Summary of the day
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Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, met with his Lithuanian counterpart, Gitanas Nauseda, in Vilnius on Wednesday. The surprise visit marked the start of Zelenskiy’s tour of Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia – all former Soviet republics and now EU and Nato members. In a statement on X, Zelenskiy called the countries “reliable friends and principled partners” to Ukraine.
Dozens of schoolchildren were evacuated from the Russian border city of Belgorod on Wednesday after a spate of deadly Ukrainian shelling attacks. About 300 residents have already left the area, making it the biggest evacuation from a major Russian city since Moscow launched hostilities against Ukraine in 2022.
Western hesitation on aid to Ukraine helps Putin, Zelenskiy warned in a news conference with Nauseda.
A 48-year-old woman has been killed and a school has been partially destroyed after Russian airstrikes against Kharkiv oblast, according to Ukraine’s state emergency service.
Pope Francis has expressed his concern that international attention is shifting away from the nearly two-year-old Russian war against Ukraine, and warned that it risks becoming a “forgotten” war.
Zelenskiy expressed his desire to see action on Ukraine gaining Nato membership at this year’s Nato summit, adding that 2024 would be decisive for Ukraine and its allies. At the news conference in Lithuania, he said: “Russia can be stopped”.
A €200m (£172m) package of long-term military assistance to Ukraine has been approved by the Lithuanian government. The news was announced after a bilateral meeting between Zelenskiy and Nauseda on Wednesday.
Air-defence systems are the “number one” thing that Ukraine are lacking, said Zelenskiy at Wednesday’s news conference in Vilnius. He asked for more support to Kyiv, warning that Putin would not stop at Ukraine but would attack other neighbours unless allies joined forces to stop him.
An “explosive” new attack drone has been developed by Iran for Russia’s war in Ukraine, according to a Sky News exclusive.
Russia accidentally bombed a Russian village, the UK said. Its Ministry of Defence said that “inadequate training” and “crew fatigue” by Russian forces has likely exacerbated accidents.
At least four people have been injured in Russian attacks against nine of Ukraine’s oblasts over the past day, say regional officials. Two people were injured in the frontline town of Avdiivka in the Donetsk oblast, while the governor of the Kherson oblast, Oleksandr Prokudin, said two civilians had been wounded in attacks against the area, which have damaged a bank, a factory, an educational institution and other civilian buildings.
A majority (63%) of Russians continue to support the full-scale war against Ukraine, according to a poll released by the University of Chicago’s nonpartisan National Opinion Research Center (Norc).
Ukraine’s agricultural product exports via its alternative Black Sea corridor reached 4.8m metric tons in December, surpassing the maximum monthly total exported via a former UN-brokered grain deal, brokers said on Wednesday.
Russian’s defence industry has shown clear signs of slowdown, said Zelenskiy in his nightly video address. In contrast, Russian officials have said that production of military equipment has been stepped up.
Updated
One person killed and a school damaged by Russian airstrike against Kharkiv
A 48-year-old woman has been killed and a school has been partly destroyed after Russian airstrikes against Kharkiv oblast, officials have said. As reported in the Kyiv Independent, Ukraine’s state emergency service said two guided aerial bombs were launched by Russian forces against the village of Vilkhuvatka in the Kupiansk district.
The attack took place at 2.30pm local time on Wednesday, officials said, adding that one of the bombs had started a fire in a local school and partly destroyed it. The fire was put out at 4.20pm by rescuers. Another bomb was responsible for the death of the 48-year-old woman, officials claimed, after it hit the village’s residential area. A shop and at least 10 houses were also reportedly damaged.
Updated
