Ukraine-Russia war latest: Russia ‘drafts 180,000 convicts’ as Zelensky says decisive Trump can stop Putin
Trump ‘capable of stopping Putin or, to put it more fairly, help us stop Putin’, says Zelensky
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Your support makes all the difference.Russia has enlisted between 140,000 and 180,000 prison inmates to fight in the war against Ukraine, Ukraine’s Foreign Intelligence Service (SZRU) said, according to the Kyiv Independent.
A Russian government decree abolishing the one-time payment of £2,842 to prisoners for signing a contract with the Russian Defense Ministry to participate in the war against Ukraine came into effect on 1 January.
“The legislative abolition of the one-time payment is evidence of the deepening crisis in the Russian economy and the shortage of financial resources,” Ukraine’s Foreign Intelligence Service claimed.
The Independent could not verify these claims.
It comes as Volodymyr Zelensky auded incoming US president Donald Trump saying he could be decisive in the outcome of the 34-month-old war with Russia and help stop Vladimir Putin.
“He can be decisive in this war,” the Ukrainian president said. “He is capable of stopping Putin or, to put it more fairly, help us stop Putin. He is able to do this.”
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Ukraine ends Russian gas pipeline to Europe – but how much will it cost Moscow?
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Crisis has aided the Russian strongman’s regime stability far more than any index of economic success, writes Mark Almond
'No heating, no light': Moldovans fear looming energy shortage as Russia halts gas supplies
'No heating, no light': Moldovans fear looming energy shortage as Russia halts gas supplies
Moldovans are bracing for a difficult winter ahead as a looming energy shortage could leave them without enough energy
2,600 UK personnel to join Nato exercise amid ‘unshakeable commitment’ to bloc
More than 2,600 UK personnel are heading to Nato’s eastern flank as part of the Government’s “unshakeable commitment” to the military bloc, the armed forces minister has said.
According to the Ministry of Defence, Exercise Steadfast Dart 25 will showcase the alliance’s readiness, capability and commitment to defend Nato territories.
The UK’s 1st Division – headquartered in York – will be in command of all of the alliance’s land forces while they are in eastern Europe.
The exercise marks the first deployment under the bloc’s new Allied Reaction Force, which replaced the Nato Response Force last year to deal “swiftly and effectively” with “any threat in an evolving security environment” during peacetime, crisis and conflict.
Luke Pollard said: “This Government wants the UK to be Nato’s leading European nation.
“Exercise Steadfast Dart demonstrates our unshakeable commitment to Nato and highlights the UK’s key leadership role in the alliance.
“As we approach the three-year anniversary of Russia’s illegal full-scale invasion of Ukraine, we must continue to strengthen our collective defences together to deter (Russian president Vladimir) Putin effectively.”
Moldova PM warns of security crisis and denounces Russian gas cut-off
Moldova faces a security crisis after tens of thousands of residents in the breakaway enclave of Transdniestria were cut off from Russian gas supply, Prime Minister Dorin Recean said.
Flows of Russian gas via Ukraine which supplied central and eastern Europe were halted at the end of 2024 as Kyiv rejected doing further business with Moscow.
Recean said Moldova would cover its energy needs with domestic production and imports but noted the separatist Transdniestria region had suffered a painful hit despite its ties with Moscow.
"By jeopardising the future of the protectorate it has backed for three decades in an effort to destabilise Moldova, Russia is revealing the inevitable outcome for all its allies – betrayal and isolation,” Recean said in a statement.
"We treat this as a security crisis aimed at enabling the return of pro-Russian forces to power in Moldova and weaponising our territory against Ukraine, with whom we share a 1,200 km border."
What is ATACMS? The US missiles being used inside Russia
There are several variants of Army Tactical Missile Systems, a long-range missile system that often carries varying amounts of cluster bomblets.
Ukrainian forces used the US-supplied long-range ATACMS missiles for the first time in October 2023, with President Volodymyr Zelenskiy saying the weapons had “proven themselves.”
Ukraine likely has what are known as M39A1 Block IA ATACMS that are guided in part by Global Positioning System and have a range of 40 to 190 miles. They can carry a payload of 300 bomblets. The M39 Block IA were used in Operation Iraqi Freedom, according to Army documents, and were added to the US arsenal in 1997.
War in Ukraine: A snapshot of 2024 military warfare
Russian forces in 2024 advanced in Ukraine at the fastest rate since 2022, the war’s first year, and control about a fifth of the country. But the gains have come at the cost of heavy, though undisclosed, losses in men and equipment.
In 2024, Russia was invaded for the first time since the Second World War as Ukraine grabbed a slice of its western Kursk region in a surprise counter-attack on 6 August.
Russia has yet to eject Ukrainian forces from Kursk despite bringing in more than 10,000 troops from its ally North Korea, according to Ukrainian, South Korean and US assessments. Russia has neither confirmed nor denied their presence.
“To sustain even the very slow advance in Ukraine, Russia has been forced to ignore the months-long occupation of part of its own territory by Ukrainian forces,” British security expert Ruth Deyermond said.
“Taking a ‘nothing to see here’ attitude to the loss of its own land is not what great powers do, particularly one so preoccupied with the idea of state sovereignty.”
Deyermond, in a long thread posted on X, suggested Putin’s efforts to portray Russia as a leading world power were also undermined by the toppling of its chief Middle East ally, former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, and its increasing dependence on China.
Mr Putin, the longest-serving ruler of Russia since Josef Stalin, said on 19 December that under his leadership the country had moved back from “the edge of the abyss” and rebuffed threats to its sovereignty.
With hindsight, he said, he should not have waited until February 2022 before launching his “special military operation” in Ukraine, the term he still uses for the full-scale invasion of Russia’s neighbour.
Watch: Russia and Ukraine swap 150 prisoners in tearful exchange
Ukraine navy says it destroyed over 37,000 Russian drones last year
Ukraine’s navy has destroyed more than 37,000 Russian drones in the year 2024, it said.
The downed platforms include Russian strike drones, operational and tactical unmanned aerial vehicles, first-person-view drones, and Shahed-type attack drones, the navy said in a Facebook post. Ukrainian naval forces also destroyed five Russian ships and 458 watercraft, it added.
Russia’s drone losses included 35,670 destroyed FPV drones and 1,140 strike drones, the navy said. Ukraine’s naval units also eliminated 192 operational and tactical drones and another 164 Shahed-136/131 drones.
Ukraine-Russia war map: Where are Putin’s forces making gains on the frontline as 2025 begins?
Ukraine-Russia war map 2025: Where are Putin’s forces making gains on the frontline?
Russian forces are advancing in the east, slowly but surely, and they are shrinking Ukraine’s partial hold of the border region of Kursk
Zelensky says Trump can be decisive in helping stop Putin
President-elect Donald Trump could be decisive in the outcome of the 34-month-old war with Russia and help stop Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin, Volodymyr Zelensky said.
Mr Zelensky, facing advances by Russian forces in eastern Ukraine, said in an interview with Ukrainian television that Mr Trump had told him he would be one of the first to visit Washington after the presidential inauguration this month.
The Ukrainian president also said a priority was to stabilise the frontline early in the new year. Mr Putin, he said, feared negotiations as they would be tantamount to a defeat for Russia.
“He’s very strong and unpredictable, and I would really like to see President Trump’s unpredictability apply to Russia. I believe he really wants to end the war,” he said. “Trump can be decisive. For us, this is the most important thing,” he said in a televised interview.
“His qualities are indeed there,” Mr Zelensky said of Mr Trump. “He can be decisive in this war. He is capable of stopping Putin or, to put it more fairly, help us stop Putin. He is able to do this.”
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