[46][47] Putin referred to the Kosovo independence precedent and NATO bombing of Yugoslavia as a justification for the annexation of Crimea and the war in Donbas,[48][49][50][51] while historians note the similarities with Nazi Germany's Anschluss of Austria.

[54][89] On 19 February, Zelenskyy made a speech at the Munich Security Conference, calling for Western powers to drop their policy of "appeasement" towards Moscow and give a clear time-frame for when Ukraine could join NATO.

[116] The Russian army adopted siege tactics on the western front around the key cities of Chernihiv, Sumy and Kharkiv, but failed to capture them due to stiff resistance and logistical setbacks.

[119][120] On 26 April, delegates from the US and 40 allied nations met at Ramstein Air Base in Germany to discuss the formation of a coalition that would provide economic support in addition to military supplies and refitting to Ukraine.

[175] On 3 April, following the retreat of Russian forces from Kyiv, Russia expanded its attack on southern Ukraine further west, with bombardment and strikes against Odesa, Mykolaiv, and the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant.

[187] Amid the heightened Russian shelling of Kharkiv on 31 March, Russia reported a helicopter strike against an oil supply depot approximately 35 kilometres (22 mi) north of the border in Belgorod, and accused Ukraine of the attack.

[203] On 6 May, The Daily Telegraph reported that Russia had used thermobaric bombs against the remaining Ukrainian soldiers, who had lost contact with the Kyiv government; in his last communications, Zelenskyy authorised the commander of the besieged steel factory to surrender as necessary under the pressure of increased Russian attacks.

[243] On 23 July, CNBC reported a Russian missile strike on the Ukrainian port of Odesa, swiftly condemned by world leaders amid a recent UN- and Turkish-brokered deal to secure a sea corridor for exports of grains and other foodstuffs.

[258] An emboldened Kyiv launched a counteroffensive 12 September around Kharkiv successful enough to make Russia admit losing key positions and for The New York Times to say that it dented the image of a "Mighty Putin".

"[261] British Foreign Office Minister Gillian Keegan called the situation an "escalation",[262] while former Mongolian president Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj accused Russia of using Russian Mongols as "cannon fodder.

[292] The Russian private military company Wagner Group took on greater prominence in the war,[293] leading "grinding advances" in Bakhmut with tens of thousands of recruits from prison battalions taking part in "near suicidal" assaults on Ukrainian positions.

[305] Appearing before the House Committee on Armed Services on 29 March, General Mark Milley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, reported that, "for about the last 20, 21 days, the Russia have not made any progress whatsoever in and around Bakhmut."

[343] Ukraine's shortage of ammunition caused by political deadlock in the US Congress and a lack of production capacity in Europe contributed to the Ukrainian withdrawal from Avdiivka, and was "being felt across the front" according to Time.

[364] Russian troops continued advancing in eastern Ukraine, notably at a faster pace than prior to the Kursk offensive,[365] including towards the strategically important city of Pokrovsk, where their number of forces had instead been increased.

[428] Pentagon spokesman John Kirby reported on 14 April that satellite images showed that the Russian warship had suffered a sizeable explosion onboard but was heading to the east for expected repairs and refitting in Sevastopol.

[441][442] Ukrainian civilians resisted the Russian invasion by volunteering for territorial defence units, making Molotov cocktails, donating food, building barriers like Czech hedgehogs,[443] and helping to transport refugees.

[514] Politico reported in March 2023 that Chinese state-owned weapons manufacturer Norinco shipped assault rifles, drone parts, and body armor to Russia between June and December 2022, with some shipments via third countries including Turkey and the United Arab Emirates.

[519] In September 2024, Reuters reported documents indicating Russia had established a weapons programme in China to develop and produce long-range attack drones, with assistance from local specialists, for use in the invasion of Ukraine.

[544] The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) reports similar issues and believed that the true civilian casualty numbers were significantly higher than it has been able to confirm.

[581] A 25 August 2022 report by the Humanitarian Research Lab of the Yale School of Public Health identified some 21 filtration camps for Ukrainian "civilians, POWs, and other personnel" in the vicinity of Donetsk oblast.

[582] In March 2023, UN human rights commissioner Volker Türk reported that more than 90% of the Ukrainian POWs interviewed by his office said they had been tortured or ill-treated, including ″welcoming beatings″ on their arrival in penitentiary facilities, which Russia despite several requests did not give UN staff access to.

The statement also included the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR)'s confirmation of systematic use of a wide range of different methods of torture used by Russians against Ukrainian prisoners.

[611] One of several efforts to document Russian war crimes concerns its repeated bombardment of markets and bread lines, destruction of basic infrastructure and attacks on exports and supply convoys, in a country where deliberate starvation of Ukrainians by Soviets the Holodomor still looms large in public memory.

[664] According to Netherlands-based peace organisation PAX, Russia's "deliberate targeting of industrial and energy infrastructure" has caused "severe" pollution, and the use of explosive weapons has left "millions of tonnes" of contaminated debris in cities and towns.

The investigation stated that long-term ecological consequences may include lowering of the groundwater level, reduction of biodiversity, worsening of air quality, fire outbreaks, and rivers and ponds drying up.

[677] Fatih Birol, the head of the International Energy Agency talking about the prospects of COP 28 noted:[678] ... the geopolitical situation, with many nations at loggerheads over the war in Ukraine, and still frosty relations between the US and China, would make for a difficult summit.

[...] The most important challenge [to limiting temperature rises to 1.5 °C (2.7 °F) above pre-industrial levels] is the lack of international cooperation.Senior Russian politicians—including Putin, Sergey Lavrov, and Dmitry Medvedev—have made statements widely seen as nuclear blackmail.

In addition to the official Russian government defense budget —direct financial expenditure for waging the war in Ukraine was estimated at US$250 billion through June 2024 for military spending through normal channels,[23] with the military budget rising to over 20% of annual GDP—an additional off-budget financing mechanism was employed to fund the war with over US$200 billion of debt funding obtained from preferential bank loans made to defence contractors and war-related businesses, loans that had been compelled by the Russian government.

This has been received with skepticism by Ukrainians and their country's supporters, with criticism that it could be an insincere, opportunistic public relations ploy by Russia that would give it time to rebuild its weakened army before renewing the offensive.

[89] Trump's special envoy Keith Kellogg and Vice President JD Vance said continued arms shipments to Ukraine and a heavily fortified demilitarised zone would ensure Russia would not invade again.