Russia Ukraine war latest: German military says Putin is rapidly rearming for possible attack on Nato

Russian troops have taken control of the eastern Ukrainian villages of Shevchenko and Novoiehorivka, the Defence Ministry claimed on Monday.

Shevchenko is just south of the vital city of Pokrovsk in the Donetsk region, a strategic point which Russia is slowly edging towards as it looks to cut off important Ukrainian supply routes.

Novoiehorivka lies in Ukraine’s Luhansk region.

The reports have not been independently verified.

Russia is rearming faster than previously thought and could be making preparations to attack a Nato country, a top German official has warned.

“The Russian armed forces are not just able to compensate for the enormous personnel and material losses, they are successfully rearming,” said Germany’s Maj Gen Christian Freuding.

While it is not clear that Vladimir Putin intends to attack a Nato member state, Gen Freuding said the Russian president was “clearly creating the conditions for it”.

“Production is growing, the supplies in the depots are growing,” said the head of Germany’s military task force for Ukraine, noting Russia is using Iran and North Korea to replenish its supplies of missiles, drones and tanks.

French president Emmanuel Macron has warned that the billions of euros of taxpayer money spent on Europe’s military budgets should not be used to buy only American weapons, pushing for more investment in home-grown defence industries.

Speaking minutes before the inauguration of US president Donald Trump, who has complained that Europeans do not pay enough for their defence, Mr Macron said the continent should spend more.

But he added, in a New Year address to military top brass: “We can’t raise debt together, spend more for our defence to subsidise the industry, wealth and jobs of other continents.

“When we say ‘let’s spend more for our armies’, in many countries it means, way too often, ‘buy more American materiel’.”

Mr Macron said France now had “Europe’s most efficient army” and met Nato’s military budget target of 2 per cent of GDP, but could not rest on its laurels at a time when the US might withdraw troops from Europe.

And he suggested that 2 per cent might not be enough “when the world is going off track”.

US president Donald Trump has said he will meet his Russian counterpart president Vladimir Putin but added that a date for the meeting had not been set.

Mr Trump, who took office yesterday, also said he will try to end the Russia-Ukraine war as quickly as possible.

A Russian disinformation campaign is seeking to support the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) campaign ahead of the country’s February election, a think tank has found.

An analysis of hundreds of German-language posts on X over the past month have exhibited patterns of Russia’s Doppelgaenger disinformation campaign against the West.

The campaign spreads links to falsified Western news outlets sharing fake information, a German foreign ministry report published last June. Russia has consistently denied involvement.

Recent posts have blamed the Greens for Germany’s economic woes, criticised chancellor Olaf Scholz’s support for Ukraine, and spoken in favour of the AfD, CeMAS said.

The tracked posts share links to falsified German news websites or to articles on authentic ones supporting their narrative, and have achieved over 2.8 million views, CeMAS said.

Volodymyr Zelensky has welcomed the incoming US president Donald Trump shortly after his inauguration and said that Ukraine looks forward to work with him.

“The inauguration of the new President of the United States, Donald Trump @POTUS. He is a man of strength. I wish President Trump and all of America success. Ukrainians are ready to work together with Americans to achieve peace — a true peace. This is a chance that must be seized,” he said in his nightly address.

In a separate post on X, Mr Zelensky said: “President Trump is always decisive, and the peace through strength policy he announced provides an opportunity to strengthen American leadership and achieve a long-term and just peace, which is the top priority.”

A man in a bus was injured after Russian troops attacked the southern Kherson region with drones and artillery on Monday morning, the region’s military administration said.

“As of now, one person is reported injured. A 56-year-old man sustained a mine-blast injury and multiple shrapnel wounds to his face and neck,” the administration said.

Other settlements in the area also came under Russian fire, causing damage to several houses, Ukrainska Pravda reported.