Ukraine steps up drone strikes as Nato to buy 1,000 Patriot missiles – live

Ukraine and Russia on Wednesday announced their first exchange of prisoners of war in nearly five months, with more than 200 freed by each side after what both said was a complex negotiation involving mediation by the United Arab Emirates.

Russia‘s Defence Ministry said 248 military personnel had been handed over by Ukraine. Kyiv said it had brought home 230 people – 224 soldiers and six civilians – in what it said was the largest documented swap of troops so far.

The UAE’s foreign ministry acknowledged its role, saying in a statement that the swap was made possible by its “strong friendly relations” with both Moscow and Kyiv.

It offered both further humanitarian efforts and to find a peaceful solution to the war.

A video released by Ukrainian authorities showed returning prisoners draped in the country’s blue and yellow flag filing off a bus, singing the national anthem and shouting the patriotic greeting “Glory to Ukraine“.

Most, but not all, appeared to be in good health. . One returnee shouted: “We are home! You didn’t forget us!”

The Russian Ministry of Defence released a similar video of returning uniformed prisoners arriving in Belgorod in buses. “I’ll be home in five hours, roughly speaking, that’s going to be a joy,” said one unnamed man.

The Russian military said Wednesday it shot down 12 Ukrainian missiles over Russia’s southern Belgorod region bordering Ukraine, as Kyiv’s forces seek to embarrass Russian President Vladimir Putin and puncture his argument that life in Russia is going on as normal despite the 22-month war.

Belgorod Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov said the situation in the regional capital, also called Belgorod, “remains tense.” The city came under two rounds of shelling Wednesday morning, Gladkov wrote on Telegram.

“Air defense systems worked,” he said, promising more details about possible damage after inspecting the area later in the day. Wednesday was a national holiday in Russia.

“I spoke with UK prime minister @RishiSunak on Russia’s continued air terror against Ukrainian cities. Over the previous five days, the enemy has launched at least 500 missiles and drones toward Ukraine,” Mr Zelensky said on Tuesday night as he thanked the UK for “substantial and comprehensive aid in bolstering Ukraine’s air defence, particularly with radars, advanced anti-drone systems, and missiles”.

The Ukrainian president said he and Mr Sunak spoke about further defence cooperation with a particular focus on air defence and long-range capabilities.

The European Union imposed sanctions on the world’s biggest diamond mining company and its chief executive officer on Wednesday as part of what it called its “unwavering commitment” to Ukraine in the war against Russia.

The move targeted Alrosa, which accounts for about 90% of Russia’s diamond production, and CEO Pavel Marinychev. The EU headquarters said the company “constitutes an important part of an economic sector that is providing substantial revenue” to Moscow.

It means Alrosa’s assets in Europe will be frozen and EU citizens and companies will be barred from making funds available to the company. Marinychev, who was appointed CEO last May for three years, also faces a travel ban in Europe.

NATO announced Wednesday that it would help buy up to 1,000 Patriot missiles so that allies can better protect their territory as Russia ramps up its air assault on Ukraine.

NATO’s Support and Procurement Agency said it will support a group of nations, including Germany, the Netherlands, Romania and Spain, in buying the Patriots, which are used to defend against cruise and ballistic missiles as well as enemy aircraft.

According to industry sources, the contract could be worth around $5.5 billion.

Russia has fired more than 450 missiles and drones at Ukrainian civilian areas over the past week, killing more than 60 civilians and injuring hundreds more. Ukraine has fired dozens of drones and missiles over the Russian border and in Moscow-occupied Crimea in return, as the aerial duel between the two escalates while the frontlines on the ground remain deadlocked.

The British Ministry of Defence (MoD), in its latest intelligence update, suggested that Russia had committed a significant proportion of its stockpiled weapons to carry out the aerial attacks. It added that Russia appears to have transitioned from targeting critical energy infrastructure to Ukraine’s defence industry – seeking to reduce Kyiv’s ability to fire missiles and drones. That is an acknowldgement that the Kremlin is expecting a long war of attrition both in the air and on the ground.

Ukraine launched repeated missile and drone attacks on Wednesday on Russia‘s southern region of Belgorod, Russia‘s defence ministry and local authorities said.

Regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said the situation “continues to remain tense” in Belgorod, where Russia says 25 civilians including five children were killed in Ukrainian attacks on Saturday.

There was no word of any casualties from the latest attacks.

Later, Gladkov said authorities were evacuating residents near potentially unexploded munitions, with sappers called in to evaluate the danger.

Defence ministry explosive technicians were working on disposing of an unexploded projectile and around 600 residents from 323 houses within a 500-metre radius had been evacuated, Gladkov said.

Several other villages came under fire on Wednesday and a power line was knocked out, he said.

A top Polish security official on Wednesday said he could not rule out that the Dec. 29 breach of Poland’s airspace by what Warsaw says was a Russian missile was a provocation.

“I cannot rule it out. (Our) allies are also not ruling it out,” Jacek Siewiera, the head of the Polish National Security Bureau, said in an interview on private broadcaster TVN24 when asked whether he thought the breach was more likely a provocation instead of an accident.

“It is difficult to assume that a 40-kilometer-(deep) breach from the border of Poland was accidental. This type of trajectory violates the airspace in a very significant way,” he said.

Polish military officials in late December said that an object they identified as a Russian guided missile had breached the country’s airspace on Dec. 29 from the direction of its border with Ukraine before exiting within three minutes of entry.

RIA Novosti News agency quoted Andrei Ordash, Russia‘s charge d’affaires in Warsaw, as saying after he was summoned on Dec. 29 to Poland’s foreign ministry that the country had provided no proof of a border violation.

Siewiera said that the recent change of government in Warsaw and among Poland’s top military officials may also have been a factor.

“The administration in the Kremlin is aware that, at a very difficult moment in Poland, government is being taken over by an administration that has not been in power for eight years,” he said. “For this reason the risk of testing is high.”

Siewiera also pointed to what he called recent disruptions to the global positioning system (GPS) in Poland and the Baltic region as worrisome.

“If we add incidents such as the disruption of the GPS system … which seems to be, well, non-specific let’s say, it is actually very concerning to military planists.

“It concerns the jamming of the allied signal near the Suwalki corridor; around the ports of Gdynia through which allied (military) aid arrives; and the Danish straits,” Siewiera said, “and it does not affect (Russia‘s) GLONASS system,” which is Russia‘s equivalent of the West’s GPS.

Reports that the United States wants Ukraine to alter its strategy of seeking total victory in its war against Russia are not true, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said on Wednesday.

In a Dec. 27 article, Politico cited an unnamed Biden administration official and a European diplomat as saying that U.S. and European officials were quietly shifting their focus from supporting Ukraine‘s goal of total victory over Russia to improving its position in an eventual negotiation to end the war.

Asked if The United States wanted Ukraine to shift its strategy away from seeking total victory, Miller said: “No. That is not true.”

With trembling hands and labored breath, Serhii Slobodiannyk meticulously searched his fire-damaged apartment, seeking to salvage any of his family’s treasured belongings following a Russian missile attack on Kyiv.

“Everything I had worked for over 30 years was destroyed in less than a second,” says Slobodiannyk, still dressed in the clothes he managed to throw on in his burning apartment Tuesday.

He and his wife, Olena, had moved into the building in Kyiv’s Solomianskyi district in 1984. Now the structure is uninhabitable — ravaged by fire, part of its facade torn off, and a huge crater gouged next to it by the missile that struck at 7:40 a.m.