Ukraine Breaking News Today Live on 12-22-2024

Three attacks in Moscow and another in St. Petersburg on Saturday were aimed at shopping malls, post offices and a bank, causing panic and some damage.

A series of firework attacks in Moscow on Saturday afternoon and evening were carried out, according to Russian mainstream and social media, by people who had lost money to “Ukrainian scammers” who said they would get their money back if they did what they were told.

At around midday, Russian Telegram channels reported that the Fort shopping center in northeast Moscow was evacuated after gunfire was heard. It turned out, according to the press service of the Russian capital’s Interior Ministry, that firecrackers had been set off by a woman pensioner who was detained at the scene.

Contract with buyers, take the profits and leave Russia with only subsistence.

Ukraine should leave open the option to transport Russian oil and gas through Ukraine. But the Ukrainian Gas Transmission System (GTS) and Ukrtransnafta should contract with the buyers rather than with Russian companies or the government. They should create a variable rate formula with a minimum rate plus an additional variable fee indexed to the European spot markets. The purpose of the formula is to set the value of the transit fee at least 10 times the profit for the Russian supplier. Preferably, it will take all the profits.

It may be possible to get Russian companies to continue gas and oil transit that covers their operating costs but provides little or no profit. It may be valuable enough to avoid the cost of shutting down and restarting many of Russia’s old wells or losing their skilled workers to accept a breakeven price or even modest losses. They may hope that the war will end soon enough that this will be less expensive.

The world in focus, as seen by a Canadian leading global affairs analyst, writer and speaker, in his review of international media.

Sweden will no longer fund the U.N. refugee agency for Palestinians (UNRWA) and will instead provide increased overall humanitarian assistance to Gaza via other channels, the Nordic country said. Israel, which says it will ban UNRWA operations in the country from late January, accuses the agency of being involved in the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attacks on Israel that triggered the 14-month-old war in Gaza. Sweden’s decision was in response to the Israeli ban, as it will make channelling aid via the agency more difficult, the country’s aid minister, Benjamin Dousa, said.“Large parts of UNRWA’s operations in Gaza are either going to be severely weakened or completely impossible,” Dousa told Reuters. “For the government, the most important thing is that support gets through.” Dousa said Sweden “in no way” supported Israel’s law and had repeatedly expressed its criticism. “Israel must do much more to ensure humanitarian access to Gaza,” he said - Reuters

Winter is hitting the Gaza Strip and many of the nearly 2 million Palestinians displaced by the devastating 14-month war with Israel are struggling to protect themselves from the wind, cold and rain. There is a shortage of blankets and warm clothing, little wood for fires, and the tents and patched-together tarps families are living in have grown increasingly threadbare after months of heavy use, according to aid workers and residents. The United Nations warns of people living in precarious makeshift shelters that might not survive the winter. At least 945,000 people need winterization supplies, which have become prohibitively expensive in Gaza, the U.N. said in an update Tuesday. The U.N. also fears infectious disease, which spiked last winter, will climb again amid rising malnutrition - AP

Getting Russian car insurance requires a Russian passport and is seen by resistance groups as a move to coerce locals into obtaining Russian citizenship.

Moscow is pressuring locals to obtain a Russian passport by requiring car owners to purchase Russian car liability insurance, Ukraine’s Center of National Resistance said. 

In its Saturday update, the center said getting the mandatory motor third-party liability insurance, known as OSAGO in Russia, could only be done with a Russian passport, and failure to do so in occupied territories could result in rights restrictions or potential confiscation of vehicles. 

In the face of evidence that Russia used social media platforms in attempt to influence the 2024 presidential election Congress and the US public must now address Moscow’s disinformation campaigns.

In the first article in this series, I examined how Russia used social media in its attempts to meddle with the 2024 US presidential election. Moscow used fake videos attributed to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Department of Justice (DOJ) on platforms such as X and TikTok which no doubt influenced how many Americans perceived the political climate ahead of the Nov. 5 election.

It is essential that Congress and US government agencies implement policies and strategies to undermine Russian election meddling in the future.

Zelensky said he had met Burns on multiple occasions throughout the war, but their meetings had been undisclosed.

President Volodymyr Zelensky said Saturday he had met the US CIA director William Burns in Ukraine, a rare public disclosure of a meeting between the pair amid Russia’s invasion.

The United States has been Ukraine’s most important financial and military backer in the almost three years since Moscow invaded, and Washington is also reported to have routinely shared military intelligence with Ukraine to support its defense.

By beating Fury in May, “The Cat” had already joined the likes of Muhammad Ali, Joe Louis and Mike Tyson as undisputed heavyweight, and the first of the four-belt era.

Oleksandr Usyk won his heavyweight championship rematch against Tyson Fury by unanimous decision overnight on Saturday to stay unbeaten across two divisions and cement his place among the greats.

The Ukrainian, who forced the pace and repeatedly tagged Fury with his accurate left hook, was awarded the fight 116-112 by all three judges, handing Fury his second straight loss.