In February 2022, Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine and began occupying more of the country, starting the biggest conflict in Europe since World War II.

The Donbas war settled into a violent but static conflict between Ukraine and the Russian and separatist forces, with many brief ceasefires but no lasting peace and few changes in territorial control.

[17] During a two-month period which became known as the Orange Revolution, large peaceful protests successfully challenged the outcome, and the Supreme Court of Ukraine annulled the result due to widespread electoral fraud.

[citation needed] As conflict between the separatists and the Ukrainian government escalated in May, Russia began to employ a "hybrid approach", combining disinformation tactics, irregular fighters, regular Russian troops, and conventional military support.

[97] Igor Girkin ('Strelkov') urged direct Russian military intervention, and said that the combat inexperience of his irregular forces, along with recruitment difficulties amongst the local population, had caused the setbacks.

[139] Poroshenko described a dangerous escalation on 21 January amid reports of more than 2,000 additional Russian troops, 200 tanks and armed personnel carriers crossing the border.

[142] After the Minsk agreements, there were few changes in territorial control, while the war settled into static trench warfare around the agreed line of contact, marked by artillery duels and special forces operations.

In August 2016, the Ukrainian intelligence service, the SBU, published telephone intercepts from 2014 of Sergey Glazyev (Russian presidential adviser), Konstantin Zatulin, and other people in which they discussed covert funding of pro-Russian activists in Eastern Ukraine, the occupation of administration buildings and other actions that triggered the conflict.

[163] As early as February 2014, Glazyev gave direct instructions to various pro-Russian parties on how to take over local administration offices, what to do afterwards, how to formulate demands, and promised support from Russia, including "sending our guys".

[202][203] There was a sharp increase in artillery shelling by the Russian-led militants in Donbas, which was considered by Ukraine and its supporters to be an attempt to provoke the Ukrainian army or create a pretext for invasion.

[227] Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on 23 February that the separatist leaders in Donetsk and Luhansk had sent a letter to Putin stating that Ukrainian shelling had caused civilian deaths and appealing for military support.

[236][237] In the northern front, amidst heavy losses and strong Ukrainian resistance surrounding Kyiv, Russia's advance stalled in March, and by April its troops retreated.

[297] In August 2024, UN official Danielle Bell claimed that 95% of Ukrainian prisoners of war had suffered from Russian torture (e.g. beating, electric shock, or being stripped naked).

[301] In September and October 2023, a series of fragments were reported found in Romania, a NATO member state, which were suspected to have been the remains of a Russian drone attack near the Romanian border with Ukraine.

[307] According to Ukraine's geological survey the lithium ore deposits are however located in Shevchenko north-west of Velika Novosilka (there's in total three villages of this name in Donetsk Oblast).

Mining them in Europe would be too expensive due to high environmental regulations, low acceptance among the population and considerable labor costs (which is why they were imported from China and countries in the global south); however, Ukraine ranks fourth in the world with 800 deposits of 94 different mineral resources and would thus displace Russia as a trading partner.

[347] In retaliation, Ukrainian operations have included the Surkov Leaks in October 2016 which released 2,337 e-mails in relation to Russian plans for seizing Crimea from Ukraine and fomenting separatist unrest in Donbas.

[360]Ukraine has a far-right fringe like most countries, including the Azov Movement and Right Sector,[361][353] but analysts say that Russia's government and mainstream media greatly exaggerate its size and influence.

[394] On 4 March 2022, Putin signed into law a bill introducing prison sentences of up to 15 years for those who publish "fake news" about the Russian military and its operations,[395] leading to some media outlets to stop reporting on Ukraine.

[401] NAFO (North Atlantic Fella Organization), a loose cadre of online shitposters vowing to fight Russian disinformation, gained notoriety after June 2022.

[408] A Russia expert and fellow of Germany's University of Bremen, told Al Jazeera that the ROC's participation in the war means it "faces the prospect of losing its 'universal character' and clout, and of reducing its borders to those of [Russian President Vladimir] Putin's political empire".

[427][428] Russian military aircraft flying over the Baltic and Black Seas often do not indicate their position or communicate with air traffic controllers, thus posing a potential risk to civilian airliners.

[429] When the Russian occupation of Crimea began, Russia had roughly 12,000 military personnel from the Black Sea Fleet,[40] in several locations in the Crimean peninsula such as Sevastopol, Kacha, Hvardiiske, Simferopol Raion, Sarych, and others.

[432] Early in the conflict, the agreement's generous troop limit allowed Russia to significantly strengthen its military presence, deploy special forces and other required capabilities to conduct the operation in Crimea, under the pretext of addressing security concerns.

He compared Russia's military actions to the 2008 Russo-Georgian War, when Russian troops occupied parts of the Republic of Georgia and the breakaway enclaves of Abkhazia and South Ossetia were established under the control of Russian-backed administrations.

[468][469][470] The Russian central bank hiked interest rates and intervened in the foreign exchange markets to the tune of $12 billion[clarification needed] to try to stabilize its currency.

"[498] In 2023, Oleg Orlov, the chairman of the Board of Human Rights Center "Memorial", claimed that Russia under Vladimir Putin had descended into fascism and that the army is committing "mass murder".

[503] On 21 May 2022, the United States passed legislation providing $40 billion in new military and humanitarian foreign aid to Ukraine, marking a historically large commitment of funds.

[506] On 7 March 2024, American President Joe Biden in his 2024 State of the Union Address compared Russia under Vladimir Putin to Adolf Hitler's conquests of Europe.

[522] On 4 March 2022, the UN Human Rights Council adopted a resolution by a vote of 32 to 2, with 13 abstentions, calling for the withdrawal of Russian troops and Russian-backed armed groups from Ukraine and humanitarian access to people in need.