Igor Girkin has been critical of war effort; Darya Trepova delivered bomb that killed pro-war blogger

Russian courts have jailed a prominent ultra-nationalist critic of Vladimir Putin and, separately, a woman convicted over a blast that killed a pro-war blogger.

In Moscow, a court sentenced Igor Girkin, a former battlefield commander of Russian proxy forces in east Ukraine who was convicted by a Dutch court over the shooting down of flight MH17, to four years in jail on extremism charges prompted by his criticism of the Russian war effort in Ukraine.

Moscow says aircraft that went down in border region of Belgorod was carrying prisoners who were to be swapped

Russia has accused Kyiv of downing a large military transport plane carrying Ukrainian prisoners of war to an exchange on Wednesday, after a crash in the Belgorod region that killed everyone onboard.

Ukraine has neither confirmed nor denied that it hit the plane but said Moscow had created a “deliberate threat to the life and safety” of its PoWs by failing to warn Kyiv to deconflict the airspace before the swap.

At least 130 people also injured, says president, with Kharkiv apartment block and Kyiv sports club among buildings hit

• Russia-Ukraine war – latest news updates

Russia has carried out a wave of attacks on Ukraine, killing 18 people and injuring more than 130, Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said, with a sports club in central Kyiv one of several civilian buildings damaged.

Making his nightly video address on Tuesday, the Ukrainian president said more than 200 sites were struck, including 139 dwellings.

‘Looking for a solution in the Middle East doesn’t mean that we are not continuing supporting Ukraine,’ says Josep Borrell

In an intelligence update published today, the British defence ministry said: “Ukraine’s ports exported more agricultural products in December 2023 than at any other point since Russia’s invasion, almost certainly driven by the reopening of Ukraine’s main Black Sea ports and the establishment of a unilateral shipping export channel.”

It added:

Ukraine has achieved this because it has largely prevented the Russian Black Sea fleet from operating in the western Black Sea, where it is held at risk by Ukrainian missiles and uncrewed surface vessels.

Russian-installed mayor and governor say another 20 people were injured in attack on occupied city in eastern Ukraine

At least 25 people have been killed after Ukrainian forces shelled a busy suburban shopping area in the Russian-controlled city of Donetsk in eastern Ukraine, according to local officials.

Alexei Kulemzin, the city’s Russian-installed mayor, said Ukrainian artillery had fired on a bustling district where shops and a market are located. Denis Pushilin, the Russian-appointed head of the Donetsk region, said emergency services were working at the scene, adding that a further 20 people, including two children, had been injured in the strike on the suburb of Tekstilshchik.

Strike on Friday targeted a Rosneft oil storage facility about 50km from the Ukrainian border, in Russian town of Klintsy, officials said

• At a glance: what we know on day 696

Russian troops have reinstalled mines along the perimeter of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant (ZNPP) in the occupied Zaporizhzhia oblast, the Euromaidan Press website has reported, citing the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

Although the plant, the largest in Europe, has been under Russian occupation since 4 March 2022, it continues to work.

Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi of the IAEA expressed concern over this development, emphasising that the presence of mines contradicts IAEA safety standards. This area is restricted and not accessible to operational plant personnel.

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