• In a wide-ranging interview with PBS NewsHour, Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said a lack of air defence missiles prevented Ukraine from thwarting a Russian missile attack last week that destroyed the Trypilska thermal power plant. His comments gave fresh urgency to Kyiv’s pleas to be sent more military weapons from its allies as the war appears to have turned in the Kremlin’s favour over recent months.

• Mike Johnson, the US House speaker, has unveiled a complicated proposal for passing wartime aid for Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan. Facing an outright rebellion from conservatives who fiercely oppose aiding Ukraine, Johnson said he would push to get the package to the House floor under a single debate rule, then hold separate votes on aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan and several foreign policy proposals, according to Republican lawmakers.

• Germany’s chancellor, Olaf Scholz, has said he hoped Berlin and Beijing could help achieve a “just peace” in Ukraine, as he met his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, in the Chinese capital.

• Ukraine’s UN ambassador, Sergiy Kyslytsya, has accused Russia of a “a well-planned false-flag operation” endangering the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, as the two countries traded accusations at the UN security council over alleged attacks on Europe’s largest nuclear power station. The Zaporizhzia nuclear power plant reportedly suffered at least three direct strikes on 7 April and another drone attack at the plant’s nearby training centre on 9 April. The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Rafael Mariano Grossi, said, without attributing blame, that the “reckless” attacks had put the world “dangerously close to a nuclear accident”.

• The Kremlin reacted coolly to France’s president Emmanuel Macron’s call for a truce in international conflicts during the Paris Olympics, saying Ukraine might use it as an opportunity to regroup and rearm.

• Russia and Ukraine negotiated for two months with Turkey on a deal to ensure the safety of shipping in the Black Sea and reached agreement on a text that was to be announced by Ankara last month, but then Kyiv suddenly pulled out, sources told Reuters.

A lack of air defence missiles prevented Ukraine from thwarting a Russian missile attack last week that destroyed the biggest power plant in the region around Kyiv, Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said.

Trypilska thermal power plant was destroyed in a strike last month. It was the biggest energy facility near Kyiv and was built to have a capacity of 1,800 megawatts, more than the prewar needs of Ukraine’s biggest city. Other stations and imports have filled the gap for now but residents have been urged to save power.

“There were 11 missiles flying. We destroyed the first seven, and four (remaining) destroyed Trypillia. Why? Because there were zero missiles. We ran out of missiles to defend Trypillia,” Zelenskiy said in an interview with PBS.

He warned earlier this month that Ukraine, which has reported ongoing ammunition shortages, could run out of air defence missiles if Russia keeps up its intense long-range bombing campaign.

It followed weeks of Russian strikes on the energy infrastructure, towns and cities using a vast arsenal of missiles and drones.

Western allies have been reluctant to send additional air defences to Ukraine, which says it needs 25 Patriot systems to cover its territory properly. Germany has pledged to deliver another system after urgent calls from Kyiv.

Zelenskiy said in the PBS NewsHour interview:

It’s a lot to preserve ourselves. It’s very difficult for us. We are fighting against a large army. They don’t care about their soldiers’ lives. They’re not training them. They’re not as trained as our soldiers.

But there’s a lot of them. They have an unlimited number of people and a lot of shells. They use thousands of drones against us. Tell me, please, how can you fight against these thousands if you don’t have weapons to take them down? They have aircraft taking off from Crimea and engaging us at a distance of over 300 kilometers. It could be over 300, 400, 500 kilometers, depending on how deep they’re targeting from Crimea.

How can we destroy those? The plan is very simple. It’s very clear. It exists. There is a specific weapon that we need to advance. There’s a specific weapon to defend the skies. This plan exists. Besides, all the partners have it in their hands. This is the plan for what we really need.

Mike Johnson, the US House speaker, has faced mounting pressure to act on Joe Biden’s long-delayed request for billions of dollars in security assistance for Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan. It’s been more than two months since the Senate passed the $95bn aid package, which includes $60bn for Ukraine.

The Republican speaker huddled with fellow GOP lawmakers on Monday evening to lay out his strategy to gain House approval for the funding package.

The Kremlin reacted coolly on Tuesday to France’s president Emmanuel Macron’s call for a truce in international conflicts during the Paris Olympics, saying Ukraine might use it as an opportunity to regroup and rearm, Reuters reports.

Suspending armed conflicts under an “Olympic truce” is a longstanding tradition of the Games, and Macron said in an interview on Monday that he would work towards achieving one when Paris hosts the Olympics from 26 July to August 11.

Asked about Macron’s comments, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that both Vladimir Putin and the Russian military had “noticed that, as a rule, the Kyiv regime uses such ideas, such initiatives to try to regroup, to try to rearm, and so on and so forth. This, of course, significantly complicates the process of considering such initiatives.”

Peskov said there had been no official steps so far on the subject of a truce.

Russia and Ukraine negotiated for two months with Turkey on a deal to ensure the safety of shipping in the Black Sea and reached agreement on a text that was to be announced by Ankara last month, but then Kyiv suddenly pulled out, sources told Reuters.

A deal was reached in March “to ensure the safety of merchant shipping in the Black Sea”, and though Ukraine did not want to sign it formally, Kyiv gave its assent for Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, to announce it on 30 March, the day before critical regional elections, the sources said.

“At the very last minute, Ukraine suddenly pulled out and the deal was scuttled,” said one of the four sources who spoke to Reuters. A reason for the apparent withdrawal was not given.

Turkey and the UN secretary-general, António Guterres, have been trying to months to get merchant shipping sailing more freely though the Black Sea, which in some areas has been turned into a naval war zone since Russia launched its full scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Russia pulled out of the Black Sea Grain deal last July, complaining that its own food and fertiliser exports faced obstacles and that not enough Ukrainian grain was going to countries in need.

As we reported in our opening summary, Ukraine’s UN ambassador, Sergiy Kyslytsya, has accused Russia of a “a well-planned false-flag operation” endangering the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant (ZNPP).

The power plant reportedly suffered at least three direct strikes on 7 April and another drone attack at the plant’s nearby training centre on 9 April, prompting the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to warn of a “major escalation” in nuclear danger.

Russia has claimed that Ukrainian drones carried out the April attacks on the nuclear power plant, allegations Kyiv rejects.

“What happened at the ZNPP on 7th and 9th of April 2024 and thereafter was a well-planned false-flag operation by the Russian Federation,” Kyslytsya said at a UN security council meeting last week.

“It was aimed at shifting the focus from the above root cause and the only way to remove all threats to nuclear safety and security, and that is de-occupation of the station.”

“The Russian Federation attempts to hide its own guilt and move our debate to fabricated issues designed to blame Ukraine in the hope of removing the issue of de-occupation from the agenda.”

The nuclear plant was captured in the early stages of the two-year-long war, and despite occasional efforts to reconnect to the Russian energy grid its reactors have gradually been put into shutdown.

The IAEA said on 13 April that all six of the plant’s reactors had been moved into a state of cold shutdown, but the IAEA head, Rafael Mariano Grossi, has said “reckless attacks” significantly increase the risk of a “major nuclear accident” and called for them to stop immediately.

Hello and welcome to the Guardian’s live coverage of the war in Ukraine.

Ukraine’s UN ambassador, Sergiy Kyslytsya, has accused Russia of a “a well-planned false-flag operation” endangering the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, as the two countries traded accusations at the UN security council over alleged attacks on Europe’s largest nuclear power station.

The Zaporizhzia nuclear power plant reportedly suffered at least three direct strikes on 7 April and another drone attack at the plant’s nearby training centre on 9 April.

The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Rafael Mariano Grossi, said, without attributing blame, that the “reckless” attacks had put the world “dangerously close to a nuclear accident”.

“Let me put it plainly. Two years of war are weighing heavily on nuclear safety” at the plant, he was also quoted as saying.

Ukraine and its allies on Monday again blamed Russia for dangers at the site. “Russia does not care about these risks … If it did, it would not continue to forcibly control the plant,” US deputy ambassador Robert Wood told the security council.

Russia and Ukraine have repeatedly accused one another of targeting Zaporizhzhia since it was captured by Russian forces in the first weeks of Moscow’s full-scale invasion in Februrary 2022 (though both sides deny attacking it).

We will have more on this story shortly. In other developments:

• Volodymyr Zelenskiy has called on allies to show Ukraine the same unity they displayed in helping Israel fend off Iranian attacks. The Ukrainian president issued a fresh plea for air defences to protect against Russian strikes on cities and infrastructure. Zelenskiy said: “Israel is not a member of Nato … and no one was drawn into the war,” he said. “They simply helped save lives. Shaheds [drones] in the skies of Ukraine sound just like in the skies of the Middle East. Ballistics strike the same everywhere if not shot down.” Western allies have hesitated to send additional air defences to Ukraine which needs 26 Patriot systems for full protection. Germany has pledged to deliver one additional system.

• In the US, the House speaker, Mike Johnson, has unveiled a proposal to separate out Ukraine military aid from other assistance for Israel and Taiwan, instead of passing a $95bn combined bill that already has Senate approval. The US president, Joe Biden, called on the House to take up the Senate funding package immediately: “They have to do it now.” Johnson insisted the House would this instead this week consider separate bills for Ukraine, Israel and Indo-Pacific security.

• Johnson said the new House bills provide roughly the same amount of foreign aid as the Senate bill but would include differences including some aid in the form of a loan. However, critics say it amounts to further unnecessary delay as the Senate bill was passed two months ago. “If House Republicans put the Senate supplemental [spending bill] on the floor, I believe it would pass today, reach the president’s desk tonight and Israel would get the aid it needs by tomorrow,” said the Senate Democratic leader, Chuck Schumer.

• Air defence systems destroyed all nine drones launched in a Russian attack across eastern and southern regions, the Ukrainian air force said on Tuesday morning.

• The US has imposed sanctions on 12 Belarus entities and 10 individuals, accusing them of supporting Russia’s war on Ukraine. The treasury department said among the entities targeted was a machine tool building firm, a company selling control systems for the Belarus armed forces, and another producing radio communication equipment.

• Asylum claims from Russians, including soldiers who have deserted, have surged since the full-scale invasion but few are winning protection, the Associated Press has reported. In France, asylum requests rose more than 50% between 2022 and 2023, to a total of about 3,400 people, according to the French office that handles the requests. In 2023, Germany got 7,663 first-time asylum applications from Russian citizens, up from 2,851 in 2022. US Customs and Border Patrol officials encountered more than 57,000 Russians at US borders in fiscal year 2023, up from about 13,000 in fiscal year 2021. The Independent Russian media outlet Mediazona has documented more than 7,300 cases in Russian courts against deserting soldiers since September 2022; cases of desertion leapt sixfold in 2023, AP said.