Russia-Ukraine updates: US concerned by Russia-China call

Given the level of its losses in Ukraine, the Russian army has lost power and will need at least five years to recover, Ukraine’s defence minister, Oleksii Reznikov, has said.

“According to NATO intelligence, the Russians have huge losses of tanks, artillery, armoured personnel carriers and soldiers,” Reznikov was quoted as saying by Ukrainska Pravda, an online newspaper.

“The regular armed forces of the Russian Federation could be restored in five years at the earliest, perhaps not for 10 years,” he said, adding the same applied to Russia’s missile stocks.

Ukraine army’s General Staff has said Russian forces have tried to advance near Bakhmut and Avdiivka, two focal points of their slow-moving campaign to take all of the Donetsk region, which together with neighbouring Luhansk makes up the Donbas.

It added that Russian forces also shelled towns near Kupiansk in the northeast Kharkiv region, settlements in the Luhansk region and in the southern areas of the Zaporizhia region, and the city of Kherson, which Ukraine recaptured last month.

The US is “concerned” by China’s alignment with Russia and has warned Beijing of consequences should it provide Moscow with military assistance in its war against Ukraine or in evading Western sanctions.

“We are monitoring Beijing’s activity closely,” a State Department spokesperson said. “Beijing claims to be neutral, but its behaviour makes it clear it is still investing in close ties to Russia.”

US officials have consistently said they have yet to see Beijing provide material support to Russia for the war, a move that could provoke sanctions against China.

Putin and Xi signed a “no limits” strategic partnership in February, a few days before Russia sent its forces into Ukraine in what it terms a “special military operation”.

Russia’s authorities have announced that soldiers and state employees deployed in Ukraine will be exempt from income tax.

The new measure concerns all those fighting in the four Ukrainian territories Russia has declared as its own but does not completely control: Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhia.

Soldiers, police, members of the security services and other state employees serving in the four regions no longer have to supply information on “their income, their expenditure, their assets”, said the decree, which extends to the partners and children of those serving.

It also grants them the right to receive “rewards and gifts” if they are of “a humanitarian character” and granted as part of the military operation in Ukraine.

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has said the war in Ukraine has been “a very dramatic factor of inefficiency for the Security Council”, which was paralysed by Russia’s veto power.

Guterres, however, said the war “demonstrated the enormous value of humanitarian action led by the UN”.

“The UN is probably the only platform that was able to seriously talk to both sides to try and solve – not the war, unfortunately – but some specific problems that have dramatic impacts at the global level,” the secretary general told a press conference.

A UN-brokered grain deal between Russia and Ukraine in July allowed Ukrainian grain to enter world markets, averting a further surge in world food prices.

Ukrainian forces are holding their positions against Russian troops in the eastern Donbas region and making small advances in some areas, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said.

“On the whole, we are holding our positions,” the Ukrainian leader said in his nightly video address. “There are also some areas of the front where we are advancing a bit.”

He added that Ukraine strengthened its anti-aircraft capability and would further strengthen it in the new year to protect both itself and the entire European continent.

The UN has had its hands tied over the war in Ukraine because Russia is a permanent member of the Security Council.

But the global body has helped evacuation efforts and restarted a Black Sea grain deal.

Al Jazeera’s diplomatic editor, James Bays, reports from the US at the UN headquarters in New York.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has called on NATO member states to supply more weapons to Ukraine.

“I call on allies to do more. It is in all our security interests to make sure Ukraine prevails and [Russian President Vladimir] Putin does not win,” Stoltenberg told the German news agency, DPA.

“We know that most wars end at the negotiating table – probably this war, too – but we know that what Ukraine can achieve in these negotiations depends inextricably on the military situation,” he said.

Moscow’s UN ambassador Vasily Nebenzya has said no civilians were tortured and killed in the Kyiv suburb of Bucha, despite evidence of atrocities.

“Not a single local person has suffered from any violent action,” Nebenzya said, calling the photos and video of bodies in the streets “a crude forgery” staged by the Ukrainians.

Such statements have been rebutted by Ukrainian and international authorities, human rights groups and journalists who gathered evidence as Russian troops withdrew from the area.

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko has said seven of the 16 drones launched in Thursday’s assault targeted the capital. Two have been shot down “on approach” and five over the city.

There were no casualties, but falling debris damaged windows in two buildings in southwestern Kyiv, he added.

One of the drones hit a four-storey administrative building, starting a fire that was later extinguished, said Kyrylo Tymoshenko, deputy head of the presidential office.

Russia’s defence ministry said it had carried out a “massive strike” on military command and energy facilities and that “all assigned targets were reached”.

Foreign investors from “unfriendly” countries selling stakes in Russian assets may have to do so at half-price or less, the finance ministry said, with the Russian budget potentially taking a 10 percent cut of any transaction.

Minutes from a commission meeting monitoring foreign investment listed measures that could apply to “foreign persons associated with foreign states that commit unfriendly acts against Russian legal entities and individuals” when selling assets.

“Unfriendly” countries have imposed sanctions on Russia, including Australia, Canada, Japan, the United Kingdom, the US and members of the European Union.

“The sale of assets at a discount of at least 50 percent of the market value of the relevant assets indicated in the asset valuation report,” one condition stated.

Another said sellers could be required to commit to one to two years of additional payments or an upfront charge of 10 percent of the overall transaction to Russia’s federal budget.

Russia’s federal statistics agency revised its estimate for economic growth in 2021 from 4.7 percent to 5.6 percent, saying the country bounced back from the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic stronger than first believed.

Rosstat said the new figures were based on a more complete set of information on business performance, the balance of payments data and government accounts.

However, independent analysts expect the country’s economy to struggle for years due to the loss of crucial energy exports to Europe and access to Western technology and finance.

Putin said this year’s economic decline is set to be less than 2.5 percent, while the economy ministry’s official forecast sees a 2.9 percent contraction.

After Moscow launched its invasion of Ukraine in February, some analysts had expected Russia to suffer a double-digit hit to its gross domestic product in 2022.

The Russian Football Union wants its teams to return to international competition after European football’s governing body, UEFA, banned Moscow from competition after Putin sent troops to Ukraine in February.

“We are indeed considering the option of returning to UEFA competitions as soon as possible,” said Alexander Dyukov, the president of the Russian Football Union.

“It is important for us to take part in the 2026 World Cup qualifiers.”

The Russian Football Union was proposing the establishment of a group to conduct consultations with UEFA to resume ties, said Dyukov.

He did not rule out that Russia could seek membership with the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) at a later stage.

As part of the UEFA ban, Russia has been excluded from the qualifying draw for Euro 2024 and will not take part in upcoming qualifying matches starting next March.

With Russia continuing to shell Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure, how likely are peace negotiations?

Al Jazeera’s Inside Story speaks to experts on whether Moscow and Kyiv can negotiate an end to the conflict.

Kyrylo Tymoshenko, the deputy head of the president’s office, announces a new package of Starlinks, part of SpaceX’s internet service, from Poland.

On Telegram, he wrote: “Ukraine received another batch of Starlinks, which will go to our ‘Points of Invincibility’, as well as for the energy and medical spheres,” referring to the heated and powered spaces offering hot meals, electricity and internet connections for displaced Ukrainians.

“We work to keep people connected,” he added. “This is the third batch we have received from Poland, and the first part of a large batch that will arrive by the end of January.”

Bulgaria’s only nuclear power plant signs a nuclear fuel supply deal with a French firm to replace shipments from Russia.

The state-owned Kozloduy plant on the Danube River currently relies on Russian fuel for its two Soviet-built 1,000-megawatt reactors.

Under a 10-year agreement, Framatome, a subsidiary of French energy giant EDF, will supply nuclear fuel to Kozloduy’s Unit 5 reactor from early 2025.

Last week, Kozloduy signed a similar contract with Westinghouse Electric Sweden to deliver nuclear fuel for its other operational reactor, Unit 6, from 2024.

With the two agreements in place, Bulgaria has “achieved full diversification of nuclear fuel deliveries” for its only nuclear power plant, interim energy minister Rossen Hristov said at the signing ceremony.

“The aim is the security of deliveries and safe operation,” he added.

Russia will never be a liberal democracy and should be “pushed into their borders and locked up,” Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said.

“The main thing now is … to make our partners understand that no matter who is in power there, Russia will not turn into a liberal, democratic country …They need to be pushed into their borders and locked up,” said Kuleba.

He said some people in the West still fear the consequences of a Russian defeat in Ukraine.

“Many sincerely support Ukraine, but still cannot imagine Russia’s defeat. I have already started to tell them that the world will not collapse if Russia collapses,” he added.

“Not a single inch of Ukrainian land will be subject to diplomatic or military concessions,” he stressed, adding that Ukraine’s tough negotiation stance was “war diplomacy”.

In an interview, the secretary of Belarus’s Security Council said it was “unlikely” that a Ukrainian air defence missile downed on Thursday had entered Belarusian airspace by accident.

“Kyiv is striving to provoke a regional conflict by any means,” Alexander Volfovich told the Russian state-owned outlet Sputnik Belarus.

“An example of this is the recent incident with the destruction of the Ukrainian S-300 missile.

“There is little reason to believe that it entered our airspace by accident. By all appearances, it seems some plan was being realised here.”

A regional military official compared the missile to an incident in November, when a stray S-300 landed on the territory of NATO-member Poland, triggering fears of an escalation that were rapidly defused.

Ukraine’s defence ministry said it would investigate the incident, suggesting it was a Russian provocation and reserves the right to protect its skies.

International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Thomas Bach has reiterated that sanctions against Russia and Belarus must remain in place.

Bach also said in a New Year’s message that the IOC will continue to support Ukraine’s Olympic community.

The IOC imposed sanctions on Russian and Belarusian governments and states shortly after the start of the invasion in late February.

“These sanctions against the Russian and Belarusian states and governments must and will remain firmly in place,” he said.

“We are supporting the athletes and members of the Ukrainian Olympic community everywhere with all our solidarity.

“Also in the new year, the Ukrainian athletes can count on the full commitment to this solidarity from the IOC and the entire Olympic movement. We want to see a strong team from Ukraine at the Olympic Games Paris 2024 and the Olympic Winter Games Milano Cortina 2026,” he added.

Ukraine is investigating Russian war crimes as the conflict nears the end of the 10-month mark.

The Associated Press (AP) news agency and Frontline have independently verified and recorded in a public database more than 600 incidents that appear to violate the laws of war.

Some of those attacks were mass killings that killed dozens or hundreds of civilians, and as a totality, they could account for thousands of individual war crimes.

Karim Khan, the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court in The Hague, told the AP that “Ukraine is a crime scene”.

While authorities have amassed a staggering amount of evidence, they are unlikely to arrest most of those who had given the orders or abused people.

Ukrainian authorities face serious challenges in gathering air-tight evidence in a war zone as the vast majority of alleged war criminals have evaded capture and are safely behind Russian lines.