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Russia has no interest in fighting with Nato country if it wins in Ukraine, Vladimir Putin says
Hello and welcome to the Guardian’s live coverage of the war in Ukraine.
Russian president Vladimir Putin said US president Joe Biden’s remark that Russia would attack a NATO country if he won in Ukraine was complete rubbish, Reuters reports, adding that Russia had no interest in fighting with the Nato military alliance.
Turkey, Romania and Bulgaria plan to sign a deal in January on a joint plan to clear mines floating in the Black Sea as a result of the war in Ukraine, Turkish Defence Minister Yasar Guler said on Saturday, after months of talks between the Nato allies. Speaking to reporters at a meeting in Ankara, Guler said the “Trilateral Initiative” would only include Turkey, Romania, and Bulgaria for now, and their defence ministers planned to hold a signing ceremony in Istanbul on 11 January.
A third Ukrainian truck driver has died in blockades at the Polish border staged by Polish truckers, Ukraine’s Suspilne public broadcaster said on Saturday.
Suspilne, quoting an official from Ukraine’s international trucking association, said the driver took ill at the Krakivets-Korczowa crossing – one of four points affected by the protests. He died while being taken to a hospital. Two truckers had died last month after becoming snared in the blockades.
Moldovan president Maia Sandu hailed the adoption by parliament of a new defence strategy calling for anchoring Moldova alongside its western allies and identifying Russia as a threat to the former Soviet state. Sandu posted on Facebook two days after the European Union agreed to open talks on extending its membership with both Moldova and neighbouring Ukraine – more than 21 months into Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.
Hungary will veto Bulgaria’s entry into Europe’s passport-free Schengen Zone unless it scraps a transit tax on Russian gas, the Hungarian foreign ministry said on Saturday. The veto threat follows Thursday’s agreement among all 27 European Union members except Hungary to start accession talks with Ukraine despite its invasion by Russia, bypassing prime minister Viktor Orbán’s grievances by getting him to leave the room.
Vladimir Putin will run for president again as an independent candidate with a wide support base but not on a party ticket, Russian news agencies reported on Saturday, citing his supporters. An initiative group made up of over 700 politicians and figures from the sporting and cultural worlds met on Saturday in Moscow and unanimously endorsed Putin’s nomination as an independent candidate, Russian news agencies said.
The Ukrainian air force said Saturday that it had repelled a Russian drone attack overnight, shooting down 30 of 31 drones launched by Moscow. The attack targeted regions including the capital Kyiv, the southern region of Kherson as well as the western Khmelnytsky region.
A Ukrainian missile attack on a Russian-held village in southern Ukraine killed two people, Moscow’s occupying authorities in the Kherson region said on Saturday. Moscow’s forces said the missile hit the village of Nova Mayachka, on the Russian-occupied bank of the Dnipro river and located 70 kilometres (40 miles) east of the Ukrainian-held city of Kherson.
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