Ukraine
Russia unleashes stunning barrage
Russian forces have launched a barrage of 367 drones and missiles at Ukrainian cities overnight, including the capital Kyiv, in the largest aerial attack of the war so far, killing at least 12 people and injuring dozens more, officials said.
The dead included three children in the northern region of Zhytomyr, local officials there said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called on the United States, which has taken a softer public line on Russia and its leader, Vladimir Putin, since President Donald Trump took office, to speak out.
"The silence of America, the silence of others in the world only encourages Putin," he wrote on Telegram.
"Every such terrorist Russian strike is reason enough for new sanctions against Russia."
Trump later responded in terms critical of Putin.
"I'm not happy with what Putin's doing. He's killing a lot of people," Trump told reporters.
He was speaking in New Jersey on Sunday just before boarding his plane for a return to the White House from his Bedminister golf club.
Donald Trump speaks to reporters about the attacks on Ukraine. – AP
The Russian attack was the largest of the war in terms of weapons fired, although other strikes have killed more people.
Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko said 12 people had been killed and 60 more wounded. Earlier death tolls given separately by regional authorities and rescuers had put the number of dead at 13.
"This was a combined, ruthless strike aimed at civilians. The enemy once again showed that its goal is fear and death," he wrote on Telegram.
US Special Envoy to Ukraine Keith Kellogg said on Sunday the attack was "a clear violation" of the 1977 Geneva Peace Protocols and called for an immediate ceasefire.
“These attacks are shameful. Stop the killing. Ceasefire now,” he posted online.
In all, Russia used 69 missiles of various types and 298 drones, including Iranian-designed Shahed drones.
There was no immediate comment from Moscow on the strikes.
Residents look at an apartment building that was damaged in a Russian drone strike. – Reuters
For Kyiv, the day was particularly sombre as the city observed Kyiv Day, a national holiday that falls on the last Sunday in May, commemorating its founding in the 5th century,
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russian missiles and drones hit more than 30 cities and villages, and urged Western partners to ramp up sanctions on Russia – a long-standing demand of the Ukrainian leader but one that despite warnings to Moscow by the United States and Europe has not materialized in ways to deter Russia.
“These were deliberate strikes on ordinary cities," Zelensky wrote online.
He added that targets included Kyiv, Zhytomyr, Khmelnytskyi, Ternopil, Chernihiv, Sumy, Odesa, Poltava, Dnipro, Mykolaiv, Kharkiv and Cherkasy regions.
“Without truly strong pressure on the Russian leadership, this brutality cannot be stopped. Sanctions will certainly help."
Russia’s Defence Ministry, meanwhile, said its air defences shot down 110 Ukrainian drones overnight.
'Sleepless night'
Sounds of explosions boomed throughout the night in Kyiv and the surrounding area as Ukrainian air defence persisted for hours in efforts to shoot down Russian drones and missiles. At least four people were killed and 16 were injured in the capital itself, according to the security service.
“A difficult Sunday morning in Ukraine after a sleepless night,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said online, adding that the assault “lasted all night”.
Fires broke out in homes and businesses, set off by falling drone debris.
In Zhytomyr region, west of Kyiv, the emergency service said three children were killed, aged 8, 12 and 17. Twelve people were injured in the attacks, it said. At least four people were killed in the Khmelnytskyi region, in western Ukraine. One man was killed in Mykolaiv region, in southern Ukraine.
Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said a student dormitory in Holosiivskyi district was hit by a drone and one of the building’s walls was on fire. In Dniprovskyi district, a private house was destroyed and in Shevchenkivskyi district, windows in a residential building were smashed.
The scale of Russia's use of aerial weapons aside, the attacks over the past 48 hours have been among the most intense strikes on Ukraine since the February 2022 invasion.
In Markhalivka, just outside Kyiv where several village homes were burned down, the Fedorenkos watched their ruined home in tears.
“The street looks like Bakhmut, like Mariupol, it’s just terrible,” said 76-year-old Liubov Fedorenko, comparing their village to some of Ukraine's most devastated cities. She said she was grateful her daughter and grandchildren hadn't joined them for the weekend.
“I was trying to persuade my daughter to come to us," Fedorenko said, adding that she told her daughter, “After all, you live on the eighth floor in Kyiv, and here it’s the ground floor.'”
"She said, ‘No, mum, I’m not coming.’ And thank God she didn’t come, because the rocket hit (the house) on the side where the children’s rooms were,” Fedorenko said.
Ivan Fedorenko, 80, said he regrets letting their two dogs into the house when the air raid siren went off. “They burned to death,” he said. "I want to bury them, but I’m not allowed yet.”
No halt in fighting
The POW exchange was the latest of scores of swaps since the war began but also the biggest involving Ukrainian civilians.
The assault comes as Ukraine and Russia conducted the third and final day of a prisoner swap in which both sides will exchange a total of 1000 people each.
Russia and Ukraine swapped hundreds more prisoners, the third and last part of a major exchange that reflected a rare moment of cooperation in otherwise failed efforts to reach a ceasefire in the more than three years of war.
A Ukrainian serviceman Vitaly, hugs his wife Olena, after returning from captivity. – AP
Russia's Defence Ministry said each side exchanged 303 soldiers, following the release of 307 combatants and civilians each on Saturday, and 390 on Friday – the biggest total swap of the war.
Zelensky confirmed the exchange, saying on X that “303 Ukrainian defenders are home". He noted that the troops returning to Ukraine were members of the “Armed Forces, the National Guard, the State Border Guard Service, and the State Special Transport Service”.
Nataliya Borovyk, the sister of released Ukrainian soldier Ihor Ulesov, was overwhelmed when she learned of her brother’s return.
“My uncle had to calm me down and put me in a taxi so I could get here,” she said. “A moment like that stays with you forever.”
Borovyk said the family had been waiting anxiously for news, and that she had hoped her brother might be released in the first part of the exchange.
“We were worried about all the guys. He wasn’t there on Friday, but I was here – I at least greeted them, I stood there until the very end and waited, (hoping) maybe he would appear after all.”
In talks held in Istanbul earlier this month – the first time the two sides met face to face for peace talks – Kyiv and Moscow agreed to swap 1000 prisoners of war and civilian detainees each. The exchange has been the only tangible outcome from the talks.
Still, the fighting has not halted. Battles have continued along the roughly 1000-kilometre (620-mile) front line, where tens of thousands of soldiers have been killed, and neither country has relented in its deep strikes.
Russia’s Defence Ministry quoted Yaroslav Yakimkin of the “North” group of Russian forces as saying that Ukrainian troops have been pushed back from the border in the Kursk region, which Putin visited days ago.
“The troops continue to advance forward every day,” Yakimkin said, adding that Russian forces have taken Marine and Loknya in Ukraine’s northeastern Sumy region, which borders Kursk, over the past week, and were advancing in the Kharkiv region around the largely destroyed town of Vovchansk.
Relatives show photos of missing soldiers to POWs. – AP
Speaking on Russian state TV, a Russian serviceman said that Putin was reportedly flying over the Kursk region in a helicopter when the area came under intense Ukrainian drone attack during his visit.
Putin’s helicopter was “virtually at the epicentre of repelling a large-scale attack by the enemy’s drones,” said Yuri Dashkin, described as commander of a Russian air defence division. He added that Russian air defence units shot down 46 drones during the incident.
Ceasefire efforts
Ukraine and its European allies have sought to push Moscow into signing a 30-day ceasefire as a first step to negotiating an end to the three-year war.
Their efforts suffered a blow earlier this week when Trump declined to place further sanctions on Moscow for not agreeing to an immediate pause in fighting, as Kyiv had wanted.
"Without pressure, nothing will change and Russia and its allies will only build up forces for such murders in Western countries," the Ukrainian president's chief of staff Andriy Yermak wrote on Telegram.
"Moscow will fight as long as it has the ability to produce weapons."
