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Latest Developments in Ukraine: Dec. 20


A woman sings a carol in front of a Christmas tree, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, at the Sofiyska Square in Kyiv, Ukraine, Dec. 19, 2022.
A woman sings a carol in front of a Christmas tree, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, at the Sofiyska Square in Kyiv, Ukraine, Dec. 19, 2022.

For full coverage of the crisis in Ukraine, visit Flashpoint Ukraine.

The latest developments in Russia’s war on Ukraine. All times EST.

11:19 p.m.: Ukraine has revoked the press accreditation of Danish state broadcaster DR's correspondent over allegations of having spread Russian propaganda, DR said on Tuesday, Reuters reported, prompting denials from both the journalist and her employer.

Matilde Kimer, an award-winning journalist who has covered Ukraine and Russia for DR since 2014, said Ukraine initially revoked her accreditation in August.

At a December meeting in Kyiv, the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) alleged that she was spreading Russian propaganda and that her social media posts appeared to sympathize with Russia, Kimer told Reuters. According to her, the security service did not provide evidence of their allegations.

Neither the SBU nor the Ukrainian Defense Ministry immediately responded to written requests for comment when contacted by Reuters.

10:23 p.m.: Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said on Tuesday Ukraine should prepare for new Russian attacks on its energy infrastructure because Moscow wanted Ukrainians to spend Christmas and New Year in darkness, Reuters reported.

He made his remarks after a series of Russian missile and drone strikes that Ukrainian officials say have left electricity supplies in the Kyiv region at a critically low level, with less than half the capital's power needs being met.

"Repairs continue but the situation remains really difficult," Shmyhal told a government meeting.

He said eight nuclear power units and 10 thermal power stations were operating but the energy deficit was "significant."

"Russian terrorists will do everything to leave Ukrainians without electricity for the New Year. It is important for them for Christmas and the New Year to take place in darkness in Ukraine," Shmyhal said.

"That's why we should prepare for new attacks."

9:35 p.m.: EU countries have cut the amount of natural gas they consume by 20% over the past four months as they adapt to an energy crunch, the bloc's statistics agency said Tuesday, Agence France-Presse reported.

Taken overall, the number was higher than the voluntary 15% target the European Union member states had signed on to in August.

It underlined the bloc's drive to reduce demand for energy as it copes with greatly diminished supplies from Russia, which has turned off its gas taps in retaliation for EU sanctions over its war in Ukraine.

Finland led the dive, with gas consumption down 53% between August and November, compared with the average consumption for that period between 2017 and 2021, Eurostat said.

All but two EU countries showed declines, with major economies Germany, France slicing the amount of gas used by 25% and 20%, respectively, over that period.

8:52 p.m.: Luxembourg's finance ministry on Tuesday said it had authorized the release of certain frozen funds or economic resources held at the Clearstream settlement house by Russia's National Settlement Depository (NSD), Reuters reported.

The general license issue should allow non-sanctioned Russian investors to transfer assets from the NSD, Russia's domestic paying agent that was sanctioned by the European Union in June, to other locations.

Luxembourg's finance ministry said in a statement that funds would be released "on the condition that these funds or economic resources are necessary for the termination by 7 January 2023 of operations, contracts or other agreements concluded with, or otherwise involving, that entity before 3 June 2022."

Analysts from Otkritie Investments wrote that Luxembourg appeared to have taken numerous appeals from Russian depositories and investors into account.

"This is a clear and positive signal that gives grounds to expect a decision on the issue of unblocking securities of Russian private investors," Otkritie analysts said.

8 p.m.: A World Health Organization official said on Tuesday that 10 million people, or about a quarter of Ukraine's population, may suffer from a mental health disorder in relation to the conflict there, Reuters reported.

"WHO estimates that up to 10 million people are at risk of some form of a mental disorder, varying from anxiety and stress to more severe conditions," Jarno Habicht, WHO's representative in Ukraine told a Geneva press briefing via video link.

More severe conditions include post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) caused by distressing events. Cases are rising after 10 months of conflict, prompting a separate U.N. agency to launch online support services.

Ukraine's health care system has been under pressure since Russia invaded in February. So far, there have been at least 700 attacks on its health care system, WHO data shows, and Russia's increase in attacks on critical infrastructure since October has added to the challenges by causing blackouts.

7:12 p.m.: France has delivered rocket launchers and weapons to Ukraine and will send more early next year, French President Emmanuel Macron said in an interview aired Tuesday, Agence France-Presse reported.

"In recent days, France has sent Ukraine more arms, rocket launchers, Crotale (air defense batteries), equipment beyond what we had already done," Macron told France's TF1 and LCI television.

He was speaking aboard the French aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle off Egypt's coast, a day before visiting Jordan for a regional summit on Tuesday.

"We are also working with the armed forces minister (Sebastien Lecornu) to be able to deliver useful arms and ammunition again in the first quarter (of 2023), so that the Ukrainians would be able to defend themselves against bombardments," Macron said.

The planned shipments include new Caesar mobile artillery units, but Macron provided no precise figures.

The president said the number "will depend" on the outcome of ongoing discussions with Denmark, which had ordered the Caesar guns from France and may agree to give at least some of them to Kyiv.

6:30 p.m.: Russia's Transneft has received requests from Poland and Germany for oil in 2023, the state oil pipeline monopoly's head told Rossiya-24 TV, Reuters reported, adding that supplies via the Druzhba pipeline's southern spur are expected to hold steady next year.

The EU has pledged to stop buying Russian oil via maritime routes from December 5, with Western nations also imposing price caps on Russian crude oil, but the Druzhba pipeline remains exempt from sanctions.

Transneft's comments are at odds with suggestions last month that Poland aimed to abandon a deal to buy Russian crude.

Sources familiar with the talks had told Reuters that Poland was seeking German support for EU sanctions on the Polish-German section of the Druzhba pipeline so that Warsaw could abandon a deal to buy Russian oil next year without paying penalties.

A German economy ministry spokesperson said reports that Germany had ordered Russian crude oil were false and the mineral oil companies at the eastern German refineries in Leuna and Schwedt are no longer ordering Russian crude for the next year.

5:51 p.m.: The World Bank on Tuesday said it had approved an additional financing package totaling $610 million to address urgent relief and recovery needs in Ukraine as Russia's war continues, Reuters reported.

The package includes a $500 million loan from the World Bank's International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, that is supported by a guarantee from Britain, and a new project to restore and improve access to health care and address war-related needs for health services, the bank said.

The remaining $110 million would go to a Health Enhancement and Life-saving (HEAL Ukraine) Project aimed at improving and strengthening primary health care, addressing increased demand for mental health and rehabilitation services due to the war, and restoring services in hospitals that are facing capacity constraints, it said.

The aid comes on top of about $18 billion mobilized for Ukraine by the World Bank, of which about $15 billion has been disbursed.

5 p.m.: London has ordered investment fund LetterOne, which was founded by Russian oligarchs targeted by Western sanctions, to sell U.K. regional internet provider Upp for national security reasons, Agence France-Presse reported.

Business minister Grant Shapps said that the measure was "necessary and proportionate to prevent, remedy, or mitigate the risk to national security," according to the decision published on Monday.

London said the risks related to the "ultimate beneficial owners" of the fund and Upp's "expanding full fiber broadband network" in the U.K.

Russian oligarchs Mikhail Fridman and Petr Aven, whom the U.K. targeted with sanctions in the wake of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, announced in March that they were stepping down from the investment fund they co-founded in 2013.

The two men, who deny having any financial or political relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin, resigned from the board of directors.

4:09 p.m.: A Polish man who died fighting in Ukraine was buried in his native soil Tuesday as weeping mourners praised him as a hero of two nations, The Associated Press reported.

The body of Daniel Sztyber, 35, of Warsaw, lay in a coffin covered in Poland’s white-and-red flag. Young Ukrainians draped in their nation’s flag and aging World War II veterans joined Sztyber’s parents, sister and childhood friends in mourning him.

At the graveside in Warsaw’s Powązki Cemetery, the resting place of illustrious Poles, Sztyber was praised as a freedom fighter in a long Polish tradition of sacrifice.

It is illegal for Poles to fight in foreign armies, but some have volunteered to help defend Ukraine during Russia’s invasion. Poles, like other foreigners who have decided to take part in a war that technically isn’t theirs, feel they are fighting to defend the free world against the menace of a re-awakened Russian imperialism.

3:20 p.m.: The Russian Justice Ministry is seeking the closure of the country’s oldest human rights watchdog, the Moscow Helsinki Group (MHG), amid a Kremlin campaign to muzzle criticism of the war in Ukraine, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported.

The ministry's motion appeared on the Moscow City Court's website on Tuesday.

MHG was established in 1976 by prominent Soviet dissidents in the apartment of legendary rights defender and physicist Andrei Sakharov. Its members were arrested or forced into exile soon after MHG was founded.

The group revived its operations in Russia in the late 1980s.

2:30 p.m.: The Economist has chosen Ukraine as its country of the year, it said in a statement and on Twitter. “In normal times, picking The Economist’s country of the year is hard,” the media organization said on its website. “Our writers and editors usually begin with a freewheeling debate in which they spar over the rival claims of half a dozen shortlisted nations. But this year, for the first time since we started naming countries of the year in 2013, the choice is obvious. It can only be Ukraine.”


1:55 p.m.: Brazilian President-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said on Tuesday that Russian President Vladimir Putin had congratulated him on his recent election win and talked of stronger relations between the two countries.

Putin said earlier this year he had "good relations" with both Lula and far-right incumbent Jair Bolsonaro, who made an official trip to Moscow in February, just days before the start of the war in Ukraine.

Lula, who plans to visit the United States and China early in his term, has tried to highlight that Brazil is "back" on the world stage since he won an election in October.

Brazil and Russia are both members of the BRICS group of emerging economies that also includes China, India and South Africa.

In a separate statement, the Kremlin said both men had expressed confidence that the countries' "strategic partnership ... will develop successfully, including within the BRICS framework."

1:30 p.m.:

1:15 p.m.: Many of the millions of Ukrainian refugees in central and eastern Europe plan to mark Christmas early this year in solidarity with their hosts, learning carols in new languages to generate holiday cheer despite fears for relatives back home, Reuters reported.

Ukrainians generally celebrate Christmas on January 7 in common with Russians, but the country's Orthodox church has gradually shifted from Moscow's orbit in recent years.

Following Russia's invasion of Ukraine this year, the church has said congregations can now also celebrate on Dec. 25 -- something many refugees said they would embrace.

12:45 p.m.: The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs has released its latest situation report on conditions in Ukraine, saying that 17.7 million people remain in need of assistance.


12:20 p.m.: A local unit of the Russian energy giant Gazprom said on Tuesday that gas was being supplied to customers in full via parallel pipelines following a fatal explosion in a section of the Urengoi-Pomary-Uzhhorod pipeline, Reuters reported.

The blast, near Kalinino, around 150 km (90 miles) west of the Volga city of Kazan in central Russia, killed three people and threatened to disrupt some of the limited volume of Russian gas that is still reaching Europe despite the economic fallout from Russia's military campaign in Ukraine.

11:50 a.m.:


11:25 a.m.: Ukraine's defense minister said on Tuesday that Russia could prepare an attack force in Belarus to launch a new offensive on Ukraine, but that he hoped Minsk's troops wouldn't take part, Reuters reported.

Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov and other Ukrainian officials have suggested Moscow could attempt a winter offensive after mobilizing more troops.

A visit to Belarus by Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday also increased speculation abroad that Moscow wants its ally to play a more direct role in the war in Ukraine.

Reznikov told Ukrainian television there was no evidence that Russia had already begun assembling an offensive-ready combat force in Belarus, which borders both Russia and Ukraine, or that Minsk would be dragged into the war.

"I think it's not in the interests of the leadership of Belarus to waste its military potential," Reznikov told Ukrainian television. "So I have hope that they will continue holding this balance."

11:05 a.m.:

10:40 a.m.: A blast ripped through a gas pipeline in central Russia, killing three people and disrupting some of the limited amount of Russian gas that is still reaching Europe, local officials said on Tuesday, according to Reuters.

The flow of gas through a section of the Urengoi-Pomary-Uzhhorod pipeline that takes gas from Russia's Arctic to Europe via Ukraine had been halted as of 1:50 p.m. (1050 GMT), the local officials said on the Telegram messaging app.

Oleg Nikolayev, governor of the Republic of Chuvashia, told state TV that three people, who were carrying out servicing work, has died in the accident, while another, a driver, "was in a state of shock".

He said it was unclear when gas supplies via the pipeline could resume, and authorities were trying to work that out.

The Chuvashia regional Emergencies Ministry said an explosion had ripped through the pipeline during planned maintenance work near the village of Kalinino, about 150 km (90 miles) west of the Volga city of Kazan. It said the resulting gas flare had been extinguished.

10:25 a.m.: Ukrainian artillery crews have been using up their Soviet-era ammunition supplies and now need to find more sources for reloading their vintage howitzers. Along with testing new shells made in Ukraine, troops are hoping to get replenished supplies of Soviet-era-compatible ammunition from Poland, the Czech Republic, and Lithuania. In the meantime, Ukrainian troops continue to employ both older equipment and more modern, Western-supplied guns with better range and accuracy. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty has this report.


10:10 a.m.: There are conflicting views in Russia on whether or not to launch a counteroffensive in Ukraine, a senior State Department official said on Tuesday, but reiterated that Washington would continue its support of Kyiv regardless of which scenario plays out, Reuters reported.

"Certainly there are some (within Russia) who I think would want to pursue offensives in Ukraine. There are others who have real questions about the capacity for Russia to actually do that," a senior State Department official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told reporters.

Ukraine's top general, Valery Zaluzhniy, told The Economist last week that Russia was preparing 200,000 fresh troops for a major offensive that could come from the east, south or even from Belarus as early as January, but more likely in spring.

9:50 a.m.:


9:35 a.m.: Britain accused Russia of planning to give Iran advanced military components in exchange for hundreds of drones, British defense minister Ben Wallace said on Tuesday. He called on the West to do more to expose the trade, Reuters reported.

"Iran has become one of Russia's top military backers," Wallace told parliament as part of a statement on the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

"In return for having supplied more than 300 kamikaze drones, Russia now intends to provide Iran with advanced military components, undermining both Middle East and international security — we must expose that deal. In fact, I have, just now."

Wallace did not provide detail on the type of military components he said Russia wanted to give Iran. The Russian defense ministry and Iran's foreign ministry did not immediately respond to Reuters requests for comment.

9:20 a.m.:


9:05 a.m.: Electricity supplies in the Kyiv region were at a “critical” level on Tuesday, with less than half the capital’s power needs being supplied following Russian missile and drone attacks, Reuters quoted regional officials as saying.

Regional governor Oleksiy Kuleba said 80% of the region was without electricity for a second day after Russian drones hit energy infrastructure around on Monday, the latest in a series of attacks on power facilities since October.

8:50 a.m.:



8:35 a.m.: Russian President Vladimir Putin hailed his country’s military and security agencies during a Kremlin ceremony Tuesday, The Associated Press reported.

While the Kremlin tries to advance its stalled invasion and Ukrainians burned their furniture to try to stay warm, Putin praised the “courage and self-denial” of his front-line forces in Ukraine. Among others, he presented awards to the Moscow-appointed heads of four regions of Ukraine that Russia illegally annexed in September.

The Kremlin released a video address by Putin before Tuesday’s award ceremony. In it, he singled out for praise the security staff deployed to the illegally annexed regions of Ukraine, saying that “people living there, Russian citizens, count on being protected by you.”

“Your duty is to do all that is needed to ensure their safety and protection of rights and freedoms,” the Russian leader said on the national day commemorating the security agencies’ work.

He promised to reinforce units stationed in the annexed areas with more equipment and personnel. The regions are under pressure from a Ukrainian counteroffensive, as well as from Russian attacks on non-occupied cities and towns.

Russia’s ground invasion, which began February 24, has lost momentum in recent months. The annexed provinces - Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia - remain fiercely contested. Capturing Bakhmut, which is located in Donetsk, would cleave Ukraine’s supply lines and open a route for Russian forces to press on toward the cities that are key Ukrainian strongholds in the province.

Mercenaries from the Wagner Group, a shadowy Russian military company, are reported to be leading the charge in Bakhmut. Before Russia’s full-scale invasion, Russia-backed separatists had controlled parts of Donetsk and neighboring Luhansk since 2014. The two provinces together make up the Donbas.

8:10 a.m.:


7:50 a.m.: Russia attacked Ukrainian oil and gas facilities in eastern Ukraine overnight, causing a fire but no casualties, Ukrainian energy company Naftogaz said on Tuesday, according to Reuters.

"Enemy missiles hit one of the facilities in the Kharkiv region. A large-scale fire broke out at the site, its elimination is currently underway. There are no casualties," the company said in a statement.

Oleksiy Chernyshov, chief executive of state-run Naftogaz, said the damage would be assessed after emergency services finished their work and that everything that had been damaged would be restored.

7:20 a.m.:

7:05 a.m.: Heavy fighting continued in Donetsk as Russian forces pressed their relentless attacks on eastern Ukraine and President Volodymyr Zelenskiy made a daring visit to Bakhmut, one of the two frontline cities that together with Avdiyivka have been the focus of Moscow's months-long offensive, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported Tuesday.

As Moscow's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine entered its 300th day, the General Staff of the Ukrainian military said that Russian troops continued to meet stiff resistance in the two cities, while failing to reestablish their positions in Lyman, another flashpoint city in Donetsk.

Meanwhile, deadly Russian bombardment again hit the recently liberated Ukrainian city of Kherson, a regional official said. Two people were killed and three were wounded as a result of Russian shelling, the head of the regional military administration, Yaroslav Yanushevych, said on Tuesday.

In the central Dnipropetrovsk region, Russian shelling overnight caused destruction in Nikopol, the head of the regional administration, Valentyn Reznychenko, said on Telegram.

Oleskiy Kuleba, the governor of the wider Kyiv region surrounding the capital, said Tuesday that 80 percent of the region remains without electricity.

The Ukrainian military said its air force carried out 22 strikes on Russian positions, while its air-defense systems downed two enemy helicopters. The claims could not be independently verified.

6:45 a.m.:

6:10 a.m.: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has visited the frontline city of Bakhmut, his office said on Tuesday, according to Reuters.

The office said that during the visit to Bakhmut, scene of some of the heaviest fighting in eastern Ukraine in recent weeks, Zelenskyy met military representatives and handed out awards to soldiers.

5:50 a.m.: According to a report by Agence France-Presse, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said Monday it had approved an economic monitoring program for Ukraine which could help Kyiv secure funding from donors, with the war-torn country needing more than $40 billion this year.

The monitoring program "is designed to help Ukraine maintain stability and catalyze donor financing amid very large balance of payment needs and exceptionally high risks," following the Russian invasion, the IMF said in a statement.

Ukrainian authorities are committed to economic and financial reforms, concerning in particular tax collection, the domestic debt market, transparency and the independence of the central bank, the IMF said.

They have four months to prove their progress as per the Program Monitoring with Board involvement (PMB) scheme, the statement said.

5:20 a.m.:

4:52 a.m.: This new report by Agence France-Presse interviews dancers with the Kyiv-based National Opera Ballet of Ukraine as they prepare for a run of shows in Paris. The dancers tell AFP about trying to stay limber during unscheduled intermissions in bomb shelters during air raids, remember one of their own who was killed in the war and discuss why this isn’t the Christmas for Tchaikovsky’s “The Nutcracker.”

4:28 a.m.: The Associated Press published a new report on Ukraine’s efforts at “de-Russification,” focusing on a campaign by Kyiv to rename city streets.

The purpose is to shift the landscape away from the cultural iconography of Russia and the Soviet Union and shine the spotlight on Ukraine’s native sons and daughters. When Kyiv first introduced the initiative, they received 280,000 name change suggestions in a single day.

In 2022 so far, 200 streets in Kyiv have been re-named, and another 100 are scheduled to be soon.

3:54 a.m.: Russia's Transneft has received requests for oil for 2023 from Poland and Germany, the state oil pipeline monopoly's head told Rossiya-24 TV station, according to TASS news agency.

The EU has pledged to stop buying Russian oil via maritime routes from December 5, with Western nations also imposing price caps on Russian crude oil, but the Druzhba pipeline remains exempt from sanctions.

Transneft's comments are at odds with suggestions last month that Poland aimed to abandon a deal to buy Russian crude.

Sources familiar with the talks had told Reuters that Poland was seeking German support for EU sanctions on the Polish-German section of the Druzhba pipeline so that Warsaw could abandon a deal to buy Russian oil next year without paying penalties.

"They announced that they would not take oil from Russia from January 1. And now we have received requests from Polish consumers: give us 3 million tons next year, and 360,000 tons for December, and Germany has already submitted a request for the first quarter," Transneft head Nikolay Tokarev was quoted as saying by TASS on Tuesday.

He also said that the Black Sea port of Novorossiisk has expanded export capacity for low-sulfur oil to 40 million tons a year.

3:16 a.m.:

2:55 a.m.:

2:26 a.m.: The Associated Press reported that officials of the Jehovah's Witnesses said four Russian members of the religious denomination have been sentenced to prison terms ranging up to seven years.

Russia banned the Jehovah’s Witnesses in 2017 and designated the religion an extremist organization. More than 110 adherents are now in prison in Russia, Jehovah's Witnesses spokesman Jarrod Lopes said in a statement.

He said the latest convictions were handed down in a court in the city of Birobidzhan in Russia's far East, four years after they were arrested in home raids.

“It’s unthinkable that peaceful Christian men ... would be accused of extremist activity and given harsh, lengthy prison sentences usually reserved for violent criminals,” Lopes said.

1:55 a.m.:

1:38 a.m.: Reuters reported that the United States accused U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres of "apparently yielding to Russian threats" and not sending officials to Ukraine to inspect drones used by Russia that Washington and others say were supplied by Iran.

Russia has denied its forces used Iranian drones in Ukraine and argues there is no mandate for U.N. officials to travel to Kyiv to investigate the origin of the drones. Iran has acknowledged it had supplied Moscow with drones, but said they were sent before Russia invaded its neighbor in February.

Britain, France, Germany, the United States and Ukraine say the supply of Iranian-made drones to Russia violates a 2015 U.N. Security Council resolution enshrining the Iran nuclear deal. They want Guterres to send officials to Kyiv to investigate.

"We regret that the U.N. has not moved to carry out a normal investigation of this reported violation," U.S. Deputy U.N. Ambassador Robert Wood told a Security Council meeting on Monday on the 2015 Iran nuclear deal resolution.

"We are disappointed that the Secretariat, apparently yielding to Russian threats, has not carried out the investigatory mandate this council has given it," Wood said.

In a report to the council earlier this month, Guterres said U.N. officials were examining the available information and any findings would be reported to the council in due course.

When asked on Monday about the pressure he faced, Guterres told reporters the Western accusation that Iran had supplied Russia with drones used in Ukraine was being looked at "in the broader picture of everything we are doing in the context of the war to determine if and when we should" send officials to Kyiv.

1:02 a.m.: President Vladimir Putin on Monday ordered the Federal Security Services to step up surveillance of Russian society and the country's borders to prevent risks from abroad and traitors at home, Reuters reported.

Speaking ahead of Tuesday's Security Services Day - widely celebrated in Russia - Putin said the "emergence of new threats" increases the need for greater intelligence activity.

"Work must be intensified through the border services and the Federal Security Service (FSB)," Putin said.

"Any attempts to violate it (the border) must be thwarted quickly and effectively using whatever forces and means we have at our disposal, including mobile action units and special forces."

Putin instructed the FSB to maximize their "use of the operational, technical and personnel potential" to tighten control of the society.

12:26 a.m.:

12:01 a.m.: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy urged Georgia on Monday to allow its jailed former president to go abroad for treatment to safeguard his health, Reuters reported.

Mikheil Saakashvili, president of ex-Soviet Georgia from 2004 to 2013, was initially credited with implementing reforms. He was later sentenced to six years in prison on abuse of power, charges his supporters say are politically motivated.

First convicted in absentia in 2018, Saakashvili worked for different Ukrainian governments, including Zelenskyy's administration, before returning home and being detained in 2021. He has launched a number of hunger strikes and his lawyers want his sentence suspended so he can seek treatment abroad.

"Everyone has probably seen the state of Mikheil Saakashvili's health. I appeal to the people of Georgia, to the authorities of Georgia," Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address.

"It is necessary to show mercy, especially as Christmas approaches. What is happening to Mikheil now is cruelty. It does not become Georgia. It must be stopped."

Zelenskyy asked that Saakashvili, 54, be transferred to a medical facility in Ukraine, Europe or the United States.

Some information in this report came from Reuters, Agence France-Presse and The Associated Press.

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