Ukraine, Briefly

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• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned that talks with Kyiv or its foreign allies may not take place if Moscow stages referendums on joining Russia in occupied areas of Ukraine, according to Radio Free Europe. Russian forces and Moscow-backed rebels now control huge swathes of territory in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region and in the south. Russian-installed leaders in both areas have suggested organizing referendums on joining Russia.
• The threat of a nuclear disaster caused heightened international concern Monday amid weekend strikes on a Russian-controlled power station in Ukraine that is nearly twice the size of Chernobyl, NBC News wrote. The facility is damaged but remains running. Meanwhile, at a ceremony in Tokyo marking the 77^th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, UN Secretary-General António Guterres appealed for independent inspectors to be granted access to the massive nuclear complex in Zaporizhzhia.

• Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder will remain a member of the Social Democrats Party (SPD), despite his connections to Russian energy corporations and friendship with Vladimir Putin, Politico reported. An internal SPD arbitration committee rejected an expulsion motion against the controversial ex-chancellor on Monday, finding he had “not been guilty of a violation of party rules.”