Nato has offered its support to Finland and Estonia as it investigates the possible sabotage of Baltic Sea cables. Mark Rutte, the chief of the alliance, said on Thursday: “Spoke with [Estonian prime minister] Kristen Michal about reported possible sabotage of Baltic Sea cables. Nato stands in solidarity with allies and condemns any attacks on critical infrastructure. We are following investigations by Estonia and Finland, and we stand ready to provide further support.” Finnish authorities have seized a ship carrying Russian oil in the Baltic Sea amid suspicions it caused the outage of an undersea power cable connecting Finland and Estonia a day earlier, and that it also damaged or broke four internet lines. A Finnish coastguard crew boarded the Cook Islands-registered ship, named by authorities as the Eagle S, on Thursday. Twelve western countries said on 16 December that they had agreed measures to “disrupt and deter” Russia’s shadow fleet to prevent sanctions breaches and increase the cost to Moscow of the war in Ukraine. On Thursday, the Finnish president, Alexander Stubb, said on X: “We must be able to prevent the risks posed by ships belonging to the Russian shadow fleet.”
Russia and Kazakhstan have sought to play down speculation about an Azerbaijan Airlines plane crash, as a US official said there were early indications that a Russian anti-aircraft system may have struck the plane. Earlier, a Ukrainian national security official and several sources in Azerbaijan claimed that the crash, which killed 38 people on Christmas Day, was caused by Russian air defence fire. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Thursday the investigation into the cause of the crash was under way, adding that it would be “wrong” to speculate before the inquiry concluded.
Slovakia has offered to be a “platform” for possible peace talks between Russia and Ukraine, Russian president Vladimir Putin said on Thursday. Putin told a televised press conference that Slovakia’s prime minister, Robert Fico, “said that if there are any negotiations, they would be happy to provide their country as a platform”. He added that Russia was “not against it”, praising Slovakia’s “neutral position”. Slovakia, an EU and Nato member, has halted military aid to Ukraine for more than a year under Fico’s government, and called for peace talks. Fico, one of the few European leaders to maintain ties with the Kremlin, met the Russian president in Moscow on 22 December despite western efforts to isolate Putin and present a united front in support of Kyiv. Fico has accused Kyiv of jeopardising his country’s supply of Russian natural gas, on which it is heavily dependent. The prospect of peace talks to end the conflict in Ukraine that began in February 2022 has grown since the re-election of Donald Trump to the White House. Trump has vowed to push for a quick deal to halt the fighting when he takes office in January, sparking fears in Kyiv and Europe that Ukraine could be pushed to make concessions to Moscow.
Putin also claimed that in 2021, US President Joe Biden offered to “push back” Ukraine’s entry into Nato. “In 2021, the current president Biden offered exactly that: push back Ukraine’s Nato membership by 10 to 15 years, because it was not yet ready,” he claimed at a press conference on Thursday. “I answered reasonably that ‘Yes, today it is not ready. But you will prepare it for it and you will accept it.’” But for Russia, “What is the difference – today, tomorrow or in 10 years?” Ukraine has been urgently seeking a Nato invitation before the end of the Biden administration, however Putin considers Nato membership for Ukraine an unacceptable threat.
Russian drones struck a multi-storey apartment building in the frontline town of Chasiv Yar, killing two people and injuring two in the Donetsk region of Ukraine on Thursday, regional prosecutors said. Chasiv Yar has been under attack by Russian forces for many months as part of Russia’s drive westward to capture the Donbas region. The town lies west of Bakhmut, a regional centre which fell to Russian forces in May 2023 after months of heavy fighting.
Moldova’s parliament has approved a 10-year defence strategy calling for increased defence spending as part of a plan to join the European Union. The chamber’s pro-Russian opposition ridiculed the document – which aims to boost defence spending by 2030 to 1% of gross domestic product – as pointlessly directed against Moscow in view of Moldova’s small land mass and armed forces. The document cites risks of the Ukraine conflict spreading, particularly around the Black Sea port of Odesa close to Moldova’s border. Pro-western president Maia Sandu, re-elected to a second term last month, has accused Russia of trying to unseat her government. The former Soviet state is one of Europe’s poorest countries, lying between Ukraine and EU member Romania.