Ukraine-Russia war – latest news: Putin’s forces ‘step over corpses of own soldiers’ as Wagner pours in more fighters

Thousands of Ukrainian refugees are being housed in hotels as councils struggle to deal with a rising number becoming homeless.

Nearly 3,000 Ukrainian households have presented themselves as homeless to English councils since the end of February 2022.

And with renting privately becoming “all but impossible” and limited social housing available, many councils have had no choice but to place them in temporary accommodation when their Homes for Ukraine or family sponsorships break down.

Councils have said that the “growing number” of Ukrainians presenting as homeless is placing pressure on local services.

Our social affairs correspondent Holly Bancroft reports:

Russia‘s Gazprom said it would ship 35.5 million cubic metres of gas to Europe via Ukraine on Tuesday, a volume broadly in line with those of recent days.

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.”

The British defence ministry has claimed that the Russian and Wagner forces have made tactical advances into the small Donbas town of Soledar and are likely in control of most of the settlement in the last four days as the offensive gathered pace.

“Soledar is 10 km north of Bakhmut, the capture of which likely continues to be Russia’s main immediate operational objective,” the defence ministry said in its latest intelligence update today.

It added that Russia’s Soledar axis is highly likely an effort to envelop Bakhmut from the north, and to disrupt Ukrainian lines of communication.

“Part of the fighting has focused on entrances to the 200 km-long disused salt mine tunnels which run underneath the district. Both sides are likely concerned that they could be used for infiltration behind their lines,” the MoD said.

Russia is unlikely to envelop the town imminently because Ukrainian forces maintain stable defensive lines in depth and control over supply routes despite the increased pressure on Bakhmut, the ministry said.

The Ukrainian general staff has claimed that Russia is conducting offensives in three areas.

The Russian military is focusing its efforts near Bakhmut, Avdiivka, and Lyman, located on the eastern part of Donetsk Oblast, the Ukrainian army’s general staff said in the latest update from the battle’s frontlines, adding that the troops from Moscow are looking to push to the administrative border of the oblast.

The U.S. would risk enabling the spread of extremism in Europe if it stopped providing support to Ukraine in its war with Russia, Maine’s independent senator said Monday in the wake of meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Sens. Angus King of Maine and Jack Reed of Rhode Island, who sit on the U.S. Senate Committee on Armed Services, traveled to Kyiv last week to meet with Zelenskyy. King said he came back more certain that U.S. aid to Ukraine is vital.

Ukraine is slated to receive $44.9 billion in U.S. aid as part of the recent government spending bill. The U.S. should continue supporting Ukraine until Russian President Vladimir Putin is out of power, King said. He characterized Putin as “a dictator.”

Two British nationals helping evacuate civilians in Ukraine have gone missing in the Donetsk region.

The men, aged 28 and 48, were last seen on 6 January heading to the town of Soledar, where fighting has been especially fierce in recent days. There has been no contact with the pair since they left Kramatorsk at 8am on Friday.

The two missing men have been identified to The Independent as Andrew Bagshaw, 48, and Christopher Parry, 28.

A famous Russian actor is being threatened with criminal charges by Russian authorities after publicly criticising the war in Ukraine.

The search for Artur Smolyaninov, a prominent film and theatre actor, was announced by Russia’s top investigative on Monday in tandem with a second probe against a philanthropist who supports the Russian opposition.

In a statement, Russia’s Investigative Committee said that its chief Alexander Bastrykin ordered the launch of a criminal case against Mr Smolyaninov, who fled the country after Moscow’s forces invaded Ukraine.

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The Pentagon is looking to send Stryker armoured combat vehicles to Ukraine in the upcoming tranche of assistance, reported Politico.

A defence department official aware of the internal deliberations said that the Strykers — an eight-wheeled armoured fighting vehicle built by General Dynamics Land Systems — can be part of the next batch of military aid being shared with Ukraine, the report added.

Another US military staple, the Strykers can operate in snow, mud and sand but has limited off-road mobility due to lack of tracks.

Russian authorities on Monday announced parallel criminal probes against a famous actor critical of the war in Ukraine and a philanthropist who supports the Russian opposition, the latest in a months-long, sweeping crackdown on dissent.

Russia’s Investigative Committee said in a statement that its chief Alexander Bastrykin ordered the launch of a criminal case against Artur Smolyaninov, a prominent Russian film and theater actor who left the country after Moscow’s forces invaded Ukraine and repeatedly spoke out against the war.

According to the statement, Smolyaninov “made a series of statements directed against Russia in an interview to a Western media outlet.” The Investigative Committee didn’t clarify which of Smolyaninov’s actions constituted a criminal offense and what charges it would bring against him.