Ukraine news – live: Heavy snowfall to blanket Kyiv with millions cut off from power – live

Russia is unlikely to be able to concentrate sufficient high-quality forces to achieve an operational breakthrough in Ukraine’s Donetsk, where heavy fighting has taken place in the last two weeks, the UK’s ministry of defence said today.

“The area around the towns of Pavlivka and Vuhledar in south-central Donetsk Oblast has been the scene of intense combat over the last two weeks, though little territory has changed hands,” the MoD said in its latest intelligence update.

It added that both Russia and Ukraine have significant forces committed to this sector, with Russian Naval Infantry having suffered heavy casualties.

“This area remains heavily contested, likely partially because Russia assesses the area has potential as a launch point for a future major advance north to capture the remainder of Ukrainian-held Donetsk Oblast,” the MoD speculated.

A spokesperson for Russia’s foreign ministry has said they are “shocked” by the sudden death of Belarusian foreign minister Vladimir Makei at the age of 64.

“We are shocked by the reports of the death of the Head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Belarus Vladimir Makei,” Maria Zakharova wrote on Telegram, adding: “Official condolences will be published soon.”

No official explanation in Belarus has yet been given for his death.

Earlier this week, Mr Makei had attended a conference of the Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO) in Yerevan, and was due to meet his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov on Monday.

Ukrainian forces have repelled Russian advances in at least five settlements in the eastern territory where a majority of Moscow’s war is concentrated, the general staff of Ukraine’s armed forces said today.

In the last 24 hours, the Ukrainian soldiers countered Russian attacks near Stelmakhivka in Luhansk oblast and Bilohorivka, Marinka, Verkhnokamianske, and Spirne in Donetsk oblast, the Ukrainian general staff said.

They added that Ukraine managed to inflict damage on two command centres, 11 concentrations of Russian military equipment and personnel, and “one other strategic site” of the Russian military over the same period.

The Ukrainian defence ministry has claimed that a total of 86,710 Russian soldiers have died in the course of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

The war, which has continued for 276 day now, has seen heavy Russian losses, the defence ministry said in its update yesterday.

Russian losses include 278 aircraft, 261 helicopters, more than 2,900 tanks and 5,848 armoured combat vehicles.

The Kremlin has not confirmed its losses in the Ukraine invasion, which Vladimir Putin calls a “special military operation”.

Aside from the impact caused by the speed of the missiles and the combustion of any unspent fuel, such weapons are unlikely to achieve reliable effects against Moscow’s intended targets, the Ministry of Defence said in an intelligence update.

The Kremlin is almost certainly hoping that such missiles “will function as decoys and divert Ukrainian air defences”, London believes.

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Volodymyr Zelensky’s office has announced that the Ukrainians who defended Mariupol and the Snake Island outpost now heavily imbued with the symbolism of Kyiv’s resistance against Moscow’s forces are among those freed in the latest prisoner swap.

“Another exchange of prisoners. We managed to free 12 of our people. The soldiers who defended, in particular, Mariupol, the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant and the Snake Island are going home,” said Andriy Yermak.

“Over the last week, we managed to return 98 Ukrainians. We are working on the release of all our people. Thank you for the work of the Coordinating Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War.”

Russia’s “special military operation” has now been raging for more than nine months in Ukraine, the conflict continuing to record devastating casualties and force the mass displacement of millions of Ukrainians.

Vladimir Putin began the war by claiming Ukraine needed to be “demilitarised and de-Nazified”, an entirely baseless pretext on which to launch a landgrab against a sovereign neighbour state that happens to have a Jewish president.

Ukraine has fought back courageously ever since and continued to defy the odds by defending itself against Russian onslaughts with the help of Western military aid.

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Volodymyr Zelensky accused Russia of carrying out a genocide against Ukraine as the invasion entered its 10th month.

The Ukrainian president was commemorating the victims of the Holodomor genocide perpetrated in Soviet Ukraine from 1932-1933 under Joseph Stalin’s regime.

“Ukrainians went through genocide. And today we are doing everything possible and impossible to stop Russia’s new genocidal policy. A new one – but similar to the one that killed millions of people in the 20th century,” Mr Zelensky said in his nightly address.

He added: “And we don’t just fight off aggression. Step by step, we are creating a system that will stop aggression, dismantle its consequences, and guarantee long-term security – the security of Ukraine, all of Europe, and the world.”

Family members held the last rites for a two-day old infant who was killed in a Russian attack on Zaporizhzhia this week.

The child was killed after artillery fire hit a maternity ward in the city of Vilniansk, Zaporizhzhia, in the early hours of Wednesday morning.

“At night, Russian monsters launched huge rockets at the small maternity ward of the hospital in Vilniansk,” regional governor Oleksandr Starukh had said.

“Grief fills our hearts,” he added. “A baby who has just appeared in the world has been killed.”

The Ukrainian defence ministry took to Twitter to share the photo of the newborn’s funeral.

“Serhiyko. The youngest victim of Russian terrorism. The baby lived for only two days. For each of our children, for each of our babies, our soldiers will fight their hardest on the battlefield. But no matter how strong our rage is, we will never become like you, Russians,” the ministry’s tweet read.

Ukrainian police officials said at least 32 people have been killed in Kherson due to Russian shelling in the last two weeks after pro-Moscow forces exited the city.

“Daily Russian shelling is destroying the city and killing peaceful local residents. In all, Russia has killed 32 civilians in the Kherson region since the de-occupation,” national police chief Ihor Klymenko said in a Facebook post yesterday.

He added that many people are evacuating the southern Ukrainian city to seek refuge in calmer regions of the country.

“But many residents remain in their homes, and we need to provide them with the maximum possible security,” he continued, saying police were once again on duty in the region.

Russian troops abandoned Kherson on 11 November, releasing the city back into Ukrainian hands as intelligence showed that the Kremlin deployed the remaining forces to the eastern part of the besieged country.

The Donetsk and Luhansk regions have witnessed fierce fighting between Russian and Ukrainian forces this month.

Russian forces are now positioned on the eastern bank of the Dnipro, from where they have been shelling the city regularly.