As the war enters its 687th day, these are the main developments.
Here is the situation on Thursday, January 11, 2024.
Fighting
Two Russian S-300 missiles struck a hotel in the centre of northeastern Kharkiv injuring 11 people, including journalists, according to Mayor Ihor Terekhov. Several other buildings, including two apartment blocks, were also damaged.
At least one person was killed in a Russian-guided bomb attack on the village of Olkhovatka in the Kupiansk district of the Kharkiv region, according to Oleg Sinegubov, the head of the regional military administration. At least 10 private homes, a shop and a school were damaged, he added.
Authorities in Belgorod evacuated some 392 children from the Russian border city after weeks of shelling from Ukrainian forces. Some 300 residents have already left the city, one of the biggest civilian evacuations on Russian soil since Moscow began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Russia and Ukraine reported intense battles along the front line in the south and east around Avdiivka, Mariinsky, Kupiansk and Kherson. Russia claimed Ukraine had lost at least 450 soldiers in the confrontations, while Ukraine claimed it had killed 800 Russian troops.
Ukraine announced a new online service which will allow Russians whose relatives are soldiers missing in Ukraine to find out whether they have been confirmed killed or are being held as POWs.
Politics and diplomacy
Speaking in Lithuania, at the start of an unannounced visit to the three Baltic states, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned that Western hesitation on aid was emboldening Russia and that Ukraine needed to strengthen its air defences and replenish its supplies of ammunition. “He [Russian President Vladimir Putin] won’t finish this [war] until we all finish him together,” Zelenskyy said after talks with his Lithuanian counterpart Gitanas Nauseda. “Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Moldova may be next.”
United Nations agencies will next week ask for $3.1bn to finance humanitarian assistance for Ukraine in 2024. Edem Wosornu, director of the Operations and Advocacy Division for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), told the UN Security Council that the war had driven “high levels of humanitarian need” and that financial support had to be sustained.
Pope Francis expressed concern that international attention was shifting away from Ukraine. In a letter to the head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, Francis said he was sorry that “in an increasingly tragic international situation, the war in Ukraine risks becoming a forgotten one”.
Weapons
NATO allies said they would continue to provide Ukraine with major military, economic and humanitarian aid and outlined plans to provide “billions of euros of further capabilities” in 2024 to Ukraine. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said the alliance strongly condemned Russia’s attacks and would boost Ukraine’s air defences.
Authorities in Russia’s Belgorod said they had sent 392 children away from the city following alleged Ukrainian shelling attacks [Olga Maltseva /AFP]
The UN Security Council discussed Russia’s alleged use of North Korean weapons in Ukraine. Russia’s UN ambassador Vasily Nebenzya said Western states had called the session an exercise in “anti-Russian propaganda” but stopped short of making an unequivocal denial that Moscow had fired North Korean missiles at Ukraine. South Korea’s UN envoy Hwang Joon-kook said Russia’s use of North Korean missiles gave Pyongyang “valuable technical and military insights” and enabled North Korea to use Ukraine as a “test site of its nuclear-capable missiles”.
Lithuania approved a package of long-term military assistance to Ukraine, totalling 200 million euros (nearly $220m). President Nauseda said the country would send ammunition, generators and detonation systems this month, and M577 armoured personnel carriers in February.
NATO members Turkey, Bulgaria and Romania are expected to sign on Thursday a preliminary agreement on demining the Black Sea, the AFP news agency reported, citing officials. The Russian navy mined Ukraine’s Black Sea coast in the early stages of its invasion.
The UK’s Sky News, citing security sources, said Iran had developed a new attack drone for Russia to use in Ukraine and appears close to providing Moscow with surface-to-surface missiles.
