Russia-Ukraine war live: Russia has installed rocket launchers at Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, says Ukraine

The US is set to levy fresh sanctions against Russia and China on Friday, the Wall Street Journal reports, citing officials familiar with the matter.

The measures will target Russia’s deployment of Iranian drones in Ukraine, as well as alleged human-rights abuses by Russia.

The UK foreign secretary, James Cleverly, has announced in today’s Guardian that he will place new sanctions on individuals in Russia.

In an opinion piece titled, “Britain is not a passive observer on the world stage. We want oligarchs and dictators to fear us”, Cleverly writes:

After Vladimir Putin launched his latest onslaught against Ukraine in February, the UK put together the biggest package of sanctions ever enacted against a major economy.

So far we have targeted over 1,200 Russian individuals, including at least 100 oligarchs and their families, with a net worth exceeding £140bn.

We’ve hit whole sectors of the Russian economy, immobilising Russian central bank reserves, preventing Russian companies from raising funds in the City of London, and placing UK financial services beyond the Kremlin’s reach. Together with allies, our sanctions have undermined Russia’s ability to wage war.

Today, I will announce new sanctions on individuals in 11 countries, including Iran, Russia, Mali and Nicaragua, targeting those responsible for acts of torture, sexual violence and the repression of protests.

Meanwhile in Moscow, firefighters are battling a fire the size of a football pitch at a shopping centre in a Moscow suburb, emergency services say.

The blaze broke out overnight at the Mega Khimki shopping centre in the northern suburb of Khimki.

The suspected cause of the fire is arson, according to authorities, and there were no immediate reports of casualties.

Mega had been home to a large number of Western retail chains before the companies’ departure from Russia in the wake of the Ukraine conflict, including one of the first IKEA stores in the Moscow area.

In his late Thursday video address, Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenksiy, paid tribute to four policemen killed by landmines in Kherson province.

“This is perhaps even fiercer and more devious than missile terror,” said Zelenksiy.

“For there is no system against mines that could destroy at least part of the threat as our anti-aircraft systems do.”

He accused Russian forces of leaving landmines, tripwire mines, mined buildings, cars and infrastructure in places they abandoned under Ukrainian military pressure.

Russian forces have installed multiple rocket launchers at Ukraine’s shut-down Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, Ukrainian officials claimed Thursday, raising fears Europe’s largest atomic power station could be used as a base to fire on Ukrainian territory and heightening radiation dangers.

Ukraine’s nuclear company Energoatom said in a statement that Russian forces occupying the plant have placed several Grad multiple rocket launchers near one of its six nuclear reactors. It said the offensive systems are located at new “protective structures” the Russians secretly built, “violating all conditions for nuclear and radiation safety.”

The claims have not been verified by the Guardian.

Although the risk of a nuclear meltdown is greatly reduced because all six reactors have been shut down, experts have said a dangerous release of radiation is still possible, the Associated Press reports.

This is the Guardian’s live coverage of the war in Ukraine with me, Helen Sullivan.

Our top story this morning is that Russian forces have installed multiple rocket launchers at Ukraine’s shut-down Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, Ukrainian officials claimed Thursday, raising fears Europe’s largest atomic power station could be used as a base to fire on Ukrainian territory and heightening radiation dangers.

We’ll have more on this shortly. In the meantime, here are the other key recent developments:

• US basketball star Brittney Griner has been released in a prisoner swap with Russia in exchange for former arms dealer Viktor Bout and was heading back to the United States on Thursday, ending what President Joe Biden called months of “hell” for her and her wife.

• US secretary of state Antony Blinken said Thursday the United States is confident that Finland and Sweden will be approved soon for membership of Nato despite ratification delays from members Turkey and Hungary. After meeting his Finnish and Swedish counterparts on Thursday, Blinken said both countries had proved their bona fides to join the alliance, most notably in joining Nato to provide support to Ukraine to counter Russia’s invasion.

• Vladimir Putin has vowed to continue attacking Ukrainian energy systems despite global criticism of strikes that have left millions without electricity and water at the start of winter. The Russian leader presented the strikes as a response to the explosion on Moscow’s bridge that connected Russia to annexed Crimea, as well as other attacks, accusing Kyiv of blowing up power lines near the Kursk nuclear power plant and not supplying water to Donetsk in eastern Ukraine.

• Russia is still set on seizing parts of eastern and southern Ukraine that Putin claimed as his own, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said. He added that the Crimean peninsula in southern Ukraine, which Russia annexed in 2014, was vulnerable to attacks by Ukrainian forces, after officials there said they had shot down a drone near a key naval base.

• The United States is preparing to send Ukraine a $275m military aid package offering new capabilities to defeat drones and strengthen air defenses, according to a document seen by Reuters on Thursday and people familiar with the package.

• Russian shelling of a town in the Donetsk region in eastern Ukraine has left one person dead and two injured, according to the region’s governor, Pavlo Kyrylenko. At least 12 houses were destroyed by the shelling in the town of Toretsk, he said in a Telegram post.

• About 10,000 Ukrainian service personnel and roughly the same number of Ukrainian civilians are believed to be being held in Russian detention facilities, according to a Ukrainian official. Oleksandr Kononenko, who oversees human rights in the security and defence sector on behalf of Ukraine’s parliament, said the civilians were being detained illegally as prisoners of war because of their alleged association with the Ukrainian army or state.

• Russian forces have fired more than 1,000 rockets and missiles at Ukraine’s power grid during the war. The grid is still working despite taking major damage, a senior official said. Volodymyr Kudrytsky, the chief executive of the grid operator Ukrenergo, also told a meeting arranged by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development that his officials were scouring the world for the complex equipment needed for repairs.

• Ukraine has introduced new emergency power cuts as it tries to repair energy infrastructure damaged in Russian airstrikes. The grid operator Ukrenergo said the situation was complicated by the weather, with western regions facing frost, rain, snow and strong winds that were causing wires to ice over, but the most difficult situation was in eastern areas, where fighting has been fiercest.

• Russian troops are reportedly taking part in tactical exercises in Belarus, according to the Russian defence ministry. Video clips posted by the ministry showed Russian soldiers in snow gear training near tanks in a winter landscape, firing weapons including artillery.

• The EU plans to tighten up sanctions on Russia’s military and industrial complex, pro-Kremlin media and Russian nationalist groups fighting in Ukraine, according to leaked papers. A total of eight individuals are facing personal sanctions, including Russian officials said to be involved in the illegal transfer and adoption of Ukrainian children in Russia, as well as the leaders of rightwing nationalist groups.

• Pope Francis broke down and wept as he prayed for peace in Ukraine during a traditional Christmas visit to the Spanish Steps in Rome. Reuters reports that Francis had to stop speaking and was unable to continue for about 30 seconds, and his head trembled. He later tweeted that “peace is possible; disarmament is possible”