Elon Musk, the billionaire ally of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, has praised the far-right Alterative for Germany party ahead of the election due in Germany early next year. The party wants to end Western support for Ukraine in its war against Russian invaders. Henry Ridgwell reports.
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Ukraine attacked a town in Russia’s Kursk region Friday, killing six people, including a child, a senior local official said.

Ten others were hospitalized in the town of Rylsk after the attack with U.S.-supplied HIMARS rockets, Kursk acting Governor Alexander Khinshtein said.

The attack, Ukrainian officials said, followed an earlier Russian missile attack on Kyiv.

Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry said an early Friday morning Russian ballistic missile attack on the capital killed at least one person, wounded 13 and damaged six foreign embassies and a university in the city’s center.

On its Telegram social media account, Ukraine’s air force said it intercepted five Iskander short-range ballistic missiles fired at the city, but falling missile debris caused damage and sparked fires in three districts. City officials reported damage to multiple residential buildings, medical facilities and schools.

Air force officials urged citizens to immediately respond to reports of ballistic attack threats because they provide very little time to find shelter.

At a briefing in Kyiv on Friday, Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Georgiy Tykhyi said the missile attack did significant damage to a building that houses the embassies of Albania, Argentina, the Palestinians, North Macedonia, Portugal and Montenegro. He shared pictures of the damage to the buildings. No injuries were reported in those attacks.

The Kyiv National Linguistics University said on its Instagram account that its building also had been hit, and it shared a picture of an area near an entrance where two large windows had been blown out.

Russia has said it launched the attack in retaliation for Kyiv’s firing U.S.-made weapons into Russia.

Russia’s attacks on Kyiv came one day after Russian President Vladimir Putin’s year-end press conference. Putin has been talking about negotiations to end the war “for quite some time, but the bombing has continued,” said Charles Kupchan, senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.

President-elect Donald Trump has talked about the possibility of talks with the Russian and Ukrainian presidents to end the war. He has said he could broker a deal to end the war in 24 hours.

Kupchan said Trump is “naive” to think he could get the two countries to come to an agreement so swiftly.

Trump “cannot afford a deal that effectively subjugates Ukraine and leaves it a ward of Russia,” Kupchan said. Ukraine must be defensible, he said, and “not left in a geopolitical limbo that invites Russia to simply pick up the war where it left off six months from now … or a year later.”

Meanwhile, Olha Stefanishyna, Ukraine’s deputy prime minister and minister of justice, reported Friday that Russia had launched a cyberattack on state registers, resulting in a shutdown.

Stefanishyna made the initial report from her Facebook page, where she said it was clear the attack was orchestrated by Russia to “sow panic among citizens of Ukraine and abroad.”

She held a briefing later Friday in Kyiv along with Ukraine’s acting head of the Cybersecurity Department of the security service, Volodymyr Karastelov.

She told reporters that while it appeared no data were lost or stolen, the ministry suspended the activities of all state registers to avoid further deployment of threats. The affected registries include civil acts such as marriages, wills, births and car registrations, and Stefanishyna said they were working to restore them.

The Cybersecurity Department said its main line of investigation was that a hacker group affiliated with Russian military intelligence was behind the attack. Russia has yet to comment on the attack.

VOA’s Kim Lewis contributed to this report. Some information came from The Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France-Presse.
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Igor Kirillov had overseen the use of chemical weapons in Ukraine and regularly spread disinformation about the West developing bioweapons prior to being killed on Dec. 17.
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washington — The United States has charged a Russian Israeli dual citizen over alleged involvement with the Lockbit ransomware group, the Justice Department said Friday. 

Rostislav Panev, 51, was arrested in Israel in August and is awaiting extradition to the United States, the department said. 

Panev was a developer at Lockbit from its inception in 2019 until at least February 2024, during which time the group grew into “what was, at times, the most active and destructive ransomware group in the world,” the department said.  

“The Justice Department’s work going after the world’s most dangerous ransomware schemes includes not only dismantling networks but also finding and bringing to justice the individuals responsible for building and running them,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement. 

Lockbit and its malware were linked to attacks on more than 2,500 victims in at least 120 countries around the world, according to the department, including small businesses and large multinationals, hospitals, schools, critical infrastructure, government and law enforcement agencies. 

Lockbit was discovered in 2020 when its eponymous malicious software was found on Russian-language cybercrime forums. 

It operated a ransomware-as-a-service operation, in which a core group of developers and administrators worked with affiliates who carried out attacks. Extortion proceeds were split among the parties involved. 

Lockbit and its affiliates extorted at least $500 million in payments from victims, according to the Justice Department, as well as causing significant costs from lost revenue and incident response and recovery. 

The arrest followed two guilty pleas in July from a pair of Russian members of the Lockbit gang — Ruslan Astamirov and Mikhail Vasiliev — and the seizure in February of numerous Lockbit websites by Britain’s National Crime Agency, the FBI and other international law enforcement agencies. 

Lockbit reappeared online not long after the seizure, defiantly saying: “I cannot be stopped.” But law enforcement officials and experts say the bust helped damage the gang’s standing in the cybercriminal underworld. 

Government actions “have proven incredibly effective at dismantling and discrediting” Lockbit as a brand and bringing the group’s volume of attacks down precipitously, said Jeremy Kennelly, a cybersecurity analyst with Google owner Alphabet.  

Affiliates and others working with the group may have shifted to collaborating with other gangs, Kennelly said, but the crackdown has been “critical to ensuring that ransomware and extortion are seen as crimes for which there are consequences.” 
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A 7-year-old girl was stabbed to death Friday at an elementary school in Croatia by a knife-wielding teenager who also wounded three other children and a teacher, officials said.  

Video footage Friday showed children running away from the school as a medical helicopter was landing.   

The attacker is a former student of the Precko Elementary School in Zagreb where the attack took place, according to Interior Minister Davor Bozinovic. 

The teen had a history of mental health issues and after Friday’s incident “shut himself in a nearby health center where he tried to injure himself with the knife,” according to Bozinovic. Police were able to prevent him from committing suicide. 

Last year, the teen also tried to kill himself, the minister said.  

“Five persons have been hospitalized, and their lives are not in danger,” Croatian Health Minister Irena Hrstic said, including the attacker in the count. 

Leaders declare day of mourning

School attacks are rare in Croatia.   

“There are no words to describe the grief over the horrible and unthinkable tragedy that shocked us all today,” said President Zoran Milanovic. 

“We are horrified,” said Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic.  

Following the assault at the school, Croatian officials declared Saturday as a day of mourning.  

Some information for this report came from The Associated Press and Reuters.   
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The United States last month formally opened a permanent military base in Poland, part of NATO’s missile defense system amid rising tensions with Russia. The Polish defense minister says the base is a testament to Polish-American cooperation. VOA Eastern Europe Bureau Chief Myroslava Gongadze reports from Redzikowo, Poland.
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U.S. billionaire Elon Musk, set to join President-elect Donald Trump’s administration, waded into Germany’s election campaign on Friday, calling the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) the country’s savior.

The AfD is running second in opinion polls and might be able to thwart either a center-right or center-left majority, but Germany’s mainstream, more centrist parties have vowed to shun support from the AfD at national level.

Europe’s leading power is expected to vote on February 23 after a center-left coalition government led by Chancellor Olaf Scholz collapsed.

“Only the AfD can save Germany,” Musk wrote in a post on his social media platform, X.

Musk, the world’s richest person, has already expressed support for other anti-immigration parties across Europe.

The German government said it had taken note of Musk’s post but declined to give any further comment at its regular press conference.

Musk reposted a message by German right-wing influencer Naomi Seibt that criticized Friedrich Merz, chancellor candidate for the conservatives, who are comfortably ahead in surveys.

Musk had already voiced support for the AfD last year, when he attacked the German government’s handling of illegal migration.

Last month, Musk called for the sacking of Italian judges who had questioned the legality of government measures to prevent irregular immigration.

And this week Nigel Farage, leader of Britain’s right-wing Reform UK party and friend of Trump, posted a photo of himself and Reform’s treasurer meeting Musk at Trump’s Florida residence, and said he was in talks with Musk about financial support.

 
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Moscow — Russia on Friday sentenced a resident of east Ukraine’s Lugansk region to 16 years in prison for “high treason,” Moscow’s FSB security service said.

Moscow regularly hands heavy sentences to people it accuses of spying for Ukraine and has also consistently imprisoned Ukrainians in Russia and occupied regions.

The sentencing came as President Vladimir Putin called on security services to be “tough” in anti-terror measures and especially vigilant in military counterintelligence as the Kremlin’s Ukraine offensive drags on for almost three years.

Putin called for special services to “identify spies and traitors” and to “stop the work of foreign security services.”

The unnamed man was sentenced Friday by a military court in Russia’s southern city of Rostov-on-Don.

Prosecutors said he had handed information on the Russian armed forces to Kyiv’s security services.

The FSB, cited by Russian news agencies, said the man was found guilty of state treason, being an accomplice in terrorist acts as well as the illegal handling and transport of explosives.

The court ordered that he serve his sentence in a high-security penal colony.

The Tass news agency published a video showing the man’s arrest, in which FSB officers stopped a car, dragged a man out and threw him to the ground, before handcuffing him and taking him to the local headquarters of the security force.

The video showed a man with his face blurred — filmed by the FSB — saying he had been recruited by Ukraine’s SBU security service in 2016.

Russia regularly releases confession videos filmed by the FSB after arrests.

Russian independent media reported that an activist had killed himself Thursday in a Rostov detention center, shortly after being sentenced to 16 years in prison also in the Rostov region.

The Mediazona website said it got confirmation from prison officials that Roman Shved — a 39-year-old anarchist sentenced for an arson attack on a government building after the Kremlin announced a military mobilization in 2022 — had died in a Rostov detention center.

Several social media channels had said Shved had killed himself hours after being sentenced.

Russia has punished thousands of its citizens for opposing the Ukraine campaign.
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Leaders of 12 European countries agreed at a meeting in Tallinn to expand sanctions against Russia’s “shadow fleet” that is used by Moscow to sell oil and evade Western sanctions. Several European states imposed new policies on Russian vessels transiting through European waters to curb Russia’s ability to use profits from illicit oil sales to fund its war in Ukraine.

Click here for the full story in Russian.

 
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Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov said that a conflict between Russia and NATO is possible within the next decade. VOA Russian spoke to experts who agreed that Belousov is most likely voicing the Kremlin’s true intentions, and that the West should treat these statements seriously.

Click here for the full story in Russian.
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Washington / belgrade, serbia — An encounter with police in the Serbian city of Pirot earlier this year unnerved investigative reporter Slavisa Milanov.

A journalist for the independent media outlet FAR, Milanov was driving with a colleague in February when they were pulled over by police, who asked the pair to accompany them to a station to be tested for illegal substances.

Once there, Milanov said he was asked to leave his phone and personal belongings behind during a check.

The drug tests were negative, but when police handed Milanov his phone, he noticed the settings had been changed.

Suspecting that spyware may have been installed, he reached out to Amnesty International.

In a report published this week, the international watchdog confirmed Milanov’s suspicions, finding forensic evidence that spyware was installed on the phones of several journalists and activists, including Milanov.

In at least two cases, software provided by Cellebrite DI — an Israeli company that markets products for government and law enforcement agencies — was used to unlock the phones prior to infection, the report found. Then, Serbian spyware called NoviSpy took covert screenshots, copied contacts and uploaded them to a government-controlled server. 

“In multiple cases, activists and a journalist reported signs of suspicious activity on their mobile phones directly following interviews with Serbian police and security authorities,” Amnesty said.

‘Major consequences’ seen

Aleksa Tesic, who has reported on spyware in Serbia for the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network, said the Amnesty report precisely documented for the first time cases showing technology abuse for the purpose of affecting civil liberties.   

“We had various indications that this was happening before, because Serbia has been interested in advanced spy software for more than 10 years. But this could now have major consequences for democracy in Serbia,” Tesic said.  

Serbia’s Security Intelligence Agency (BIA) rejected the findings. In a statement on its website, the agency said the report contained “nonsensical statements,” and that the BIA operates within local law.  

The Serbian Interior Ministry also denounced the report as incorrect.  

Milanov said the existence of spyware on his phone could “jeopardize me, my family, colleagues and my sources.”

“If anything happens to any of us, I will hold the state responsible for it. I don’t see who else it could be,” he told VOA Serbian.

Milanov is based in Dimitrovgrad, at the border of Serbia and Bulgaria, 330 kilometers from Serbia’s capital, Belgrade. He recalled to VOA the traffic stop and police headquarters, where he believes his phone was accessed.

“There, I was told to turn off my phone and leave other personal belongings during the check. Alcohol and drug tests were, of course, negative. Yet the policeman was, as it seemed to me, messaging with someone unknown to me,” Milanov said.

The reporter asked if he was free to go but was told, “We are waiting for the boss.”

Not long afterward, two men arrived. Milanov said they did not identify themselves.

“I assumed they were police inspectors. We went to another police station, where they questioned me about my work, financing, if I have traveled to Bulgaria recently and with whom,” he said.

Milanov answered the questions before being released with his belongings.

But changes to his phone settings led to a suspicion that something was wrong.

At home, he used specialized software and found that although he had left his phone off at the police station, it had been switched back on for the duration of his police encounter.

Call for accountability

Pavol Szalai, who heads the European Union-Balkans Desk of Reporters Without Borders, told VOA that Amnesty’s report corroborates  information his organization had about journalists targeted by surveillance. 

“Spyware and surveillance used in an illegitimate way kills journalism without spilling [any] blood of a journalist. Surveillance undermines confidentiality of sources, which is a cornerstone of press freedom,” he said. “And as for Serbia on the international level, it must be held accountable by the international organizations of which it is a member.”

Serbia is a European Union candidate country. But a report this year by the European Commission said the country lacked progress, including in the rule of law, the fight against corruption, nonalignment with Russia sanctioning and media freedoms.

A European Commission spokesperson told VOA that any attempts to illegally access citizens’ data, including journalists and political opponents, if confirmed, are not acceptable. 

“The commission expects national authorities to thoroughly examine any such allegations and to restore citizens’ trust,” the spokesperson said.

U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said that while he could not comment on a specific case, the use of spyware raises concerns.

“Speaking broadly, we have made quite clear since the outset of this administration the concerns that we have about governments that use spyware to track journalists, to track dissident groups, to track others who legitimately oppose or report on government activities,” Miller said in response to a question by VOA. 

Grant Baker, a research analyst for technology and democracy at Freedom House, said Serbia should conduct an impartial investigation and provide remedy to those affected. 

“Authorities should also amend excessively broad laws regulating surveillance so they better align with both the European Court of Human Rights rulings and the International Principles on the Application of Human Rights to Communications Surveillance,” Baker said.  

The international community should also “make clear that such disproportionate surveillance is a grave threat to democracy,” Baker said.  

“While export controls are not a panacea, they are one important and necessary step to reducing the technology’s negative impact on human rights around the world,” he said. 

Serbia has a vibrant media landscape, but reporters often face political pressure, and impunity for crimes against journalists tends to be the norm, according to press freedom groups. 

Reporters Without Borders ranks Serbia 98th out of 180 on the Press Freedom Index, where 1 reflects the best environment for media.
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