“It is with deep regret that I must inform you that Ildar Dadin – call sign Gandhi – died yesterday in combat in the Kharkiv region” in northeast Ukraine, his friend and former Russian MP Ilia Ponomarev said on Facebook. His friend hailed Dadin as a “fearless and determined fighter” who had gone “to the front to fight Putinism”.

Ukrainian air defences repelled a Russian attack of hypersonic missiles on Kyiv at rush hour yesterday, defence sources have confirmed. Air-raid sirens sounded across Ukraine’s capital as many people were going to work and school.