The Wall Street Journal, citing Ukrainian intelligence and security officials, reported that at the start of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov to occupy government buildings in Kyiv and kill Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky.

On December 16, the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, Karim Assad Ahmad Khan, announced the completion of the investigation into the August War, the 2008 Russian-Georgian armed conflict that took place in the territory of the self-proclaimed South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

Russia has dealt another massive blow to Ukraine. According to the Ukrainian Air Force, more than 60 missiles were fired from land, air and sea. Ukrenergo declared a state of emergency due to a systemic failure in the energy infrastructure.

In Kyiv, Kharkov, and Dnieper, the movement of metro trains has been stopped, the stations are operating as bomb shelters. All districts of Kyiv have problems with water supply.

As a result of enemy shelling of Kherson, civilians were killed, including an 8-year-old child.

In Odessa and the region, hundreds of thousands of people were left without electricity after an attack by Russian drones. Interruptions in water supply and heating have also been reported.

The Armed Forces of Ukraine reported that in Donetsk, the Russian authorities began to mobilize women to make up for losses in manpower and to complement the units of the 1st Army Corps of the Russian Ground Forces.

The Ukrainian military attacked the “Hunter’s Rest” recreation center in Melitopol, which was allegedly occupied by Kadyrov’s supporters. The mayor said the number of victims was close to two hundred. At the same time, the acting governor of the Zaporozhye region, Yevgeny Balitsky, reported that two people were killed and 10 were wounded.

The BBC Russian Service and Mediazona, together with a team of volunteers, recorded the deaths of at least 10,002 Russian military personnel, 430 of them mobilized.

Heavy fighting for Bakhmut continues.