Biden pledges $800 million in new weapons for Ukraine, says U.S. gas prices will remain high

Indonesian President Joko Widodo told a reporter in Moscow that he had passed Russian President Vladimir Putin a message from Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky.

Widodo arrived in Russia on Thursday, a day after becoming the first Asian leader to visit Ukraine since the conflict began. Indonesia is the host of the annual Group of 20 summit on Nov. 15 and 16.

Speaking in Moscow after meeting with Putin at the Kremlin, Widodo said he had “expressed readiness to help with a dialogue between the two leaders,” according to Russian state media.

President Biden and leaders of some other nations have said Russia should be expelled from the G-20, an informal group of large economies. Earlier this week, Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi said Indonesia had ruled out in-person participation by Putin.

Putin attended last year’s G-20 summit in Rome via videoconference, citing coronavirus concerns.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters Thursday that Putin was still deciding whether to attend this year’s summit: “The president can go himself, or he can delegate someone. … We will make the decision that best suits our interests.”

ISTANBUL — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan warned Sweden and Finland on Thursday to meet their obligations to Turkey under an agreement signed at the NATO summit in Madrid, raising concerns that an 11th-hour deal to allow the two Nordic countries to join the alliance might already be under threat.

Erdogan, speaking to the news media at the close of the summit, said Sweden had promised to extradite 73 “terrorists” wanted by Turkish authorities as part of the agreement, in which Turkey dropped its opposition to NATO accession for the two Nordic countries.

There was no immediate response by Sweden to his comments. Sweden’s prime minister had previously said that the country would follow international and local laws in evaluating extradition requests and would not extradite Swedish citizens.

Russian troops have retreated from Snake Island, a small victory for Ukrainian forces, who are still seeing high casualties in the war.

Here are some updates from across Ukraine:

Lysychansk: Russian troops are shelling the city from several directions while maintaining a heavy presence in the area, according to the head of the Luhansk region’s military administration, Serhiy Haidai. He contends that the municipality is not surrounded but advised residents to stay in shelters at all times because evacuations remain impossible with Russian forces mining roads. About 15,000 civilians remain in this eastern city.

Kremenchuk: Russian President Vladimir Putin denied responsibility for a strike this week on a shopping mall that killed at least 20 people in this central Ukrainian city. He falsely claimed Wednesday that the Russian military does not hit civilian targets or conduct indiscriminate attacks on civilian populations. Witnesses who spoke to The Washington Post described the devastation after the missile attack.

Mykolaiv: At least six people were killed and six injured Wednesday in this southern city when 10 Russian missiles struck civilian infrastructure, according to the Mykolaiv region’s military administration on Telegram. The Russian Defense Ministry claimed its forces targeted a military base near Mykolaiv used to train foreign fighters.

Kherson region: In an attempt to regain control, Russian forces unleashed unsuccessful air attacks near the southern region, according to Operational Command South. Ukrainian fighters in recent weeks have been steadily regaining control of the region, in a sign that the Russian military may be overextended on a front line that stretches about 300 miles. Moscow is trying to assert more control over this strategically key area, and Russian-backed authorities here said they are gearing up for a referendum on Kherson joining Russia.

Black Sea: Russian forces say they have withdrawn from Ukraine’s Snake Island, a highly contested speck of land in the Black Sea that they captured shortly after the start of the war — presenting a small but strategic win for Ukraine on Thursday. Russia’s Defense Ministry framed the move as a “gesture of goodwill” and an effort to create a humanitarian corridor for the export of agricultural products such as grain from Ukraine. However, officials in the nearby southern Ukrainian port city of Odessa said Russian troops had evacuated only after protracted missile and artillery strikes by Ukrainian forces.

David L. Stern, Annabelle Timsit and Isabelle Khurshudyan contributed to this report.

President Biden told reporters in Madrid, where he was attending a key NATO summit, that drivers in the United States and elsewhere should be prepared to pay a premium for gasoline for “as long as it takes” to support Ukraine.

“As long as it takes so Russia cannot, in fact, defeat Ukraine and move beyond Ukraine. This is a critical, critical position for the world,” Biden said.

Gas prices have risen sharply since the war, hitting between $4 and $7 a gallon in the United States this summer, with average prices up by more than $1.50 from a year ago, according to AAA.

Biden said the United States had pursued a number of policies that would bring down the price of fuel by about a dollar a gallon at the pump, including putting a global cap on the amount that the world should pay for Russian oil.

“But the bottom line is: Ultimately, the reason why gas prices are up is because of Russia. Russia, Russia, Russia,” he said.

The president also was asked whether he would try to get Saudi Arabia to pump more oil in a bid to lower prices. Biden is visiting the Saudi kingdom next month, but said he would not ask the Saudis directly because he had already asked all Persian Gulf states as a group.

“I’ve indicated to them that I thought they should be increasing oil production generically, not to the Saudis, particularly,” Biden said.

OPEC reaffirms slightly higher oil output

President Biden suggested Thursday that the United States will give Ukraine at least some of the advanced air defense systems it has asked for after a weekend of more frequent Russian missile strikes.

Biden said a new $800 million assistance package was soon to be announced and that it included “new advanced Western air defenses,” as well as counter-battery radars and more ammunition for the M142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, known as HIMARS, that were already provided.

Ukrainian officials welcomed the announcement on social media. “We are becoming more powerful,” Andriy Yermak, head of the presidential office of Ukraine, concluded in Telegram and Twitter messages that announced the new package. “We will win.”

“This is exactly what we need” to stop Putin, Ukrainian lawmaker Kira Rudik wrote on Twitter.

Though Biden did not specify exactly what sort of air defense system was involved, Ukrainian officials have repeatedly called for more-advanced systems to protect themselves from an increasing barrage of missiles fired by Russian forces.

Appearing virtually at a meeting of leaders of the Group of Seven on Monday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky asked for more heavy weaponry, including antiaircraft weapons, to end the war before winter, according to officials briefed on the conversation.

After a Russian missile strike at a mall in central Ukraine left at least 20 civilians dead on Monday, Yermak said Ukraine needed more weapons for defense. “We need missile defenses,” he wrote on Twitter.

The Associated Press reported earlier this week that the Biden administration was expected to provide Ukraine with NASAMS, a Norwegian-developed antiaircraft system, to provide medium- to long-range defense.

Biden also said that the United States would provide more ammunition for HIMARS sent earlier this month. The satellite-guided weapons can be launched from the back of a truck and used to quickly and accurately target Russian artillery and forces.

Biden said there would be “more HIMARS coming from other countries as well.”

RIGA, Latvia — Russian forces say they have withdrawn from Ukraine’s Snake Island, a highly contested speck of land in the Black Sea they captured shortly after the start of the war — presenting a small but strategic win for Ukraine on Thursday.

Russia’s Defense Ministry framed the move as a “gesture of goodwill” and an effort to create a humanitarian corridor for the export of agricultural products such as grain from Ukraine. However, officials in the nearby southern Ukrainian port city of Odessa said Russian troops had evacuated only after protracted missile and artillery strikes by Ukrainian forces.

Snake Island, also known as Zmiinyi Island, is about 25 miles off the southern coast and is a critical outpost for controlling shipping lanes for the export of Ukrainian grain and accessing the key port of Odessa.