Ukraine news latest: UK ‘could send Challenger tanks’ as Bakhmut faces ‘bloodiest battle’ of Putin’s war

Twitter owner Elon Musk has sparked yet another debate on social media after he described tanks as “deathtraps” that should not be used in Russia’s war against Ukraine.

“Tanks are a deathtrap now,” tweeted Mr Musk before drawing parallels with the First World War. “With neither side having air superiority, you’re left with infantry & artillery – essentially WW1.”

The comments from the tech tycoon came as Ukraine received tank-killing armored vehicles in its latest multibillion-dollar package of military aid from the US.

This included 50 Bradley armored vehicles and 500 anti-tank missiles they can fire. Germany also announced it would supply around 40 Marder armored personnel carriers and France promised wheeled AMX-10 RC tank destroyers.

Western countries have stopped short of providing heavy tanks to Ukraine that could be used for offensive operations, despite Kyiv saying it needs them. In a video message thanking France’s Emmanuel Macron for the AMX-10s, Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelensky said: “There is no rational reason why Ukraine has not yet been supplied with Western tanks.”

The Biden administration said Monday that Iran‘s sale of lethal drones to Russia for use in its ongoing invasion of Ukraine means the country may be “contributing to widespread war crimes.”

National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan leveled the charge against Iran on Monday as he spoke to reporters accompanying President Joe Biden on a trip to Mexico. While it did not signal a policy shift, the charge marked some of the sharpest U.S. rhetoric against Iran since it began providing weapons to Russia to support its nearly year-long war in Ukraine. It comes as the U.S. and European partners are looking to further ostracize both nations in the court of public opinion, as they face challenges with physically stopping the transfers of weapons on which Russia is increasingly reliant.

Sullivan said Iran had chosen “to go down a road where their weapons are being used to kill civilians in Ukraine and to try to plunge cities into cold and darkness, which from our point of view, puts Iran in a place where it could potentially be contributing to widespread war crimes.”

Looking ahead to a likely spring offensive, the U.S. and Germany are sending Ukraine an array of armored vehicles, including 50 tank-killing Bradleys, to expand its ability to move troops to the front lines and beef up its forces against Russia as the war nears its first anniversary.

The vehicles don’t fulfill Ukraine’s request for combat tanks. But they provide a strategic war-fighting capability as the season change brings muddy terrain and Ukraine launches an aggressive campaign to recoup territory taken by Russia, particularly in the east.

Britain is weighing up supplying Ukraine with tanks for the first time to help the country fight Russian forces, it has been reported.

Discussions have been taking place “for a few weeks” about delivering the British Army’s Challenger 2 main battle tank to Ukraine, Sky News reports, quoting a Western source with knowledge of the conversations.

The broadcaster cited one source as saying Britain could offer around 10 Challenger 2 tanks. The move would constitute a major step up in western support for Ukraine, with the potential to prompt other NATO allies, such as Germany, to emulate.

The government has not yet made a final decision on the potential boost to its military support for Ukraine, but should it been given the green light the UK would become the first nation to respond to Kyiv’s pleas for more powerful western tanks.

The Ministry of Defence did not confirm nor deny Sky News’s report, but said in a statement the UK “will continue to build on recent donations with training and further gifting of equipment”.

A cargo ship carrying corn that went aground early on Monday in the Suez Canal was refloated and traffic through the crucial waterway was restored, Egyptian authorities said.

According to Adm. Ossama Rabei, head of the Suez Canal Authority, the Marshall Islands-flagged MV Glory suffered a sudden technical failure while transiting through the canal, and four tugboats were deployed to help refloat it.

The vessel, owned by Greek firm Primera Shipping Inc., was heading to China before it broke down at the 38 kilometer (24 mile) -mark of the canal, near the city of Qantara in the province of Ismailia, Rabei said.

The Joint Coordination Center listed the Glory as carrying over 65,000 metric tons of corn from Ukraine bound for China. The vessel was inspected by the center — which includes Russian, Turkish, Ukrainian and United Nations staffers — off Istanbul on Jan. 3.

Poland’s President Andrzej Duda met Monday with the prime minister and some of his ministers to discuss security issues amid the war in neighboring Ukraine, including Kyiv’s request for delivery of Western-made heavy battle tanks.

After the meeting, top national security official Jacek Siewiera said decisions were taken as to current and future support to Ukraine, but did not provide any details.

Earlier, a presidential aide said that Kyiv’s request for German-made Leopard 2 tanks which Poland, among other countries, uses, would be on the agenda.

Pawel Szrot said that should Warsaw decide to hand over a limited number of Leopard tanks it would “only be within a wide agreement and an undertaking by other countries that have these tanks.”

Szrot stressed that such decisions need to also take Poland’s security into account.

The US has not seen any evidence of Belarusian troops preparing to deploy in Ukraine, a senior US military official has reportedly stated.

The source, who remains unnamed, told Voice of America’s Jeff Seldin that this is despite Russian and Belarusian troops continuing to train together.

Western experts believe that Russia is pushing for Belarus to enter the war. However, no Belarusian soldiers have been sent into Ukraine.

The US official further remarked that intense fighting is continuing around the eastern city of Bakhmut and surrounding areas, stating that the battlefield “has not changed significantly.”

Kyiv has rejected a Russian claim that a missile strike on a city in Ukraine’s Donetsk region killed 600 of its troops, insisting there were no fatalities.

Russia’s defence ministry had earlier alleged that missiles had hit two makeshift bases housing 1,300 Ukrainian soldiers in the city of Kramatorsk.

Its spokesperson Igor Konashenkov said the bombardment had been launched in retaliation for Ukraine’s New Year’s Eve attack on temporary bases in the eastern city of Makiivka, which killed at least 89 Russian troops.

But Serhii Cherevatyi, spokesman for Ukraine‘s forces in the east, told the Associated Press on Sunday that the strikes on Kramatorsk only damaged civilian infrastructure, adding: “The armed forces of Ukraine weren’t affected.”

According to Ukrainian authorities, 15 people including a two-year-old have been injured in a Russian strike on the city of Ochakiv.

Regional governor Vitaliy Kim confirmed that the two-year-old was amongst those injured.

During the attack, a hospital in the city had its windows and doors damaged. However, none of those injured were hospital patients.

Just yesterday, one attack on a market killed two women. Four others, including a 10-year-old girl, were injured in the strike on the village of Shevchenkove in eastern Ukraine.

The idea of Russia as a defender of traditional Christian beliefs has been used to justify Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, write Mary Ilyushina and Mary Gelman:

As Russian president Vladimir Putin steers Russia toward becoming a closed-off, conservative society, ruled by “traditional values” and bound tightly to the Orthodox Church, with visions of a “Russian world” in opposition to the decadent, amoral West, the Russian parliament has expanded Moscow’s official discrimination against gays and others of non-heterosexual orientations.

The idea of Russia as a defender of traditional Christian beliefs has been used to justify Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. And it has driven the Russian Parliament to tighten restrictions on LGBT+ “propaganda”.

In December, Putin signed legislation making it illegal to promote or “praise” same-sex relationships, to publicly express non-heterosexual orientations, or to suggest they are “normal” – expanding a 2013 law that prohibited spreading “gay propaganda” among minors. That ban now applies to all ages.