Vladimir Putin remains intent on trying to defeat and dominate Ukraine two years after launching an invasion that has caused more than half a million casualties, western officials said in a fresh assessment of the war. However, Putin is not thought to have any clearcut medium-term strategy, the officials added. “We do not believe Russia has a meaningful plan beyond continuing to fight in the expectation that Russian manpower and equipment numbers will eventually tell,” they said. The officials also said they believed that “sanctions are hitting the Russian military complex hard”, causing severe delays and higher costs as Moscow scrambles to deal with shortages of western components.
The EU on Wednesday approved its 13th package of sanctions against Russia. The new package, which will be formally approved in time for the second anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on 24 February, will see nearly 200 entities and individuals added to the sanctions list. European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen said the agreement would further cut “Russia’s access to drones”. “We must keep degrading Putin’s war machine,” she wrote on X.
Three mainland Chinese firms were added to a list of companies that EU businesses were banned from dealing with, diplomats said. The firms – the first in mainland China to be targeted by the measures – were accused of involvement in supplying sensitive military technology to Russia. Firms in Turkey and India were also included, as the EU increasingly targets third countries for helping Moscow circumvent its sanctions. The EU also imposed an asset freeze and visa ban on North Korea’s defence minister, Kang Sun Nam, for supplying ballistic missiles to Moscow, diplomats said.
Iran has provided Russia with a large number of surface-to-surface ballistic missiles, six sources told Reuters, deepening the military cooperation between the two US-sanctioned countries. Iran’s defence ministry and the Revolutionary Guards – an elite force that oversees Iran’s ballistic missile programme – declined to comment on Reuters’ report. Russia’s defence ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment either.
Nato secretary-general Jens Stolenberg said he believes the best way to honour the memory of Alexei Navalny was to ensure a Russian defeat in Ukraine. Speaking to Radio Free Europe, Stolenberg said: “I strongly believe that the best way to honour the memory of Alexei Navalny is to ensure that President Putin doesn’t win on the battlefield, but that Ukraine prevails.”
Ursula von der Leyen has ruled out working with Vladimir Putin’s “friends” in the next EU parliament. “Those who are defending our values against Putin’s friends, these are the ones with which I want to work,” von der Leyen said.
Andrey Morozov, a prominent pro-war Russian blogger, has reportedly died by suicide following outrage over a post in which he claimed that the Russian army lost 16,000 soldiers during the capture of the eastern Ukrainian city of Avdiivka.
Russia’s capture of Avdiivka has alarmed people in nearby towns and many are now leaving for safer areas after hunkering down for months from constant fire, Reuters reported. Most of those fleeing are elderly and in many cases barely mobile, but are being helped by a charity called East SOS. Russia’s top general, Valery Gerasimov, visited troops after the battle of Avdiivka, awarding medals to troops involved.
Ukraine’s army on Wednesday denied it had lost Krynky, its bridgehead on the Russian-occupied side of the Dnipro river, a day after Russia’s defence minister said the area had been taken. It claimed Russian forces assaulted Krynky but suffered “significant losses” and retreated. AFP was not able to verify the claims. Russian defence minister Sergei Shoigu told Putin on Tuesday that Krynky had been “cleared” of Ukrainian forces.
Polish police are investigating a banner at a farmers’ protest calling on Putin to get Ukraine “in order”, which sparked anger in Kyiv. On Wednesday, Poland’s minister in charge of the secret services, Tomasz Siemoniak, denounced the “scandalous” banner as a “provocation”. In recent protests, Polish farmers have blocked roads to the border and dumped Ukrainian grain from trucks and freight cars.
Finland has said it has launched almost 800 investigations into potential sanctions breaches on its border with Russia in the two years since Putin invaded Ukraine. The border with Russia has recently been closed because of irregular migration which the Finns believe was orchestrated by Russia from St Petersburg. It has meant train and shipping transport are now the focus of sanctions enforcement in Finland.
The BBC Russian Service and news outlet Mediazona have confirmed the identities of about 45,000 Russian soldiers who died in Ukraine since the invasion began in February 2022. The issue of military casualties is extremely sensitive in both countries. Russia has banned criticism of the conflict and no official figures have been released since 2022.
Barely 10% Europeans believe Ukraine can defeat Russia, even though support for Ukraine among Europeans remains broad, according to an EU-wide survey – with some form of “compromise settlement” seen as the most likely end point.
The Republican senator Lindsey Graham, a key ally of Donald Trump, has been added to a list of “terrorists and extremists” kept by Russia’s state financial monitoring agency. Tass, the state-run news agency, first reported the move by Rosfinmonitoring, which allows authorities to freeze Russian bank accounts, though in Graham’s case is likely to be chiefly symbolic.
