"(Russian President Vladimir) Putin is not interested in peace, he wants to continue this war, and we must not allow this, which is why the European Union will agree on additional sanctions," German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said on May 25.
A rail line was damaged in Russia's Belgorod Oblast on May 25 after a cargo train ran over an explosive device planted underneath the tracks, regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov claimed.
"The indiscriminate killing of women and children at night in their homes is a clear violation of the 1977 Geneva Peace Protocols designed to protect innocents. These attacks are shameful," U.S. President Donald Trump's special envoy for Ukraine Keith Kellogg said on X without explicitly naming Russia. "Stop the killing. Ceasefire now."
Key developments on May 24-25: * Ukraine brings home 303 POWs in final phase of biggest prisoner swap with Russia * Russian missile, drone attack kills 12, injures 79 * US silence 'encourages Putin', Zelensky says after massive Russian attack * Russia losing battlefield edge in war against Ukraine, WP reports * Russia will reveal
"We were simultaneously engaged in an air defense battle and ensuring airspace security for the president’s helicopter flight," Yury Dashkin, commander of an air defense division, said, as cited by the Russian news agency on May 25.
Beijing is supplying "special chemicals, gunpowder, and components" to 20 Russian military-industrial manufacturing facilities, head of Ukraine's Foreign Intelligence Service Oleh Ivashchenko said in an interview partially released on May 25.
HUR released video of the strike on its official Telegram channel on May 25, showing a train engulfed in flames.
Several Ukrainian drones were downed by Russian air defenses on their approach to Moscow, Mayor Sergey Sobyanin claimed on May 25. Sobyanin's report comes following Russia's large-scale missile and drone attack on multiple cities of Ukraine, which killed 12 people and injured 60.
As Kyiv completed its largest prisoner exchange of the war on May 25, exchanging 1,000 Ukrainian POWs for 1,000 Russians, some spoke out on social media to criticize authorities for failing to return certain captives.
"How will the world react to Putin’s terror and clear provocation? To his mockery of any ceasefire discussion? I must admit, I ask that myself," Mathernova wrote. "Putin is clearly after his stated goal, killing Ukrainians and forcing Ukraine into submission. Sadly, the only language he understands is the language of force."
"I do not think that (the Russian negotiating team's) directives had a position that allowed for the possibility of reaching an agreement with the Ukrainian side on a ceasefire," Kyslytsia said.
"At this moment, two people are known to have died - women aged 85 and 56," Kharkiv Oblast Governor Oleh Syniehubov wrote on Telegram.
"Without really strong pressure on the Russian leadership, this brutality cannot be stopped. Sanctions will definitely help," Zelensky wrote in a post on Telegram on May 25.
The prisoner exchange took place in three phases carried out over three days, and was agreed on during peace talks held in Turkey on May 16, the first direct negotiations between Ukraine and Russia in three years.
The drones were intercepted over several regions of Russia, including Moscow and Kursk oblasts, according to the ministry.
Russia has lost around 980,850 troops in Ukraine since the beginning of its full-scale invasion on Feb. 24, 2022, the General Staff of Ukraine's Armed Forces reported on May 25.
The bodies of two victims were found when first responders extinguished a fire in the Obukhiv district. Another person was killed in the Bucha district, Governor Mykola Kalashnyk said.
Moscow faces critical shortages of weapons and manpower, making the time ripe for escalated pressure, Western officials told The Washington Post (WP).
Six drones were shot down as they flew towards Moscow, Mayor Sergey Sobyanin said on May 25. His report came as Russia attacked Kyiv for the second consecutive night.
Russia launched 69 missiles overnight and 298 drones, according to Ukraine's Air Force.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov announced on May 23 that Moscow will convey its peace terms to Kyiv immediately after the completion of the ongoing prisoner exchange between the two countries.
In southern Ukraine, giant reeds are known to populate the wetlands, skirting the Black Sea and stretching from Odesa to Kherson and Mykolaiv. Hollow grasses as tall as seven meters, swaying and pliant, that were the raw materials for the kinds of thatched roofs once common a century ago and
According to a recent report from the US Defense Intelligence Agency, Russian President Vladimir Putin remains "committed to victory in Ukraine, and his objectives remain mostly unchanged since the beginning of the war: Ukrainian neutrality and a further partition of the Ukrainian state."
Karol Nawrocki, backed by the opposition Law and Justice (PiS) party, claimed President Volodymyr Zelensky "treats Poland badly" and defended his criticism of Ukraine's NATO bid by insisting, "I speak the language of Poles."
"It complicates (the interception), but doesn’t make the interception impossible," Ukraine's Air Force spokesperson Yurii Ihnat said. "I think our partners are already working to improve the system's capabilities."
The identities of 31 of them have been revealed on the project's website. These included Oleksandr Tarnashinskyi, a former associate of pro-Kremlin oligarch Viktor Medvedchuk, or ex-Security Service of Ukraine officer Vitalii Vasiliev.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that he believed "it would not be very comfortable for the Vatican itself to host delegations from two Orthodox countries in these circumstances."
Ukraine has secured the release of 307 Ukrainians from Russian captivity in the second phase of its largest prisoner exchange with Russia, President Volodymyr Zelensky announced on May 24.
"Russia's continued aggression has a simple explanation: it hasn't faced enough pressure to stop. The power to change that lies with us," Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna said.
Russian troops have upped the intensity of their Donetsk Oblast offensive in recent weeks, increasingly pressuring a relatively large Ukrainian pocket between some of the last cities in the region. An unsettling situation for Ukrainian troops is now unfolding south of the town of Kostiantynivka, which has long served as
The new measures under consideration would also include lowering the Group of Seven oil price cap on Russian crude exports from $60 to around $45 per barrel.
Earlier, Russia's state-run news agency TASS claimed that Russian forces had entered Yunakivka, a village near the Russian border in Sumy Oblast.
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