Ukraine-Russia war latest: Putin threatens to target Kyiv with new missile after energy grid attack

Russian authorities on Tuesday ordered a British diplomat to leave the country on allegations of spying as tensions soar over the conflict in Ukraine.

Russia’s Federal Security Service, the top domestic security and counterintelligence agency, said in a statement carried by Russian news agencies that the diplomat, identified as Edward Pryor Wilkes, had provided false personal data while seeking permission to enter the country.

The agency, known under its Russian acronym FSB, alleged that he has worked for British intelligence under diplomatic cover, replacing one of the six British diplomats who were expelled from Russia in August. The FSB alleged that Wilkes was involved in “intelligence and subversive activities that threatened the security of the Russian Federation.”

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Russia has targeted energy infrastructure in several Ukrainian cities in a “massive” overnight attack using cruise missiles, Ukrainian officials said this morning.

Explosions were heard in the cities of Odesa, Kropyvnytskyi, Kharkiv, Rivne and Lutsk this morning, Ukrainian news outlets Zerkalo Tyzhnya and Suspilne said.

“Energy infrastructure is once again targeted by the enemy’s massive strike,” Ukrainian energy minister Herman Halushchenko said on Facebook.

“The enemy continues to attack Kharkiv with missiles,” that city’s mayor Ihor Terekhov wrote on the Telegram channel. Odesa regional governor Oleh Kiper urged residents to stay in shelter in a separate message.

In the shattered Ukrainian city of Avdiivka, which Russian forces took in February this year, some of the few residents left said they were trying to rebuild their lives, though the scars of war – and the tears they provoke – remain.

Reuters footage, some of the first visuals by an international media organisation, showed destroyed buildings and vast amounts of rubble dusted with snow. Abandoned family pictures and clothes littered ruined apartments.

In a newly renovated apartment building in the city, Florida Troshina, a Russian-speaking Ukrainian, wept over the death of her daughter, killed just two days before Russian troops arrived.

Others told of the deprivations of living in a ruined city, which is known as Avdeyevka by Russian speakers.

"I just wanted to get out of the basement," Tatiana Golovina said in Russian, adding that she was pleased to be moving back above ground.

"It is hard there. There is no light, the lighting is bad, we have battery-powered lamps there - at least it is warm here," Golovina said.

Avdiivka, once a city of more than 37,000, was largely abandoned during the fighting though some residents endured the war and stayed.

"I think, starting from next year we will have the opportunity to approach in detail how and at what pace, what Avdiivka will look like in a post-military period, how it will be linked to the development of Donetsk," said Denis Pushilin, the Russian-installed head of the surrounding Donetsk region.

Any decision by Donald Trump’s incoming administration to cut support for Ukraine would be a “death sentence” for the Ukrainian army, Russia’s deputy UN ambassador said.

“Even if we’re to lay to one side the prediction that Donald Trump will cut assistance to Ukraine, which for the Ukrainian army would essentially be a death sentence, it is becoming clearer that he and his team will, in any case, conduct an audit of the assistance provided to Kyiv,” said Dmitry Polyanskiy, the deputy UN envoy said, speaking at the UN security council.

Mr Polyanskiy said Volodymyr Zelensky was terrified of the return of Trump in January, and had reason to be so.

He also accused the outgoing Biden administration of trying through its increased support to Ukraine to create a “mess, both in Russia and with the new team in the White House.”

Europe is no longer in a “pre-war situation” with Russia, but “an actual war”, the former head of MI6 said.

“I think we have to face up to the fact that the Russians think they’re in a state of war with us,” Sir Richard Dearlove told tonight’s Politics Hub with Sophy Ridge as he disagreed with Polish prime minister Donald Tusk’s remarks of Europe being in a pre-war era.

“Donald Tusk has referred to it as a pre-war situation. I think he’s wrong. I think it’s an actual war. We’ve seen already quite clearly some very aggressive moves on the part of the Russians in various European countries,” he told Sky News.

The UK should be on alert for possible acts of sabotage, he warned.

President-elect Donald Trump has picked Keith Kellogg, a highly decorated retired three-star general, to serve as his special envoy for Ukraine and Russia.

Mr Trump made the announcement on his Truth Social account, and said “He was with me right from the beginning! Together, we will secure PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH, and Make America, and the World, SAFE AGAIN!”

Mr Kellogg, who is one of the architects of a staunchly conservative policy book that lays out an “America First” national security agenda for the incoming administration, will come into the role as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine enters its third year in February.

The 80 year-old retired Army lieutenant general has long been Mr Trump’s top adviser on defence issues, served as national security adviser to vice president Mike Pence, was chief of staff of the National Security Council and then stepped in as an acting security adviser for Mr Trump after Michael Flynn resigned.

As special envoy for Ukraine and Russia, Mr Kellogg will have to navigate an increasingly untenable war between the two nations.

Ukraine should consider lowering the age of military service for its soldiers to 18 from 25, a senior US administration official said.

Speaking on the condition of anonymity, the official said Ukraine was not mobilising or training enough new soldiers to replace those lost on the battlefield, according to Reuters. “The need right now is manpower,” he said.

“The Russians are in fact making progress, steady progress, in the east, and they are beginning to push back Ukrainian lines in Kursk... Mobilisation and more manpower could make a significant difference at this time as we look at the battlefield today.”

However, a source in president Volodymyr Zelensky’s office said the country did not have what it needed to equip the troops it was mobilising now.

“Right now, with our current mobilisation efforts, we don’t have enough equipment, for example armoured vehicles, to support all the troops we are calling up,” the source said. “We cannot compensate for our partners’ delays in decision-making and supply chains with the lives of our soldiers and of the youngest of our guys.”

A senior Kremlin aide said on Tuesday he was not aware of any contacts yet between President Vladimir Putin's office and the team of US president-elect Donald Trump.

Putin has publicly congratulated Trump on defeating Kamala Harris in this month's election and has said he is willing to talk to him. Trump told NBC on 7 November he had not spoke with Putin since his election victory but "I think we'll speak".

Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov told reporters: "There are no contacts going on with Trump's team yet, as far as I know."

Trump said repeatedly during his election campaign that he could bring a swift end to the Ukraine war, but without saying how. Putin said on 7 November that what Trump had said "deserves attention, at least".

The Biden administration is preparing a $725m weapons package for Ukraine, two US officials told Reuters yesterday, as the outgoing president seeks to bolster the government in Kyiv before leaving office in January.

According to an official familiar with the plan, the Biden administration plans to provide a variety of anti-tank weapons from US stocks to blunt Russia’s advancing troops, including land mines, drones, Stinger missiles and ammunition for High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS).

Ukrainian drones attacked two districts of Russia’s southern region of Krasnodar in the early hours of Thursday, its governor Veniamin Kondratyev said on Telegram.

At least one person has been wounded by the debris from a downed drone, he said.