Kyiv Post Morning Memo – Everything You Need to Know on Friday, Dec. 2

Good morning from Kyiv, where it’s a chilly -3 degrees, and a pair of ice skates are probably the best bet for getting anywhere on foot.

What’s happening today? 

All of Ukraine is still braced for another expected mass missile attack from Russia targeting the country’s energy infrastructure.

On Thursday, Dec. 1, it was revealed that nearly half of Ukraine’s electricity grid remains damaged.

“Russia has destroyed 40 percent of the Ukrainian energy system with terrorist missile attacks,” the privately-owned energy operator DTEK company said in a statement.

“Dozens of energy workers were killed and wounded.”

Elsewhere, a senior adviser to President Volodymyr Zelensky has said up to 13,000 Ukrainian troops have been killed since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February. You can read more about this story here.

What was Zelensky’s latest message? 

In his daily address on Thursday evening, President Zelensky noted the 31st anniversary of Ukraine’s independence referendum in which 84 percent of the electorate took part and 90 percent voted in favour.

“Since that day in 1991, Ukrainians have experienced many attempts to turn a dot into three dots or a semicolon,” he said. “We saw many figures who could not put up with the fact that the empire had been overthrown.

“We are still defending Ukraine against such ‘comrades’ who wanted to celebrate the centenary of the empire this year instead of another anniversary of freedom.

“But Ukrainian rules will prevail.”

What’s the situation on the front lines?

The U.K. Ministry of Defence (MoD) discusses Russian logistical difficulties, noting Russia’s withdrawal from Kherson last month means more of its supply nodes and lines of communication are now within reach of Ukrainian fire.

This will have forced the Russian army to relocate many of them, making resupply to the front lines more difficult.

The MoD adds: “Russia’s shortage of munitions (exacerbated by these logistical challenges) is likely one of the main factors currently limiting Russia’s potential to restart effective, large scale offensive ground operations.”

The Institute for the Study of War’s Dec. 1 daily assessment covers a multitude of topics, most notably:

• Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko continued to set informational conditions to resist Russian pressure to enter the war against Ukraine.
• Russian forces continued to make incremental gains around Bakhmut and to conduct offensive operations in the Avdiivka-Donetsk City area.
• Russian military movements in Zaporizhzhia Region may suggest that Russian forces cannot defend critical areas amidst increasing Ukrainian strikes.

And that’s it for today’s Morning Memo.

Kyiv Post will bring you the latest news throughout the day and we’ll be back with another edition tomorrow.