The Kyiv Independent Live in London: 
Medical center, science academy struck in downtown Kyiv as all-day Russian drone attacks continue
In the city center, local media and Telegram channels reported a strike next to the main campus of Kyiv's Taras Shevchenko National University.
Team
Francis Farrell
Senior ReporterFrancis Farrell is a senior reporter at the Kyiv Independent. He is the co-author of War Notes, the Kyiv Independent's weekly newsletter about the war. For the second year in a row, the Kyiv Independent received a grant from the Charles Douglas-Home Memorial Trust to support his front-line reporting for the year 2025-2026. Francis won the Prix Bayeux Calvados-Normandy for war correspondents in the young reporter category in 2023, and was nominated for the European Press Prize in 2024. Francis speaks Ukrainian and Hungarian and is an alumnus of Leiden University in The Hague and University College London. He has previously worked as a managing editor at the online media project Lossi 36, as a freelance journalist and documentary photographer, and at the OSCE and Council of Europe field missions in Albania and Ukraine.
Articles
Ukraine's Operation Vivaldi liberates 3 more settlements, inflicts 2,000 Russian losses, 3rd Army Corps announces
The villages of Ridkodub, Nove, and Katerynivka were liberated amid newly-reported territorial gains of 51 square kilometers.
Ex-defense minister Fedorov announces new 'Army of Robots' initiative in latest move since leaving office
According to Fedorov, the initiative will be not one company, but an "ecosystem," combining investment, native production, and R&D.
As Russia adapts to Ukraine's middle strikes, elite drone units stay ahead of the curve
Russian logistics continued to be hunted by Ukrainian drones on a daily basis, but Kyiv's advantage is not set in stone
Russia's total oil refining capacity down 45% due to long-range strikes, Ukrainian military says
The assessment comes a day after major strikes on the Moscow Oil Refinery by Ukrainian drones and missiles.
69% of Russian soldiers on Zaporizhzhia front line have criminal records, Ukrainian military says
According to internal analysis conducted by the military, 31% of Russia's overall force had signed up to avoid criminal charges, and 24% were in the military to improve their financial situation.
Russia pulls elite drone unit from northern Donetsk Oblast after losses from Operation Vivaldi, Ukraine's military says
"Most specialized drone units in the area suffered significant losses among qualified personnel and material and technical resources," the 3rd Army Corps said.
As elections get underway, Russia closes Sochi polling stations over drone threat
"Exhaustive security measures have been taken at polling stations in Sochi," said the city's mayor, Andrey Propushin.
Deadly strike on industrial zone in Zhytomyr as Russian attacks kill 6, injure 34 over past day
The strike occured in the evening of Sept. 17 near the city of Korosten, oblast governor Vitaliy Buchenko said on Telegram.
Analysis: Through the fog of war, Ukraine reveals 'Operation Vivaldi' counterattack near Lyman
Ukrainian forces under the command of the 3rd Army Corps are conducting a series of counterattacks north of the front-line city of Lyman in Donetsk Oblast, corps commander Brig. Gen. Andrii Biletskyi confirmed on Sept. 15.
"The 3rd Army Corps has launched an offensive operation in this direction under the name Vivaldi," Biletskyi said.
"This operation is being conducted under conditions of maximum information silence."
Biletskyi said Ukrainian troops had cleared 75 square kilometers in northe
Russia using Belarusian LTE networks, relay stations for mass drone attacks on Ukraine, Kyiv says
The revelations came a day after Russia sent hundreds of the petrol-powered drones in a rare mass attack targeting regions in northwestern Ukraine on Sept. 12.
Trump claims Ukraine, Russia agree to halt strikes on energy targets, Kyiv unaware of deal
"Ukraine has agreed not to hit Russian Energy Targets. Russia has agreed to do, likewise!" Trump said in a Truth Social post on Sept. 14.
As Russia-Ukraine war escalates in the air, what comes next?
In this interview, The Kyiv Independent's Francis Farrell speaks with Mykola Bielieskov, senior analyst at Come Back Alive and research fellow at the National Institute for Strategic Studies, about why Russian advances have slowed, how Ukraine’s drone tactics are reshaping the battlefield, and the limits of relying on manpower alone.
Who has the upper hand in Ukraine’s evolving drone war?
In this interview, the Kyiv Independent's Francis Farrell speaks with “Schweiger,” a Ukrainian drone operator from the Signum UAV Battalion of Ukraine's 59th Separate Assault Brigade – one of the country's pioneering FPV drone units.
With no defense against ballistic missiles, Ukraine starts hunting Russian launch sites
Instead of trying to shoot arrows out of the sky, shoot the archer.
The medieval analogy can come off as simplistic and even naive when describing the task of defending a huge country from one of the most advanced and deadly weapons systems in the world.
But for Ukraine, with a track record of seemingly impossible military feats, and looking down the barrel of likely the hardest winter of its independence, trying is not a matter of choice.
On Aug. 22, President Volodymyr Zelensky revealed tha
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