Ukraine updates: Government overthrow plot foiled — SBU

World Athletics chief Sebastian Coe visited Ukraine over the weekend and met the country's athletes to show them he "was in their corner" as the Paris Olympic Games approach, he said.

"It was important for me to be here this weekend at their national championships ahead of the Paris Olympics," said Coe, who attended the Ukrainian Athletics Championships in Lviv on Saturday.

"I have been deeply moved by the resilience and determination of the athletes. As we arrived at the stadium, an air raid siren was sounding and delayed the 200-meter start. This is the stark and sobering reality and challenges the athletes face day-in, day-out," he said.

Coe also met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv, reiterating his sport's support for the war-torn country and inviting Zelenskyy to the track and field meet at the Paris Olympics.

World Athletics and other national track and field federations have set up a fund and provided training facilities to help Ukrainian athletes train, qualify and compete in international events.

Fewer than 30 Ukrainian track and field athletes will go to the Paris Games from a team that would have numbered around 70 three or four years ago, Coe said, underlining the "massive impact" the war has had on sport in Ukraine.

World Athletics has imposed a blanket ban on Russian athletes from the track and field program at the Paris Olympics because of the Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, while other sports allow selected Russians to compete as neutrals if they meet certain criteria. The International Olympic Committee recommended that second, less punitive path, but Coe and the athletics federation chose to go further.

Beatrix von Storch, a senior member of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, said in an interview with DW's Michaela Küfner that she was against Ukraine joining the EU.

"We're not even able within the European Union as it is now to organize ourselves and to get everything fixed. So we do not need someone else," she said during the party's conference in the western city of Essen at the weekend.

Some members of the populist party are being investigated for their connections to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Ukrainian authorities said on Monday that they had foiled a bid to occupy the country's parliament and "remove from power" the current government.

A group had attempted to mount "provocations" in Ukraine's capital, Kyiv, on Sunday, when the country marked Constitution Day, the SBU intelligence service and prosecutors reported on Monday.

The group's plans included occupying parliament during a demonstration and the "removal from power" of Ukraine's current military and political leadership, the report said. Four men are under investigation, two of whom are in custody.

Weapons and ammunition were found in raids, the report said. The suspects could face up to 10 years in prison if found guilty. The investigation is being led by authorities in Ivano-Frankivsk in the west of the country. 

In May, the SBU said it had uncovered a network of Russian agents plotting to assassinate President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Russia claims to have captured two more villages in eastern Ukraine. Following advances over the weekend, the Russian Defense Ministry said its forces had taken the Ukrainian village of Novopokrovske in the war-torn Donetsk region. 

The tiny village is in an area of the front northwest of occupied Avdiivka, where Moscow has claimed to capture a new settlement almost every week this summer. 

Moscow also said its forces had taken the village of Stepova Novoselivka in the Kharkiv region, where Russia launched a renewed local offensive in May.

Ukraine has yet to comment on the Russian claims.

Drone strikes have disrupted electricity and gas supplies and damaged telephone lines in the Russian region of Belgorod, bordering Ukraine, according to Belgorod governor Vyacheslav Gladkov.

"There is damage to phone cables, to the gas and electricity supply. Electricity has been cut in a string of villages," Gladkov posted on his Telegram channel.

He mentioned Grayvoron and Krasnaya Yaruga, west of the city of Belgorod, and Shebekino, southeast of the regional capital. All three settlements are near the border with Ukraine. 

Local media reported that Belgorod itself and the town of Oskol, northeast of Belgorod, were also affected. They attributed the blackout to a damaged substation.

In the Kursk region, which borders Ukraine and the Belgorod region, governor Alexei Smirnov warned that "due to technical issues on power lines in neighbouring regions, a deficit of electricity capacity could arise in the Kursk region."

The Kursk region came under drone attack overnight, with air defenses shooting down seven Ukrainian drones, Smirnov said. 

dh/msh (AP, AFP, dpa, Reuetrs)