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Free Malaysia Today
12-06-2025
- Politics
- Free Malaysia Today
Ukraine denies postponing prisoner swaps as Russian strike on Kharkiv kills 4
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called the killing of a civillian 'another brutal murder'. (EPA Images pic) KYIV : Ukraine denied Russian allegations on Saturday that it had indefinitely postponed prisoner swaps, accusing Moscow of 'playing dirty games' after overnight Russian missile and bomb strikes on Kharkiv left three people dead and 22 injured. Later on Saturday, Russian aircraft carried out another bombing raid on Kharkiv, killing one civilian and injuring more than 40, which Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called 'another brutal murder'. Separately, Russian officials said a Ukrainian drone attack in the Moscow region wounded two people. At a second round of peace talks in Istanbul on Monday, the two sides agreed to swap more prisoners and return the bodies of 12,000 dead soldiers. However, Kremlin aide Vladimir Medinsky said on Saturday Kyiv had unexpectedly postponed the exchanges indefinitely. This was denied by Andriy Kovalenko, an official with Ukraine's national security and defence council, who said Moscow should stop 'playing dirty games' and return to constructive work. 'Today's statements by the Russian side do not correspond to reality or to previous agreements on either the exchange of prisoners or the repatriation of bodies,' he said on the Telegram app. Overnight, Russian forces used high-precision long-range weapons and drones to attack military targets in Ukraine, hitting all of them, according to Russia's defence ministry. The northeastern city of Kharkiv, one of Ukraine's largest, is just a few dozen kilometres from the Russian border and has been under frequent Russian shelling during more than three years of war triggered by Russia's full-scale invasion. 'Kharkiv is currently experiencing the most powerful attack since the start of the full-scale war,' Mayor Ihor Terekhov said in a post on Telegram earlier on Saturday. Residential buildings, educational and infrastructure facilities were attacked, he said, and photos showed buildings burnt and reduced partially to rubble, as rescuers carried the wounded away for treatment. Kharkiv regional governor Oleh Syniehubov said there could still be people buried under the rubble after one civilian industrial facility was hit by 40 drones and several bombs. In the Moscow region, two people were injured after a drone attack by Ukraine overnight and on Friday, Governor Andrei Vorobyov said on Telegram, with nine drones shot down. Russia's aviation watchdog said operations had resumed at the Domodedovo, Sheremetyevo and Zhukovsky airports in the Moscow region after being suspended temporarily for flight safety reasons. The defence ministry said that since midnight, air defence units had intercepted and destroyed 36 Ukrainian drones over Russian territory, including the Moscow region. Ukraine's air forces also shot down a Russian Su-35 fighter jet on Saturday morning, its military said without providing further details. Russian forces have not yet commented on the matter while Reuters could not independently verify the report. Zelenskiy said that Ukrainian forces recently destroyed three Iskander missile systems and damaged Russian military helicopters. 'There have also been new blows to Russian military logistics and airfields. This helps our defence – every complication for Russia is important for us,' Zelenskiy said in his evening statement. A Ukrainian drone attack deep inside Russian territory last weekend likely damaged around 10% of Russia's strategic bomber fleet and hit some of the aircraft as they were being prepared for strikes on Ukraine, a senior German military official said in a YouTube podcast set for broadcast later on Saturday.
Al Jazeera
12-06-2025
- Politics
- Al Jazeera
Ukraine keeps up pressure on Russian airfields and war production
Ukraine has kept up the pressure on Russian airfields and war production in the past week after its highly successful Operation Spiderweb, which destroyed Moscow's strategic bombers on June 1. Russia responded with its biggest air raids on Ukrainian cities, causing dozens of civilian casualties and introducing a jet-powered version of the Iranian-designed Shahed drone. On Friday, Ukraine struck at least three fuel tanks at Engels airbase 500km (310 miles) southeast of Moscow. Fires were also reported at Dyagilevo airbase, 170km (105 miles) from the capital. Both had been targeted in Operation Spiderweb. Andriy Kovalenko, head of Ukraine's Center for Countering Disinformation, also said Kyiv's forces struck the JSC Progress plant in Michurinsk, a key link in Russia's defence industrial chain manufacturing electronic stabilisation and control systems for artillery and rocket systems. Ukraine hit Russia's munitions industry again on Sunday, targeting the Azot chemical plant in Novomoskovsk, which produces military explosives. Ukrainian drones also stopped operations at the Tambov Gunpowder plant, 430km (270 miles) southeast of Moscow, on Wednesday. Kovalenko said it was 'one of the main suppliers of explosives for the Russian army', providing gunpowder for bullets, shells and rocket systems. Geolocated footage confirmed the hit. At the start of this week, Ukraine destroyed two fighter planes on the tarmac of the Savasleyka airbase in the region of Nizhny Novgorod east of Moscow. The planes were used to fire Kinzhal ballistic missiles, the Ukrainian military's General Staff said. Ukrainian drone strikes caused fires at a plant in the city of Cheboksary, 500km (310 miles) east of Moscow, which manufactures Comet antennas that provide Russian Shahed drones with resistance to Ukrainian electronic warfare. The plant also makes guidance kits retrofitted onto inertial bombs, turning them into precision-guided glide bombs. Russia has been dropping more than 3,000 of these bombs onto Ukrainian front-line positions every month. It is key to Moscow's ability to maintain pressure on the ground. Ukraine's strikes against airfields and factories aim to stop these bombs' production and delivery. Russia reported that it downed 102 Ukrainian long-range drones on Tuesday morning. 'We have come very close to the moment when we can force Russia to stop the war. We feel it,' Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in an ABC interview on Saturday, a possible reference to the growing effectiveness of Ukrainian long-range interdiction of Russian war production. French Defence Minister Sebastien Lecornu said on Saturday that carmaker Renault was launching a new partnership in Ukraine to build drone production lines – a result of Kyiv's months-long effort to attract more Western investment in domestic weapons production. Stung by the loss of perhaps a third of its strategic bomber fleet, used to launch cruise missiles against Ukraine, Russia has scaled up its attacks. It launched more than 1,400 Shahed drones in the past week and launched at least 59 cruise missiles. On June 5, two Russian attacks destroyed the Kherson regional administration building. On Friday, a deadly cocktail of 407 drones and 45 missiles of various kinds killed at least four people in Kyiv and injured dozens across the country. At least one person was reported killed when Russian bombs hit an apartment building in Kharkiv on Saturday. Kharkiv, which is only 30km (20 miles) from the Russian border, had been shelled continuously for 24 hours, Zelenskyy said. Ukraine's air force said on Saturday that Russia had launched 215 drones across the country overnight. Russia launched its largest yet attack of drones and missiles on Sunday night at Kyiv and Dubno in the Rivne region of Ukraine. Ukraine's air force said on Monday that it had intercepted 479 of 499 Russian air targets. Of the 479 downed objects, 460 were drones. On Tuesday Ukraine said it intercepted 277 out of 315 launched drones and stopped seven missiles. A further salvo of drones targeted Kyiv on Tuesday, which reportedly included a jet-propelled version of the Shahed for the first time, capable of reaching speeds of 600 kilometres per hour (370 miles per hour). The strike targeted 'Ukraine's aviation, missile, armour and shipbuilding industries in Kyiv', Russia's Ministry of Defence said. At least two people were killed in Kharkiv on Wednesday after 17 Shahed drones fell on the city. Russia is now capable of manufacturing 2,700 Shahed drones and 2,500 decoys each month, compared with 500 a year ago, according to Ukraine's Defence Intelligence Service, meaning that strikes of this scale and density are indefinitely sustainable. In addition, Russia has come to an agreement with North Korea to build Harpy and Shahed-type drones, Kyrylo Budanov, head of Ukraine's intelligence community, said in an interview with The War Zone. 'This is extremely dangerous both for Europe and for East and Southeast Asia,' Zelenskyy wrote on Telegram. 'This must be addressed now – not when thousands of upgraded 'Shahed' drones and ballistic missiles begin to threaten Seoul and Tokyo.' While the air war played out at these new levels of intensity, Russian troops in eastern Ukraine's Donetsk region at the weekend reached the border of Dnipropetrovsk, a Ukrainian region that Russian boots had yet to step on in the more than three-year war, achieving a psychological milestone. While Ukrainian officials said fighting was still raging in Donetsk and had not spilled over the administrative border, geolocated footage on Monday showed that the Russians had reached it. Russian units were 'developing an offensive on the territory of the Dnepropetrovsk Region', Russia's Defence Ministry said on Wednesday. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Russian troops intended to create a buffer zone in Dnipropetrovsk, using the same argument Russia has offered for its second attempt to invade northern Ukraine's Kharkiv and Sumy regions last year and this year, respectively. The deputy chairman of Russia's National Security Council, Dmitry Medvedev, sought to leverage the news to diplomatic advantage on Telegram: 'Those who refuse to acknowledge the realities of war at the negotiating table will face new realities on the battleground,' he wrote. 'Our Armed Forces have launched an offensive in the Dnepropetrovsk region.' United States Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth did not attend the 28th Contact Group for Ukraine on June 4, in keeping with US President Donald Trump's freeze on aid to Ukraine, but Ukraine's European allies did show up and pledged significant military upgrades. Britain said it would spend $476m to build 100,000 drones for Ukraine in 2025, 10 times its drone assistance last year. German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius announced that a long-range weapon Ukraine has been building with German funding could enter service imminently. 'The first systems can be put into operation in the armed forces of Ukraine in a few weeks,' he said. On Tuesday, the European Commission floated an 18th package of sanctions targeting Russia's banks, energy revenues and military. Among other things, the sanctions would forbid any transactions involving Russia's damaged and currently inoperable Nord Stream gas pipelines. The measure would send 'a clear message to global liquefied natural gas producers, which may be hesitant to expand partnerships with the European buyers as long as a relapse to Russian gas dependence is a possibility', wrote Olga Khakova, deputy director for European energy security at the Atlantic Council. Europe has already banned all Russian oil imports but allows tankers insured in the European Union to trade oil to third parties for up to $60 a barrel. It would now lower that price cap to $45. The proposals also included sanctioning an additional 22 Russian banks and banks from third countries. The oil price cap was to be discussed at the Group of Seven meeting in Canada next week. EU leaders are to approve the sanctions later this month. 'Europe remains focused on the war and, let's say, continues to engage in militaristic bravado,' Peskov said. 'There are absolutely no signals about the willingness to seek any common ground.' Meanwhile, Hegseth told a US Senate Appropriations Committee hearing on Thursday that the US would provide no military aid to Ukraine. 'The president is committed to peace in this conflict,' Hegseth said.
Newsweek
12-06-2025
- Politics
- Newsweek
Map Shows Ukraine's Crippling Strikes on Russia's Microchip Plants
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. Ukraine targeted a technology plant close to Moscow overnight, Kyiv's military said on Thursday, the latest in a run of attacks on Russian microelectronics plants since the beginning of the year. The assault was launched on the Rezonit facility roughly 25 miles, from the center of the Russian capital city, Andriy Kovalenko, an official with Ukraine's national security and defense council, said on Thursday. The site was a "bold target" for Ukraine, Kovalenko added. Ukraine's military, confirming the overnight attack, said the Rezonit plant was an "important facility" for Russia's industry, supplying its military. Why It Matters Kyiv has repeatedly targeted Russian facilities pumping out microelectronics and components key for some of the country's most advanced weapons, including next-generation missiles. What To Know Russia's Defense Ministry said it had destroyed three Ukrainian drones over the broader Moscow overnight. The mayor of the city of Moscow and the governor of the Moscow region had not commented at the time of writing. The extent of the damage is not clear, but footage circulating online on Thursday appears to show at least one bright flash and plumes of smoke at the site. Newsweek could not independently verify the footage and has reached out to the Russian Defense Ministry for comment via email. The microelectronics made at the Rezonit plant are used for flight control, navigation and guidance systems in Russia's Iskander missiles, Kalibr and Kh-101 cruise missiles, as well as Russian drones and artillery systems, Kovalenko said. Ukraine said on May 21 it had attacked the Bolkhovsky semiconductor plant in Russia's Oryol region, southwest of Moscow, with ten drones. Kyiv's military described the site as one of Russia's major suppliers of semiconductors and microelectronics, key for producing Iskander and Kinzhal missiles, as well as Russia's aircraft. Russia has frequently fired Iskander missiles at Ukraine and debuted the Kinzhal, one of the Kremlin's "next generation" weapons, during the conflict. Russia claims the missile is hypersonic and impossible to intercept. Ukrainian and Western intelligence suggests advanced U.S.-made air defense systems have shot down Kinzhal missiles in Ukraine. A week later, Kyiv said it had struck a microelectronics plant, named as the Mikron facility in Zelenograd, near Moscow. Ukraine's Kovalenko said Russia's Kremniy-EL microelectronics plant in the Bryansk region bordering Ukraine was attacked in late April. Russian state-controlled media reported in January the Bryansk plant suspended operations after six Ukrainian drones homed in on the site. What People Are Saying Ukraine's military said on Thursday its forces had "struck an important facility of the Russian aggressor's military-industrial complex."
Miami Herald
09-06-2025
- Politics
- Miami Herald
Ukrainian drones hit Russian plant involved in missile output
Ukraine said its drones hit a Russian research and production facility that supplies components for missiles, as Russia unleashed a fresh barrage of air attacks overnight. Two Ukrainian drones struck the site of an electronics developer and manufacturer in Cheboksary, which temporarily halted operations to protect employees, Oleg Nikolayev, governor of Russia's Chuvashia region that's located 1,300 km (800 miles) from the border with Ukraine, said in a Telegram post. The plant is involved in the missile production process, including for the Iskander system, said Andriy Kovalenko, head of the Ukrainian Center for Countering Propaganda, on Telegram. It also produces navigation systems for Russian Shahed drones and components used in glide bombs, according to the Ukrainian unmanned systems forces. The attack on the electronics plant comes as Russian forces have been targeting Ukraine with major missile and drone strikes for several days. U.S. President Donald Trump said last week that Russian President Vladimir Putin warned in a telephone call that Moscow would retaliate for Ukrainian drone operations that destroyed several strategic nuclear bombers at airfields across the country. Russia overnight launched 499 drones and missiles, including four Kinzhals and 14 cruise missiles, Ukraine's air defense forces said Monday on Telegram. The military shot down or jammed 479 of them, it said. Ukraine regularly targets Russian plants involved in military production, as Moscow's full-scale invasion continues into its fourth year. While officials from Kyiv and Moscow have held direct talks in Turkey twice in the past month, Russia has so far refused calls by the U.S., Europe and Ukraine to agree to a ceasefire to allow for peace negotiations. Copyright (C) 2025, Tribune Content Agency, LLC. Portions copyrighted by the respective providers.
Free Malaysia Today
08-06-2025
- Politics
- Free Malaysia Today
3 killed in Russian strikes on Ukraine's Kharkiv
The northeastern city of Kharkiv has been under frequent Russian shelling. (AP pic) KYIV : Overnight missile and bomb strikes by Russia on the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv left three people dead and 22 hurt, while a Ukrainian drone attack in the Moscow region wounded two people, officials from both countries said separately today. Russian forces used high-precision long-range weapons and drones to hit designated military targets in Ukraine overnight, hitting all of them, according to Russia's defence ministry. Separately, Ukraine denied an accusation made by Kremlin aide Vladimir Medinsky that it had indefinitely postponed accepting the bodies of its killed soldiers and the exchange of prisoners of war. 'Today's statements by the Russian side do not correspond to reality or to previous agreements on either the exchange of prisoners or the repatriation of bodies,' Andriy Kovalenko, an official with the national security and defence council said on the Telegram app. In an agreement at a second round of peace talks in Istanbul on Monday, the two sides said they would swap more prisoners and return the bodies of 12,000 dead soldiers. The northeastern city of Kharkiv, one of Ukraine's largest, is just a few dozen kilometres from the Russian border and has been under frequent Russian shelling during more than three years of war triggered by Russia's full-scale invasion. 'Kharkiv is currently experiencing the most powerful attack since the start of the full-scale war,' mayor Ihor Terekhov said in a post on Telegram earlier today. Residential buildings, educational and infrastructure facilities were attacked, he said, and photos showed buildings burnt and reduced partially to rubble, as rescuers carried the wounded away for treatment. Kharkiv regional governor Oleh Syniehubov said there could still be people buried under the rubble after one civilian industrial facility was hit by 40 drones and several bombs. In the Moscow region, two people were injured after a drone attack by Ukraine overnight and yesterday, governor Andrei Vorobyov said on Telegram, with nine drones shot down. Russia's aviation watchdog said operations had resumed at the Domodedovo, Sheremetyevo and Zhukovsky airports in the Moscow region after being suspended temporarily for flight safety reasons. The defence ministry said that since midnight, air defence units had intercepted and destroyed 36 Ukrainian drones over Russian territory, including the Moscow region. Ukraine's air forces also shot down a Russian Su-35 fighter jet this morning, its military said without providing further details. Russian forces have not yet commented on the matter while Reuters could not independently verify the report. A Ukrainian drone attack deep inside Russian territory last weekend likely damaged around 10% of Russia's strategic bomber fleet and hit some of the aircraft as they were being prepared for strikes on Ukraine, a senior German military official said in a YouTube podcast set for broadcast later today.
