Ukraine-Russia war – live: Putin suffering losses on front line as ‘11,000’ troops killed

Nearly 200 Nepalese nationals are serving as mercenaries in the Russian army – but it’s not only a phenomenon benefitting the Kremlin’s military recruitment, as Namita Singh explains

Read Namita’s full piece here:

Russia faces the prospect of Vladimir Putin extending his two-decade stranglehold on power until at least 2030, with an announcement that he will run for president again in March 2024.

The 71-year-old Russian autocrat has been in power since 1999, bar a four-year stint as prime minister under Dmitry Medvedev, during which he was widely regarded to still be at the helm of the Kremlin. Given Putin’s domination of the Russian political and media landscape – and jailing opposition figures like Alexei Navalny who could challenge him on the ballot – there is little doubt about the result when the elections take place next year.

“Vasily Kukharsky passed away. He never made it back to life,” announced Kyiv-based Theater on Podil in a statement on Facebook.

Finland will not extradite to Ukraine a Russian man suspected of terrorism in Ukraine, Finland’s supreme court ruled on Friday, citing the risk of inhuman prison conditions in Ukraine.

Russian national Yan Petrovsky was taken into custody by Finnish authorities in August after a Ukrainian court issued an arrest warrant for the man who is suspected of participating in a terrorist organisation in Ukraine, Finnish court documents seen by Reuters showed.

Social media channels linked to Russia’s Wagner Group mercenaries said in August that Petrovsky was a top fighter in Rusich, a far-right subunit affiliated to Wagner.

Rusich identified Petrovsky as a founding member and leader of the unit who has been under European Union and United States sanctions since last year.

In Finland, Petrovsky has used the name Voislav Torden, court documents showed.

“The Supreme Court has stated in its opinion today that the extradition request regarding Torden cannot be agreed to,” the court said in its decision.

Vladimir Putin has moved to prolong his repressive and unyielding grip on Russia for another six years, state media said, announcing his candidacy in the 2024 presidential election that he is all but certain to win.

Mr Putin still commands wide support after nearly a quarter-century in power, despite starting an immensely costly war in Ukraine that has taken thousands of his countrymen’s lives, provoked repeated attacks inside Russia – including one on the Kremlin itself – and corroded its aura of invincibility.

A short-lived rebellion in June by mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin raised speculation that Mr Putin could be losing his grip or that it would mar his strongman image.

But he has emerged with no permanent scars, and Mr Prigozhin’s death in a mysterious plane crash two months later reinforced the view that Mr Putin was in absolute control.

Mr Putin announced his decision to run in the March 17 presidential election after a Kremlin award ceremony, when war veterans and others pleaded with him to seek re-election.

“I won’t hide it from you – I had various thoughts about it over time, but now, you’re right, it’s necessary to make a decision,” Mr Putin said in a video released by the Kremlin after the event.

“I will run for president of the Russian Federation.”

The Ukrainian parliament on Friday approved three bills necessary to start European Union accession talks, including one on national minorities’ rights, a critical demand from Hungary which opposes Ukraine’s EU bid, officials said.

Lawmaker Yaroslav Zhelezniak said on Telegram messenger that members of parliament voted in the final reading for the bill regarding minorities’ rights, taking into consideration the expert assessment of the European Council.

Budapest has clashed with Kyiv over what it says are curbs on the rights ethnic Hungarians in west Ukraine, in particular regarding education.

The other two bills adopted concern staff increases in the National Anti-Corruption Bureau and additional power for the National Agency on Corruption Prevention on assets checks.

“Just now Ukrainian parliament passed three out of four laws by constitutional majority identified by the European Commission as leftovers in the EU Enlargement report,” Deputy prime minister Olha Stefanishyna said on X.

She added that a fourth requirement – a law on lobbying – was approved by the cabinet on Tuesday.

From trade to human rights, the leaders of China and the European Union differed on a wide range of issues at a summit this week in the Chinese capital.

China, which sees Europe as an important export market, raised concerns about trade protectionism and “de-risking,” the EU initiative to reduce its reliance on any one country — such as China — for vital raw materials and products.

In a snow-covered field in western Poland, Ukrainian soldiers are being trained in trench warfare, just days before being sent to the front in what has become a grinding war of attrition against Russia.

Media organisations were invited this week to watch the training, which was conducted by soldiers from Poland, France and Belgium, in Wedrzyn, around 40 kilometres from the German border.

“Most of the people have actually no military experience and they are taught how to execute some basic tactics,” said one Ukrainian soldier. “We are taught how to use weapons in urban areas and in trenches.”

The training was conducted by the Combined Arms Training Command, which was established as part of the European Union’s efforts to aid Ukraine’s military. Exercises have been held in 24 out of the bloc’s 27 member states.

“We will keep adapting because the situation on the battlefield is changing every day,” said Lieutenant General Michiel van der Laan, Director General European Union Military Staff.

Russian warplanes fired 19 long-range missiles at targets in Ukraine on Friday morning, killing one civilian in a central region, wounding four more and damaging an industrial facility, Kyiv officials said. The strike was the first big salvo of missiles Russia has fired at targets, including the Ukrainian capital, in weeks. Russia has mainly been using drones for its overnight attacks in recent weeks.

“Unfortunately, one person is dead. Preliminarily, four people are wounded. They are all in hospital. Two people are in severe condition,” Dnipropetrovsk’s regional governor Serhiy Lysak said on the Telegram messaging app. Air defences shot down 14 incoming missiles over the region outside Kyiv and the central region of Dnipropetrovsk, air force spokesman Yuriy Ihnat said in televised comments.

The strike damaged an unnamed industrial facility and more than a dozen homes in the towns of Pavlohrad and Ternivka and the village of Yuryivska, Lysak said.

Russia used seven Tu-95 bombers to launch missiles at different regions across the country, the air force said in a statement. Serhiy Popko, head of Kyiv’s military administration, said the Ukrainian capital had been targeted in the attack but that all the missiles were downed by air defences as they approached. Missile debris damaged privately-held homes in several settlements in Kyiv region, smashing windows and destroying some walls, governor Ruslan Kravchenko said.

Air alerts were announced at about 0700 a.m. (0500 GMT) and lasted for over 2 hours. Officials reported an earlier overnight missile attack that struck the northeastern Kharkiv region.Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko said rescuers and police were clearing rubble after the attack damaged a five-story residential building, at least seven residential homes and 20 cars.

Celebrities such as Lord of the Rings actor Elijah Wood were paid to record a message on Cameo for someone named “Vladimir”, asking them to find help for alcohol and substance abuse.

Alisha Rahaman Sarkar reports: