Resident Olha Mudra and her daughter Natalia, 6, look at their damaged apartment after a nearby building got struck during overnight Russian missile and drone attacks, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine, Tuesday (June 2, 2026).
| Photo Credit: Reuters

File picture of Russian President Vladimir Putin talking to Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, who has said that Russia would reject Ukraine’s offer to exchange territories held by both sides
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Ukrainian President Zelenskyy said he planned to offer Russia a straight territory exchange to help bring an end to the war

The Kremlin said on Wednesday (Feburary 12, 2025) Russia will never discuss trading the Ukrainian territory it holds for areas in Russia’s western Kursk region held by Kyiv.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told The Guardian newspaper that he planned to offer Russia a straight territory exchange to help bring an end to the war, including offering pockets of Kursk that Ukraine holds.

Kyiv staged a lightning incursion over the border last August and seized chunks of Kursk, from which Russian troops are still battling to eject them.

“We will swap one territory for another,” Mr. Zelenskyy said, adding that he did not know which part of Russian-occupied territory Ukraine would ask for back.

“I don’t know, we will see. But all our territories are important, there is no priority,” he said.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Moscow categorically rejects all offers to trade territory.

Will not discuss exchange: Kremlin

“This is impossible,” he told reporters at a daily briefing. “Russia has never discussed and will not discuss the exchange of its territory.”

President Vladimir Putin told Russians at his marathon annual phone-in in December that their troops would definitely eject Ukrainian forces from Kursk, but declined to say when this would happen.

Mr. Peskov said: “Ukrainian units will be expelled from this territory. All who are not destroyed will be expelled.”

Russia controls just under 20% of Ukraine, or more than 112,000 square kilometres, while Ukraine controls around 450 square kilometres of the Kursk region, according to open source maps of the battlefield.

Russian forces in 2024 advanced in Ukraine at the fastest rate since 2022, the war’s first year, but the gains have come at the cost of heavy, though undisclosed, losses in men and equipment.

Russian President Vladimir Putin takes part in a ceremony opening objects of transport infrastructure via video link in Moscow, Russia December 22, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Sunday (December 22, 2024) vowed to bring more “destruction” to Ukraine in retaliation for a drone attack on the central Russian city of Kazan a day earlier.

Russia accused Ukraine of a “massive” drone attack that hit a luxury apartment block in the city, some 1,000 km from the frontier.

Videos on Russian social media networks showed drones hitting a high-rise glass building and setting off fireballs, though there were no reported casualties as a result of the strike.

“Whoever, and however much they try to destroy, they will face many times more destruction themselves and will regret what they are trying to do in our country,” Mr. Putin said during a televised government meeting on Sunday.

Mr. Putin was addressing the local leader of Tatarstan, the region where Kazan is located, in a road-opening ceremony via video link.

The strike on Kazan was the latest in a series of escalating aerial attacks in the nearly three-year conflict.

Ukraine has not commented on the strike.

Mr. Putin has previously threatened to target the centre of Kyiv with a hypersonic ballistic missile in response to Ukrainian attacks on Russian territory.

And the Defence Ministry has called Russian strikes on Ukrainian energy facilities over recent weeks retaliatory hits for Kyiv using Western-supplied missiles to hit Russian air bases and arms factories.

Advances

The latest threat comes as Russia claimed fresh advances on the battlefield in east Ukraine.

The defence ministry said on Telegram that its troops had “liberated” the villages of Lozova in the northeastern Kharkiv region and Krasnoye — called Sontsivka in Ukraine.

The latter is close to the resource hub of Kurakhove, which Russia has almost encircled and would be a key prize in Moscow’s attempt to capture the entire Donetsk region.

Russia has accelerated its advance across eastern Ukraine in recent months, looking to secure as much territory as possible before U.S. President-elect Donald Trump comes to power in January.

The Republican has promised to bring a swift end to the nearly three-year-long conflict, without proposing any concrete terms for a ceasefire or peace deal.

Moscow’s Army claims to have seized more than 190 Ukrainian settlements this year, with Kyiv struggling to hold the line in the face of manpower and ammunition shortages.

Kyiv on Sunday also accused Russian forces of killing captured Ukrainian soldiers — an alleged war crimes violation.

A video posted by Ukraine’s 110th separate mechanised brigade showed “the shooting of soldiers who surrendered,” Kyiv’s human rights ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets said in a post on Telegram.

He said the video — aerial footage from a drone of an apparent confrontation between Russian and Ukrainian soldiers — showed Russians shooting the Ukrainians at point-blank range after they had already surrendered.

AFP could not verify the footage.

It is the latest in a string of similar allegations lodged by Ukraine throughout the nearly three-year conflict.

A local resident rides a bicycle near a destroyed bridge, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in the town of Pokrovsk, near a front line in Donetsk region, Ukraine December 19, 2024.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Russian troops have captured the village of Kostiantynopolske in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine, the Defence Ministry said on Saturday (December 21, 2024).

Reuters could not independently confirm the report about the village, called Ostrovsky by Russia.

The settlement lies 10 km southwest of Kurakhove, which Russian troops have stormed and are threatening to encircle, according to DeepState, a Ukrainian group mapping the fighting.

Meanwhile, Ukraine brought the war into the heart of Russia on Saturday morning with drone attacks that local authorities said damaged residential buildings in the city of Kazan in the Tatarstan region, over 1,000 km from the front line.

The press service of Tatarstan’s governor, Rustam Minnikhanov, said that eight drones attacked the city. Six hit residential buildings, one hit an industrial facility and one was shot down over a river, the statement said.

A video posted on local Telegram news channel Astra, verified by The Associated Press, shows a drone flying into the upper floors of a high-rise building.

Local authorities said there were no casualties. Flights were halted at Kazan’s airport and all mass gatherings cancelled on Saturday and Sunday.

The attacks, which Ukraine didn’t acknowledge in keeping with its security policy, comes after a Ukrainian attack Friday on a town in Russia’s Kursk border region using U.S.-supplied missiles killed six people, including a child.

Moscow sent 113 drones into Ukraine overnight into Saturday, Ukrainian officials said. According to Ukraine’s Air Force, 57 drones were shot down during the attacks. A further 56 drones were “lost,” likely having been electronically jammed.

The governor of Ukraine’s Kharkiv region, Oleh Syniehubov, said eight persons were wounded on Friday night in drone attacks on the regional capital, also called Kharkiv.

Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump meets with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at Trump Tower in New York on Friday (September 27, 2024).
| Photo Credit: AP

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy arrived on Friday (September 27, 2024) for a meeting with former American President Donald Trump as public tensions have been rising between the two over Ukraine’s defense against Russia’s invasion.

“I think we have a common view that the war in Ukraine has to be stopped and Putin can’t win,” Mr. Zelenskyy said, referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

After arriving together at a conference room on Friday (September 27, 2024), Mr. Trump said, “The fact that we’re even together today is a very good sign.”

The visit is taking place at Trump Tower in New York, a day after Vice President Kamala Harris, Mr. Trump’s Democratic opponent, met with the Ukrainian leader and expressed unwavering support.

The meeting is highly anticipated and comes as Election Day nears, with Mr. Trump and Ms. Harris taking sharply different positions on backing Ukraine in the third year of its war with Russia.

Mr. Trump has in recent days praised Russia’s historic military victories and insisted the U.S. needs “to get out” and end its involvement with Ukraine.

Friday’s (September 27, 2024) meeting almost wasn’t scheduled despite Mr. Zelenskyy’s office saying something had been planned during the Ukrainian leader’s visit to the U.N. General Assembly, during which he is making his endgame pitch to allies.

In an interview with The New Yorker that was published earlier this week, Mr. Zelenskyy implied Mr. Trump does not understand and oversimplifies the conflict. The Ukrainian leader said Mr. Trump’s running mate JD Vance was “too radical” and had essentially advocated for Ukraine to “make a sacrifice” by “giving up its territories.”

Mr. Trump ripped Mr. Zelenskyy and Ukraine on two separate occasions this week. Speaking Wednesday (September 25, 2024) in North Carolina, Mr. Trump referred to Ukraine as “demolished” and its people as “dead.”

“Any deal — the worst deal — would’ve been better than what we have now,” Mr. Trump said. “If they made a bad deal, it would’ve been much better. They would’ve given up a little bit, and everybody would be living, and every building would be built, and every tower would be aging for another 2,000 years.”

Meanwhile, Ms. Harris on Thursday (September 26, 2024) stood alongside Mr. Zelenskyy and said Mr. Trump’s push for Ukraine to quickly cut a deal to end the war were “not proposals for peace,” but “proposals for surrender.” Mr. Trump on Thursday (September 26, 2024) said he was not advocating for a surrender.

While Mr. Trump and Vance have been critical of U.S. backing for Ukraine, other Republican allies of the former president have backed Kyiv’s defense against Moscow’s invasion and argue supporting Ukraine is in America’s interest.

One ally of both Ukraine and Mr. Trump is Senator Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. At a closed-door meeting Mr. Zelenskyy had with senators on Capitol Hill, also on Thursday (September 26, 2024), Mr. Graham stood up and said he had been talking to Mr. Trump about the Ukrainian president, according to a person familiar with the situation and granted anonymity to discuss the private meeting.

Mr. Graham told those in the room he would talk to Mr. Zelenskyy privately about his conversations with Mr. Trump, the person said. As the meeting came to a close, Mr. Graham pulled Mr. Zelenskyy aside, and the two had a private conversation.

Mr. Graham is close to the former president, despite an on-again, off-again relationship, and has often played a role as an intermediary on various subjects. He did not respond to a message seeking comment Thursday (September 26, 2024).

Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman and the head of the United Russia party Dmitry Medvedev, center, visits the Pogonovo military training ground in Voronezh region of Russia. Image used for representative purpose only.
| Photo Credit: AP

Russia has declared a state of emergency in part of the Voronezh region bordering Ukraine after an overnight drone attack, local governor Alexander Gusev said in his Telegram channel.

According to Gusev, Russian forces intercepted five drones. Falling debris ignited a fire, leading to the detonation of explosive materials.

The incident damaged no civilian buildings, but prompted authorities to impose emergency measures in three settlements in the Ostrogozhsky district and evacuate 200 people, he said.

U.S. F16 jet. File.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Ukraine has received the first F-16 fighter jets that it has sought for months to fight back against an onslaught of Russian missile strikes, a U.S. official confirmed to the Associated Press.

Ukraine has been pushing its Western allies for F-16s for Ukraine for months, saying they were critically needed to fight back against the onslaught of missiles Russia has fired against it. The F-16 is specialised in suppressing enemy air defences.

The U.S. has also been training Ukrainian pilots on how to fly the jets and has already graduated the first group of pilots on its operation.

It’s not clear how many jets were provided in the first tranche or which nations provided them. The Ukrainian government has not confirmed receipt of the jets.

The arrival of the jets was first reported by Bloomberg.

Director of the Office of European Security and Political Affairs Liam Wasley.
| Photo Credit: PTI

“India, as a critical security provider globally, must play a constructive role in ensuring peace in Ukraine and providing it with the impetus to be able to negotiate with Russia,” a senior U.S. official has said.

Liam Wasley, Director of the Office of European Security and Political Affairs at the U.S. State Department said this, days after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s high-profile visit to Moscow and his meeting with President Vladimir Putin, including on the Ukraine conflict.

Mr. Wasley said Indians should understand how much of a threat President Putin and his country are to America’s European allies and the NATO alliance. “It has also been a very jarring direct threat to the security of a billion members of democracies,” Mr. Wasley told PTI in an interview.

“I think that the Indian people can recognise how that is impacting the understanding and the approach of our NATO allies. It’s really important for India to be playing a constructive role in ensuring a just peace for Ukraine and providing the impetus for Ukraine to be able to negotiate to ensure its own future,” he said.

Leaders of the 32-member NATO alliance gathered in Washington DC this week for the 75th anniversary summit meeting where Russia’s war in Ukraine and China has been the two major topics of discussion.

He mentioned NATO’s strong statement in Washington on Wednesday on China’s role in enabling the Russian war machine and continuing the war in Ukraine. Russia would not be able to continue its onslaught on the Ukrainian people if it were not for the technology and the support that they are getting from China, Iran, and North Korea.

When asked if the Indian Prime Minister was insensitive to the security concerns of Europe and NATO allies, Mr. Wasley said: “We think it’s important for Indians to understand how those forces are contributing to extending and continuing an unjust, unprovoked war for several years.”

Referring to the meeting between U.S. President Joe Biden along with NATO allies and with the heads of state of Indo-Pacific partners, Mr. Wasley said part of this is because many aspects of security are now global.

“The declaration yesterday focussed on undersea warfare, focused on cyberspace, focussed on war in space. These are conversations that we’re having with our Indo-Pacific partners. Those were conversations that I can see are a future role for India because their security, our security, all of our security is interconnected,” he said, adding that there is room for this conversation to grow.

Describing NATO as a defensive alliance, he said it relies on the interest of other partners to want to be engaged. “I think that that is a decision for India to take, whether it wants a deeper relationship with NATO or with individual NATO partners,” he said.

Responding to a question, he said India has not chosen to be a partner of NATO. “India is a critical security provider and projector in a very large part of the world. We think India has enormous influence and an enormous voice and will have a great impact on how the future of the international security environment develops. This is why I think India can play a constructive role in bringing peace to Ukraine,” he said.

“This is why I think India has a key role in the conversation as we deal with the global security threats that we are all grappling with,” he added.

Mr. Wasley said the NATO alliance has shown that it is united in support of Ukraine and providing Ukraine with the support, the political support, the material support it needs to defend its own people, defend its own territory, and forge a just and lasting peace.

“It’s up to India to figure out how it can best contribute to that role,” he said. “The reference to China in the Washington declaration,” he said, captures the mood of the alliance.

“It captures the tone of the conversations that we’ve been having as allies for the past two years. China has stepped up its role in supporting Putin and in his no-limits partnership. So, I think it’s a recognition that China has decided that it is seeking to influence this conflict by enabling Putin,” Mr. Wasley said.

In this image released by the U.S. Department of Defense, German soldiers assigned to Surface Air and Missile Defense Wing 1, fire the Patriot weapons system at the NATO Missile Firing Installation, in Chania, Greece, on Nov. 8, 2017. U.S. officials say the Pentagon is expected to announce that it will provide about $6 billion in long-term military aid to Ukraine. It will include much sought after munitions for Patriot air defense systems and other weapons.
| Photo Credit: AP

The U.S. is expected to announce Friday that it will provide about $6 billion in long-term military aid to Ukraine, U.S. officials said, adding that it will include much sought after munitions for Patriot air defense systems.

The officials said the aid package will be funded through the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative, which pays for longer-term contracts with the defense industry and means that it could take many months or years for the weapons to arrive. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss details not yet made public.

The new funding — the largest tranche of USAI aid sent to date — will include a wide array of munitions for air defense, such as the National Advanced Surface to Air Missile System (NASAM) and the High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS), as well as the Patriot munitions, Switchblade and Puma drones, counter drone systems and artillery.

The announcement is expected to come as Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin convenes a virtual meeting on Friday of defense officials from Europe and around the world to discuss international aid for Ukraine. The gathering — created by Austin and known as the Ukraine Defense Contact Group — has been meeting about monthly for the past two years, and is the primary forum for weapons contributions to Kyiv for the war.

It follows the White House decision earlier this week to approve the delivery of $1 billion in weapons and equipment to Ukraine. Those weapons include a variety of ammunition, including air defense munitions and large amounts of artillery rounds that are much in demand by Ukrainian forces, as well as armored vehicles and other weapons.

That aid, however, will get to Ukraine quickly because it is being pulled off Pentagon shelves, including in warehouses in Europe.

The large back-to-back packages are the result of the new infusion of about $61 billion in funding for Ukraine that was passed by Congress and signed into law by President Joe Biden on Wednesday. And they provide weapons Kyiv desperately needs to stall gains being made by Russian forces in the war.

Bitterly divided members of Congress deadlocked over the funding for months, forcing House Speaker Mike Johnson to cobble together a bipartisan coalition to pass the bill. The $95 billion foreign aid package, which also included billions for Israel and Taiwan, passed the House on Saturday, and the Senate approved it Tuesday.

Senior U.S. officials have described dire battlefield conditions in Ukraine, as troops run low on munitions and Russian forces make gains.

Since Russia’s February 2022 invasion, the U.S. has sent more than $44 billion worth of weapons, maintenance, training and spare parts to Ukraine.

Among the weapons provided to Ukraine were Abrams M1A1 battle tanks. But Ukraine has now sidelined them in part because Russian drone warfare has made it too difficult for them to operate without detection or coming under attack, two U.S. military officials told The Associated Press.

A handout picture released by the Russian Defence Ministry shows a demonstration flight of military drones at a training range in the Moscow military district, in Russia, picture released April 20, 2024.
| Photo Credit: REUTERS

Ukraine launched a barrage of drones across Russia overnight, the Defence Ministry in Moscow said Saturday, in attacks that appeared to target the country’s energy infrastructure.

Fifty drones were shot down by air defences over eight Russian regions, including 26 over the country’s western Belgorod region close to the Ukrainian border.

Two people — a woman with a broken leg and the man caring for her — died during the barrage, after explosions sparked a blaze that set their home alight, Belgorod Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov wrote on social media.

Drones were also reportedly destroyed over the Bryansk, Kursk, Tula, Smolensk, Ryazan, Kaluga regions across Russia’s west and south, as well as in the Moscow region.

Ukrainian officials normally decline to comment about attacks on Russian soil. However, many of the drone strikes appeared to be directed toward Russia’s energy infrastructure.

The head of the Kaluga region, Vladislav Shapsha, said Saturday that a drone strike had sparked a blaze at an electrical substation, while Bryansk Gov. Alexander Bogomaz and Smolensk Gov. Vasily Anokhin also reported fires at fuel and energy complexes.

In recent months, Russian refineries and oil terminals have become priority targets of Ukrainian drone attacks, part of stepped-up assaults on Russian territory.

Ukrainian drone developers have been extending the weapons’ range for months, as Kyiv attempts to compensate for its battlefield disadvantage in weapons and troops.

The unmanned aerial vehicles are also an affordable option while Ukraine waits for more U.S. military aid.

Moscow also said Friday evening that an American citizen known to have fought with Kremlin-backed separatists in Ukraine between 2014 and 2017 had died in the Russian-occupied Donetsk region.

Russell Bentley, 64, was no longer involved in military operations and previously worked for state-owned Russian news agency Sputnik. His death was confirmed by his former battalion and by Margarita Simonyan, head of the state-funded television channel RT, who described him as “a real American.”

He used the call-sign “Texas” and had spent time in prison on charges of drug smuggling before leaving the United States.

No information has been released as to the cause of Bentley’s death, but local police had previously reported the American as missing on April 8.

Meanwhile, Russia attacked Ukraine overnight with seven missiles, and air defences downed two missiles and three reconnaissance drones, the Ukrainian air force said Saturday.

Gov. Oleh Kiper, head of Ukraine’s Odesa region, said that ballistic missiles had damaged infrastructure overnight, but did not provide further details.

Previous attacks on the Black Sea city on Friday damaged port infrastructure, including two food export terminals, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said.

Russian shelling also killed a 50-year-old man in the city of Vovchansk, said Gov. Oleh Syniehubov, head of Ukraine’s Kharkiv region.

A 60-year-old woman was also injured after shelling struck a nine-story apartment block, he said.