Kiev/Moscow, 7 January 2023 (dpa/MIA) – Russian air defences have once again repelled a drone attack on the Crimean peninsula, annexed by Moscow in 2014, according to state sources.

The unmanned aerial vehicle was shot down early on Saturday morning over a breakwater near Sevastopol – the naval base of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet – the city’s Russian-appointed governor Mikhail Razvozhayev wrote on his Telegram channel, according to state news agency TASS.

The port has been the target of Ukrainian drone attacks several times, most recently on January 4 when two drones were shot down.

Despite the ceasefire unilaterally announced by Russian President Vladimir Putin for the Orthodox Christmas holiday that started on Friday, renewed fighting broke out in Ukraine.

The 36-hour ceasefire, which was due to begin at noon Moscow time (0900 GMT) on Friday – Russian Orthodox Christmas Day – would have been the first ceasefire along the entire front line since Russia began the war on February 24 last year.

Ukraine’s Orthodox churches traditionally do not celebrate Christmas until January 7.

Razvozhayev went on to complain that even “holy Christmas” could not stop the “inhuman beings” from attacking his “heroic city.”

Ukraine had rejected the Orthodox Christmas ceasefire as a hypocritical diversionary tactic by the Russian invaders. On Friday, despite the ceasefire, Ukraine as a whole was on air alert for about two hours.

Meanwhile, Putin attended an Orthodox Christmas service at the Annunciation Cathedral in the Kremlin, according to TASS.

Russia supplies its occupying forces in southern Ukraine mainly via Crimea, so Ukraine repeatedly targets logistic and military objectives on the peninsula.

Moreover, winning back Crimea is one of Kiev’s declared goals as the Russian war has increasingly faltered in recent months. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said that this could be done diplomatically or militarily.

In Belarus meanwhile, concerns are growing among the opposition about a possible mobilization in their country to support Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Preparations for this are well advanced, opposition politician Pavel Latushka, who lives in exile in Warsaw, told Germany’s media network Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland (RND) on Saturday.

Belarusian ruler Alexander Lukashenko only needs to press the button on orders from the Kremlin to start mobilizing, he said. Latushka, the former Belarusian culture minister, is a member of opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya’s Cabinet in exile.

Latushka reported, referring to sources in Minsk, that almost all employees working for the Belarusian Interior Ministry had been asked to hand in their passports. This information was available from various cities in the country, he said. “This means that these people will no longer be able to leave the territory of Belarus in case of their mobilization,” Latushka said.

He added that one could also observe that the Russian military presence in Belarus was constantly growing, both the number of soldiers and equipment.

“Military exercises by the Russian armed forces, including exercises on cooperation between the armed forces of Russia and Belarus, take place regularly,” Latushka said.

Fears of active participation by the Belarusian military in the war in Ukraine have existed almost since the beginning of the Russian invasion in February 2022, when Russian forces used the territory of ally Belarus as a starting point for attacks on Ukraine.

Lukashenko visited a joint Russian-Belarusian force in the country on Friday, according to officials. The experience “gained through the merging of military units and formations” has “great significance” for Belarus, the Defence Ministry in Minsk announced.

Recently, there has been increasing speculation that another Russian attack on the Ukrainian capital Kiev could again take place via Belarus. The Belarusian border is only around 140 kilometres from the Ukrainian capital.

Lukashenko, who is no longer recognized as president in the West, is militarily, politically and economically dependent on the Kremlin. However, according to official information, Belarusian soldiers are not fighting in Ukraine so far.