Russian leader conducts first end of year press conference since start of invasion

• Russia-Ukraine war at a glance: what we know on day 659

Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, arrested in Russia on espionage charges, lost an appeal on Thursday to be released from jail and will remain in custody at least until 30 January.

Gershkovich was arrested on 29 March in the Urals city of Yekaterinburg on charges of espionage that carry up to 20 years in prison.

EU leaders prepare for showdown with Hungary over Ukrainian membership talks; more than 50 injured in Russian missile attack on Kyiv

• See all our Russia-Ukraine coverage

Russia launched a massive missile attack on Kyiv in the early hours of Wednesday in an apparent show of strength, minutes after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy met his US counterpart Joe Biden for talks in Washington. Ukraine’s air defences shot down all 10 Russian missiles targeting the capital but least 53 people were injured by falling debris.

EU leaders were heading into a high-stakes summit for Ukraine, with Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán threatening to block both the start of EU membership talks and 50bn euros ($54bn) in financial aid for Kyiv. If EU leaders give a green light, Kyiv will be able to claim a geopolitical victory just as the Biden administration is struggling to get a Ukraine aid package through the US congress.

Ahead of Thursday’s summit, Zelenskiy said that Orban had no reason to block Ukraine’s EU membership. “I was very direct … He has no reasons to block Ukrainian membership in the EU. I asked him to tell me one reason … I’m [still] waiting for an answer,” Zelenskiy said about his short encounter with Orban in Argentina on Sunday.

Zelenskiy’s chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, also urged EU countries to recognise that Ukraine has “much to offer” the bloc. “Values-wise and ideologically, Ukraine is an indisputable part of Europe – which is precisely why Russia attacked us … Without Ukraine, the ‘Europe’ puzzle cannot come together,” he said.

Arriving at the summit in Brussels, Poland’s new prime minister, Donald Tusk, said that “apathy on Ukraine” was “unacceptable”. Poland’s previous government had become embroiled in a row with Ukraine over grain exports but new foreign minister Radoslaw Sikorski also stressed that supporting Ukraine would be a “priority” for the new administration.

The five Nordic nations told Zelenskiy during previously unannounced talks in Oslo that they would support his country “for as long as it takes” in its struggle to drive out Russian forces. Together, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Iceland have provided aid to Ukraine worth 11bn euros since Russia invaded in February 2022 and are ready to continue giving extensive military, economic and humanitarian support, the five nations said in a joint statement.

Denmark’s government would present a new support package for Ukraine worth 1 bn euros ($1.08bn) to parliament on Thursday, prime minister Mette Frederiksen said at a press conference in Oslo with the Nordic leaders and Zelenskiy in Oslo.

Russia’s president Vladimir Putin is expected to hold his annual end of the year press conference on 14 December. The event will include a call-in known as the “direct line”, in which Russians can ask Putin for his advice. “On December 14, Vladimir Putin will sum up the results of the year. It will be a combined format of the direct line and the president’s final press conference,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters Thursday.

Ukraine’s top mobile phone operator, Kyivstar, started restoring voice services to some clients a day after its networks were knocked out by a major cyber-attack, Kyivstar CEO Oleksandr Komarov said, with data and other services to follow. The company, which provides services to more than half of Ukraine’s population, sustained “huge” damage during the attack on Tuesday, Komarov told Reuters, calling it “the biggest cyber-attack on telco infrastructure in the world”.

A hacking group believed by Kyiv to be affiliated with Russian military intelligence claimed responsibility for the cyber-attack. A group of activist hackers, or “hacktivists”, called Solntsepyok said in a post on the Telegram messaging app that it carried out the cyber-attack, and published screenshots appearing to show that the hackers had accessed Kyivstar’s servers.

Scores injured in missile attack on Kyiv; Zelenskiy gets frosty reception from Republicans in Washington; Biden announces $200m military aid package

• See all our Ukraine coverage

Ukraine’s capital came under a missile attack early on Wednesday, resulting in at least 45 injuries and several damaged buildings. Kyiv mayor Vitali Kitschko said on Telegram that debris from intercepted missiles fell in the eastern Dniprovskyi district, injuring at least 45 people. Eighteen people including two children were hospitalized while 27 people received medical treatment on the spot. An apartment building, a private house and several cars caught fire, while the windows of a children’s hospital were shattered, Klitschko said. Falling rocket debris also damaged the water supply system in the district.

US president Joe Biden warned Republicans they would give Russia a “Christmas gift” if they failed to provide additional military aid to Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy, whose meeting with top lawmakers concluded without a commitment for more support.

Zelenskiy travelled to Washington to plead for money to back Ukraine in its war with Russia, but he faced a sceptical reception from key Republican lawmakers. Mike Johnson, the speaker of the House of Representatives, would not agree to support Biden’s request to give Ukraine $61.4bn, with objectors insisting on White House concessions on border security as a condition for a deal.

Biden announced an additional $200m military aid package and, amid concerns that the war had reached a stalemate, insisted that Ukraine has made significant progress. “I will not walk away from Ukraine, and neither will the American people,” Biden said.

Moscow said it was watching developments closely. Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesperson, said that “tens of billions of dollars” already provided by Washington had failed to turn the tide of war and that more money would make little difference.

A declassified US intelligence report assessed that the Ukraine war has cost Russia 315,000 dead and injured troops, or nearly 90% of the personnel it had when the conflict began, a source familiar with the intelligence said on Tuesday. The report also assessed that Moscow’s losses in personnel and armoured vehicles to Ukraine’s military have set back Russia’s military modernisation by 18 years, the source said.

Ukraine’s biggest mobile network operator, Kyivstar, said it was the target of a major cyber-attack on Tuesday morning that temporarily knocked out its cellular and internet signal. The cyber-attack affected the air raid alert system in more than 75 settlements in the Kyiv region, the regional military administration said.

Poland will demand the full mobilisation of the free world to help Ukraine, the newly appointed prime minister, Donald Tusk, said. He said: “We will demand full mobilisation of the west to help Ukraine. I can no longer listen to politicians who talk about being tired of the situation in Ukraine.”

Russian forces in southern Ukraine have “advanced considerably” around the village of Novopokrovka in the Zaporizhzhia region, Moscow’s occupational authorities have said. “Our units have advanced significantly forward north-east of Novopokrovka,” the Moscow-installed head of the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia region, Yevgeny Balitsky, wrote on Telegram.

Europeans are generally open to the idea of Ukraine joining the EU, despite the costs and risks, but lukewarm at best about the bloc’s prospective enlargement to also take in Georgia and countries in the western Balkans, according to a survey.