Vladimir Putin will today hold his first marathon year-end press conference since ordering the invasion of Ukraine. The cocky Russian president feels the tide turning in his favor nearly two years after the grinding conflict began.
The despot will answer questions from journalists and viewers during the hour-long marathon, a week after he announced he was running in May's presidential election that will keep him in the Kremlin until at least 2030.
The Russian leader will “summarize the results of the year,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, telling reporters: “It will be a combined format of the Direct Line and the final presidential press conference.”
Direct Line is a carefully choreographed call-in television show that Putin has hosted annually since 2001, with a few exceptions.
But the event was canceled last year due to a difficult operation in Ukraine that saw Kiev retake parts of its territory from Russia in the east and south.
Vladimir Putin will today hold his first marathon year-end press conference since ordering the invasion of Ukraine. The cocky Russian president (seen in his speech on Tuesday) feels the tide turning in his favor nearly two years after the grinding conflict began
Ukraine's strong resistance and support from its allies surprised observers around the world and in Moscow, where many had expected Kiev to be captured within days.
But almost two years after launching his offensive, Putin may sense that his fortunes are improving and that the situation may be shifting in Russia's favor.
Ukraine's recent counteroffensive failed to break through heavily entrenched Russian lines and support from its allies is waning. Neither side has managed to make significant progress on the battlefield recently, a situation that suits Putin for now.
Meanwhile, Russia was able to secure the support of its own allies.
While Ukraine's European and North American allies have strongly condemned Russia and imposed sanctions, others – such as China – have supported Moscow.
Other powerful nations such as India have avoided criticizing Russia over its actions in Ukraine.
During a visit to Washington this week, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky failed to overcome opposition from congressional Republicans to approving a new $60 billion aid package.
And the Russian economy has withstood Western sanctions aimed at isolating Russia – although the economy's long-term resilience remains uncertain.
Moscow is still able to sustain its war effort through oil sales, something Putin spoke about this month during a trip to the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, where he was given a full welcome.
In any case, Putin's election campaign, which he launched last week, is unlikely to be forced to confront the real economic and human costs of the offensive.
Putin has sharply limited his interaction with foreign media since fighting began in Ukraine, but international journalists have been invited this year.
At Thursday's event, he is expected to address domestic issues and international politics, repeating his usual rhetoric distorting Ukraine's past.
Russian callers have already sent over 1.5 million inquiries, and Russian state news agencies reported that most call questions related to the conflict in Ukraine, housing and public services.
Putin will also outline his ambitions for the March 17 election, which will allow him to extend his decades-long grip on power into the 2030s.
There is little doubt about the outcome, as most of the opposition figures are in exile or behind bars. Putin's most prominent rival, Alexei Navalny, is currently serving a 19-year prison sentence on political charges.
And the Kremlin has intensified its crackdown on dissidents since the attack on Ukraine. Thousands of people have been arrested and detained over protests, and many thousands more have fled the country for fear of being called up to fight.
Two years into his offensive, Putin may sense that his fortunes in Ukraine are improving and that the situation may be shifting in Russia's favor. Pictured: Ukrainian soldiers control a tank in a position near the city of Bakhmut in the Donetsk region on December 13, 2023
However, the conflict has still left Russia struggling: Moscow's armies suffered heavy losses and the economy collapsed under the pressure of sanctions.
According to US intelligence, Putin lost almost 90 percent of his army before the invasion, with 315,000 soldiers either killed or injured since the war began.
A declassified U.S. intelligence report found that Moscow's losses of personnel and armored vehicles to the Ukrainian military set back Russia's military modernization by 18 years, a source familiar with the intelligence said on Tuesday.
Russia also lost nearly two-thirds of its armored force, or 2,200 of its 3,500 troops, before the invasion, the congressional source said.
Although it is well known that Putin's forces have suffered enormous losses in Ukraine, the assessment sheds new light on the extent of these setbacks.
Many assumed that within days Russia would claim victory in Ukraine with its much larger army, overthrow the government in Kiev and install a puppet government.
Instead, after reaching the edge of Kiev in the first month of the war, Russian forces were pushed back east and suffered one setback after another.
Now they find themselves in a grueling war fought along a front line hundreds of miles long against a determined Ukraine that has exposed weaknesses in the Russian army, once considered one of the strongest in the world.
However, analysts say the situation is currently favorable for Russia, with Moscow's armies controlling around 20 percent of Ukrainian territory.
Russia is expected to be able to replenish its troops with new conscripts and produce weapons faster than the West can deliver them to Ukraine.
But Putin's news conference also comes after it was revealed that his country's economy has suffered a setback since the conflict began.
The war has driven up domestic prices and forced Moscow to spend a third of its budget on defense, the British newspaper Financial Times reported on Thursday, citing a draft text from the US Treasury Department.
The Russian economy would have grown by over five percent if Putin had not started the war in Ukraine, the newspaper reported, citing Rachel Lyngaas, the ministry's chief sanctions economist.
Lyngaas added that the country was performing worse than other energy exporters, including the United States.
People with bags walk past a damaged apartment building in the Ukrainian capital Kiev after a Russian missile attack December 13
The US Treasury Department did not respond to a Portal request for comment.
According to the FT report, Moscow spent more than $100 billion on defense in 2023, or almost a third of its total spending.
The backbone of the Russian economy – oil and gas revenues – suffered a slump this year, although there had been a slight recovery in recent months due to firmer oil prices.
In addition, Western sanctions against Russia's oil trade did not have as big an impact as initially expected.
As Putin speaks on Thursday, EU leaders will work to agree a major aid package and begin accession talks for Ukraine.
However, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has threatened to veto it.
Kiev is desperately trying to improve the narrative after Zelensky failed to win over Republican lawmakers in Washington.
But Orban – Russia's closest ally in the European Union – stands in the way of Ukraine's hopes for 50 billion euros in financial aid and progress towards its goal of one day joining the bloc.
Critics accuse Orban of taking Kiev's survival hostage in order to force Brussels to release billions of euros in EU funds that had been frozen due to a dispute over the rule of law.
The European Commission, the EU's executive arm, agreed on Wednesday to unblock 10 billion euros of those funds, in what some saw as a last-minute concession.
But 21 billion euros are still out of Orban's reach, and it was far from clear that the gesture would prevent a damaging dispute at the summit.
Members of the pro-Ukrainian Russian-Siberian Battalion practice during a military exercise near Kiev, Ukraine, Wednesday, Dec. 13
The right-wing veteran warned that starting accession negotiations with Ukraine would be a “terrible mistake” and that he would not back down.
Zelensky responded that Orban had “no reason” to prevent Kiev from EU membership and said his country could not beat Russia without further support.
This came after Russia fired a new wave of missiles into Kiev on Wednesday, wounding dozens of people in the most devastating attack on the capital in months.
Another attack early Thursday injured another 11 people in the southern Odessa region, emergency services said.