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Russia-Ukraine war: Belarus summons Ukrainian ambassador over missile incident – as it happened


Belarus summons Ukrainian envoy for formal protest over missile incident

The Ukrainian ambassador has been summoned to the foreign ministry in Minsk to receive a formal protest.

A spokesperson for Belarus’ ministry of foreign affairs, Anatoly Glaz, said:

The Belarussian side views this incident as extremely serious.

We demanded that the Ukrainian side conduct a thorough investigation, … hold those responsible to account and take comprehensive measures to prevent the recurrence of such incidents in the future.

A Ukrainian military spokesperson in effect acknowledged that the missile was a Ukrainian stray, saying the incident was “nothing strange, a result of air defence” and something that “has happened more than once”.

Key events

Summary of the day

Rachel Hall

Rachel Hall

It’s been a significant day in the Russia-Ukraine war, with a round of missile strikes in the morning that the Ukraine’s foreign ministry described as “one of the most massive” attacks so far.

Here are all the day’s key developments:

  • Belarus’ state-run BelTA news agency reported that a Ukrainian S-300 missile had fallen onto the territory of Belarus during one of Russia’s largest missile attacks against Ukraine since the start of the war.

  • The Ukrainian ambassador was summoned to the foreign ministry in Minsk to receive a formal protest after the spokesperson for the ministry of foreign affairs said the missile landing on Belarussian soil was “extremely serious”.

  • Russia launched a new wave of missile attacks across Ukraine on Thursday morning, with Ukraine’s air force claiming it shot down 54 Russian winged cruise missiles out of 69 launched into Ukraine from Rostov in Russia, the Caspian sea and the Black sea.

  • The mayor of Kyiv, Vitali Klitschko, stated that three people were known to be injured in the country’s capital, including a 14-year-old girl. Two people had been rescued from a private house that had been struck by debris. Klitschko said 40% of the capital’s consumers are without electricity after the missile attack.

  • Later, the emergency services spokesperson, Oleksandr Khorunzhy, stated that in today’s attacks five people were injured.

  • There were widespread reports of power outages as residents in cities across Ukraine were warned to stay in air raid shelters, charge their devices and stock up on water where possible.

  • There were also explosions reported in Kharkiv, and Ukraine’s air force stated that overnight it had destroyed 11 Shahed drones.

  • Italy’s prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, pledged that Rome would continue to help Kyiv’s war effort and that she would visit before the end of February.

  • The UK’s defence minster Ben Wallace has said the UK will commit £2.3bn in aid to Ukraine in 2023.

We’re closing the blog for the evening, but we’ll open again tomorrow. Thanks for following today.

France’s defence minister Sebastien Lecornu has tweeted that Lithuania and France have signed an agreement consolidating the two countries’ defence partnership, especially in armaments.

This includes a commercial contract between Lithuania’s defence ministry and French weapons manufacturer Nexter to purchase 18 Caesar artillery guns.

Lecornu visited Kyiv on 28 December, where he was hosted by his Ukrainian counterpart.

À l’occasion de la visite du ministre de la Défense lituanien @a_anusauskas à Paris, nous avons signé un accord renforçant les relations de défense – déjà fortement développées – entre la France et la Lituanie, notamment dans le domaine de l’artillerie. pic.twitter.com/5KW62HAcGV

— Sébastien Lecornu (@SebLecornu) December 29, 2022

The Kyiv Independent has a story about how volunteers have been risking their lives to rescue abandoned animals during the war.

According to the United Nations, over 13 million Ukrainians have been forced to flee their homes since the beginning of Russia’s all-out war, including 7 million refugees and 6.5 million internally displaced. Countless animals were left behind, forced to fight for survival amid Russian attacks and cold weather.

For many of them, the only chance to survive is to be rescued by Ukrainian volunteers, who risk their lives traveling to front-line settlements and liberated territories to save abandoned cats and dogs, farm animals, and wild ones.

Volunteer Kateryna Arisoy said:

Most humanitarian missions and charities are aimed at helping people, and I can understand that.

But I believe that all creatures deserve to live.

(Animals) suffer no less than people, and in some cases — even more.

Belarusian state media has tweeted a video of the missile wreckage from this morning’s landing in Brest:

The Guardian’s central and eastern European correspondent, Shaun Walker, has the full report on the missile strikes today:

Russia launched a large round of missile attacks across Ukraine on Thursday morning, as Moscow rejected a Ukrainian peace plan and kept up its attacks on the country’s infrastructure.

Targets from Lviv in the west to Kharkiv in the east, came under fire on Thursday morning. The Ukrainian army command said Russia launched 69 missiles from land, sea and air, 54 of which it said were shot down by Ukrainian air defences.

The Ukrainian defence ministry tweeted that the strikes constituted “one of the most massive missile attacks since the beginning of the full-scale invasion”.

The US Institute for the Study of War has a report on US-Russia relations:

In a tweet, the ISW says that the Kremlin is framing the US transfer of Patriot air defence systems and trainers to Ukraine as an escalation in US-Russia relations – but if anything, it opines that the transfer is, if anything, less escalatory than previous western military shipments to Ukraine because Patriot is a purely defensive system.

But the ISW adds that it “forecasts with high confidence” that Putin will not seek to engage Nato militarily in response to the provision of any of the western military systems currently under discussion.

Belarus summons Ukrainian envoy for formal protest over missile incident

The Ukrainian ambassador has been summoned to the foreign ministry in Minsk to receive a formal protest.

A spokesperson for Belarus’ ministry of foreign affairs, Anatoly Glaz, said:

The Belarussian side views this incident as extremely serious.

We demanded that the Ukrainian side conduct a thorough investigation, … hold those responsible to account and take comprehensive measures to prevent the recurrence of such incidents in the future.

A Ukrainian military spokesperson in effect acknowledged that the missile was a Ukrainian stray, saying the incident was “nothing strange, a result of air defence” and something that “has happened more than once”.

Belarus has summoned Ukraine’s ambassador after saying that it had shot down a Ukrainian air defence missile over its territory.

The Belarus foreign ministry said:

We have demanded that Ukraine carry out a thorough investigation into all the circumstances of the missile launch, bring those responsible to justice and take comprehensive measures to prevent the recurrence of such incidents in the future. Which could lead to catastrophic consequences for everyone.

The BBC’s Russian service is today carrying an interview with the Ukrainian military intelligence chief, Kirill Budanov, in which he says that the war on the ground is at something of a stalemate. The BBC quotes him saying:

The situation has just stalled. The situation is not developing at all. We can’t completely defeat them on all fronts. They can’t either.

Here is an image of Ukraine’s emergency services clearing up today the aftermath of the attacks in Bortnichi, Kyiv oblast.

Debris cleaning works after missile attacks hit Kyiv.
Debris cleaning works after missile attacks hit Kyiv. Photograph: Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

My colleague Isobel Koshiw is in Ukraine for the Guardian. She notes a report today that the mayor of Poltava has been “placed under suspicion by the security services for allegedly sharing unsanctioned information about the movements of Ukrainian troops”.

The mayor of Poltava has been placed under suspicion by the security services for allegedly sharing unsanctioned information about the movements of Ukrainian troops. https://t.co/keKHY4DcbO

— Isobel Koshiw (@IKoshiw) December 29, 2022

Poltava is a city in the Poltava oblast, which lies to the north of Dnipro and to the south-west of Kharkiv.

The Ukrinform website has published a quote from the emergency services spokesperson, Oleksandr Khorunzhy, who states that in today’s attacks five people have been injured. The news service quotes him as saying:

As for the massive missile strikes on Ukraine, 10 regions were hit as a result, 28 objects were damaged. Eighteen of them are private residential buildings, the rest are objects of critical infrastructure. As a result of the shelling, three men, one woman and one child were injured.

He said more than 100 members of the emergency services had been involved in responses to the attacks, and that 87 generators were in use to provide electricity supply to critical facilities.

“Currently, our rescuers are still working on the ground. They conduct search and rescue operations. Information about the victims throughout Ukraine is being clarified,” he added.





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