WAR IN UKRAINE: January 13, 2023
Odesa residents rejoiced Thursday as street lights were switched on throughout the city centre for the first time in weeks. Russian attacks on critical infrastructure had triggered blackouts nationwide. Friday marks New Years Eve on the Julian calendar.
LATEST DEVELOPMENTS: Day 324
Ukrainian fighters remain in the eastern town of Soledar, Russian-installed authorities in the Donetsk region have said today. This is despite claims made overnight by mercenaries in the Wagner Group that the hotly contested area had been seized. However, Russian-installed authorities claim the western part of the town is under the full control of Vladimir Putin's forces. Ukraine has denied that victory has been seized by Russians, saying this morning that "fierce fighting" continues - SKY News
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in his daily address thanked the Ukrainian soldiers defending the eastern town of Soledar from a Russian assault. “Especially today I would like to highlight the paratroopers of the 77th separate airmobile brigade, who along with the fighters of the 46th separate airmobile brigade in Soledar hold their positions and inflict significant losses on the enemy,” Zelensky said. “I thank you, guys! The Ukrainian military unit stationed in Soledar said Thursday that the situation in the contested eastern town “is critical. News coming soon,” the 46th Airmobile Brigade said on Telegram - CNN
The children of sanctioned officials, security officials and parliamentarians continue to visit NATO and EU countries - including the U.S., Italy and Greece, The Insider investigation found out. Dubai, Bali, the Maldives and the Seychelles are also popular holiday destinations for travelers whose fathers are at war with Ukraine.
Russia and Ukraine did not reach a new prisoner exchange agreement during talks in Turkey, the Telegraph has reported this afternoon. It added that Moscow's envoy told the AFP news agency that her earlier remarks about a potential swap were "misinterpreted". Tatyana Moskalkova, the Russian human rights commissioner, held talks with her Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Lubinets in Ankara yesterday. She was later quoted by Turkish state media as saying an exchange of "more than 40 prisoners" from each side had been agreed. But Ms Moskalkova has now confirmed these numbers referred to the number of people who had been exchanged in the past. She said that "someone misunderstood something" from her comments.
A Ukrainian official said Thursday that Russia is stepping up its “illegal integration” of occupied territory into Russia. “They began to replace driver's licenses with Russian ones and issue Russian license plates with a numeric indication of the Russian region,” Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Maliar said on Telegram. “The occupiers announced that it will be prohibited to operate vehicles, including personal ones, without meeting these conditions, and in case of violation they can be seized.” Maliar also claimed that Russian forces were forcibly evicting locals from homes in order to house military forces - CNN
Required reading…
Why Putin might have ordered yet another shake-up of his military leadership - and what it could suggest
Analysis by Diana Magnay, Sky News Moscow correspondent
Replacing Sergey Surovikin with the Chief of the General Staff, Valery Gerasimov, feels a little like President Putin is trying to consolidate the Ministry of Defence's hold over an operation whose most recent successes, if Soledar can be counted as that, have been driven by freelancers, ie Evgeny Prigozhin and his band of Wagner mercenaries.
Prigozhin had good words to say about Surovikin; Gerasimov and Prigozhin will not have that kind of pally rapport. Could this be a way of Defence Minister Shoigu and ultimately, let's face it, President Putin, putting Prigozhin in his place?
Keeping him at arm's length - after all those triumphant videos Prigozhin posted of himself in the trenches and salt mines around Bakhmut - lest he get too buoyed by his successes and forget who's ultimately in command?
It may be a way of signalling too that Russia is in this for the long haul and now heralds a new, concerted phase in the war, an "expansion of the scale of tasks" as the Ministry of Defence put it. Less about what Surovikin failed to achieve and more about putting the "special military operation" under the most senior leadership.
Surovikin had a tricky mandate. He had to take the fall for the retreat from Kherson even though it was a situation he inherited. Russian troops then essentially consolidated their positions for the winter with Wagner doing a lot of the offensive work around Bakhmut. Surovikin can hardly be charged with having "failed" in his short tenure.
Rather, appointing Gerasimov as head of operations in Ukraine may simply suggest that now begins a new phase, a tandem approach of the top army personnel, Gerasimov with Surovikin as his deputy.
Probably not a role Gerasimov will relish given the difficulty of pulling off anything game-changing any time soon. Plus this will require his full attention, so who will take on his other responsibilities? Questions still unanswered.
But if this is about slapping anyone down, it seems to be about Prigozhin not Surovikin. And it leaves Gerasimov, who alongside Shoigu and Putin dreamt up the "special military operation" in the first place, with quite the task on his hands.