“Ukraine – Russia”

Britain is increasing purchases of Indian oil amid the Western sanctions war with Russia – but much of it is likely refined from Russian product sold to India at a discount.

While there is a general perception that Russia has become a pariah state since its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, with only the likes of Iran and North Korea allegedly offering covert support, many governments in Africa, Asia, and South America have largely stayed out of the West’s economic war with Moscow, including countries considered traditional allies such as Israel, India, and even NATO member Turkey.

Ukraine is planning to ask Canada for some of its Leopard-2 main battle tanks, as soon as Germany drops its opposition to the re-export of the weaponry it manufactured.

Mykhailo Podolyak, a top adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, told The Globe and Mail that Mr. Zelensky will make the request to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau when the bureaucratic hurdle with Berlin is cleared.

Related … German tank manufacturer’s warning puts pressure on Ukraine’s allies

Defence firm dampens Kyiv hopes other European allies will follow UK’s lead in supplying heavy armour

Battle tanks from German industrial reserves wanted by Ukraine will not be ready to be delivered until 2024, the arms manufacturer Rheinmetall has warned, increasing pressure on Nato allies to support Ukraine with armoured vehicles in active service instead, ahead of a key meeting this week.

“Even if the decision to send our Leopard tanks to Kyiv came tomorrow, the delivery would take until the start of next year,” Rheinmetall’s chief executive, Armin Papperger, told the Bild am Sonntag newspaper.

Rheinmetall, which manufactures the battle vehicle’s gun, has 22 Leopard 2 and 88 older Leopard 1 tanks in its stocks. Getting the Leopard tanks ready for battle, however, would take several months and cost hundreds of millions of euros the company could not put up until the order was confirmed, Papperger said.

The West has sent an array of weapons once seen as too provocative, and it looks like tanks will be next. With a new Russian offensive expected, officials see an urgent need to shift the balance.

Western officials increasingly fear that Ukraine has only a narrow window to prepare to repel an anticipated Russian springtime offensive, and are moving fast to give the Ukrainians sophisticated weapons they had earlier refused to send for fear of provoking Moscow.

Over the last few weeks, one barrier after another has fallen, starting with an agreement by the United States in late December to send a Patriot air-defense system. That was followed by a German commitment last week to provide a Patriot missile battery, and in the span of hours, France, Germany and the United States each promised to send armored fighting vehicles to Ukraine’s battlefields for the first time.

President Putin could mobilise up to half a million extra troops for his war against Ukraine as he seeks to wrestle back the initiative with a multi-pronged spring offensive.

Western allies are being urged to “act now” and send hundreds of tanks and armoured vehicles to Ukraine after Putin appointed a new commander and laid plans to deploy 150,000 reservists who were conscripted in the autumn.

Russia claimed its first victory in months today, as Ukrainian troops began withdrawing from the town of Soledar after a battle that cost thousands of lives. Its fall gives the Russians a greater chance of seizing nearby Bakhmut, which controls access to Kramatorsk and Slovyansk, the last big cities in Ukrainian hands in Donetsk.

#Ukrainian T-72 tank driving right up to a trench with #Russian soldiers, taking them all out.

Cossack-style… This is how #Ukraine won WW2

pic.twitter.com/Sn5uEfiWQf

— Pavel (@FreeCrimeaNow) January 6, 2023

Ukraine has become a de facto member of the Nato alliance, the Ukrainian defence minister says, as Western countries, once concerned that military assistance could be seen as an escalation by Russia, change their “thinking approach”.

In an interview with the BBC, Oleksii Reznikov said he was sure Ukraine would receive long-sought weapons, including tanks and fighter jets, as both Ukraine and Russia seemed to be preparing for new offensives in the spring.

“This concern about the next level of escalation, for me, is some kind of protocol,” Mr Reznikov said.

“Ukraine as a country, and the armed forces of Ukraine, became [a] member of Nato. De facto, not de jure (by law). Because we have weaponry, and the understanding of how to use it.”

#Ukraine: A Russian T-72B tank was destroyed in Marinka, #Donetsk Oblast by a Ukrainian commercial drone with a HEAT munition installed.

A Russian BMP and T-72B3 tank were also hit by the same drones but the results are unclear. pic.twitter.com/Ehuw0TPJVz

— 🇺🇦 Ukraine Weapons Tracker (@UAWeapons) January 12, 2023

Ukrainians held prisoner in Kherson had their hands submerged in boiling water, their fingernails pulled out and their genitals electrocuted, according to new accounts of systematic torture during the Russian occupation.

Yuriy Belousov, Kyiv’s top war crimes prosecutor, said of the more than 50,000 reports of war crimes registered with the Ukrainian authorities, some 7,700 had come from the Kherson and the surrounding region.

Investigators have discovered 10 sites in the area around the southern city used by Russia to unlawfully detain and torture Ukrainians.

So, one granite-faced general has been replaced by another. The announcement that, after just three months in post, General Sergei Surovikin is being succeeded as overall commander of Russia’s war in Ukraine by Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov may sound like appointing a new captain for a hull-breached Titanic. But it is significant in what it says, not just about the war, but Putin’s relationship with his generals.

#Ukraine: A Russian tank was destroyed by the 59th Motorized Brigade in Lozove, #Donetsk Oblast. pic.twitter.com/HndqRGZ0oy

— 🇺🇦 Ukraine Weapons Tracker (@UAWeapons) January 10, 2023

Russia’s defence ministry says its forces are taking part in the battle for Soledar, a town north of Bakhmut in east Ukraine which has been the focus of recent fighting.

It comes after the head of Russia’s notoriously brutal Wagner mercenary group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, claimed his fighters were in full control there and boasted that only his troops took part.

Mr Prigozhin will most likely use any victory to bolster the reputation of Wagner as an effective fighting force in the eyes of President Putin.

But the Russian defence ministry appeared to contradict the controversial oligarch’s claims.

Update from Soledar – the morning of 11 January (2,5h ago) – Maygar. pic.twitter.com/tBnOC3JCZj

— Dmitri (@wartranslated) January 11, 2023

The Russian mercenary group Wagner has said it is fighting “heavy, bloody battles” for control of the town of Soledar as part of Moscow’s months-long offensive to capture Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region.

Wagner’s claims appeared to be confirmed by the UK’s Ministry of Defence (MoD), which suggested that most of Soledar, a small town about six miles (10km) north of the key city of Bakhmut, was in Russian hands after Moscow continued to make “tactical advances”.

The MoD said the efforts in Soledar over the past four days appeared to be aimed at encircling Bakhmut, although it added it believed that scenario was unlikely at present.

PMC Wagner unit completely wiped out just south of the salt mine in central Soledar. A heavy price is paid with uncontainable losses. pic.twitter.com/g4be7OFD3U

— NOËL 🇪🇺 🇺🇦 (@NOELreports) January 10, 2023

It is cold and dark. Sirens break the silence from time to time. Although the Christmas tree in the city square is standing, there is a tank trap on top of it. This is what the locals draw strength from.

This is not the first time I have crossed the Hungarian–Ukrainian border since the outbreak of the war—in the past, my team and I have provided legal assistance to more than 1,200 Hungarian compatriots from Transcarpathia.

Now, however, duty calls to areas outside Transcarpathia.

#Ukraine:Footage of the latest consignment of Turkish 🇹🇷 BMC KİRPİ MRAPs to Ukrainian forces has appeared- but these are particularly interesting, as they're equipped with Romanian 🇷🇴 Pro Optica ANUBIS RCWS, equipped with either a 12.7 or 7.62mm machine gun, plus thermal optics. pic.twitter.com/Hxz624dhEs

— 🇺🇦 Ukraine Weapons Tracker (@UAWeapons) January 6, 2023

The UK is considering sending tanks to Ukraine to help Kyiv launch a major counter-offensive in the spring.

The British army could send about a dozen Challenger 2s, becoming the first western country to donate tanks to Ukraine.

The Challenger 2 first entered service in 1994. It has a 1,200 horsepower engine and is equipped with a 120mm gun. Only one has ever been destroyed in combat — it was hit by friendly fire during operations in Basra in 2003.

Did Ukraine Change your Mind about Russian Tanks?