Live: At least two people killed in Kherson after ‘massive’ Russian shelling

3:49pm: NATO will not treat Russia like Moscow treats its neigbours, says Polish president

NATO countries can guarantee to Russia that they will not treat it in the same way Moscow is treating Ukraine, Poland’s president said in response to a question about French President Emmanuel Macron’s idea of security guarantees for Russia.

“What we, as honest people, politicians, NATO members, are able to guarantee to Russia is that no one is going to do to Russia what she is doing to her neighbours,” Andrzej Duda told a news conference in Berlin on Monday.

2:30pm: Two killed in ‘massive’ Russian shelling of Ukraine’s Kherson, says governor

At least two people were killed and five wounded in the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson on Monday after what the regional governor said was “massive shelling” by Russian forces.

Ukrainian troops liberated the city from Russian occupation on November 11. Ukrainian officials say Russian forces have been firing on it since then from the opposite side of the Dnipro River.

2:06pm: EU agrees to top up fund used for Ukraine arms purchases by €2 billion

European Union foreign ministers agreed on Monday to replenish a fund that has been used to pay for military support for Ukraine with another €2 billion.

There is a possibility of a further boost at a later stage, with the total increase until 2027 amounting to up to 5.5 billion euros, said the European Council which is grouping the bloc’s member states.

“Today’s decision will ensure that we have the funding to continue delivering concrete military support to our partners’ armed forces,” EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said in a statement.

12:08pm : Ukraine could provide workers for Czech arms industry

Highly-trained Ukrainian workers could fill thousands of job vacancies in the Czech arms industry to help meet demand triggered by the war in Ukraine, a Czech defence official said on Monday.

The Czech Republic has been one of the top weapons providers to Kyiv among NATO allies since Russia invaded Ukraine on February  24. Deliveries, though, have badly depleted inventories and officials have warned it could take years to restock. Some Czech arms producers have already signalled that they need to boost their workforce.

“(There) will be thousands of jobs,” Deputy Defence Minister Tomas Kopecny was quoted as saying by Czech Radio, suggesting that workers could come from Ukraine, whose own arms industry has been targeted by Russian attacks.

Kopecny said Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala had agreed to take in Ukrainian weapons experts when he met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv in October.

12:04pm: UN aid chief to visit Kherson on Ukraine trip amid power outages

UN aid chief Martin Griffiths arrived in Ukraine on a four-day trip on Monday as officials raced to repair energy facilities hit by Russian air strikes that have caused winter power outages.

The under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator will visit the southern city of Mykolaiv as well as the frontline city of Kherson, which was liberated last month, the United Nations said.

It said in a statement that nearly 18 million people –around 40 percent of Ukraine’s population – need humanitarian aid.

Waves of Russian attacks on infrastructure are leaving “millions of people without means to heat their homes, have clean water or electricity, at the same time as a freezing winter sets in”, it said.

8:52am: Ukraine’s Odesa port resumes operations after blackout 

Ukraine’s Black Sea port of Odesa has resumed operations after a Russian attack on the region’s energy system lead to a temporary power cut, a spokesperson for the infrastructure ministry said Monday.

Russia has since October been targeting Ukraine’s energy infrastructure with waves of missile and drone strikes.

Ukrainian Agriculture Minister Mykola Solsky said on Sunday that two other ports – Chornomorsk and Pivdennyi – that are authorised to export grains from Ukraine under a deal between Russia and Ukraine were partially operating. 

8:45am: Alleged strike on Wagner group HQ in Luhansk: ‘If true, a very successful strike for Ukrainians’

FRANCE 24’s correspondent in Ukraine Gulliver Cragg on Monday said that if the alleged Ukraine strike on the Wagner group’s headquarters in Kadiivka turns out to be true, it would be “a very forceful, successful strike for the Ukrainians”.

On Sunday, Serhiy Gaidai, governor of the Russian-occupied Luhansk region, said Ukrainian forces had hit a hotel where many members of the Russian mercenary group were staying, killing a “huge number” of them. So far, however, the claimed attack has not been independently confirmed.

Watch Cragg’s report below, where he goes through what it would mean for Ukraine if the alleged strike on the Wagner Group turns out to be true.

7:25am: EU leaders to meet on more Russia sanctions

European Union foreign ministers are set to meet to try to agree on further sanctions on Russia and Iran and an additional €2 billion for arms deliveries to Ukraine. They will discuss a ninth package of sanctions that would add almost 200 individuals and entities to the already very long EU sanctions list.

However, it remained unclear whether Hungary will block some decisions, resorting to what diplomats have denounced as “blackmail diplomacy” due to a dispute over locked EU funds for Budapest.

“There is agreement, in principle, but there’s also the big elephant in the room,” a senior EU diplomat told reporters, referring to Budapest’s use of its veto power. “It’s a type of blackmail diplomacy that we would rather not see but it is what it is.”

4:01am: Zelensky’s talks with world leaders signal diplomatic flurry around Ukraine

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky held talks with US President Joe Biden and with the leaders of Turkey and France on Sunday, stepping up diplomatic activity around a war started by Russia nearly 10 months ago.

“We are constantly working with partners,” Zelenskiy said in his nightly video address, adding that he expects some “important results” next week from a series of international events that will tackle the situation in Ukraine.

While Zelensky has held numerous talks with Biden, French President Emmanuel Macron and Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan since Russian forces invaded in late February, the accumulation of discussions in just one day is not a regular event.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP, AP and Reuters)