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Russian military bloggers say new Kursk attack came ‘like a bolt from the blue’
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Ukraine has launched a new assault inside Russia’s Kursk oblast, expanding its incursion into Russian territory by as much as three miles.
Kyiv’s new incursion came on the six-month anniversary of its first attack inside Kursk, with one Russian military blogger describing the surprise attack as coming “like a bolt from the blue”.
The incursion was also reported by the Russian ministry of defence, which said Ukrainian troops and armoured vehicles had launched several waves of attacks near the villages of Ulanok and Cherkasskaya Konopelka.
Kyiv‘s forces launched a “new series of battalion-sized mechanised assaults in Kursk Oblast and advanced up to five kilometres behind Russian lines southeast of Sudzha, Kursk Oblast,” the Institute for the Study of War said.
Without directly referring to the new attack, Volodymyr Zelensky said in his overnight address that the incursion “brought the war home for Russians so that they might feel just what war is. And they are feeling it.”
Meanwhile, the first batch of French Mirage 2000 fighter jets arrived in Ukraine, French armed forces minister Sebastien Lecornu announced yesterday.
The fourth-generation jets have been modified to focus on air-to-ground combat, reportedly so they can fire French and British long-range missiles at Russian targets.
Three people were killed in a Russian guided bomb attack on Ukraine’s northeastern region of Sumy, Ukrainian authorities said on Friday.
Earlier, we reported the death toll was at two people.
The attack late on Thursday with three guided aerial bombs destroyed a residential building in the village of Myropillya, the Prosecutor General’s office said in a statement.
The village sits near the border with Russia’s Kursk region, where Ukrainian troops are locked in fierce fighting with Russian forces after launching an incursion there last year.
Below, we have some of the latest pictures from the eastern Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk.
Russian forces have advanced to the city’s outskirts and gained control of at least one of the two supply lines feeding the area. Pokrovsk is linchpin of the
Only the White Helmets, a specialist Ukrainian evacuation group, is still entering the city to evacuate citizens. Between 5,000 and 7,000 civilians remain from a prewar population of 60,000.
A Russian guided bomb attack on Ukraine’s northeastern region of Sumy has killed at least two people, local officials said on Friday.
The attack late on Thursday with three guided aerial bombs destroyed a residential building and rescue work continued into the morning, the local officials said in a statement on the Telegram messaging app.
“It is likely that people may still be under the rubble,” the regional administration wrote on the Telegram messenger app.
Ukrainian military said that it shot down 81 out of 112 drones launched by Russia overnight to attack the country.
Out of the total number launched, 31 drones did not reach their targets likely due to electronic warfare, the military said this morning.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky’s chief of staff said he discussed approaching meetings and battlefield developments with Keith Kellogg, US president Donald Trump’s special envoy for Ukraine and Russia.
Andriy Yermak said issues discussed ranged from Mr Kellogg’s visit to Ukraine and the safety of Ukrainian civilians to meetings later this month at the Munich Security Conference.
Russia and the US have not yet begun to discuss a possible meeting between Russian president Vladimir Putin and US president Donald Trump, a Kremlin spokesperson said.
There had been no initial contacts about whether such a meeting was needed or where and how it might take place if it did happen, Mr Peskov said, Russian news agency Interfax reported.
Both the leaders have said they are keen to meet in person with the agenda, if such a meeting does take place, expected to focus on Mr Trump’s stated aim to bring a swift end to the Ukraine war.
Volodymyr Zelensky has said he is open to negotiating the end of war in Ukraine via diplomacy but the Russian president Vladimir Putin is avoiding talks.
“Answering journalists’ questions in Kyiv, I emphasised that Ukraine is open to diplomacy, but no decision or plan about Ukraine can be made without us. It cannot be a plan created by individual states – we must have a joint vision with our partners,” he said on X yesterday.
The Ukrainian president said Russia “will always look for excuses to avoid real talks”.
He went on: “I believe Putin is afraid to have a conversation with me about ending the war. He prefers to hide behind his entourage rather than sit down and have a direct conversation. Nevertheless, I believe President Trump will be able to force him to stop the war.”
The US president says he will use financial leverage to force Russia to accept a deal to end the invasion of Ukraine
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