Presidential Office chief Andriy Yermak voiced doubt about leading negotiations with anyone from Russia except President Vladimir Putin, implying only the Russian leader can make real decisions.
This includes at least seven people injured in drone attacks overnight on May 12, a date from which Kyiv and its allies put forward a demand for a 30-day unconditional truce, a step that Moscow continues to reject.
"When European unity becomes inconvenient, disinformation goes so far as to make a simple tissue look like drugs," the Elysee Palace reacted to a fake story pushed by Russia.
The comments came after Trump urged Ukraine to agree to direct negotiations with Russia, which has invited Kyiv to peace talks in Istanbul on May 15, without first agreeing to halt military operations.
A Russian drone hit a civilian freight train in Donetsk Oblast on May 12 and injured its driver, Ukrainian Railways said amid Kyiv's calls for a ceasefire.
Moscow and Hanoi agreed to negotiate and sign agreements to construct nuclear power plants in Vietnam, the two countries said in a joint statement on May 11.
The sanctions appear to be in response to Russia's rejection of a 30-day ceasefire that the U.K., alongside Ukraine, France, Germany, and Poland, demanded during a visit to Kyiv on May 10.
"We now know for sure that the great fire of the Marywilska shopping centre in Warsaw was caused by arson ordered by the Russian special services," Prime Minister Donald Tusk said on X. "Some of the perpetrators have already been detained, all the others are identified and searched for."
The publications' latest report covers the period of February 24, 2022 to May 8, 2025. Since it was last updated at the end of April, 2,857 additional Russian military personnel have been confirmed killed.
Hungary cancelled a meeting planned for May 12 with a Ukrainian delegation on the rights of national minorities, Hungary's Deputy Foreign Minister said on May 11, amid a deepening spying scandal between the two countries.
Three were injured in Russia's Kursk Oblast when the town of Rylsk was allegedly struck by a missile attack on May 11, local governor Alexander Khinshtein claimed.
A view in Sudzha, Russia, on Aug. 16, 2024, after the Ukrainian military entered the city amid its incursion into Kursk Oblast. (Kostiantyn Liberov/Libkos/Getty Images)
Russian forces launched a new counterattack against Ukraine's left flank in Russia's Kursk Oblast, several Russian and Ukrainian Telegram channels claimed on Oct. 10.
A Ukrainian official commented that the "Russian plan in Kursk Oblast has been thwarted so far" as Russian forces suffered losses.
Ukraine launched its cross-border incursion into Kursk Oblast in early August, claiming to initially seize some 1,300 square kilometers (500 square miles) but recently facing mounting pressure from growing Russian reinforcements.
"No details yet, but the Russian military suffered significant losses in equipment," said Andrii Kovalenko, the head of the counter-disinformation department at Ukraine's National Security and Defense Council.
DeepState, a Ukrainian crowdsourced monitoring website, reported late on Oct. 10 that Russia managed to push through the left flank of Ukraine's salient in Kursk Oblast.
"The enemy is now trying to establish a foothold near the settlements of Novoivanovka and Zeleny Shliakh," DeepState said on Telegram. The two settlements lie some 15 kilometers from the Ukrainian-held Russian town of Sudzha and around 10 kilometers north of the Ukrainian border.
The estimated Ukrainian control (blue) in Russia's Kursk Oblast as of Oct. 10, 2024. (DeepState/OpenStreetMaps)
Parallel messages also appeared on Russian pro-war channels. The well-known Rybar channel wrote that Russian forces launched several attacks in the Korenevsky and Sudzhansky districts, in which Ukraine established its foothold.
"The advanced groups of Russian troops reached Zeleny Shliakh by the end of the day, which allows us to claim at least a partial breakthrough in the Ukrainian Armed Forces' defenses," Rybar claimed on Oct. 10.
Russia's Defense Ministry alleged late on Oct. 10 that its forces had "penetrated" into the Ukrainian-held territory in Kursk Oblast and inflicted losses on manpower and equipment.
Later, on Oct. 11, DeepState reported that the situation in the area remains difficult, but Ukrainian forces are succeeding in stabilizing it. According to the channel, it was not yet possible to regain all the lost territory, but Russian forces suffered significant losses in the attack.
The Kyiv Independent could not verify all the claims.
Russia launched another counterattack against Ukraine's left flank in mid-September, but this attempt was halted by Kyiv's troops.
Ukraine's incursion was aimed at stopping Russian cross-border attacks and diverting Russian troops from the front in eastern Ukraine. Ukrainain Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi recently said that Moscow redeployed around 50,000 troops to Kursk Oblast from other parts of the front.
Martin Fornusek is a news editor at the Kyiv Independent. He has previously worked as a news content editor at the media company Newsmatics and is a contributor to Euromaidan Press. He was also volunteering as an editor and translator at the Czech-language version of Ukraïner. Martin studied at Masaryk University in Brno, Czechia, holding a bachelor's degree in security studies and history and a master's degree in conflict and democracy studies.
James Beardsworth
