Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff, Special Envoy for Peace Missions. File.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Rescuers work at a site of a shopping centre destroyed by yesterday’s Russian drone attack, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in the city of Kryvyi Rih, Dnipropetrovsk region, Ukraine.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Ukraine hit more oil facilities deep inside Russia in overnight attacks, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Thursday (August 6, 2026), as Kyiv kept up its campaign to undermine Moscow’s wartime economy and embarrass the Kremlin.

The repeated strikes have caused fuel shortages and rattled Russians. Ukrainians, meanwhile, are enduring regular barrages that Kyiv’s depleted air defences are struggling to counter amid Moscow’s 4-year-old full-scale invasion.

The Kyiv region observed an official day of mourning Thursday (August 6, 2026) after a Russian missile and drone blitz killed 17 people the previous day, prompting an increasingly urgent scramble by Ukraine and its partner countries to find new air defense supplies.

In the first six months of this year, 1,396 civilians were killed and 7,978 injured in Ukraine, the United Nations office in Kyiv said Wednesday (August 5, 2026). That was a 37% increase from the same period last year and a 114% jump over 2024, it said, attributing the rise to more long-range aerial attacks by Russia.

Mr. Zelenskyy said he met with senior officials on how to accelerate the development of Ukraine’s own ballistic weaponry, similar to its swift wartime innovation in drone technology.

“Developing one’s own ballistic capabilities and creating a new anti-ballistic system is a task that only a tiny minority of countries worldwide have managed to accomplish,” he said in a social media post. “Ukraine has this capability.” Mr. Zelenskyy said he expects the programme to produce results this year and next after it overcomes “key challenges,” including procuring critical components, technological cooperation with partner countries, and choosing where to build the armaments.

Ukraine says it hit Russian refineries and vessels at sea

Ukrainian forces hit a refinery in Russia’s Bashkortostan region, more than 1,300 kilometres from the front line, as well as a refinery in the Yaroslavl region, almost 700 kilometres from the border, Mr. Zelenskyy said on social media.

Yaroslavl Gov Mikhail Yevrayev confirmed an attack on a refinery, saying in a Telegram post that drone debris hit the facility’s oil reservoirs, sparking a fire. Three private houses also caught fire, and several residential buildings were damaged, he added.

Ukrainian forces hit two Russian military patrol boats in the Black Sea, Zelenskyy said, along with vessels belonging to Moscow’s so-called shadow fleet, which Russia uses to evade Western restrictions on its oil exports. He did not give any details.

The Russian Defence Ministry said its air defences overnight shot down 605 Ukrainian drones over its territory.

Ukraine seeks more interceptor missiles to bolster air defences

Drone and glide bomb attacks across Ukraine overnight killed at least three civilians and wounded 22 others, authorities said Thursday (August 6, 2026), as countries helping Kyiv resist the invasion scrambled to find more vital air defences for its fight.

Moscow’s forces have in recent weeks pummeled Ukraine with ballistic missiles that Kyiv officials say only the U.S.-made Patriot air defence system can stop. But the Iran war has drained stocks of Patriot interceptor missiles, leaving Ukraine at the mercy of Russian bombardments that seek to exploit the weakened air defences.

“We are working as hard as possible with all partners who can assist with the supply of interceptor missiles to protect against such insane Russian strikes targeting life, people, and civilian facilities,” Mr. Zelenskyy said on social media late Wednesday (August 5, 2026).

He said he had spoken to NATO chief Mark Rutte and Finnish President Alexander Stubb about urgently procuring interceptors from stockpiles. Zelenskyy said he and Mr. Rutte “coordinated our efforts regarding countries that have the necessary missiles and the capacity to help.” Mr. Rutte said on X that he was discussing with allies “how we can continue to get Ukraine the air defences they urgently need.”

Russian glide bombs wound 12 in Sumy region

Russia appears determined to exhaust Ukraine through sheer weight of numbers in terms of soldiers, armour and weapons. Russian President Vladimir Putin believes time is on his side, that Western support will fade and that Ukraine’s resistance will eventually collapse under pressure, Western analysts and officials say.

Ukraine’s air force said Russia fired four missiles and 101 long-range strike drones overnight, with air defences shooting down or jamming 66 drones.

Three people were killed in Balakliia in the Kharkiv region of northeastern Ukraine, said Vitalii Karabanov, head of the city’s military administration.

In the neighbouring Sumy region, Russian glide bombs wounded 12 people, the National Police said. Apartment buildings and infrastructure were damaged, with hundreds of windows shattered, said regional military administration chief Oleh Hryhorov.

In the Kherson region of southern Ukraine, a Russian drone struck a bus carrying farmworkers, injuring six people, regional authorities said.

A Russian drone also struck a residential area in the southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia, injuring four, said regional administration head Ivan Fedorov.

Published – August 06, 2026 11:48 pm IST

Ukrainian drone attacks in the region around Moscow killed five people, local officials said Tuesday (August 4, 2026), while authorities in Ukraine said Russian aerial strikes there also caused at least five civilian deaths.

Since Russia’s invasion more than four years ago, Ukraine has developed long-range drones that can hit targets deep inside Russia. In the past year, they have battered oil facilities, major storage depots and other key infrastructure.

More than 16,000 civilians have been killed in Ukraine since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion, according to the United Nations, with the vast majority of them occurring in areas under the Ukrainian government’s control. Casualties have risen steadily each year.

Meanwhile, escalating attacks by both sides on shipping in the Black Sea has reawakened fears that global food security could be put at risk.

Russia says a Ukrainian drone killed 7 on Black Sea coast

The death toll from a drone strike Monday (August 3) in the Russian Black Sea resort of Arkhipo-Osipovka rose to seven, including four children, regional authorities said.

On Tuesday (August 4) morning, Krasnodar regional authorities updated the number of wounded to 58, with 21 of them hospitalised.

Footage circulating online showed a drone slamming into a crowded beach, with what sounded like rapid gunfire ringing in the background. Ukraine has not commented on the strike.

Ukrainian drones attack near Moscow and St Petersburg

A Ukrainian drone attack in the Moscow region, which surrounds but doesn’t include the Russian capital, killed five people and wounded 10 others wounded on Tuesday morning, the region’s Governor Andrei Vorobyov said.

Most damage from the attack occurred in the Chekhov municipal district, where several fires erupted at the Novoselki industrial zone, Mr. Vorobyov said.

In the latest in a string of attacks attack on Russia’s biggest online retailer, Wildberries said Tuesday that its warehouse in the Leningrad region, which lies adjacent to St Petersburg, was on fire.

In the Tver region, located between Moscow and St Petersburg, drone debris inflicted “partial” damage on a wall of a Wildberries warehouse in the village of Emmaus, the region’s governor Vitaly Korolyov said.

Ukrainian drones have over the past 18 days targeted 15 Wildberries warehouses, 13 of which have caught fire, Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces commander Robert Brovdi said. Ukrainian officials say the company provides goods that can be used by the Russian military. Kyiv is also keen to unsettle the Russian public with high-profile attacks.

Overall, the Russian Defense Ministry reported Tuesday morning that its air defences shot down 320 Ukrainian drones overnight.

Russia hits Ukrainian ports and shipping

The Russian Defence Ministry said in a statement Tuesday that its forces the previous night “continued to strike Ukrainian ports, vessels, and port infrastructure” used by Kyiv’s army.

In the port of Chornomorsk, in Ukraine’s southern Odesa region, the Russian military said it struck an automobile components plant and a port terminal, where the Ukrainian forces “were repairing military vehicles and storing ammunition and fuel.” In the southern port of Mykolaiv, a bulk carrier with military cargo was damaged, while in Pivdennyi, another Ukrainian Black Sea port, a vessel unloading military cargo was hit, according to the statement.

The ministry also said two bulk carriers taking weapons and military equipment to Ukrainian ports were damaged at sea, south of Odesa.

Turkey on Tuesday repeated its appeal for both Russia and Ukraine to ensure the safety of navigation in the Black Sea after two Turkish-owned ships were attacked by drones after leaving the Russian port of Novorossiysk.

A Turkish Foreign Ministry statement expressed concerns that the war is increasingly spreading across the Black Sea, threatening civilian shipping, and warned such incidents could have broader consequences, including for the global food supply, as important amounts of grain, fertilisers and other key produce moves through those waters.

Ukraine reports more Russian glide bomb attack

Russian attacks on Mykolaiv, including its port, killed an 89-year-old woman and wounded seven other people aged between two and 83, Ukrainian regional officials said.

The Russian strike on civilian infrastructure in southern Odesa region destroyed a private home and wounded two people, according to Oleh Kiper, head of the regional military administration.

Elsewhere, in Ukraine’s northern Sumy region, six Russian glide bombs killed two girls aged 5 and 10 and an elderly woman, Oleh Hryhorov, head of the Sumy regional military administration, said.

Russian forces also struck Kharkiv and 18 towns and villages across the northern region over the previous 24 hours, killing one person and injuring seven others, including an 8-year-old child, said Oleh Syniehubov, head of the Kharkiv regional military administration.

Strikes in Balakliia, also in the Kharkiv region, significantly damaged an apartment building, a library, three stores and more than 10 houses, wounding two women, local authorities said.

Two 250-kilo (550 lbs) glide bombs struck Kramatorsk in the eastern Donetsk region of Ukraine on Tuesday morning, injuring 22 people, local officials said.

Kramatorsk sits at the northern end of Ukraine’s Fortress Belt, where Western analysts say Russia’s army is making a renewed effort to break through after four years of attrition.

Vadym Filashkin, head of the regional military administration, urged people remaining near the front line to evacuate, saying evacuation is free and that authorities would help with transportation, housing and other necessary support. (AP) ABD ABD

Books burn in the fire at a major book warehouse following Russian drone strikes in Kharkiv, Ukraine, Saturday, August 1, 2026.
| Photo Credit: AP

Rescuers carry the body of a killed resident at a site of a house destroyed by a Russian air strike, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine on August 2, 2026.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy arrived Monday (July 27, 2026) in England for a meeting with Prime Minister Andy Burnham, a visit the British leader said is intended to signal the country’s “unwavering” support for Kyiv.

Mr. Zelenskyy’s visit is the first by a foreign leader since Mr. Burnham took office a week ago. His predecessor, Keir Starmer, was in Kyiv less than two weeks ago in his last overseas trip before leaving office.

Mr. Burnham will be the fifth British Prime Minister to deal with Mr. Zelenskyy since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

“Russia should be in no doubt of our resolve, and we will not back down until we achieve long-lasting and just peace for Ukraine,” said Mr. Burnham, who has spent the past nine years as mayor of Greater Manchester and has little foreign policy experience.

The trip to a naval base in Portsmouth on England’s south coast comes a day before Mr. Zelenskyy is expected to meet with U.S. President Donald Trump in Washington.

Mr. Zelenskyy posted on X that he had arrived in Britain for the meeting with Mr. Burnham “as well as with our warriors” in the UK. He and Mr. Burnham will meet more than 200 Ukrainian military personnel who have spent three weeks in Britain for an exercise aimed at strengthening their fighting capabilities and measures to counter mines in the Black Sea, the U.K. government said.

The U.K. will give Ukraine the intellectual property behind its new “Stone Cloak” electronic warfare system, which is capable of jamming Russian air defenses to stop drones from being detected, Mr. Burnham’s office said.

Ukraine has expanded its campaign of frequent drone attacks deep inside Russia that have targeted oil facilities, military factories and, most recently, logistical centers, bringing the war home to millions of Russians and raising pressure on President Vladimir Putin.

The raids have shattered Mr. Putin’s narrative of the conflict as something that doesn’t affect the lives of ordinary people in his country. But he has remained undeterred, and Russia has ramped up its aerial campaign, regularly bombarding Ukraine with missiles and drones.

Russia and Ukraine exchange more drone attacks

Russia again attacked Ukraine overnight with 147 long-range drones, according to the Ukrainian air force, which said it intercepted or jammed 123 of them.

In Zaporizhzhia, one person was killed and two injured in attacks on the city that damaged a high-rise residential building and several private residences overnight, according to regional administration head Ivan Fedorov.

A Russian strike on the town of Balakliia in the Kharkiv region killed one person and wounded eight, according to Vitalii Karabanov, head of the city military administration.

In the Nikopol district of the Dnipropetrovsk region, Russian strikes damaged a kindergarten, residential buildings and infrastructure, injuring a woman and a 6-year-old boy, according to administration head Oleksandr Hanzha.

In the eastern Kharkiv region, a regional council member said Russian forces destroyed every gas station along the highway between Kharkiv and Poltava, a distance of about 150 kilometres (93 miles). Oleksandr Skoryk said the situation is becoming more critical daily, but the region is not facing a fuel or food crisis.

The highway is a key supply route linking Kharkiv, the country’s second-largest city and a regional hub close to the Russian border, with central Ukraine. Russia has intensified strikes on gas stations, power facilities and other infrastructure this year as part of a broader campaign to strain Ukraine’s logistics and energy networks.

Romania’s Ministry of National Defense said a drone briefly entered its airspace before crossing the river border into Ukraine, where explosions were subsequently reported. It said two F-16 fighter jets were deployed to monitor airspace.

The drone’s incursion into Romanian airspace marked the fourth such incident in as many days. The three previous drones were all shot down by the NATO member.

In Moscow, Russia’s Defense Ministry said air defenses downed 276 Ukrainian drones overnight.

Rostov regional Gov. Yuri Slyusar said five people, including a child, were killed when a Ukrainian drone hit an apartment building in Rostov-on-Don. Ukraine’s military General Staff said Ukrainian forces struck an export terminal in Rostov-on-Don, setting it ablaze.

The Ukrainian military said other strikes in the Moscow-held part of the Kherson region targeted a ground relay station used to control drones and a bridge over the Henichesk Strait that Russia uses for military logistics. Russian fuel and supply depots were also hit.

In the city of Belgorod in southwestern Russia near the border with Ukraine, a Ukrainian drone attack injured 12, including two children, according to regional emergency officials.

Iran vows retaliation after Ukrainian attack on ship

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Ukraine struck an Iranian vessel in the Caspian Sea, killing a sailor.

In a statement on X on Sunday (July 26, 2026), Mr. Araghchi denounced the attack as a “blatant UN Charter violation done at Israel’s behest to drag Europe into its war.” He said he made it clear in calls with the European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov that the attack “can’t go unanswered.” Mr. Zelenskyy said Ukrainian long-range strikes in the Caspian Sea over the weekend achieved “very good results,” adding that the targets included “vessels involved in transporting military cargo linked to Iran, as well as a warship.” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha rejected Iran’s threats of retaliation as unjustified and groundless, saying Tehran’s weapons supplies to Russia have made it a direct accomplice to Moscow’s aggression. “Iran has no standing to pretend to be a victim,” he posted on X, and called its references to the UN Charter “absurd.” Mr. Sybiha said Iran’s statements were an attempt to divert attention from Russia’s attacks on civilian shipping in the Black Sea, which would be a focus of an emergency UN Security Council meeting Monday (July 27, 2026).

Published – July 28, 2026 05:10 am IST

Near the Black Sea port of Odesa, Ukraine. Image used for representative purpose only.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

A satellite image shows smoke rising and damage at the Omsk oil refinery following a drone attack, Russia on July 7, 2026. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Emergency workers carry a wounded person at the site of an apartment building which was heavily damaged during Russian missile and drone strikes, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine on July 6, 2026.
| Photo Credit: Reuters