Ukraine-Russia war latest: Nato responds to Putin’s nuclear weapon threat against member nations

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Russia has sent a letter to Nato threatening to use nuclear weapons if it feels its Baltic territory of Kaliningrad is under threat.

Despite a growing campaign of Russian hybrid attacks on Ukraine's European neighbours and allies, Moscow said it was Nato exhibiting "dangerous and reckless" behaviour that entailed "high risks of the outbreak of a direct armed conflict".

The letter said Russia "will be ready to use the entire arsenal of forces and capabilities at its disposal, including nuclear weapons, in order to defend its territory".

Nato said it had responded to Moscow directly, calling on Vladimir Putin to end his invasion of Ukraine and noting “that Nato is a defensive alliance”. “We strongly denounce the threat of force, including any irresponsible nuclear rhetoric,” a spokesperson said.

Meanwhile, Russia plans to raise its defence spending to more than £150bn next year to bolster its war on Ukraine, according to a draft budget due to be submitted to parliament tomorrow.

And in Kyiv, overnight strikes by Russia killed at least four people and targeted energy infrastructure and data centres. The strikes, described as massive by the Russian defence ministry, saw Poland scramble fighter jets and briefly close two airports.

Moldova reported three separate incidents of drones or unidentified aerial objects entering its airspace yesterday, as Russia launched a major attack on Ukraine.

A drone entered Moldovan airspace at about 5.43am local time, crashed near Hirbovat in Anenii Noi district and exploded. No injuries were reported.

A second drone was detected over Lunga village in the Russian-occupied Transnistria region at about 10.26am, prompting Moldova to close airspace in its northern and central regions.

Later in the evening, another unidentified object entered from Ukraine’s Vinnytsia region and flew over Transnistria before disappearing from monitoring systems.

Romania also scrambled two Spanish F-18 jets after detecting an aerial target near Izmail, although the object did not enter Romanian airspace.

Ukraine said Russia had launched 188 drones and several missiles during the attack.

Emergency power cuts returned to Kyiv yesterday after a Russian attack damaged the Trypilska Thermal Power Plant in Kyiv Oblast, Ukraine’s state-owned power producer Centrenergo confirmed.

The company said generating equipment at the plant had been damaged but did not provide further details, citing security concerns.

Centrenergo CEO Serhii Isachenko said the immediate priority was to assess the damage and determine what repairs were needed. He said specialists would begin work once the security situation allowed, The Kyiv Independent reported.

Ukrenergo announced emergency electricity shutdowns in Kyiv at about 5.40pm local time as the attack disrupted the capital’s power supply.

The outages also affected public transport. Electric ground transport was suspended in the Shevchenkivskyi and Holosiivskyi districts, while tram services were also halted, according to authorities.

Russia launched a major assault on Kyiv and the surrounding region yesterday, targeting Ukraine’s energy infrastructure as the country heads into winter.

The attacks killed three people and injured seven in Kyiv, while one child was killed and a woman injured in the surrounding Kyiv region.

A key thermal power plant in Kyiv and other energy facilities were damaged, triggering emergency power cuts, authorities said.

DTEK said it had restored electricity to 8,000 customers on Kyiv’s left bank, while state grid operator Ukrenergo reported outages in several areas and urged people to limit their use of high-power appliances.

Kyiv remained under air-raid alerts for more than 20 hours, among the longest sustained periods since Russia launched its full-scale invasion.

Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky said the capital’s energy infrastructure was the main target and called for stronger air defences ahead of winter.

Two concerts by US rapper Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, in St Petersburg, Russia, have been cancelled, organisers said on 30 September.

Ye was due to perform on 10 and 11 October.

The shows were expected to be his first major concerts in Russia and would have made him the biggest Western artist to perform there since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Russian event agency Say Agency said in a statement: “Ye’s concerts in St Petersburg will not be able to take place on the scheduled dates.”

It said more details would be provided in a later statement and that ticket holders would receive refunds.

Russia has delivered a formal warning to NATO, threatening to deploy nuclear weapons if tit attempts to isolate or blockade its militarised Baltic exclave, Kaliningrad.

In a diplomatic note sent to Brussels, Moscow warned it will use "the entire arsenal of forces at its disposal, including nuclear weapons" and conduct "strikes against decision-making centres in member states" if NATO tries to sever Kaliningrad from mainland Russia.

The threat follows a secret NATO exercise in mid-August that simulated jamming the exclave's air defences and communications. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov called the note a necessary warning to "hotheads in Europe."

NATO has responded, dismissing the threat as "irresponsible nuclear rhetoric" and declaring that no alliance activities pose a threat to Russian territory.

The Kremlin has summoned Denmark’s ambassador to Moscow to lodge a formal protest over what it described as "provocative actions" by a Danish military helicopter toward a Russian Baltic Fleet warship.

The diplomatic rebuke follows an incident on September 14 in international waters off Denmark, where a Russian warship fired two signal flares toward a Danish helicopter conducting a routine photo reconnaissance overflight.

Denmark has previously summoned the Russian ambassador over the encounter, with Danish foreign minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen calling the firing of flares "completely unacceptable."

Moscow has defended its crew's actions, claiming the helicopter approached the vessel without responding to radio calls and that the commander fired the warning flares to prevent a dangerous approach.

Ukrainian human rights ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets has warned that a critical shortage of urban bomb shelters has left Kyiv’s civilians dangerously exposed ahead of an expected Russian winter bombing campaign.

In a statement issued on Wednesday, Lubinets asserted that the public shelter network in major cities like Kyiv has "completely failed" to scale up to meet population demands.

He said: "Five years into the war, Kyiv's civil defense system has completely collapsed. The number of shelters is insufficient to accommodate the entire population of the capital, and there are no mobile shelters at all. .. Where are the mobile shelters that are needed here and now? Where are the improvements to the existing ones?"

The warning comes as Ukrainian authorities work to fortify power grids and diversify energy generation ahead of winter strikes.

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky has visited a military command post near Lyman in eastern Ukraine, praising frontline forces for reclaiming territory during a counteroffensive operation in the Donbas.

In a video posted to Telegram on Wednesday, the leader conferred with commanders, reviewing maps and handing out state awards near the strategic railway hub.

Zelensky said the operation, codenamed "Vivaldi", prevented a major Russian breakthrough toward the critical "fortress cities" of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk, reporting that Ukrainian troops have recaptured 176 square kilometers of land in the sector since launching the counteroffensive earlier this year.

Papal envoy Cardinal Matteo Zuppi has met with Kremlin officials in Moscow to discuss prisoner swaps and humanitarian relief, as Pope Leo XIV urges Russia and Ukraine to negotiate an end to the four-year war.

The Russian foreign ministry has confirmed Zuppi met with Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov to address prisoner exchanges, the repatriation of displaced children, and civilian supplies in the occupied Kherson town of Oleshky.

Zuppi was also granted access to Ukrainian prisoners of war held in Russia. While Moscow claimed the visit proved its compliance with humanitarian standards, Kyiv continues to accuse Russian forces of mistreating detainees and blocking humanitarian corridors.

The mission coincides with a fresh appeal from Pope Leo XIV, who warned against rising global tensions, condemning leaders "beginning to speak about nuclear weapons and wars that are becoming ever more destructive."