KYIV: Russian attacks killed 21 people in cities across Ukraine, as President Volodymyr Zelensky condemned Moscow&#39;s &quot;utter cynicism&quot; for launching deadly strikes while seeking a truce to stage its May 9 patriotic parade. The attacks on Tuesday &mdash; hitting the cities of Zaporizhzhia, Kramatorsk, and Dnipro &mdash; came hours before a Ukrainian-suggested ceasefire. In Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine&#39;s southern city close to the frontline, 12 people were killed in an attack Zelensky described as having &quot;absolutely no military justification.&quot; Early Wednesday, the head of the Crimea region, which Russia annexed in 2014 from Ukraine, said Ukrainian drone strikes had killed five civilians. Meanwhile, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio spoke by telephone on Tuesday with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, according to the State Department. The two, who spoke at Lavrov&#39;s request, &quot;discussed the US-Russia relationship, the Russia-Ukraine war, and Iran,&quot; State Department spokesperson Tommy Pigott said, without giving details. Russia has demanded that Kyiv agree to a ceasefire for its May 9 World War II Victory Day commemorations. &quot;We need silence from such strikes and all others like them every single day, not just for a few hours somewhere out there for &#39;celebrations,&#39;&quot; Zelensky said, calling on allies to condemn the attacks. Kyiv has instead said it will halt fire over May 6. But Russia attacked the city of Dnipro late on Tuesday, nearing Kyiv&#39;s deadline. &quot;With mere hours until Ukraine&#39;s ceasefire proposal comes into force, Russia shows no signs of preparing to end hostilities. On the contrary, Moscow intensifies terror,&quot; Ukraine&#39;s Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiga said on X. Zelensky said four civilians were killed in Dnipro. Five others, he said, were killed when Russia attacked the center of the eastern city of Kramatorsk &mdash; the last hub under Kyiv&#39;s control in the embattled Donetsk region. &quot;The attack hit right in the city center, targeting civilians,&quot; he said, warning the death toll could rise. The attacks came after several people were killed overnight, and as Russia geared up for its patriotic May 9 event this weekend. At least 70 people were also wounded in Tuesday&#39;s strikes, according to numbers released by officials. The attacks were the deadliest in weeks. Intensifying strikes&nbsp;Russia&#39;s May 9 parade is typically a bombastic display of military strength, which, since 2022, has sought to link Soviet victory over Nazi Germany with the invasion of Ukraine. But the Kremlin ordered a scaled-back version this year &mdash; with no military hardware to be on display &mdash; over the fear it could be targeted by Ukraine. Moscow also cut mobile internet throughout the Russian capital on Tuesday morning ahead of the parade, with operators reporting restrictions would last until Saturday. Kyiv has intensified its retaliatory long-range strikes in recent weeks, hitting a spate of Russian oil facilities and a luxury high-rise building in Moscow. It calls the strikes fair retaliation for Russia&#39;s nightly bombing of its cities with drones and missiles. Short-term ceasefires are not infrequent, with the two sides having suspended long-range attacks over Orthodox Easter last month. There is no sign that the four-year war is close to being resolved at the negotiating table. Moscow is demanding that Kyiv fully withdraw troops from the eastern Donbas area and renounce Western military support &mdash; ultimatums seen as tantamount to capitulation in Kyiv, which has rejected them.

Europe

Russia has demanded that Kyiv agree to a ceasefire for its May 9 World War II Victory Day commemorations; Kyiv has instead said it will halt fire over May 6.

Russian strikes kill 21 in Ukraine

SEOUL: North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has reaffirmed Pyongyang&#39;s support for Russia&#39;s invasion of Ukraine, vowing to help Moscow achieve victory in its &quot;sacred&quot; war, state media reported on Monday. Pyongyang has sent missiles, munitions, and thousands of troops to assist Russia in Ukraine, and analysts say Moscow is sending financial aid, military technology, food, and energy to the diplomatically isolated country in return. A string of high-level Russian officials have visited North Korea in recent days, with Defence Minister Andrey Belousov meeting Kim on Sunday, according to official statements. North Korea &quot;will as ever fully support the policy of the Russian Federation to defend the national sovereignty, territorial integrity and security interests&quot;, Kim told Belousov, according to the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA). Kim expressed &quot;belief that the Russian army and people would surely win a victory in the just sacred war&quot;, KCNA reported. Both sides said their delegations had discussed deeper military ties, with Belousov saying Moscow was ready to sign a cooperation plan covering the period from 2027 to 2031. Kim, Belousov, and Russian parliamentary speaker Vyacheslav Volodin also attended the opening ceremony of a memorial complex honouring North Korean soldiers killed in Ukraine. The ceremony included a concert, a fireworks display, and an air force flyover, KCNA reported. The audience was moved by portrayals of &quot;life-and-death bloody battles&quot; and &quot;death-defying hand-to-hand fights and heroic suicidal explosions the young soldiers chose without hesitation&quot;, it said. North Korea and Russia signed a military treaty in 2024, obligating both states to provide military assistance &quot;without delay&quot; in the event of an attack on the other. The opening of the memorial coincides with what Moscow describes as the first anniversary of its recovery of parts of Kursk, a region in Russia where Ukraine launched a major counteroffensive starting in mid-2024. North Korean soldiers were deployed in the area to help beat back the Ukrainian advance. In his meeting with Belousov, Kim hailed the &quot;brilliant war results in liberating Kursk&quot;, according to KCNA. Russian President Vladimir Putin praised the &quot;extraordinary bravery and genuine devotion&quot; of North Korean troops in a letter to Kim, published by KCNA. Seoul estimates that about 2,000 North Koreans have been killed in the Ukraine war. North Korean soldiers are said to have been instructed to kill themselves rather than be captured in battle. Only two North Korean troops have been taken alive and are currently in the custody of Ukrainian authorities.

Asia

Pyongyang has sent missiles, munitions and thousands of troops to assist Russia in Ukraine, and analysts say Moscow is sending financial aid, military technology, food and energy to the diplomatically isolated country in return.

North Korea's Kim reaffirms support for Russia's 'sacred' Ukraine war

KYIV: Ukraine and Azerbaijan signed six cooperation agreements on Saturday, President Volodymyr Zelensky said, as he pushes to share Kyiv&#39;s drone expertise amid the Middle East war. &quot;We have signed six documents today,&quot; said Zelensky in the Azerbaijan capital Baku, without specifying which fields. &quot;Today, the number one area is security. This concerns the defense-industrial complex,&quot; he said. &quot;We have shared our experience in countering the aggressor today&quot;. Speaking alongside Azerbaijani counterpart Ilham Aliyev, Zelensky said Ukrainian drone experts were already working in Azerbaijan, a former Soviet republic on the Caspian Sea that borders southern Russia. The Ukrainian president also said he was ready to hold trilateral talks on ending the war with Russia in Azerbaijan, if Moscow showed a willingness to do so. &quot;We shared with the president of Azerbaijan that we are ready for trilateral talks,&quot; said Zelensky. Azerbaijan repeatedly expressed support for Ukraine&#39;s territorial integrity and sent humanitarian aid after the Russian invasion in 2022. Ties between Moscow and Baku have cooled over the past year, after an Azerbaijani passenger plane was mistakenly hit by a Russian anti-aircraft missile in 2024, causing a crash that killed 38.

Ukraine and Azerbaijan signed six agreements, mainly on security and drones. The Ukrainian president says he is ready to hold trilateral talks with Russia in Azerbaijan if Moscow is willing, while tensions in the region continue.

Ukraine signs pacts with Azerbaijan in drone push

BRUSSELS: The EU on Thursday gave final approval to a 90-billion-euro ($105 billion) loan for Ukraine and a new round of sanctions on Russia, in a boost for Kyiv after a prolonged row. The measures were signed off when Hungary and Slovakia dropped objections after Ukraine restarted oil flows following repairs to the damaged Druzhba pipeline. &quot;Deadlock over,&quot; EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas posted online. &quot;Russia&#39;s war economy is under growing strain, while Ukraine is getting a major boost.&quot; The row has held up EU support for Ukraine at a time when the United States has largely cut Kyiv off and eased sanctions on Russian oil amid the Iran war. Hungary&#39;s outgoing prime minister Viktor Orb&aacute;n&mdash;who suffered a crushing election defeat this month&mdash;stalled the loan as leverage to get Ukraine to fix the pipeline carrying Russian oil to his landlocked country. The green light means that Brussels should be able to start paying out the funds in the coming months that Kyiv badly needs to plug budget blackholes four years into Russia&#39;s invasion. At the same time, the EU&#39;s 27 countries also signed off on a new package of sanctions against Moscow that had been held up by both Hungary and Slovakia over the same row. The new round of economic punishment for the Kremlin&mdash;the 20th by the EU since the war started&mdash;targets Russia&#39;s energy, banking, and trade sectors. The measures included clamping down further on the so-called &quot;shadow fleet&quot; of aging tankers that Moscow uses to skirt oil export restrictions and curbs on Russian cryptocurrency traders. But the EU stopped short of imposing a full maritime service ban for vessels carrying Russian crude, saying it hoped to get G7 partners to go ahead together on it at a later date. The bloc also announced it was stopping sales of certain machinery to the Central Asian nation Kyrgyzstan to prevent the products from going to Russia. That marks the first time the US has used a mechanism to halt entire categories of exports to a specific country to avoid sanctions dodging.

The EU on Thursday gave final approval to a 90-billion-euro ($105 billion) loan for Ukraine and a new round of sanctions on Russia, in a boost for Kyiv after a prolonged row

EU signs off on Ukraine loan, new Russia sanctions

KYIV: Ukraine&#39;s military command on Saturday reported nearly 470 Russian violations of a truce agreed to mark the Orthodox Easter.&nbsp;&quot;After 4:00 pm, 469 ceasefire violations were recorded, namely: 22 enemy assault actions, 153 shelling attacks, 19 strikes by attack drones... &nbsp;and 275 strikes by FPV drones,&quot; it said on Facebook.&nbsp;&quot;Today in total, the enemy carried out 57 air strikes and dropped 182 guided aerial bombs. In addition, it deployed 3,928 kamikaze drones and conducted 2,454 shelling attacks on populated areas and positions of our troops&quot;.

Ukraine’s military reported 469 Russian violations of an Easter truce, including assaults, shelling, and drone strikes. It said Russia also launched dozens of air strikes, dropped bombs, and carried out thousands of attacks on troops and populated areas, showing the ceasefire was largely ignored.

Ukraine reports 469 Easter truce violations

KYIV: A temporary truce between Russia and Ukraine entered into force on Saturday, with Kyiv warning it would respond &quot;immediately&quot; if Russia violated it. Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the ceasefire on Thursday to coincide with Orthodox Easter, more than a week after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky first made the proposal. Both sides have agreed to observe it. The ceasefire is due to last for 32 hours, from 4:00 pm (1300 GMT) on Saturday until the end of the day on Sunday, according to the Kremlin. &quot;Ukraine will adhere to the ceasefire and respond strictly in kind. The absence of Russian strikes in the air, on land, and at sea will mean no response from our side,&quot; Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a post on X. The Ukrainian army said it was ready to &quot;immediately&quot; respond if Russia violated it. Hours before the truce was due to start, Russia launched at least 160 drones at Ukraine, killing four people in the country&#39;s east and south and wounding dozens of others, Ukrainian authorities said. The southern Odesa region was among the hardest hit, with authorities reporting two dead and damage to civilian infrastructure. A wave of Ukrainian drones sparked a fire at an oil depot and damaged apartment buildings in Russia&#39;s southern Krasnodar region, authorities said. Four people died in Ukrainian drone strikes on Russian-occupied parts of Ukraine&#39;s eastern Donetsk and Kherson regions, according to Russian-installed officials. Ukrainians have expressed scepticism about whether the truce will hold. The two sides held a ceasefire for Orthodox Easter last year, but both accused the other of hundreds of violations. Despite tensions over the truce, the warring sides exchanged 175 prisoners of war each on Saturday, according to officials. The United Arab Emirates helped mediate the exchange, the Russian defence ministry said. Prisoner of war exchanges are one of the few areas of cooperation between the warring sides. Stalled diplomacyUS-led talks aimed at ending the four-year conflict have stalled in recent weeks because of the war in the Middle East. Even before the Iran war, progress towards a peace deal in Ukraine had been slow, due to differences over the issue of territory. Ukraine has proposed freezing the conflict along the current front lines. But Russia has rejected this, saying it wants Ukraine to give up all the territory in the Donetsk region that it currently controls -- a demand Kyiv says is unacceptable. Several rounds of US-led talks have failed to bring the warring sides closer to an agreement. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov denied Russia had discussed the ceasefire with Ukraine or the United States in advance and said it was not linked to negotiations to end the war. The war has cost hundreds of thousands of lives and forced millions to flee their homes, making it Europe&#39;s deadliest conflict since World War II. After four years, fighting on the front has come to a near standstill. Russia has made small territorial gains at a high cost. But Kyiv recently managed to push back in the southeast and Russian advances have been slowing since late 2025, according to the US-based Institute for the Study of War (ISW). Apart from Ukrainian counter-attacks, analysts attributed the slowdown to Russia being banned from using SpaceX&#39;s Starlink satellites and Moscow&#39;s own efforts to block the Telegram messaging app. But the situation is unfavourable for Ukraine in the Donetsk region, near the cities of Kramatorsk and Sloviansk, according to the ISW. Moscow occupies just over 19 percent of Ukraine, most of which was seized during the first weeks of the conflict.

A temporary truce between Russia and Ukraine entered into force with Kyiv warning it would respond "immediately" if Russia violated it

Easter truce between Russia and Ukraine begins

WASHINGTON: Donald Trump said on Tuesday he is sending his envoy Steve Witkoff to meet with Russian leader Vladimir Putin in Moscow next week as the US president seeks to close out a deal to end the war in Ukraine. Trump posted on his Truth Social platform that there were &quot;only a few remaining points of disagreement,&quot; but European leaders were skeptical, and Russian missiles continued to rain down on Ukraine. He also expressed hope to meet &quot;soon&quot; with Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, &quot;but ONLY when the deal to end this War is FINAL or, in its final stages.&quot; Trump later told journalists aboard Air Force One that Witkoff may be joined in Moscow by the president&#39;s son-in-law, Jared Kushner. An initial US plan, which was heavily weighted in Russia&#39;s favor, has been replaced by one taking in more of Ukraine&#39;s interests, and an official familiar with the new version told AFP it was &quot;significantly better.&quot; However, US officials acknowledged that &quot;delicate&quot; issues remain. French President Emmanuel Macron threw cold water on the idea of a rapid solution, stating there is &quot;clearly no Russian willingness&quot; for a ceasefire or to discuss the new, more Ukraine-friendly proposal. Frantic discussions have been underway since the weekend when Ukrainian and US representatives huddled in Geneva to discuss Trump&#39;s controversial, initial 28-point plan for settling the bloody conflict. The latest talks, including US and Russian delegates, were taking place in Abu Dhabi, US media reported. Leaders of a group of 30 countries supporting Ukraine also met by video on Tuesday. US negotiator Dan Driscoll emerged upbeat from meeting with Russian counterparts, with his spokesperson saying: &quot;The talks are going well and we remain optimistic.&quot; The White House cited &quot;tremendous progress,&quot; while cautioning that &quot;there are a few delicate but not insurmountable details that must be sorted out.&quot; But the war, which began with Russia&#39;s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, continued unabated. On Tuesday night, Russia launched a major attack on Zaporizhzhia that damaged at least seven high-rise buildings and caused 12 people to be hospitalized, the head of the regional military administration said. The night before, powerful explosions rocked Kyiv beginning around 1 am local time, as Russian drones and missiles rained down, setting fires in apartment buildings. City officials said seven people were killed. Thick smoke, turning red and orange in the blizzard of Ukrainian air defense fire, rose over the capital as residents fled underground into metro stations, according to AFP reporters. &#39;Tough road ahead&#39;&nbsp;Trump, who long boasted he could negotiate an end to the Ukraine war within 24 hours, announced last week that he wanted his proposal approved by Kyiv by this Thursday &mdash; the US Thanksgiving holiday. But the initial plan, pushing numerous Russian war aims, sparked alarm in Ukraine and Europe. Among its points were prohibitions on Ukraine ever joining NATO and the surrender of swaths of new territory to Russia. The updated plan clearly pleases Kyiv more. The official familiar with the text told AFP that one key improvement was raising a proposed cap on the country&#39;s future military forces from 600,000 to 800,000 members. Ukrainian negotiator Rustem Umerov said on Tuesday there was &quot;common understanding on the core&quot; of the deal between Ukraine and the United States. However, remaining details should be hammered out in direct talks &quot;at the earliest suitable date,&quot; he said. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer warned: &quot;There&#39;s still a long way to go and a tough road ahead.&quot; Russia&#39;s military occupies around a fifth of Ukraine, much of it ravaged by fighting. Tens of thousands of civilians and military personnel have been killed and millions have fled the east of the country. Ukrainian army Sergeant Ivan Zadontsev said negotiating was &quot;healthy.&quot; &quot;We also are getting tired of war. We need a break,&quot; he told AFP. But the proposals by both Washington and the European Union &quot;do not serve Ukraine&#39;s national interests,&quot; he said.

Americas

US president says "only a few remaining points of disagreement," expresses hope to meet "soon" with Putin, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, "but only when the deal to end this war is final or, in its final stages."

Trump sends Witkoff to Moscow in hopes of finalizing Ukraine deal

MOSCOW:&nbsp;<a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/russian-says-no-deadlines-to-end-ukraine-war" target="_blank" style="color:#0073e6;" rel="noopener noreferrer">Moscow</a>&nbsp;and Kyiv will each release a total of 500 prisoners of war over Thursday and Friday, Russia&#39;s top negotiator said, with the Russian defense ministry saying the first 200 on each side had already been swapped. &quot;There will be an exchange of prisoners of war with Ukraine. 500 for 500,&quot; Russian negotiator Vladimir Medinsky wrote on Telegram. He added that the swap was part of agreements reached at trilateral talks between Russia, Ukraine and the United States in Geneva searching for an end to the conflict. The Russian defense ministry said the UAE and the United States helped mediate Thursday&#39;s exchange of 200 captured Russian soldiers for 200 captured Ukrainians. It added that the Russian servicemen were in <a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/ski-body-blocks-russian-belarusian-athletes-from-2026-winter-olympics" target="_blank" style="color:#0073e6;" rel="noopener noreferrer">Belarus</a>, a close ally of Russia that neighbors Ukraine. Moscow and Kyiv have held several rounds of prisoner exchanges throughout the war, one of the rare areas of cooperation between the warring countries. The swaps are among the very few tangible results of the talks, being pushed and mediated by Washington, trying to broker a deal to end the war. Negotiations appeared to have stalled amid a lack of progress and since the eruption of war in the Middle East. Kyiv had said there had been a tentative plan to hold talks in Abu Dhabi this week - one of the places being hit by Iranian missiles and drones. <a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/trump-zelensky-speak-before-ukraineus-talks-in-geneva" target="_blank" style="color:#0073e6;" rel="noopener noreferrer">Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky</a> on Monday suggested holding the next meeting in Switzerland or Turkey, which both have hosted previous rounds talks, instead.

This handout photograph taken and released by the State Emergency Service of Ukraine on March 5, 2026 shows buildings on fire following a Russian attack in the coast of Bilgorod-Dnistrovskyi district in Odesa region. (AFP)

The swap was part of agreements reached at trilateral talks between Russia, Ukraine and the United States in Geneva searching for an end to the conflict.

Russia, Ukraine to exchange 500 POWs on March 5-6: negotiator

MOSCOW: Moscow is in no hurry to reach a deal to end the war in Ukraine, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov suggested in comments to state media on Thursday.&nbsp;Negotiators from both countries were in Geneva on Thursday for separate talks with US officials, part of a fraught negotiation process being pushed by President Donald Trump in a bid to end the fighting.&nbsp;Several rounds of discussions have failed to clinch a deal, with Moscow insisting on hardline territorial and political demands that Kyiv has ruled out as tantamount to capitulation.&nbsp;Top officials in Russia on Thursday again&nbsp;<a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/ukraine-marks-four-years-since-russian-invasion" target="_blank" style="color:#0073e6;" rel="noopener noreferrer">pushed back</a>&nbsp;on the idea a deal was close.&nbsp;&quot;Have you heard anything from us about deadlines? We have no deadlines, we have tasks. We are getting them done,&quot; state news agencies quoted Lavrov as saying.&nbsp;Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov also said it was too early to make &quot;forecasts&quot; or say at what stage the peace process was at.&nbsp;&quot;It would be a big mistake to try right now to define some kind of stage or make some kind of forecasts. I don&#39;t want to make those mistakes,&quot; he told state media.&nbsp;Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has repeatedly said a meeting with Russia&#39;s Vladimir Putin is needed to agree on the key sticking points, like the fate of territory in eastern Ukraine that Russia is fighting to seize control of.&nbsp;Peskov repeated on Thursday that Russia will not agree to a summit until the very end of talks, and only to sign off on a deal thrashed out between the negotiating teams.

Moscow signaled it is not rushing Ukraine deal, as Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said, while talks in Geneva with United States officials continue under Donald Trump’s push to end fighting.

Russian foreign minister says 'no deadlines' to end Ukraine war

KYIV: Vladimir Putin has not broken Ukraine, its leader Volodymyr&nbsp;<a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/zelensky-says-europe-fragmented-looks-lost-facing-trump" target="_blank" style="color:#0073e6;" rel="noopener noreferrer">Zelensky</a>&nbsp;said Tuesday, as the Kremlin marked the fourth year of its invasion by vowing that it will keep fighting Europe&#39;s bloodiest conflict since World War II until it achieves its goals. Moscow had hoped to take Kyiv in days when it launched its&nbsp;<a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/ukraine-marks-four-years-since-russian-invasion" target="_blank" style="color:#0073e6;" rel="noopener noreferrer">invasion</a>&nbsp;on February 24, 2022. Four years later &mdash; with hundreds of thousands dead, millions forced to flee, much of eastern Ukraine destroyed and US-led peace talks still deadlocked over territory &mdash; it conceded that it has not achieved all it wants in the country. &quot;The goals haven&#39;t been fully achieved yet, which is why the military operation continues,&quot; Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters in response to an AFP question. Ukraine, meanwhile, was ready to do &quot;everything&quot; it could to secure peace, Zelensky said in a video address that featured images of Ukrainians carrying out acts of resistance against Russian soldiers in the opening days of the conflict. But any settlement must not &quot;betray&quot; the price paid by Ukrainians throughout the conflict, he said. &quot;<a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/putin-says-developing-russias-nuclear-forces-absolute-priority" target="_blank" style="color:#0073e6;" rel="noopener noreferrer">Putin</a>&nbsp;has not achieved his goals. He did not break the Ukrainians. He did not win this war. We have preserved Ukraine, and we will do everything to achieve peace -- and to ensure there is justice,&quot; Zelensky said. &quot;We want peace. Strong, dignified, and lasting peace,&quot; he said, adding that any agreement &quot;must not simply be signed, it must be accepted by Ukrainians&quot;. &quot;Everything Ukraine has gone through. It must not be surrendered, forgotten, or betrayed,&quot; he added. In a later video address to the European Parliament, Zelensky urged Brussels to set out a clear timeline for his country&#39;s accession to the <a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/pakistan-urges-diplomacy-warns-of-disinformation-risks-at-un-meeting-on-ukraine" target="_blank" style="color:#0073e6;" rel="noopener noreferrer">bloc</a>. Several European leaders including Finnish President Alexander Stubb and Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson visited Kyiv on Tuesday to mark the anniversary. European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen was also there, reaffirming that Europe stood &quot;unwaveringly with Ukraine, financially, militarily, and through this harsh winter.&quot; Zelensky was also hosting a video-conference with Kyiv&#39;s top allies, including Britain, France and Germany, to push for more support to deter the Russian invasion. In the suburb of Irpin -- where the bodies of hundreds of civilians were discovered in 2022 after it and the neighbouring suburb of Bucha were occupied by Russian forces -- kindergarten manager Olena Ponomariova said Ukrainians had become united and more resilient. But she &quot;can&#39;t say&quot; what victory would look like, she told AFP, adding: &quot;I don&#39;t know if that will happen, but let&#39;s hope it will.&quot; Territory dispute The United States has been pushing to end the conflict, mediating talks between the two sides this year in Geneva and Abu Dhabi, but they remain at odds over the issue of territory. Russia, which occupies around 20 percent of Ukraine, is fighting to gain full control of Ukraine&#39;s eastern Donetsk region as part of any deal. It has threatened to take it by force if Kyiv does not cave at the negotiating table. Ukraine has rejected the demand and said it would not sign a deal without security guarantees from allies &mdash; including the US &mdash; to deter Russia from invading again. Despite heavy losses, Russian troops have in recent months advanced on the front line, particularly in the eastern Donbas region, which Moscow wants to annex. The <a href="https://www.pakistantv.com/article/russian-missile-barrage-hits-energy-railways-across-ukraine" target="_blank" style="color:#0073e6;" rel="noopener noreferrer">Russian army</a> seized more territory during the fourth year of the Ukraine war than in the preceding two years combined, according to an AFP analysis of data from the Institute for the Study of War (ISW). Since February 24, 2025 &mdash; the third anniversary of Russia&#39;s invasion &mdash; Moscow&#39;s troops have taken 4,524 square kilometres, an area slightly larger than the US state of Rhode Island. That is according to data from the ISW, which works with the Critical Threats Project (part of the American Enterprise Institute, or AEI), another US think-tank specializing in conflict. The grinding four-year war has devastated Ukraine, which even before the fighting was one of the poorest countries in Europe. The cost of post-war reconstruction is estimated at around $588 billion over the next decade, according to a joint World Bank, EU and UN report with Kyiv, published on Monday. Russia cast its decision to send troops into Ukraine as a defensive move to halt Ukraine&#39;s ambition to join NATO. Ukraine, a former Soviet republic, considers the war to be a resurgence of Russian imperialism aimed at subjugating the Ukrainian people.

A woman holding flowers pays her respect at the Wall of Remembrance of the Fallen for Ukraine in Kyiv on February 24, 2026, as Ukraine marks the fourth anniversary of Russia's invasion. (AFP)

Ukraine marks four years of war as Zelensky vows peace, Russia presses territorial gains, while European leaders visit Kyiv and reconstruction costs are estimated at $588 billion, according to ISW and UN reports.

Articles tagged with "Russia Ukraine War"

Russian strikes kill 21 in Ukraine

North Korea's Kim reaffirms support for Russia's 'sacred' Ukraine war

Ukraine signs pacts with Azerbaijan in drone push

EU signs off on Ukraine loan, new Russia sanctions

Ukraine reports 469 Easter truce violations

Easter truce between Russia and Ukraine begins

Trump sends Witkoff to Moscow in hopes of finalizing Ukraine deal

Russia, Ukraine to exchange 500 POWs on March 5-6: negotiator

Russian foreign minister says 'no deadlines' to end Ukraine war

Zelensky says Ukraine unbroken after 4 years, but Russia vows to fight on

Russian strikes kill 21 in Ukraine