Demonstrators in Baymak, a small town in Russia's central Bashkortostan region, clashed with riot police yesterday after a court sentenced eco-activist and campaigner for the protection of the Bashkir language Fail Alsynov to four years in prison for “incitement to hatred”. According to OVD-Info, which monitors protests across Russia, police used tear gas to disperse protesters. The head of the local Interior Ministry, Rafail Divayev, urged people to back down and said: “I advise you to come to your senses and not ruin your lives.”
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said his country's priority for 2024 is to gain control of its skies. “In 2024, of course, the priority is to kick Russia out of our skies,” Kuleba said in a speech at the World Economic Forum.
A new military doctrine that for the first time involves the use of nuclear weapons will be presented by Belarus, Defense Minister Viktor Khrenin said at a meeting of the Belarusian Security Council on Tuesday.
A senior NATO military officer said the war in Ukraine could “determine the fate of the world” and that Western armies and political leaders must dramatically change how they help Kiev repel invading Russian forces. The chairman of the NATO military committee, Admiral Rob Bauer, also stated, in a meeting of senior NATO officials at the Brussels headquarters, that fear of democracy lies behind Putin's logic of war.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said he doesn't think a ceasefire in Ukraine is close, but he may see a future in which Ukraine can stand firmly on its own two feet. Blinken spoke in Davos with WEF founder Klaus Schwab and commentator Thomas Friedman.
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Ukraine: Kiev Defense Minister cancels visit to France
Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Oumerov has canceled his visit to France scheduled for today “for security reasons”. The French Ministry of Defense announced this in a statement released late yesterday evening. The Ukrainian minister will however participate in the morning, in a videoconference with his French counterpart Se'bastien Lecornu, in the launch in Paris of a “military coalition” aimed at strengthening Kiev's capabilities in the face of Russia. This coalition, led by France and the United States, is one of the components of the contact group for the defense of Ukraine, known as the Ramstein group, which brings together more than 50 countries that support Kiev. This component, in which 23 nations participate, “aims to federate efforts to help Ukraine – in the short and long term – to have an artillery force suited to the needs of the counteroffensive and its army of tomorrow”, declared the French Ministry of the Armed Forces in a previous press release. This afternoon, Lecornu and Oumerov planned to visit Nexter's industrial sites in Bourges, where Kiev's popular Caesar self-propelled guns are produced, and then that of missile manufacturer MBDA in Selles-Saint-Denis, another city of central France.
Moscow's mayor says a drone was shot down near the capital
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said Thursday that Russian air defense units shot down a plane south of the capital, with no damage or casualties on the ground. Sobyanin, writing on the Telegram messaging app, said the drone was intercepted and shot down in the Podolsk district while en route to the capital. The fragments fell to the ground, but there was no damage or casualties.
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