Damaged electrical wires in recently-liberated Lyman in the Donetsk region in eastern Ukraine, November 27, 2022 (Metin Aktas/Anadolu/Getty)

Tuesday’s Coverage: US and NATO to Announce More Aid to Kyiv

Source: Institute for the Study of War

UPDATE 1637 GMT:

The UK has added 22 Russians to its sanctions list, following Vladimir Putin’s September mobilization of men to fight in Ukraine.

Deputy Prime Minister Denis Manturov is named for oversight of the Russian weapons industry and the arming of mobilized men. Arkady Gostev, director of the Russian prison service, is cited for his support of recruitment of inmates, including by the Wagner Group of mercenaries.

The governors and regional heads are sanctioned, including those in the Dagestan, Ingushetia, and Kalmykia regions.

The list also includes Ella Pamfilova and Andrey Burov, who helped organize staged “referendums” for Vladimir Putin’s annexation of four Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.

UPDATE 1410 GMT:

Russian shelling has killed a teenager in a hospital in the Sumy region in northern Ukraine.

Kyrylo Tymoshenko, deputy head of the Zelenskiy Administration, said Russian forces bombarded the region with artillery and mortar bombs over the past day.

UPDATE 1403 GMT:

The city council in Odesa in southern Ukraine has confirmed the decision to remove the monument of Catherine the Great of Russia.

The statue of the city’s founder, prominent in a central square, has been vandalized and daubed with paint during the Russian invasion.

A slim majority of Odesa residents voted, in an online poll organized by the city’s authorities, to remove the statue.

The city’s legislators also voted to remove and relocate a monument to 18th-century Russian general Alexander Suvorov.

UPDATE 1401 GMT:

A 70-year-old woman has been killed and a 64-year-old man injured in Russian shelling of the recently-liberated city of Kherson in southern Ukraine.

Governor Yaroslav Yanushevych wrote that several residential buildings and medical facilities were damaged.

UPDATE 1138 GMT:

The Russian Foreign Ministry has admitted that Moscow cancelled this week’s talks with the US about nuclear weapons reduction because of American military assistance to Ukraine.

Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told State radio on Wednesday that “the United States is planning to send more weapons to the region of the conflict in which Russia has been involved…as we sit down to discuss mutual security issues with them, including those in their interests”.

Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov had said that Russia withdrew from the “New START” talks, scheduled to begin yesterday in Egyptian capital Cairo, because of a US emphasis on inspections rather than on other issues.

UPDATE 0945 GMT:

The latest Russian strikes across the Donetsk region in eastern Ukraine have killed five civilians and wounded 15.

Two people were killed in the city of Bakhmut, two in Drobysheve, and one in Lyman.

Russian forces have tried for several weeks to move into Bakhmut, in fighting causing mass casualties on both sides. They reportedly have made limited advances south of the city this week.

UPDATE 0939 GMT:

Oil tank fires are reported in Russia’s Bryansk region near the border with Belarus and Ukraine.

Governor Alexander Bogomaz said tanks were burning in the Surazhsky district, 10 km (6 miles) south of Belarus and 40 km (25 miles) north of Ukraine’s Chernihiv region.

Emergency services said the fire spread over 4,000 square meters.

On Tuesday, Russian officials claimed a Ukrainian strike on a power plant in the Kursk region, causing outages of electricity (see 0747 GMT).

UPDATE 0909 GMT:

Ukrainian officials say a hotline for Russian troops to surrender is receiving up to 100 enquiries each day.

Russian fighters can call the “I Want To Live” hotline or entering details through messenger applications. Officials say they have already had more than 3,500 contacts from troops and their families.

“Svitlana”, a call handler, says:

First of all, we hear a voice, mainly male. It’s often part-desperate, part-frustrated because they don’t fully understand how the hotline works, or whether it’s just a set-up.

There’s also curiosity because many call not to surrender but to find out how they could if needed. It’s different every time.

UPDATE 0826 GMT:

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy is calling for a Special Tribunal “so that every Russian murderer receives the deserved punishment”.

In his nightly address to the nation, Zelenskiy said that Ukraine had “already established cooperation with the International Criminal Court and will increase it”. But he continued:

Unfortunately, the available international legal instruments are not enough for justice.

Even in the International Criminal Court, it is still impossible to bring the highest political and military leadership of Russia to justice for the crime of aggression against our state — for the primary crime. The crime that gave birth to all other crimes of this war — and not only after February 24, but also from 2014. That’s when it all started.

He noted that Ukraine First Lady Olena Zelenskiy discussed the topic with UK officials in London on Tuesday, citing historical precedent:

In the winter of 1942, when no one could predict when World War II would end, it was in London that representatives of the Allies signed the Declaration of St. James’s Palace. The document that started the path to the Nuremberg Trials.

The President pointed to cooperation with the Netherlands on the creation of a prosecutor’s office for war crimes, and with France on fieldwork documenting Russian abuse and killing of Ukrainian civilians.

On Tuesday, at a meeting of Justice Ministers in Berlin, the G7 nations — US, France, Italy, Germany, Japan, Australia, and UK — agreed to establish a network for coordination of investigations into war crimes.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Wednesday that the European Union will try to set up a court, backed by the UN, for investigations and prosecutions:

Russia must pay for its horrific crimes including for its crime of aggression against a sovereign state….

We are ready to start working with the international community to get the broadest international support possible for this specialized court.

Von der Leyen also said “Russia and its oligarchs” must compensate Ukraine for war damages estimated at €600 billion ($623 billion).

UPDATE 0813 GMT:

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg says the bloc may provide Patriot air defense systems to Ukraine.

As the two-day NATO Foreign Ministers opened on Tuesday in Romania, Stoltenberg told a press conference:

This is partly about providing new systems, like, for instance, the Patriots, and there is an ongoing discussion about that now. But it is also very much about ensuring that the systems that we have already delivered are functioning and effective.

And to do so, we need to ensure that we provide spare parts, enabling [the Ukrainians] to do maintenance of the systems, and also ammunition. This is a huge challenges that we face now.

Pentagon Press Secretary Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder told reporters in Washington, “Right now we have no plans to provide Patriot batteries to Ukraine but again, we’ll continue to have those discussions.”

Russia's former President and current deputy chair of the State Security Council, Dmitry Medvedev, snapped, "If, as Stoltenberg hinted, Nato were to supply the Ukrainian fanatics with Patriot systems along with Nato personnel, they would immediately become a legitimate target of our armed forces."

UPDATE 0747 GMT:

The governor of Russia's Kursk region says Ukrainian forces struck a power plant in multiple attacks on Tuesday, causing outages of electricity.

Roman Starovoyt posted on Telegram, “In total, there were about 11 launches. A power plant was hit."

ORIGINAL ENTRY: Europe's electricity companies are being asked to donate surplus equipment to Ukraine, as the country repairs its grid after waves of Russian missile strikes.

The Energy Community, a European trade body, is coordinating the effort to prevent Russian fragmentation Ukraine’s grid “into small isolated units”. Almost 40 shipments have already been organized.

Energy Community's director Artur Lorkowski said Ukraine's "stored equipment will not to be enough continue the repair activities" after Russia split the grid into two parts last month. The top priority is transformers in substations "intensively targeted by Russia”.

Ukraine's State energy provider Ukrenergo said on Tuesday morning that there was still a 30% shortage of electricity. The figure was an increase on Monday's 25% because of emergency shutdown of units at several power plants and increased consumption amid worsening weather.

Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said distribution of forced outages will allow Ukrainians to turn on lights for at least five to six hours a day.

"My Heart Says Ukrainians Should Survive"

State-level assistance is expected to be announced on Wednesday, including a $1.1 billion package of financial and energy aid from the US. NATO Foreign Ministers, meeting in Romania's capital Bucharest, may renew pledges of fuel, generators, and medical supplies as well as additional military support.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg opened the meeting with the declaration, "[Russia] is willing to use extreme brutality and leave Ukraine cold and dark this winter. So we must stay the course and help Ukraine prevail as a sovereign nation."

Energy Community's Lurkowski summarized:

My heart is saying yes, [Ukrainians] should survive. This is what my heart is saying, this is an unprecedented situation, never ever has a country experienced anything like that.