Russia’s foreign minister has said Moscow will focus on developing relations with China, though would consider offers from the west to re-establish ties. Sergei Lavrov, in a question and answer session at an event in Moscow, said western countries had espoused “russophobia” since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine.
Russia’s ministry of defence claims to have destroyed a warehouse full of ammunition in Razdolovka which was stockpiling 155mm shells manufactured for American-made M-777 howitzers supplied to Ukraine.
Russia has increased the intensity of its operations in the Donbas as it seeks to encircle Sieverodonetsk, Lyschansk, and Rubizhne in order to place the whole of Luhansk oblast under Russian occupation, the UK Ministry of Defence has said.
Russian Security Council secretary Nikolai Patrushev said that Russia will achieve its objectives in Ukraine and is not “chasing deadlines”. “All the goals set by the president will be fulfilled. It cannot be otherwise,” he said.
The Russia-appointed administration of Ukraine’s Kherson region will ask Moscow to set up a military base on its territory, Russia’s RIA Novosti news agency reports. Russia successfully seized Ukraine’s southern Kherson region in mid-March which is adjacent to Crimea, the peninsula which Moscow has controlled since 2014.
The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said Vladimir Putin was the only Russian official he was willing to meet with to discuss how to end the war. “The president of the Russian Federation decides it all,” he said in a video address to the World Economic Forum in Davos. “I cannot accept any kind of meeting with anyone coming from the Russian Federation but the president.”
A team of Colombian soldiers will travel to Europe to train their Ukrainian counterparts on de-mining techniques, the South American country’s defence minister has said.
Finland and Sweden will send delegations to Ankara tomorrow to try to resolve Turkish opposition to their applications for membership of the Nato military alliance, Finland’s foreign minister Pekka Haavisto has said.
Poland has continued to signal its intent to bolster its defences in the light of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Defence secretary Mariusz Blaszczak said the country intends to buy six additional Patriot missile batteries.
Ursula von der Leyen, head of the European Commission, says the war on Ukraine is putting the international order into question. She said the World Economic Forum at Davos should be talking about making the world better together, but instead they must talk about Putin’s invasion, where Russia’s playbook for the war “comes out of another century”. To rebuild Ukraine, she said “We should leave no stone unturned, including possibly using the Russian assets we have frozen.”
A Russian court has rejected an appeal from opposition leader Alexei Navalny against a nine-year prison sentence he is serving for large-scale fraud and contempt of court, charges which he denies. Navalny lambasted President Vladimir Putin during court hearing, casting him as a madman who had started a “stupid war” in Ukraine based on lies.
A veteran Russian diplomat in Geneva has resigned over the invasion of Ukraine, in a rare political protest from within the Russian foreign policy establishment. Boris Bondarev, a counsellor at the Russian permanent mission to the UN in Geneva, wrote in a public statement: “Never have I been so ashamed of my country.” He confirmed he had submitted his letter of resignation.
A court in Kyiv has sentenced a Russian soldier to life in prison for the killing of a Ukrainian civilian, in the first verdict in a trial related to war crimes by the Russian army during its invasion of Ukraine. Vadim Shishimarin, a 21-year-old sergeant, was found guilty of killing 62-year-old Oleksandr Shelipov in the Sumy region during the first days of the invasion.
Ukraine’s prosecutor general, Iryna Venediktova, said there were about 13,000 cases of Russian alleged war crimes being investigated as of Monday. Another 48 Russian soldiers were due to face war crimes trials, she said, and Ukrainian officials have a list of about 600 suspects thought to have engaged in war crimes.
Twenty countries announced new security assistance packages and agreed to send more advanced weapons to Ukraine, including a Harpoon launcher and missiles to protect its coast, said Lloyd Austin, the US defence secretary. The new security packages included “critically needed artillery ammunition, coastal defence systems and tanks and other armoured vehicles”.
Denmark pledged to send Harpoon anti-ship missiles that could be used to push the Russian navy away from Ukraine’s Black Sea ports, allowing exports of grain and other agricultural products to resume.
“Low-level” discussions were under way on whether some US troops should be based in Ukraine and how the US may need to adjust its training of Ukrainian forces, said General Mark Milley, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy urged the west to intensify its economic sanctions against Russia as he said business leaders in Davos needed to decide whether “brute force” should rule the world. In a keynote video address to the World Economic Forum, Zelenskiy called for a full oil embargo, the severing of Russian banks from the global financial system, the complete isolation of the Russian IT sector and a ban on trade with Russia.
The European Union will likely agree an embargo on Russian oil imports “within days”, Germany’s economy minister said on Monday. Robert Habeck also told German broadcaster ZDF that the European Commission and the US were working on a proposal to cap global oil prices rather than pay “any price”.
Zelenskiy gave an insight into the level of losses being sustained by Ukrainian forces in the Donbas, saying between 50 to 100 Ukrainians could be dying every day. While Ukraine and its allies have made much of Russian losses since the war began, the issue of Ukrainian casualties has been something of a black hole.
Nearly 90 people were killed in a Russian airstrike on the village of Desna in the northern Ukrainian region of Chernihiv, according to Zelenskiy. Ukrainian authorities said eight people were killed in the strike, which took place last Tuesday. Zelenskiy’s figure would give the Desna attack Ukraine’s biggest military death toll in a single strike of the war so far.
The Ukrainian fighters who surrendered at the Azovstal steelworks in the port city of Mariupol are to be put on trial, the head of the separatist Donetsk region, Denis Pushilin, told Russian state media. It was not clear what charges the soldiers would face.
The war in Ukraine could cause a recession in weaker economies, the head of the IMF has warned. Kristalina Georgieva predicted that 2022 would be a tough year and declined to rule out a global recession if conditions worsened markedly.
New satellite images reportedly show Russian theft of Ukrainian grain. The pictures released by Maxar Technologies seemingly back up claims from Zelenskiy that food had been gradually stolen from the country, CNN has reported. In the photos, taken from 19 and 21 May, two bulk carrier ships with Russian flags can be seen loading grain from the grain silos they are docked by.
Starbucks is leaving the Russian market, bringing an end to nearly 15 years of business there. The Seattle-based coffee company has 130 stores and nearly 2,000 employees in Russia. McDonalds is also pulling out, removing the “golden arches” from Moscow before leaving for good.
