Russian Forces Gain Control of Maryinka in East Ukraine, Defense Minister Says

Ukrainian Army snipers are silhouetted at a shooting range near a front line, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Donetsk region, Ukraine December 23, 2023. (Reuters)
Ukrainian Army snipers are silhouetted at a shooting range near a front line, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Donetsk region, Ukraine December 23, 2023. (Reuters)
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Russian Forces Gain Control of Maryinka in East Ukraine, Defense Minister Says

Ukrainian Army snipers are silhouetted at a shooting range near a front line, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Donetsk region, Ukraine December 23, 2023. (Reuters)
Ukrainian Army snipers are silhouetted at a shooting range near a front line, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Donetsk region, Ukraine December 23, 2023. (Reuters)

Russian forces have gained full control of Maryinka, a town in eastern Ukraine, Russian defense minister Sergei Shoigu told President Vladimir Putin, one of Russia's most significant gains since the capture of Bakhmut in May.

Most accounts of Maryinka, southwest of the Russian-held regional center of Donetsk, describe it as a ghost town.

Putin said control of the town, which was once home to 10,000 people, will allow the Russian forces to move enemy combat units away from Donetsk.

"Our troops (now) have the opportunity to reach a wider operational area," he said in a video of the exchange between him and Shoigu posted online by a Kremlin journalist.

Russia's last major success on the battlefield was the capture in May of Bakhmut, theater of some of the bloodiest fighting. Ukraine launched a counteroffensive in June aimed at retaking land in the country's south and east, including Bakhmut.

Kyiv's forces have made little progress in the counteroffensive in the face of entrenched Russian resistance.

Russian troops have also intensified land and air-based attacks on the nearby town of Avdiivka since mid-October as the focal point of their slow-moving push through eastern Ukraine's Donbas region in the 22-month-old conflict.

Avdiivka was briefly captured in 2014 by Russian-backed separatists who seized large chunks of eastern Ukraine. Fortifications were later built around the town - seen as a gateway to Donetsk.

"Ukrainian defense forces continued to hold back the enemy in the areas of Maryinka and Novomykhailivka in the Donetsk region, repelling five Russian attacks," Ukrainian General Staff said in its dispatch early on Monday.

There have been no comments so far from Ukraine on the latest developments.



Huge Power Outage Paralyzes Parts of Spain and Portugal

This photograph shows a flamenco dress factory without light and workers during a massive power cut affecting the entire Iberian peninsula and the south of France, in Seville on April 28, 2025. (AFP)
This photograph shows a flamenco dress factory without light and workers during a massive power cut affecting the entire Iberian peninsula and the south of France, in Seville on April 28, 2025. (AFP)
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Huge Power Outage Paralyzes Parts of Spain and Portugal

This photograph shows a flamenco dress factory without light and workers during a massive power cut affecting the entire Iberian peninsula and the south of France, in Seville on April 28, 2025. (AFP)
This photograph shows a flamenco dress factory without light and workers during a massive power cut affecting the entire Iberian peninsula and the south of France, in Seville on April 28, 2025. (AFP)

A huge power outage hit large parts of Spain and Portugal on Monday, paralyzing traffic, grounding flights, trapping people in elevators and leaving power operators scrambling to restore power to millions of homes and businesses.

Some hospitals halted routine work and the two countries' governments convened emergency cabinet meetings, with officials initially saying a possible cyber-attack could not be ruled out. Outages on such a scale are extremely rare in Europe, and the cause could not immediately be established.

Reuters witnesses said power had started returning to the Basque country and Barcelona areas of Spain in the early afternoon, a few hours after the outage began. It was not clear when power might be more widely restored.

Hospitals in Madrid and Cataluna in Spain suspended all routine medical work but were still attending to critical patients, using backup generators. Several Spanish oil refineries were shut down and retail businesses shut.

The Bank of Spain said electronic banking was functioning "adequately" on backup systems, though residents also reported ATM screens had gone blank.

"I'm in a data center, and everything has gone off. All the alarms popped up, and now we're with the groups, waiting to find out what happened," said Barcelona resident and engineer Jose Maria Espejo, 40.

In a video posted on X, Madrid Mayor Jose Luis Martinez-Almeida urged city residents to minimize their journeys and stay where they were, adding: "It is essential that the emergency services can circulate."

In Portugal, water supplier EPAL said water supplies could also be disrupted, and queues formed at stores by people rushing to purchase emergency supplies like gaslights, generators and batteries.

The main Portuguese electricity utility, EDP, said it had told customers it had no forecast for when the energy supply would be "normalized", Publico newspaper said. It warned it could take several hours.

Parts of France also suffered a brief outage. RTE, the French grid operator, said it had moved to supplement power to some parts of northern Spain after the outage hit.

Play at the Madrid Open tennis tournament was suspended, forcing 15th seed Grigor Dimitrov and British opponent Jacob Fearnley off the court as scoreboards went dark and overhead cameras lost power.

TRAFFIC JAMS

Spanish radio stations said part of the Madrid underground was being evacuated. There were traffic jams in Madrid city center as traffic lights stopped working, Cader Ser Radio station reported.

Hundreds of people stood outside office buildings on Madrid’s streets and there was a heavy police presence around key buildings, directing traffic as well as driving along central atriums with lights, according to a Reuters witness.

One of four tower buildings in Madrid that houses the British Embassy had been evacuated, the witness added.

Local radio reported people trapped in stalled metro cars and elevators.

Portuguese police said traffic lights were affected across the country, the metro was closed in Lisbon and Porto, and trains were not running.

Lisbon's subway transport operator Metropolitano de Lisboa said the subway was at a standstill with people still inside the trains, according to Publico newspaper.

A source at Portugal's TAP Air said Lisbon airport was running on back-up generators, while AENA, which manages 46 airports in Spain, reported flight delays around the country.

Such widespread outages are unusual in Europe. In 2003 a problem with a hydroelectric power line between Italy and Switzerland caused a major outage across the whole Italian peninsula for around 12 hours.

In 2006 an overloaded power network in Germany caused electricity cuts across parts of the country and in France, Italy, Spain, Austria, Belgium, Netherlands and as far as Morocco.