As the war enters its 684th day, these are the main developments.

Fighting

• Ukraine’s Air Force said it shot down 21 out of 28 Russian drones aimed at the south and east of the country. Russia also launched three cruise missiles, the Air Force added, without offering further details.
• Dnipropetrovsk regional authorities said 12 people were injured in a Russian drone attack on the city of Dnipro.
• Local officials said two people were killed in the city of Kherson after Russian forces occupying the opposite bank of the Dnipro River hit the city with numerous shelling attacks. Roman Mrochko, the head of the Kherson city administration, said several people were also injured.
• In the northeast, the Kharkiv Regional Prosecutor’s Office said one man was killed and two other civilians, including a child, injured in Russian shelling of Kupiansk.
• Russia’s Defence Ministry said soldiers fighting on the front line in Ukraine marked Orthodox Christmas with military priests leading prayer services.

Politics and diplomacy

• Japanese Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa, on an unannounced trip to Kyiv, promised $37m to NATO to help Ukraine avert Russian drone strikes. She also said Japan would donate five mobile gas turbine generators and seven transformers to maintain power supplies. Kamikawa was forced to hold her press conference with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba underground after an air raid alert. “Japan is determined to continue to support Ukraine so that peace can return,” she said.

• Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told a security conference in Sweden that the situation on the battlefield remained relatively stable and that Russia could be defeated.
• Speaking at the same event, Swedish Foreign Minister Tobias Billstrom said the primary task of Sweden’s foreign policy in the coming years would be to support Ukraine.

Weapons

• Zelenskyy said the war in Ukraine had shown the need for Europe to develop joint weapons production to ensure it can “preserve itself” and defend its freedoms.