Europe

LONDON (AP) — U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak faces a test of his authority and his nerve on Wednesday as he tries to subdue a Conservative Party rebellion and win parliamentary approval for his stalled plan to send some asylum-seekers on a one-way trip to Rwanda.

DAVOS, Switzerland (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken reiterated the need for a “pathway to a Palestinian state” during a talk Wednesday at the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in the Swiss ski resort of Davos, saying Israel would not “get genuine security absent that.”

BRUSSELS (AP) — Ukraine is locked in an existential battle for its survival almost two years into its war with Russia and Western armies and political leaders must drastically change the way they help it fend off invading forces, a top NATO military officer said on Wednesday.

At a meeting of the 31-nation alliance’s top brass, the chair of the NATO Military Committee, Admiral Rob Bauer, also said that behind President Vladimir Putin’s rationale for the war is a fear of democracy, in a year marked by elections around the world.

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia fired two missiles at Kharkiv during the night, hitting apartment buildings and a medical center and injuring 17 people in the city in northeastern Ukraine, officials said Wednesday, in Moscow’s latest strikes on civilian areas in the almost two-year war.

The S-300 missiles landed after dark Tuesday, Kharkiv regional Gov. Oleh Syniehubov said on Telegram.

BUDAPEST, January 16. /TASS/: Budapest believes that the European Union should provide assistance to Ukraine without damaging its own budget, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said.

"I think that we should help Ukraine but without damaging the European Union’s budget," Orban told reporters following talks with his Slovak counterpart Robert Fico.

He added that financial assistance to Kiev should be provided outside of the EU budget.

DAVOS, January 16. /TASS/: NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has described the situation on the battlefield in Ukraine as extremely difficult for the Ukrainian army and called for not underestimating Russia.

MOSCOW, January 16. /TASS/: Russia is gaining allies around the world, as most countries support the idea of a multipolar world, so Russian parliamentarians need to build and develop relations with them, Russian State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin said, speaking at the first plenary session of the chamber's spring meeting.

MOSCOW, January 16. /TASS/: Russian President Vladimir Putin has met with the foreign ministers of Russia and North Korea, Sergey Lavrov and Choe Son Hui, who earlier in the day held talks in Moscow, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

"Russian President Vladimir Putin received at the Kremlin DPRK Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui," Peskov said.

According to him, the top diplomats informed the Russian president of the agreements reached.

Ukraine Jan 16 (Reuters) - Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy urged the West on Tuesday to tighten sanctions pressure on Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin and to step up its support for Kyiv to ensure that Moscow did not succeed in its war.

Western hesitation in its backing for Kyiv and fears of an escalation in the war with Russia were costing time and lives, and could prolong the fighting by years, he told the World Economic Forum in Davos in an emotional speech.

MOSCOW, Jan 16 (Reuters) - A court on Tuesday sentenced a former senior officer in the National Guard to six years in a prison colony after convicting him of buying equipment unable to protect the bridge which links southern Russia to Crimea, the TASS state news agency reported.

TASS said that Colonel Sergei Volkov had purchased two radar-based air defence systems for 395 million roubles ($4.5 million) which were meant to be able to bring down Ukrainian attack drones by suppressing their signal.