These are the important thing developments from day 1,391 of Russia’s battle on Ukraine.
Printed On 16 Dec 2025
Right here is the place issues stand on Tuesday, December 16:
Preventing
- A Russian drone assault killed a 62-year-old Ukrainian man as he was driving a bicycle within the Velyka Pysarivka neighborhood of Ukraine’s Sumy area, Governor Oleh Hryhorov mentioned in a submit on the Telegram messaging app.
- Russian forces launched 850 assaults on Ukraine’s Zaporizhia area in a single day, injuring 14 folks and damaging homes, vehicles and infrastructure, Governor Ivan Fedorov mentioned on Telegram.
- Russian forces injured 5 folks in assaults on Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk area, and 6 folks within the Kherson area up to now day, native officers mentioned, in accordance with the Ukrainian information company Ukrinform.
- In Dnipropetrovsk, these injured included a firefighter and manufacturing facility employee, harm after Russian forces launched a second assault on a manufacturing facility within the Synelnykivskyi district, as rescuers tried to answer a fireplace brought on by an earlier Russian assault, the State Emergency Service of Ukraine reported on its web site.
- Russian assaults induced energy outages in Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, in addition to the Donetsk and Dnipropetrovsk areas, the Ukrainian power firm NPC Ukrenergo mentioned on Fb.
- Ukraine claimed that underwater drones had, for the primary time within the battle, struck a Russian submarine docked within the Black Sea port of Novorossiysk.
- The pinnacle of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet press service, Aleksei Rulyov, denied that the underwater drone assault was profitable. “Not a single ship or submarine of the Black Sea Fleet situated on the base in Novorossiysk Bay was broken,” he mentioned. “The enemy’s try at sabotage by way of underwater drones failed to realize its goals.”
Ceasefire talks
- US President Donald Trump mentioned a deal to finish Russia’s battle in Ukraine was “closer than ever” after American, Ukrainian, European and NATO leaders met in Berlin for hours of talks on a possible settlement, hosted by German Chancellor Friedrich Merz.
- European leaders issued a joint assertion after the talks, saying that any selections on potential Ukrainian territorial concessions to Russia can solely be made by the folks of Ukraine, and as soon as sturdy safety ensures are in place for Kyiv.
- In addition they mentioned that US and European leaders had agreed to “work collectively to offer sturdy safety ensures”, together with a European-led “multinational power” made up of countries keen to help “in securing Ukraine’s skies, and in supporting safer seas, together with by way of working inside Ukraine”.
- Talking at a information convention after the talks, Merz mentioned that the US had provided “appreciable” safety ensures, and that though there may be now a “likelihood for an actual peace course of”, “territorial settlement stays a key query”.
Regional safety
- Russian Minister of International Affairs Sergey Lavrov known as “the EU’s aggressive actions the primary risk on the planet in the meanwhile”, and claimed that the US is making an attempt to place Europe “as a replacement”, in an interview with Iranian state tv.
- Germany’s decrease home of parliament, the Bundestag, suffered a serious electronic mail outage. Officers advised UK newspaper The Monetary Instances that they think it was a cyberattack, whereas the Ukraine ceasefire talks had been happening in Berlin.
- Air Chief Marshal Sir Richard Knighton, the brand new head of the UK’s armed forces, has known as for “nationwide resilience” within the face of a “rising” threat from Russia. “It means extra folks being able to battle for his or her nation,” Knighton mentioned of the risk from Moscow, whereas additionally referring to current feedback from his French counterpart, Fabien Mandon, who mentioned France have to be able to “lose its youngsters”.
