A probe has uncovered a Russian plan to use decoy drones to cover for a deadly new weapon in Ukraine. Meanwhile, Vladimir Putin and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz have spoken directly for the first time since 2022 – a move that has prompted anger from Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Saturday 16 November 2024 11:54, UK
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G7 leaders have vowed to continue punishing Russia with sanctions, saying it “remains the sole obstacle” to peace.
In a joint statement published today, leaders reiterated that the bloc would continue to support Ukraine for as long as it takes.
“Russia remains the sole obstacle to just and lasting peace,” the statement read.
“The G7 confirms its commitment to imposing severe costs on Russia through sanctions, export controls and other effective measures. We stand united with Ukraine.”
The latest statement has been adopted in support of Kyiv as the war approaches its 1,000th day.
Vladimir Putin will not enter any peace negotiations until he has “kicked out every last Ukrainian soldier from Kursk”, a Russian journalist has said.
Ukraine has occupied a swathe of Russian territory in the border region since it launched a surprise invasion in August.
It’s thought Moscow’s forces have retaken around a third of the territory initially lost to Kyiv – but Ukraine still maintains a foothold there.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy said last week that Ukrainian troops were engaged against nearly 50,000 troops in Kursk. US officials said thousands of North Korean soldiers were involved in combat operations with Russian forces.
NATO allies reportedly believe Putin is trying to recapture all territory lost to Ukraine before Donald Trump takes office in January, and ahead of any possible peace negotiations.
“It is clear that Moscow will not start any negotiations until they have kicked out every last Ukrainian soldier from Kursk,” Konstantin Remchukov, editor-in-chief of Russian newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta, told The Washington Post.
He added that Putin does not want Kursk to be used as a means of bargaining with the Ukrainian side.
The Russian president’s insistence that a deal should reflect “realities on the ground” points to his hopes that Kursk will be recaptured, Mr Remchukov told the paper.
WP also reports that Russian military blogger and propagandist Mikhail Zvinchuk expects Kursk to be retaken in the coming weeks or months.
“I believe that in any case the Kursk issue will be resolved before Trump’s inauguration,” he said.
We reported earlier that Russia was expected this morning to cut off its natural gas supply to Austria – one of only three European countries that still relies on Russian gas.
Austria’s energy regulator confirmed deliveries of Gazprom to oil and gas company OMV had stopped as of 6am local time (5am UK time).
However it said prices and supplies to customers were stable.
The cut-off follows OMV’s announcement that it would stop paying for Gazprom gas to its Austrian arm to offset a €230m (£192m) arbitration award it won over an earlier cut-off of gas to its German subsidiary.
Austrian chancellor Karl Nehammer said the decision by Gazprom had been long expected since the start of the war and the country had been “preparing for this situation”.
Moscow will now only supply significant gas volumes to Hungary and Slovakia in Europe.
Russia is making hundreds of decoy drones it plans to use as cover for a deadly new weapon in Ukraine, according to an investigation.
The AP news agency reports that a factory in Russia’s special economic zone of Alabuga has been manufacturing thermobaric drones along with the decoys.
Thermobaric drones create high-pressure, high-heat explosions which can penetrate walls and inflict serious injuries such as collapsed lungs, brain damage and crushed eyeballs.
A source told AP that Moscow first came up with the “Operation False Target” decoy plan in late 2022, which proposed firing a barrage of armed drones alongside a host of decoys which cannot be identified from those carrying real bombs.
An insider said: “The idea was to make a drone which would create a feeling of complete uncertainty for the enemy. So he doesn’t know whether it’s really a deadly weapon… or essentially a foam toy.”
The potential damage from a thermobaric drone in a residential area would be “terrifying”, they said.
According to Ukrainian electronic expert Serhii Beskrestnov, more than half the drones targeting Ukraine are now decoys.
Russian forces have captured two more villages in eastern Ukraine, Russia’s defence ministry has said, according to state news agencies.
The ministry said troops have taken Makarivka and Hryhorivka in Ukraine’s Donetsk region.
Kyiv has not responded to the claim.
Ukraine is struggling to hold back a months-long onslaught by Russian forces in Donetsk, where the key cities of Pokrovsk and Kurakhove remain firmly in Moscow’s sights.
Russia has been closing in on Pokrovsk, a strategic road and rail hub that has a coal mine. Russian troops are also trying to break through Ukrainian defences around Kurakhove, an industrial town home to a major coal-powered thermal power plant.
By Nicole Johnston, Asia correspondent
Outgoing US President Joe Biden is set to meet his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping today for what is likely to be his last time as US president.
The two leaders are expected to hold talks on the sidelines of a meeting of Asia-Pacific leaders in the Peruvian capital, Lima.
It comes against the backdrop of increasing tension in the US-China relationship with a potential trade war looming under a Trump presidency, several China hawks tapped for US cabinet positions and China’s growing status among global south countries as an emerging leader of an alternative world order.
This week China was focused on events in the southern city of Zhuhai.
Less than an hour’s drive from a deadly car ramming attack at Zhuhai’s sports stadium, the country was holding its premier air show.
It was a military enthusiast’s dream. The air show included massive exhibition halls of military hardware, from drones to robotics, firearms and mock missiles. Merely getting from one end of the venue to the other through densely packed crowds was a mission.
One of the crowd pullers was Russia’s aerobatic air force unit, performing daily theatrics at dizzying speeds.
It is another sign of the deepening ties between China and Russia.
Read the full piece here…
Former UK prime minister Boris Johnson says yesterday’s phone call between the German and Russian leaders means “we risk drifting back” to a diplomatic set up which saw Ukraine and Russia given equal weight in war resolution talks.
As we’ve been reporting, Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the call between Olaf Scholz and Vladimir Putin opened “Pandora’s box” and gave Putin what he has “long sought”.
In a post to X, Johnson, who previously boasted a good relationship with Zelenskyy, said the Ukrainian leader was “completely right”.
“We risk drifting back to the ghastly Franco German Normandy format which treated Russia and Ukraine as equally valid interlocutors in a domestic squabble,” he said in a post to X.
“That is a shameful betrayal of the reality – that Putin has launched a criminal and unjustifiable invasion while Ukraine is an entirely innocent party.”
For context: The Normandy Format is an informal set up involving France, Germany, Russia, and Ukraine.
It was created in June 2014 with the aim of finding a peaceful resolution to the separatist conflict in eastern Ukraine, started by Russia.
The group achieved early success with the Minsk agreement which paved the way for an end to the conflict. However, it ultimately failed to stop the fighting, with both Ukraine and Russia repeatedly accusing each other of violating the agreement. Despite further meetings, there has been no breakthrough as a result of the Normandy Format.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy says Ukraine must do what it can to ensure the conflict ends next year through diplomacy.
In a radio interview aired today, the Ukrainian president acknowledged a “difficult” battlefield situation in the east, where Russia is making advances and has claimed the capture of several towns and villages.
However, he said Vladimir Putin was not interested in agreeing a peace deal.
According to a report by news outlet Ukrainska Pravda, Zelenskyy said a “strong Ukraine” was his main condition – either in diplomacy or on the battlefield.
“If we are talking with Putin, and we are not strengthened in the conditions we are in now, this is a losing status for Ukraine at the entrance,” he was reported as saying.
Zelenskyy to meet Trump next year
During the interview, Zelenskyy also said US legislation prevented him from meeting Donald Trump until after his inauguration in January.
He insisted he would only talk with the president-elect himself, and not any adviser.
“I, as the president of Ukraine, will only take seriously a conversation with the president of the United States of America, with all due respect to any entourage, to any people,” he said.
Russia is “intensifying” a campaign aimed at “influencing Western decision-making in Russia’s favour”, military analysts have said.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Vladimir Putin spoke via phone call yesterday – the first between the pair since December 2022.
Volodymyr Zelenskyy criticised the call, saying it opened “Pandora’s box” and undermined efforts to isolate the Russian leader.
During the call, Putin “reiterated several Kremlin information operations aimed at influencing the German government and other Western states to pressure Ukraine into premature peace negotiations instead of providing Ukraine with further military support”, the Institute for the Study of War said in its latest briefing.
According to the Washington-based think tank, Putin and other senior officials in Moscow have “intensified rhetoric aimed at influencing the foreign policy of the incoming US government under president-elect Donald Trump”.
The Kremlin has also underlined its demand that any peace deal should acknowledge Russia’s territorial gains in Ukraine.
“The Kremlin likely aims to take advantage of uncertainty about the future US policy regarding Ukraine by intensifying its reflexive control campaign against Ukraine’s European allies,” the ISW said.
Japan’s foreign minister has arrived in Ukraine on an unannounced visit, the Kyodo news agency is reporting.
Takeshi Iwaya has stopped in Kyiv for talks with officials and to underscore Japan’s support for Ukraine in its fight against Russia, the agency said.
Iwaya is reportedly set to meet Ukrainian foreign minister Andrii Sybiha, with talks with Volodymyr Zelenskyy “possible” later in the day.
A Japanese foreign minister has not visited Ukraine since Yoko Kamikawa in January.
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