Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Saturday that Russian and North Korean forces had suffered heavy losses in the fighting. southern Russia. “Yesterday and today, Russian troops were defeated by a North Korean infantry battalion and Russian paratroopers in battles near just one village, Makhnovka, in the Kursk region,” President Zelenskiy said. “This is important,” he said, without providing specific details. Battalions vary in size, but typically consist of several hundred troops. According to Ukrainian and Western assessments, 11,000 North Korean troops are stationed in the Kursk region, after Ukrainian forces carried out a major cross-border incursion in August. It occupies a wide area.
President Zelenskiy also said “heavy fighting” was unfolding across the 1,000 km (620 miles) front, with the most difficult conditions near the city of Pokrovsk.. Earlier, a Ukrainian military spokesperson said Pokrovsk remained the “hottest” frontline zone and that Russian troops had launched new attacks near the town to bypass Pokrovsk from the south and cut off supply routes to Ukrainian forces. He said he is doing so. Ukraine estimates that about 11,000 of its population of 60,000 remain in the city, home to the mines that provided the only coking coal for Ukraine's once huge steel industry.
Russia said on Saturday it would retaliate after accusing Ukraine of launching a U.S.-supplied Atakumus missile into the Belgorod border region the day before., They say all the missiles were shot down.. According to publicly available data, the Atacms missile has a maximum range of 300 kilometers (190 miles). In an interview published last month, President-elect Donald Trump said he was “very vehemently” opposed to Ukraine's use of weapons, and called for an immediate cease-fire as Ukraine wary of Trump's involvement in negotiations.
Russian media outlet Izvestia reported on Saturday that a Ukrainian drone strike had killed its reporter and freelance correspondent Alexander Martemyanov. Near the city of Donetsk in eastern Ukraine. The car was traveling on a highway connecting Donetsk, the main city in the Russian-controlled Donetsk region, with the city of Horlivka in the north, the paper said. Russia's state-run Ria news agency said two of its correspondents traveling with Martemyanov were injured in the incident, as well as two journalists working for a local Donetsk newspaper.
Early Saturday, Russia attacked a village in northeastern Ukraine's Kharkiv region, killing a 74-year-old man., Regional Governor Oleg Sinegubov said:. Moscow's forces also attacked a town in northern Ukraine's Sumy region, wounding seven people, including a two-year-old girl, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said. A 10-year-old boy was killed and his parents injured when a drone crashed into a car in the Russian-occupied southern Zaporozhye region, said Evgeny Balitsky, head of the region's Moscow installation.
Meanwhile, the Russian Ministry of Defense announced on Saturday that it had captured the Ukrainian village of Nadiya., One of the few settlements in the eastern Luhansk region still under Kiev control.. According to an AFP analysis, Moscow advanced about 4,000 square kilometers (1,540 square miles) into Ukraine in 2024 as Kiev's military suffered from chronic understaffing and exhaustion.
Russia on Saturday declared a regional state of emergency in Crimea, which it captured from Ukraine in 2014., Workers clear tons of contaminated soil on both sides of the Kerch Strait after an oil spill in the Black Sea last month.. Mikhail Razbodyaev, the Russian-installed governor of Sevastopol, said new traces of minor pollution require urgent elimination, declaring a state of emergency in the city and ordering authorities to evacuate citizens from their homes. He said he has given him the authority to make quick decisions. Rescue workers have now removed more than 86,000 tonnes of contaminated soil, the Ministry of Emergencies said on Saturday. Crude oil spilled from two aging tankers that were hit by a storm on December 15th. One ship sank and the other ran aground.
Russia arrests four teenagers on suspicion of planning 'terrorist' attack on Yekaterinburg city, Russia's state news agency reported on Saturday.. Russia's already fragile domestic security has worsened in recent years as the Kremlin devotes resources to arresting people suspected of collaborating with Ukraine.
The separatist Transnistria region of Moldova ordered a second day of rolling blackouts on Saturday as a Russian gas outage depleted the self-proclaimed pro-Moscow state of energy. The small breakaway republic, which borders Ukraine, has been without heating and hot water for its residents since Wednesday, when Moscow cut off gas supplies to Moldova, citing a financial dispute.
