As fighting intensifies, cross-Channel shipping is attacked by Russian submarines, and long-range conventional missiles strike Dover and Southampton. We won't know for some time how badly Ukraine's landscape, nature and climate action will be impacted by the war. Many experts say it is too soon to tell how Russia's invasion will affect its participation in climate diplomacy and international action, such as at the next yearly United Nations climate talks, COP27, in Egypt in November.
- The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office has since advised all UK citizens to leave the country, but it is not known how many remain and the FCDO has declined to comment on numbers.
- Russian air defences have prevented a drone attack on an oil refinery in the city of Yaroslavl, northeast of Moscow, the regional governor has said.
- Madame Chair, as we approach the third year since Russia’s full-scale invasion, the UK’s support will not falter.
- Opposition leaders including Labour’s Sir Keir Starmer criticised the initial package of sanctions for being too soft.
- "The nightmare scenario would be that the states close to Russia double down on aid to Ukraine while those farther west decide to force a deal on Putin's terms. Then Europe itself could fracture," he says.
This is because Nato uses a system of collective security, whereby its independent member states agree to mutual defence in response to an attack by any external party. Ukraine has said its goal for the talks is an immediate ceasefire and the withdrawal of Russian forces from the country. If war broke out in Ukraine and Russian forces occupied large swathes of the country, many civilians might flee. Nato powers are already promising to build up their own forces in the alliance's eastern flank. Oil prices have also risen since the invasion, given Russia’s role as an oil producer and as a form of security for investors as the stock market slumps.
Boris Johnson Accuses Russia Of 'False Flag' Operation In Ukraine
They said Moscow did not ask for any specific stretch of airspace to be kept safe for a certain length of time, as it has for past prisoner exchanges. “We currently don’t have evidence that there could have been that many people onboard the aircraft,” Budanov said. In a pre-dawn TV statement on Thursday, President Putin said Russia did not plan to occupy Ukraine, but demanded its soldiers lay down their weapons, before warning that Moscow's response would be "instant" if anyone tried to take on Russia. " https://euronewstop.co.uk/what-did-liz-truss-have-to-say-about-ukraine.html is a grave moment for the security of Europe. Russia's unprovoked and unjustified attack on Ukraine is putting countless lives at risk," he said. Foreign Secretary Liz Truss summoned Russia's ambassador to the UK, Andrei Kelin, for the second time this week to ask him to explain the "illegal, unprovoked invasion of Ukraine".
Only aircraft deployed to protect energy facilities, or those carrying top Russian or foreign officials, will be allowed to fly with special permission in the designated zones, according to the Vedomosti daily newspaper. A spate of Ukraine-linked attacks on Russia's oil infrastructure have reportedly led Moscow's energy ministry to propose restricting flights over energy facilities. Hungary has signalled it is ready to compromise on EU funding for Ukraine - after Brussels reportedly prepared to sabotage its economy if it did not comply. Meanwhile, Moscow has claimed its forces have taken control of the village of Tabaivka in Ukraine's northeastern Kharkiv region. This week, Ms Truss told MPs that a special oligarch taskforce - composed of ministers and officials from across government - will be formed to build cases against targets. For years, since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the belief was that Western armed forces would only ever have to take part in what was known as 'expeditionary' wars.
Biden to host German chancellor to discuss Ukraine aid
General Sir Patrick Sanders warned that an increase in reserve forces alone "would not be enough". Unfortunately, the attacks on Tuesday morning were just the latest of a series of acts of wanton destruction by Russia in Ukraine since we last gathered for a Permanent Council in December. Over the Christmas period, Russia launched hundreds of missile and drone strikes across cities in Ukraine including Kyiv, Odesa, Kharkiv, Dnipro and Lviv. This culminated on 29 December, when Russian unleashed its largest aerial assault against Ukraine since the war began. It killed at least 41 civilians, including a 15-year-old boy, wounded hundreds, and caused significant damage to civilian infrastructure, including a maternity hospital. All three armed forces are experiencing a recruitment and retention crisis, with the number of fully trained soldiers in the Army set to fall to 72,500.
- Mr Putin also urged Ukrainian soldiers in the combat zone in the east of the country to lay down their weapons and return to their homes, warning that Moscow's response would be "instant" if anyone tried to take on Russia.
- Other senior Nato military commanders have also recently been calling on the alliance to ready itself for a potential conflict.
- The memorandum is not a treaty and lawyers dispute whether it is legally enforceable.
- “If you are talking about mass mobilisation to defend the homeland, that is hundreds of thousands of people,” he said.
During his visit to Kyiv earlier this month, my Prime Minister announced a package of support and reaffirmed the close UK-Ukraine partnership. This included £2.5 billion in military support and a historic long-term security agreement. This brings the United Kingdom’s total package of support to Ukraine to approximately £12 billion.
Biden pressing Congress on Ukraine aid
Social media users in the Belgorod region posted videos that showed a plane falling from the sky in a snowy, rural area and a huge ball of fire erupting where it allegedly hit the ground. The US is planning to station nuclear weapons in the UK for the first time in 15 years amid a growing threat from Russia, according to a report. Warheads three times as strong as the Hiroshima bomb would be located at RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk under the proposals, the Daily Telegraph reported. The prospect of further UK sanctions against Russia comes a day after the prime minister announced that five Russian banks had had their assets frozen and three Russian billionaires would have travel bans imposed.
- In the Ukraine invasion, Russia initially tried to use blitzkrieg tactics, learned from the Germans in WW2, by attempting to sweep down from the border with Belarus and take Kyiv within days, as Hitler had done in Poland in the late 1930s.
- He has not been the only one to criticise cuts, with former CGS General Lord Dannatt saying the UK risked a repeat of the 1930s unless it invested more in its armed forces last week.
- Nato has a strong partnership with Ukraine (even though the country is not an official member) so it’s not surprising prime minister Boris Johnson has also joined in with Western allies in calling for an immediate de-escalation from Putin.
- Mr Putin has accused the West of ignoring Russia's demands to prevent Ukraine from joining the western Nato military alliance and offer Moscow security guarantees.
- Analysis by BBC Reality Check showed 15 individuals were sanctioned last week, including Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Belarusian defence chiefs and President Putin himself.
A little earlier, we told you about a report in the Financial Times that the EU was proposing to sabotage Hungary's economy if Budapest blocks further aid for Ukraine this week. Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said he supported action the government was taking on sanctions but urged ministers to "go further and faster". The amendments added requirements on ministers to explain why sanctions were "a reasonable course of action" and provide "good reasons" to those subject to them, unless there were national security exemptions. He said new UK sanctions against Russia would be announced "in waves" and warned it would be "the largest and most severe economic sanctions" package Russia had ever seen. It comes after President Putin announced a "special military operation" in Ukraine's Donbas region in a televised address to the Russian people earlier and said the Ukrainian people would be able "to choose freely" who ran the country. But as Ukraine is not a Nato member state, “the alliance will not provide military support in the form of troops”, Oliver Wright said in The Times.
