The IMF Executive Board approved a $1.1 billion disbursement to Ukraine as part of an ongoing lending program to support the budget. Friday's approval strengthens Ukraine as Russia continues to attack it and comes just over a month after International Monetary Fund officials completed the sixth review of the existing four-year plan, worth about $15.5 billion. I was disappointed. Friday's payment brings the total amount disbursed under the program since it was signed in March 2023 to about $9.8 billion, according to the IMF. The board's approval on Friday means Kiev will receive the funds before U.S. President-elect Donald Trump takes office on January 20.
A Ukrainian missile attack on the town of Rylsk in Russia's Kursk region on Friday killed six people, including a child. said Deputy Governor Alexander Hinshteyn. Ten injured people, including a 13-year-old boy, were taken to hospital with minor injuries, Hinstein wrote on Telegram. Ukrainian authorities have not commented on the incident. Khinstein said Ukraine fired a US-supplied Himal rocket, damaging several buildings, including a school, recreation center and private homes, in Rylsk, about 26 kilometers from the border with Ukraine's Sumy region. Ta.
The attack came hours after Ukrainian authorities said a Russian ballistic missile attack on Kiev killed at least one person and injured 12 others. The Russian government claimed the Kiev attack was in retaliation for a Ukrainian attack on the Russian mainland using U.S.-made weapons. Russia is trying to push back a Ukrainian military invasion of Kursk that began in early August, but Ukrainian forces have entrenched themselves and still hold parts of the Kursk region. Russian President Vladimir Putin said at his annual press conference on Thursday that they would be expelled, but declined to say when.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Friday he would meet again with President Putin after resuming contact with the Kremlin chief last month.. At a press conference with Estonian Prime Minister Kristen Michal, Scholz confirmed: “I have spoken with the Russian president and will speak again,” but did not specify when. Scholz said the purpose of these calls with Putin was to “always make it clear that President Putin's contribution to ending the conflict is to stop the aggression and withdraw the troops.” Scholz raised eyebrows when he called President Putin for the first time in more than two years in mid-November, amid Russia's ongoing invasion of Ukraine.
Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov, the Russian general assassinated by Ukraine, was buried Friday with full military honors and posthumously awarded his highest medal.. Kirillov, a former commander of Russia's nuclear, biological and chemical protection forces, is the most senior Russian military officer killed on Russian soil by Ukraine. He was killed along with his assistant on Tuesday in an attack blamed on Ukraine's SBU security services, when a bomb attached to an electric scooter exploded outside their Moscow apartment.
Russian cyberattack on Ukraine's Ministry of Justice registry shuts down online services such as marriage, but no data appears to have been leaked or stolen.announced by the Ukrainian government. Deputy Prime Minister Olha Stefanishina, who is also the Minister of Justice, told reporters at a press conference in Kiev that Russia took several months to prepare for the cyber attack, which was the largest in recent times to target Ukraine's state registry. That's what he said.
According to the government services platform, online services for registering matters such as marriage, cars, births and changes of residence in Ukraine have been suspended.
Stefanishina said the attack was aimed at “causing panic among the Ukrainian people and people abroad.” No comment was received from Russia.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy announced Friday that he has approved the appointment of a senior Crimean Tatar politician, who was imprisoned by Russia for nearly three years, as ambassador to Turkey. The 44-year-old former journalist and community leader of a largely Muslim ethnic minority persecuted in Moscow-annexed Crimea was freed earlier this year in an unusual prisoner swap involving civilians. . Zhelyar was arrested in September 2021 and sentenced to 17 years in prison in 2022 on terrorism charges for allegedly conspiring with several other activists to blow up a gas pipeline near the regional capital Simferopol. He also denied the charges.
Ukraine's central bank said on Friday it would ease some wartime currency controls to simplify nuclear fuel purchases and corporate bond coupon payments and reduce jewelry imports.. The central bank is gradually easing capital outflow restrictions and tight exchange rate policies imposed after Russia launched its invasion in February 2022.
The country said in a statement that it would expand permission to purchase hard currency to purchase nuclear fuel. Ukraine is facing a serious energy crisis after Russia stepped up shelling of its electricity infrastructure, damaging thermal and hydropower plants. Currently, the country relies on nuclear power plants for more than half of its energy needs. The central bank also announced it would ease restrictions on buying and selling precious metals, with the aim of supporting domestic producers and reducing jewelery imports.
