Kiev Ukraine

An overnight Ukrainian drone attack on an oil depot near Russia's Black Sea resort of Sochi sparked a major fire, Russian officials said Sunday, as the two countries traded strikes. More than 120 firefighters attempted to extinguish the blaze, sparked after debris from a downed drone struck a fuel tank, Krasnodar regional Gov Veniamin Kondratyev said on Telegram. Videos on social media appeared to show huge pillars of smoke billowing above the oil depot. Russia's civil aviation authority, Rosaviatsia, temporarily stopped flights at Sochi's airport. Further north, authorities in the Voronezh region reported that four people were wounded in another Ukrainian drone strike. Russia's Defence Ministry said its air defences shot down 93 Ukrainian drones over Russia and the Black Sea overnight into Sunday. Meanwhile, in southern Ukraine, a Russian missile strike hit a residential area in the city of Mykolaiv, according to the State Emergency Services, wounding seven people. The Ukrainian

Russia fired a record 728 Shahed and decoy drones at Ukraine overnight, as well as 13 missiles, the Ukrainian air force said Wednesday, in the latest escalation amid mounting Russian aerial and ground attacks in the more than three-year war. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the city of Lutsk, which lies in Ukraine's northwest along the border with Poland and Belarus, was the hardest hit, though 10 other regions were also struck. Lutsk is home to airfields used by the Ukrainian army. Cargo planes and fighter jets routinely fly over the city. No casualties were immediately reported, as emergency crews continued to assess the damage. Russia has recently sought to overwhelm Ukrainian air defences by launching massive aerial assaults, including adding more decoy drones to its attacks. Russia launched its previous largest aerial assault late in the night of July 4 into the following day, with the biggest prior to that occurring less than a week earlier. Russia's bigger army h

A Russian drone and missile attack through the night and early morning Tuesday wounded at least 20 people in Kyiv, Ukrainian officials. It was the latest intense drone and missile attack to target Kyiv recently. It occurred as world leaders convened at the Group of Seven summit in Canada, which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is expected to attend. Kyiv Mayor Vitalii Klitschko said nine people were wounded in the Sviatoshynskyi district and 11 more in the Solomianskyi district. The mayor said six people were hospitalized. Fires broke out in two other Kyiv districts as a result of falling debris from shot down Ukrainian air defences. The G7 host country Canada invited Zelenskyy to the summit, where he is expected to hold one-on-one meetings with world leaders. He won't be meeting with US President Donald Trump because Trump was returning early to Washington. Russia has launched a record number of drones and missiles in recent weeks. Moscow escalated attacks after Ukraine's .

Russian attacks targetting the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv killed at least four people and wounded more than two dozen others on Saturday, officials said, as hopes for peace dimmed further. The first wave on Ukraine's second-largest city was a large Russian drone-and-missile attack in the early hours. It killed at least three people and wounded 21 others, according to local officials. In the afternoon, Russia dropped aerial bombs on the city centre, killing at least one person and wounding five more, Kharkiv's mayor said. The warring sides also accused each other of trying to sabotage a planned prisoner exchange, nearly a week after Kyiv embarrassed the Kremlin with a surprising drone attack on military airfields deep inside Russia. Saturday's barrage the latest in near daily widescale attacks on Ukraine included aerial glide bombs that have become part of a fierce Russian onslaught in the all-out war, which began on February 24, 2022. Kharkiv residents describe fiery trap

Russia and Ukraine began a major prisoner exchange Friday, swapping hundreds of soldiers and civilians in the first phase of an exchange that was a moment of cooperation in otherwise failed efforts to reach a ceasefire in the 3-year-old war. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the first phase of the exchange brought home 390 Ukrainians, including soldiers and civilians, with further releases expected over the weekend that will make it the largest swap of the war. Russia's Defence Ministry said it had received the same number from Ukraine. It's very important to bring everyone home, Zelenskyy wrote on Telegram, thanking all who worked to secure their return and pledging to continue diplomatic efforts to make more exchanges possible. Dozens of relatives of prisoners cheered and chanted Thank you! as buses carrying the freed captives arrived at a medical facility in Ukraine's Chernihiv region. The men, some with expressionless faces, got off the buses wrapped in Ukrainian flags. Kyiv a

Ukraine is set to sign a major rare earth minerals deal with the US, amid ongoing ceasefire talks as both sides push for faster negotiations and a potential ceasefire

Trump's support for Putin came just hours after he rebuked the latter in a rare criticism. After Russia launched an attack on Kyiv, Trump asked Putin to 'STOP' the attacks on Ukraine

Trump, who says he wants to be remembered as a peacemaker, has repeatedly said he wants to end the bloodbath of the three-year war in Ukraine

Washington portrayed Monday's talks as a step in President Donald Trump's effort to end the war

Trump also told reporters as he met his Cabinet that the United States is talking to Ukraine about the potential for American firms owning Ukrainian power plants

Russian and US experts are due to discuss ways to ensure the safety of shipping in the Black Sea at talks on a possible peace settlement in Saudi Arabia on Monday

Kommersant said that Putin wanted the US to formally recognise the four regions - Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson - as part of Russia along with Crimea

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Russia had called off a drone attack on Ukrainian energy infrastructure targets and had shot down seven of its own drones

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Wednesday that a vow by Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin not to attack energy infrastructure was very much at odds with reality following an overnight barrage of drone strikes across the country. Zelenskyy said that he would speak with US President Donald Trump later in the day and expected to hear more about the American leader's phone call with Putin about a ceasefire and to discuss the next steps to be taken. Even last night, after Putin's conversation with ... Trump, when Putin said that he was allegedly giving orders to stop strikes on Ukrainian energy, there were 150 drones launched overnight, including on energy facilities, Zelenskyy said at a news conference in Helsinki with Finnish President Alexander Stubb. The strikes, which hit civilian areas and damaged a hospital, followed Putin's refusal to back a full 30-day ceasefire during discussions with Trump. The White House described the call between Trump and Putin as the first

Kiev is waiting for Russia's response, expected later today during a call between Trump and Putin, Andrii Sybiha said at Raisina Dialogue

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed on Monday that Putin would speak with Trump by phone but declined to comment on Trump's remarks about land and power plants

Russia claimed Thursday that its troops have driven the Ukrainian army out of the biggest town in Russia's Kursk border region, as a senior Kremlin official said that a US-proposed 30-day ceasefire in the war three years after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine would help Kyiv by giving its weary and short-handed military a break. The Russian Defence Ministry's claim that it recaptured the town of Sudzha, hours after President Vladimir Putin visited his commanders in Kursk and wore military fatigues, could not be independently verified. Ukrainian officials made no immediate comment on the claim. The renewed Russian military push and Putin's high-profile visit to his troops came as US President Donald Trump presses for a diplomatic end to the war. The US Tuesday lifted its March 3 suspension of military aid for Kyiv after senior US and Ukrainian officials made progress on how to stop the fighting during talks held in Saudi Arabia. Trump said Wednesday that it's up to Russia now as hi

While Ukraine has already accepted the US-backed ceasefire, Russia has remained hesitant, stating that it was 'studying' the proposal

Volodymyr Zelenskyy's visit to the UK was markedly different from his tense encounter at the White House with US President Donald Trump

He said he told Zelenskyy that "we really have to respect what President Trump has done so far for Ukraine"