They said Moscow did not ask for any specific stretch of airspace to be kept safe for a certain length of time, as it has for past prisoner exchanges. “We currently don’t have evidence that there could have been that many people onboard the aircraft,” Budanov said. In a pre-dawn TV statement on Thursday, President Putin said Russia did not plan to occupy Ukraine, but demanded its soldiers lay down their weapons, before warning that Moscow's response would be instant if anyone tried to take on Russia. This is a grave moment for the security of Europe. Russia's unprovoked and unjustified attack on Ukraine is putting countless lives at risk, he said. Foreign Secretary Liz Truss summoned Russia's ambassador to the UK, Andrei Kelin, for the second time this week to ask him to explain the illegal, unprovoked invasion of Ukraine. He talked about the need for the UK's pre-war generation to prepare for the possibility of war and said that was a whole-of-nation undertaking. We will continue to work with Ukraine and our international partners for a just and sustainable peace. Another potential threat could come from anti-war politicians, whom Kremlin propagandists might seek to incite. Unnamed Indian government sources have suggested India wants to distance itself from Russia, according to Reuters news agency. Social media users in the Belgorod region posted videos that showed a plane falling from the sky in a snowy, rural area and a huge ball of fire erupting where it allegedly hit the ground. The US is planning to station nuclear weapons in the UK for the first time in 15 years amid a growing threat from Russia, according to a report. Warheads three times as strong as the Hiroshima bomb would be located at RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk under the proposals, the Daily Telegraph reported. The prospect of further UK sanctions against Russia comes a day after the prime minister announced that five Russian banks had had their assets frozen and three Russian billionaires would have travel bans imposed. Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters During his visit to Kyiv earlier this month, my Prime Minister announced a package of support and reaffirmed the close UK-Ukraine partnership. This included £2.5 billion in military support and a historic long-term security agreement. This brings the United Kingdom’s total package of support to Ukraine to approximately £12 billion. After an uneasy peace with Ukraine, Moscow has sent forces into the Baltics, clashing with British troops based there to protect Nato’s eastern flank. But as Ukraine is not a Nato member state, “the alliance will not provide military support in the form of troops”, Oliver Wright said in The Times. Meanwhile, other Western defence sources have expressed concern about an increase in signals intelligence and chatter being monitored which could signal Russia's preparedness to invade. A Ukrainian presidential adviser said that more than 40 soldiers had died and dozens more were wounded, but this has not been independently confirmed. If the West became involved in a war with Russia, it is likely to be protracted, meaning supplies would have to be maintained for potentially months or even years. Mr Zelenskyy has called for public officials to disclose their incomes to increase transparency and eliminate corruption as Ukraine tries to meet the stringent requirements for its bid to join the European Union. A little earlier, we told you about a report in the Financial Times that the EU was proposing to sabotage Hungary's economy if Budapest blocks further aid for Ukraine this week. Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said he supported action the government was taking on sanctions but urged ministers to go further and faster. The amendments added requirements on ministers to explain why sanctions were a reasonable course of action and provide good reasons to those subject to them, unless there were national security exemptions. He said new UK sanctions against Russia would be announced in waves and warned it would be the largest and most severe economic sanctions package Russia had ever seen. It comes after President Putin announced a special military operation in Ukraine's Donbas region in a televised address to the Russian people earlier and said the Ukrainian people would be able to choose freely who ran the country. But as Ukraine is not a Nato member state, “the alliance will not provide military support in the form of troops”, Oliver Wright said in The Times. Ukraine-Russia war live: Russia 'captures Ukrainian village' This is because Nato uses a system of collective security, whereby its independent member states agree to mutual defence in response to an attack by any external party. Ukraine has said its goal for the talks is an immediate ceasefire and the withdrawal of Russian forces from the country. If war broke out in Ukraine and Russian forces occupied large swathes of the country, many civilians might flee. Nato powers are already promising to build up their own forces in the alliance's eastern flank. Oil prices have also risen since the invasion, given Russia’s role as an oil producer and as a form of security for investors as the stock market slumps. If President Putin decides to extend his attacks beyond Russia and into a neighbouring Nato state, such as Latvia, Lithuania or Estonia, then the UK would be bound to go to war with Russia. Germany has said it might need to use coal, the most polluting fossil fuel, for longer than expected, in order to free itself from gas. The European Commission has proposed to provide Ukraine with €50bn ($55bn), with 26 of the 27 nation bloc’s leaders endorsing this plan at a summit before that last payout. Turkey’s parliament ratified Sweden’s Nato membership on Tuesday after more than a year of delays that upset western efforts to show resolve over Russia’s war in Ukraine. These took place far away from the front lines of Russia’s war, in civilian populated areas. The intensity, regularity and indiscriminate nature of Russia’s attacks may violate international humanitarian law, is extremely concerning and must stop. The documents show the Pentagon has ordered new equipment for the base, including ballistic shields designed to protect military personnel from attacks on “high value assets”. Construction on a new housing facility for American forces working on the site will begin in June. How a Russian invasion of Ukraine could spill over into Europe General Sir Patrick Sanders warned that an increase in reserve forces alone would not be enough. Unfortunately, the attacks on Tuesday morning were just the latest of a series of acts of wanton destruction by Russia in Ukraine since we last gathered for a Permanent Council in December. Over the Christmas period, Russia launched hundreds of missile and drone strikes across cities in Ukraine including Kyiv, Odesa, Kharkiv, Dnipro and Lviv. This culminated on 29 December, when Russian unleashed its largest aerial assault against Ukraine since the war began. It killed at least 41 civilians, including a 15-year-old boy, wounded hundreds, and caused significant damage to civilian infrastructure, including a maternity hospital. All three armed forces are experiencing a recruitment and retention crisis, with the number of fully trained soldiers in the Army set to fall to 72,500. The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, has pledged to make the findings of Moscow’s crash investigation public. https://euronewstop.co.uk/why-is-israel-not-supporting-ukraine.html said the UK and allies will launch a massive package of sanctions to hobble Russia's economy. If Russia did decide to invade Ukraine, the senior Western intelligence official said large numbers of people would be displaced. Only aircraft deployed to protect energy facilities, or those carrying top Russian or foreign officials, will be allowed to fly with special permission in the designated zones, according to the Vedomosti daily newspaper. A spate of Ukraine-linked attacks on Russia's oil infrastructure have reportedly led Moscow's energy ministry to propose restricting flights over energy facilities. Hungary has signalled it is ready to compromise on EU funding for Ukraine - after Brussels reportedly prepared to sabotage its economy if it did not comply. Meanwhile, Moscow has claimed its forces have taken control of the village of Tabaivka in Ukraine's northeastern Kharkiv region. This week, Ms Truss told MPs that a special oligarch taskforce - composed of ministers and officials from across government - will be formed to build cases against targets. For years, since the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the belief was that Western armed forces would only ever have to take part in what was known as 'expeditionary' wars. For now the UK appears likely to stick to sanctions rather than engaging in direct military action unless a Nato ally is attacked, although some Conservative MPs have called for the Government to provide air support to Ukraine. And for every shirker or draft-dodger, others might take pride in national duty, be it manning a machine gun post or cleaning the streets. All the expeditionary wars involved victories that came, generally, in a matter of weeks, sometimes days. The decline in manufacturing means there are far fewer factories that can be converted to make arms, as happened in the Second World War, when car makers churned out Spitfire parts. A senior European Union official has denied that member states are discussing financial coercion to force Hungary to agree on financing for Ukraine.
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