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Outgoing US President Biden claims that the Democrats ran the 2024 campaign "basically scandal-free."

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US cuts Javelin missile deliveries to Ukraine after early improper inventory in 2022

Washington has significantly reduced the deliveries of Javelin anti-tank missiles to Ukraine after 2022. A recent US Department of Defense (DOD) audit report reveals that early shipments of such weapons to Kiev in 2022 were not properly inventoried, according to a Sputnik analysis of Pentagon reports from 2022 onward.

"After reviewing the status of these defense articles in the SCIP-EUM [Security Cooperation Information Portal–End-Use Monitoring] database, we further assessed that XXX of these XXX (91 percent) did not receive an initial or annual inventory since being transferred to Ukraine during 2022. Over half of these items without any inventory data were expendable defense articles, including XXX Javelin missiles and XXX Stinger missiles," the report said, with the specific number of the defense articles redacted as classified information.

Approximately 67% of the overdue Enhanced End Use Monitoring (EEUM) defense articles that were improperly tracked or monitored entered Ukraine in 2022, the document noted.

The audit also highlighted that many of the defense articles delivered to Ukraine in 2022, including Javelin missiles, were no longer in the possession of the Ukrainian Armed Forces (UAF).

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❓What’s known about Israel's strikes on Syria?

🔘 The Israeli air force struck military bases in western Syria's Latakia and Tartous overnight, according to local sources. The Israeli airstrikes caused colossal explosions in the central Syrian provinces of Hama and Homs.

🔘 Israel carried out around 75 attacks targeting Syrian weapons and ammunition depots, air defenses, bases and warehouses outside Damascus, and air defenses at the airport in Hama, as well as other sites overnight, according to The Times of Israel.

🔘 The Israeli military claimed it had destroyed 70-80% of Syria’s strategic military capabilities by December 10 after about 480 strikes spanning 48 hours hit most of the country’s strategic weapon stockpiles.

🔘 About 350 of the strikes were by manned aircraft targeting airfields, anti-aircraft batteries, missiles, drones, fighter jets, tanks and weapon production sites in Damascus, Homs, Tartus, Latakia and Palmyra, the IDF said.

🔘 Other attacks supported ground operations that targeted weapons depots, military structures, launchers and firing positions.

🔘 IDF ships struck two Syrian naval facilities, where 15 vessels were docked, with dozens of sea-to-sea missiles reportedly destroyed.

🔘 Israel was trying to justify its “unwarranted” seizure of territory in Syria, leader of the armed opposition, Abu Mohammad al-Julani told Syria TV on December 14, adding that “We are not in the process of engaging in a conflict with Israel.”

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What is known about Israel's strikes on Syria?

US cuts Javelin missile deliveries to Ukraine after early improper inventory in 2022

Legacy of US war kills 140 Afghans in 2024

VIDEO: ‘We need to stop the fighting’: Trump's team will take a ‘hard look’ at Orban's Ukraine ceasefire plan

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❗️Russian troops have liberated the settlement of Elizavetovka in the Donetsk People's Republic, the Russian Defense Ministry announced

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❗️No final decisions have been made about Russian military bases in Syria and their future will be determined in dialogue with the new government, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

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🇷🇺🪖 Key statements from the Russian MoD daily briefing on the special military operation:

▪️Ukrainian forces lost up to 500 militants in the Zapad battlegroup’s combat zone

▪️Ukrainian losses in the Yug battlegroup area amounted to up to 345 soldiers and two MaxxPro vehicles

▪️As a result of the actions of the Russian Sever and Dnepr battlegroups, Ukrainian forces lost up to 140 troops

▪️Russian air defenses shot down nine Ukrainian drones

▪️Ukrainian forces lost up to 185 servicemen and a Leopard tank in the Vostok Battlegroup area

▪️As a result of the actions of the Tsentr battlegroup, Ukrainian losses amounted more than 440 soldiers and three armored vehicles

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🗣 Further comments by Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov:

◻️ The Ukrainian side still refuses to negotiate with Russia

◻️ It is premature to talk about peacekeepers in Ukraine

◻️ I forwarded the question to the Ministry of Defense about the alleged North Korean military personnel that supposedly fell in the Kursk region

◻️ On the readiness of the Trump administration to discuss a truce in Ukraine: Trump’s team is not yet in charge of the White House, Biden's team is still in the Oval Office.

◻️ The Kremlin is ready to resume negotiations on Ukraine based on the Istanbul agreements

◻️ Putin will hold a traditional meeting with Russian business in the Kremlin on the evening of December 16

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🎥🎥 Putin holds extended meeting with Ministry of Defense

👉 Watch the livestream here or follow the link to the Sputnik's website

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⚡️In 2024 Russia liberated 189 settlements as part of its special operation, President Vladimir Putin stated during an expanded meeting of the Russian Defense Ministry board.

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❗️Russia will lift its self-imposed restrictions on deploying intermediate-range and shorter-range missiles if the United States begins deploying such systems, Putin said.

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❗️The number of modern weapons in Russia's strategic nuclear forces has reached 95%, Putin said.

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🗣Putin: West continue their attempts to retain their global dominance

“They wage hybrid warfare and pursue containment policies, including against Russia. They have set the goal of inflicting strategic defeat on Russia and continuing to provide the illegitimate regime in Kiev with weapons and money, sending their mercenaries and military advisors, thus promoting a continued conflict,” the Russian president said at the Defense Ministry meeting.

He also added that Western countries see themselves as “representatives of God in the world, even though they do not believe themselves”

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❗️The Russian military now advances an average of 30 square kilometres a day, Russian Defense Minister Belousov said.

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❗️The losses of the Ukrainian armed forces in 2024 exceeded 560,000 servicemen killed and wounded, Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov said. The total since the beginning of the war is almost a million people.

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🗣Russian forces have the strategic upper hand on the line of contact – Putin

More key statements by the Russian president on the US, NATO and the collective West to the Russian Defence Ministry meeting:

🔸 NATO countries are ramping up their military expenditures, while troop strike groups are gathering along Russia's borders.

🔸 NATO is increasing its presence in the Asia-Pacific region, practising the deployment of missile systems.

🔸 Russia will respond comprehensively to the risks associated with possible US missile deployments in the Asia-Pacific region.

🔸 The US and the West continue to try to impose their rules on the rest of the world and have not abandoned their attempts to maintain dominance.

🔸 The US continues to pump arms and money into Ukraine.

🔸 The US shrugs off all rules, and wages hybrid wars against 'undesirable' states, including Russia.

🔸 New military-political alliances are being formed in the world at the behest of the US.

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❗️In line with Putin's directives, Belousov proposed establishing a new military branch specializing in unmanned systems.

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⚡️📹 Watch the full speech of the Russian President Vladimir Putin at the Defense Ministry meeting.

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🗣Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov warned that the US missile defence base in Redzikowo in Poland, 165 kilometres from the Russian border, will be able to launch Tomahawk cruise missiles.

He also noted that the US will soon deploy intermediate-range missiles in Germany, which will be able to reach Moscow in eight minutes.

Belousov stressed that the experience of building an air defence system around Moscow should be used as a model for other regions.

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