Because the conflict enters its 659th day, these are the principle developments.
Right here is the state of affairs on Thursday, December 14, 2023.
Preventing
- No less than 53 folks, together with six youngsters, have been injured after Russia launched a missile assault on Kyiv, the second in every week. Town’s air defences shot down the missiles – Iskander-M and S-400s – however the falling particles blew out home windows of residence blocks in addition to a youngsters’s hospital and destroyed parked automobiles. Of the injured, 18 have been taken to hospital.
- A gaggle of hackers referred to as Solntsepyok claimed accountability for the cyberattack on Kyivstar, Ukraine’s largest cell phone community, after hundreds of thousands of individuals have been left with out telephone entry or air raid alerts. Kyiv believes the group is affiliated with Russian navy intelligence. Kyivstar started restoring voice providers to some folks on Wednesday.
Politics and diplomacy
- With European Union leaders because of meet on Thursday to resolve whether or not to formally open Ukraine membership talks, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who was on a go to to Norway after returning to Europe from america, mentioned that Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban had no cause to dam Kyiv’s membership of the 27-member grouping. Zelenskyy mentioned he had been “very direct” when he had a quick chat with Orban in Argentina on Sunday.
- Orban, a conservative nationalist who’s Russian President Vladimir Putin’s closest ally within the EU and is obstructing 50 billion euros in monetary assist for Kyiv, appeared unmoved. “Our stance is obvious. We don’t assist Ukraine’s fast EU entry,” Orban wrote in a submit on Fb, claiming Ukrainian membership wouldn’t serve the pursuits of Hungary or the EU.
- Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Iceland, in the meantime, promised Zelenskyy they might “stand with Ukraine for so long as it takes”. The 5 international locations have offered Ukraine with assist value some 11 billion euros since Russia started its full-scale invasion in February 2022 and mentioned they have been able to proceed giving in depth navy, financial and humanitarian assist. “Russia should finish its aggression and withdraw its forces instantly and unconditionally from the territory of Ukraine inside its internationally recognised borders,” they mentioned in a joint assertion.
- Different EU leaders, together with EU Fee President Ursula von der Leyen, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and French President Emmanuel Macron, reiterated their assist for Ukraine, with Scholz suggesting the EU take enlargement choices by majority vote somewhat than unanimity. Newly-elected Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk mentioned he would attempt to persuade Orban to vary course. “Apathy on Ukraine is unacceptable,” Tusk mentioned, including that he’ll attempt to persuade “some member states”.
- A German court docket heard that Russia paid Carsten Linke, a former soldier working for Germany’s overseas intelligence company (BND), no less than 450,000 euros in return for details about weaponry with which the West was arming Ukraine. Linke and his confederate, a Russian-born German diamond dealer named Arthur Eller, are charged with excessive treason.
Weapons
- Germany’s Scholz careworn that the goal of the West’s persevering with navy assist for Ukraine was to strengthen Kyiv’s defence to such an extent that Russia would “by no means once more dare to assault”.
