As the war begins on day 680, these are the key developments.

Here is the situation as of Thursday, January 4, 2024.

Battle

• Russia and Ukraine exchanged hundreds of prisoners of war It was the largest single prisoner release since Russia began its full-scale invasion in February 2022. Ukrainian officials said 230 of its prisoners were released, while Russia said 248 of its soldiers were returned after mediation by the United Arab Emirates.
• Russia said Ukraine launched Attacks on the Belgorod and Kursk regions, as well as the Crimean peninsula, which Moscow annexed and annexed from Ukraine in 2014. Belgorod Region Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said the situation remained “tense” after 12 rockets were fired over the region. Around 25 people were killed in an air strike on Belgorod on Saturday. There were no reports of casualties from Wednesday’s attacks.
• Two people were killed and one injured after 134 Russian strikes hit the Zaporizhia region in the 24 hours ending Wednesday, according to Yuri Malashko, head of Ukraine’s regional military administration.
• One person was killed in heavy Russian shelling of the southern Kherson region and the capital of Ukraine.
• One person was killed and one injured after Russia fired four rockets into the eastern town of Avdiivka, Donetsk regional head Vadym Filashkin said in a Telegram message. The Russian-occupied city not far from Donetsk has been the scene of fierce fighting for weeks.
• The UK Defense Ministry said the Russian military may have changed its attack strategy in Ukraine to target the country’s defense industry rather than the country’s energy infrastructure, as it did last winter. “Russian planners almost certainly recognize the growing importance of the relative capabilities of the defense industry as they prepare for a long war,” the ministry said in its latest intelligence report.

• Oleksandr Syrskyi, commander of the Ukrainian army’s ground forces, said Russian forces were continuing their offensives in Bakhmut and Kupyan on the eastern front, with fighting particularly intense in Bakhmut. Syrskyi said Russian forces suffered losses in Lyman and were regrouping in preparation for a new offensive.
• Russia said four people were injured after its plane accidentally bombed the village of Petropavlovka in southwestern Russia on Tuesday. There was also damage to houses, a school and some administrative buildings as well as vehicles.

Politics and diplomacy

• The European Union imposed it Sanctions against Alrosa, the largest diamond mining company in the world, to further cut off Russian revenue streams. The company’s CEO, Pavel Alekseevich Marinychev, was also sanctioned. According to the EU, Alrosa accounts for more than 90 percent of all Russian diamond production.
• Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said the country will need more than $37 billion in foreign financing this year and that Kiev is counting on “stable and timely assistance” from its international partners to keep its economy afloat.
• Rafael Grossi, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said inspectors had been denied access to parts of the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine for two weeks and had not yet received maintenance plans for the plant through 2024.

weapons

• Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski said Western countries should tighten sanctions against Russia and provide Kiev with long-range missiles that would allow it to attack “launch sites and command centers.”
• Norway will send two F-16 fighter jets to Denmark so that Ukrainian pilots can train to operate the US-made planes. Ten Norwegian instructors have already been sent to Denmark to help train the pilots.