Kyiv rejects claim of deadly Russian strike; warm winter defuses Putin’s energy gambit 

The ceasefire unilaterally declared by Moscow over Orthodox Christmas ended on Saturday night. President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russian troops had violated President Vladimir Putin’s order, continuing to shell the town of Bakhmut and other Ukrainian positions. Ukraine’s general staff said civilian infrastructure was targeted by multiple missile strikes during the 36-hour ceasefire.

Russia and Ukraine completed another prisoner swap, this time for 50 service members on each side.

Key developments

• Putin’s energy gambit fizzles as warm winter saves Europe


• McCarthy’s speaker deal could stymie defence spending next year


• US adds offensive weapons for Ukraine in $2.85bn package 


• Russia looks to press big firms for more cash as war costs mount

On the ground

Ukraine’s forces repelled Russian attacks near 16 settlements in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, the General Staff said on Facebook. Russian forces continued their offensive in the direction of Bakhmut, Avdiivka and Lyman. Ukrainian aviation delivered 21 strikes at Russian strongholds and three strikes at Russian anti-aircraft complexes. Three Russian reconnaissance drones were downed.

A UN mission delivering humanitarian aid to Orikhiv in the Zaporizhzhia region came under Russian shelling, regional governor Oleksandr Starukh said. The outskirts of Zaporizhzhia were also shelled. A civilian was killed in missile strikes on the town of Merefa in the Kharkiv region.

Russian claim of massive strike is ‘nonsense,’ official tells CNN 

A Ukrainian military official denied the Russian defence ministry’s claim that it killed 600 Ukrainian troops overnight in a missile attack on Kramatorsk in the Donetsk region.

“This is nonsense,” Serhiy Cherevatyi, a spokesman for the Eastern Group of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, told CNN. Journalists in the area said they saw no evidence of casualties or other unusual activity.

Cherevatyi told the Suspilne Novyny website that Kremlin forces don’t have the means to deliver high-precision strikes and that Sunday’s claim was an “informational operation”. Photos on social media of a school allegedly hit by a Russian missile appeared to show an empty building.

 

Russia, Ukraine each swap 50 in prisoner exchange  

Servicemen from Ukraine’s armed forces, territorial defence, national guard and other units, including 33 officers and 17 soldiers captured in Mariupol, Kyiv, Kherson and the Donetsk region, were returned to Ukraine, Andriy Yermak, head of presidential staff, said on Telegram.

Russia’s defence ministry confirmed the swap, saying 50 military personnel had been returned after negotiations and would be flown to Moscow for treatment and rehabilitation.

It was the 36th such exchange between Ukraine and Russia since the Kremlin’s invasion, which is well into its 11th month.

Russia claims it killed hundreds in retaliatory strike on Kramatorsk 

Russia’s defence ministry said it carried out a “retaliatory operation” in the Donetsk region to seek revenge for Ukraine’s rocket strike on Makiyivka on New Year’s Day that, by official account, killed at least 89 Russian troops.

“More than 600 Ukrainian servicemen” were “eliminated” in a “massive missile strike” on about 1,300 troops housed in two buildings in Kramatorsk, the ministry said in a daily report. The report couldn’t be verified and top Ukrainian officials made no comment.

Oleksandr Honcharenko, the mayor of Kramatorsk, said missile attacks on Saturday night had damaged two schools and eight residential buildings. No civilian casualties were reported.

Warm winter defuses Putin’s energy gambit 

Mild weather, an expanded array of suppliers and efforts to reduce demand are taking the sting out of Putin’s plan to squeeze Europe by weaponising energy. Gas reserves are still nearly full, and prices have tumbled to pre-war levels.

“The danger of a complete economic meltdown, a core meltdown of European industry, has — as far as we can see — been averted,” said German Economy Minister Robert Habeck.

Pipeline blast leaves 13,000 people without gas 

An explosion at a gas pipeline near Luthuhyne in Luhansk on Saturday left about 13,000 people without gas supplies, Interfax reported. Gas service was gradually being restored on Sunday, Tass reported. A preliminary investigation showed the blast was deliberate, the newswire said.

Russia has created a massive minefield, says Ukraine PM

Russia’s war has resulted in a minefield of some 250,000 square kilometres, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal told South Korea’s Yonhap news agency. That would be roughly the size of the UK.

“It is currently the largest minefield in the world,” Shmyhal said in an interview published on Sunday. “It’s not only making it difficult for people to travel, but also causing major disruptions in farming, which is one of our main industries.”

Russia bracing for new Ukrainian counteroffensive, says UK 

Kremlin troops have bolstered defensive fortifications in the central Zaporizhzhia oblast in anticipation of a major Ukrainian counteroffensive either in northern Luhansk or in Zaporizhzhia, the UK defence ministry said in a Twitter update.

“Deciding which of these threats to prioritise countering is likely one of the central dilemmas for Russian operational planners,” the UK said.

Russia breached its own ceasefire, says Zelensky

Russian forces violated their own ceasefire, Zelensky said in his nightly video address. He said Russian shells again hit Bakhmut, a city that has been embattled for months, and other Ukrainian positions.

The president noted the number of Ukrainian soldiers who attended a Christmas service in the 11th-century Pechersk Lavra in Kyiv, where services were held in Ukrainian for the first time in decades.

Ukraine sanctions Russian singers, actors and propagandists  

Zelensky signed a decree on Saturday imposing sanctions on 119 individuals, most of them Russian show business and film stars, as well as media personalities.

The list includes Vienna-based opera singer Anna Netrebko, Oscar-winning movie director Nikita Mikhalkov and pop singer Dmitry (Dima) Bilan, who has performed at the Eurovision Song Contest.

The list also includes nationalist ideologist Alexander Dugin, whose daughter was killed in a car bombing in August; Margarita Simonyan, editor-in-chief of the state-run RT media group; and the heads of think tanks known to advise the Kremlin, including Fyodor Lukyanov and Sergei Karaganov.

 

Russia ‘firing along the entire contact line’ 

Russian forces were firing “along the entire contact line” as the 36-hour ceasefire declared by Putin entered its final hours, Ukrainian presidential aide Mykhailo Podolyak said on Twitter, without offering more details.

The halt in hostilities, tied by Putin to the Orthodox Christmas holiday, was scheduled to end at midnight on Saturday evening, Moscow time.

Russia’s defence ministry said on Saturday its troops were repelling Ukrainian offensives in the Donetsk region.

Pope Francis calls for ‘concrete steps towards peace’  

In extending best wishes to members of the Eastern churches celebrating Orthodox Christmas on Saturday, the pontiff sent greetings “in particular” to “the suffering people of Ukraine” and called for concrete steps towards peace.

Ukraine envoy urges haste in German military support 

Ukraine’s ambassador to Berlin warned against delays in decisions on future military support, days after Germany’s government announced it would supply Kyiv with Marder infantry fighting vehicles. Oleksii Makeiev said he was optimistic that Leopard-type tanks might be offered next.

The Iris-T air defence system and Gepard flak tanks previously provided by Germany were “already showing a fantastic result” in intercepting Russian missiles and drones, and the Marders “will benefit our ground forces enormously,” Makeiev told the German magazine WirtschaftsWoche.

It was understandable that Germany wanted to coordinate decisions with its partners, “but it is crucial not to hesitate too long in supplying weapons. Every day costs us many lives,” Makeiev said. DM