Ukraine may revise its ceasefire offer to Russia if the UN security council fails to pass a resolution urging a full and unconditional end to the hostilities, Kyiv’s envoy to the UN has warned. Ukraine had changed the dynamic in the war with recent strikes, said Andrii Melnyk, adding that some 40% of Russia’s oil refineries had been damaged.
Melnyk told a security council session that Ukraine stoody ready for direct negotiations with Russia but “our patience is not endless”. “If the security council would further choose a wait-and-see approach, I cannot exclude that Ukraine may recalibrate and modify its offer. Ceasefire along the de facto front line is already a great compromise.”
The envoy’s statement reflects growing confidence that Ukraine’s war effort is on the front foot, with Russian cities starved of fuel supplies and a “middle strike” campaign seriously disrupting supply lines to Moscow’s occupying forces. The campaign’s success has prompted Russian-held Crimea to halt civilian gasoline sales, Pjotr Sauer writes. All summer camps in illegally annexed Crimea on Monday stopped accepting children and new bookings until 1 September for security reasons, said Sergei Aksyonov, the Russian-installed governor of the illegally occupied peninsula. Aviation authorities temporarily closed Moscow’s four airports on Monday as air defences battled a wave of Ukrainian drones.
Ukraine’s military said it hit a plant producing electronics for missiles in Russia’s border Voronezh region on Monday and the Russian region’s governor said five people were killed and dozens injured in the attack. The Ukrainian general staff said precision air-launched cruise missiles hit the facility, which it described as a “critical component” in Russia’s defence production, making parts for missiles including the Iskander.
Russia’s Dubna satellite communications centre in the Moscow region was also hit, the Ukrainian general staff said. Russia’s state-run Tass news agency reported “a massive drone attack by the Ukrainian armed forces”. A top Ukrainian drone maker, General Cherry, meanwhile said that one of its factories had been hit – a rare disclosure.
In the early hours of Tuesday the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, was put on air raid alert as authorities told people to seek shelter. Two people sought medical help after Russian forces struck the south-eastern region of Zaporizhzhia, said the governor, Ivan Fedorov. Three more people were wounded in Sumy, in the north, late on Monday, emergency services said. A drone attack on Ukraine’s second-largest city of Kharkiv left one woman wounded, said the mayor, Ihor Terekhov.
Earlier a Russian drone strike on Sumy in north-eastern Ukraine killed three members of one family, including a 13-year-old boy. “Their home was destroyed,” said Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the Ukrainian president. “An ordinary home – not a military target whatsoever.” The attack also wounded two others, regional military head Oleh Hryhorov said on Monday.
A Russian nighttime drone strike also killed a woman and wounded three people, including an 11-year-old boy, in the south-eastern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia, regional head Ivan Fedorov said on Monday. Russia has continuously targeted Ukrainian civilian areas with drones and missiles, and the UN reports more than 16,000 civilian deaths in the war. Recent attacks have increased civilian casualties, with May seeing the highest monthly total since April 2022: at least 274 civilians killed and 1,763 injured.
A Russian drone attack hit a ship in the Black Sea, starting a fire and killing its Egyptian cook, said the Ukrainian deputy prime minister Oleksii Kuleba. Eight other sailors, including citizens of Turkey and India, abandoned ship on a life raft while the vessel “sustained significant damage and lost seaworthiness”, Kuleba said.