Latest Developments in Ukraine: Jan. 17

For full coverage of the crisis in Ukraine, visit Flashpoint Ukraine.

The latest developments in Russia’s war on Ukraine. All times EST.

11 p.m.: Russian and Belarusian flags have been banned from the Melbourne Park precinct during the Australian Open after a complaint from the Ukraine ambassador to the country, a move that the Russian embassy described as "regrettable," Reuters reported.

Vasyl Myroshnychenko, Ukraine's ambassador to Australia and New Zealand, posted a picture showing a Russian flag hanging from a bush beside the court where his compatriot Kateryna Baindl was playing her first-round match on Monday.

"I strongly condemn the public display of the Russian flag during the game of the Ukrainian tennis player Kateryna Baindl at the Australian Open today," he wrote on Twitter. "I call on Tennis Australia to immediately enforce its 'neutral flag' policy."

Tennis Australia responded on Tuesday by banning the flags of the two countries. "Flags from Russia and Belarus are banned onsite at the Australian Open," Tennis Australia said in a statement.

10:25 p.m.:

9:30 p.m.: Russian navy's newest nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarine Generalissimo Suvorov is on its way to a temporary base for the Northern Fleet in the Arctic, Reuters reported Tuesday citing the TASS news agency, which quoted an unidentified defense source.

"Recently, the submarine cruiser Generalissimo Suvorov has started moving from Severodvinsk, where it was located at the Sevmash shipyard, to a temporary base for the Northern Fleet," the state agency cited its source as saying.

The strategic submarine was officially included into the Russian navy at the end of 2022 by President Vladimir Putin.

It is set to eventually join and bolster the Russian Pacific Fleet's force of nuclear-powered submarines and to be moved to the Rybachiy submarine base on the Kamchatka Peninsula in the summer.

The submarine is the sixth vessel of the Russian Borei-class smaller and stealthier submarines, Russian agencies have reported, a class of submarines that is replacing the country's previous generations of ballistic missiles submarines.

It carries up to 16 nuclear-tipped Russian Bulava missiles that each is capable of carrying more than one nuclear warhead.

8:50 p.m.:

7:00 p.m.: The Norwegian police unit that investigates war crimes said Tuesday that it wants to talk to a Russian asylum-seeker who reportedly is a former high-ranking member of the private Russian military contractor Wagner Group, The Associated Press reported.

Norway’s National Criminal Investigation Service, which takes part in the investigation of war crimes in Ukraine with the International Criminal Court, said it was in contact with Andrey Medvedev and his Norwegian lawyer and “would like to conduct an interrogation of him in the near future. Medvedev has the status of a witness.”

Last week, Medvedev, who says he’s fears for his life, fled to Norway where he sought asylum. In a video posted by the Russian dissident group Gulagu.net, Medvedev said he came under Russian gunfire before he crossed into the Scandinavian country. In the video interview with France-based Gulagu, the ex-fighter says he feared experiencing the same fate as another recruit whose head was reportedly smashed in by a sledgehammer by the Wagner Group in a public execution.

Medvedev explained he had left the Wagner after his contract, initially from July to November, was extended without his consent, and was willing to testify about any war crimes he witnessed and denied he had participated in any.

The Wagner Group, owned by Yevgeny Prigozhin, a millionaire with ties to Putin, includes a large number of convicts recruited in Russian prisons who have spearheaded attacks in the war with Ukraine.

5:30 p.m.: Current Time correspondent Andriy Kuzakov spent a day with a Ukrainian air reconnaissance unit along the front line between Bakhmut and Soledar, where brutal fighting continues to rage. Ukrainian military officials reported that Russian forces launched more than 70 attacks on January 16 around Bakhmut. Some 15 settlements were shelled, including Soledar, a town that Russian forces have claimed to control. Current Time, a co-production of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and VOA, has this report.

2:30 p.m.:

2:10 p.m.: The White House press office said in a statement that U.S. President Joe Biden spoke with Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany on Tuesday.

“The leaders discussed their steadfast support to Ukraine and condemned Russia’s aggression,” according to the statement.

“President Biden and Chancellor Scholz discussed their ongoing assistance to Ukraine,” it added.

2:00 p.m.: German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Tuesday he was convinced Europe's largest economy would not fall into a recession despite soaring energy and food prices in the wake of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Reuters reported.

German economic output stagnated in the final quarter of 2022 but grew 1.9% over the full year, data showed last week, coming in slightly higher than expectations.

"I'm absolutely convinced that this will not happen that we are going into a recession," he said in an interview with Bloomberg TV. "We showed that we are able to react to a very difficult situation."

1:50 p.m.: Despite constant power cuts, attacks on infrastructure and fears that they could turn deadly at any time, locals in the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, say they are trying to build their businesses and live as normally as possible. VOA’s Heather Murdock reports.

1:35 p.m.: Turkey and the United States will aim to smooth out a series of disagreements between the NATO allies when the Turkish foreign minister visits Washington this week. But expectations that outstanding issues can be resolved are low, The Associated Press reported.

Mevlut Cavusoglu departs on Tuesday for a meeting on Wednesday with U.S. counterpart Antony Blinken on a rare visit by a top Turkish official. U.S. President Joe Biden ’s administration has kept its distance from Turkey because of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan ’s increasingly authoritarian direction and policies curbing rights and freedoms.

Positioned at the crossroads between East and West, Turkey remains strategically important for Washington. Last year, the Turkish government helped broker a crucial agreement between Russia and Ukraine that allowed millions of tons of Ukrainian grain to be transported to world markets, averting a food crisis amid the war.

NATO allies, however, frequently find themselves at odds over a number of issues, with the biggest disputes centering on Turkey’s purchase of Russian-made missiles and American support for Kurdish militants in Syria.

1:20 p.m.: Russia's war against Ukraine is increasingly targeting the civilian population and the country's electricity infrastructure, in a bid analysts say seeks to break the will of the people. But huge power ships from Turkey could help to thwart Russia's goal, as VOA’s Dorian Jones reports from Istanbul.

1:05 p.m.: Kazakhstan will no longer allow Russian citizens to stay in the Central Asian country indefinitely by doing so-called visa runs every three months, according to a government directive published this week, Reuters reported.

The Astana government will disallow the practice from January 26, requiring Russians and citizens of other members of the Eurasian Economic Union, a post-Soviet bloc, to leave the country for at least 90 days after the permitted three-month stay.

The Interior Ministry, which proposed the reform, has said it would give the state greater control over immigration.

Tens of thousands of Russians, mostly young and middle-aged men, relocated to Kazakhstan last year as Moscow, embroiled in the Ukraine conflict, launched its first conscription campaign since World War II.

The Russian language is widely spoken in Kazakhstan and the two countries share the world's longest continuous land border, making Kazakhstan a popular choice among Russians fleeing the draft.

12:55 p.m.:

12:40 p.m.: The Netherlands will send a Patriot missile defense system to Ukraine, Dutch news agency ANP reported on Tuesday, citing Prime Minister Mark Rutte.

Rutte is currently in Washington D.C. meeting U.S. President Joe Biden.

ANP, citing a fireside chat between the two leaders, quoted Rutte as saying they would participate in a U.S.-German initiative to send the defense systems to Ukraine.

Rutte said he had earlier spoken by telephone with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to discuss the decision.

12:30 p.m.:

12:15 p.m.: Ukraine's first lady told the World Economic Forum on Tuesday she would deliver a letter to China's delegation setting out President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's proposals for ending Russia's war against his country, Reuters reported.

China, like Russia a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council, is an important partner for Moscow and has refused to condemn Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

In a speech urging delegates to do more to help end the war, Olena Zelenska said she planned to hand the letter to Chinese Vice-Premier Liu He — who spoke after her — for passing on to President Xi Jinping.

She said she also had letters for European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Swiss President Alain Berset.

"Today I will give the colleagues participating in this part (of the forum) 'formula letters' from the president of Ukraine," she said in Ukrainian.

Urging her audience in the Swiss resort of Davos to make greater use of their influence to end the fighting, she said global cooperation was needed to prevent the collapse of the lives to which people across the world have become accustomed.

11:55 a.m.:

11:40 a.m.: A NATO surveillance plane arrived in Romania on Tuesday to bolster the military alliance's eastern flank and help monitor Russian military activity, Reuters reports.

The plane, the first to be deployed, landed at an air base near Bucharest and two more are expected to land later in the day and on Wednesday. They are due to stay for several weeks.

NATO announced last week it would deploy the Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) surveillance planes to Bucharest, where they will start reconnaissance flights solely over NATO territory.

"In the context of Russia's illegal war against Ukraine, NATO will monitor military activity on the eastern flank with the help of AWACS aircraft," Romanian Defense Minister Angel Tilvar said on Facebook.

NATO has boosted its air presence in eastern Europe and the Baltics since Russia invaded Ukraine in February last year, using fighter jets, surveillance planes and tankers.

11:20 a.m.: Oleksiy Yukov spent years trawling the sprawling Ukrainian countryside for the remains of fallen soldiers from World War I and II. In 2014, he began searching for the bodies of soldiers killed in a new conflict between Ukraine and Kremlin-backed separatists. Since February 2022, he has been busier than ever. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty has this report. (Warning: This video contains scenes some may find disturbing.)

11:05 a.m.: Germany's allies on Tuesday ramped up pressure on Chancellor Olaf Scholz to allow the supply of German-made Leopard tanks to Ukraine for deployment against Russia's invasion, ahead of a crunch defence ministers meeting on Friday, Reuters reported.

Berlin has so far resisted providing the modern tanks or allowing partners which have them to do so, saying Western tanks should only be supplied to Ukraine if there is agreement among Kyiv's main allies, particularly the United States.

Leopard battle tanks - the workhorse of armies across Europe - are widely seen as the only plausible choice to supply Ukraine with the large-scale tank force it needs. But they cannot be delivered without German re-export approval, so far withheld.

Western officials want to strike a balance between ensuring Ukraine can defend itself and not supplying arms that could encourage Kyiv to attack Russia itself or draw NATO into conflict with Moscow.

10:40 a.m.: Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin spoke at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, on Tuesday, saying that the European Union and allies should have acted sooner and imposed stronger sanctions in 2014 when Russia took over the Ukrainian province of Crimea, and that had they done so, circumstances may have been different now in Ukraine. She said Europe was also too dependent upon Russian energy, which is causing “a lot of problems everywhere in Europe right now.” Speaking of Finland’s NATO application, she said Finland and Turkey have spoken and agreed on the steps needed, Finland has now taken those steps, and it is waiting for Turkey to ratify the applications from Finland and Sweden.

10:25 a.m.: Ukraine’s first lady warned world leaders and corporate executives at the World Economic Forum’s annual gathering in the Swiss town of Davos that not all of them were using their influence at a time when Russia’s invasion leaves children dying and a world struggling with food insecurity, The Associated Press reported.

As the anniversary of the war nears, Olena Zelenska said Tuesday that parents are in tears watching doctors trying to save their children, farmers are afraid to go back to their fields filled with explosive mines and “we cannot allow a new Chernobyl to happen,” referring to the 1986 nuclear disaster as Russian missiles have pounded Ukrainian energy infrastructure for months.

“What you all have in common is that you are genuinely influential,” Zelenska told attendees. “But there is something that separates you, namely that not all of you use this influence, or sometimes use it in a way that separates you even more.”

She spoke as hundreds of government officials, corporate titans, academics and activists from around the world who descended on the town billed as Europe’s highest. The weeklong talkfest of big ideas and backroom deal-making prioritizes global problems such as hunger, climate change and the slowing economy, but it’s never clear how much concrete action emerges to help reach the forum’s stated ambition of “improving the state of the world.”

10:10 a.m.:

10:00 a.m.: Russia expects Western sanctions to have a significant impact on its oil products exports and therefore its production, but that will likely leave more crude oil to sell, a senior Russian source with detailed knowledge of the outlook told Reuters.

In what the West casts as unprecedented sanctions and President Vladimir Putin deems a declaration of economic war, the United States and its allies are trying to constrict the economy of Russia, the world's second largest oil exporter after Saudi Arabia.

In an attempt to punish Russia for the conflict in Ukraine, the European Union banned seaborne Russian crude imports from December 5 and will ban Russian oil products from February 5.

"The oil products' embargo will have a greater impact than the restrictions on crude oil," said the senior Russian source who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity the situation.

The source said the sanctions will lead to more crude oil supplies from Russia, which lacks storage capacity for oil products.

9:50 a.m.: At one of Ukraine’s main hospitals for the war-wounded in Lviv, medical workers and patients say they are preparing for long-term and sustained violence by Russia against their country. VOA correspondent Heather Murdock and cameraman Yan Boechat visited the hospital January 16 to report on conditions there.

9:35 a.m.: President Joe Biden is set to host Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte for talks as the U.S. administration looks to persuade the Netherlands to further limit China’s access to advanced semiconductors with export restrictions, The Associated Press reported. Tuesday’s wide-ranging talks are also expected to cover the countries’ efforts to thwart Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine and an upcoming democracy summit, according to the White House.

Rutte said in a Twitter posting on Monday that he had spoken by phone with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy about Saturday’s Russian missile strike on an apartment building in Dnipro — one of the deadliest attacks on civilians in the nearly 11-month-old war. Authorities said the death toll from the strike rose to 40 and that 30 people remained missing Monday.

“The horrific attack on an apartment block in Dnipro underscores just why Russia cannot be allowed to win this war,” Rutte said in the posting. “The coordination of international military support remains essential in the months ahead.”

Ahead of Tuesday’s meeting, White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby praised the Netherlands as as a “key supporter of security assistance in Ukraine.” The Netherlands has committed about $2.7 billion (2.5 billion euros) in support for Ukraine this year. The money will be spent on military equipment, humanitarian and diplomatic efforts.

9:20 a.m.:

9:00 a.m.: The European Union has given Finland 242 million euros ($262 million) to set up for the first time a reserve against chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear threats for use by all member states, the Finnish government said on Tuesday, Reuters reported.

"Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine has confirmed the need to strengthen the EU CBRN (chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear) preparedness," European Commissioner for Crisis Management Janez Lenarcic said in a statement.

The reserve will consist of rescue equipment and medical supplies, such as antidotes and radiation metres, that are intended to protect first responders and the civilian population, Finland's interior ministry said.

8:45 a.m.:

8:30 a.m.: The General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces said in its daily report on Tuesday that Russians launched more than 70 attacks the previous day, shelling 15 settlements near the disputed city of Bakhmut in Donetsk, including the strategic town of Soledar, which has been all but razed to the ground by Russian shelling, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported.

"The enemy does not abandon its intentions to seize the entire Donetsk region. It is conducting offensive actions in the Bakhmut and Avdiyivka directions," the General Staff said, adding that Russian forces also continued to press in the direction of Zaporizhzhya and Kherson.

Oleskiy Danylov, Secretary of Ukraine's Security Council, said on January 16 that Ukraine urgently needs more and better weapons as it expects Russia "to attempt to make a so-called final push," which could occur on the invasion's anniversary or in March.

"We must prepare for such events every day. And we are preparing," Danylov told Ukrainian television. "The first and last question is always about weapons, aid to help us defeat this aggressor that invaded our country," Danylov said.

The calls come as U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin prepares to visit Berlin on January 19 and then host a meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group the following day at the U.S. military base in Ramstein to discuss further support -- including military aid -- for Ukraine with allies.

8:15 a.m.:

7:50 a.m.: Ukraine called off search and rescue operations on Tuesday at the rubble of an apartment building in the eastern city of Dnipro where at least 44 people were killed in a Russian missile attack, Reuters reported.

The State Emergency Service said 20 people were still unaccounted for after Saturday's attack and that the 44 confirmed dead included five children. Thirty-nine people had been rescued from the rubble and a total of 79 had been hurt, it said.

"At 1:00 p.m. on January 17, search and rescue operations in the city of Dnipro at the site of the rocket attack were completed," the emergency service wrote on the Telegram messaging app under a photograph from the scene.

The attack was the deadliest for civilians since the start a three-month Russian missile bombardment campaign. Regional authorities said on Tuesday the body of a child was among the last pulled out of the rubble.

7:35 a.m.:

7:05 a.m.: President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that the Russian economy was likely to have shrunk by 2.5% in 2022, but that it was performing better than most experts had predicted, Reuters reported.

Putin, who was speaking at a meeting with top officials including the finance minister and central bank chief, said real wage growth needed to be stimulated.

"The actual dynamics turned out to be better than many expert forecasts. According to the Ministry of Economic Development, Russia's GDP in January-November 2022 declined, but only by 2.1%," Putin said.

"Some experts in our country, not to mention foreign ones, predicted a decline of 10% and 15% or even 20%. For the year as a whole, it is expected to fall by 2.5%," he added.

The war in Ukraine and ensuing barrage of Western sanctions have upended some sectors of Russia's economy, cutting its biggest banks off from the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications, or SWIFT, network, curbing its access to technology and restricting its ability to export oil and gas.

6:40 a.m.:

6:15 a.m.: NATO surveillance planes were due to arrive in Romania on Tuesday to bolster the military alliance's eastern flank and help monitor Russian military activity, Reuters reported.

NATO announced last week it would deploy the Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) surveillance planes to Bucharest, where they will start reconnaissance flights solely over NATO territory.

Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February last year, NATO has boosted its air presence in eastern Europe and the Baltics, including fighter jets, surveillance planes and tankers.

The aircraft deploying to Romania belong to a fleet of 14 NATO surveillance aircraft usually based in Germany. Around 180 military personnel will be deployed in support of the planes.

"As Russia’s illegal war in Ukraine continues to threaten peace and security in Europe, there must be no doubt about NATO’s resolve to protect and defend every inch of Allied territory," NATO spokesperson Oana Lungescu said in a January 12 statement.

"Our AWACS can detect aircraft hundreds of kilometers away, making them a key capability for NATO’s deterrence and defense posture."

6 a.m.:

5:30 a.m.: Russia's foreign intelligence chief Sergei Naryshkin said on Tuesday that another meeting with U.S. Central Intelligence Agency Director William Burns was possible, Reuters cited the state-run TASS news agency as reporting.

Naryshkin, head of Russia's SVR Foreign Intelligence Service, met Burns in Ankara in November.

U.S. officials said at the time that Burns had cautioned Naryshkin about the consequences of any use of nuclear weapons and raised the issue of U.S. prisoners in Russia.

When asked if there would be another such meeting, Naryshkin told TASS: "It's possible."

He said the meeting with Burns had been meaningful and had allowed Russia to clarify its position, TASS reported.

Burns is a former U.S. ambassador to Russia who was sent to Moscow in late 2021 by President Joe Biden to caution Putin about the troop build-up around Ukraine.

Naryshkin said Russia had "unprecedented" cooperation with China, including exchanges of large quantities of operational and signals intelligence, TASS said.

He said Russia was building up broad intelligence connections with its ally Iran, saying that "some special services are our partners."

Naryshkin also said he spoke at intervals to unidentified heads of European spy agencies about the situation in Ukraine, TASS reported.

Reuters also reported that the Kremlin said on Tuesday that any possible meeting between Naryshkin and Burns would "make sense."

"It can't be ruled out, and of course this kind of dialog makes sense," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. But he said he was not aware of any concrete date for such a meeting.

4:55 a.m.: Reuters reported that Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych tendered his resignation on Tuesday after a public outcry over comments he made suggesting a Russian missile that killed at least 41 people in the city of Dnipro had been shot down by Ukraine.

Arestovych announced his resignation on Facebook after publicly apologizing and rowing back on his comments in a post on the Telegram messaging app. The Ukrainian Air Force says the apartment complex was hit by a Russian Kh-22 missile, which Kyiv does not have the equipment to shoot down.

"I offer my sincere apologies to the victims and their relatives, the residents of Dnipro and everyone who was deeply hurt by my prematurely erroneous version of the reason for the Russian missile striking a residential building," he wrote.

4:25 a.m.: Social Democrat (SPD) interior minister of the state of Lower Saxony Boris Pistorius is to serve as Germany's next defense minister, a party source told Reuters on Tuesday.

German Defense Minister Christine Lambrecht resigned on Monday as her government came under rising pressure to let allies send Ukraine heavy tanks, at the start of what is likely to be a pivotal week for Western plans to further arm Kyiv.

The Pioneer news portal and other local media also reported the planned appointment.

4:10 a.m.: The first item on the agenda of Germany's next defense minister will be whether to deliver main battle tanks to Ukraine, German Economy Minister Robert Habeck told Deutschlandfunk radio broadcaster on Tuesday, according to Reuters.

"When the person, when the minister of defense, is declared, this is the first question to be decided concretely," he said on the sides of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

German Defense Minister Christine Lambrecht resigned on Monday as her government came under rising pressure to let allies send Ukraine heavy tanks, at the start of what is likely to be a pivotal week for Western plans to further arm Kyiv.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Monday that he would act fast to replace Lambrecht. The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, citing government sources, said a successor would be announced on Tuesday.

3:30 a.m.:

3:10 a.m.: Reuters reported Russian-installed authorities in Ukraine's eastern Donetsk region as saying on Tuesday they were in control of Soledar, repeating their earlier claim about the salt-mining town where intense fighting has taken place.

"On the territory of the Donetsk People's Republic, Russian troops liberated Soledar," they said in a post on Telegram.

Russia said on Friday its forces had taken control of Soledar, but Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said later that fighting for Soledar and other eastern towns and cities was continuing.

2:53 a.m.:

2:25 a.m.: According to Reuters, Russia's Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said late on Monday that British Foreign Minister James Cleverly, who has been sanctioned by Moscow over Ukraine, is yet to answer for his support of Kyiv.

Cleverly said on Monday he had been sanctioned by the Russian government and added that if that were the price for supporting Ukraine — he was happy to be sanctioned.

"Dear James, you don't understand," Zakharova wrote on her Telegram messaging app. "This is for the anti-Russian course and personal sanctions. But you still have to answer for the support of the Kyiv regime and neo-Nazism."

Russia framed its invasion of Ukraine as a battle against Nazism but Kyiv and its allies say this is a lie used to justify an unprovoked, imperialist land grab.

Britain said on Saturday it would send 14 of its Challenger 2 main battle tanks as well as other advanced artillery support in the coming weeks in what could be the first shipment of Western-made tanks to Ukraine.

1:55 a.m.:

1:32 a.m.: Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on the Organization for Security and Cooperation (OSCE) on Monday to do more about Ukrainians that Kyiv says have been forcefully deported to Russia and their fate once inside the country, Reuters reported.

Bujar Osmani, Minister of Foreign Affairs of North Macedonia and the 2023 OSCE Chairman-in-Office, visited Kyiv on Monday, with Zelenskiy saying the two talked about how to "make the OSCE effective."

Ukraine and its allies have accused Russia of large-scale deportation of Ukrainians since the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February of 2022.

The U.S. State Department estimated last year that between 900,000 and 1.6 million Ukrainian citizens, including 260,000 children, have been forcibly deported into Russian territory.

Russia denies deportations and says those arriving are war refugees. In November, the country's emergency ministry said that some 4.8 million Ukrainians, including 712,000 children, had arrived in Russia since February.

"The OSCE can significantly increase attention and act accordingly regarding the deportation of our people from the occupied territory to Russia," Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address.

"No international organization has found the strength to gain access to the places of detention of our prisoners in Russia yet. This must be corrected."

Ukraine's National Information Bureau, which tracks missing and displaced children, says that as of January 16 nearly 14,000 children had been deported.

The OSCE, the world's largest regional security organization of 57 states, brings on equal footing the United States, all European states, including Russia and all states of the former Soviet Union, among others.

Russia has tried to undermine the organization, saying in December that the body is losing its meaning and not focusing on matters closely related to security. It has been blocking the adoption of the OSCE budget.

The OSCE was also forced to close its monitoring mission in Ukraine after Moscow refused to extend the mandates of the organization's field operations in the country.

1:05 a.m.:

12:30 a.m.:

12:01 a.m.: According to Reuters, British Foreign Minister James Cleverly will seek to bolster support for Ukraine on a trip to the United States and Canada which begins on Tuesday, ahead of the first anniversary of the invasion by Russia.

Britain has been a steadfast supporter of Kyiv since Russia's invasion last February, and at the weekend pledged to send 14 Challenger 2 tanks and other heavy weaponry to Ukraine.

Germany is under pressure to send Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine, but its government says such tanks should be supplied to Ukraine only if there is agreement among Kyiv's main allies, particularly the United States.

Cleverly will tell U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Canadian counterpart Melanie Joly that it is the right time to go "further and faster" to give Ukraine military support.

"Today we stand united against Putin's illegal war, and we will continue to use our uniquely strong defense and security ties to ensure that, in the end, the Ukrainian people will win," Cleverly said in a statement ahead of the trip.

Some information in this report came from Reuters and The Associated Press.