Ukraine Update…694 days into the Russian Conflict…

Ukraine and Poland leaders make nice…

EU leaders express support for the Ukraine in its conflict with Russia….

Zelensky may talk to Hungary’s leader Orban, who has dragging his feet on EU funding for Ukraine from the EU….

The UK provides evidence of th North Korea to Russia arms shipments….

The Russian Foreign Minister uses the UN to sell Putins view of what the Ukraine should be vs what it actually is….

• Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, said he had “very productive talks” with Poland’s prime minister, Donald Tusk, who visited Kyiv today. The Ukrainian leader said the two countries would be able to resolve problematic issues.

• Tusk underlined that Warsaw and Kyiv would work in a spirit of friendship to resolve differences.

• Denys Shmyhal, Ukraine’s prime minister, said that he “discussed the free movement of goods across the border” with Tusk and that the sides agreed to resume intergovernmental consultations.

• EU foreign ministers discussed support to Ukraine.

• With ministers focusing much of their attention today on the situation in the Middle East, the bloc’s foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, insisted that Ukrainians should not worry and that the EU’s support for Kyiv would continue as strong as ever.

• Borrell also said Ukraine “needs more and faster military support now”.

• Latvia’s foreign minister, Krišjānis Kariņš, said that “if we do not help Ukraine stop Russia now, it will be only all the more expensive for us later”.

• Elina Valtonen, Finland’s foreign minister, said there’s a need to fulfil Ukraine’s immediate defence needs, but that Europe also needs to ramp up its defence industry and capabilities.

• Zelenskiy announced a proposal aimed at granting ethnic Ukrainians and their descendants Ukrainian citizenship.

• There is movement toward a meeting between Zelenskiy and Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán, a senior Ukrainian official said.

• The UK updated its travel advice “to advise against all but essential travel” to the regions of Zakarpattia, Ivano-Frankivsk, Ternopil, Chernivtsi in western Ukraine. Previously, there was advice against all travel to the whole of Ukraine.

• The UK has provided satellite photographs of North Korean cargo shipments to Russia to a panel of UN experts.

• The Kremlin has drawn up a bill to confiscate property and valuables from Ukraine war critics convicted of, among other crimes, “discrediting the Russian army” or calling for foreign sanctions….

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Russia continues to weaponize its position on the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to propagate several long-standing Russian information operations. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov spoke at a UNSC meeting, which Russia convened, on January 22 and blamed the West for the lack of negotiations, claiming that Russia has always been “ready for negotiations.” Lavrov clarified, however, that Russia is only interested in negotiations that result in the removal of the current Ukrainian government from power, confirming that Russia still officially seeks regime change in Ukraine. Lavrov continued to deny Ukraine’s independence and sovereignty, falsely claiming that the Ukrainian people have no interests in the war against Russia and that the West has pushed Ukraine to continue the war. Lavrov advised the West to understand that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s ”peace formula” is a “path to nowhere,” claiming that the “sooner [the West] realizes this, the better it will be for both Ukraine and the West.” Lavrov also claimed that “if Ukraine stops fighting, hundreds of thousands” of Ukrainian lives would be saved. Lavrov previously made similar comments, suggesting that the Kremlin believes that Russia will be able to occupy more territory as the war continues and that this course of the war will increasingly weaken Ukraine’s negotiating position.