Ukraine war latest: Russia claims capture of towns in east as six dead in attacks

When outgoing president Joe Biden was asked if he or Donald Trump deserved credit for the Gaza ceasefire deal struck in Qatar he shot back: “Is that a joke?” It wasn’t. Trump’s claim of having secured the “EPIC” deal was comic, but his contribution was real.

Biden’s team worked in tandem with Trump’s incoming administration – and his Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff – to deliver the agreement which had taken many months to thrash out.

It was no accident that it was struck in the dying days of the Biden years, less than a week before Trump was due to move back into the White House. Israel’s prime minister knew that involving Trump would set him up to warm relations with the 47th president.

Hamas knows he’ll always be an enemy, but one who might actually make good on a threat to “rain hell” on the movement if no deal was made.

Ukrainian air defences shot down 43 out of 61 drones launched by Russia in an overnight attack on Sunday that targeted nine regions across Ukraine, the air force said.

It said that 15 other drones were “lost” in reference to Kyiv using electronic warfare to redirect them.

No major damage or casualties were immediately reported by officials.

The yellow name tag that Ales Bialiatski wears on his prison garb sets him apart from other inmates in Penal Colony No. 9 in eastern Belarus.

It marks Bialiatski as a political prisoner to be singled out for harsh treatment. Because he’s been labeled an “extremist” by authorities, he’s routinely denied medications, food parcels from home and contact with relatives, and is subjected to forced labor and stints in punishment cells, according to former inmates.

Authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko often claimed in his three decades in power that Belarus has no political prisoners, but activists say it currently holds about 1,300 of them. Many endure harsh conditions like Bialiatski, 62, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2022 for his human rights activism and is believed to be in worsening health.

An overnight onslaught on Russian missile strike on 19 January damaged Ukraine’s oldest McDonald’s in capital’s Shevchenkivskyi district.

McDonald’s confirmed the damage to the outlet opened in 1997.

“Today, during an aerial attack on Kyiv, a McDonald’s restaurant near the Lukianivska metro station was damaged. Our staff were able to evacuate to a shelter in time thanks to our safety protocols.”

The restaurant has been closed but the company has pledged to reopen it after repairing the damages.

The UK sending peacekeeping troops to Ukraine is “highly risky”, a former security adviser to Gordon Brown has warned, arguing the “grotesquely underfunded” armed forces do not have the resources to do so.

But a number of senior military figures have expressed concerns at the plan. Among them is Lord West of Spithead, retired admiral of the Royal Navy and Mr Brown’s former advisor.

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President-elect Donald Trump is considering a visit to China early in his presidency, possibly within his first 100 days, according to sources cited by The Wall Street Journal.

Mr Trump’s inauguration is Monday, and Chinese state news agencies said on Friday that Chinese Vice president Han Zheng will attend as Beijing stands ready to strengthen cooperation.

The proposed trip would aim to ease tensions with Beijing, heightened by Mr Trump’s campaign promises to impose significant tariffs on Chinese goods.

Although Mr Trump’s transition team has not issued a statement, advisors have also explored the idea of inviting Chinese president Xi Jinping to the United States to initiate discussions on key issues.

A meeting between Mr Trump and Mr Xi could prove critical as both nations face complex economic and geopolitical challenges, including trade disputes, Taiwan, and the ongoing war in Ukraine.

On January 17, Mr Trump and Mr Xi had their first phone conversation since the November election.

They discussed topics such as trade, the fentanyl crisis, and concerns surrounding TikTok. Expressing optimism, Mr Trump later stated on social media that he anticipates the two countries will “work together to address many pressing issues without delay.”

When outgoing president Joe Biden was asked if he or Donald Trump deserved credit for the Gaza ceasefire deal struck in Qatar he shot back: “Is that a joke?” It wasn’t. Trump’s claim of having secured the “EPIC” deal was comic, but his contribution was real.

Biden’s team worked in tandem with Trump’s incoming administration – and his Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff – to deliver the agreement which had taken many months to thrash out.

It was no accident that it was struck in the dying days of the Biden years, less than a week before Trump was due to move back into the White House. Israel’s prime minister knew that involving Trump would set him up to warm relations with the 47th president.

Read the full article here:

Russian forces unleashed a combined drone and missile strike on the Ukrainian capital Kyiv early on Saturday, killing three people, while two other attacks in the country’s south killed three more, officials said.

In Kyiv, explosions boomed across the pre-dawn sky as air defences activated against the attack, which also wounded three others, according to city military administration chief Timur Tkachenko.

A shopping mall, business centre, metro station and water pipe were damaged in the assault, he said.

“Russian forces initially launched drones and then a ballistic-missile strike,” parliamentary ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets wrote on social media. “These acts merely underscore the enemy’s ruthlessness and barbarity.”

Rescue workers plodded through a flooded street as they sifted through debris. The charred remains of a van were visible in front of the station, whose facade was marked by twisted metal and blown-out windows.

As daylight broke, they could be seen examining missile fragments and loading a body bag into a truck.

Another Russian missile attack killed one person and wounded 11 in the southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia, regional governor Ivan Fedorov said.

The governor of the adjacent southern region of Kherson, Oleksandr Prokudin, said Russian shelling killed two people in a town north of the regional centre, also called Kherson.

Russian forces took control of two more settlements in eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk region, Russia’s Defence Ministry said on Saturday, the latest in a series of gains it has reported in its steady advance westward.

The ministry statement said Russian forces were now in control of Petropavlivka, a village between the towns of Pokrovsk and Kurakhove, focal points in fighting in recent months in the area.

It also noted the capture of Vremivka, one of a cluster of small towns further south in the Donetsk region.

The ministry also said Russian forces hit Ukraine‘s military facilities with high-precision weapons in response to a Ukrainian attack on Russia’s southern Belgorod region with US-made ATACMS missiles.

Ukrainian military statements made no mention of either of the two villages changing hands, but referred to heavy fighting near the key city of Pokrovsk.

Ukraine‘s popular Deep State blog, which documents changes in the positions held by both sides using open source materials, placed both Petropavlivka and Vremivka in Russian hands.

The spokesperson for the Ukrainian military’s Khortytsya, or eastern, group of forces dismissed for the second day running any notion that Russian forces had entered Pokrovsk.

“There have been no developments in Pokrovsk, things are stable,” Viktor Trehubov told national television. “The enemy is not there.”

It now holds about 20 per cent of Ukraine’s territory.

The Ukrainian military’s General Staff, in a late night report, said Russian forces trying to pierce Ukrainian defences had launched 84 attacks in the Pokrovsk sector. Fourteen battles were still raging in the area.

The Russian Foreign Ministry said on Saturday Ukraine and Britain “had no room” for cooperation in the Sea of Azov, commenting on a new 100-year partnership agreement between Kyiv and London the two countries’ leaders announced on Thursday.

The Kremlin said on Friday that any placement of British military assets in Ukraine under the new agreement would be of concern to Moscow, in particular in the Sea of Azov, which Russia considers its own, and the ministry echoed those remarks.

“Any claims to this water area are a gross interference in the internal affairs of our country and will be firmly resisted,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said in a comment posted on the ministry’s website.

The Azov Sea is bordered by southwest Russia, parts of southern Ukraine that Russia has seized in the war, and the Crimean peninsula that Moscow annexed from Ukraine in 2014.

Ms Zakharova said the agreement itself was “worthless” for Russia, calling it “just another PR campaign” of Ukraine. Ms Zakharova described the Sea of Azov as Russia’s “internal sea”.

British prime minister, Keir Starmer pledged on Thursday to work with Ukraine and allies on robust security guarantees if a ceasefire is negotiated with Russia, offering more support to President Volodymyr Zelensky with a 100-year partnership deal.

The agreement, announced in Kyiv during Starmer’s first visit as prime minister, covered several areas, including boosting military cooperation to strengthen security in the Baltic Sea, Black Sea and Sea of Azov.