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Ukraine's reach widened on 19 September 2023
Summary
A look back at a day when reports pointed to Ukrainian special forces operating in Sudan, amid strikes in Crimea and a new ICC presence in Kyiv.
What did Ukraine's war look like beyond its own front lines on 19 September 2023? On that date, CNN, citing a source in the Ukrainian military, reported that Ukrainian special forces were likely behind recent drone strikes and a ground operation against Wagner Group mercenaries in Sudan, in the context of the Sudanese civil war.
A conflict moving outward
The Sudan report suggested a theatre far from Ukraine's borders. It rested on a single source in the Ukrainian military, and the claim was framed as likely rather than confirmed.
The days just before 19 September 2023 showed a war that was also reaching deep into Russian-held areas. On 13 September, Russia said at least 24 people were injured in Ukrainian missile strikes in Sevastopol, and that two boats were damaged. Ukraine claimed to have destroyed the Russian landing ship Minsk, submarine B-237 and a KC-701-class patrol boat of the Black Sea Fleet. The submarine, also known as Rostov-na-Donu, is a Project 636.3 diesel-electric attack submarine that joined the Black Sea Fleet when it was commissioned on 26 December 2014.
On the same day, the head of Rosatom, Alexei Likhachev, said Ukraine had launched a drone strike on Enerhodar, near the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, and that all six drones were destroyed.
Legal track in Kyiv
Alongside the military developments, a legal process was advancing. On 14 September 2023 the International Criminal Court opened a field office in Kyiv as part of its war crimes investigations. It became the largest ICC office outside its headquarters in The Hague.
What the pieces show
Taken together, the reports from 13 to 19 September 2023 covered strikes on Crimea, drone activity near a nuclear plant, a permanent international investigative presence in the capital and an alleged operation in Africa against Wagner fighters. Each item stood on its own: Russia and Ukraine gave differing accounts of the Sevastopol damage, Rosatom reported the Enerhodar attack, and the Sudan claim came from an unnamed source. What linked them was the range of arenas in which the war was being reported, from the Black Sea to The Hague to Sudan.
