WASHINGTON, June 3 — A shooter wounded multiple people during a funeral in the US state of Wisconsin on Thursday, police and local media said.

“At 2:26pm there were multiple shots fired at Graceland Cemetery. There are victims but unknown how many at this time. The scene is still active and being investigated,” the Racine Police Department said on Twitter.

Local media reported that five people were wounded at the funeral, which was for Da’Shontay L. King Sr, a man who was killed by police in March.

Gun violence-plagued America is reeling from two devastating mass shootings last month: one at a Texas elementary school that killed 21 people, and another at a New York State supermarket that left 10 dead. — AFP

KYIV, June 2 — Ukraine's deputy defence minister said Ukraine was 'fighting a defensive war' when asked whether the country promised its Western partners not to use weapons systems provided by them to hit targets in Russia.

'Ukraine is fighting an exclusively defensive war, and we always state this,' Hanna Malyar told a briefing today. — Reuters

NEW YORK, June 2 — Pfizer Inc and partner BioNTech have completed the filing with the US drugs regulator seeking authorisation for their Covid-19 vaccine in children under 5 years of age.

The companies filed data with the US Food and Drug Administration showing three lower-dose shots of the vaccine generated a strong immune response in children as young as 6 months of age. — Reuters

MOSCOW, June 2 — Russia does not plan to 'close the window' to Europe, the Kremlin said today, as its relations with the West linger at new lows over the conflict in Ukraine.

Asked whether difficult relations with Europe were turning the clock back on Peter the Great's efforts to open Russia up to Europe, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said: 'We are not planning to close anything.'

Peter the Great, a tsar who ruled the Russian Empire from 1682 to 1725, oversaw Russia's transition to a major European power and founded the city of Saint Petersburg, dubbed Russia's 'window to Europe'. — Reuters

ABU DHABI, June 2 —The United Arab Emirates has vaccinated all those who must be vaccinated against Covid-19 in the oil-rich Gulf Arab state, state news agency WAM reported today.

The UAE 'announces that 100 per cent of the targeted categories have been vaccinated,' it said. — Reuters

WASHINGTON, June 1 — US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said today that Ukraine had given assurances that it will not use long-range weapons systems provided by Washington against targets on Russian territory.

Blinken was asked what could be done to minimise the risks of escalation as the United States provides long-range weapons systems to Ukraine, after a meeting with Nato Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg in Washington. — Reuters

BERLIN, June 1 —Russia has adopted a strategy of flattening settlements from a safe distance in Ukraine's Donbas region, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said, making it all the more important for Berlin to send Kyiv defensive weapons.

In a speech to the German parliament today, she said Russia was fighting a war to 'depopulate and extinguish civilisation' in the eastern Ukrainian region.

'City by city, village by village, Russian troops are destroying them from a safe distance,' she said. 'First the missiles, then the warplanes with artillery, and then, when everything is flattened, the tanks roll in.'

Germany needed to send more artillery, drones and air defence weapons to help Ukraine defend itself from this onslaught, she added. — Reuters

KYIV, June 1 — A Ukrainian presidential advisor and peace talks negotiator accused Europe and the United States of having an 'irrational fear' of Russia in an interview released today by news agency Interfax Ukraine.

Mykhailo Podolyak, a key negotiator for Ukraine during previous talks with Russia, said the political elites of the West 'want to return to the pre-war period and do not want to solve problems,' adding that their financial priorities took precedence in decision-making. — Reuters