Closing summary
Russia is mobilising about 1,000-1,100 recruits to its armed forces every day, Vadym Skibitsky, deputy head of Ukraine’s military intelligence agency (HUR), said in an interview with RBC-Ukraine published on Monday.
Russia said it had given more than 200 Ukrainian prisoners of war lengthy prison sentences, with some getting a life sentence, AFP reported. The state-run outlet RT quoted an Investigative Committee source as saying that 242 soldiers were sentenced in occupied Ukraine.
Ukraine said it shot down a Russian A-50 spy plane and Il-22 command aircraft in the area of the Sea of Azov.
The Kremlin said Russia was developing relations with “our partner” North Korea in all areas and would build on the agreements reached between the countries’ leaders when they met at a Russian space launch centre last year.
The UK’s Ministry of Defence (MoD) said that Russia had probably “substantially inflated” the number of people whom it says have joined the country’s armed forces, with new recruits being disproportionately drawn from some of Russia’s most impoverished and rural communities.
The UK announced that it would send 20,000 service personnel to one of Nato’s largest military exercises since the cold war.
The UN and its partners appealed for $4.2bn (£3.3bn) from donors to support communities in Ukraine devastated by the war, as well as Ukrainian refugees, in 2024. The UN aid chief, Martin Griffiths, urged diplomats in Geneva: “Please do not forget Ukraine while there are many other places in the world that grab our attention.”
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Volodymyr Zelenskiy said earlier today he had arrived in Switzerland to attend the World Economic Forum in Davos and meet top Swiss officials.
Here are some photographs of the Ukrainian president in Berne:
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