Here are the main developments on the 1,038th day of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
This is the situation on Saturday, December 28:
Fighting:
- Russia’s Federal Security Service said on Saturday that it had foiled a plot by Ukrainian intelligence services to kill a high-ranking Russian officer and a war blogger, Interfax news agency reported.
- Ukrainian forces killed or wounded more than a thousand North Korean soldiers sent by Russia to fight them, according to Ukraine and South Korea. He added: “Their losses are great and very significant.” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his evening speech on Friday: “We see that neither the Russian military nor the North Korean supervisors have any interest in ensuring the survival of these North Koreans.” Meanwhile, a spokesman for the National Security Council said American John Kirby said a “human wave” of North Korean troops had been sent to their deaths in “desperate” attacks by generals they saw as expendable.
- The Russian Defense Ministry said on Friday that its forces had taken control of two villages in eastern Ukraine, Ivanivka in the Donetsk region and Zheryzov in the Kharkiv region, the RIA news agency reported.
- The Russian Information Agency also quoted the ministry as claiming that it shot down four British-made Storm Shadow missiles last week.
- A North Korean soldier, who was fighting for Russia, died in Ukrainian captivity from serious injuries, according to the South Korean spy agency.
- Ukrainian air defenses shot down 13 out of 24 Russian drones launched in an attack overnight, the Ukrainian air force said on Friday. The Air Force said the other 11 Russian planes were “lost” without causing damage.
Deals and diplomacy:
- The administration of US President Joe Biden has pledged to approve new military aid to Ukraine, including air defense systems. Kirby said the US security assistance package is expected to be announced “in the next couple of days.”
- “If someone wants to organize peace talks in Slovakia, we will be ready and hospitable,” Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico said in a Facebook post late Friday evening. His comments come after Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that he was open to Slovakia’s proposal to host peace talks with Ukraine.
- Ukraine has received the first batch of liquefied natural gas from the United States, a deal Kiev says is key to strengthening Ukrainian and European energy security as a key gas transit agreement with Russia expires. “Dtek, Ukraine’s largest private energy company, today received its first shipment of liquefied natural gas from the United States,” the company said on Friday.
Opposition:
- A Russian court sentenced singer Edward Charlotte (26 years old), who burned his passport in protest against the Russian war in Ukraine, to five and a half years in prison, according to what Russian news agencies reported. The official RIA Novosti news agency reported that Charlotte was convicted of “publicly insulting” the religious feelings of believers and “rehabilitating Nazism” by a court in the city of Samara, located on the Volga River, in a case related to videos he posted on the Internet.
