Iranian activist takes his own life to protest country’s dictatorship

(LONDON and KYIV) — Russia on Thursday launched what officials in Kyiv said was an intercontinental ballistic missile toward southeastern Ukraine, but a U.S. official told ABC News that Russia launched “an experimental medium-range ballistic missile against Ukraine” near Dnipro.

The official said the United States briefed Ukraine and other close allies and partners in recent days on Russia’s possible use of this weapon in order to help them prepare. According to the official, Russia likely only possesses “a handful” of these experimental missiles.

Two U.S. officials previously told ABC News it was not an ICBM but instead an intermediate-range ballistic missile, or IRBM.

The launch raises the prospect of nuclear weapons; IRBMs or ICBMs can both be equipped with nuclear warheads. A U.S. official confirmed to ABC News that the ballistic missile Russia fired at Dnipro contained MIRVs, or multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles, meaning it had multiple warheads that hit the target. MIRV technology is used in ICBMs to use multiple nuclear warheads atop the missile so they can strike multiple targets. The missile used Thursday did not carry nuclear warheads.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, in remarks Thursday following the missile launch, said Russia has the right to use its weapons against the military facilities of countries employing their weapons against Russia.

“We consider ourselves entitled to use our weapons against military objects of those countries that allow to use their own weapons against our objects. In the event of an escalation of aggressive actions, we will respond decisively and in a mirror manner,” Putin said.

Putin said Russia used “one of the newest Russian medium-range missile systems” in an attack on Ukraine, adding that it was a “ballistic missile with a non-nuclear hypersonic equipment” and that the “test was successful.”

Russia warned the U.S. 30 minutes before the launch of its new “Oreshnik” missile against targets in Dnipro, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Russian news outlet TASS.

The Kremlin announced earlier this week that Putin had updated the country’s nuclear doctrine, a move that lowered the bar for Russia to respond with nuclear weapons. Russian ICBMs are capable of carrying nuclear warheads, although it appeared the missile fired on Thursday was not equipped with one.

Ukraine’s military was “95% sure” the strike on Thursday was with an ICBM, a Ukrainian official told ABC News, but added that they were still examining the missile parts on the ground and had not yet reached a final conclusion.

“Today it was a new Russian missile. All the parameters: speed, altitude — match those of an intercontinental ballistic missile,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a statement on social media. “All expert evaluations are underway.”

The Ukrainian Air Force announced Thursday morning it had tracked the launch of the ICBM, along with six additional missiles, all of which were targeting the Dnipro region. The ICBM appeared to have been launched from the Astrahan region, in Russia’s southwest, Ukrainian military officials said.

All of the missiles were launched in about two hours, beginning at about 5 a.m. local time, Ukraine said.

All were targeted at businesses and critical infrastructure, but only the missile that Ukraine identified as an ICBM struck the city, Ukraine said. The six other missiles were shot down. There were no reports of casualties or significant damage, officials said.

The U.S. officials said the assessment of the launch, the type of missile and warhead, and the damage in Dnipro was continuing. The distance from what Ukraine said was the launch point to the strike location in Dnipro is about 600 miles, a distance shorter than what an ICBM would be expected to travel.

Two experts told ABC News the projectile, seen in video circulating online, looks likely to be “a ballistic missile with MIRV-ed capabilities.”

The launch of an ICBM, if confirmed as such, would arrive amid concerns that the conflict between Russia and Ukraine could further escalate. This week, Ukraine’s military for the first time launched U.S.-made ATACMS missiles toward targets within Russia, days after U.S. President Joe Biden allowed for such use of the long-range weapons.

Putin, in his remarks Thursday, blamed the U.S. for escalating the conflict, saying: “I would like to emphasize once again that it was not Russia, but the United States that destroyed the international security system. And by continuing to fight, cling to their hegemony, they are pushing the whole world into a global conflict.”

Kyiv on Tuesday launched six of the ATACMS at targets within Russian territory, according to the Russian Defense Ministry.

Zelenskyy said he would not confirm if Ukraine had used ATACMS to conduct a strike on an ammunition depot in the Bryansk region of Russia, but said Ukraine has ATACMS and “will use all of these” against Russia.

Within hours of Russia announcing it had struck down five of the ATACMS on Tuesday, the Kremlin announced that Putin had updated the country’s nuclear doctrine.

Following that warning, Ukraine on Wednesday fired long-range British Storm Shadow cruise missiles into Russia for the first time, a Ukrainian military unit involved in the operation told ABC News. At least 10 of those missiles hit an estate in the village of Marino, the unit said.

They were targeting a command post where North Korean army generals and officers were present, the unit said. More than 10,000 North Korean troops are said to be operating alongside Russian forces in the Kursk region.

Ukraine’s 413th Separate Unmanned Systems Battalion, which helped provide fire control for the strikes, told ABC News that there was intelligence showing high-ranking North Koreans were present.

Zelenskyy cast the Russian strike on Thursday as a result of Russia and its leader being “terrified.”

“Obviously, Putin is terrified when normal life simply exists next to him. When people simply have dignity. When a country simply wants to be and has the right to be independent,” Zelenskyy said. “Putin is doing whatever it takes to prevent his neighbor from breaking free of his grasp.”

ABC News’ Joe Simonetti, Lauren Minore, Yulia Drozd, Natasha Popova, Tanya Stukalova and Ellie Kaufman contributed to this report.

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(LONDON) — The U.S. is communicating with rebel groups inside Syria amid the search for missing American journalist Austin Tice, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said Tuesday, as the prisons of former President Bashar Assad empty and more evidence of alleged atrocities emerges.

Miller told journalists at a Tuesday briefing, “We do continue to believe that he is alive and we continue to make clear in all of our conversations, either with entities on the ground in Syria or with entities that may be in communication with those on the ground in Syria, that we have no higher priority than the safe return of Austin Tice to his family.”

The U.S. has expressed its desire to find Tice to the lead Syrian rebel group now guiding the transition of power in Damascus, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham — led by Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, real name Ahmed Al-Sharaa — Miller said.

“It is a message that we have sent to HTS,” Miller told reporters. The group has its roots in Al-Qaeda and is a designated terrorist organization in the U.S. and the European Union. Jolani himself is still the subject of a $10 million U.S. bounty.

“We have sent very clearly the message that as they move through Syria liberating prisons, that our top priority is the return of Austin Tice,” Miller continued. “We want anyone who is operating on the ground in Syria to be on the lookout for him and if so — if they do find him, to help return him to us safely and as soon as possible.”

Tice went missing while reporting in Syria in 2012. The journalist is believed to have been kidnapped at a checkpoint in a contested area west of Damascus. His whereabouts and the identity of his abductors is unknown, though U.S. officials have previously said they believe Tice was being held by Syrian government forces.

The collapse of the Assad regime raised hopes that Tice would be found. “We believe he’s alive,” President Joe Biden said on Sunday. “We think we can get him back, but we have no direct evidence of that yet.”

On Monday, the State Department increased its reward for information on Tice to $10 million. The State Department also offered relocation for anyone that helps information that helps find and recover Tice.

Roger Carstens, the special presidential envoy for hostage affairs, also traveled to the Middle East to hold talks with regional officials to “get him home as soon as possible,” Miller said on Monday.

Debra and Marc Tice — Austin’s parents — released a statement urging “anyone who can do so to please assist Austin so he can safely return home to our family” following the collapse of the Assad government.

“We are watching the events unfold in Syria and seeing families reunited with their loved ones after years of separation,” said a statement released via the Press Freedom Center at the National Press Club.

“We know this is possible for our family, too,” they added. “Austin Tice is alive, in Syria, and it’s time for him to come home. We are eagerly anticipating seeing Austin walk free.”

Tice is one of the 157,000 people disappeared into the bowels of Assad’s totalitarian state between 2011 and 2024, per an estimate by the Syrian Network for Human Rights.

Rebel fighters surging south from Idlib and north from Daraa emptied government prisons as they advanced on Damascus at the close of an 11-day surprise offensive.

There, the infamous Saydnaya prison — once described as the “Human Slaughterhouse” by Amnesty International — became a rallying point for the hopeful family and friends of the missing.

Rebel fighters and Damascenes rushed through the facility, freeing groups of men, women and children from cells.

The Syrian Civil Defence, also known as the White Helmets, said that rumors of hidden underground cells proved unfounded. But rescuers said they found evidence of the regime’s vast torture apparatus as well as the bodies of those who did not live to see its fall.

Among them was famed anti-government activist Mazen Al-Hamada, who had been held in Saydnaya since February 2020.

ABC News’ Dee Carden and Camilla Alcini contributed to this report.

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(NEW YORK) — Oleksandra Matviichuk works to expose stories about the war in Ukraine. The Ukrainian human rights lawyer leads advocacy group the Centre for Civil Liberties, which was awarded the 2022 Nobel Peace Prize.

Matviichuk acknowledged the severe personal impact of Russia’s war crimes. She sees opportunities to bring war criminals to justice before the war ends, restore the rule of law and create a just future.

ABC News’ Linsey Davis sat down with Matviichuk to discuss the ongoing threat to Ukraine.

ABC NEWS: Our next guest is a Nobel Peace Prize winner for her work exposing the hidden and underreported stories of the war in Ukraine. Oleksandra Matviichuk has documented more than 80,000 war crimes committed by Russia and is using her platform to inform people all around the world about the conflict.

Oleksandra, thank you so much for joining us tonight. We are almost three years into this war. So many, of course, have been forced to flee their homes. But you decided to stay in Kyiv. Why did you decide to stay? What’s life like for you?

MAVIICHUK: Because this is my home, and I think it’s a very choice to fight for freedom, for my country, for my people, and to defend human dignity. Even in this situation, when the law doesn’t work because Russia ignore all norms of international law and all decisions of international organizations.

ABC NEWS: You had the Center for Civil Liberties in Ukraine recognized with the Nobel Peace Prize in 2022 for turning the horrors of war into action and documenting thousands of human rights violations. How is this information processed and what do you hope comes to light through your organization’s efforts?

MAVIICHUK: When large scale war started, we united our efforts with dozens of organizations from different regions. We built national network of local commentators. We covered the whole country, including the occupied territories.

And working together, we jointly documented more than 80,000 episodes of war crimes. But what we are literally doing while this war turned people into the numbers, we are returning people their names because people are not numbers.

ABC NEWS: And Ukraine is of course, your country, Ukrainians, your people. Many of these stories you documented, I’m sure, hit so close to home. How do you deal with this at an emotional level and what keeps you going?

MAVIICHUK: Frankly speaking, it’s difficult because we face with enormous amount of crimes, which mean that we face this enormous amount of human fates. But what keeps me going, it’s people, because ordinary people in Ukraine now doing extraordinary things.

It were ordinary people who help to survive under artillery fire. It were ordinary people who took people out from the ruined cities. It were ordinary people who broke through the encirclement to provide humanitarian aid. And now it became obvious that ordinary people fighting for their freedom and human dignity are stronger that even the second army of the world.

ABC NEWS: You are also a seasoned human rights lawyer. You’ve been calling for Vladimir Putin to be tried in what’s called a special tribunal. Can you explain how this would work in holding him accountable?

MAVIICHUK: We have four types of international crimes: it’s war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide and crime of aggression. And Russia is committing all these four types of international crimes. And the problem is that there is no international court which can prosecute Putin and his surroundings for the crime of aggression.

And that is why I am advocating to create a special tribunal on aggression and to hold Putin and his surrounding accountable. Because all these crimes, which we have documented, it’s a result of their leadership decision to start this war and to broke the peace.

ABC NEWS: Russia’s attacks have been relentless. Just today, we learned that a Russian missile killed three people and injured a dozen in south east Ukraine. At this point, what do you think the possible scenarios are for this war to ultimately come to an end?

MAVIICHUK: We have to go to this sustainable peace through strength because dictators are coward. They afraid only of strength, and we have to demonstrate it. And Russia has a goal to occupy and destroy Ukraine even more. Russia wants to forcibly restore Russian empire.

And that is why, in order to get sustainable peace, Ukraine have to get security guarantees which not provide Russia opportunity just to postpone this goal, but to make Russia impossible to achieve this goal in future.

ABC NEWS: Oleksandra Matviichuk we thank you so much for joining us. Really appreciate your time.

MAVIICHUK: Thank you.

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