DONETSK REGION, Ukraine — Russian authorities in St. Petersburg detained a woman on Monday as part of their investigation of the cafe explosion Sunday that killed prominent Kremlin-aligned military blogger Vladlen Tatarsky. Russia’s Investigative Committee identified a suspect as Darya Trepova and accused her of being involved in the attack.
Moscow forces made creeping advances in Bakhmut, the besieged city in the eastern Donetsk region that Ukraine has defended against waves of Russian attacks for months. Forces with the Wagner mercenary group hoisted a Russian flag over the city administration building overnight, according to the group’s leader, Yevgeniy Prigozhin. A Ukrainian soldier involved in Bakhmut’s defense confirmed the building’s capture to The Washington Post on Monday.
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“I didn’t do anything, I was never on the side of aggression and never will be,” Metropolitan Pavlo, head of the Lavra monastery, said as he denied the charges before a judge.
Ukraine has long alleged that the local branch of the Orthodox Church has ties to Moscow, but the escalation with Pavlo was a display of how religious tensions have been exacerbated by the war.
Khurshudyan reported from Kyiv, Ukraine, Pietsch from Seoul and Sands from London. Robyn Dixon and Natalia Abbakumova in Riga, Latvia, contributed to this report.
