Russian general probably under intense pressure to take Vuhledar, says UK
The town of Vuhledar, in southern Donetsk oblast, has experienced heavy shelling again, according to the MoD’s latest defence intelligence update.
“There is a realistic possibility that Russia is preparing for another offensive effort in this area despite costly failed attacks in early February and late 2022,” the update on Thursday morning said.
Colonel General Rustam Muradov, commander of Russia’s Eastern Group of forces, is likely to be under intense pressure to improve results in Vuhledar after harsh criticism from the Russian nationalist community, according to the MoD.
“However, it is unlikely that Muradov has a striking force capable of achieving a breakthrough,” it said.
Key events
Summary
Hello and welcome to those now following today’s live coverage on the war in Ukraine. It’s 1pm in Kyiv.
On the eve of the anniversary of the start of the war, Vladimir Putin has threatened to strengthen Russia’s nuclear forces. His comments were released before an address to mark Thursday’s Defender of the Fatherland public holiday.
And Nato’s chief, Jens Stoltenberg, says the military alliance has seen “some signs” that China may be planning to support Russia in its war in Ukraine, and strongly urged Beijing to desist from what would be a violation of international law.
The UN general assembly is expected to endorse a broad resolution demanding Russia unconditionally and immediately withdraw from Ukraine’s territory by a massive majority. But China, South Africa, India and many countries in the global south are likely to continue to abstain, underlining their alienation from what they regarded as the west’s war.
We’ll have more on these stories shortly. In the meantime, here are the key recent developments:
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Russia is intensifying hostilities in Ukraine a year after its invasion in a deliberate attempt to deplete Ukrainian forces, the Ukrainian military said on Thursday.The fiercest fighting remained around the eastern city of Bakhmut, Brigadier general Oleksiy Gromov said, according to Reuters.
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Finland will send three Leopard 2 battle tanks to Ukraine, the country’s defence ministry said according to Reuters. The announcement comes after Sweden’s defence minister said it was open to sending some of its Leopard battle tanks, and the Czech government announced a further military aid shipment to Ukraine.
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The founder of Russia’s Wagner mercenary force has said much-needed ammunition for his troops has been dispatched, after a public row in which he accused the military leadership of treason. In an audio clip on Thursday, Prigozhin said he felt the pressure he and others had put on the ministry had paid off, and he had been told that ammunition was now on its way.
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A Russian fighter plane crashed on Thursday and the pilot was killed in Russia’s Belgorod region, near the border with Ukraine. The cause of the incident is not yet known, the Russian defence ministry said. The cause of the crash was a “technical malfunction”, according to preliminary information and crashed in an uninhabited area and there were no reports of other damage.
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Sweden is open to sending some of its Leopard battle tanks to Ukraine as it prepares to present another package of aid to help Kyiv fight off the Russian invasion, the Nordic country’s defence minister said.
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Moldova dismissed an accusation by Russia’s defence ministry on Thursday that Ukraine planned to invade the breakaway Moldovan region of Transdniestria after staging a false-flag operation, and called for calm.
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The US Treasury secretary stepped up calls for increased financing support to Ukraine, as the US readies an additional $10bn in economic assistance in the coming weeks. Janet Yellen said it was critical for the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to “move swiftly” towards a fully financed loan programme for Ukraine.
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‘I think he is not going to stop’: UK defence secretary on Putin’s war. Ben Wallace has said the conflict in Ukraine could last another year. PA news also reported that Wallace stressed that the war was “not a Nato conflict”.
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Spain’s prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, has arrived in Kyiv to meet Volodymyr Zelenskiy as the first anniversary of the Russian invasion approaches. Arriving in the Ukrainian capital, Sánchez said: “I’m back in Ukraine a year after the start of the war. We will stay by Ukraine’s side until peace returns to Europe.”
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The town of Vuhledar, in southern Donetsk oblast, has experienced heavy shelling again, according to the UK MoD’s latest defence intelligence update. “There is a realistic possibility that Russia is preparing for another offensive effort in this area despite costly failed attacks in early February and late 2022,” the update on Thursday morning said.
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The Chinese government did not consult with Kyiv when preparing its peace plan to end Russia’s war in Ukraine, a senior Ukrainian official said on condition of anonymity. “China did not consult with us,” the official told reporters.
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Vladimir Putin will use an address to mark Thursday’s Defender of the Fatherland public holiday to threaten to strengthen the country’s nuclear forces. Putin said that for the first time, Sarmat intercontinental ballistic missiles – a weapon able to carry multiple nuclear warheads – would be deployed this year.
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Joe Biden has said Putin made a “big mistake” by suspending the last remaining nuclear arms treaty with the US. The Russian deputy foreign minister, Sergei Ryabkov, has said Russia’s decision to suspend its participation in the New Start nuclear arms reduction treaty with the US will not increase the risk of a nuclear war. Russia’s parliament on Wednesday approved Putin’s move to suspend the treaty.
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The Biden administration is considering releasing intelligence it believes shows that China is weighing whether to supply weapons to support Russia’s war in Ukraine, the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday.
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The UN secretary general, António Guterres, condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as “an affront to our collective conscience”, at a two-day meeting of the general assembly. Friday’s anniversary is “a grim milestone for the people of Ukraine and for the international community”, he said in New York.
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Two civilians were killed in Russian shelling of the Kherson region in southern Ukraine on Wednesday, according to regional officials. Oleksandr Prokudin, the head of the regional military administration, said an 81-year-old woman and a 68-year-old man were killed during shelling of the village of Novotyahinka, about 40km (25 miles) from Kherson city. A Russian missile strike on the north-eastern city of Kharkiv on Wednesday morning left two civilians wounded, Oleh Synyehubov, the governor of Kharkiv region, has said.
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Biden vowed that the US would defend “literally every inch of Nato” territory, ahead of talks with Nato’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, and leaders of the Bucharest Nine (B9), a collection of nations on the most eastern parts of the Nato alliance and closest to Russia.
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All members of the B9 have jointly condemned Russia’s war in Ukraine, a Polish presidential adviser said. Biden and the B9 leaders “reaffirmed their unwavering support for Ukraine and underscored their shared commitment to stand with the Ukrainian people for as long as it takes” according to a White House account of Wednesday afternoon’s meeting in Warsaw.
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China’s top diplomat, Wang Yi, has met Vladimir Putin in Moscow, as China and Russia reaffirm their close bilateral relationship. Wang told Putin that Beijing would play a “constructive” role in reaching a political settlement of the crisis in Ukraine, the Russian state-owned Tass news agency reported.
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Earlier on Wednesday, Wang met Sergei Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, where he said he expected to reach a “new consensus” on advancing the relationship between the two allies. Xi Jinping, China’s president, is expected to visit Putin in Russia in the coming months.
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Vladimir Putin has praised soldiers who are “fighting heroically, courageously, bravely” to “defend the fatherland”, in a speech at a rally in Moscow to mark a year of war in Ukraine. Thousands gathered at Luzhniki stadium in Moscow for a concert marking Defenders of the Fatherland Day.
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EU countries have failed to agree on a new set of sanctions against Russia meant to be in place for the one-year anniversary of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine on Friday, four diplomatic sources in Brussels have told Reuters. More talks among Brussels representatives of EU member countries were due on Thursday afternoon, said the sources.
Russia is intensifying hostilities in Ukraine a year after its invasion in a deliberate attempt to deplete Ukrainian forces, the Ukrainian military said on Thursday.
Brigadier general Oleksiy Gromov said Russia had set the goal of capturing all the territory it does not control in the two regions that make up the industrial Donbas area of eastern Ukraine by summer, Reuters reports.
The fiercest fighting remained around the eastern city of Bakhmut, he told a military briefing on the eve of Friday’s anniversary of the invasion on Feb. 24 last year.
Gromov said:
The enemy, having an advantage in the resource of human mobilisation, is deliberately intensifying hostilities in an effort to deplete the units of the armed forces of Ukraine…In the short term, it is important for the Kremlin to capture the key settlements in the Donetsk region, and in the future to capture (all of) the Donetsk and Luhansk regions before the summer.
Finland will send three Leopard 2 battle tanks to Ukraine, Reuters cites the country’s defence ministry as saying on Thursday.
The announcement comes after Sweden’s defence minister said it was open to sending some of its Leopard battle tanks.
As reported earlier, the Czech government has announced a further military aid shipment to Ukraine.
Here are some of the latest images from Ukraine:
The Czech government has approved a further military aid shipment to Ukraine and will continue to send equipment from stocks, the defence minister, Jana Černochová, said on Thursday.
Černochová did not disclose details of specific equipment being shipped, reports Reuters, but said the country had so far sent 38 tanks, 55 armoured vehicles, four aircraft and 13 self-propelled howitzers from its military reserves, alongside larger shipments from the private sector.
The founder of Russia’s Wagner mercenary force has said much-needed ammunition for his troops has been dispatched, after a public row in which he accused the military leadership of treason.
On Wednesday, Yevgeny Prigozhin published a grisly image of dozens of men who he said had been killed because commanders including the defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, and the chief of the general staff, Valery Gerasimov, had withheld ammunition to spite him, Reuters reports. Neither man commented but the defence ministry rejected the charge.
In an audio clip on Thursday, Prigozhin said he felt the pressure he and others had put on the ministry had paid off, and he had been told that ammunition was now on its way.
“So far it’s all on paper but, so we have been told, the principal documents have already been signed,” Prigozhin said.
A Russian fighter plane crashed on Thursday and the pilot was killed in Russia’s Belgorod region, near the border with Ukraine.
The cause of the crash was a “technical malfunction”, according to preliminary information, the TASS news agency cited the ministry as saying. The plane crashed in an uninhabited area and there were no reports of other damage, it said.
In a post on the Telegram messenger app, Belgorod’s governor, Vyacheslav Gladkov, said the emergency services and investigators were on the scene near the town of Valyuki, and the reason for the crash was being established.
Mikhail Afanasyev wants your letters, write Andrew Roth and Pjotr Sauer. The Russian journalist from Abakan in Siberia was jailed last year for writing about a small group of national guardsmen who had refused to fight in Ukraine. But Afanasyev remains defiant, while local supporters crowdfund thousands of dollars to pay off his legal fines.
“It is the duty of every person to expand the horizon of freedom by his actions, so that light pours in and overcomes the darkness,” Afanasyev wrote from pre-trial detention in a letter to his supporters this month.
“I really ask you to write to me, very much! It helps me a lot … I just want to be a journalist, faithful to my profession to the end and defend its values.”
Read more of the story here:
Sweden is open to sending some of its Leopard battle tanks to Ukraine as it prepares to present another package of aid to help Kyiv fight off the Russian invasion, its defence minister told the local news agency TT.
The latest instalment Sweden has delivered to Ukraine since the invasion includes armoured infantry fighting vehicles, which the defence minister, Pal Jonson, told Reuters would be the country’s main contribution to Ukraine in terms of equipment for ground warfare.
Sweden is also preparing to send Ukraine the advanced Archer artillery system to Ukraine, and support has been growing in the Swedish parliament for additionally contributing some of the country’s around 120 Leopard tanks.
“We are open to that and we are in close dialogue with above all Germany about it,” Jonson was quoted by TT as saying.
Moldova dismisses Russia accusation of Ukraine planning to invade Transnistria
Moldova has dismissed an accusation by Russia’s defence ministry on Thursday that Ukraine planned to invade the breakaway Moldovan region of Transdniestria after staging a false-flag operation, and called for calm, Reuters reports.
Earlier we reported on Russia’s defence ministry accusing Ukraine of planning to invade Moldova’s breakaway Transnistria region after a false-flag operation, citing reports from the RIA news agency.
The ministry said Ukraine planned to stage an attack purportedly by Russian forces from Transnistria as a pretext for the invasion, according to RIA.
Separately, the Tass news agency quoted the Russian deputy foreign minister Mikhail Galuzin as saying the west had instructed the Chisinau government to stop all interaction with the Moscow-backed Transnistrian administration.
Moldova’s president, Maia Sandu, accused Moscow earlier this month of planning a coup to overthrow the government and drag Transnistria into its war.
The mainly Russian-speaking region broke away from the then Soviet Moldova in 1990. After the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991, pro-Russia separatists fought a bloody war with the Moldovan government forces.
The US Treasury secretary has stepped up calls for increased financing support to Ukraine, as the US readies an additional $10bn in economic assistance in the coming weeks.
In remarks prepared for delivery to a news conference as G20 finance leaders gathered on the outskirts of the Indian technology hub of Bengaluru, Janet Yellen said it was critical for the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to “move swiftly” towards a fully financed loan programme for Ukraine, Reuters reports.
As President Biden has said, we will stand with Ukraine in its fight – for as long as it takes. Continued, robust support for Ukraine will be a major topic of discussion during my time here in India.
Yellen added:
Our economic assistance is making Ukraine’s resistance possible by supporting the home front: funding critical public services and helping keep the government running. In the coming months, we expect to provide around $10bn in additional economic support for Ukraine.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, the Russian founder of the Wagner mercenary group, was able to pass UK anti-money laundering checks by submitting a utility bill in the name of his elderly mother, the FT reports.
Leaked emails seen by the Financial Times show that the law firm Discreet Law in 2021 requested identification documents from Prigozhin, who has been placed under sanctions and accused of human rights abuses around the world, before taking him on as a client.
As part of anti-laundering checks, Prigozhin’s Russian lawyers forwarded the London-based law firm a copy of his passport and a gas bill in the name of his then 81-year-old mother, Violetta, for an address in St Petersburg, the FT reports.
Discreet Law’s founder, Roger Gherson, said the firm “cannot comment on confidential communications with [its] former clients”.
Here are some of the latest images from Ukraine:
Summary
Hello and welcome to those now following today’s live coverage on the war in Ukraine. It’s 10am in Kyiv.
On the eve of the anniversary of the start of the war, Vladimir Putin has threatened to strengthen Russia’s nuclear forces. His comments were released before an address to mark Thursday’s Defender of the Fatherland public holiday.
And Nato’s chief, Jens Stoltenberg, says the military alliance has seen “some signs” that China may be planning to support Russia in its war in Ukraine, and strongly urged Beijing to desist from what would be a violation of international law.
The UN general assembly is expected to endorse a broad resolution demanding Russia unconditionally and immediately withdraw from Ukraine’s territory by a massive majority. But China, South Africa, India and many countries in the global south are likely to continue to abstain, underlining their alienation from what they regarded as the west’s war.
We’ll have more on these stories shortly. In the meantime, here are the key recent developments:
-
‘I think he is not going to stop’: UK defence secretary on Putin’s war. Ben Wallace has said the conflict in Ukraine could last another year. PA news also reported that Wallace stressed that the war was “not a Nato conflict”.
-
Spain’s prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, has arrived in Kyiv to meet Volodymyr Zelenskiy as the first anniversary of the Russian invasion approaches. Arriving in the Ukrainian capital, Sánchez said: “I’m back in Ukraine a year after the start of the war. We will stay by Ukraine’s side until peace returns to Europe.”
-
The town of Vuhledar, in southern Donetsk oblast, has experienced heavy shelling again, according to the UK MoD’s latest defence intelligence update. “There is a realistic possibility that Russia is preparing for another offensive effort in this area despite costly failed attacks in early February and late 2022,” the update on Thursday morning said.
-
The Chinese government did not consult with Kyiv when preparing its peace plan to end Russia’s war in Ukraine, a senior Ukrainian official said on condition of anonymity. “China did not consult with us,” the official told reporters.
-
Vladimir Putin will use an address to mark Thursday’s Defender of the Fatherland public holiday to threaten to strengthen the country’s nuclear forces. Putin said that for the first time, Sarmat intercontinental ballistic missiles – a weapon able to carry multiple nuclear warheads – would be deployed this year.
-
Joe Biden has said Putin made a “big mistake” by suspending the last remaining nuclear arms treaty with the US. The Russian deputy foreign minister, Sergei Ryabkov, has said Russia’s decision to suspend its participation in the New Start nuclear arms reduction treaty with the US will not increase the risk of a nuclear war. Russia’s parliament on Wednesday approved Putin’s move to suspend the treaty.
-
The Biden administration is considering releasing intelligence it believes shows that China is weighing whether to supply weapons to support Russia’s war in Ukraine, the Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday.
-
The UN secretary general, António Guterres, condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as “an affront to our collective conscience”, at a two-day meeting of the general assembly. Friday’s anniversary is “a grim milestone for the people of Ukraine and for the international community”, he said in New York.
-
Two civilians were killed in Russian shelling of the Kherson region in southern Ukraine on Wednesday, according to regional officials. Oleksandr Prokudin, the head of the regional military administration, said an 81-year-old woman and a 68-year-old man were killed during shelling of the village of Novotyahinka, about 40km (25 miles) from Kherson city. A Russian missile strike on the north-eastern city of Kharkiv on Wednesday morning left two civilians wounded, Oleh Synyehubov, the governor of Kharkiv region, has said.
-
Biden vowed that the US would defend “literally every inch of Nato” territory, ahead of talks with Nato’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, and leaders of the Bucharest Nine (B9), a collection of nations on the most eastern parts of the Nato alliance and closest to Russia.
-
All members of the B9 have jointly condemned Russia’s war in Ukraine, a Polish presidential adviser said. Biden and the B9 leaders “reaffirmed their unwavering support for Ukraine and underscored their shared commitment to stand with the Ukrainian people for as long as it takes” according to a White House account of Wednesday afternoon’s meeting in Warsaw.
-
China’s top diplomat, Wang Yi, has met Vladimir Putin in Moscow, as China and Russia reaffirm their close bilateral relationship. Wang told Putin that Beijing would play a “constructive” role in reaching a political settlement of the crisis in Ukraine, the Russian state-owned Tass news agency reported.
-
Earlier on Wednesday, Wang met Sergei Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister, where he said he expected to reach a “new consensus” on advancing the relationship between the two allies. Xi Jinping, China’s president, is expected to visit Putin in Russia in the coming months.
-
Vladimir Putin has praised soldiers who are “fighting heroically, courageously, bravely” to “defend the fatherland”, in a speech at a rally in Moscow to mark a year of war in Ukraine. Thousands gathered at Luzhniki stadium in Moscow for a concert marking Defenders of the Fatherland Day.
-
EU countries have failed to agree on a new set of sanctions against Russia meant to be in place for the one-year anniversary of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine on Friday, four diplomatic sources in Brussels have told Reuters. More talks among Brussels representatives of EU member countries were due on Thursday afternoon, said the sources.
On Thursday 2 February, my friend Pete Reed died as he tried to evacuate civilians in the Ukrainian city of Bakhmut, writes Cengiz Yar.
Based on footage we now have of the incident, his vehicle was hit by a Russian anti-tank missile. He was killed in the blast, and others in his team were severely injured. Reports suggest it was likely a double-tap strike, a technique used frequently by Russia in Syria, where an attack is made to draw in additional support and recovery operations before a second attack is made.
Pete was one of the most selfless people I’ve ever met. You should know a bit about the good he did in this world.
I met him in the spring of 2016 over some drinks in Iraq, where I worked as a photographer. He was loud, a bit goofy, and trying to do some good. What good? He hadn’t quite figured that out yet.
Read more by Cengiz Yar here:
Sam Jones
Spain’s prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, has arrived in Kyiv to meet Volodymyr Zelenskiy as the first anniversary of the Russian invasion approaches.
Arriving in the Ukrainian capital, Sánchez said:
I’m back in Ukraine a year after the start of the war. We will stay by Ukraine’s side until peace returns to Europe.
Sánchez, who last visited Ukraine in April, is understood to have travelled to Ukraine at Zelenskiy’s invitation.
Vuelvo a Kyiv un año después del inicio de la guerra.
Estaremos al lado de Ucrania y de su gente hasta que la paz regrese a Europa.
Сьогодні повертаюся до Києва.
Ми будемо з Україною та її народом, поки до Європи не повернеться мир. pic.twitter.com/9ekUL9Lmfl
— Pedro Sánchez (@sanchezcastejon) February 23, 2023
/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/tbt/UD4IDQTGHFFUZM43GMJ7RO2ZFE.JPG "Keep up with Tampa Bay’s top headlines")
