December 2024
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The Kremlin has rejected Turkish media reports which suggested the wife of Bashar al Assad wanted a divorce and to leave Russia. Earlier this month, Assad, his wife Asma and members of his family arrived in the Russian capital after fleeing Syria. Assad’s location was confirmed as Russian news agencies said Moscow had struck a…
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Vladimir Putin has repeated his assertion that he should have invaded Ukraine earlier, the Institute for the Study of War reports. In an interview with Kremlin journalist Pavel Zarubin yesterday, the Russian leader said his country should have started its full-scale invasion before February 2022 but added that it was impossible to say exactly when that should…
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Ukraine’s air force has said it shot down 47 out of 72 Russia-launched drones across the country overnight. In a statement on Telegram, it said an additional 25 drones had not reached targets and were “locationally lost”. The air force also said that in the Khmelnytskyi and Kyiv regions, citizens’ homes had been damaged and assistance…
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NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has said he considers the criticism of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz by Volodymyr Zelenskyy to be unjustified. Although Germany has been a vital ally of Ukraine, its hesitation in providing long-range Taurus cruise missiles has been a source of frustration in Kyiv, which is battling a foe armed with a powerful…
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The number of killed and injured North Korean soldiers fighting alongside Russian forces in Russia’s Kursk Oblast has surpassed 3,000, President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a statement shared on Telegram on Dec. 23. Russia has reportedly deployed about 12,000 North Korean troops to help oust Ukrainian troops fighting in Kursk Oblast since early August. Zelensky warned of the global…
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Vladimir Putin yesterday hosted Slovakia’s prime minister, Robert Fico, in a rare visit to the Kremlin by an EU leader since Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Fico arrived in Russia on a “working visit” and met with Putin one-on-one yesterday evening, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Russia’s RIA news agency. Peskov said the…
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A Russian cyberattack on Ukraine’s justice ministry registries caused a shutdown of online services for marriages and other matters, but no data appears to have been leaked or stolen, the Ukrainian government reports. Deputy prime minister Olha Stefanishyna, who is also justice minister, told reporters at a briefing in Kyiv that Russia took several months…
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Foreign Secretary David Lammy has issued a message to Ukraine ahead of 2025. In a statement shared on X, the minister acknowledged this was the third winter Ukraine was experiencing Russia’s invasion. “I know that you are facing periods without heat and electricity as a result of Russia’s attacks on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure and that…
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Ukraine’s former commander-in-chief and current ambassador to the UK has released an autobiographical book, which will be the first part of a planned trilogy. The book, entitled My War, covers Valerii Zaluzhnyi’s life from his childhood until the outbreak of Russia’s invasion in 2022. In a statement on Telegram, the Ukrainian official said he started working…
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Russian general Igor Kirillov has been buried with full military honours. Kirillov, who was chief of Russia’s nuclear, biological and chemical protection troops, was the most senior Russian officer to be killed inside Russia by Ukraine. He was killed outside his Moscow apartment building on Tuesday along with his assistant when a bomb attached to…
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We’ve read reactions over the last 24 hours to Vladimir Putin’s comments encouraging a “missile duel” between Russia and the US. The Russian president suggested the two superpowers could use Kyiv as a target to see which country’s missiles were able to bypass US air defences. His comments drew international condemnation, with Volodymyr Zelenskyy labelling…
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Kyiv church damaged during missile attack There was a missile attack in Kyiv damaged the capital’s second-oldest Catholic church. Windows were broken on the front of the St Nicholas Church, with the business centre located opposite the building severely damaged by the Russian attack. Ukrainian military pulls back from areas in the east Ukraine’s military…
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Viktor Orban says he’s still holding out hope that Russia and Ukraine may agree to a ceasefire and large-scale prisoner exchange before Orthodox Christmas. Hungary’s prime minister noted that Kyiv and Moscow were unlikely to reach such an agreement by Catholic Christmas, celebrated on 25 December. “Therefore, I will try to make it happen by…
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Volodymyr Zelenskyy says his country has been hit by Christmas attacks on its energy infrastructure for the third time since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began. Moscow launched a huge aerial attack on Ukraine’s energy facilities last Friday, which Zelenskyy said was one of the largest yet on the grid. The attack damaged power facilities…
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Russia’s spy agency was likely behind the cyber attack that hit Ukraine’s state registries yesterday, Kyiv’s intelligence service (SBU) has claimed. Olha Stefanishyna, Ukraine’s deputy prime minister, said the cyber-attack was one of the largest to have hit the country in recent times. In a post on Telegram, the SBU said criminal proceedings have been…
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Donald Trump’s second stint as president will be like a “24/7 bar-room brawl”, according to the UK’s former ambassador to Washington. Lord Darroch was the representative for the UK to the US between 2016 and 2019 – when Mr Trump was last in power – until cables he sent to London were leaked and showed him criticising…
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