The Ukrainian military reported that Russian forces attempted to advance in eastern Ukraine and trained tank, mortar, and artillery fire on Kherson in the south as Western allies attempted to support Ukraine and its neighbors against Moscow.
According to the Pentagon, Raytheon received a $1.2 billion contract in Washington for six National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems (NASAMS) for Ukraine.
Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine’s foreign minister, said on Wednesday that his country needed Patriot missile defense systems made in the United States to protect its civilian infrastructure, which had been heavily attacked by Russia at the beginning of winter.
Antony Blinken, Secretary of State for the United States, stated that Russian President Vladimir Putin had directed “his ire and his fire” toward the civilian population of Ukraine and warned Russia that its strategy would not divide supporters of Ukraine.
“Heat, water, power … these are President Putin’s new targets. He is pounding on them hard. Following a two-day NATO meeting, Blinken addressed a news conference in Bucharest. “This brutalization of Ukraine’s people is barbaric.”
According to NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg and ministers, allies pledged to assist Moldova, Georgia, and Bosnia-Herzegovina in the face of Russian pressure on those nations.
Maria Zakharova, a spokesperson for the Russian Foreign Ministry, stated that the outcome demonstrated NATO’s “absolutely no interest in a political and diplomatic solution in Ukraine.”
Nine months ago, Russia invaded Ukraine in what it called a “special military operation” to get rid of nationalists it thought were dangerous. Russia is accused of an unprovoked, imperialist land grab by Ukraine and Western allies.
After two letter bombs were sent to the Ukrainian ambassador in Madrid and a Spanish arms company that makes rocket launchers donated to Ukraine, Ukraine instructed all of its embassies abroad to increase security. The two bombs, one of which injured an embassy security officer, were said to be linked by Spanish police.
Battleground
The General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces said in a statement on Wednesday night that Russian forces attempted to make further advances and shelled several towns, including Bakhmut and nearby Soledar and Opytne, in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine, the location of the heaviest fighting.
It claimed that Russian forces established defensive positions on the southern front and trained tank, mortar, and artillery fire against Ukrainian positions as well as the regional capital of Kherson, which Russian troops had abandoned earlier in November.
The military stated that additional battleground activity was reported in central and northeastern Ukraine.
Reuters couldn’t check combat zone reports.
In a speech delivered on Wednesday evening, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy stated, “We are analyzing the intentions of the occupiers and preparing countermeasures – tougher countermeasures than is currently the case.”
According to Kyrylo Tymoshenko, deputy head of Ukraine’s presidential administration, 65 percent of Kherson’s customers now have access to electricity.
Zelenskiy stated on Wednesday night that there were nearly six million customers without electricity in the majority of Ukraine’s regions and in Kyiv.
Drones
According to Yuriy Ignat, a spokesperson for the Ukrainian Air Force, defense forces had destroyed 340 of the roughly 400 Iranian drones that Russian forces had launched during the conflict.
He started to Ukraine’s primary television network, “We haven’t seen these Iranian unmanned aerial vehicles for about two weeks… the first batch has probably already run out.”
According to UN aid chief Martin Griffiths, a deal was close on the economic front for resuming Russian ammonia exports via pipeline to a Black Sea port in Ukraine.
Griffiths stated at a Reuters NEXT event, “I think we’re quite close, we’re edging towards it this week.”
On November 17, a deal was extended for four months with the intention of easing global food shortages by assisting Ukraine in exporting its agricultural products from Black Sea ports. However, Russia stated that its own demands had not yet been fully met. The United Nations and Turkey worked together to broker the agreement in July.
