Russia Ukraine war live: Putin ‘playing with lives’ in plane crash as Moscow blames Kyiv

A father crying over the body of his 16-year-old son, who was hit by a Russian missile in Mariupol while playing football with his friends. Frightened and wounded pregnant women being pulled out of a maternity ward, minutes after the building was hit in an airstrike. The first sighting of a Russian tank – the letter “Z” plastered on its side – turning its turret toward the top floor of a hospital as Moscow’s forces took over the southern Ukrainian city.

Officials in Ukraine said Russia has provided no credible evidence to back its claims that their own forces shot down a military transport plane carrying Ukrainian prisoners of war who were to be swapped for Russian POWs.

The Ukrainian agency that deals with prisoner exchanges said late Friday that Russian officials had “with great delay” provided it with a list of the 65 Ukrainians who Moscow said had died in the Wednesday plane crash in Russia’s Belgorod region.

Ukraine’s Coordination Staff for the Treatment of Prisoners of War said relatives of the named POWs were unable to identify their loved ones in crash site photos provided by Russian authorities. The agency’s update cited Ukraine’s military intelligence chief, Kyrylo Budanov, as saying that Kyiv had no verifiable information about who was on the plane.

“We currently don’t have evidence that there could have been that many people onboard the aircraft. Russian propaganda’s claim that the IL-76 aircraft was transporting 65 Ukrainian POWs (heading) for a prisoner swap continues to raise a lot of questions,” Budanov, who heads Ukraine’s POW agency, said.

Nazi crimes “will never be forgotten”, Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky has said in a Holocaust Memorial Day message.

“The manmade disaster that claimed the lives of millions of innocent people.

“Six million Jews were killed…Every new generation must learn the truth about the Holocaust. Human life must remain the highest value for all nations in the world.”

Vladimir Putin’s strategy of waiting for Donald Trump to return to the White House is “another Kremlin miscalculation”, a former secretary-general of Nato has said.

Lord Robertson of Port Ellen, also a former UK defence secretary, argued that, despite his Russia-friendly rhetoric, Mr Trump actually bolstered American defences and Nato contributions as US president.

Ukraine’s counter attacks are stopping Russia from advancing in Avdiivka, Britain’s Ministry of Defence has said.

The MoD said in a statement: “Russian forces have seized the hamlets of Krokhmalne, Kharkiv on 21 January 2024 and Vesele, near Bakhmut on 18 January 2024; however, these are strategically insignificant.

“Vesele had a pre-war population of 102 and Krokhmalne, 45. This represents a continuation of Russia’s minor incremental gains whilst Ukraine focuses on active defence.

“The assessed main priority for Russian forces is the city of Avdiivka. The Russians are mounting a three-pronged attack to encircle the city from the south and north, and also fighting on the outskirts of the eastern quarter of Avdiivka city itself.

“Russian forces have suffered heavy personnel and armoured vehicle losses, frequently caused by Ukrainian uncrewed aerial vehicle munitions.

“Russian forces are reportedly attempting to bypass Ukrainian fortifications by entering the city edges via service tunnels; this is a method of infiltration they have been attempting since October 2023.

“Ukrainian counter-attacks are holding Russian forces from progressing further within the city. As the main supply route remains intact, and Ukrainian forces make local counter-attacks, Avdiivka is likely to remain in Ukrainian control over the coming weeks.”

President Joe Biden said on Friday said that the border deal being negotiated in the US Senate was the “toughest and fairest” set of reforms possible and vowed to “shut down the border” the day he signs the bill.

The bipartisan talks have hit a critical point amid mounting Republican opposition. Some Republicans have set a deal on border security as a condition for further Ukraine aid.

Earlier in the day, U.S House Speaker Mike Johnson said the deal is “dead on arrival” in its current form, according to a letter to Republican lawmakers in the House of Representatives.

The Ilyushin Il-76 military aircraft carrying 74 people was shot down near the Russian city Belgorod, just 40km north of the border with Ukraine on Wednesday. The Il-76 is a military transport aircraft designed to airlift troops, cargo, military equipment and weapons. It has a normal crew of five people, and can carry up to 90 passengers.

The Biden administration said Friday it is delaying consideration of new natural gas export terminals i n the United States, even as gas shipments to Europe and Asia have soared since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The decision by President Joe Biden, announced as the 2024 presidential election year kicks off, aligns the Democratic president with environmentalists who fear the huge increase in exports of liquefied natural gas, or LNG, is locking in potentially catastrophic planet-warming emissions when Biden has pledged to cut climate pollution in half by 2030.

Under the proposals, warheads three times as strong as the bomb which devastated Hiroshima would be based at RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk, according to Pentagon documents seen by the Daily Telegraph.

Kate Devlin has more details:

A Russian woman has been jailed for 27 years for delivering a bomb that exploded in the hands of a pro-war military blogger, killing him on the spot.

Darya Trepova, 26, was convicted by a St Petersburg court of charges including terrorism in connection with the death of blogger Vladlen Tatarsky, whose real name is Maxim Fomin, last April. Trepova, 26, denied the charges, saying she thought the statuette contained a listening device and claiming that she had acted on the orders of a Ukrainian contact, and was set up.