Ukraine remains the most mined country in the world. Nearly one-third of Ukraine's territory, approximately 174,000 square kilometers, had been mined since Russia began its full-scale invasion of the country in February 2022.
The phone call comes as Moscow once again rejected a 30-day ceasefire, with Russian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Maria Zakharova claiming that a ceasefire would give "Kyiv a break to restore its military potential and continue its confrontation with Russia."
Flight MH17 departed from Amsterdam Schiphol Airport en-route to Kuala Lumpur International Airport on July 17, 2014. Three hours into the flight, the Boeing-777 was shot down by Russian proxy forces using a Buk surface-to-air missile above Ukraine’s Donetsk Oblast.
"I am grateful for the support and the readiness at the highest level to promote diplomacy," President Volodymyr Zelensky said of the phone conservation with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. "We share the same view on the need for a ceasefire."
The convictions mark a significant development in Britain's efforts to counter Russian intelligence operations amid heightened tensions stemming from Moscow's war against Ukraine and repeated Kremlin threats toward Kyiv's allies.
According to the Verkhovna Rada's website, Ukraine completed the ratification of the U.S.-Ukraine minerals agreement on May 12. President Volodymyr Zelensky signed the deal.
"I myself have heard relatives talking: our village is being attacked, let's roll the car out of the garage, maybe they will shell it — at least we will get money. The car is old, we can't sell it," Belgorod Oblast Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said.
The new tranche brings total recent EU defense support for Ukraine to 3.3 billion euros ($3.6 billion), marking a significant expansion of European efforts to boost Kyiv's defense industry.
Belgorod administration building after an alleged drone attack on March 12, 2024. (Telegram)
The governor of Russia’s Belgorod Oblast, Vyacheslav Gladkov, has said there are no hostilities on the territory of the region just hours after Ukrainian military intelligence said it was “now an area of active combat actions.”
In a post on Telegram published late on March 14, Gladkov claimed he had taken a tour of villages in the area where several pro-Ukrainian military units comprised of Russian citizens had advanced after crossing the border from Ukraine earlier this week.
Gladkov claimed that the battle is taking place outside the Belgorod Oblast borders. He also said that the village of Kozinka had “suffered greatly, the destruction was very serious.”
Residents in the areas affected had been taken to a “safe place,” according to Gladkov.
The Russian governor’s comments were contradicted by a spokesperson of Ukraine’s military intelligence (HUR), Andrii Yusov, who told national television just a few hours earlier that Kursk and Belgorod regions are “now an area of active combat actions.”
“As stated by the volunteers and rebels, we are talking about Russian citizens who, having no other options, are defending their civil right with arms against the (Russian President Vladimir) Putin regime.”
Unconfirmed videos posted to social media on the morning of March 15 appear to show air raid sirens, fires and explosions in the Belgorod region continuing.
Chris York is news operations editor at the Kyiv Independent. Before joining the team, he was head of news at the Kyiv Post. Previously, back in Britain, he spent nearly a decade working for HuffPost UK. He holds an MA in Conflict, Development, and Security from the University of Leeds.
Emmanuelle Chaze
