Tensions between Russia and the United States rose after Russian jets shot down a US surveillance drone in the Black Sea, the first such incident since Vladimir Putin launched the war in Ukraine.

08:11 Russian authorities continue to take steps to mobilize Russia’s weak defense-industrial complex (DIB) for a protracted war, including measures that would force the Kremlin to choose between specialized DIB workers and qualified military personnel in Ukraine, the Institute for the Study of War notes.

Putin announced that the Ministry of Industry and Trade has drawn up a list of skills for which Russians can be exempted from military service, which may indicate that the Kremlin prefers the use of skilled workers in Russian arms production over the ability to have qualified soldiers to fight in Russian army.

Three rockets were allegedly shot down in the Belgorod region of Russia

08:02 The governor of Belgorod, Vyacheslav Gladkov, said that air defense shot down three missiles over the Russian region on Tuesday evening, Kyiv Independent reports.

He did not specify whether the missiles were of Ukrainian origin or Russian that deviated from the course. There were no casualties, Belgorod Mayor Valentyn Demidov said.

07:48 British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace urged Moscow to respect international airspace.

“The key element here is for all parties to respect international airspace, and we urge the Russians to do so. The Americans said it looked unprofessional,” Wallace told Reuters at the DSEI Japan defense fair in Chiba Prefecture, near Tokyo.

01:45Zelenskyi: There is a clear position of the entire General Staff – we are strengthening the Khortytsia-Bakhmut direction in order to inflict as much damage as possible on the occupier.

00:37 Moscow views the incident involving a Russian Su-27 fighter jet and an American military drone over the Black Sea as a provocation, Russian Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov said.

The latest on the war in Ukraine, day 385, LIVETEXT:

• An American MQ-9 drone crashed in the Black Sea after being intercepted by Russian fighter jets. The Pentagon said that one of the Russian Su-27 jets hit the propeller of the drone during a “very unprofessional” interception, causing it to malfunction. Russia’s Defense Ministry blamed the crash on the drone’s “sudden maneuvers” and says its planes did not make contact with it.
• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyi on Tuesday dismissed three regional governors, including the head of the Luhansk region, Serhii Gaidai.
• The US State Department has approved the possible sale of 95 light tactical vehicles and related equipment to Romania, the Pentagon announced on Tuesday.
• The Ukrainian military has almost completed training on Leopard 2 tanks in Münster, Germany, and according to them, driving these combat vehicles “is like driving a Mercedes.”
• Poland may provide Ukraine with MiG-29 fighter jets within the next four to six weeks, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said on Tuesday.
• Ukraine has charged two Russian soldiers who sexually assaulted a four-year-old girl and gang-raped her mother at gunpoint while the woman’s husband watched.
• Officials appointed by Moscow in the Kherson region of southern Ukraine are preparing to leave the territories they still occupied in what appears to be the beginning of a retreat, Ukrainians say.
• The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York has changed the classification of some of his paintings. Two artists previously identified as Russian are now classified as Ukrainian, and a painting by French impressionist Edgar Degas has been renamed from “Russian Dancer” to “Dancer in Ukrainian Dress.”
• Russian occupation troops are intensifying mobilization actions on the territory of the Crimean peninsula, the Center of National Resistance of Ukraine reported
• Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that last year’s Nord Stream gas pipeline explosions were carried out at the “state level”, saying it was “complete nonsense” that an autonomous pro-Ukraine group was responsible.
• On Tuesday, the Kremlin said it had agreed to extend a deal that allows Ukraine to export grain as a sign of “goodwill” to Kiev, charging that parts of the deal still do not satisfy Russia.
• The missiles launched by the Russians in the south and north of Ukraine in recent days are aimed at detecting air defense systems, the head of the Nikolaev Regional Military Administration Vitaly Kim said.

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• Tuesday’s events were broadcast live on HotNews.ro