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Ukrainian missiles hit barracks in Russian-occupied Melitopol
Peter Beaumont
Ukraine has attacked a barracks within the Russian-occupied metropolis of Melitopol, with some Ukrainian sources claiming scores of Russian casualties.
According to witnesses, 10 explosions have been heard, though a few of these might have been from Russian anti-aircraft programs. Ukrainian officers claimed scores of Russian lifeless and injured whereas Russia conceded a handful of casualties.
Video footage posted on social media confirmed what was claimed to be a Russian barracks within the southern metropolis engulfed in a fierce blaze with some claiming the positioning was being utilized by the Wagner mercenary group.
Another video confirmed rescue staff within the ruins with a number of our bodies seen.
The website, a former resort and lodge advanced subsequent to a church within the metropolis often called the Hunter’s Halt, was getting used as a barracks with a lot of the casualties apparently in a large number corridor when it was hit.
The strike on Melitopol – reportedly with Himars rockets – was certainly one of a number of in a single day on Russian bases. Explosions have been additionally reported in a single day within the Russian occupied Crimea, together with Sevastopol and Simferopol.
Key occasions
More on the cellphone name between Putin and Erdoğan.
Reuters studies that the pair mentioned their two international locations’ joint power tasks, particularly within the gasoline sector, Russian information companies cited the Kremlin as saying.
Two leaders exchanged opinions on the creation of a regional gasoline hub in Turkey, it added.
The Turkish presidency stated on Sunday:
President Erdoğan expressed his honest want for the termination of the Russia-Ukraine battle as quickly as doable.”
In the decision, Erdoğan and Putin additionally mentioned grain provides.
Erdoğan’s workplace stated Ankara and Moscow may begin work on exporting different meals merchandise and commodities by the Black Sea grain hall.
Russia has urged the United Nations to push the West to raise some sanctions to make sure Moscow can freely export its fertiliser and agricultural merchandise – part of the Black Sea grain deal that Moscow says has not been carried out.
The Kremlin stated in a press release:
The deal is of advanced character, which requires the removing of obstacles for the related provides from Russia with the intention to meet the calls for of the international locations most in want.”
The Kremlin stated the 2 additionally mentioned an initiative to create a base in Turkey for exports of Russian pure gasoline:
The particular significance of joint power tasks, primarily within the gasoline trade, was emphasised.”
Gazprom chief Alexei Miller has held talks with Erdoğan in Istanbul prior to now week.
Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan referred to as for a 30-kilometre (19-mile) safety hall on Turkey’s border with Syria in a cellphone name with Russian president Vladimir Putin, Erdogan’s workplace stated Sunday.
Referring to Kurdish militants that Ankara considers terrorists, Erdoğan reiterated the “importance and urgency” of making the hall in northern Syria in accordance with a 2019 settlement between Turkey and Russia, the Associated Press studies.
The name got here three weeks after Turkey launched air and artillery strikes in Syria and Iraq in response to a bomb assault in Istanbul on 13 November that killed six individuals and wounded dozens.
The Turkish authorities has blamed the bombing on the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, and its Syrian affiliate the People’s Protection Units, or YPG.
Both teams have denied involvement within the assault.
It is simply gone 2.20pm in Ukraine and here’s a abstract of occasions to date:
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Two individuals have been killed and one other 5 wounded after Russian troops shelled the southern area of Kherson, the governor Yaroslav Yanushevich stated, including that Russian forces hit a maternity ward, a restaurant and an condo constructing on Saturday.
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Ukraine has attacked the Russian-occupied metropolis of Melitopol, with pro-Moscow authorities saying a missile assault killed two individuals and wounded 10, whereas the exiled mayor stated scores of “invaders” have been killed.
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The UK’s international secretary James Cleverly has stated that there wanted to be “accountability” for Vladimir Putin for alleged battle crimes dedicated in Ukraine.
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A neo-Nazi paramilitary group linked to the Kremlin has requested its members to submit intelligence on border and army exercise in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, elevating considerations over whether or not far-right Russian teams are planning an assault on Nato international locations.
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Russia is ramping up manufacturing of ‘most powerful’ weapons, says Russia’s ex-president Dmitry Medvedev.
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The UK’s international secretary James Cleverly has stated he has not seen something coming from Russia to recommend Putin is eager to resolve the battle in Ukraine.
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The German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, has stated Vladimir Putin is set to overcome elements of Ukraine and exhibits no restraint in his brutality.
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The UK’s Ministry of Defence says Russia’s Federal Draft Budget, signed by Vladimir Putin in 2022, stating that greater than 9 trillion rubles (US $143bn) will probably be allotted throughout “defence, security and law enforcement” in 2023 is more likely to be “over-optimistic”.
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Russian forces have “destroyed” the jap Ukrainian metropolis of Bakhmut, the nation’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, stated
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Jens Stoltenberg, the head of Nato has expressed fear that the combating in Ukraine may spin uncontrolled and grow to be a battle between Russia and Nato. “If things go wrong, they can go horribly wrong,” he stated in an interview on Friday with to Norwegian broadcaster NRK.
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Russia needs to show Ukraine right into a “dependent dictatorship” like Belarus, the spouse of jailed Belarusian Nobel peace prize laureate Ales Bialiatski stated on Saturday upon receiving the prize on his behalf, talking his phrases. Bialiatski, Russian rights group Memorial and Ukraine’s Centre for Civil Liberties gained the 2022 prize in October.
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Moscow introduced it’s banning 200 Canadian officers from coming into Russia in response to related sanctions from Ottawa. The well being minister, Jean-Yves Duclos, and the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce head, Victor Dodig, have been amongst these focused.
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Boris Johnson has urged western international locations to “look urgently” at what extra they will do to help Ukraine within the hopes of ending the battle in opposition to Russia as quickly as subsequent yr. In an article within the Wall Street Journal, he argued that ending the battle as quickly as doable is “in everyone’s interest, including Russia”.
Here are some pictures coming to us over the wires from Ukraine.
Two killed and 5 injured in southern area of Kherson, governor says
Two individuals have been killed and one other 5 wounded after Russian troops shelled the southern area of Kherson, the governor stated on Sunday.
The metropolis of Kherson was recaptured in November by Ukrainian forces throughout a Kyiv counteroffensive.
On the messaging app Telegram, the governor, Yaroslav Yanushevich, stated Russian forces hit a maternity ward, a restaurant and an condo constructing on Saturday, information company Agence France-Presse studies.
He added:
The enemy once more attacked the residential quarters of Kherson.
Last evening, two individuals have been killed resulting from Russian shelling.”
Yanushevich stated 5 others had been wounded within the metropolis which was attacked with artillery, a number of launch rocket programs, tanks and mortars.
‘There have to be accountability’ in Ukraine battle, says UK international secretary
The UK’s international secretary James Cleverly has stated that there wanted to be “accountability” for Vladimir Putin for alleged battle crimes dedicated in Ukraine.
He referred to claims of rape and sexual violence getting used as weapons whereas he was in Kyiv, and that he additionally heard “very credible claims” that Ukrainian youngsters are being forcibly despatched to Russia to be adopted.
When requested by Laura Kuenssberg on her BBC present whether or not Putin ought to be tried for battle crimes he did give not a definitive reply.
He stated:
There completely have to be accountability and which means the troopers on the bottom who’re perpetrating these atrocities proper as much as the very prime. There must be accountability, together with Vladimir Putin.
We’ve been supportive of the International Criminal Court, however we recognise there could also be different autos and we’ll work with our associates, together with the Ukrainians, within the worldwide group to look about what an efficient accountability framework would seem like.
He added:
The message we have to ship throughout the entire globe is that aggression doesn’t repay, that you simply can not profit by brutalising your neighbour.
Addressing feedback made by Nato chief, Jens Stoltenberg, that there was fear combating in Ukraine may spin uncontrolled and grow to be a battle between Russia and Nato, Cleverly stated:
Nato has made it clear that we’re a defensive alliance. Nato has by no means threatened Russia and isn’t doing so now.
Vladimir Putin has tried to create this narrative, however the backside line is international locations that be part of Nato do [so] voluntarily, there is no such thing as a coercision and the alliance is there to guard its member states, to not threaten anyone else.
So there is no such thing as a inherent want for Nato to be drawn right into a battle and in reality we try to ensute that doesn’t occur.
He continued:
Ultimately it’s Vladimir Putin who’s utilizing the esculatory language. He is the one who has threatened additional imperial enlargement paying homage to … his deal with Russia’s historic empire. So it’s him who’s being the aggressor.”
Russia ramping up manufacturing of ‘most powerful’ weapons, says Medvedev
Russia’s ex-president Dmitry Medvedev has stated the nation is ramping up manufacturing of new-generation weapons to guard itself from enemies in Europe, the United States and Australia, Reuters studies.
Medvedev stated on messaging app Telegram:
We are rising manufacturing of essentially the most highly effective technique of destruction. Including these based mostly on new rules.
Using the time period to explain territories of modern-day Ukraine that have been a part of the Russian Empire underneath the tsar he added:
Our enemy dug in not solely within the Kyiv province of our native Malorossiya.
It is in Europe, North America, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, and a complete variety of different locations that pledged allegiance to the Nazi.”
Medvedev, who serves as deputy head of Russia’s Security Council, didn’t present particulars of the weapons.
Neo-Nazi Russian militia appeals for intelligence on Nato member states
Mark Townsend
A neo-Nazi paramilitary group linked to the Kremlin has requested its members to submit intelligence on border and army exercise in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, elevating considerations over whether or not far-right Russian teams are planning an assault on Nato international locations.
The official Telegram channel for “Task Force Rusich” – at present combating in Ukraine on behalf of the Kremlin and linked to the infamous Wagner Group – final week requested members to ahead particulars relating to frame posts and army actions within the three Baltic states, which have been previously a part of the Soviet Union.
The information has prompted questions over who has total command over the far-right pro-Kremlin teams combating in Ukraine.
Rusich is intently aligned to the Wagner Group, a army outfit run by an in depth ally of Vladimir Putin and now leading the Russian offensive to seize the Ukrainian metropolis of Bakhmut, at present essentially the most fiercely contested battle of the battle.
Sources talking on situation of anonymity stated the “extraordinary” transfer by Rusich may level to disenchantment with the Kremlin and frustration with how Putin’s battle in Ukraine goes.
Read the remainder of the report here.
The UK’s international secretary James Cleverly has stated he has not seen something coming from Russia to recommend Putin is eager to resolve the battle in Ukraine.
He was addressing current studies that Putin had hinted that peace talks may very well be on the horizon.
Talking on Sky’s Sophy Ridge on Sunday, Cleverly stated:
I’m probably not seeing something coming from the Russian aspect that provides me confidence that Vladimir Putin is coming into these talks in good religion. The wider rhetoric continues to be very confrontational.
Cleverly stated that, whereas Britain needed to see peace talks “sooner rather than later”, he reiterated that it was as much as Ukraine to resolve the circumstances underneath which they might be prepared to barter with Russia.
He added:
Any negotiations have to be actual, they have to be significant, they will’t simply be a fig leaf for Russian rearmament and additional recruitment of troopers.”
Reuters studies that Russia’s Gazprom stated it plans to ship 42.6 million cubic metres of gasoline to Europe through Ukraine on Sunday, a quantity largely in step with current days.
The UK’s Ministry of Defence says Russia’s Federal Draft Budget, signed by Vladimir Putin in 2022, stating that greater than 9 trillion rubles (US $143bn) will probably be allotted throughout “defence, security and law enforcement” in 2023 is more likely to be “over-optimistic”.
The MoD provides that this quantity is a “significant” enhance in contrast with earlier years and can characterize “more than 30 per cent of Russia’s entire budget”.
As a consequence, different elements of Russia’s price range will come underneath “increasing pressure” to help the battle, the MoD says.
The Russian-installed administration of Ukraine’s Kherson area has stated it had begun altering domestically circulated Ukrainian hryvnia foreign money into Russian roubles, with hryvnia circulation in Moscow-controlled areas of the area to finish on 1 January.
In a video revealed on Telegram on Saturday by the area’s Moscow-appointed administration, Andrei Peretonkin, head of the Russian central financial institution’s native department, stated: “For the sake of the convenience of residents and to allow for a smoother integration of the region into the Russian economic space, this week banks in Kherson region began currency exchange operations.”
Previously, the Russian-installed administration had stated that each the rouble and hryvnia can be accepted in Kherson area, studies Reuters.
Russian forces took management of most of Kherson area within the early days of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. Russia declared it annexed in September after a referendum condemned by Ukraine and western international locations.
Less than two months later, Russian forces withdrew from Kherson metropolis underneath stress from a Ukrainian counteroffensive, whereas persevering with to carry a lot of the area’s territory.
For the most recent on the battle for Bakhmut, learn the Guardian’s account by Peter Beaumont:
Viktor Bout, the arms supplier freed by the US in a prisoner swap for American basketball participant Brittney Griner, stated he wished her good luck on the tarmac in Abu Dhabi the place they have been exchanged, studies Reuters.
Bout, who spent 14 years in US jail for arms trafficking, cash laundering and conspiring to kill Americans, was swapped on Thursday for the basketball star, jailed in Russia this yr for bringing hashish oil when arriving to play for a Russian staff.
Russia’s FSB safety service launched pictures of the 2 being led previous one another on the tarmac on the airport in Abu Dhabi throughout the swap, though the video cuts away as they cross and there was no footage exhibiting them interacting.
“I wished her luck, she even sort of reached out her hand to me,” Bout stated on Saturday in an interview with Russian state-controlled broadcaster RT.
“Again, it’s our tradition. You should wish everyone good fortune and happiness,” he stated, including that he believed Griner “was positively inclined” in the direction of him.
Speaking to Maria Butina, who herself spent 14 months in US jail for performing as an unregistered Russian agent and is now a lawmaker and RT presenter, Bout praised the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, whose portrait he stated he had held on his cell wall.
Asked about Russia’s battle in Ukraine, Bout stated he wished that Moscow had been capable of launch it sooner.
“If I had the chance and the required skills, I’d join up as a volunteer,” he stated.
Griner has not but spoken publicly. Her spouse, Cherelle Griner, stated on Thursday their household was now “whole”, and the couple would work to assist safe the discharge of different Americans held overseas, together with former US marine Paul Whelan, jailed in Russia on spying costs he denies.
Ukrainian missiles hit barracks in Russian-occupied Melitopol
Peter Beaumont
Ukraine has attacked a barracks within the Russian-occupied metropolis of Melitopol, with some Ukrainian sources claiming scores of Russian casualties.
According to witnesses, 10 explosions have been heard, though a few of these might have been from Russian anti-aircraft programs. Ukrainian officers claimed scores of Russian lifeless and injured whereas Russia conceded a handful of casualties.
Video footage posted on social media confirmed what was claimed to be a Russian barracks within the southern metropolis engulfed in a fierce blaze with some claiming the positioning was being utilized by the Wagner mercenary group.
Another video confirmed rescue staff within the ruins with a number of our bodies seen.
The website, a former resort and lodge advanced subsequent to a church within the metropolis often called the Hunter’s Halt, was getting used as a barracks with a lot of the casualties apparently in a large number corridor when it was hit.
The strike on Melitopol – reportedly with Himars rockets – was certainly one of a number of in a single day on Russian bases. Explosions have been additionally reported in a single day within the Russian occupied Crimea, together with Sevastopol and Simferopol.
Putin is set to overcome elements of Ukraine, Scholz says
The German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, has stated Vladimir Putin is set to overcome elements of Ukraine and exhibits no restraint in his brutality.
“Whenever I speak with Putin, he says very clearly that for him it is about conquering something,” Scholz stated on Saturday at an occasion in Potsdam, close to Berlin. “He simply wants to conquer part of Ukrainian territory with violence.”
Scholz has spoken immediately with the Russian president greater than most different western leaders because the 24 February invasion of Ukraine. The two final spoke by phone for an hour on 2 December.
Scholz stated it was not clear what number of Russian troopers had died to date within the invasion, however the quantity may very well be as excessive as 100,000.
We have seen the brutality the Russian president is able to: in Chechnya, the place he mainly eradicated the entire nation; or in Syria. There isn’t any restraint there, it’s so simple as that.
We are of utterly totally different opinions. Nonetheless, I’ll hold talking with him as a result of I need to expertise the second the place it’s doable to get out of this example. And that’s not doable with out talking with each other.
In his remarks on Saturday, Scholz additionally defended his authorities’s intention to lift defence spending to Nato’s objective of two% of gross home output, saying that earlier than German reunification, it had reached as a lot as 4%.
Nato international locations wanted to be sturdy sufficient that no one would dare to assault them, he stated.
– Reuters
Summary
Hello and welcome again to the Guardian’s persevering with dwell protection of the Russia-Ukraine war.
Our prime story this morning is Ukraine has reportedly attacked Russian-occupied Melitopol, based on each the Moscow-installed and exiled Ukrainian authorities of the strategically situated metropolis within the nation’s south-east.
The pro-Moscow authorities stated an assault by western-supplied Himars missiles on Saturday night killed two individuals and injured 10, whereas the exiled Ukrainian mayor stated scores of “invaders” have been killed.
Here’s a rundown on the opposite key current developments within the battle:
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Russian forces have “destroyed” the jap Ukrainian metropolis of Bakhmut, the nation’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, stated, whereas Ukraine’s army reported missile, rocket and airstrikes in a number of elements of the nation. The newest battles of Russia’s nine-and-a-half-month battle in Ukraine have centred on 4 provinces that the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, illegally claimed to have annexed in late September.
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The head of Nato has expressed fear that the combating in Ukraine may spin uncontrolled and grow to be a battle between Russia and Nato, based on an interview launched on Friday. “If things go wrong, they can go horribly wrong,” Nato’s secretary normal, Jens Stoltenberg, stated in remarks to Norwegian broadcaster NRK.
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All non-critical infrastructure in Ukraine’s southern port metropolis of Odesa have been with out energy after Russia used drones to hit energy facilities, native officers stated, with a lot of the encompassing area additionally affected.
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Iran’s backing for the Russian army is more likely to develop in coming months and Moscow will in all probability supply Tehran an “unprecedented” stage of army help in return, the UK Ministry of Defence has stated. The ministry’s newest intelligence replace stated Iran had grow to be certainly one of Russia’s prime army backers since Russia invaded Ukraine in February and that Moscow was now making an attempt to acquire extra weapons, together with a whole lot of ballistic missiles.
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Russia needs to show Ukraine right into a “dependent dictatorship” like Belarus, the spouse of jailed Belarusian Nobel peace prize laureate Ales Bialiatski stated on Saturday upon receiving the prize on his behalf, talking his phrases. Bialiatski, Russian rights group Memorial and Ukraine’s Centre for Civil Liberties gained the 2022 prize in October.
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Australia’s international minister, Penny Wong, stated the federal government would place focused sanctions on Russia and Iran in response to what it referred to as “egregious” human rights violations.
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Moscow has introduced it’s banning 200 Canadian officers from coming into Russia in response to related sanctions from Ottawa. The well being minister, Jean-Yves Duclos, and the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce head, Victor Dodig, have been amongst these focused.
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Boris Johnson has urged western international locations to “look urgently” at what extra they will do to help Ukraine within the hopes of ending the battle in opposition to Russia as quickly as subsequent yr. The former UK prime minister, who was hailed by Zelenskiy as a key ally within the nation’s battle in opposition to Russia, used an article within the Wall Street Journal to argue that ending the battle as quickly as doable is “in everyone’s interest, including Russia”.
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Explosions have been reported at Berdiansk airbase in Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia area. Three giant explosions have been heard, in addition to smaller ones, close to the Russian-occupied metropolis on the coast of the Sea of Azov.
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Ukraine says its southern areas are struggling the worst electrical energy outages days after the most recent bout of Russian assaults on the nation’s power grid. The head of Ukraine’s grid operator Ukrenergo, Volodymyr Kudrytskyi, stated staff have been struggling most to revive energy within the Black Sea areas of Odessa, which was badly hit on Monday, and across the lately recaptured metropolis of Kherson.
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Putin stated Russia may amend its army doctrine by introducing the potential for a pre-emptive strike to disarm an enemy, in an obvious reference to a nuclear assault. Speaking simply days after warning that the chance of nuclear battle was rising however Russia wouldn’t strike first, Putin stated on Friday that Moscow was contemplating whether or not to undertake what he referred to as Washington’s idea of a pre-emptive strike.
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Ukraine’s international minister stated his authorities was working with the UN’s nuclear watchdog to create a security zone across the Russian-held Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant. Dmytro Kuleba stated at a joint press convention in Kyiv along with his Slovak counterpart, Rastislav Káčer, that Kyiv remained “in close contact” with Rafael Grossi, the International Atomic Energy Agency head.
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Russia claimed its proposed security zone across the Zaporizhzhia plant was to “stop Ukrainian shelling”. Russia’s international ministry spokesperson, Maria Zakharova, additionally stated the US’s withdrawal from a treaty banning intermediate-range nuclear missiles was a “destructive” act that created a vacuum and stoked further safety dangers.
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