According to TASS, former Wagner member Pavel Nikolin shot at police officers in December 2022 in the suburbs of the city of Novoshakhtinsk, near the border with the region of Donetsk Oblast occupied by Russia.
In total, Russian-installed official Vladimir Konstantinov said that 1,150 properties had been seized.
Trust in Zelensky declined to 62%, compared to 84% in December 2022. At the same, the percentage of those who said they do not trust Zelensky increased from 5% in December 2022 to 18% in the most recent poll.
The General Staff of Ukraine's Armed Forces confirmed on Dec. 18 that recording devices had been detected in offices used by Commander-in-Chief Valerii Zaluzhnyi and his staff.
The man was allegedly remotely recruited by Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) in October and subsequently formed his own group of informants to scour Zaporizhzhia in search of the positions of Ukrainian troops and defenses.
The Latvian parliament passed an amendment in 2022 tightening residency rules for Russian citizens in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Russians living in Latvia are now required to apply for permanent residence and pass a basic-level Latvian language test.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic and the ruling SNS party have been in power for almost a decade and have been criticized for causing democratic backsliding in the country. There were allegations of voting irregularities in the Dec. 17 election.
Rafal Mekler, an organizer of the protests, also declared a set of demands that included a ban on importing sugar from Ukraine, compensation for Polish corn production, and subsidy payments for farmers.
The news came after a video surfaced that was subsequently republished by RFE/RL depicting what appeared to be unarmed Ukrainian POWs being forced to walk at gunpoint toward Ukrainian lines.
The drivers were treated for their minor injuries at the scene and did not require hospitalization.
A village council member detonated at least two grenades inside a crowded room in a local government building in the western Zakarpattia Oblast on Dec. 15, Ukraine's National Police said.
The blockade by Slovak truckers at the Ukrainian border has ended, the Slovak Truckers Union said on Dec. 15. Ukraine's State Border Guard Service also said that the border had been unblocked for an "indefinite period."
The funding is part of the Public Expenditures of Administrative Capacity Endurance program (PEACE) in Ukraine, designed to support the country's social and humanitarian expenditures.
Charles McGonigal, a former U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) officer, was sentenced to four years in prison on Dec. 14 for helping well-known, Kremlin-linked Russian oligarchs evade sanctions and launder money.
Groups of Russian saboteurs tried to enter Ukrainian territory seven times in the past two weeks, but five of the attempts were caught in the act by Ukrainian troops, Lieutenant General Serhii Naiev said on Dec. 15.
U.S. President Joe Biden spoke with his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, on Dec. 14 and discussed "the importance of welcoming Sweden as a (NATO member) as soon as possible."
The U.S. "continues to strongly support the EU’s enlargement process, and we look forward to supporting EU candidate and prospective candidate countries as they continue critical reforms on the path to EU membership," said State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller.
The National Defense Authorization Act is an annual bill that Congress has approved on a bipartisan basis for over 60 years. It contains a full spectrum of defense spending, including $300 million in funds for the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative.
Russian Drone fragments and debris have been found on Romanian territory on numerous occasions, prompting Romania to install anti-drone systems, bunkers, and other security measures in the area.
"We have contacts on this matter with our American partners, there’s a dialogue on this issue, Russian dictator Vladimir Putin said. "But, I repeat, the American side must hear us and make a decision that will satisfy the Russian side as well.”
Russia launched several long-range missiles at Ukraine on Dec. 14, with explosions heard in Khmelnytskyi Oblast and in Kyiv as of 4:00 p.m. local time.
The former head of Odesa's military enlistment office, Yevhen Borysov is accused of illegally enriching himself by more than Hr 188 million ($5 million) through his official position.
The Finnish government announced it would open two of the crossings on Dec. 12, explaining that there had been no attempts to cross by asylum seekers in recent weeks.
Ukraine has not fulfilled three of the seven conditional reforms obligated by the EU, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said, so any decisions would have to wait until the conditions are completed.
The air defense zone is not the same as territorially delineated airspace, which is protected by international law, but is established as a safety mechanism to ensure that foreign planes identify themselves and prevent crashes.
The program, called Operation Kudu, is managed by the Australian Defense Forces and entails the deployment of Australian servicemen to multinational training missions in the U.K. for Ukrainian soldiers.
As a result of the attack, a house and neighboring buildings were destroyed in the town of Myroliubivka, about 32 kilometers away northwest of the city of Kherson. The body of an elderly woman was found among the rubble of the house.
The Polish parliament elected Donald Tusk as the prime minister on Dec. 11, ending the eight-year rule of the conservative Law and Justice party (PiS). He was sworn in as prime minister on Dec. 13.
Trucks were able to pass through the Uzhhorod-Vysne Nemecke border crossing as of Dec. 14, albeit at a slower pace of around 3-4 per hour. As of 6 a.m. local time, the border guard service said that 24 trucks have been cleared by Slovak border controls and another 28 were registered for departure from Ukraine.
The 26 European Union member states are determined to overcome Hungary's objections and move forward with several key priorities for Ukraine in one of the most "complex, complicated, and difficult European Councils."
The wife of notorious pro-Russian lawmaker Yurii Boiko owns an apartment in the city center of Moscow worth more than 190 million rubles ($2.1 million), RFE/RL's Schemes project reported on Dec. 13.
President Volodymyr Zelensky's visit to the U.S. on Dec. 11-12 to convince members of Congress to approve further assistance to Kyiv left the president largely empty-handed as Western aid on both sides of the Atlantic is at risk of drying up. Republicans in the Senate blocked a bill on
