Vladimir Putin says Russia’s war in Ukraine could be ‘long-term process’

President says potential of nuclear war more likely but Russia has ‘not gone crazy’ and will not use nuclear weapons first

Vladimir Putin has admitted Russia’s war in Ukraine could turn into a “long-term process” as he sought to defend an invasion in which Russian troops have been forced to retreat and even airbases deep inside Russia have come under attack.

Speaking to members of his personal human rights council on Wednesday, Putin claimed that Russia would not use nuclear weapons first in any conflict, denied that Russian troops were deserting en masse from the field of battle, and claimed he would not need to mobilise more troops, a process that has caused considerable upheaval in Russia.

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Russia-Ukraine war: Putin hints at ‘long’ conflict and says risk of nuclear war is on the rise – as it happened

This live blog has now closed, you can read more of our Ukraine coverage here

More now on Europe’s energy crisis, via AFP:

Sky-high energy prices have caused numerous factories, particularly in Germany’s chemicals sector, which was highly dependent upon cheap Russian gas, to halt operations. But European nations were able to fill their gas reservoirs and no one has been cut off yet.

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‘They want to kill us’: mayor Vitali Klitschko plans for the worst as Russia tries to freeze Kyiv

Klitschko says capital taking no chances, working day and night readying for critical strike on power supplies

In his office in Kyiv’s city hall, mayor Vitali Klitschko is planning for the worst and hoping for the best.

The previous day, in the middle of the sixth mass Russian missile strike against Ukrainian cities that had sent Kyiv’s resident to the bomb shelters and metro stations, no rockets had made it through to hit the capital.

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Saudi Arabia readies full state pageantry for Xi Jinping visit

Chinese president’s three-day trip to Riyadh will lead to a ‘strategic agreement’ between the authoritarian powers

Xi Jinping will arrive in Riyadh on Wednesday on a long awaited visit to a regional ally that has readied full state pageantry and a round of agreements likely to cement ties between China and Saudi Arabia – and deepen alarm in Washington.

China’s president will meet more than 30 heads of state and business leaders during his three-day visit to the Saudi capital, which is set to lead to a “strategic agreement” between the authoritarian powers. The trip is the culmination of decades of cooperation once based on oil sales, which has grown into bilateral trade of close to $90bn a year.

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Joe Biden and Rishi Sunak agree to increase gas exports from US to UK

Leaders announce partnership to reduce global dependence on Russian energy

Joe Biden has agreed a deal to ramp up gas exports from the US to the UK as part of a joint effort to cut bills and limit Russia’s impact on western energy supplies.

Sunak and Biden announced an “energy security and affordability partnership” and set up a joint action group, led by Westminster and White House officials, with the aim of reducing global dependence on Russian energy.

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Russia-Ukraine war live: Russia claims Ukraine shelling Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant and says there is ‘no prospect for peace talks’

Moscow accuses Ukraine of ‘nuclear terrorism’; Kremlin spokesperson says there is no prospect for negotiations with Kyiv at the moment

The Latvian broadcasting regulator cancelled the licence of Russian independent television station TV Rain on Tuesday, the regulator’s chairman said.

“In connection with the threat to the national security and public order, [the regulator] has made a decision this morning to annul the broadcast licence of TV Rain”, Ivars Abolins said on Twitter, adding the broadcasts will cease on Thursday.

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Iran has not sent ballistic missiles to Russia so far, says Ukrainian official

Mikhailo Podolyak says pressure on Tehran from overseas and distraction of civil unrest mean helping Moscow is not a priority

Iran has so far not delivered ballistic missiles to Russia and may not do so, as a result of diplomatic pressure and Iran’s own internal political turmoil, a senior Ukrainian presidential adviser has said.

Mikhailo Podolyak also told the Guardian that Russian forces had run short of their first batch of Iranian drones – and only had enough of their own cruise missiles in their stockpile for “two or three” more mass strikes against Ukraine.

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Russian TV station in Latvia loses licence over Ukraine war coverage

TV Rain had relocated from Russia soon after invasion but on-air remarks by presenter were deemed to take Moscow’s side

Latvia has revoked a broadcast licence for TV Rain, the independent Russian TV station broadcasting from exile, following a scandal over its coverage of the war in Ukraine.

The liberal television station relocated to Riga, the Latvian capital, as well as Tbilisi and Amsterdam shortly after Vladimir Putin launched the full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

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Ukraine says it has shot down 60 of over 70 missiles launched after explosions at two Russian airbases – as it happened

No reports of missile impacts in Kyiv but two killed in Zaporizhzhia and Odesa hit hard after Russian strike follows blasts at Russian airfields. This blog is now closed

The Chinese foreign ministry has said it will continue energy cooperation with Russia after the G7, EU and Australia imposed a price cap on Russian oil exports.

China, which said it would continue on the basis if respect and mutual benefit, has increased its purchases of Russia’s Urals oil blends this year, reports Reuters, citing Russia’s RIA news agency.

I am more responsible than I am brave … I just hate to let people down.

I just want to catch a carp in the Dnipro River.

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Explosions rock two Russian airbases far from Ukraine frontline

Russia confirms blasts at military facilities as Kyiv finds way to target long-range bombers

Explosions have rocked two Russian airbases far from the frontlines as Kyiv appeared to launch a pre-emptive strike on bombers that the Kremlin has used to try to cripple the Ukrainian electrical grid.

The Russian defence ministry confirmed the attacks on Monday, claiming two of its warplanes had been damaged when it intercepted two Ukrainian drones. For Kyiv the strike represented an unprecedented operation deep inside Russia to disrupt the Kremlin strategy of provoking a humanitarian catastrophe in Ukraine on the verge of winter.

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Kit and morale may prove decisive as Ukraine war enters winter phase

With temperatures expected to plummet to -20C or lower, Russian troops could be most vulnerable

Winter has arrived. Temperatures in the frontline Ukrainian city of Bakhmut, under remorseless attack from the Russians, plunged to -11C (12.2F) this weekend, and at no point got above freezing. Gradually the mud and rain of late autumn will give way to snow and cold of -20C or worse. Yet both sides have their reasons to carry on fighting.

The weather is a neutral party to the near-10-month war, but in winter it inevitably acts as a constraint. Simple operations take far longer to conduct in the cold, cover from foliage is reduced or eliminated, white camouflage is required when snow has arrived and more rations are needed because soldiers consume more calories.

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Russia-Ukraine war live: public support in Russia for military campaign ‘falling significantly’, says UK

British ministry of defence says it obtained official confidential survey that shows only 25% of Russians want war to go on

The British MoD has released photographs of Ukrainian recruits training in the UK being issued with their kit for their return to Ukraine.

The British Ministry of Defence, in its latest intelligence estimate, has pointed to new signs from an independent Russian media outlet that public support in Russia for the military campaign was “falling significantly”.

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Russia-Ukraine war at a glance: what we know on day 284 of the invasion

UK says support within Russia for military action is waning; US intelligence chief says Putin ‘more informed’ about reality of challenges on the ground

The British ministry of defence, in its latest intelligence estimate, pointed to new signs from an independent Russian media outlet that public support in Russia for the military campaign was “falling significantly”.

The US expects “reduced tempo” in fighting to continue over winter months, the top US intelligence chief Avril Haines has said.

Haines , speaking at the Reagan National Defense Forum in California, also alluded to past allegations by some that advisers to the Russian president Vladimir Putin could be shielding him from bad news – for Russia – about war developments, and said he “is becoming more informed of the challenges that the military faces in Russia”.

Russia will not sell oil that is subject to a western price cap even if it has to cut production, Russian deputy prime minister, Alexander Novak, said on Sunday. The G7 and Australia agreed to the price cap on Friday.

OPEC+ has agreed to stick to its oil output targets at a meeting on Sunday. OPEC+, which comprises the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and allies including Russia, angered the US and other western nations in October when it agreed to cut output by 2m barrels a day (bpd), about 2% of world demand, from November until the end of 2023.

A draft resolution is circulating at the United Nations in New York for a Nuremberg-style tribunal to hold the Russian leadership accountable for crimes of aggression in Ukraine.

More than 500 Ukrainian localities remained without power on Sunday following weeks of Russian airstrikes on the electric grid, an interior ministry official said.

Ukraine is imposing sanctions on 10 senior clerics linked to a pro-Moscow church on the grounds they agreed to work with Russian occupation authorities or justified Moscow’s invasion, the security service said.

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Russian war crimes draft resolution being circulated at the UN

US opposition may be softening after lobbying by Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy

A draft resolution is circulating at the United Nations in New York for a Nuremberg-style tribunal to hold the Russian leadership accountable for crimes of aggression in Ukraine amid signs that US opposition to the proposal may be softening in the face of lobbying by the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

Beth Van Schaack, the US ambassador for global criminal justice, said this week: “It’s something that President Zelenskiy cares deeply about. This is something Ukraine wants, and I think that’s going to carry a lot of weight. The question is, will they have the votes at the general assembly?”

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Vladimir Putin better informed now about Ukraine war, says US

Russian president not as insulated from bad news as earlier in campaign, claims intelligence chief

The head of US intelligence has said Vladimir Putin has “become better informed” about the difficulties facing his invading forces in Ukraine, as the Kremlin suggested the Russian president could visit the occupied Donbas region at a future unspecified date.

Speaking at a defence forum late on Saturday, Avril Haines, the US director of national intelligence, indicated Putin was no longer as insulated from bad news about the conditions facing his invasion of Ukraine as he was earlier in the campaign.

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Russia-Ukraine war live: Kyiv says ‘sick’ packages sent to its embassies following letter bomb in Madrid – as it happened

Ukraine’s foreign minister says 17 diplomatic missions have now received suspicious packages

More details have been published about attacks on Ukraine on Friday, in an update from the general staff of the Ukrainian armed forces.

They said Russia continues to shell civilian infrastructure and is trying to go on the offensive in Avdiivka and Bakhmut.

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Russian army ‘came knocking’ to recruit son of slain spy Alexander Litvinenko

The poisoned agent’s son Anatoly tells of the visit to his Moscow flat, as ITV prepares to screen a drama about the killing of his father, played by David Tennant

Anatoly Litvinenko: How the Kremlin tried to conscript me

The Moscow home of the son of Alexander Litvinenko, the defector killed with polonium-210 in London in 2006, has been visited by recruiting officers from the Russian army hoping to sign him up.

Anatoly Litvinenko, 28, has revealed that he was called up for military service in Ukraine a few weeks ago by soldiers who seemed unaware of his tragic history with Vladimir Putin’s regime.

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G7 countries and Australia to cap price of seaborne Russian oil

Critics including Ukraine say cap of $60 per barrel is still above market value and will not hurt Russia’s war coffers

G7 countries and Australia have agreed to cap the price of Russian seaborne oil, with the aim of reducing Moscow’s income and limiting its ability to finance its war in Ukraine.

But critics, including Ukraine, say the cap of $60 a barrel is still higher than the current market price for Russian crude oil and is unlikely to affect the Kremlin’s war coffers.

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