Ukraine-Russia latest: North Korea prepares to send kamikaze drones and more troops to battlefield
South Korea says Kim Jong Un is focused on the production of kamikaze drones
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Your support makes all the difference.North Korea is preparing to send to Russia more troops and weapons, including kamikaze drones, to support Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine, South Korea’s military has claimed.
North Korea has already provided 240mm multiple rocket launchers and 170mm self-propelled howitzers, and was seen preparing to produce more suicide drones to be shipped to Russia after leader Kim Jong Un guided a test last month, according to Seoul’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS).
“Suicide drones are one of the tasks that Kim Jong Un has focused on,” a JCS official said, adding that the North had expressed its intention to give them to Russia.
Such drones have been widely used in the Ukraine war, and Kim ordered a mass production of the aerial weapons and an update of military theory and education, citing intensifying global competition, state media reported.
Seoul, Washington and Kyiv have said there are around 12,000 North Korean troops in Russia. The JCS said at least 1,100 of them had been killed or wounded, reportedly in the border region of Kursk.
Vladimir Putin: Russia is ready to compromise with Trump on Ukraine war
Kim Jong Un ‘personally overseeing’ North Korean training for Ukraine amid reports of heavy losses
The huge spike in gun range openings in a country that borders Russia
Warning North Korea can produce ballistic missiles for Russia ‘in months’
UK may send British troops to Ukraine to train soldiers, defence secretary suggests
UK may send British troops to Ukraine to train soldiers, defence secretary suggests
John Healey has said Britain needs to ‘make the training a better fit for what the Ukrainians need’ and left the door open to it taking place in the war-torn country
The one battle President Zelensky looks set to win
Not so very long ago, Vladimir Putin, the would-be reincarnation of Joseph Stalin, had some cause for satisfaction. True, his ill-fated “special military operation” in Ukraine had spectacularly failed in its initial stated aim of subsuming the country into a Greater Russia, resistance supposedly crumbling in days, with Volodymyr Zelensky skulking off into exile.
However, the Kremlin’s “meat-grinder” strategy has succeeded in occupying roughly a third of what was left of Ukrainian territory after the 2014 invasion. Russian troops were advancing, albeit at a glacial pace and an obscene cost in human lives.
The attacks on civilians, homes and energy infrastructure were helping to demoralise and exhaust the Ukrainians, brave as they were. Some 40,000 fresh troops were promised by North Korea – Kim Jong Un’s elite squads, according to reports. Mr Kim and Russia’s other allies in the Middle East were assisting with the sanctions-busting; and the Iranians and Syrians (and, to a lesser degree, the Houthis, Hezbollah and Hamas) shared Russia’s agenda.
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The one battle President Zelensky looks set to win
For all of Russia’s recent setbacks, it is increasingly unlikely Ukraine will be able to push back invading forces to the border positions when hostilities first broke out – but it may yet force Vladimir Putin into a negotiated peace that would ensure greater security for Europe
Ukraine strikes in heart of Russia with drone attack 1,000km beyond frontline
Ukraine brought the war into the heart of Russia on Saturday morning with drone attacks that local authorities said damaged residential buildings in the city of Kazan in the Tatarstan region, over 600 miles (1,000 kilometers) from the front line.
The press service of Tatarstan’s governor, Rustam Minnikhanov, said that eight drones attacked the city. Six hit residential buildings, one hit an industrial facility and one was shot down over a river, the statement said.
It comes as Moscow’s troops continue to slowly advance in eastern Ukraine, with their defence ministry stating they had taken control of the village of Kostiantynopolske in the Donetsk province.
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Ukraine strikes in heart of Russia with drone attack 1,000km beyond frontline
Russian authorities said the attacks damaged residential buildings in the city of Kazan
The huge spike in gun range openings in a country that borders Russia
Unsettled by Russia’s expansionism and emboldened by its accession to NATO, Finland is rallying to strengthen its national self-defense.
The popularity of weapons training in the Nordic country has soared in recent months. Few places tell the story of the rise in Finnish affinity for self-defense more than shooting ranges that are riding a boom of interest.
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s order for a full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine — another big Russian neighbor — in February 2022 continues to resonate in many Finnish minds, and partially explains the ballistics binge.
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The huge spike in gun range openings in a country that borders Russia
The training doesn’t stop at the gun range
Putin praises Boris Johnson’s hair as he peddles baseless Ukraine army theory
Putin praises Boris Johnson’s hair as he peddles baseless Ukraine army theory
Vladimir Putin praised Boris Johnson’s hair as he referred to a quote there is no online record of the former prime minister ever having said. During a four-hour phone-in on Thursday (19 December), the Russian president said: “Prime minister Johnson with the great hair... He said they need to fight until the last Ukrainian, that’s what they’re doing now. They’re running out of Ukrainians who would like to fight, I don’t think there are any left.” Mr Putin appeared to reference a Kremlin-peddled theory that Mr Johnson hindered peace talks between Kyiv and Moscow, something the former PM denied, telling The Times it was “total nonsense and Russian propaganda.”
Putin vows retaliation after Ukrainian drones struck Kazan
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday vowed retaliation after Ukrainian drones the day before struck residential buildings in the city of Kazan, in the Tatarstan region over 600 miles (1,000 kilometers) from the front line.
Speaking to Tatarstan’s regional governor, Rustam Minnikhanov, Putin asserted that anyone attacking Russia has to reckon with Moscow inflicting “many times greater damage” in return, but did not elaborate.
His remarks were carried by Russian state news agencies.
Minnikhanov’s press service on Saturday said that eight drones attacked Kazan. Local authorities said there were no casualties.
Russia to start humanitarian supplies of electricity to breakaway Georgian region
Russia will start humanitarian supplies of electricity to Abkhazia, a breakaway Georgian region backed by Moscow, from Monday, Russian news agencies quoted local officials as saying.
Electricity shortages, common in Abkhazia in the winter months, began in early December when low water levels at the Enguri hydroelectric dam forced an emergency shutdown.
The region appealed to Russia for assistance, saying it was facing a “humanitarian catastrophe” due to a critical shortage of power.
“In response to Abkhazia’s appeal, the Russian leadership has once again extended a helping hand to us and is starting to carry out a humanitarian transfer of electricity to the republic,” Interfax news agency cited Badra Gunba, Abkhazia’s self-styled president, as saying on Sunday.
Abkhazia broke from Georgia’s control in a war after the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, during which hundreds of thousands of ethnic Georgians fled the region.
Moscow has long supported it and another breakaway Georgian region, South Ossetia, and recognised them as independent after winning a five-day war against Georgia in 2008.
Ukraine says Russian forces executed five POWs
Russian forces executed five Ukrainian prisoners of war, Ukraine’s Parliamentary Commissioner for Human Rights, Dmytro Lubinets, said on Sunday.
Lubinets said on the Telegram messenger app that Russian troops shot the five unarmed soldiers after capturing them. He gave no details, but will report this fact to the UN.
“Russian war criminals who shoot Ukrainian prisoners of war should be brought before an international tribunal and punished with the most severe punishment provided for by law,” Lubinets said.
Russia did not immediately comment on the incident, but has previous denied committing war crimes.
Zelensky says Ukraine’s membership of NATO is ‘achievable’
Ukraine’s membership of NATO is “achievable”, but Kyiv will have to fight to persuade allies to make it happen, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy told Ukrainian diplomats in a speech on Sunday.
Ukraine has repeatedly urged NATO to invite Kyiv to become a member. The Western military alliance has said Ukraine will join its ranks one day but has not set a date or issued an invitation.
Moscow has cited the prospect of Ukraine joining NATO as one of the principal justifications for its 2022 invasion. Kyiv says membership in the Western alliance’s mutual defence pact, or an equivalent form of security guarantee, would be crucial to any peace plan to ensure that Russia does not attack again
“We all understand that Ukraine’s invitation to NATO and membership in the alliance can only be a political decision,” Zelensky told diplomats at a gathering in Kyiv. “Alliance for Ukraine is achievable, but it is achievable only if we fight for this decision at all the necessary levels.”
Zelensky said allies needed to know what Ukraine can bring to NATO and how its membership in the alliance would stabilise global relations.
Last week Zelensky urged European countries to provide guarantees to protect Ukraine after the war with Russia ends and said Ukraine would ultimately need more protection through membership of the alliance.
42 Ukrainian drones intercepted by Russian forces overnight
According to Ukraine’s Air Force, Russia launched 103 Iranian-made Shahed drones at its neighbor overnight into Sunday. Ukrainian air defense shot down 52 of the drones while another 44 failed to reach their targets, the force said in a statement, in a likely reference to electronic jamming.
Meanwhile, Russia’s Defense Ministry said Sunday that its forces had intercepted 42 Ukrainian drones launched overnight at Russian territory.
According to the ministry, 20 of those were over the Oryol region, where the local governor said a blaze tore through the oil terminal.Separately, Russian forces have continued grinding forward in Ukraine’s northeast, in addition to eking out gains near the eastern town of Kurakhove.
On Sunday, Russia’s Defense Ministry reported that its troops had captured two northeastern settlements: Lozova in the Kharkiv region and Krasne in the Luhansk province. There was no immediate confirmation from Kyiv.
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