Zelenskyy seeks more sanctions as Russian strikes kill at least 14 people
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Saturday called for more sanctions against Russia as overnight strikes killed at least 14 people and injured dozens more, days ahead of talks between US and Ukrainian negotiators aimed at securing a truce, reports Agence France-Presse (AFP).
A Russian assault hit the centre of Dobropillia in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region late on Friday, killing 11 people and injuring 30, according to the emergency services.
Separately, three people were killed and seven others injured in a drone attack early on Saturday in the city of Bogodukhiv, the military head of the eastern Kharkiv region, Oleg Synegubov, said. Russia fired two missiles and 145 drones at Bogodukhiv, Ukraine’s air force said.
The overnight air raids came after US president Donald Trump threatened new sanctions and tariffs on Russia but said it may be “easier” to work with Moscow than Kyiv on efforts to end the three-year-long war.
“Such strikes show that Russia’s goals are unchanged. Therefore, it is very important to continue to do everything to protect life, strengthen our air defence, and increase sanctions against Russia,” Zelenskyy wrote on the Telegram social media channel.
In Dobropillia, AFP saw charred residential buildings, flattened market stalls and evidence of cluster bomb damage.
Irina Kostenko, 59, spent the night cowering in her hallway with her husband. When she left the apartment building on Saturday, she saw a neighbour “lying dead on the ground, covered with a blanket”. “It was shocking, I don’t have the words to describe it,” Kostenko told AFP.
Zelenskyy said that Russia had struck Dobropillia, waited until rescuers arrived and then “deliberately” targeted them as well. “This is a despicable and inhumane tactic of intimidation that the Russians often use,” he said.
Key events
Russia says it retook three villages from Ukraine in Kursk
The Russian defence ministry has announced the recapture of Viktorovka, Nikolayevka and Staraya Sorochina, according to Agence France-Presse (AFP) and Reuters.
According to DeepState, an online military tracker linked to the Ukrainian army, the Russian move followed a “breach” in Ukrainian defence lines near the town of Sudzha which is under Kyiv’s control.
“One of our units left its positions. After that the enemy reinforced its troops and systematically launched assault operations … and here’s the result,” said DeepState, which is followed by more than 800,000 subscribers on the Telegram website, reports AFP.
An army source interviewed by Ukrainska Pravda newspaper said that the Ukrainian soldiers were trying to “stabilise the situation” but the Russian troops had “completely cut off the supply lines”.
Serhiy Sternenko, a prominent Ukrainian activist, wrote on Thursday:
The logistics situation in the Kursk region is rapidly deteriorating and is already critical.”
“Logistics routes to Sudzha are under full enemy fire control,” he said in a post on X, citing information from army units in the area.
According to Reuters, Two Majors, a pro-Russian war blogger, wrote on Telegram on Saturday that Russian troops had begun an assault on Sudzha, a major town about 6 miles (9.5 km) from the border, and that the situation for Ukrainian troops in Kursk was “close to critical”.
The Guardian has been unable to independently verify the report.
Russian troops retook from Ukrainian forces the villages of Viktorovka, Nikolayevka and Staraya Sorochina in Russia’s western Kursk region, the Tass state news agency reported on Saturday, citing the defence ministry.
Reuters could not independently confirm the battlefield report.
The Russian army has been fighting to eject Ukrainian troops from Kursk since last August, when Kyiv’s forces staged a lightning incursion over the border and seized a swath of Russian territory.
Speaking about Russian missile and drone attacks on Ukraine’s eastern city of Dobropillia overnight, president Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Facebook:
Such strikes show that Russia’s objectives have not changed. Therefore, it is crucial to continue to do our best to protect lives, strengthen our air defences, and increase sanctions against Russia. Everything that helps Putin finance the war must collapse.”
Russia has carried out huge strikes across Ukraine as it targeted facilities in several regions, including Odesa and Poltava, using nearly 70 cruise and ballistic missiles and almost 200 attack drones, according to Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Over a matter of days, the White House has suspended weapons deliveries and the supply of intelligence to Kyiv. Zelenskyy is due to travel to Saudi Arabia on Monday to meet Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
Andrew Roth
Donald Trump has said Vladimir Putin was “doing what anybody would do” after Russia launched a massive missile and drone strike on Ukraine days after the US cut off vital intelligence and military aid to Kyiv.
Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office on Friday Trump said he finds it “easier” to work with Russia than Ukraine and that Putin “wants to end the war”.
“I’m finding it more difficult, frankly, to deal with Ukraine. And they don’t have the cards,” Trump said. “In terms of getting a final settlement, it may be easier dealing with Russia.”
Asked whether the Russian leader was taking advantage of the pause in US intelligence sharing and military aid to Ukraine, Trump replied: “I actually think he is doing what anybody else would do.”
Senior US and Ukrainian officials plan to meet in Saudi Arabia next week as Volodymyr Zelenskyy and his advisers seek to revive relations with the US after a botched summit in the Oval Office during which Trump told Zelenskyy he was “gambling with world war three”.
Russia launched a massive drone and missile attack on Ukrainian energy facilities on Friday in the wake of the US decision to halt intelligence sharing with Ukraine that had helped it target incoming fire.
Speaking with reporters in the Oval Office, Trump said: “We’re doing very well with Russia. But right now they’re bombing the hell out of Ukraine.”
You can read more on this reporting by Andrew Roth in Washington and Luke Harding in Kyiv here:
A tank at Russia’s Kirishi refinery, one of the country’s largest, was damaged by falling debris during a Ukrainian drone attack, the governor of the north-western Leningrad region said on Saturday, reports Reuters.
Surgutneftegaz’s Kirishinefteorgsintez (KINEF) refinery is one of the top two refineries in Russia. It refines about 17.7 million tons a year (355,000 barrels a day) of Russian crude, or 6.4% of the total, according to industry sources.
“Air defences shot down one drone on approach, the other was destroyed over the territory of the enterprise,” Alexander Drozdenko, governor of the Leningrad region, said on Telegram.
“When the debris fell, the external structure of one of the tanks was damaged,” he said.
No one was injured, he said.
The refinery produces about 2.3 million tons of gasoline – 5.3% of Russia’s total – 7.6% of its diesel fuel, 16.3% of its fuel oil and 3.4% of the country’s aviation fuel, according to industry sources.
Looking ahead to Ukraine’s talks with the US next week on a possible end to the war with Russia, Volodymyr Zelenskyy is due to land in Saudi Arabia on Monday for discussions with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
The meeting is a day before Ukrainian officials are expected to hold fresh talks with their US counterparts on Tuesday in the Middle Eastern kingdom.
After meeting with Prince Mohammed, Zelensky said his team “will remain in Saudi Arabia to work with our American partners”, Agence France-Presse reports.
“Ukraine is most interested in peace,” he added.
Earlier on Friday, the Ukrainian president renewed calls for a mutual halt to aerial attacks on critical infrastructure following the recent Russian barrage.
He said the first steps to establishing real peace should be stopping both Russian and Ukrainian aerial and naval attacks.
This latest proposal builds on growing rhetoric from Kyiv, Washington and Moscow on halting the war.
The Kremlin has previously ruled out a temporary ceasefire in Ukraine.
At least 11 killed and 30 injured in Russian missile strike on Ukraine, Kyiv says
Five children were among the 30 wounded in overnight Russian attacks on Dobropillia which also killed at least 11 people, the Ukrainian interior ministry said on Saturday.
It said Russian forces attacked the town in eastern Ukraine with ballistic missiles, multiple rockets and drones, damaging eight multi-storey buildings and 30 cars, Reuters reports.
“While extinguishing the fire, the occupiers struck again, damaging the fire truck,” the ministry said on Telegram.
It published photos of partially destroyed buildings engulfed in fire and rescuers removing rubble from the buildings.
Dobropillia, home to about 28,000 people before the war, is in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine, 22km (14 miles) from the front line north of the key hub of Pokrovsk, which Russian troops have been attacking for weeks.
The ministry also said at least three people were killed and seven injured in a separate drone attack on the Kharkiv region overnight.
The Ukrainian military said Russia attacked Ukraine overnight with two Iskander-M ballistic missiles and one Iskander-K cruise missile as well as 145 drones.
The military said air forces shot down one cruise missile and 79 drones. It said another 54 drones did not reach their targets, likely due to electronic countermeasures.
A tank at Russia’s Kirishi oil refinery – one of the country’s largest – was damaged by falling debris during a major Ukrainian drone attack, the governor of the north-western Leningrad region said on Saturday.
Surgutneftegaz’s Kirishinefteorgsintez (KINEF) refinery is one of the top two refineries in Russia, Reuters reports.
“Air defences shot down one drone on approach, the other was destroyed over the territory of the enterprise,” Alexander Drozdenko, governor of the Leningrad region, said on Telegram.
When the debris fell, the external structure of one of the tanks was damaged.
No one was injured, he said.
The extent of the damage to the refinery was not immediately clear. There was no immediate comment from Surgutneftegaz, one of Russia’s biggest oil companies, or from Ukraine.
Industry sources say the Kirishi refinery refines about 17.7m tons a year or 355,000 barrels a day of Russian crude – 6.4% of the country’s total.
Opening summary
Welcome to our live coverage of the Russia-Ukraine war. Here’s a snapshot of the latest to bring you up to speed.
At least 11 people were killed and 30 wounded in Russian strikes on eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk region late on Friday, the country’s emergency service said on Saturday, raising the earlier death toll of four.
At least nine buildings were damaged in the attack on the centre of Dobropillia, it said on Telegram.
The regional governor said earlier that Russian forces had launched three night-time strikes on the town north of Pokrovsk, a focal point of their advance through eastern Ukraine, and according to initial information high-rise apartment buildings were involved. Emergency crews were at the site, Vadym Filashki said on Telegram.
Meanwhile in Russia, thousands of Ukrainian troops who stormed into the country’s Kursk region last August are almost surrounded by Russian forces there in a major blow to Kyiv, which hoped to use its presence as leverage over Moscow in any peace talks, Reuters has reported, citing open source maps.
The news agency said the maps showed Ukraine’s situation in Kursk had deteriorated sharply in the past three days, after Russian forces retook territory as part of a gathering counteroffensive that has nearly cut the Ukrainian force in two and separated the main group from its principal supply lines.
The situation for Ukraine comes after Washington suspended its intelligence sharing with Kyiv and raises the possibility that its forces may be forced into a retreat back into Ukraine or risk being captured or killed.
In other developments:
-
Russia carried out huge ballistic missile and drone strikes across Ukraine a day after the US stopped sharing intelligence with Kyiv which had previously given advance warnings of attacks. The strikes came early on Friday as a Ukrainian delegation prepared to meet with US counterparts in Saudi Arabia next week for talks about a possible end to the war, report Luke Harding and Dan Sabbagh. In a post on Truth Social, Donald Trump appeared to criticise Russia’s latest bombardment. The US president posted: “Based on the fact that Russia is absolutely ‘pounding’ Ukraine on the battlefield right now, I am strongly considering large scale Banking Sanctions, Sanctions, and Tariffs on Russia until a Cease Fire and FINAL SETTLEMENT AGREEMENT ON PEACE IS REACHED.”
-
Separately, Trump said after the strikes that Vladimir Putin was “doing what anybody would do”. “I think he wants to get it [the war] stopped and settled and I think he’s hitting them harder than he’s been hitting them and I think probably anybody in that position would be doing that right now,” he told reporters in the White House. Trump also said he found it “easier” to deal with Russia than with Ukraine in efforts to end the war and that he trusted Putin, the Russian president. “I believe him,” Trump said. “I’m finding it more difficult, frankly, to deal with Ukraine and they don’t have the cards. It may be easier dealing with Russia.”
-
Volodymyr Zelenskyy responded to Russia’s strikes by calling for a truce covering air and sea. “The first steps to establishing real peace should be forcing the sole source of this war, Russia, to stop such attacks,” the Ukrainian president said on Telegram. Moscow has rejected the idea of a temporary truce, which has also been proposed by Britain and France.
-
US aerospace company Maxar Technologies disabled Ukraine’s access to its satellite images after a request from the Trump administration. Maxar said it had contracts with the US government and dozens of allied and partner nations and “each customer makes their own decisions on how they use and share that data”.
-
Zelenskyy’s approval rating in Ukraine has risen by 10 percentage points since his White House spat with Trump, a survey by a leading Ukrainian pollster showed on Friday. The poll by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology – conducted from 14 February to 4 March – found 67% of respondents trusted Zelenskyy in March, up from 57% a month earlier.
-
Iran’s foreign ministry denied accusations by Emmanuel Macron that Tehran had supplied equipment to Russia for use in the Ukraine war, calling the French president’s remarks “baseless and false”.
