At least two civilians killed in attacks across country after Russia declared ceasefire for Orthodox Christmas
Russia has launched attacks across Ukraine, killing at least two civilians, in violation of a unilateral, self-declared ceasefire for the Orthodox celebration of Christmas on Saturday.
The attacks came as the US announced it would send Ukraine another $3.75bn of weapons and other aid, including a first shipment of Bradley armoured vehicles known as “tank killers”.
Continue reading...New $3.75bn US military aid package for Ukraine to include Bradley fighting vehicles for first time; reports of Russian shelling despite ceasefire declaration
Continue reading...Latest tranche of assistance will include for the first time Bradley armored vehicles
The White House has announced a new $3.75bn military assistance package to help Ukraine and its neighbors on Nato’s eastern flank as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine grinds on.
The latest tranche of assistance will include for the first time Bradley armored vehicles for Ukraine. The armored carrier is used to transport troops to combat and is known as a “tank-killer” because of the anti-tank missile it can fire.
Continue reading...Largest assistance package Washington has provided marks Biden’s latest effort to help Ukraine beat back Russian forces. This live blog is now closed
Reuters has the full report on how things are looking on the day of Russia’s unilateral ceasefire:
Russia and Ukraine attacked each others positions in eastern Ukraine on Friday with no sign they would observe a 36-hour ceasefire unilaterally ordered by Russian President Vladimir Putin at short notice to mark Orthodox Christmas in the region.
Patriarch Kirill, head of the Orthodox church in Russia, called for a ceasefire and a Christmas truce in Ukraine from noon on 6 January to midnight on 7 January to enable Orthodox people to attend services. Kirill has been a vocal supporter of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Vladimir Putin subsequently instructed his defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, to introduce a 36-hour ceasefire along the entire line of contact in Ukraine from noon tomorrow to midnight 7 January. He said that Russian troops must hold fire for 36 hours in order to mark Orthodox Christmas.
US president Joe Biden criticised Vladimir Putin for “trying to find some oxygen” by floating a 36-hour ceasefire from tomorrow noon to mark Orthodox Christmas, noting that Putin didn’t implement the break during the 25th, which many Orthodox Ukrainians celebrate, or on new year.
In his Thursday night address, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy rejected the idea, saying the goal was to halt the progress of Ukraine’s forces in Donetsk and the wider eastern Donbas region and bring in more of Moscow’s forces.
Mykhailo Podolyak, a senior aide to Ukraine’s president, dismissed Putin’s ceasefire calls. Ukraine “doesn’t attack foreign territory and doesn’t kill civilians” and “destroys only members of the occupation army on its territory”, he wrote on Twitter, adding that a “temporary truce” would be possible only when Russia leaves territory it is occupying in Ukraine.
Ukraine’s foreign minister of affairs, Dmytro Kuleba, also posted on Twitter to say that Russia’s “unilateral ceasefire can not and should not be taken seriously.”
Russia’s state first TV channel has reported: “At noon today, the ceasefire regime came into force on the entire contact line. It will continue until the end of January 7.”
Continue reading...Light armoured vehicles arriving in Ukraine are good fit for tactics Kyiv has been deploying against Russia
On the roads leading to Ukraine’s frontlines, a striking change has become visible in recent months.
Where once the armoured vehicles being ferried in were familiar from the Soviet era – T-model tanks, BMPs and post-Soviet Ukrainian-built BTRs – they have in recent months been joined by a growing array of western-supplied vehicles.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Files raise questions about whether oligarch’s children were made beneficiaries to protect fortune from possible asset freezes
Trusts holding billions of dollars of assets for Roman Abramovich were amended to transfer beneficial ownership to his children shortly before sanctions were imposed on the Russian oligarch.
Leaked files seen by the Guardian suggest 10 secretive offshore trusts established to benefit Abramovich were rapidly reorganised in early February 2022, three weeks before the start of Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine.
Continue reading...Ukraine rejects Russia’s proposed ceasefire; Germany sending additional Patriot air defence battery to Ukraine
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, has rejected out of hand a Russian order for a truce over Orthodox Christmas, saying it was a trick to halt the progress of Ukraine’s forces in the eastern Donbas region and bring in more of their own. Speaking pointedly in Russian and addressing both the Kremlin and Russians as a whole on Thursday, Zelenskiy said Moscow had repeatedly ignored Kyiv’s own peace plan.
The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, instructed his defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, to introduce a 36-hour ceasefire along the entire line of contact in Ukraine from noon on Friday to midnight on 7 January, the Kremlin said. Russian troops must hold fire for 36 hours in order to allow people “in the areas of hostilities” to mark Orthodox Christmas, Putin said.
The war would end, Zelenskiy said, when Russian troops left Ukraine or were thrown out. “They now want to use Christmas as a cover, albeit briefly, to stop the advances of our boys in Donbas and bring equipment, ammunitions and mobilised troops closer to our positions,” the Ukrainian leader said in his nightly video address. “What will that give them? Only yet another increase in their total losses.” He said the war “will end either when your soldiers leave or we throw them out”.
The US state department expressed skepticism over Putin’s announced ceasefire, describing it as “cynical” given Moscow’s New Year’s Day attack on Ukraine and saying the US had “little faith” in the announcement’s intentions.
Putin’s announcement came hours after the head of the Russian Orthodox church, Patriarch Kirill, called for a ceasefire and a Christmas truce in Ukraine. In a statement, Kirill said he appealed to “all parties involved in the internecine conflict” for the ceasefire, so that “Orthodox people can attend services on Christmas Eve and the day of the Nativity of Christ”.
Germany will join the US in supplying an additional Patriot air defence battery to Ukraine, the White House has announced, after the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, and the US president, Joe Biden, spoke by phone. The two leaders “expressed their common determination to continue to provide the necessary financial, humanitarian, military and diplomatic support to Ukraine for as long as needed”, the White House said in a statement.
The US believes that Vladimir Putin’s ally Yevgeny Prigozhin is interested in taking control of salt and gypsum from mines near the Ukrainian-held city of Bakhmut, a White House official said on Thursday. There were indications that monetary motives were driving Russia’s and Prigozhin’s “obsession” with Bakhmut, the official added. Prigozhin is the owner of private Russian military company Wagner Group.
Germany’s economy minister, Robert Habeck, said Germany providing weapons to Ukraine was a “good decision” during a Thursday briefing. Habeck’s department has to approve weapons exports.
Continue reading...Joe Biden and Olaf Scholz indicate shift in position on supplying heavier weapons to Kyiv to help in war against Russia
Joe Biden and his German counterpart Olaf Scholz have agreed to send infantry fighting vehicles to help Ukraine fight Russia, a day after France said it would supply its own armoured vehicles to Kyiv in an attempt to create a breakthrough in the 10-month war.
The joint announcement followed a phone call between Biden and Scholz and amounts to a step change in western military support for Ukraine, which has asked for up to 700 armoured vehicles to help force the Russians out.
Continue reading...Kyiv says Moscow’s declaration of truce, after Russian president cited appeal from patriarch, is ‘hypocrisy’
Ukraine has rejected an announcement by Vladimir Putin of a 36-hour ceasefire to mark Orthodox Christmas, saying there will be no truce until Russia removes its invading forces from occupied land.
The Kremlin said Putin had ordered his defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, to introduce a temporary ceasefire along the entire line of contact in Ukraine for Orthodox Christmas from midday on Friday to midnight on Saturday.
Continue reading...The Russian president has called for ceasefire to take place from noon 6 January to midnight 7 January for Orthodox Christmas
The UK’s ambassador to Ukraine, Melinda Simmons, has posted a picture from Cornwall of people celebrating Christmas with Ukrainian flags, commenting: “Pretty amazing to see how strong support for Ukraine remains in the UK after nearly a year of the Russian invasion.”
Dmytro Zhyvytskyi, governor of Sumy oblast, has said on Telegram that the night passed without incident in his region, which borders Russia.
Continue reading...Ukrainian shelling that killed 89 recruits aided by mobiles switched on near frontlines, claims Russia defence ministry
Russia’s defence ministry on Wednesday blamed the use of mobile phones by its soldiers for a deadly Ukrainian missile strike that killed dozens of conscripts, sparking anger among relatives of the soldiers.
Commenting on the deadliest single incident Moscow has acknowledged since the start of the war that it said killed 89 servicemen, Lt Gen Sergei Sevryukov said in a video statement that a commission was working to investigate the circumstances of what had happened.
Continue reading...Kyrylo Budanov says he expects fighting to be ‘hottest’ in March, with a Ukraine counter attack in the spring. This blog is now closed
The city administration in Kyiv has said that 160 million passengers used the city’s subway in 2022, compared with 319 million passengers the previous year. It also said that about 5.200 people used the network for shelter on New Year’s Eve. In a statement posted to Telegram, the city authority said:
On new year’s eve, during the air raid, about 5,200 people, including almost 400 children, used underground stations as shelter. The subway infrastructure operates 24/7 as a shelter and provides the most necessary conditions: drinking water, sanitary facilities and the possibility of recharging gadgets.
Continue reading...About 200 people laid roses and wreaths in a central square in the city of Samara, where some vowed to ‘avenge’ the victims
Mourners have voiced grief and anger at a rare public commemoration in Russia for the scores of soldiers killed on New Year’s Eve.
Admitting its worst military losses from a single Ukrainian attack, Russia on Tuesday said 89 servicemen were killed when a temporary deployment point was struck in Makiivka, a town in the eastern region of Donetsk partially held by separatists since 2014.
Continue reading...Protracted campaign of Iranian drones to ‘exhaust’ Ukraine, says president. This live blog is now closed
Nato countries will discuss their defence spending targets in the coming months as some of them call for turning a 2% target into a minimum figure, Nato secretary general Jens Stoltenberg told the German news agency DPA, according to a Reuters report.
Some allies are strongly in favour of turning the current 2% target into a minimum,” DPA quoted Stoltenberg as saying in an interview published on Tuesday.
We will meet, we will have ministerial meetings, we will have talks in capitals,” he said.
The parties discussed expected results of the next Ukraine-EU summit to be held on 3 February in Kyiv and agreed to intensify preparatory work,” the statement read.
Continue reading...Recently mobilised Russian troops said to have been killed; Ukraine reports 20 ‘aerial targets’ shot down above Kyiv
A New Year’s Day attack on a complex in the Russian-controlled city of Makiivka killed scores of recently mobilised troops sent by Moscow, according to reports on both sides, in what could be one of the deadliest known incidents involving Russian conscripts so far.
Without claiming the strike, Ukraine’s military command said up to 400 Russian soldiers were killed in the incident in Makiivka, a city in the Moscow-controlled parts of the Donetsk region.
Continue reading...Moscow says 63 of its soldiers died in attack on school building used as barracks amid claims death toll could be higher
A New Year’s Day attack on a complex in the Russian-controlled Ukrainian city of Makiivka has killed scores of recently mobilised troops sent by Moscow, in one of deadliest single strikes against Russia’s forces since the war began.
Russia’s defence ministry, in a rare admission on Monday, said 63 Russian soldiers died when Ukraine hit “a temporary deployment facility” with four US-supplied Himars missiles.
Continue reading...There has been little movement in the frontlines for weeks, and there are signs Russia lacks offensive combat power
Russia’s war on Ukraine enters its second calendar year at a delicate point. It is six weeks after the liberation of Kherson and there has been little movement in the frontlines either way since. There is not yet any sign of a full, renewed counteroffensive by the Ukrainians, not helped by the weather which has been above freezing, leaving muddy ground not conducive to military manoeuvre.
“The situation is just stuck,” Ukraine’s head of military intelligence, Kyrylo Budanov, told the BBC last week, which, if an accurate assessment, is not helpful to Kyiv, badly needing to retain momentum in the run-up to spring. But the political leadership of both countries clearly signalled a desire to try to break the deadlock with new goals for the new year.
Continue reading...Ukraine president says his only wish for 2023 is victory. This blog is now closed
The Ukrainian ministry of foreign affairs has posted a video illustrating how new year was celebrated under curfew in Kyiv last night.
Stefania, Ukraine’s Eurovision song contest winning entry, featured in London’s new year fireworks display last night, as did the colours of the Ukrainian national flag as England expressed solidarity with those under bombardment.
Continue reading...President says country ready to fight for return to normal life as Moscow launches latest wave of attacks
Ukraine was targeted by a fresh wave of strikes overnight as Russia’s attack on the country continued into a second year and the embattled President Zelenskiy said in a new year’s message that he hoped for victory.
Blasts were heard in Kyiv after midnight as people celebrated the new year indoors, but the destruction appears to have been limited to two cases of rocket debris falling on the city, damaging a car in the city centre.
Continue reading...Volodymyr Zelenskiy pledges to fight for freedom in 2023; Putin says Moscow will ‘never give in’ to west
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Saturday that his only wish for Ukrainians for 2023 was victory and he resolved to stay the course. “I want to wish all of us one thing – victory,” he said in a video message shortly before midnight as Ukrainians marked their first new year since the invasion. Zelenskiy reiterated that he would stay with his people while they were fighting for freedom. “We were told to surrender. We chose a counterattack,” he said. “We are ready to fight for it [freedom]. That’s why each of us is here. I’m here, we are here, you are here, everyone is here. We are all Ukraine.”
Russia has claimed its strikes against Ukraine on New Year’s Eve that killed three people were targeting its neighbour’s drone production. A children’s hospital was among the buildings said to have been hit by Russian shelling. Ukrainian officials claim Russia is deliberately targeting civilians to sow fear.
Russian leaders issued a series of defiant messages ahead of new year. President Vladimir Putin said Russia would “never give in” to the west, and was fighting for its “motherland, truth and justice … so that Russia’s security can be guaranteed”. It was his longest new year’s address in his two decades in charge.
Russia launched more than 20 cruise missiles at Ukrainian targets on Saturday, killing at least one person in Kyiv, the capital, and injuring another 20 people in what one Ukrainian official described as “terror on New Year’s Eve”. Fourteen of the injured were taken to hospital and at least one was in critical condition after Moscow’s second major missile attack in three days.
Ukrainian air defence forces destroyed 45 Iranian-made unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), including 32 during attacks on Kyiv as its citizens attempted to welcome in the new year, Ukrainian command said.
Ukraine’s defence minister, Oleksii Reznikov, said Russia may be preparing a new mobilisation order and could close its border to men eligible to fight within a week.
Russia and Ukraine have exchanged more than 200 captured soldiers, the latest prisoner swap between the two sides.
The US is concerned by China’s alignment with Russia as Moscow continues its invasion of Ukraine, the US said after the presidents of Russia and China, Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping, held a video meeting on Friday.
Russian authorities have announced that soldiers and state employees deployed in Ukraine will be exempt from income tax, in the latest effort to encourage support for its military operation there.
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