Russia-Ukraine war: List of key events – day 1,075

Here is the situation on Monday, February 3:

Fighting

• Two men have been charged in connection with the murder of a draft officer in the central Poltava region, according to the prosecutor general of Ukraine. One of the suspects allegedly called an acquaintance who arrived at the scene and shot the officer while he was being driven to a military training facility.
• One man was hurt in an “unidentified object” explosion close to a Ukrainian military recruitment center in Pavlohrad, according to Kyiv’s police. Regional police in Dnipropetrovsk announced an investigation is being conducted.
• Igor Girkin, a prominent nationalist and former commander of the militia, was sentenced to four years in prison after being found guilty of inciting extremism, but the Russian Supreme Court declined to hear his appeal.
• According to Governor Igor Babushkin, flights were suspended at several airports in the southern Russian region of Astrakhan after a falling drone from a Ukrainian region overnight started a fire. No casualties were reported.

• Russia illegally deported at least 20, 000 Ukrainian children to occupied Crimea and Russia since 2022 under the guide of evacuation and rehabilitation programmes, Ukraine’s presidential adviser on children’s issues, Daria Herasymchuk, said. She added that with the aid of humanitarian organizations and allies, Ukraine was able to bring 1, 189 children home.
• Herasymchuk claimed that Moscow’s efforts to recruit Ukrainian teenagers into the Russian military were in violation of the Geneva Convention. The Institute for the Study of War has said that Russia has used “rehabilitation” and “evacuation” camps in Crimea to indoctrinate and militarise Ukrainian children.

Politics &amp, Diplomacy

• Vladimir Putin, the president of Russia, called it “strange” and “shameful” to not have Moscow attend the events surrounding the Auschwitz liberation. Puntin added that if it had been difficult to invite the soldiers’ relatives because of their age or health, the situation could have been handled more subtly and that the relatives of the Soviet soldiers who had liberated the camp could have been.
• Putin praised Donald Trump’s political philosophy, claiming that the newly elected president would bring the European elite back on track. He predicted that it would occur very soon and that “they will be wagging their tails nicely at their master’s heel.”
• According to Keith Kellogg, Trump’s representative for Ukraine, both Moscow and Kyiv must be willing to make compromises in order to successfully resolve the conflict. “I think both sides will give a little bit”, he said.

• Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the president of Ukraine, has recently made a fresh appeal to the West asking for more assistance to defend Kyiv from Russian-style attacks. “We need better protection – air defence systems, long-range weapons and sanctions pressure”, he said.
• Zelenskyy’s communication adviser, Dmytro Lytvyn, said the US’s call for Kyiv to hold an election after agreeing to a ceasefire with Moscow looked like a “failed plan” if there was not more to it. He admitted that he had not seen Kellogg’s full interview on the subject, but said Ukraine would prefer a more in-depth approach.

• Trump claimed in a press release that talks with Russia and Ukraine are “pretty well” going. He claimed that discussions and meetings with interested parties, including Moscow and Kyiv, were planned.