Summary of the day
Here are all the key developments in the Ukraine war from today:
In a interview with the Financial Times, Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Russia’s new strategy to destroy Ukraine’s infrastructure would not weaken the country’s resolve to liberate all occupied land, describing the conflict as a “war of strength and resilience” and pushing back against western fears of escalation.
More than 15,000 people have gone missing during the war in Ukraine, an official at the International Commission on Missing Persons (ICMP) said.
European Union governments remained split over what level to cap Russian oil prices at to curb Moscow’s ability to pay for its war in Ukraine without causing a global oil supply shock, with further talks expected on Friday. Six of the EU’s 27 countries are said to be opposed the price cap level proposed by the G7, which will come into force on 5 December.
Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban said that Hungary’s parliament will ratify Nato membership for Finland and Sweden early next year. Hungary and Turkey are the only members of the alliance who have not yet cleared the accession.
Russia and Ukraine have carried out the latest in a series of prisoner of war exchanges, with both sides handing over 50 people, officials in Kyiv and Moscow confirmed
Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko provoked ire in Ukraine by suggesting that the end of the war is Ukraine’s responsibility, and that if it does not “stop”, it will end in the “complete destruction” of the country. He said that similar to relations with Germany following the second world war, once the Ukraine war has concluded “we will make it all up”.
Foreign ministers from the G7 will discuss how to further support Ukraine in ensuring its energy supply during a meeting in Bucharest next week, German foreign minister Annalena Baerbock said.
Russia risked causing a “nuclear and radioactive catastrophe” by launching attacks in which all Ukraine’s nuclear power plants were disconnected from the power grid for the first time in 40 years, Ukraine’s nuclear energy chief said. Ukrainian officials said on Wednesday that three nuclear power plants on territory held by Ukrainian forces had been switched off after the latest wave of Russian missile strikes on Ukrainian energy facilities.
Ukraine expects the three nuclear power plants will be operating again by Thursday evening, energy minister German Galushchenko said.
The European Union is pressing ahead with a ninth sanctions package on Russia in response to Moscow’s attack on Ukraine, the European Commission chief, Ursula von der Leyen, said during a visit to Finland. She said the EU would “hit Russia where it hurts to blunt even further its capacity to wage war on Ukraine”.
More than two-thirds of the Ukrainian capital was still without power on Thursday morning and a number of residents had no running water, a day after Russian missile strikes caused Kyiv’s biggest outages in nine months of war.
Ground battles continue to rage in eastern Ukraine, where Russia is pressing an offensive along a stretch of frontline west of the city of Donetsk, which has been held by its proxies since 2014.
Russia’s federal security service (FSB) claimed it has prevented Ukrainian special services from carrying out what it said was sabotage on the “South Stream” gas pipeline, Russian news agencies reported.
Hungary will provide €187m ($195m) in financial aid to Ukraine as its contribution to a planned EU support package worth up to €18bn in 2023, according to a government decree.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy urged the United Nations security council to act against Russia over air strikes on civilian infrastructure that have again plunged Ukrainian cities into darkness and cold as winter sets in.
Neighbouring Moldova said it was suffering massive blackouts caused by the missile barrage and its EU-friendly president, Maia Sandu, accused Russia of leaving her country “in the dark”.
Ukraine’s military said Russian forces had fired about 70 cruise missiles at targets across the country and also deployed attack drones. The strikes killed 10 people and disconnected three nuclear power stations from the grid, officials said.
I’m closing the blog now for the day but it will reopen again tomorrow morning. Thanks again for following.
Zelenskyy says Ukraine will not be weakened by Russia's strategy to destroy infrastructure
The Financial Times has an interview with Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in which he said Russia’s new strategy to destroy Ukraine’s infrastructure and plunge it into darkness would not weaken the country’s resolve to liberate all occupied land, describing the conflict as a “war of strength and resilience”.
Pushing back against western fears of escalation, Ukraine’s president insisted there would be no lasting resolution to the war unless Russia withdrew from all the territories it was occupying.
Moscow has stepped up a bombing campaign against Ukraine’s critical infrastructure since last month, hoping to force Kyiv to make concessions despite its advances on the battlefield.
Zelenskyy said:
We must return all lands . . . because I believe that the battlefield is the way when there is no diplomacy.
If you can’t get your land back entirely, the war is simply frozen. It’s a question of time before it resumes.
On Wednesday, Russia launched 70 missiles against infrastructure targets across Ukraine, leaving about 80 per cent of the country in the dark and without water.
All 15 of Ukraine’s nuclear reactors were taken offline because electricity became unstable.
Speaking in the presidential office, which was also out of water supply, Zelenskyy said:
It was the kind of incident that hasn’t happened for I don’t know how many years, maybe 80, 90 years: a country on the European continent where there was totally no light.
The state superbly fought back. Energy workers, the state emergencies’ ministry, deminers, everyone worked to fix and restore power and provide at least a bit of water.
This is a war about strength, about resilience, it is about who stands stronger.
Zelenskyy also appealed to Ukraine’s western partners to provide more air defence equipment to help protect critical infrastructure, as well as diesel supplies for emergency generators and additional gas to help offset power shortages.
The president said the attacks targeting civilian infrastructure showed Moscow had no intention of negotiating an end to the war. Kyiv has been pushing back at perceived pressure to show its openness to an eventual negotiated solution to the war.
Some western partners are concerned that any attempt by Ukraine to take back Crimea — annexed by Russia in 2014 and which it deems crucial for its security — could lead to a dangerous escalation by Moscow, possibly even the use of nuclear weapons.
As Ukrainian forces have made advances against Russian troops in the south and east, Ukraine’s military aims have hardened: it is seeking the return of territory occupied since February and land occupied in the 2014 Russian assault.
Zelenskyy acknowledged that the fate of Crimea was rising on the international agenda.
I understand that everyone is confused by the situation and what will happen to Crimea. If someone is ready to offer us a way regarding the de-occupation of Crimea by non-military means, I will only be in favour.
If the solution [does not involve] de-occupation and [Crimea] is part of the Russian Federation, no one should waste their time on this. It’s a waste of time.
