Civilians and servicemen attend funerals of Oleh Yashchyshyn, Serhiy Melnyk and Rostyslav Romanchuk, Ukrainian servicemen killed during Russia's invasion of Ukraine, at Lychakiv cemetery in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv on March 15, 2022. (AFP/Getty Images)
One month ago, just after 4:45 a.m. Kyiv time on Feb. 24, Russian President Vladimir Putin went on television to announce what he called a “special operation” to “disarm and de-Nazify” Ukraine. His address was immediately followed by missile strikes on major Ukrainian cities, including Kyiv, and multi-directional assaults towards Kyiv, Kharkiv, Chernihiv, Sumy, Kherson, and Mariupol.
Since then, Russian forces have launched more than 1,100 missilies onto the Ukrainian territory, according to Pentagon.
Russia has been shelling Ukrainian cities, large and small, forcing over 10 million Ukrainians to flee their homes, with 6.5 million being displaced inside the country and 3.6 million going abroad, according to the United Nations.
Russian forces have besieged several Ukrainian cities, attacked agreed-upon humanitarian corridors for evacuation and have committed multiple atrocities towards civilians, which have shocked the Ukrainian nation.
At least 977 civilians were killed and 1,594 injured, according to the UN, but the actual figures are belived to be significantly higher. According to the local authorities in Mariupol, a besieged seaport city in south-eastern Ukraine, over 2,000 residents were killed in the city alone. Russia's war took the lives of at least 128 children and injured at least 172 other children, according to Prosecutor General's Office.
Civilian infrastructure has been damaged across the country. Some 4,431 residential buildings, 548 schools, and 135 health care institutions were partially or completely destroyed, according to the Ukrainian Legal Advisory Group.
The body of a rocket stuck in a flat after recent shelling on the northern outskirts of Kharkiv on Feb. 24, 2022. (AFP/ Getty Images)Residents of Severodonetsk, Luhansk Oblast, hide in a basement during the heavy shelling by Russian forces on Feb. 28, 2022. (AFP/Getty Images)Russian President Vladimir Putin (R) meets with Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu (2L) and Chief of Russia's General Staff Valery Gerasimov in Moscow on Feb. 27, 2022. (AFP/Getty Images)People remove personal belongings from a burning house after being shelled in the city of Irpin, outside Kyiv, on March 4, 2022. (AFP/Getty Images)Ukrainians fleeing the war to Poland get for the train at Lviv train station on Feb. 28, 2022. (Kostyantyn Chernichkin)Around 100,000 protesters crowd around the victory column and close to the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin to demonstrate against Russia's war in Ukraine on Feb. 27, 2022.(AFP/Getty Images)People cross a destroyed bridge as they evacuate from the city of Irpin, northwest of Kyiv, during heavy shelling and bombing on March 5, 2022. (AFP/ Getty Images)U.S. President Joe Biden takes questions as he addresses the Russian invasion of Ukraine at the White House on Feb. 24, 2022, in Washington, DC. (AFP/Getty Images)A Ukrainian soldier holds a Next Generation Light Anti-tank Weapon (NLAW) that was used to destroy a Russian armored personal carrier (APC) in Irpin, northwest of Kyiv, on March 12, 2022. (AFP/Getty Images)A staff member and the parents of a newborn baby hide in the bomb shelter of a maternity hospital on March 2, 2022 in Kyiv, Ukraine. (Getty Images)Ukrainian servicemen patrol in the streets as security measures tightened due to the ongoing Russian attacks in the Black Sea port city of Odesa on March 14, 2022. Volunteers have placed sandbags around one of Odesa’s landmarks, the monument to Duke of Richelieu, to protect it from potential Russian bombardment. (Getty Images)Service members of Ukrainian Territorial Defense, Valery (3rdL) and Lesya (2ndL), get married not far from a checkpoint on the outskirts of Kyiv on March 6, 2022. (AFP/ Getty Images)President Volodymyr Zelensky speaks during a press conference in Kyiv on March 3, 2022. (AFP via Getty Images)Ukrainian emergency workers carry an injured pregnant woman from a maternity hospital that was damaged by Russian shelling in Mariupol, Donetsk Oblast on March 9, 2022. The mother and her unborn baby died. (Evgeniy Maloletka)Residents of Kherson block Russian military vehicles as Russian troops attempt to occupy the city. Kherson has been under the Russian control since March 5, 2022.A woman learns how to use an AK-47 assault rifle during a civilian self-defense course in the outskirts of Lviv on March 4, 2022. (AFP/Getty Images)A mass grave in Mariupol, Donetsk Oblast, on March 9, 2022. According to local authorities, over 2,000 residents have been killed in the city since Feb. 24, 2022. (Mstyslav Chernov)A wounded woman is seen following an airstrike that damaged a residential building outside of Kharkiv on Feb. 24, 2022. (Anadolu Agency/Getty Images)Ukrainian soldiers search for bodies in the debris at the military school hit by Russian rockets the day before, in Mykolaiv on March 19, 2022. Ukrainian media reported that the attack had killed at least 40 Ukrainian soldiers at their brigade headquarters. (AFP/Getty Images)An evacuated resident is comforted by Svitlana Vodolaga, spokeswoman for the State Emergency Service of Ukraine (R) outside a burning apartment building in Kyiv on March 15, 2022, following attacks on residential areas that had killed at least two people. (AFP/Getty Images)
U.S. President Donald Trump said that his special envoy, Steve Witkoff, may travel to Russia on Aug. 6 or 7 — just days before a deadline for Moscow to reach a peace deal with Ukraine or face secondary tariffs targeting its oil exports.
The Russian and Chinese navies are conducting joint military exercises in the Sea of Japan, the Kremlin said Aug. 3, just days after U.S. President Donald Trump ordered the deployment of nuclear submarines in a show of force toward Moscow.
Markus Soder, Prime Minister of the German state of Bavaria, has called for an end to citizen's allowance payments for Ukrainian refugees, proposing that new arrivals instead receive reduced benefits under the country's Asylum Seekers Benefits Act.
In an Aug. 3 Fox News interview, senior Trump aide Stephen Miller accused India of helping fund Russia's war in Ukraine by continuing to import oil from Moscow.
A drone strike resulted in a major fire early on Aug. 3 at an oil depot in Russia’s resort city of Sochi, setting ablaze a 2,000-cubic-meter fuel tank, local authorities said.
President Volodymyr Zelensky signed a decree on Aug. 3 imposing sanctions against 94 individuals and five legal entities, primarily targeting the captains of Russia's so-called "shadow fleet" vessels.
Work is ongoing between Ukraine and Russia as the warring parties prepare to each exchange 1,200 Prisoners of War (POWs), President Volodymyr Zelensky said on Aug. 3.
The unidentified civilians "armed with bats and metal pipes, damaged a vehicle and inflicted bodily injuries on a soldier" as the officer was attending to enlistment activities, officials allege. In response to the incident, a serviceman fired a non-lethal weapon at the civilians, allegedly in self-defense.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Aug. 3 announced the appointment of Lieutenant General Anatoliy Kryvonozhko, who has been serving as the Air Force's acting head since the end of last August.
A Russian missile strike hit the southern Ukrainian city of Mykolaiv overnight on Aug. 3, injuring seven and damaging homes and civilian infrastructure, according to Ukrainian officials.
Oleksii Kuznetsov, a member of parliament who belongs to Zelensky's Servant of the People party, allegedly accepted kickbacks for inflating military contracts. He has been dismissed from his parliamentary faction pending the outcome of the case.
