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Russia launched 267 drones into Ukraine on Saturday night, according to the Ukrainian air force, in the largest such attack of the war, as both nations prepare to mark three years since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of its western neighbor. Russian drone and missile attacks have for months been a nightly occurrence. But Saturday night's 267 drones were the largest-ever such bombardment, breaking the previous record of 193 drones set in a December attack. Ukraine's air force said it shot down 138 Shahed attack drones, with 119 others lost in flight without causing any damage. Three drones flew into...

The Ukrainian Defense Ministry's Main Directorate of Intelligence said on Monday that at least 30 North Korean soldiers were killed and wounded in weekend battles in Russia's western Kursk region, prompting commanders to send reinforcements to frontline units. "North Korean army units are being re-equipped after losses in assaults" around the villages of Plekhovo, Vorozhba and Martynovka in the Kursk region, the GUR wrote in a post to its official Telegram channel. On Dec. 14 and 15, the GUR said, "units of the DPRK army suffered significant losses -- at least 30 soldiers were killed and wounded," using the acronym...

Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told the Izvestia newspaper in an interview published Wednesday that Russia sees "no grounds for negotiations yet" to end Moscow's war on Ukraine. President-elect Donald Trump's imminent return to the White House has revived speculation as to a possible deal to end Russia's full-scale invasion of its neighbor, which by the time Trump takes office again will be nearly three years old. Russia still occupies around 20% of Ukraine and claims to have annexed four entire regions -- Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia -- though it only partially occupies the areas it claims.

Ukraine's air force said that at least 73 Russian attack drones entered the country's airspace on Saturday into Sunday morning, after a week in which both sides made battlefield history with new advanced weapons systems. Ukraine's air force said it downed 50 of the 73 Russian drones that crossed into the country. Another 19 drones were lost in flight, while four more were still flying in Ukrainian airspace as of just after 7 a.m. local time. Russia's Defense Ministry reported downing 36 Ukrainian drones overnight Saturday and early Sunday. The ministry said its own strikes were part of a wider...

Russia launched a major missile and drone attack on Ukraine overnight into Sunday targeting power plants and energy infrastructure across the country. The barrage was the largest attack on Ukraine since late August and the third largest so far this year. Missiles and drones targeted cities including the capital Kyiv, forcing people into basements, subway stations and other underground shelters. -snip- The Russian aircraft involved in the assault included Tu-160 and Tu-95 strategic bombers, the air force said, as well as Su-34, Su-27 and MiG-31 jets.

Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili called on international backers to support the pro-Western opposition as it prepared for street protests on Monday in response to what it said were falsified results favoring the Moscow-leaning Georgian Dream government in Saturday's parliamentary election. "These elections are illegitimate, and nothing can change that," Zourabichvili wrote on X, shortly after giving a press conference in the capital Tbilisi at which she described the alleged vote rigging as "a Russian special operation" and "a new form of hybrid warfare waged against our people and our country." "We reject Russia's infiltration and occupation," the president wrote on...

Ukrainian forces downed a Russian Su-25 ground attack aircraft on Friday, according to the country's Khortytsia group of forces operating in the eastern Donetsk region. The aircraft was shot down by anti-aircraft guns from the 110th Separate Mechanized Brigade as it attacked Ukrainian frontline positions near the town of Pokrovsk, the forces' statement posted on Telegram said. The Soviet-designed Sukhoi armored aircraft has been used extensively by both sides since the beginning of the full-scale invasion in February 2022.

A large part of Russia's mauled Black Sea Fleet was seen leaving the port of Novorossiysk this week, with satellite images suggesting the berths of the southern Russian port had been largely emptied despite the ever-present threat posed by Ukrainian maritime drones and missiles. The intentions of the vessels departing Novorossiysk—further from Ukrainian-controlled territory and considered safer than the Crimean ports repeatedly bombarded by Kyiv's forces—remain unclear. -snip- The Black Sea Fleet has been forced to largely abandon its traditional bases of choice on the occupied Crimean Peninsula because of numerous—and ever more sophisticated—Ukrainian long-range attacks. Despite having no conventional...

Russia's new offensive into Ukraine's northeastern Kharkiv region has done what months of lobbying from President Volodymyr Zelensky could not: secured Kyiv's ability to fire advanced Western weapons at Moscow's forces within their borders. The Russian drive into the Kharkiv border region—where fighting is ongoing some 15 miles north of Kharkiv, Ukraine's second-largest city and an important political, economic, and cultural center—has prompted Kyiv's NATO backers into a flurry of diplomatic and military activity, with the result that Ukrainian cross-border strikes are now ravaging Russian forces operating in the Belgorod region.

A Russian army general who was blamed for a costly HIMARS strike on troops in occupied Ukraine last year has been removed from his post, according to pro-war Russian Telegram channels. Lieutenant General Sukhrab Akhmedov was dismissed as commander of the Russian 20th Combined Arms Army (CAA), per reports from prominent Russian milbloggers. The formation is currently engaged in Russia's grinding offensive towards the eastern city of Lyman on the Donetsk front. -snip- Akhmedov has been involved in multiple battlefield setbacks since Russia's full-scale invasion began in February 2022, including the 20th CAA's recent inability to make significant progress on...

Ukraine's Main Directorate of Intelligence (HUR) has released video of its claimed sabotage operation against a Russian missile corvette on Sunday in the Baltic Sea exclave of Kaliningrad, which the intelligence service said had "disabled" the vessel. The footage purportedly showed a fire being set somewhere inside the Serpukhov Buyan-M class corvette, which is part of the Baltic Fleet and can be armed with either Kalibr or Oniks cruise missiles. The video also showed what were claimed to be blueprints of the vessel, presumably used by HUR operatives to plan the attack. The claimed HUR attack took place while the...

T Tucker Carlson's interview with Russian President Vladimir Putin could see the conservative pundit targeted by European Union lawmakers, current and former members of the European Parliament have told Newsweek.Carlson visited Russia this week, and on Tuesday revealed he would "soon" be releasing an interview with the Russian leader.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a new decree relating to Moscow's historic real estate holdings abroad, a move interpreted by ultranationalist bloggers as a foundation for future revanchism against Russia's neighbors—and even the U.S. The decree, signed by the president late last week, allocates funds for the search, registration, and legal protection of Russian property abroad, including property in the former territories of the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. This would include Alaska, swathes of eastern and central Europe, large chunks of central Asia, and parts of Scandinavia. Russia's Foreign Ministry and its presidential administration's Foreign Property Management...

For all its supposed modernization, Moscow's military doctrine has retained the historical Russian focus on artillery. Russian gunners proved more numerous and well-supplied than their Ukrainian enemies in the early stages of the conflict. But as Kyiv's arsenal has been bolstered by NATO systems, Russia's "god of war" has been somewhat muted... Kyiv's claimed tally of Russian equipment losses demonstrates the enthusiasm with which Ukrainian artillery and drone teams have hunted Russian big guns, as well as multiple launch rocket systems (MLRS) that perform a similar function at shorter ranges. From September to November 2023, Ukraine claimed to have destroyed...

Long-awaited approval for DPICM rockets with ranges to just over 100 miles, Rice told Newsweek on Monday, appears imminent, as the White House edges closer to finally lifting its block on supplying the long-range MGM-140 Army Tactical Missile System—known as the ATACMS—to Kyiv... "Getting approval this week for HIMARS DPICM will be a game changer," Rice said. "And with no training and change needed, it will likely be on the battlefield next week, making a huge difference. When those rockets launch, they break the sound barrier. To me, that's the sound of freedom."... Rice has been working with U.S. lawmakers...

Drone attacks on Russian territory have become an almost daily occurrence in recent weeks.... Hodges, who has been one of Kyiv's most vocal advocates in the U.S., said in an interview on Monday that the growing drone threat "is a part of the counteroffensive" that is currently raging in southeastern Ukraine. There, Ukrainian troops are pushing into Russian fortified lines, hoping to precipitate a defensive collapse.... "You've got what I would call 'strategic bombing,'" he added. The campaign has seen "drone strikes that have hit Moscow several nights in a row as well as other places throughout Russia, by Ukrainian...

Russia is claiming two significant victories in its ongoing sanctions war with the West, after Canada agreed to waive restrictions on a key gas pipeline component and the European Union clarified its position on the standoff over the Kaliningrad exclave."The truth is that some European politicians might be more interested in Russian gas rather than in Ukraine's victory," Oleksandr Merezhko, a member of Ukraine's parliament and the chair of the body's foreign affairs committee, told Newsweek.Merezhko—a member of Zelensky's Servant of the People party—shared a similar view from Kyiv. "To us it's a dangerous political precedent," he explained. "I'm also...

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has accused U.S. forces of stealing the country's oil and working with terrorists to maintain their positions there, as he tries to restore his authoritarian rule over the war-torn nation. Assad—who is backed by Russia and Iran—told state news agency SANA that Syrians must unite to make America's position in the country untenable. It has been a turbulent end to 2019 for U.S. forces in Syria. There were some 2,000 soldiers stationed in the country until October, when President Donald Trump abruptly ordered American troops out of position in the northeast of the country, where they...