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The US defence secretary Lloyd Austin and Ukrainian defence minister Oleksii Reznikov have discussed “priorities”, including air defence and artillery, for upcoming meetings of Kyiv’s allies in Brussels, both sides said late on Saturday.
After securing a promise of scores of modern battle tanks, including the US M1 Abrams, German Leopard 2 and British Challenger 2, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy and other Kyiv officials have been urging allies to send fighter aircraft.
The Ukraine Defense Contact Group will meet on Tuesday at the NATO headquarters, following up on a 20 January conference at the Ramstein Air Base in Germany that was key for the decisions to send tanks.
Austin and Reznikov discussed the importance of delivering promised capabilities as quickly as possible, the Pentagon’s chief spokesperson, brigadier general Patrick Ryder, said in a statement.
After the call, Reznikov tweeted that “the United States is unwavering in its support of Ukraine,” adding that the two also discussed the situation on the front line.
Had a 📞with my great friend & friend of 🇺🇦 Lloyd J. Austin III @SecDef
We discussed the situation on the frontline&priorities for the next #Ramstein.
🇺🇸 is unwavering in its support of 🇺🇦
All this is possible thanks to our transparent and trustworthy relationship.
Thank you 🇺🇸! pic.twitter.com/eQTCU6uvSM
First reports indicate that three Russian S-300 missiles hit the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv on Saturday night, regional governor Oleh Sinehubov wrote on the Telegram messaging app.
“One infrastructure facility was damaged. Information about the victims and the scale of the destruction is being clarified,” he said.
Russian missiles hit power generating facilities in Kharkiv on Friday in an attack that injured eight people. Kharkiv is eastern Ukraine’s largest city.
Ukraine’s forces hold defence along the frontline in Donetsk - Kyiv
Ukraine’s forces hold defence along the frontline in Donetsk, including of the besieged town of Bakhmut, with the fiercest battles raging for the cities of Vuhledar and Maryinka, Kyiv’s top military commander said on Saturday, Reuters reports.
Valeriy Zaluzhnyi, commander-in-chief of Ukraine’s Armed Forces, said Russia carries out some 50 attacks daily in Donetsk, a region in Ukraine’s southeast that Moscow has been trying to occupy fully.
“Fierce fighting continues in the area of Vuhledar and Maryinka,” Zaluzhnyi said in a Telegram message after a call with US General Mark Milley.
“We reliably hold the defence. In some areas of the front we have managed to regain previously lost positions and gained a foothold.”
Zaluzhnyi did not specify where the gains were. He added that Ukraine continues to hold Bakhmut, tying to “stabilise” the frontline around the town.
Summary and welcome
Hello, I’m Christine Kearney and I’ll be bringing you the latest developments in the Russia-Ukraine war.
Ukraine’s capital Kyiv and the surrounding region and the Odesa and Dnipro regions can avoid power cuts on Sunday, leading producer DTEK said, as authorities worked to repair power grids damaged by a major Russian strike.
Russia bombarded Ukraine in a large-scale attack on Friday, hitting several cities including Kyiv. Ukraine’s state-run energy operator Ukrenergo has said the situation in the country’s energy system is challenging but controlled.
Kyiv said Russia struck power facilities in six regions, causing blackouts across most of Ukraine.
The attacks came a day after Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelenskiy ended a tour of European allies to lobby leaders for long-range weapons and fighter jets.
In other developments:
Galina Danilchenko, the Russia-installed mayor of the Ukrainian city Melitopol in south-eastern Zaporizhzhia region, said on Saturday one civilian died in overnight shelling of Melitopol by Ukrainian forces. Two people were also injured, she wrote on the Telegram social media app.
First reports indicate that three Russian S-300 missiles hit the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv on Saturday night, regional governor Oleh Sinehubov wrote on the Telegram messaging app. “One infrastructure facility was damaged. Information about the victims and the scale of the destruction is being clarified,” he said.
Ukraine’s forces are holding defence along the frontline in Donetsk, including in the besieged town of Bakhmut, with the fiercest battles raging for the cities of Vuhledar and Maryinka, Kyiv’s top military commander said on Saturday. Valerii Zaluzhnyi did not specify where the gains were. He added that Ukrainian forices are trying to “stabilise” the frontline around Bakhmut, a city in the eastern Donbas region, which has become the focal point of Ukrainian resistance to Russia’s invasion and of Moscow’s drive to regain battlefield momentum.
Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Wagner mercenary group, acknowledged that his forces are facing fierce resistance around Bakhmut from Ukrainian defenders. He said it could take two years for Russia to fully control the Donetsk and Luhansk regions in eastern Ukraine, two regions whose capture Moscow has stated as a key goal of the war. “If we have to get to the Dnipro, then it will take about three years,” Prigozhin added, referring to a larger area that would extend to the vast Dnieper River that runs roughly north to south, bisecting Ukraine. Russian forces must capture the Ukrainian stronghold of Bakhmut to proceed with their campaign.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Saturday issued a decree sacking a senior security figure and said separately that his drive to clean up the government would continue. Authorities have dismissed dozens of officials in recent weeks and opened probes as part of a widespread drive against wrongdoing. The European Union says addressing corruption is a requirement for Ukraine joining the 27-member bloc.
Russia is ready for negotiations with Ukraine, but without preconditions, state media have reported the Russian deputy foreign minister, Sergey Vershinin, as saying. In an interview with state-run Zvezda television, Vershinin said it was not Ukraine, but the US and the EU that should make the decision on talks with Russia. Ukraine’s presidential adviser, Mykhailo Podolyak, who headed the country’s negotiating team in the early phases of the conflict, said “talks are out of the question”.
Russia’s sports minister, Oleg Matytsin, has said Ukraine’s call to ban Russian athletes from the 2024 Paris Olympics was “unacceptable”, state media are reporting. He described the call as “a blatant desire to destroy the unity of international sport and the international Olympic movement”. His remarks came as a group of 35 countries will demand that Russian and Belarusian athletes are banned from the 2024 Olympics, according to the Lithuanian sports minister, Jurgita Šiugždinienė.
A proposed resolution for adoption by the UN’s general assembly has underlined the need for peace ensuring Ukraine’s “sovereignty, independence, unity and territorial integrity”. The draft resolution from supporters of Ukraine, on the eve of the first anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, is broader and less detailed than Zelenskiy’s 10-point peace plan he announced in November.
Zemfira, one of Russia’s most popular singers, has been placed on a list of “foreign agents” on grounds that she supported Ukraine and criticised Russia’s “special military operation” in that country, according to the Russian justice ministry. The ministry has added several other people to its “foreign agents” list, including opposition politician Dmitry Gudkov, political analyst Abbas Gallyamov, and activists Aleksandra Kazantseva and Tatyana Nazambaeva for “LGBT propaganda”.
Immigration authorities in Argentina are cracking down on Russian women who since the invasion of Ukraine have started travelling to Buenos Aires to give birth in order to gain Argentinian citizenship for their children. The director of Argentina’s immigration office, Florencia Carignano, said on Friday that a judicial investigation has been launched into what she described as a lucrative business that promises Argentinian passports for the Russian parents.
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