Ukraine news – live: Putin’s ceasefire falters as Moscow and Kyiv trade blame over fighting

Global prices for food commodities like grain and vegetable oils were the highest on record last year even after falling for nine months in a row, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization said, as Russia’s war in Ukraine, drought and other factors drove up inflation and worsened hunger worldwide.

The FAO Food Price Index, which tracks monthly changes in the international prices of commonly traded food commodities, dipped by 1.9 per cent in December from a month earlier, the Rome-based organisation said yesterday.

For the whole year, it averaged 143.7 points, more than 14 per cent above the 2021 average, which also saw large increases.

Looking ahead to a likely spring offensive, the US and Germany are sending Ukraine an array of armored vehicles, including 50 tank-killing Bradleys, to expand its ability to move troops to the front lines and beef up its forces against Russia as the war nears its first anniversary.

The vehicles don’t fulfill Ukraine’s request for combat tanks. But they provide a strategic war-fighting capability as the season change brings muddy terrain and Ukraine launches an aggressive campaign to recoup territory taken by Russia, particularly in the east.

Read this report to find more about the Bradley and other armored carriers, and what they bring to the fight:

Shortly before the ceasefire was meant to start, rockets slammed into a residential building in Kramatorsk, close to the eastern front line, damaging 14 homes, though with no casualties as many people have fled.

“It’s bad, very bad,” said Oleksnadr, 36, outside a supermarket at the time of the attack. “We need to pressure them, get them to leave, maybe more air defence systems would help. This happens often, not only on festive occasions. Every other day.”

One rescue worker was killed and four others injured when Russian forces shelled a fire department in the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson before the deadline early on Friday, the regional governor said.

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky rejected the Russian ceasefire out of hand as a ploy for Russia to buy time to bring in equipment and ammunition after sustaining crippling losses at the front line. Scores of Russian troops were killed in one attack over the New Year weekend.

Laura Cooper, a US deputy assistant secretary of defence focusing on Russia and Ukraine, remarked to reporters in Washington yesterday that Russian president Vladimir Putin’s statement about a ceasefire needed to be taken with a “grain of salt.”

The Bradley is a tracked, medium-armored vehicle armed with a 25-mm gun. Named after a general who commanded US troops in World War II, it is operated by a crew of three and depending on the version can carry seven soldiers around the battlefield. In addition to its turret-mounted gun it can carry a tube-launched, optically tracked, wireless-guided (TOW) missile launcher that can destroy tanks. Made by BAE Systems , they weigh 80,000 pounds and can go about 38 mph (61 kph), according to the US army.

If shipped by sea, the trip could take several weeks. If Bradleys that the US has in Europe are sent to Ukraine, the timeline would be much shorter. Ukrainians will need training on how to operate the Bradleys.

The TOW missiles aboard a Bradley are “tank killers” and Ukraine can use that firepower in conjunction with its own tanks as a part of the “mechanised combined arms” team, an advanced fighting tactic Ukrainians will receive training for in the coming weeks.

The US has thousands of Bradleys.

It’s unclear. While Ukraine has requested advanced tanks such as the M1 Abrams, Nato has been reluctant to send them because of fears that this could further escalate the war.

The Ukrainian governor of the front line eastern Luhansk province, Serhiy Haidai, said that in the first three hours of the purported ceasefire the Russians had shelled Ukrainian positions 14 times and stormed one settlement three times.

“Orthodox murderers wish you a merry Christmas,” he wrote on the Telegram messaging app.

Russia’s Orthodox Church observes Christmas on 7 January. The main Orthodox Church in Ukraine has rejected the authority of Moscow, and many Ukrainian believers have shifted their calendar to celebrate Christmas on 25 December, as in the West.

Vladimir Putin attended a service by himself inside a Kremlin cathedral rather than joining other worshippers in a public celebration.

State television showed two live clips of Putin inside the gilded Cathedral of the Annunciation as Orthodox priests conducted the midnight service, known as the Divine Liturgy.

Russia’s forces should know they cannot act with impunity and the UK will back Ukraine until justice is served, said justice secretary Dominic Raab as London prepares to an host international war crimes meeting in March.

“Almost a year on from the illegal invasion, the international community must give its strongest backing to the ICC so war criminals can be held to account for the atrocities we’re witnessing,” he said.

The meeting will allow countries to determine how to provide further help to the court, the Ministry of Justice said.

Officials said this would include offering practical support, such as helping to gather information and share evidence of atrocities committed on the ground.

Ministers will also discuss how to help victims and witnesses provide testimonies, without causing them further distress.

Dilan Yesilgoz-Zegerius, co-host of the London meeting and the Netherlands’ minister of justice, said: “The reports and images of Russia’s unlawful and unprovoked armed attack on Ukraine are horrific.

“For us it is crystal clear, these crimes may not go unpunished.”

Last year the UK offered a package of support to the ICC which included an additional £1m funding and dedicated police assistance.

Russian and Ukrainian forces exchanged artillery fire at the front line in Ukraine yesterday, even after Moscow said it had ordered its troops to stop shooting for a unilateral truce that was firmly rejected by Kyiv.

President Vladimir Putin ordered the 36-hour ceasefire from midday on Friday to observe Russian Orthodox Christmas. Ukraine has said it has no intention to stop fighting, rejecting the purported truce as a stunt by Moscow to buy time to reinforce troops that have taken heavy losses this week.

“What ceasefire? Can you hear?” said a Ukrainian soldier, using the nom de guerre Vyshnya, as an explosion rang out in the distance at the front line near Kreminna in eastern Ukraine. “What do they want to achieve if they keep on shooting? We know, we have learnt not to trust them.”

Russia’s defence ministry said its troops began observing the ceasefire from noon Moscow time “along the entire line of contact”, but said Ukraine had kept up shelling populated areas and military positions.

Reuters heard explosions of what Ukrainian troops at the front line described as incoming Russian rocket fire. Ukrainians fired back from tanks.

The Ukrainian troops said it was quieter than many other days because snowy weather had made it hard to fly drones and spot targets.

“The situation today is exactly the same as yesterday, the day before yesterday, last week and last month,” said one, concealing his face with a scarf. “There is no point in talking to them, in believing in their promises, orders and decrees.”

Ukraine will need at least $1.79bn (£1.5bn) to restore its telecommunications sector to pre-war levels, a UN agency said in a report published on Friday alleging Russia had “destroyed completely or seized” networks in parts of the country.

The long-anticipated and sensitive damage assessment by the Geneva-based International Telecommunication Union (ITU) was commissioned in April to assess the extent of destruction of Ukraine’s communication networks as a result of Russia‘s invasion last February.

The report, which covers the first six months of the war, found that there was considerable damage and destruction to communications infrastructure in more than 10 out of 24 regions of Ukraine.

“Since the beginning of military attacks, with the purpose of using the facilities in its interests and for its own needs, the aggressor either destroyed completely or seized the regular operation of public and private terrestrial telecommunication and critical infrastructure in the temporarily occupied and war-affected territories of Ukraine,” the report said.

It also alleges that Moscow unilaterally switched Ukrainian dialling codes, fixed by the UN agency, to Russian ones and that there had been 1,123 cyber attacks against Ukraine. An official with the Russian diplomatic mission in Geneva dismissed the report’s allegations, saying they were designed to divert attention from unspecified “atrocities” committed by Ukraine on Russian-occupied territory.

The foreign ministry in Moscow did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The investigation into alleged war crimes in Ukraine will be at the top of the agenda when justice ministers from across the world meet in London in the spring.

Deputy prime minister and justice secretary Dominic Raab will host the meeting in March at Lancaster House alongside his Dutch counterpart.

The group will hear from the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) Karim Khan about the court’s work and the role of the international community in supporting its investigations.

It comes as Russian president Vladimir Putin continues to target crucial energy infrastructure as he looks to plunge Ukrainian citizens into darkness and wipe out central heating supplies during the freezing winter temperatures.

Mr Khan is currently investigating accusations that Russian soldiers have carried out war crimes during Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, with claims from Kyiv that civilians have been executed and raped during the 11-month conflict.

The absorption of militias from the Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR) and Donetsk People’s Republic (LPR) — carried out last week — is set to squeeze out Russian finances and weigh heavily on Moscow politically, the British defence ministry said today.

“The status and identities of the DNR and LNR likely remain divisive within the Russian system. Even before the February 2022 invasion, these territories represented a significant drain on Russian finances,” the defence ministry said in its latest intelligence update.

“Now the Kremlin has overtly committed to supporting them, they will likely constitute a large political, diplomatic and financial cost for Russia which will last well beyond the current phase of the conflict,” the MoD said, noting Russia’s claim over the LNR and DNR as “intrinsic parts of the Russian Federation” following the fixed accession referendums in September last year.

Russia has discreetly controlled both since 2014, creating DNR’s 1st Army Corps and LNR’s 2nd Army Corps and supporting them with Russian military officers, according to the ministry.