Central African Republic and Mali,” Brian Nelson, the U.S. under secretary of the treasury for terrorism and financial intelligence, said in a written statement. “The United States will continue to target the Wagner Group’s revenue streams to degrade its expansion and violence in Africa, Ukraine, and anywhere else.”

-ABC News’ Ben Gittleson

Jun 27, 2:19 PM EDT
Ukraine has recaptured 300 sq km so far: UK minister

Ukraine has recaptured approximately 300 square kilometers during the summer counteroffensive so far, United Kingdom Defense Secretary Ben Wallace said Tuesday.

The gains represent more territory than Russia seized during its winter offensive in 2022, Wallace told Parliament.

-ABC News’ Ellie Kaufman

Jun 27, 1:31 PM EDT
Belarus president talks about Wagner negotiations

Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko provided more details about his alleged role in negotiations between Wager Group leader’s Yevgeny Prigozhin and Russian President Vladimir Putin following the PMC’s rebellion.

Lukashenko claimed Prigozhin abandoned his demands, including the resignation of Shoigu, after they talked.

“[Prigozhin] told me ‘Alexander Grigoryevich, I will not demand from the president that he give up Shoigu and Gerasimov, and I will not even ask for a meeting,’ I say, ‘Well, that’s good. This is a very good move,'” Lukashenko claimed.

Lukashenko said that Wagner forces could join the Belarusian army but said that he won’t built camps for Wagner’s troops in his country.

“We don’t need to open any Wagner recruitment points,” he said.

-ABC News’ Victoria Beaule

Jun 27, 12:22 PM EDT
Belarus president says Prigozhin arrived in the country Tuesday

Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko said on state media Tuesday that Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin arrived in his country earlier in the day.

Lukashenko claimed on state media that “security guarantees” Russian President Vladimir Putin promised to Prigozhin were provided.

“Yes, indeed, he is in Belarus today. As I promised, if you want to stay with us for a while and so on, we will help you,” Lukashenko said.

-ABC News’ Victoria Beaule and Tanya Stukalova

Jun 27, 11:10 AM EDT
Ukraine makes gain on occupied bank across from Kherson

Ukrainian troops have reportedly seized a small village on the Russian-occupied eastern bank of Dneipr after crossing the river from the liberated city of Kherson, according to Russian accounts on Tuesday.

A small Ukrainian force has managed to dig in to the village of Dachi after making a landing there a few days ago and are trying to expand the beachhead. Ukrainian troops in small boats crossed the river and landed at the base of the ruined Antonivskiy Bridge, which they destroyed last year.

Russian military bloggers reported very heavy fighting on Tuesday, saying Russian airborne units have been trying unsuccessfully to dislodge the Ukrainians for the past four days. Russian aviation and heavy artillery have been firing on the Ukrainian position.

So far, the Russian side claims some 70 Ukrainian soldiers are dug in, covered by intense artillery fire from across the river. The Russian accounts say Ukraine is trying to move reinforcements across. Video released by Ukraine also shows a Russian APC being destroyed in the village of Oleshkjy, further south, indicating the bank south of Kherson is now contested.

Ukrainian troops have also managed to advance and liberate Rivnopil, a village on the Zaporozhzhia front, breaking through after more than two weeks of fighting. It’s notable because the Russians had been fighting hard to hold it.

Taken together the advance there, the landing in Kherson and advances near Bakhmut are small signs the Ukrainian counteroffensive may be starting to pick up steam and the Russians are coming under growing pressure.

-ABC News’ Patrick Reevell

Jun 27, 6:39 AM EDT
Military stopped ‘civil war,’ Putin says

The Russian military and security forces stopped what could have become a “civil war,” President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday.

“The Russian military in a difficult hour for the country stood in the way of turmoil, the result of which would be chaos,” Putin said at an event for military units, adding that “the military and law enforcement officers of the Russian Federation actually stopped the civil war.”

Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, who the Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin’s had sought to have replaced, was present at Tuesday’s ceremony.

Jun 27, 5:15 AM EDT
Belarus was ‘combat’ ready during rebellion, president says

The military in Belarus was ordered to “full combat readiness” during the Wagner Group’s rebellion in neighboring Russia, President Alexander Lukashenko said.

Lukashenko, a longtime ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, was said to have helped broker a deal to halt the choatic rebellion by Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin.

“I will not hide, it was painful to watch the events that took place in the south of Russia,” Lukashenko said Tuesday during brief remarks before a military presentation. “Not only me. Many of our citizens took them to heart. Because the fatherland is one.”

The fatherland comment appeared to allude to Lukashenko’s longstanding belief that Russia and Belarus share a special bond.

He added, “I gave all orders to bring the army to full combat readiness.”

Jun 27, 5:01 AM EDT
Russia closes case against Wagner Group leader

The Russian Federal Security Service on Tuesday dropped the criminal case investigating the rebellion by Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin and his forces.

The FSB said it closed the case because it has been established that participants stopped actions directly aimed at committing a crime.

Jun 26, 6:28 PM EDT
US to announce 500M in military aid to Ukraine, official says

The U.S. will announce another military aid package for Ukraine Tuesday, a U.S. official told ABC News.

The $500 million aid package will include 30 Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicles, 25 Stryker armored vehicles, missiles for the HIMARS system and the Patriot air defense system, TOW missiles, Javelins and more ammunition for artillery, according to the official.

This will be the 41st aid package under the Presidential Drawdown Authority that allows the transfer of weapons from U.S. military stockpiles to Ukraine.

-ABC News’ Luis Martinez

Jun 26, 3:42 PM EDT
Putin expresses defiance against attempted Wagner rebellion

Russian President Vladimir Putin offered his first public remarks after the Wagner Group attempted to march to Moscow and overthrow the government.

In a pre-recorded video statement, Putin thanked the Russians for their endurance, solidarity and patriotism during the ordeal and claimed that any blackmail attempt was doomed to fail.

Putin said an armed rebellion would have been suppressed.

“The organizers of the rebellion, betraying their country, their people, betrayed those who were drawn into the crime. They lied to them, pushed them to death, under fire, to shoot at their own,” Putin said.

The Russian president noted that the majority of Wagner fighters were “patriots.”

“I thank those soldiers and commanders of the Wagner Group who made the only right decision,” Putin said. “They did not go to fratricidal bloodshed, they stopped at the last line.”

Putin offered Wagner Group members who participated in the rebellion the option of joining the defense ministry or other law enforcement agencies or returning home.

-ABC News’ Ellie Kaufman, Natalia Shumskaia, Tanya Stukalova and Anastasia Bagaeva

Jun 26, 12:52 PM EDT
Biden says US, NATO not involved in Wagner rebellion

President Joe Biden spoke out addressed the Wagner Group’s actions over the weekend.

He said the U.S. and its allies convened on Friday when the rebellion began.

“They agreed with me that we had to make sure we gave Putin no excuse, let me emphasize, gave Putin no excuse to blame this on the West or to blame this on NATO,” Biden said at a news conference at the White House.

The president added that the incident was “part of a struggle within the Russian system.”

-ABC News’ Alexandra Hutzler

Jun 26, 12:44 PM EDT
European leaders respond to Wagner attempted rebellion

The European Union Foreign Affairs Council met Monday and discussed the attempted rebellion by the Wagner paramilitary group over the weekend.

Josep Borrell, the European Union High Representative for Foreign Affairs, told reporters at a news conference after the meeting that “the situation remains complex and unpredictable” and 27 EU states are remaining vigilant.

U.K. Foreign Minister James Cleverly released a statement Monday claiming the “Russian government’s lies have been exposed by one of President Putin’s own henchmen.”

“Prigozhin’s rebellion is an unprecedented challenge to President Putin’s authority, and it is clear that cracks are emerging in the Russian support for the war,” he said.

-ABC News’ Ellie Kaufman

Jun 26, 12:18 PM EDT
‘We had no goal of overthrowing’ the government: Prigozhin

Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin released an 11-minute recording Monday explaining why his troops reversed course on their campaign against Moscow over the weekend.

Prigozhin said the purpose of the “march” was to prevent losses of his troops “and to bring justice to all persons who, through their unprofessional actions, made a huge number of mistakes during” the war in Ukraine.

“We had no goal of overthrowing the regime,” he added, referring to Putin’s government.

Prigozhin said that the march escalated after their convoy was hit by a missile attack from Russian forces.

Prigozhin said that the marched stopped when his troops approached “Moscow deployed artillery.”

“We did not want to shed Russian blood. We went to demonstrate our protest and not to overthrow the government in the country,” he said.

He claimed that several of his troops were wounded and two were killed.

-ABC News’ Ellie Kaufman, Natalia Shumskaia and Tanya Stukalova

Jun 26, 5:47 AM EDT
Ukrainian forces appear to cross river into occupied Kherson

The Ukrainian military has landed troops on the Russian-held eastern bank of the Dnipro River across from the city of Kherson, according to Russian reports.

Media posted online by pro-Russian accounts suggested small boatloads of Ukrainian soldiers have managed to establish a small beachhead at the foot of the destroyed Antonivskiy Road Bridge that spanned the river before Ukraine brought it down last year.

The size of the Ukrainian force on the bank is unclear, but Russian accounts suggested it was relatively small.

Some Russian accounts posted dramatic video showing fighting on the eastern bank, including what appears to be a Russian armored vehicle firing intensively at Ukrainian soldiers as it recovers Russian wounded.

The video was undated but Russian reports suggested around several dozen Ukrainian troops landed on June 24 and Russian airborne units have been trying to dislodge them since.

Another video shows a small boat carrying perhaps a dozen Ukrainian soldiers landing by the ruined bridge, coming under shell fire.

The Russian military blogger account, Two Majors, reported a small group of Ukrainian soldiers had succeeded in digging in around the bridge. It noted Russian forces had been forced to pull back to a distance from the bank because their positions had been flooded after the Kakhovka dam was blown up earlier this month.

Russian military bloggers said Russian aircraft and artillery were firing on the Ukrainians Monday.

If Ukraine is able to keep hold of its foothold, it will put further pressure on Russia’s forces in the south, already battling to hold back Ukraine’s counteroffensive on the Zaporizhzhia front.

-ABC News’ Patrick Reevell

Jun 25, 2:05 PM EDT
Exiled Russian oligarch supports Russian mercenary group’s rebellion

In the wake of Saturday’s short-lived attempted rebellion against the Kremlin by the Wagner private military company, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, an exiled oligarch considered one of Putin’s best-known opponents, told ABC News he supports the mutiny and encourages Russians to back the leader of the mercenary group.

Once Russia’s richest man, Khodorkovsky, a Putin opposition activist, spent 10 years imprisoned after he challenged Putin, his case now considered a foundational moment for Putin’s regime.

When Wagner founder Yevgeny Prigozhin and his fighters marched on Moscow Saturday before making a sudden about-face, Khodorkovsky was notable among Russia’s pro-democracy opposition in calling on people to support Prigozhin, arguing that allowing him to remove Putin would create an opportunity for the democrats.

Khodorkovsky told ABC News he believed Prigozhin’s actions were a real coup attempt and that it had “seriously undermined” Putin’s power. He predicted that similar opportunities to collapse the regime will be launched soon.

“The blow to Putin’s reputation, to the authorities’ reputation, was absolutely fantastical,” Khodorkovsky said. “Putin’s government today is, without a doubt, strongly undermined by what happened — his authority, his ability to control the security services is seriously undermined.”

Khodorkovsky said Prigozhin’s march on Moscow had undermined Putin’s popularity, showing neither ordinary Russians nor the security services were prepared to act to protect him.

“Along the entire route of Wagner’s columns, no one in any way tried to hinder him (Prigozhin). Even the security forces did not try to stop him,” Khodorkovsky said. “It showed that, in fact, inside the country, Putin has an absolute void.”

Khodorkovsky said he did not support Prigozhin himself — considering him a “war criminal” — but that the democratic opposition should have sought to help him overthrow Putin, and then taken power from him after.

Khodorkovsky criticized other parts of the anti-Kremlin opposition who attacked him for calling on people to assist Prigozhin, saying he believed the opposition had “slept through” the opportunity and suggesting it should have sought to stage a rebellion in Moscow at the same time.

“There will definitely now be more such opportunities because of Putin’s weakening. But the next time we need to simply be more ready,” said Khodorkovsky, who is living in exile in England. “If an uprising had started in Moscow to meet Prigozhin then a situation could have developed quite differently.

-ABC News’ Patrick Reevell

Jun 24, 6:53 PM EDT
US official says it’s a ‘mystery’ why Prigozhin stopped march to Moscow

A senior U.S. official says it is a mystery as to why Yevgeny Prigozhin stopped his march to Moscow given that he was seemingly in a dominant position.

The official said he was greeted as a hero in Rostov-on-Don. However, the senior official told ABC News that Prigozhin is in an “emotional state,” and perhaps did it because he thought this would destroy Russia, or because he glimpsed his own end. It is impossible to tell whether Prigozhin thinks Russian President Vladimir Putin will actually honor their deal which included allowing Wagner group soldiers to be folded into the Russian military.

The official said that Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko was very effective, telling Prigozhin and Putin that this was all a misunderstanding and that they are both patriots and aligned for the same goals.

Putin is said to be completely shocked by how fast Wagner Group moved through Russia. For now, he is just trying to secure his position. He does not want to be seen negotiating over his defense minister, but the official says the U.S. believes concessions were made over Sergei Shoigu’s future as well as others.

-ABC News’ Martha Raddatz

Jun 25, 3:56 AM EDT
Moscow highway restrictions remain, Russian media reports

Travel restrictions remained in place on Sunday on the major M-4 highway near Moscow, according to Russia’s state-run media.

“According to the previously issued regional decisions, traffic restrictions remain in force on the M-4 Don highway near the Moscow Region and the Tula Region,” the federal road agency said, according to TASS.

The security checkpoints had been put in place Saturday as a column of Wagner Group forces traveled toward Moscow. Roadblocks in southern Russia, including in Rostov-on-Don and the Krasnodar Region, were reportedly lifted.

“All previously imposed restrictions on highways have been lifted,” TASS reported, citing a branch of the Russian Interior Ministry.

-ABC News’ KJ Edelman

Jun 24, 10:20 PM EDT
‘Gang of 8’ briefed about Wagner Group movements

Senior congressional leaders were briefed about the ongoing situation in Russia, according to a congressional aide.

U.S. intelligence officials told the so-called “Gang of Eight” — the top Republicans and Democrats currently in congressional leadership– in recent days about potentially concerning movements of Wagner Group forces and equipment build-ups near Russia. However, it was unclear to U.S. intelligence what was going to happen and when.

-ABC News’ Trish Turner

Jun 24, 5:18 PM EDT
Blinken holds call with Turkish counterpart for ‘ongoing situation in Russia’

Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke Saturday with Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan to discuss the ongoing situation in Russia.

“Secretary Blinken reiterated that U.S. support for Ukraine will not change. The United States will stay in close coordination with Allies and partners as the situation develops,” spokesperson Matthew Miller said.

Blinken also spoke with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba on Saturday to discuss the situation in Russia, Miller said. Blinken reiterated that support by the U.S. for Ukraine will not change.

The U.S. will stay in close coordination with Ukraine as the situation develops.

-ABC News Shannon K. Crawford

Jun 24, 4:45 PM EDT
Wagner chief will not be prosecuted, Kremlin says

Yevgeny Prigozhin will go to Belarus to ease tensions and the fighters of PMC Wagner Group who took part in the so-called “campaign” against Moscow will not be prosecuted, the Kremlin said Saturday evening.

The rest will be able to sign a contract with the Ministry of Defense, the President of the Russian Federation Dmitry Peskov told reporters.

“In the end, we managed to resolve this situation without further losses, without raising the level of tension,” Peskov said.

“An agreement was reached that PMC Wagner would return to their camps,” he added.

Jun 24, 2:55 PM EDT
Wagner Group chief orders mercenaries to halt march on Moscow

The Wagner Group’s chief Yevgeny Prigozhin said he has ordered his mercenaries to halt their march on Moscow and return to their field camps, saying he wants to avoid shedding Russian blood.

Prigozhin made the announcement in an audio message posted on his Telegram channel.

Russian state media has shown Wagner fighters packing up and reportedly leaving Rostov.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has called Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko and thanked him for his efforts de-escalating the situation.

Jun 24, 1:12 PM EDT
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff cancels trip to Israel, Jordan due to situation in Russia

Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has canceled his planned trip to Israel and Jordan due to the situation in Russia. The trip was to have begun Saturday.

Milley also spoke with his Ukrainian counterpart, Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces Gen. Valerii Zaluzhnyi.

“They discussed the unprovoked and ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine and exchanged perspectives and assessments. The Chairman reaffirmed unwavering support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” according to Joint Staff spokesperson Col. Dave Butler.

The Pentagon said Department of Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin is monitoring the ongoing situation in Russia and will continue to be briefed on any significant developments.

Jun 24, 12:47 PM EDT
Moscow suspends schools, events until July 1

Andrey Vorobyov, the governor of the Moscow region, has suspended mass events outdoors and at educational institutions until July 1.

Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin urged residents to refrain from traveling around the city. Monday was also declared a non-working day for the city. Sobyanin said that a counter-terrorism regime was declared in Moscow and that the situation was difficult.

Jun 24, 12:34 PM EDT
Biden speaks with leaders of France, Germany, UK about ‘situation in Russia’

President Joe Biden spoke with French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak about the developments in Russia.

Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris were also briefed by their national security team on the developments in Russia and will continue to receive updates throughout the day, the White House said Saturday.

Jun 24, 10:11 AM EDT
Wagner troop column 300 miles south of Moscow, Russian media says

The governor of the Lipetsk region, which is about 300 miles south of Moscow, said a column of Wagner troops has been spotted in the region, Russian state media reports.

Jun 24, 9:15 AM EDT
What is the Wagner Group?

The Wagner Group is a private military organization run by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a longtime ally of Russian leader Vladimir Putin, with tens of thousands of fighters, according to U.S. officials.

Earlier this year, the U.S. labeled the group a “significant transnational criminal organization” and levied new sanctions, while human rights observers this week said they suspected Wagner fighters were linked to the mass killing of people in Mali last year.

Government reports, statements from U.S. officials and insights from experts, as well as other sources, shed light on the Wagner group’s history and goals, its alleged wrongdoings and its importance to Russia — in Ukraine and elsewhere in the world.

Jun 24, 7:24 AM EDT
NATO monitoring Russian situation, official says

A NATO representative said the alliance was watching what was happening in Russia on Saturday.

“We are monitoring the situation,” spokesperson Oana Lungescu said.

Jun 24, 6:31 AM EDT
‘Operational combat’ underway north of Rostov, official says

A governor of the Voronezh region, about 300 miles south of Moscow, says Russia’s armed forces are conducting “operational combat operations” there as part of “counter terrorism operation.”

Earlier the region’s government reported a column of Wagner Group fighters was moving through the region, an area between Rostov-on-Don and Moscow.

“In the bounds of the counterterrorist operation on the territory of the Voronezh region, the armed forces of the Russian Federation are conducting necessary operational combat operations,” the official said. “We will inform further about the development of the situation.”

Jun 24, 6:03 AM EDT
Russia in ‘so much chaos that no lie can hide it,’ Zelenskyy says

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia appeared to be suffering “full-scale weakness” after the Wagner Group mercenaries said they’d taken hold of a key Russian city.

“Russia used propaganda to mask its weakness and the stupidity of its government. And now there is so much chaos that no lie can hide it,” he said on Twitter.

Jun 24, 5:47 AM EDT
Prigozhin responds to Putin, says Wagner not going to surrender

The Wagner Group’s Yevgeny Prigozhin responded to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s calling him a “traitor,” by saying he will not surrender or turn back.

“Putin was deeply mistaken about the betrayal. We are patriots of our homeland, we fought and are fighting,” Prighozin said in an audio message. “No one is going to turn around at the request of the president, the FSB or anyone else, because we do not want the country to live longer in corruption, deception and bureaucracy.”

Prigozhin accused Russia’s military of targeting a Wagner column with helicopters and jets.

Jun 24, 5:37 AM EDT
Chechen leader backs Putin, says forces moving into ‘zones of tension’

The powerful head of Chechnya, the semi-independent Russian region, Ramzan Kadyrov, said on Saturday he supported President Vladimir Putin.

Kadyrov saiud he fully backs Putin and called Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin’s actions “treacherous.”

Kadyrov has tens of thousands of heavily armed fighters. He said his forces are already moving to “zones of tension.”

It raises prospect of Chechen forces fighting with Wagner Group troops.

Kadyrov has previously been friendly with Prigozhin — his coming out in support of Putin is a boost for Putin, but also raises prospect of serious clashes in Russia.

Jun 24, 5:27 AM EDT
Next 48 hours ‘will define’ Russia, Zelenskyy advisor says

Russian leaders are “now choosing which side they are on,” an advisor to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Saturday.

“The next 48 hours will define the new status of Russia,” Mykhailo Podolyak said on Twitter. “Either a full-fledged Civil War, or a negotiated Transit of Power, or a temporary respite before the next phase of the downfall of the Putin regime.”

He added, “A deafening ‘elite’ silence is in Russia so far…”

Jun 24, 3:52 AM EDT
Uprising ‘significant challenge’ to Russian state, UK says

Members of the mercenary Wagner Group have begun moving north “almost certainly aiming to get to Moscow,” in what amounts to the “most significant challenge to the Russian state in recent times,” the U.K. Ministry of Defense said on Saturday.

“Over the coming hours, the loyalty of Russia’s security forces, and especially the Russian National Guard, will be key to how the crisis plays out,” the ministry said on Twitter.

Jun 24, 3:25 AM EDT
Putin: Wagner Group moves are ‘stab in the back’

Russian President Vladimir Putin said moves taken by Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin, a longtime ally, to bring his troops into a key Russian city amounted to a “stab in the back.”

Putin didn’t mention Prigozhin by name, but said that “necessary orders have been given” to defend Russia in a recorded address aired on Russian television on Saturday.

“Actions that divide our unity are in essence defeatism before one’s own people,” he said. “This is a stab in the back of our country and our people.”

Jun 24, 3:12 AM EDT
Kremlin briefs Putin on ‘attempted armed rebellion’

Russian President Vladimir Putin has been briefed by the country’s security agencies about what was referred to as an “attempted armed rebellion,” according to Russia’s state-run media.

The late-night statement from Putin’s spokesman suggested that the Kremlin considered Wagner Group’s move into Rostov-on-Don, a key Russian city close to the border with Ukraine, to be a “rebellion.”

Wagner’s founder Yevgeny Prigozhin in an audio message on Friday claimed his forces would now punish Russia’s defense minister and chief of general staff, telling other units to stand down and not offer resistance.

“Special services, law enforcement agencies, namely the Ministry of Defense, the FSB, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Rosgvardiya, in round-the-clock mode, constantly report to the president on the measures taken in the context of the implementation of the instructions previously given to him,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Saturday.

Jun 24, 2:42 AM EDT
Wagner Group claims control over Rostov military facilities, airport

Yevgeny Prigozhin, leader of the Wagner Group, said on Saturday that the headquarters of the Southern Military District and all military facilities in Rostov-on-Don were under his control.

Prigozhin in a video demanded that Kremlin bring him Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov and Sergei Shoigu.

He also threatened in the video that he would go to Moscow.

“We will destroy anyone who stands in our way,” he said in one of a series of video and audio recordings posted on social media.

He added, “We are moving forward and will go until the end.”

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(PARIS) — Riots erupted for a fourth night across France over the fatal police shooting of 17-year-old Nahel M., who was laid to rest on Saturday.

More than 1,300 people were arrested overnight throughout the country, according to the French Ministry of the Interior, as cars and buildings were set ablaze and stores looted. The damage was widespread, from Paris to Marseille and Lyon, with about 2,500 fires set, officials said.

Dozens of police officers and firefighters were injured overnight, as some 45,000 police officers were deployed in France to quell potential violence, officials said. It’s unclear how many protesters were injured.

French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin told reporters that 45,000 police and gendarmes will again be mobilized Saturday evening.

The violent unrest in France kicked off after the teen was shot and killed by a police officer during a traffic check in the northwestern Paris suburb Nanterre on Tuesday morning.

Lawyers for the victim’s family, who have roots in Algeria, identified him as Nahel M. A funeral for Nahel was held on Saturday in Nanterre. Mourners gathered at a mosque and on the street outside the cemetery to pay their respects.

Amid the unrest, the French government canceled large-scale events around the country on Friday. French President Emmanuel Macron appealed to parents to keep their children at home, noting that many of the protesters are young people.

On Saturday, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier’s office said Macron called to postpone what would have been the first state visit by a French president to Germany in nearly two dozen years, The Associated Press reported.

The officer who shot and killed the teen has been detained on suspicion of voluntary homicide amid an ongoing investigation into the incident, according to the local prosecutor’s office.

Nanterre prosecutor Pascal Prache said Thursday that the officer did not meet the requirements to discharge his weapon and will remain in custody awaiting trial.

France’s Inspectorate General of the National Police, which investigates allegations of police misconduct, is also conducting a probe into the fatal shooting.

Nahel’s family’s lawyers told ABC News they filed complaints against the officer accused of pulling the trigger and another officer who was at the scene.

Macron and Darmanin have both repeatedly called for “calm” as authorities investigate the teen’s death.

France’s national football team – including international star Kylian Mbappé — has also called for an end to the violence. “Many of us are from working-class neighborhoods, we too share this feeling of pain and sadness” over the killing of Nahel, the team said in a statement.

ABC News’ Morgan Winsor contributed to this report.

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(NEW YORK) — As Canada and the U.S. continue to feel the lasting effects of the ongoing wildfires raging in the Great White North, environmental experts are pushing for long-term changes that they say can mitigate the damage from future blazes.

And with climate change making these once unprecedented wildfire events commonplace, those experts said governments on both sides of the border need to act fast.

“It has been an issue because we don’t have a strong federal government and it’s left us in this mess right now, Robert Gray, a wildland fire ecologist based in British Columbia, told ABC News.

Gray, who has studied wildfires in both the U.S. and Canada, said that higher temperatures, and dryer conditions have left the land in the eastern Canadian wilderness more susceptible to larger wildfires.

Even one lightning strike on a tree or brush could be detrimental as there is much more wood to keep the fire burning for a long time.

“These fires are reburning past fires that have been not that old,” he said. “The trees fall down and then it’s basically available to burn again.”

As for the current situation, some experts said the terrain and severity of the fire make it difficult to put out quickly.

“Because of the size of the fires, the weather is going to be the only thing now that’s going put them out. That means major rain, and in some areas, possibly snowfall,” Gray said.

John Gradek, a faculty lecturer and the coordinator of McGill University’s aviation management program, told ABC News that Canada doesn’t have a unified government entity that manages the country’s forests and handles disasters that take place in multiple provinces.

Those responsibilities lie with each province’s government, and because of that, he said there is not a coordinated effort between Quebec and Ontario with the current situation.

But even without that national oversight, Gradek said that emergency response teams can start to implement mitigation techniques that have been proven to curb forest fires.

For example, in locations such as British Columbia, California and Colorado, which have had more experience with major wildfires, forestry teams will do controlled fires to clear the underbrush at the beginning of the season, Gradek said.

“In the wildlands of the Quebec forests there is no prescribed program to clean up the forest floor,” he said.

Gradek said that government groups can also plan before the warmer months by deploying fire retardant substances from the air to lessen the chance of a spread once wildfire season starts.

Negar Elhami-Khorasani, an associate professor of civil, structural and environmental engineering at the University at Buffalo School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, told ABC News that at the very least local and federal governments should come up with policies and strategies that provide fair warning about the dangers of the wildfires.

Similar to hurricane plans near coastal cities, Elhami-Khorasani said it wouldn’t take too much time or resources to warn residents who live and work near wildfire-prone areas in Canada about dangers during wildfire season.

“Prior to the event, completing a risk evaluation and creating tools to predict what can happen can guide mitigation actions,” she added.

Gray emphasized that increased wildfires are a multinational problem throughout North America, and both the U.S. and Canada need to prioritize wildfire mitigation in all areas of the country as he predicted that this summer’s events will become more common.

“There is a political will to do this, and there is an outcry in the U.S. that is raising the word on the impact,” he said.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(LONDON) — Canada’s wildfire season is now the worst ever recorded as the country has exceeded the largest area ever burned in a year, totaling more than 19.5 million acres so far.

There are at least 500 active fires burning around the country, 257 of which are classified as “out of control”, according to Canada Interagency Forest Fire Centre (CIFFC).

The scale of the environmental catastrophe is unparalleled in the country’s recorded history. In Quebec alone, 3.6 million acres have burnt in the wildfires so far. The average annual area that has burned in the past 10 years is 24,359 acres, meaning that the areas burned just in the last two months are approximately 147 times larger than an average year.

One fire, in the western province of British Columbia, is the largest the province has ever seen. The Donnie Creek fire now covers an area larger than the size of Rhode Island.

Rains have so far failed to provide relief for the ferocious fires as Canadian officials say heavy rains in Quebec have missed areas where wildfires are most active.

According to the report Canadian government, climate change is already affecting the frequency, duration and intensity of extreme weather and climate-related events in Canada.

The report adds that June has already brought above-normal temperatures across the northern Prairies in Canada as well as northern Ontario and northern Quebec. Throughout the summer, higher temperatures are expected to persist and experts say the extreme warmth at high latitudes is a clear connection to climate change.

The sheer number and size of the fires is only part of the reason why they have created such a problem for the country, with one key reason being the geographic spread. In a normal year, provinces might be able to help each other by sending resources to badly affected regions, but this year there are fires in nearly every single province which has caused a huge problem when it comes to figuring out the resourcing of fire fighting equipment.

The Canadian army has been mobilized in several provinces as international crews have arrived to help — most notably South African teams in Alberta and French teams in Quebec. The White House announced earlier this month that over 600 U.S. firefighters and support personnel have been deployed to help fight the fires.

South Korean teams are also expected to arrive in Quebec next week but the geographic scope of the fires still means resources that would usually be able to target one place have to now be spread unevenly.

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(NEW YORK) — The State Department released a declassified version of its long-anticipated report Friday examining the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, unveiling the harshest critique of any of the administration’s efforts to examine its own handling of the crisis to date.

“The decisions of both President Trump and President Biden to end the U.S. military mission posed significant challenges for the [State] Department as it sought to maintain a robust diplomatic and assistance presence in Kabul and provide continued support to the Afghan government and people,” the report states.

The White House released portions of its broad review in April, drawing in part from the State Department’s probe, which was completed in March of 2022.

But that initial summary painted the Biden administration in far more glowing terms, asserting that the president “undertook a deliberate, intensive, rigorous, and inclusive decision-making process” but was constrained by his predecessor.

Biden did not specifically address the report’s findings when he was asked Friday.

“No, no. All the evidence is coming back together. Remember what I said about Afghanistan? I said Al-Qaeda would not be there. I said it wouldn’t be there. I said we’d get help from the Taliban. What’s happening now? What’s going on? Read your press. I was right,” Biden said.

The State Department’s review finds that some of the choices made by Biden “compounded the difficulties” diplomats faced in Afghanistan, such as the speed at which the military withdrew and handing over Bagram Air Base to the Afghan government in July of 2021, leaving Hamid Karzai International Airport as the sole evacuation route.

That airport later became the setting for some of the darkest, most frantic moments of the exit, including a terror attack that claimed the lives of 13 American servicemembers and scores of Afghans desperate to flee as Kabul fell to the Taliban.

While the White House previously said that Biden directed government agencies to prepare for “all contingencies,” the State Department inquiry found disorganization in the highest level of government, saying it was “unclear who in the department had the lead” on evacuation efforts.

The review also claims that senior officials failed to make critical decisions about which at-risk Afghan nationals would be airlifted before Afghanistan fell into turmoil.

Even as the Taliban amassed power and drew closer to Kabul, the report says that American officials failed to act with appropriate urgency and instead “seemed to rely on received assurances” from Afghanistan’s then-president that the country’s forces “would concentrate on the defense of Kabul and believed that they could hold the Taliban at bay for some time.”

Though estimates for how long Afghanistan’s military could retain control varied, the State Department review claims U.S. officials did not sufficiently plan for a worst-case scenario and failed to take decisive action once it became clear that scenario was a reality.

“We’ve already internalized many of these painful lessons and applied them in subsequent crises, most notably in how we managed the Russian invasion in Ukraine and in some of the aspects of our response to the crisis in Sudan a couple of months ago,” a senior official said.

Like the previous release from the White House, this report makes no mention of a message sent by dozens of diplomats from the U.S. embassy in Kabul in July 2021 that warned the country could collapse and urged the Secretary of State to speed up evacuation efforts.

Republicans on Capitol Hill have been urging the State Department to widely share its findings since the report was transmitted to select members of Congress in April, but it’s unclear whether the version released on Friday will satisfy conservatives. Only a quarter of the 80-page report was made public.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(PARIS) — Widespread rioting continued in the streets of France for a third night amid anger over the fatal police shooting of 17-year-old Nael M.

Protesters erected barricades, set buildings and cars ablaze, threw fireworks at riot police and ransacked stores. Police stations, schools and town halls were among the buildings targeted. Riot police used tear gas, water cannons and non-lethal dispersion grenades to fend off violent groups.

A total of 875 people were arrested, 3,880 fires were started, 2,000 vehicles were burned and 492 buildings were damaged nationwide on Thursday night as curfews were in place in multiple cities, according to the French Ministry of the Interior. About half of the arrests were reportedly made in the Paris region alone.

“Last night, our police, gendarmes and firefighters courageously faced rare violence,” Darmanin said in a Twitter post on Friday morning.

Among those arrested were 14 people who allegedly broke into a flagship Nike store at the Chatelet station in the heart of Paris, according to an official in the Paris Prefecture Office.

Some 40,000 law enforcement officers had been deployed across France on Thursday evening to quell potential violence, including about 5,000 in the capital and its inner suburbs. Nearly 250 of those officers were injured overnight, according to the interior minister.

Protests over the teenager’s death also took place in Belgium’s capital on Thursday night, with some rioters allegedly attacking officers in Brussels, a spokesperson for the Belgian Federal Police told ABC News. A least eight people were arrested there, the police spokesperson said.

Dozens of police officers were deployed in the city center of Brussels on Thursday night and two subway stations were shuttered.

The violent unrest in France kicked off after a 17-year-old driver was shot and killed by a police officer during a traffic check in the northwestern Paris suburb Nanterre on Tuesday morning. The officer has been detained on suspicion of voluntary homicide amid an ongoing investigation into the incident, according to the local prosecutor’s office.

Nanterre prosecutor Pascal Prache said Thursday that the officer did not meet the requirements to discharge his weapon and will remain in custody awaiting trial.

France’s Inspectorate General of the National Police, which investigates allegations of police misconduct, is also conducting a probe into the fatal shooting.

Lawyers for the victim’s family identified him as 17-year-old Nael M. and said they intend to file complaints against the officer accused of pulling the trigger and another officer who was at the scene. A funeral for Nael is set to be held in Nanterre on Saturday.

While tensions have remained highest in the Paris suburbs, almost every region of France has been hit with unrest since Tuesday. As a result, the southern port city of Marseille has banned all public demonstrations.

French President Emmanuel Macron and the interior minister have both repeatedly called for “calm” as authorities investigate the teen’s death.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — Weeks into Ukraine’s counteroffensive, political turmoil in Russia has raised new questions in the war and what it means for Vladimir Putin’s invasion.

In a fleeting but shocking show of rebellion against Russia’s top military brass, forces with the Russian paramilitary organization Wagner Group left the front line in Ukraine and claimed control of military facilities in Rostov-on-Don, a key Russian city near the Ukrainian border, late last week.

They then marched toward Moscow before the mercenary leader, Yevgeny Prigozhin, ordered them to halt on Saturday and return to their field camps in Ukraine, saying he wanted to avoid shedding Russian blood.

The 24-hour mutiny marked the most significant challenge to Russian President Putin’s authority in his more than 20 years of rule. In response, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that Russia appeared to be suffering “full-scale weakness.”

Amid the brief drama, though, little has changed on the 600-mile front in southern and eastern Ukraine, as Ukrainian forces look for breakthroughs in what “continues to be a very long hard, difficult and bloody fight,” according to retired U.S. Marine Corps Col. Steve Ganyard, an ABC News contributor.

“It’s important to take what was going on with Prigozhin and with Putin and put that into a Russia context, because that’s something that’s going on behind the scenes in Russia,” Ganyard said. “As of now, it’s not going to have any significant effect on the battlefield. The battlefield remains what it was.”

Counteroffensive a ‘long, hard slog’

Ukraine’s probing operations followed a stagnant period during the winter, when the Russians had months to build up three lines of defense, with layers of minefields, tank traps and trenches, according to Ganyard.

“The Ukrainians haven’t even gotten through the first line of defense anywhere along the front lines,” he said.

Whether Ukraine has the equipment and manpower to make a major breakthrough against those fortified defenses will be pivotal in the direction of the war — and its possible end, Ganyard said.

“The world really hasn’t seen a fight like this, hasn’t seen a war like this, for almost 100 years. It’s very reminiscent of the Western Front in World War I, where you had trenches and progress was measured in hundreds of feet per day,” he said.

“Even today, where there’s some quote-unquote breakthroughs going on, we’ve seen the Ukrainians making advances of less than a mile per day,” he continued. “So it’s a long, hard slog. It’s gonna be very bloody, it’s gonna take a lot of men, material, and a lot of people are gonna get hurt along the way.”

As Ukrainian forces advance, they’re looking for weaknesses and lightly manned places along the long front line; it could take weeks or months to make a potentially “catastrophic breakthrough” that could signal success for the Ukrainians, according to Ganyard.

The static battlefield during the winter has given Ukraine time to train soldiers with new equipment from the U.S. and NATO — “theoretically it’s a better military than it was, say, 12 or 14 months ago” — though in some ways, Russia has an advantage being on the defensive and protected behind the multiple layers of trenches, Ganyard said.

Ukraine also may be at a disadvantage in terms of manpower and lack the 3-to-1 advantage of an attacker over a defender that is a “general truism in war,” he said.

“If things go badly for the Ukrainians, where they continue to lose men and machines at a rate that they can’t replace, then we are looking at another few months where we may end up in stalemate,” Ganyard said. “So it’s really going to depend on how well the Russians defend, whether the Ukrainians can find a breakthrough, and whether the Ukrainians have the means and the will to continue a fight even when they are at a sort of parity in a very defensive position with the Russians.”

The Institute for the Study of War said at the onset of Ukraine’s counteroffensive that the attack will likely vary in size and intensity over “many weeks,” with the initial phase likely to be the “most difficult and slowest” and resulting in the greatest Ukrainian losses as they go up against the prepared defense.

“Militaries have long identified the penetration phase of a mechanized offensive as the most dangerous and costly,” it said. “The success or failure of this phase may not be apparent for some time.”

Zelenskyy admitted in an interview with the BBC last week that progress has been “slower than desired.”

“Some people believe this is a Hollywood movie and expect results now. It’s not,” Zelenskyy said.

Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said during a news conference in Brussels last week that Ukraine is in the “early stages” of its offensive operations and that it would be “premature” to estimate how long the counteroffensive could last given that “there are several hundred thousand Russian troops dug in and prepared positions all along the front line.”

“This is a very difficult fight. It is a very violent fight. And it will likely take a considerable amount of time at high cost,” he said.

Potential impact of Wagner rebellion

Then there’s the question of the Wagner Group and Prigozhin, whose march toward Moscow represented the “most significant challenge to the Russian state in recent times,” the U.K. Ministry of Defense said on Saturday.

State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told reporters this week that it’s “too soon to tell” what the impact of the Wagner rebellion could be on the ground in Ukraine.

Prigozhin had clashed for months with Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Gen. Valery Gerasimov, chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, over the conduct of the ongoing war in Ukraine. Prior to the rebellion, Prigozhin, once a close ally of Putin, accused the Russian military of deliberately shelling his fighters in Ukraine.

After Prigozhin ordered his soldiers to halt their march on Moscow, the Kremlin announced it had made a deal that the mercenary leader will move to the neighboring country of Belarus and receive amnesty, along with his mercenaries, who were also invited to join the Russian army instead. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko claimed to help broker the deal.

In his first public remarks following the march to Moscow, Prigozhin referred to the Wagner Group as the “most experienced and combat-ready unit in Russia, and possibly in the world.”

Taking Prigozhin and any Wagner troops off the battlefield could be to Ukraine’s advantage, Ganyard said.

“The most important thing that comes out of all of this with a disillusion or whatever happens to the Wagner troops, is that they get taken off the battlefield. It’s the only thing that’s good for the Ukrainian fight,” Ganyard said. “The Wagner troops were among the most effective and among the most capable on the battlefield.”

“But right now the defensive fight the Russians are able to put up with their multiple layers of defenses are going to be very, very tough for the Ukrainians to break through,” he added.

The Institute for the Study of War said in a recent assessment that the “ongoing Putin-Lukashenko-Prigozhin powerplay is not yet over and will continue to have short-term and long-term consequences that may benefit Ukraine,” including by potentially tying up heavy weapon and tanks for internal security “that could otherwise be used in Ukraine.”

Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak told ABC News that he believes “without a doubt” that the brief armed rebellion marks “the beginning of the end” of the war in Ukraine.

“The problem is this ‘end’ can last for quite some time and we have to understand that,” Podolyak said during an interview in Kyiv on Saturday.

“Russia has accumulated a lot of internal problems, but they are not ready to accept defeat because it would put an end to two decades of its domination in global processes,” he added. “It would mean the end of Russia’s ambitions, because I always said that the end of war must not mean just a victory for Ukraine. It should bring about reformatting Russia itself.”

Putin’s war effort might also suffer if front-line soldiers fighting in Ukraine learn of the armed rebellion.

“How do you motivate these guys who don’t want to be the last guy to die for a losing cause?” a senior U.S. official said Tuesday.

Ganyard noted that the Wagner Group revolt was a mutiny by a mercenary force — not one by regular Russian troops.

“So we don’t know how the regular Russian troops might have felt about this, if they even heard about it,” he said. “This is very different from something, say, if the Russian military itself had mutiny.”

Milley noted that Russian leadership “is not necessarily coherent,” and Russian troop morale is not high — “many of them don’t even know why they’re there.”

Ganyard said that while Ukraine may not have a 3-to-1 advantage, they do have “moral superiority” — which has been a key factor since Russia launched its invasion in February 2022.

“They are convinced that their cause is just. That is not the case on the Russian side,” Ganyard said. “Napoleon said that ‘[in war] the moral is to the physical as 3 is to 1.’ In other words, saying that whoever has the righteous, just cause has a 3-to-1 advantage over the other side.”

“The Ukrainians clearly feel that they’re trying to take back their country, that the Russians are in the wrong here, that the Russians were the attackers,” he continued. “And so the Ukrainians do have the kind of morale, the kind of support, the kind of esprit that is important to be able to continue these hard slog, bloody kinds of conflicts.”

If a stalemate persists, taking a toll on men and machines on both sides, that could lead to some sort of negotiated settlement, Ganyard said. However, neither Zelenskyy nor Putin can afford that politically at this time, he said.

“In many ways this is like two punch-drunk fighters in the eighth round of a prize fight,” he said. “Both want to continue fighting. Neither has the stamina or the strength left to fight the fight that they were able to fight before.”

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(PARIS) — Widespread rioting continued in the streets of France for a third night amid anger over the fatal police shooting of 17-year-old Nael M.

Protesters erected barricades, set buildings and cars ablaze, threw fireworks at riot police and ransacked stores. Police stations, schools and town halls were among the buildings targeted. Riot police used tear gas, water cannons and non-lethal dispersion grenades to fend off violent groups.

A total of 667 people were arrested nationwide on Thursday night as curfews were in place in multiple cities, according to French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin. About half of the arrests were reportedly made in the Paris region alone.

“Last night, our police, gendarmes and firefighters courageously faced rare violence,” Darmanin said in a Twitter post on Friday morning.

Among those arrested were 14 people who allegedly broke into a flagship Nike store at the Chatelet station in the heart of Paris, according to an official in the Paris Prefecture Office.

Some 40,000 law enforcement officers had been deployed across France on Thursday evening to quell potential violence, including about 5,000 in the capital and its inner suburbs. Nearly 250 of those officers were injured overnight, according to the interior minister.

Protests over the teenager’s death also took place in Belgium’s capital on Thursday night, with some rioters allegedly attacking officers in Brussels, a spokesperson for the Belgian Federal Police told ABC News. A least eight people were arrested there, the police spokesperson said.

Dozens of police officers were deployed in the city center of Brussels on Thursday night and two subway stations were shuttered.

The violent unrest in France kicked off after a 17-year-old driver was shot and killed by a police officer during a traffic check in the northwestern Paris suburb Nanterre on Tuesday morning. The officer has been detained on suspicion of voluntary homicide amid an ongoing investigation into the incident, according to the local prosecutor’s office.

Nanterre prosecutor Pascal Prache said Thursday that the officer did not meet the requirements to discharge his weapon and will remain in custody awaiting trial.

France’s Inspectorate General of the National Police, which investigates allegations of police misconduct, is also conducting a probe into the fatal shooting.

Lawyers for the victim’s family identified him as 17-year-old Nael M. and said they intend to file complaints against the officer accused of pulling the trigger and another officer who was at the scene.

While tensions have remained highest in the Paris suburbs, almost every region of France has been hit with unrest since Tuesday.

French President Emmanuel Macron and the interior minister have both repeatedly called for “calm” as authorities investigate the teen’s death.

ABC News’ Tom Soufi Burridge and Aicha El Hammar Castano contributed to this report.

Copyright © 2023, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — A University of California, Berkeley graduate student was killed in Mexico, ABC News has learned.

Gabriel Trujillo, a botanist who was a fourth-year Ph.D. student in the Department of Integrative Biology, was killed in the Mexican state of Sonora last week while doing field research, according to a statement from UC Berkeley obtained by San Francisco ABC station KGO on Friday.

The university, located in Northern California, said it received confirmation of Trujillo’s death on June 23.

“Local police authorities are investigating,” UC Berkeley said in the statement. “This is heartbreaking news and campus officials have reached out to his family to offer support and assistance.”

Sonora is located in northwestern Mexico, sharing the U.S.-Mexico border primarily with Arizona.

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

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(PHOENIX) — An Arizona woman is fighting for her life after contracting fungal meningitis following a plastic surgery procedure at a private clinic in Matamoros, Mexico.

Alondra Lomas is one of nine confirmed cases of the life-threatening infection in an outbreak the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says is tied to cosmetic surgery clinics in the Mexican city that borders Brownsville, Texas. So far, at least seven women have died – one in Mexico and six Americans, according to the CDC.

The fatalities, Lomas says, include another woman she says she befriended in Mexico and who had plastic surgery at the same clinic just two hours after her own procedure.

When asked what her greatest fear is, an emotional Lomas told “Impact x Nightline” from her hospital room, “Death. And I only say that because I have not seen one lady leave. I have not seen no girl go home yet.”

The latest “Impact” episode, “If Looks Could Kill,” explores the medical tourism industry in Mexico, the destination for some patients who travel from the U.S. seeking less expensive medical care, including elective cosmetic surgery. Mexico was the second most popular destination for medical tourism around the world in 2020, according to Patients Beyond Borders. Thailand was the No. 1 most popular destination.

Lomas, a mother of two, sought out plastic surgery, specifically liposuction and a so-called Brazilian butt lift, after she says two C-section births left her with sagging skin on her stomach area.

The surgeon she chose, Dr. Luis Manuel Rivera de Anda, offered a variety of cosmetic surgeries at what seemed like bargain prices, Lomas said. At first, Lomas says she was nervous and scared, but then started to feel happy at the prospect of being able to “get the body that [she] wants.”

Lomas flew to Brownsville, Texas, then crossed the border to Matamoros. Dr. Rivera worked out of Clinica K-3, Lomas said. Like many Mexican clinics, surgery there is done using epidurals for anesthesia.

After the procedure, Lomas says she began to experience headaches and back pain while home in Arizona until it finally got so bad that she couldn’t walk. Lomas immediately reached out to the surgical coordinator and doctor, but she says they didn’t have any real answers. Throughout April, the symptoms would come and go.

Lomas said she began to experience worsening symptoms, including fatigue and hallucinations. On May 7, she went to St. Joseph’s Medical Center in Phoenix, where she was diagnosed with fungal meningitis.

“The doctors told me that if I didn’t go in time, I could have died within 24 hours because this is a fatal infection,” Lomas said.

Meningitis occurs when an infection causes inflammation in the protective membranes that surround the brain and spinal cord. Most of the time, the infection is viral or bacterial. Fungal meningitis is much more rare. Symptoms like backaches, headaches and sensitivity to light usually appear gradually, making it harder to diagnose.

Getting treatment as early as possible is critical to survival, according to Dr. Tom Chiller, who runs the fungal disease branch of the CDC.

By May 11, the CDC had enough cases in the U.S. to notify Mexican officials about the outbreak, linking them to cosmetic surgery in Matamoros. They identified two private clinics – Riverside Surgical Center and Clinica K-3, where Lomas had her surgery.

“The strongest hypothesis right now is that a batch of these drugs used for anesthesia, either epidural or spinal anesthesia, were contaminated,” Dr. Vicente Joel Hernandez Navarro, state secretary of health for Tamaulipas, Mexico, told “Impact.”

Both Clinica K-3 and Riverside have been shut down, Navarro said, adding that 10 other clinics are being investigated and currently closed for failing to comply with health requirements.

Both clinics linked to the outbreak, along with Dr. Rivera, did not respond to a request for comment.

The CDC has issued an alert, telling anyone who had procedures under epidural anesthesia at the two clinics between Jan. 1 and May 13 of this year to go to their local emergency room and get tested for meningitis. The CDC is tracking about 200 people they know had surgery in Matamoros and could be at risk.

This isn’t the first time Mexico has dealt with an outbreak. Just six months ago, there were 80 confirmed cases of fungal meningitis linked to a medical center in the Mexican state of Durango, the New York Times reported. Thirty-nine women died.

The issue isn’t limited to Mexico. In 2012, dozens died after 14,000 people were exposed to tainted steroid injections in the U.S, according to the CDC.

After more than a month in the hospital, Lomas said her treatment didn’t appear to be working, so doctors performed brain surgery to create a port that delivers the anti-fungal medication directly to the infection. It appears the surgery worked, she says, but she’s not out of the woods yet.

“So I try to, you know, stay positive, because I need to be there for my children, you know? I don’t wanna have another party in the hospital because my son’s birthday is in August. I wanna be able to go home and be present,” Lomas said.

“Impact x Nightline” is now streaming on Hulu. The episode was produced by ABC News’ Knez Walker, Stephanie Fasano, Zach Fannin, Caroline Pahl, Jaclyn Skurie, Anne Laurent, Tara Guaimano and Candace Smith Chekwa.

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