Issued on:
Some Kyiv residents are facing lengthy power outages, FRANCE 24’s Gulliver Cragg reported on Tuesday, despite city authorities’ statement on Sunday that outages would not exceed five hours running. “It seems to be a consensus opinion in Ukraine that it’s not a question of if, but of when, the next wave of [Russian] attacks on electricity infrastructure will come,” Cragg said. Follow our live blog for all the latest developments. All times are Paris time (GMT+1).
11:42am: Allies to ramp up Ukraine aid as Putin uses winter as weapon of war: NATO
NATO allies will ramp up aid for Ukraine as Russian President Vladimir Putin is using winter as a weapon of war because his forces are failing on the battlefield, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said on Tuesday.
“We have delivered generators and spare parts, and the allies are helping to rebuild destroyed infrastructure,” he told reporters ahead of a NATO foreign ministers’ meeting in Bucharest, adding the gathering would serve as a platform to ramp up Western aid to rebuild Ukraine‘s energy infrastructure.
10:36am: Kyiv electricity system ‘under strain’ as authorities strive to manage outages
Kyiv authorities said Sunday that city residents would not experience power outages for more than five consecutive hours, but as FRANCE 24 correspondent Gulliver Cragg reports from the Ukrainian capital, that is not yet in evidence, as some buildings only have power for a few hours a day.
“It seems to be a consensus opinion in Ukraine that it’s not a question of if, but of when the next wave of [Russian] attacks on electricity infrastructure will come,” Cragg said. “Natalia Humeniuk, the spokeswoman for the Ukrainian military in the south, was saying yesterday that they are observing ships being deployed in the Black Sea with cruise missiles on board.”
10:18am: Russian envoy protests pope’s ‘cruelty’ comments
Russia’s envoy has expressed Moscow’s strong dissatisfaction to the Vatican following Pope Francis’ latest condemnation of the “cruelty” of Russia’s actions in Ukraine, the RIA Novosti news agency reported on Tuesday.
Francis had told the Jesuit magazine America in an interview: “When I speak about Ukraine, I speak about the cruelty because I have much information about the cruelty of the troops that come in. Generally, the cruellest are perhaps those who are of Russia but are not of the Russian tradition, such as the Chechens, the Buryati and so on. Certainly, the one who invades is the Russian state. This is very clear.”
10:02am: Qatar to send Germany 2 million tonnes of LNG per year for 15 years
Qatar has agreed to send Germany 2 million tonnes of liquefied natural gas a year for at least 15 years, officials said Tuesday, as Europe’s biggest economy scrambles for alternative supplies after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
With the long-awaited deal, Qatar aims to “contribute to efforts to support energy security in Germany and Europe”, said Saad Sherida al-Kaabi, Qatar’s energy minister and CEO of QatarEnergy.
8:05am: Ukrainians flee liberated Kherson amid Russian ‘revenge attacks’
Some Ukrainians are fleeing recently liberated Kherson amid Russian ‘revenge attacks’ that have killed several people and damaged infrastructure, including electricity infrastructure. FRANCE 24’s Gulliver Cragg reports.
7:19am: NATO chief to call for more Ukraine winter aid at meeting of foreign ministers
NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg will call on allies to pledge more winter aid for Kyiv at a meeting on Tuesday and Wednesday, after Ukraine’s president told residents to brace for another week of cold and darkness due to Russian attacks on infrastructure.
NATO foreign ministers meeting in Bucharest will focus on ramping up military assistance for Ukraine such as air defence systems and ammunition, even as diplomats acknowledge supply and capacity issues, but also discuss non-lethal aid as well.
Part of this non-lethal aid – goods such as fuel, medical supplies, winter equipment and drone jammers – has been delivered through a NATO assistance package that allies can contribute to and which Stoltenberg aims to increase.
“It is going to be a terrible winter for Ukraine, so we are working to strengthen our support for it to be resilient,” a senior European diplomat said.
4:00am: Ukraine’s Naftogaz asks USAID for help with gas
Ukrainian energy company Naftogaz has asked the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) to help with additional natural gas volumes for the heating season, Oleksiy Chernyshov, the company’s chief executive said on Monday.
Russia has been carrying out massive missile bombardments on Ukraine’s energy and power infrastructure roughly weekly since early October, with each barrage having greater impact than the last as damage accumulates and a frigid winter sets in.
12:00am: US Secretary of State Blinken to announce help for Ukraine’s power transmission
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Tuesday will announce new assistance to help restore Ukraine’s power transmission ability in the face of Russian attacks targeting the country’s energy grid, a senior State Department official said.
Blinken arrived in Romania on Monday evening ahead of a meetings with NATO allies and foreign ministers from the Group of Seven advanced economies.
The US official, who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity, said Washington had been working with US utilities and hardware providers and with European nations to locate equipment that can help restore high-voltage transmission stations damaged by Russian missile strikes.
Blinken would use a Tuesday meeting of a new energy coordination group that includes the G7 and other nations on to roll out some of what the United States has been able to mobilise and our plans to get that equipment into Ukraine as quickly as possible in the next few weeks,” the official said.
(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP and Reuters)
For all the latest health News Click Here
