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Stay on top of Russia-Ukraine war 01-03-2025 developments on the ground with KyivPost fact-based news, exclusive video footage, photos and updated war maps.
Oil from two damaged Russian tankers, allegedly part of Russia’s ‘shadow fleet’ of sanction-busting ships, has spilled into the waters off Crimea, causing environmental damage to miles of coastline.
Oil from two damaged Russian tankers was detected Friday off the coast of Sevastopol, the largest city in Moscow-annexed Crimea, a local official said.
The Volgoneft-212 and the Volgoneft-239 were hit by a storm last month in the Kerch Strait linking Crimea to the southern Russian Krasnodar region, about 250 kilometers (155 miles) from Sevastopol.
Ambassador Gilmore explains the broader consequences of Russia’s actions and what’s at stake if the international community fails to push back against Putin’s expansionist ambitions.
Christmas is celebrated by the Russian church on Jan. 7, and caroling is banned in occupied parts of Ukraine for fear of Western influence
In a move straight out of “The Grinch,” children in Russian-occupied parts of Ukraine are prohibited from singing carols or mentioning “Santa Claus,” Ukrainian partisans from the National Resistance Center claim.
The partisans reported that the move is a measure to prevent the spread of Western culture.
Russian forces in Tartus are awaiting several of their ships, which are currently in the Mediterranean Sea, HUR says.
Russian units in Syria, presently stationed at the Port of Tartus, are awaiting ships to relocate them to Africa, the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine (HUR) stated.
“On Jan. 5, 2025, the Russian large landing ships Ivan Gren and Alexander Otrakovsky, along with the dry cargo ship Sparta, are scheduled to arrive at the Syrian port. They are currently en route to Tartus in the Mediterranean Sea. On board the Otrakovsky is the chief of staff of the 121st Brigade of Landing Ships of the Russian Navy, Captain 1st Rank Yuri Davityan. On Jan. 8, 2025, two additional Russian vessels are expected to dock in Tartus – the universal cargo ship Sparta II and the tanker Ivan Skobelev, which are now preparing to cross the Strait of Gibraltar,” HUR reports on Telegram.
Verkhovna Rada Commissioner for Human Rights, Dmytro Lubinets, summed up the results of 2024.
In 2024, Ukraine secured the return of 1,042 children from the occupied territories and Russia, the Verkhovna Rada Commissioner for Human Rights, Dmytro Lubinets, announced on Facebook.
“Numerous state bodies and public organizations were involved in helping with the restoration of documents and providing necessary assistance,” Lubinets wrote. “A happy reunion also took place between a mother, a prisoner of war Natalia, and her son Dmytro. They had not seen each other for more than two years. First, we brought the child back from [Temporarily Occupied Territories], and in May, just days after his birthday, the boy embraced his mother.”
Workers have been pumping sunflower oil out of one of Ukraine and Europe’s largest rivers for days.
As of the morning of Friday, Jan. 3, about 42 tons of sunflower oil were pumped out of the Southern Bug River, which became polluted with vegetable oil after a Dec. 28 Russian drone attack.
Debris from a downed Russian drone had struck an industrial vegetable oil tank in southern Ukraine, spilling dozens of tons of sunflower oil into one of the country’s largest rivers – the Southern Bug.
A selection of recent posts on the X (former Twitter) site of the Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya @Tsihanouskaya, President-elect of Belarus.
Lukashenka has announced the date of his ‘reelection’ — January 26. It’s a sham with no real electoral process, conducted in an atmosphere of terror. No alternative candidates or observers will be allowed. We call on Belarusians and the international community to reject this farce.
Ukraine has received $106 billion in aid under the Ramstein format
The first meeting in this format took place on April 26, 2022, at the Ramstein Air Force Base.
“Representatives of 43 countries, including 13 non-NATO countries, attended the Summit on Ukraine’s Long-Term Security. Most of them were represented by defense ministers or senior defense policy officials and included NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. Among the non-NATO countries, key Pacific partners of the US were invited: Japan, South Korea, Australia, and New Zealand; representatives of the Middle East – Israel, Qatar, and Jordan; the quartet from Africa – Kenya, Liberia, Morocco, and Tunisia, as well as Finland and Sweden (at that time these countries were not yet full members of NATO); and, of course, Ukraine itself.”
The last meeting of the group was in Germany on Sept. 6
The next meeting of the Contact Group on Defense of Ukraine (Ramstein format), an alliance of 57 countries supporting Ukraine’s defense, will be held on Jan. 9, Radio Liberty reported on Friday.
The relevant information was also confirmed on Suspilne. The meeting will be held at the Ramstein Airbase in Germany. It will be hosted by US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin.
Yoon Suk Yeol, who has already been suspended from duty by lawmakers, would become the first sitting president in South Korean history to be arrested if the warrant is executed.
South Korean investigators abandoned their attempt to arrest impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol at his residence on Friday over a failed martial law bid, citing safety concerns after a standoff with his security team.
Yoon, who has already been suspended from duty by lawmakers, would become the first sitting president in South Korean history to be arrested if the warrant is carried out.
He’s built his own underground hospital, once operated on four gravely wounded victims at the same time and tearfully tells of amputating the limbs of children maimed by Putin’s bombs.
This city (Kharkiv) is so close to the front line that the air-raid sirens go off after the Russian bombs have detonated. Whether delivered from the air or the ground, Putin’s missiles take less than 40 seconds from launch to landing and exploding.
Ukrainians are blown to pieces as they go about their everyday lives – be it walking to work, shopping or taking children to school.
Fico called the cessation of Russian gas into his country via Ukraine “sabotage.”
Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico stated that Slovakia may cut off funding to Ukrainian refugees living in Slovakia in response to Kyiv’s cessation of Russian gas transit through Ukraine.
Despite Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Kyiv continued the transit of Russian gas to the rest of Europe up until Wednesday, Jan. 1 when its contract expired.
The 25-year-old truck driver was struck dead by debris from the downed drone
Struck by wreckage from a downed drone in a Russian overnight attack, a 25-year-old truck driver was killed and several people injured in the Kyiv region.
Ukraine’s State Emergency Service reported that the truck driver was in the Brovarsky district when drone debris struck him.
The world in focus, as seen by a Canadian leading global affairs analyst, writer and speaker, in his review of international media.
The Army veteran who drove a pickup truck into a crowd of New Year’s revelers in New Orleans acted alone, the FBI said Thursday, reversing its position from a day earlier that he likely worked with others in the deadly attack that officials said was inspired by the Islamic State group. The FBI also revealed that the driver, Shamsud-Din Jabbar, an American citizen from Texas, posted five videos on his Facebook account in the hours before the attack in which he proclaimed his support for the militant group and previewed the violence that he would soon unleash in the famed French Quarter district. “This was an act of terrorism. It was premeditated and an evil act,” said Christopher Raia, the deputy assistant director of the FBI’s counterterrorism division, calling Jabbar “100% inspired” by the Islamic State. The attack along Bourbon Street killed 14 revelers, along with Jabbar, 42, who was fatally shot in a firefight with police after steering his speeding truck around a barricade and plowing into the crowd. About 30 people were injured. - AP
The cut-off of Russian gas supplies to Moldova’s breakaway Transdniestria region has forced the closure of all industrial companies except food producers, an official said on Thursday. The mainly Russian-speaking territory of about 450,000 people, which split from Moldova in the 1990s as the Soviet Union collapsed, has suffered a painful and immediate hit from Wednesday’s cut-off of Russian gas supplies to central and eastern Europe via Ukraine. “All industrial enterprises are idle, with the exception of those engaged in food production - that is, directly ensuring food security for Transdniestria,” Sergei Obolonik, first deputy prime minister of the region, told a local news channel. “It is too early to judge how the situation will develop. ... The problem is so extensive that if it is not resolved for a long time, we will already have irreversible changes - that is, enterprises will lose their ability to start up.” Ukraine had allowed Russia to keep pumping gas across its territory despite nearly three years of war, and was earning up to $1 billion a year in transit fees. But Kyiv refused to renew a five-year deal that expired on Wednesday. European gas buyers such as Slovakia and Austria had prepared for the cut-off by securing alternative supplies. But Transdniestria - despite its ties to Moscow and the presence of 1,500 Russian troops there - has been crippled - Reuters
Armed Forces General Staff said most attacks occurred in the Kurakhove, Pokrovsk, Lyman, and Vremivka sectors. There were also attacks in Russia’s Kursk region, where Ukrainian troops hold positions.
Russian troops lost 1,080 troops in 138 attacks across the front line Thursday, Jan. 2, Ukraine’s Armed Forces reported in a Friday war summary.
According to the Armed Forces General Staff, most attacks occurred in the Kurakhove, Pokrovsk, Lyman, and Vremivka sectors in Ukraine. There were also attacks in Russia’s Kursk region, where Ukrainian troops hold positions.
The Deputy Speaker of Russia’s State Duma has complained that its mass media is overrun by predictions from “magicians, astrologers, fortune tellers, shamans and other ‘predictors’.”
In a Dec. 24 news report the Russian news site MK, citing a poll carried out by Moscow’s Public Opinion Research Center (VTSIOM), said that in 2024 Russians spent almost as much on “sorcerers” and “occult services” as they did on groceries.
According to the poll, one in four Russians believe that “mediums” can effectively predict the future and almost two-thirds had consulted fortune tellers at least once in their life.
Latest from the Institute for the Study of War.
Key Takeaways from the ISW:
Despite gripes in Slovakia and shutdown in Transnistria, EU says energy supply is just fine; Zelensky wants Trump’s “unpredictability applied to Russia”; Parliament damaged by New Years air strike.
Two days into a new era with no more Russian gas being piped into Europe via Ukraine, the European Union said it will be just fine.
“The situation is stable with all member States using a mix of regular winter storage and imports from third countries, which provide stable supplies to their consumers,” according to a statement from Poland, which has just assumed the EU’s rotating presidency.
Ukraine launches a criminal probe into the 155th Mechanized Brigade after reports surfaced of 1,700 soldiers going AWOL, raising concerns over the AFU’s military management and training effectiveness.
Ukraine has opened a criminal probe into an alleged case of desertion and “abuse of power” after hundreds of soldiers were reported to have fled an army unit partly trained by France, investigators said Thursday.
The 155th Mechanized Brigade, dubbed “Anne of Kyiv,” was one of several military groupings formed last year as Ukraine sought to boost preparations for possible new Russian offensives. The unit was to be made up of 4,500 soldiers, with France training roughly half of them and providing equipment.
