Russia Ukraine War News Live Updates: Moscow, Kyiv accuse each other of trying to blow up dam and flood Ukraine

‘It was horror’: Liberated Ukrainians share tales of occupation
Russian troops spent weeks searching for Mariya, the 65-year-old common-law wife of a serving Ukrainian army officer.
Twice, she said, they ransacked her cottage in a village outside the town of Balakliya, Ukraine, and when they did eventually detain her months later, they tortured her repeatedly under interrogation, using electric shocks and threats of rape.
The recapturing Ukrainian fighters of much of the Kharkiv region a month ago is now revealing what life was like for thousands of people living under Russian military occupation from the early days of the war. For many, there were periods of calm but almost no food or public services. For those like Mariya, accused of sympathising with or helping the Ukrainians, it was pure hell. (Read more)
Police officers shoot at a drone during a Russian drone strike, which local authorities consider to be Iranian-made Shahed-136 UAVs, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv October 17, 2022. (Photo: Reuters)
Ukraine rations power and warns of lethal winter, despite war gains
Russian attacks on the Ukrainian power grid forced nationwide power cuts Thursday, deepening the misery of a people facing winter without enough light or heat, while Ukraine’s president accused Moscow of planning to blow up a dam, which would cause catastrophic flooding and knock out more power supply.
The government ordered Ukrainians to minimize electricity use from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m., after 10 days of concerted missile and drone attacks on utilities that have left civilians struggling with rolling blackouts and scattered shortages of clean water. Ukrainian and United Nations officials have warned of a deadly humanitarian crisis for civilians in the coming cold months.
Speaking remotely video to European Union leaders, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Thursday that “we have information” that Russian forces had mined the Kakhovka hydroelectric dam on the Dnieper River. If the dam were destroyed, he said, towns would be inundated and “hundreds of thousands of people could be affected.” (Read more)