Who is really fighting Russia's war by 13 September 2024?

Who counts as a participant in Russia's war against Ukraine? On 13 September 2024, that question ran through reports on weapons, diplomacy and the human cost of the fighting.

Chinese components, Western missiles

Reuters reported on 13 September 2024 that Russia had begun producing thousands of Garpiya-A1 long-range combat drones, used against Ukrainian civilian and military targets, and that they incorporated engines, parts and technology from China. Later background on China's role notes that Beijing abstained from United Nations votes condemning the invasion, objected to sanctions on Russia, and that sanctions left Russia heavily dependent on China economically and technologically.

On the other side of the ledger, the United Kingdom reportedly approved the use of Storm Shadow cruise missiles against targets inside Russian territory on 11 September 2024. The next day, Russian president Vladimir Putin warned that Ukrainian use of NATO weapons to strike deep into Russia would amount to NATO's formal entry into the war. He argued that NATO personnel programme these weapons, which he called a direct confrontation.

The two accounts mirror each other. Moscow described Western-supplied arms as proof of NATO involvement, while the reporting on the Garpiya-A1 pointed to Chinese-origin technology in a Russian weapon used against Ukraine.

A peace pitch rejected

On 12 September 2024, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy strongly denounced a Brazilian–Chinese peace initiative. He said both countries were effectively siding with Russia, because the approach would let the Russian army keep Ukrainian territory as a way of de-escalating the war, rather than helping Ukraine resist the invasion. Background on China's diplomacy records that its mediation proposals were rejected as pro-Russian.

The disagreement concerned the terms on which any de-escalation might happen. Kyiv's position, as stated that day, was that a plan allowing territorial gains to stand was not neutral.

The toll on the ground

The fighting continued to fall on civilians and aid workers. On 12 September 2024, Russian shelling of Borova in Kharkiv Oblast killed three civilians and injured nine, including several emergency service personnel. Russian artillery in Donetsk Oblast killed three Red Cross workers and injured two others. On 13 September 2024, Russian artillery targeted 15 areas of Sumy Oblast, killing two civilians near the village of Yampil and injuring nine.

The war also reached shipping. Ukraine accused Russia on 12 September 2024 of striking, with missiles, a Saint Kitts and Nevis-flagged bulk carrier carrying grain to Egypt in Romania's exclusive economic zone in the Black Sea. No casualties were reported.

Foreign nationals and demographic strain

An Indian Foreign Ministry spokesperson said on 12 September 2024 that about 45 Indian nationals had been discharged from the Russian military and that efforts were under way to secure the release of a further 50. The remark showed that the war's reach extended well beyond the belligerents and their suppliers.

On 13 September 2024, the US Central Intelligence Agency reported that Ukraine's death rate, at 18.6 per thousand people, was the highest in the world, while its birth rate, at six per thousand, was the lowest.

What the day showed

Taken together, the reports of 11 to 13 September 2024 show a war whose edges were contested. Russia framed Ukrainian strikes with Western weapons as NATO belligerence. Ukraine's president framed a Brazilian–Chinese peace proposal as a tilt towards Moscow. Reporting on the drone programme tied Chinese technology to Russian attacks. Each side's argument about outside involvement was also an argument about legitimacy.

Meanwhile, the casualty reports from Kharkiv, Donetsk and Sumy, and the demographic figures, showed the cost borne inside Ukraine regardless of how that argument was settled.