Summary
Ukraine was hit by a 48-hour cyber-attack this week that the UK has described as probably “one of the highest-impact disruptive cyber-attacks on Ukrainian networks since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion”. Kyivstar, the operator which was hit, supplies over half of Ukraine’s population with mobile and home internet services. The cyber-attack also reportedly disrupted air raid sirens, some banks, ATMs, and point-of-sale terminals.
Vladimir Putin’s supporters have formally nominated him to run as an independent candidate in the 2024 presidential election. Putin is running as an independent in March’s election, which he is all but certain to win. Constitutional reforms that he himself has enacted could allow him to remain in power until 2036.
A Ukrainian missile attack on a Russian-held village in southern Ukraine killed two people, according to Moscow’s occupying authorities in the Kherson region. It comes after Russian-occupying forces said that at least 15 aerial targets had been downed, while Ukraine says its air defence and mobile groups of drone hunters have shot down 30 out of 31 Russian drones over 11 regions.
Hungary has threatened to veto Bulgaria’s entry into Europe’s passport-free Schengen Zone unless it ends its transit tax on Russian gas. The foreign ministry said the country would lift its veto as soon as the transit tax on Hungary’s main gas import route is repealed. Hungary receives 4.5 billion cubic metres of gas per year from Russia under a deal signed in 2021, mainly via Bulgaria and Serbia.
Russia is stepping up its efforts to capture Kupiansk in the Kharkiv region, moving battalion reserves to the area, a spokesperson for the Ukrainian army has said. Kupiansk is seen as a key logistics centre.
We’ll be closing this blog shortly, but head to our Ukraine page for all our latest reporting on the war.
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Hungary has threatened to veto Bulgaria’s entry into Europe’s passport-free Schengen Zone unless it ends its transit tax on Russian gas.
“We have made it clear to the Bulgarians that if they keep this in place for long, if they jeopardise the safety of Hungary’s energy supply for long, then we will veto their Schengen entry,” the Hungarian foreign minister, Péter Szijjártó, is quoted as saying by Reuters.
He said the country would lift its veto as soon as the transit tax on Hungary’s main gas import route is repealed. Hungary receives 4.5 billion cubic metres of gas per year from Russia under a deal signed in 2021, mainly via Bulgaria and Serbia.
The foreign ministry’s move comes amid Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán’s resistance towards Ukraine in Brussels. Orbán has sided with Moscow, even as all the other European Union members support the beginning of accession talks with Ukraine, despite its invasion by Russia.
Ukraine has expressed confidence it will receive a €50bn aid package from the EU, despite Orbán vetoing the funding at a crucial summit in Brussels. Russia has congratulated Hungary for blocking aid to Ukraine.
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