Russia-Ukraine War: List of key events, day 1,033 | Russia-Ukraine war News

Here are the key developments on the 1,033rd day of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Here's the situation on Monday, December 23:

Fighting:

• More than 1,000 North Korean soldiers have been killed or injured in the war between Russia and Ukraine, South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said on Monday.
• Russia's Defense Ministry said its air defense systems destroyed 42 Ukrainian planes in five Russian regions overnight on Sunday.
• Russian forces captured two villages in Ukraine, one in the northeastern Kharkiv region and the other east of Donetsk, Russia's Defense Ministry said on Sunday.
• A Ukrainian army general said Sontsivka, a town in the east, had come under attack from 26 Russians in the past 24 hours. The crew also reported heavy fighting around Pokrovsk, with 34 Russian attempts to break through the defenses.
• Parliamentary Commissioner for Human Rights of Ukraine Dmytro Lubinets said that Russian soldiers killed five unarmed Ukrainian prisoners on Sunday.
• The Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) has named Colonel General Alexei Kim, Russia's deputy chief of the General Staff, as one of the people it suspects of ordering a missile strike on a hotel in eastern Ukraine in August. The SBU said he did this “with the intention of deliberately killing employees” of the Reuters news agency.

Diplomacy and Security

• Russian President Vladimir Putin has vowed to retaliate after Ukrainian warplanes crashed into residential buildings in the city of Kazan in Russia's Tatarstan region.
• Putin met Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico in the Kremlin on Sunday, a rare visit by a European Union leader to Moscow as a contract allowing Russian gas to flow through Ukraine nears expiration.
• South Korea says North Korea is preparing to deploy more troops and weapons to help Russia in its all-out war with Ukraine, Yonhap news agency reported.
• US President-elect Donald Trump said on Sunday that Russian President Vladimir Putin has expressed a desire to meet with him “immediately” to discuss the war in Ukraine.