Ukraine-Russia war latest: Kyiv says it is in strongest frontline position ‘in a year’ due to drone tactics – UK Times

Russian drones attacked civilian transport infrastructure in Ukraine’s Zhytomyr region west of Kyiv, killing one, the regional governor said on Thursday.

Governor Vitaliy Bunechko said that rescue workers, repair crews and law enforcement agencies were working at the site of the attack.

He shared the details about the attack on Telegram.

The Duke of Sussex has made an unannounced visit to Ukraine to “remind people back home and around the world” of the country’s war with Russia.

Harry was filmed by ITV News arriving at Kyiv railway station on Thursday morning, stepping off an overnight train from Poland and greeting people on the platform.

“It’s good to be back in Ukraine,” he said, according to the broadcaster.

The duke said he wanted “to remind people back home and around the world what Ukraine is up against and to support the people and partners doing extraordinary work every hour of every day in incredibly tough conditions”.

Ukraine has asked Turkey to host a meeting between president Volodymyr Zelensky and Russian president Vladimir Putin.

The development was shared by Ukrainian foreign minister Andrii Sybiha, saying that Ukraine is ready to meet Putin at any venue to end the war, except Belarus or Russia.

“We asked the Turks about it, we asked some other capitals,” Sybiha said, speaking to reporters on Tuesday.

“We addressed the Turks specifically,” he said. “But if another capital, besides Moscow and Belarus, organises such a meeting, we will go.”

On Friday, Sybiha told the Antalya Diplomacy Forum that Ukraine was ready to participate in any round of talks “regardless of format,” including meetings involving Zelensky, Putin, Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan, or US president Donald Trump.

An industrial facility in the Kstovo district of Russia’s Nizhny Novgorod region was damaged in a Ukrainian attack, regional governor Gleb Nikitin said on Thursday.

The facility caught fire overnight after being hit by debris from Ukrainian drones, he said.

Ukraine has previously targeted the Lukoil oil refinery located in the town of Kstovo.

Turkey is making efforts to revive negotiations between Russia and Ukraine and bring together the leaders of the warring sides, Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan told ⁠Nato secretary general Mark Rutte in a meeting in Ankara, the Turkish presidency said on Wednesday.

Earlier on Wednesday, Kyiv said it had asked Turkey, a Nato member, to host a leaders’ ⁠level meeting with Russia. Ankara ​has maintained ⁠good ties with both Ukraine and Russia since Moscow’s full-scale invasion in 2022.

“Erdogan said we were ⁠engaged, as Turkey, for the Ukraine-Russia war to end with ​peace, ⁠and that we are ‌working to revive negotiations and start talks at leaders’ level,” the presidency said in a readout of the meeting.

The Turkish ‌president also told Rutte that maintaining transatlantic ‌ties was “indispensable”, but that Ankara expected European Nato allies to take more responsibility for transatlantic security, the presidency said.

“Erdogan said Turkey was working to end the Ukraine-Russia war through negotiations ‌and reach lasting peace, just as it ​is trying with regards to Iran,” the presidency said ‌in a separate statement.

Ukrainian officials in the southeastern city of Dnipro are reporting a Russian drone attack that has killed three people and injured another 10, including two children.

The strike partially destroyed an apartment building, emergency services said, and triggered fires that damaged an administrative building, cars and a shop.

“The Russians directed drones at a residential area. When people and their families were sleeping in their beds,” Mykola Lukashuk, head of the Dnipropetrovsk region council, said on Telegram.

The regional governor, Oleksandr Hanzha, writing on Telegram, said the body of another person was found in the ruined apartment building, bringing to three the toll of those killed.

Four people were being treated in hospital, including the two wounded children – girls aged 9 and 14, he said.

Officials posted photos of the aftermath of the attack, showing the apartment building with a gaping hole in its middle, wrecked balconies, broken windows, and shoes scattered on a lawn.

Earlier photos showed apartments ablaze and emergency crews using extendable ladders with a bucket to bring the flames under control.

Ukraine’s frontline position is now “the strongest” it has been in a year, the country’s foreign minister Andrii Sybiha said, crediting its superiority in drone warfare and air defence.

“We have minimised the Russians’ advantage in manpower through the use of drones,” Sybiha said.

He added: “For us, the situation on the battlefield is about strengthening our negotiating position. We can shoot down up to 90 per cent of the targets that strike our cities… [Ukraine’s] position on the battlefield is indeed the strongest, or the most solid, it has been over the past year.”

A new analysis of data from the Institute for the Study of War said that Russia made almost no territorial gains across the frontline in March, the first time Moscow has made such little progress in two and a half years.

Ukraine could face increased risks in securing US ​anti-missile defences if the war in Iran goes on for an extended period of time, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky has cautioned.

Speaking to CNN, Zelensky said Ukraine received limited numbers of such weaponry because US production was limited, but so far it had experienced no disruption in supplies or in provision of intelligence.

Zelensky said Ukraine was ⁠able to secure US ​weaponry through ⁠the PURL programme under which Nato countries can finance the purchase of weapons for Kyiv.

“Through this ⁠programme, we can include and buy anti-ballistic missiles for Patriot ​systems ⁠and some other weapons which ‌is very important for us. We don’t have this…with our European neighbours,” Zelensky told CNN in English.

“And of course, (given) ‌the big challenge in the Middle ‌East war and Iran, all these packages are at risk.”

The United States, he said, had supplied “only a small number. We had not ⁠too much. We understand why, because the production in the United States is not so big.”

“And if the war will continue or a ceasefire is delayed…(this) will be not good. And maybe we will have more risks with anti-ballistics.”