U.S. attorney general visits Kyiv as heavy fighting continues in Luhansk

Moscow’s suggestion that two Americans captured by Russian forces in Ukraine could face the death penalty is “totally appalling,” White House national security spokesman John Kirby said Tuesday.

Kirby’s comments came after Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Russia “can’t rule out” a possible death sentence for the Americans, Alexander J. Drueke and Andy Tai Huynh, who were taken into custody while fighting for Ukraine.

“We can’t rule anything out, because these are court decisions,” Peskov said. He has also said the two U.S. citizens will not be granted the protections afforded to prisoners of war by the Geneva Conventions.

“It’s appalling that a public official in Russia would even suggest the death penalty for two American citizens,” Kirby said at a news briefing, later adding: “It’s totally appalling, even the suggestion that that result could be the outcome here for these two.”

Kirby said U.S. officials would “continue to try to learn what we can learn about this” but did not say what steps the United States would take if Drueke and Huynh face inhumane treatment.

An impending deadline is likely to cause Russia to intensify its efforts to seize the eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk, Ukrainian Defense Minister Hanna Malyar said Monday. The most decisive battles for control of the broader Donbas region could happen this week. However, while Russian forces have advanced in Ukraine’s east, Russia appears to be struggling to consolidate its authority over the territories it occupies, according to U.S.-based analysts.

Here are updates from across the country:

Severodonetsk: Fierce fighting raged Monday as Russia intensified its attack for control of the eastern city, where it continues to funnel troops and equipment. Serhiy Haidai, the regional governor of Luhansk, said Tuesday that Russian forces had captured the nearby village of Toshkivka and had been bombarding Lysychansk, a neighboring city still under the control of Ukrainian forces.

Elsewhere in eastern Ukraine: Russian advances from the cities of Izyum and Lyman toward Slovyansk in the Donetsk region appear to be unsuccessful and slowly grinding, the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War said in an update Monday. This, it said, was a consequence of Russia’s focus on capturing Severodonetsk and Lysychansk. Such operations have included attempts to interdict Ukrainian lines of communication along the T1302 Bakhmut-Lysychansk highway, the think tank added.

Kharkiv: The region has been under continuous bombardment that left at least 15 people dead on Tuesday, said Oleh Synyehubov, the governor of Kharkiv. Ukrainian troops launching counteroffensive operations have nearly pushed to the region’s border with Russia but still have a stretch of territory left to take back from Russian control, according to the Ukrainian Defense Ministry.

Southern Ukraine: Missile and artillery strikes struck parts of the Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, Dnipropetrovsk, Mykolaiv and Odessa regions Monday. According to the Institute for the Study of War, Russian forces are concentrating equipment in Zaporizhzhia in preparation for Ukrainian counteroffensive operations.

Polish soccer player Maciej Rybus will not be selected for the national team at this year’s World Cup in Qatar after he signed with another Russian club, the Polish Football Association said.

The 32-year-old defender has spent five years playing for Lokomotiv Moscow and recently signed a new two-year deal with Spartak Moscow.

“The coach of the Polish national team, Czeslaw Michniewicz, talked to Maciej Rybus, who was currently staying in Poland, after the training camp of the national team ended last week,” the association said in a statement.

“The coach informed the player that, due to his current club situation, he would not be called up for the September training camp of the national team and would not be taken into account for the team that would go to the World Cup in Qatar.”

Rybus has made 66 appearances for his country.

Relations between Warsaw and Moscow have been strained since Russia invaded Ukraine in late February. Poland borders Ukraine and has taken in more than 3 million refugees since the conflict began.

Poland refused to play Russia in a World Cup qualifying playoff in March. FIFA, soccer’s international governing body, awarded Poland a bye and later suspended Russia from international competition.

Self-propelled, armored German howitzers have arrived in Ukraine, officials in Kyiv said Tuesday, marking the first delivery of heavy weapons promised by Berlin.

“Panzerhaubitze 2000 are finally part of 155 mm howitzer arsenal of the Ukrainian artillery,” Ukrainian defense minister Oleksii Reznikov wrote on social media, thanking his German counterpart Christine Lambrecht.

“Our artillerymen will bring the heat to the battlefield,” Reznikov added.

The Panzerhaubitze 2000 is considered one of the most powerful artillery weapons in Germany’s arsenal and has a range of up to 25 miles. Berlin pledged to send seven howitzers in early May after criticism from Ukrainian officials.

Andriy Yermak, head of the presidential office of Ukraine, also thanked German officials for the delivery. “This is a help our army needs badly,” Yermak wrote on Twitter.

Russian forces have captured the strategically important village of Toshkivka, the Ukrainian governor of Luhansk said Tuesday.

Control of the village could allow Russian troops to encircle Severodonetsk and neighboring Lysychansk, twin cities that have been at the heart of the battle for the Donbas region for weeks.

Writing on Telegram, Luhansk regional governor Serhiy Haidai said that Russian forces had sent a “huge amount” of personnel and equipment to win Toshkivka, which lies southeast of Severodonetsk, and that they were now firing heavily at Lysychansk, a city directly across the Donets River from Severodonetsk.

Much of the continued resistance to Russian forces has been in Lysychansk, which remains fully under Ukrainian control. Local officials estimate that Severodonetsk is almost totally occupied.

Russians have used overwhelming firepower to win the city and surrounding area, according to Ukrainian officials. “Today everything that can burn is on fire,” Haidai told the Associated Press on Tuesday.

The European Commission announced Tuesday that it would redirect 600 million euros ($634 million) from the European Development Fund to support the countries most affected by a growing food security crisis that was “aggravated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.”

The funds “will address different dimensions” of food insecurity — including humanitarian assistance, food system resilience and macroeconomic support — in African, Caribbean and Pacific countries, the commission said in a news release. Most of the money will be used to underpin sustainable food production, but over $105 million is destined to the International Monetary Fund’s Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust, a concessional support program for low-income nations.

“Russia’s war of aggression is taking a heavy and senseless toll, not only on the Ukrainian population, but also those most vulnerable around the world,” said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. “Russia is still blocking millions of [metric tons] of desperately needed grain.”

Since March, Ukraine — known as one of the world’s “breadbaskets” — has accused Moscow’s forces of stealing vast stores of grain and diverting them to Russia. Last week, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said credible reports showed that Russia is both “pilfering Ukraine’s grain exports to sell for its own profit” and “hoarding its food exports” — two actions that have led to a sharp increase in global grain prices and looming shortages across Africa and the Middle East.

The food crisis has also been exacerbated by Russia’s blockade of Ukraine’s Black Sea ports, which has prevented Ukraine from exporting grain and spurred calls to oust Russia from the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization. While addressing African Union leaders on Monday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accused Russia of holding African countries “hostage” by weaponizing food.

Attorney General Merrick Garland made an unannounced trip to Ukraine on Tuesday and met with the nation’s top prosecutor, offering a message of solidarity with the Ukrainian people against Russian aggression.

Garland crossed over the border from Poland for a meeting with Iryna Venediktova, Ukraine’s prosecutor general, in Krakovets, U.S. Justice Department officials said. He announced the launch of a “war crimes accountability team” aimed at centralizing the department’s efforts to prosecute Russians or others involved in war crimes or other atrocities.

“There is no hiding place for war criminals. The U.S. Justice Department will pursue every avenue of accountability for those who commit war crimes and other atrocities in Ukraine,” Garland said. “Working alongside our domestic and international partners, the Justice Department will be relentless in our efforts to hold accountable every person complicit in the commission of war crimes, torture and other grave violations during the unprovoked conflict in Ukraine.”

What are war crimes, and is Russia committing them in Ukraine?

Garland has tapped Eli Rosenbaum, former director of the Justice Department’s Office of Special Investigations, which focused on deporting Nazi war criminals from the United States, to lead the war crimes accountability team. The department also will assign additional personnel to help Ukraine counter Russia’s efforts to avoid financial sanctions.

This initiative will bring together Justice Department experts on human rights abuses and war crimes, provide technical assistance and advise on criminal prosecutions, evidence collection, forensics and legal analysis. The department also will continue to investigate potential war crimes related to the killing and wounding of U.S. journalists in the region, officials said.

Both Russian and Ukrainian forces have been accused of committing war crimes. Russian forces have come under the most scrutiny, however, over evidence of carnage in towns they occupied, such as Bucha.

Venediktova said last month that her office receives 200 to 300 new war crimes cases each day, with a total of 15,000 alleged incidents and 80 suspects. Several Russian soldiers have been sentenced to prison for war crimes by Ukrainian courts.

Russian officials have denied committing war crimes or targeting civilians.