Category: Security

This article was originally published by Radio Free Asia and is reprinted with permission.

Hungry North Korean soldiers are selling some of their military equipment to buy food, prompting officials to conduct inspections that have caught some soldiers without all their issued gear, residents in the country told Radio Free Asia.

Though the country’s military is often said to be under-supplied, military-grade items tend to be of better quality than products civilians can obtain, so are viewed as desirable.

Weapons are used often during training, but personal gear like tents, lunch boxes, canteens and waterproof rice containers are not used as often, so some soldiers figure they won’t be missed.

RFA has reported in the past that soldiers often go hungry, and some of them even steal from residents get food.

The inspections began earlier this month, and will now happen on a regular basis, a resident of the northeastern province of North Hamgyong told RFA Korean on condition of anonymity for safety reasons.

“The authorities recently determined that some young soldiers are selling their military-issued gear or giving it to people they know because they are hungry and need money,” he said. “In fact, quite a few soldiers during this inspection were caught without their gear that they were supposed to have.”

Two items — canteens and waterproof rice bags — are particularly sought after, he said.

Those who were caught without all their issued gear were going to be severely punished, he said.

“They will be questioned about how they disposed of their military gear,” he said. “Measures will likely be taken such as having them bring back their gear or paying for the missing items.”

Not fed enough

A unit in the northwestern province of North Pyongan conducted the surprise inspection by instructing the soldiers to assemble for a combat exercise in an open field, a resident there told RFA on condition of anonymity to speak freely.

“I heard this from a soldier who frequently visits my house,” he said. “The items that were mainly raised during the inspection were military rice containers and personal tents. There was also unit that was missing several shovels.”

He said that the rice container is something that everyone needs, and that the tents can be used to cover holes in the roofs of homes and other buildings.

In North Korea, able-bodied men are required to serve 10 years in the 1.2 million-strong military after high school, from around age 18, while able-bodied women must serve seven years.

But rations can be small, and RFA has reported that new recruits plead with their parents for food soon after enlisting.

“Some newly enlisted soldiers are so hungry that they will secretly sell their military-issued supplies,” he said. “It will be difficult to completely eradicate this phenomenon unless chronic problems such as hunger are resolved.”

This article was originally published by Radio Free Asia and is reprinted with permission.

Hong Kong rights groups, Tibetans, Uyghurs and local residents gathered at the historic former Royal Mint Court on Saturday to rally against China’s proposed ‘mega-embassy’, voicing fears that Beijing would use the building to harass and monitor dissidents living abroad.

It’s the second mass protest in in five weeks at the site near the Tower of London. Organizers estimated that 6,000 people participated.

The protesters dispersed peacefully after the rally and no one was arrested.

The Chinese government purchased the historic building in 2018 with plans to build what would become Beijing’s largest diplomatic facility globally.

An architect working on the project revealed some of the details of the project, including a tunnel connecting two of the former Royal Mint buildings, basement rooms and accommodation for hundreds of staff.

This article was originally published by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and is reprinted with permission.

US-made weapons continue to be actively used on Ukraine’s battlefields despite a temporary pause in military aid from the United States.

Deliveries of ammunition and weapons resumed on March 12 after being suspended for just over a week.

The suspension followed an Oval Office row between US President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on February 28.

RFE/RL’s Maryan Kushnir met frontline troops in the eastern Donetsk region in early March.

He found them using the US Paladin howitzer and Bradley fighting vehicles, as well as the M777 howitzer, which is manufactured in the United States and United Kingdom.

The weapons were under heavy and near constant use.

“The Ukrainian troops have opened intensive fire near [the town of] Kurakhove,” said Kushnir, standing next to a M777. “They’ve just fired more than 20 shells, and the firing hasn’t stopped. This type of artillery arrived in 2022 from the United States. There are many such guns on the front line and they are used widely, as are NATO-caliber shells. The firing never stops, as you can see.”

The soldiers Kushnir interviewed said they believed the suspension of military aid had had little impact so far.

“As far as I know, we are manufacturing shells now, so I don’t think we will have any problems with the supply,” one unnamed soldier told Kushnir. “And we will still have these guns, too. If something happens in the future, we can still repair them. They are being repaired and restored so we can use them again.”

“It’s not just America that’s helping us,” said another unnamed soldier. “We will hold out and this situation will stop.”

According to the Germany-based Kiel Institute for the World Economy, the United States supplied $67 billion of military aid between the start of the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 and December 2024.

Europe provide $65 billion in the same period.

Fedir Venislavsky, who sits on the defense committee of the Ukrainian parliament, estimated in early March that Ukraine’s weapons supplies would last just six months without US military aid.

Gov. Ron DeSantis is asking lawmakers to spend $510 million to combat illegal immigration and create a six-week sales tax holiday on gun and ammunition purchases as part of his proposed state budget for the next fiscal year.

In his recommended $115.6 billion budget, DeSantis would spend nearly $590 million to continue a popular home-hardening program and resume back-to-school and disaster preparedness sales tax holidays.

He would also create a two-month fuel tax holiday for Florida boaters and repeal the business rent tax, which would save companies $1.6 billion over the next two years.

“All in all, this is a really good place for the state of Florida to be in,” DeSantis said during a news conference Monday.

DeSantis’ budget for the 2025-26 fiscal year is a recommendation. Ultimately, the Republican-controlled Legislature will craft the budget when it meets for the annual 60-day legislative session next month.

But it comes amid a bitter feud with lawmakers, some of whom are warning that they will take a more critical eye towards his spending.

Last week, lawmakers rejected his plan to spend $350 million flying migrants from Florida to other countries, and instead passed a bill stripping him of nearly all his immigration enforcement powers. DeSantis vowed to veto the bill — but on Monday sounded more conciliatory, saying that he was working out a deal with lawmakers. Spokespeople for the House speaker and Senate president declined to comment.

DeSantis is calling his spending plan the “Focus on Fiscal Responsibility Budget‚” and it’s about $900 million less than last year’s final budget.

DeSantis is proposing eliminating 741 vacant positions across state government.

His own office would continue to grow by 11 employees and about $11 million. The governor’s office has been the fastest-growing unit in state government since he was elected in 2018.

House Minority Leader Fentrice Driskell, D-Tampa, said DeSantis’ proposed budget did little to help Floridians with the cost of living.

“The Governor’s budget proposal focuses on grabbing headlines and trying to keep him relevant in the national spotlight while leaving Florida’s families behind,” she said in a statement.

State lawmakers last week called out DeSantis’ lack of enforcement on E-Verify, the federal program that checks the legal eligibility of new workers. Until Wednesday, the state had not issued any citations against companies since 2022.

DeSantis’ proposed budget includes adding 10 positions at the Department of Commerce to enforce E-Verify. Another 21 positions and nearly $510 million would assist the federal government in combating illegal immigration.

State police and firefighters would receive an up to 25% pay increase under DeSantis’ plan. The union representing Florida Highway Patrol troopers last week said they needed more funding if they were going to be the “tip of the spear” in the governor’s immigration enforcement.

DeSantis continued to highlight education as a priority, calling for a $609 million increase in the state K-12 funding formula, to $16 billion. Combined with local tax revenue for schools, he projected an education budget of $29.7 billion.

He proposed increasing teacher pay by about $246 million a year, which in past years has translated into raises of about 1.5%.

His budget anticipated K-12 public school enrollment of 3.2 million students along with more than 350,000 children who receive state-funded education vouchers. Some observers anticipate Florida’s voucher system, which is expanding this year and is the nation’s largest, will exceed $4 billion.

DeSantis’ budget proposal also sets aside $69 million for “infrastructure improvements and resource management” at Florida state parks.

Last year, Florida’s Department of Environmental Protection proposed building golf courses, pickleball courts and 350-room lodges in nine state parks. The plan sparked outrage among Floridians and lawmakers of both parties.

Though DeSantis’ staff at first stood by the plans, the governor soon announced he would shelve the ideas — and said the state would go “back to the drawing board.”

When asked on Monday whether the proposed funding for this year’s budget had anything to do with the previous development proposals, DeSantis dismissed the state’s involvement and said “there was never anything that was proposed at all.”

For the upcoming budget, DeSantis said the parks plan would be to maintain “what we have” and avoid damage or depreciation of the resources.

After slashing more than $32 million in arts and culture funding from the budget last year, DeSantis’ proposal suggests $27 million for culture and museum grants.

That includes $1 million to fund projects related to the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, which will be on July 4, 2026.

Last year, DeSantis said he cut the arts funding over “sexual”festivals and said the Legislature needed to reevaluate how arts projects were funded.

“I thought it was too much into the DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion), into the woke stuff,” DeSantis said.

This year his proposal suggests coupling the $27 million in arts funding with a new law to “ensure funding is provided only to activities and programs that are appropriate for all age groups.”

A proposed bill coupled with that funding would give the secretary of state more influence over what gets funded and what arts programs could lose funding.

Although Florida’s economy and tax rolls are growing, state economists warned in December that the state was facing a nearly $10 budget deficit in the next three years and that state lawmakers can’t continue to spend as they have been.

DeSantis would also spend $830 million to pay down state debt ahead of schedule, an effort that has become a frequent talking point at his campaign events.

DeSantis’ proposed budget also doubles down on his accusations of fraud in Florida’s citizen initiative process by setting aside about $1.8 million for nine new positions to “perform investigations relating to petition fraud allegations.”

Last year, as DeSantis waged a war against Florida’s two citizen-proposed constitutional amendments, his administration released a report accusing the proposed abortion amendment of widespread fraud.

Since then, DeSantis has pushed for major change to Florida’s petition initiative process that would make it near impossible for a campaign to get on the ballot.

The governor’s budget proposal includes $1 million for voter signature verification, though it’s not immediately clear what that program would look like. Another $2.5 million would be spent upgrading the state’s voter registration system.

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© 2025 Tampa Bay Times

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

This article was originally published by Radio Free Asia and is reprinted with permission.

South Korean and Chinese authorities faced off at sea for two hours last month after Chinese authorities blocked the South’s attempt to investigate a steel structure set up by Beijing in their overlapping waters in the Yellow Sea, according to South Korea’s foreign ministry.

The standoff occurred on Feb. 26, when South Korea’s Korea Institute of Ocean Science and Technology deployed its research vessel RV Onnuri to examine the structure in the Provisional Measures Zone, or PMZ – a contested area where the exclusive economic zones of both nations overlap.

South Korean intelligence had earlier detected China’s construction of a mobile steel structure measuring more than 50 meters in both height and diameter in the waterway, also known as the North Sea

As the RV Onnuri approached, four Chinese personnel in two rubber boats intercepted it, preventing South Korean researchers from deploying inspection equipment, officials from the South’s foreign ministry told media.

Although the South Korean vessel said its investigation was legitimate, the Chinese side said the structure was an aquafarm and asked the Korean vessel to leave.

In response, South Korea’s coast guard dispatched patrol ships, resulting in a standoff with Chinese maritime authorities that lasted for two hours.

Some of the Chinese civilians were reportedly carrying knives but no physical clash occurred.

“We have delivered our firm position to China regarding the reported incident,” South Korea’s foreign ministry spokesperson Lee Jae-woong said in a press briefing on Tuesday.

“We are actively working with related government agencies to ensure the legitimate maritime rights and interests in the Yellow Sea.”

China has neither declined nor acknowledged the reports.

Such confrontations are rare between China and U.S. ally South Korea, which have built up extensive business relations despite China’s support for South Korea’s main rival, North Korea.

In a response to a question about the reported dispute, Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said that she was “not familiar with the specifics” but added that the situation in the Yellow Sea was “stable.”

“Regarding the maritime disputes between the two sides, China and the ROK maintain sound communication through the dialogue and cooperation mechanism of maritime affairs, and the maritime law enforcement authorities of the two countries also have smooth communication channels,” said Mao, referring to South Korea by its official name, the Republic of Korea.

​South Korea and China signed a China-ROK Fishery Agreement in August 2000, which came into effect in June 2001. The agreement established a PMZ in the Yellow Sea, allowing fishing vessels from both countries to operate within the zone and the joint management of marine resources.

The agreement prohibits any activity beyond navigation and fishing in the PMZ.​

Despite the agreement, China has installed several large steel structures in the zone, including two in April and May of last year, and another this year, raising concerns in South Korea over potential territorial disputes.

China has insisted that the structures are for aquaculture purposes.

A state bill introduced during this year’s legislative session seeks to punish distribution of AI-generated sexually explicit images of children with up to 15 years in prison, whether or not the child exists.

Senate Bill 9 comes on the heels of similar bills in legislatures across the country to combat a crime getting attention: AI-created child pornography. Laws specifically aimed at curbing AI child deepfakes sailed through legislatures, including most recently in California and Tennessee. In Georgia, because the bill has bipartisan support, it is expected to pass. The legislation passed Wednesday without dissent out of the House Technology and Infrastructure Innovation Committee to the House Rules Committee.

Sen. Emanuel Jones, D-Decatur, who co-sponsored the bill, said the legislation was created to prevent and deter AI crime being seen across the country.

Within weeks, the issue had come home to Georgia with the arrest of Ronald Richardson, a Pepsi vendor, who took advantage of his access to Gilmer County High School so he could refill soda machines to take photos of girls he encountered, authorities say. He convinced other girls to share with him photos and videos of themselves, Gilmer County sheriff’s officials said. What the girls did not know is that he would allegedly use AI to convert their photos to child pornography that he circulated via the internet. Richardson was charged in January with multiple counts of sexual exploitation for possessing child pornography.

Richardson’s arrest is believed to be the first Georgia case of AI-created child pornography. The arrest confirms for Jones that a new law is needed specifically for this type of activity. “There’s already been one case and it’s just a matter of time before others. We need to get ahead of it,” he said.

In December, one of the girls reported to the school’s resource officer that Richardson had asked her for videos.

Parents of eight alleged female victims filed a lawsuit against Richardson and Pepsi on behalf of their children, who ranged from ages 12 to 17 at the time they say they were victimized.

The investigation began after a student told the school resource officer that she would talk regularly to Richardson when he was at the school and had done so for approximately a year. Richardson had often given her free soft drinks, but this was the first time she had been asked to send him pictures, according to the Gilmer County Sheriff’s incident report.

Gilmer County High School demanded that Pepsi investigate and remove Richardson in September when students reported Richardson taking pictures of them as they walked past him loading the vending machines. Though temporarily removed, Richardson was reinstated to his route and serving the high school because Pepsi was “having difficulty finding other drivers in the area,” according to the lawsuit.

After being reported again in December, Richardson was fired from the company and is currently in jail on multiple counts of sexual exploitation. He was not employed by the district but was given an access badge to freely enter the high school and middle school. Gilmer County Charter Schools Superintendent H. Brian Ridley declined to comment beyond the district’s Jan. 29 news release, which pledged to cooperate with police.

Gilmer County Sheriff Stacy Nicholson said there were many minors who were victims in the case.

“All of the sexually explicit (nude) photographs of the minor children that Richardson is alleged to have possessed are actually normal snapshots which he captured from various social media pages and then altered (or had altered) using AI to make the images appear nude,” said Nicholson.

Richardson was denied bail. The case was referred to the DeKalb County District Attorney’s Office, which agreed to serve as the prosecuting office on Feb. 5.

Sen. John Albers, R-Roswell, chaired the Senate Study Committee on Artificial Intelligence and also co-sponsored SB 9.

“SB 9 is designed to modernize and strengthen the legal provisions concerning obscenity and the use of emerging technologies in criminal activities, thereby offering better protection to the citizens of Georgia from evolving threats and inappropriate materials,” Albers said in a statement to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

At the federal level, legislators are also attempting to curb the issue of AI child pornography. The U.S. Senate unanimously passed the Take It Down Act on Feb. 13, which would criminalize “revenge porn,” the distribution of nonconsensual sexually explicit images and videos to humiliate or retaliate against a victim. The act would also require technology companies to take down nonconsensual images within 48 hours of notice from a victim. The bill is co-sponsored by Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn. First lady Melania Trump recently appeared at a Capitol Hill roundtable and urged lawmakers to pass the bill.

Thomas Kadri, an assistant professor at the University of Georgia School of Law, said there are currently very few, if any, legal requirements for platforms to remove sexual deepfakes or ways for users to ask for their removal.

Beyond addressing the issue criminally, Kadri said, there is also potential for states like Georgia to create laws around civil liability such as giving victims the right to sue their perpetrators for AI deepfake creation and distribution.

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© 2025 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

The Trump administration’s crackdown on immigration has led to a string of concerned reports from principals and parents to Chicago Public Schools officials, according to a review of internal communication from district security personnel.

On Jan. 24, a mistaken CPS report of two U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers at Hamline Elementary School on the South Side spurred nationwide panic. The two officers were later confirmed to be Secret Service, not ICE — both under the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. A security video showed the agents approached the school in a relatively benign manner, despite high levels of fear from that day.

A look at emails from district officials in the weeks since the mistaken ICE report demonstrates that both panic and misinformation around ICE in schools under Trump has continued since Hamline. The emails were mostly sent by officials at the CPS’ Student Safety Center, the district’s 24/7 command center for safety communications and were obtained by the Tribune through a Freedom of Information Act request.

They show that there were multiple other sightings of ICE vehicles outside schools, some confirmed and some dismissed. And though not always found true, experts say reports of ICE activity can have serious effects at the classroom level.

“Something like this happens in the community and everyone is on edge,” said Patricia Gandara, an education professor and co-director of the Civil Rights Project at the University of California, Los Angeles.

“The teachers in the classroom are under enormous stress, because they’re trying to teach a class, they’re trying to get the kids ready to take their exams … (But) kids may be crying. They’ve got their heads down. They can’t cooperate.”

According to an ICE spokesperson, the agency makes case-by-case determinations about whether, where and when to conduct an immigration enforcement action at or near a school. ICE focuses on targeting public safety threats, the spokesperson said.

ICE agents are not allowed into schools unless they have a criminal warrant, according to CPS rules. The district said it has provided detailed guidance to principals about how to handle interactions with ICE, and how to protect students who may have a parent or guardian who has been detained by ICE during the school day.

Previously, DHS maintained guidance that restricted immigration enforcement in sensitive locations like schools health care centers and churches. The week after being sworn into office, Trump changed that longstanding precedent, as part of his plans to implement the largest mass deportation operation in United States history.

And though there is a great deal of uncertainty about how swiftly ICE will be able to carry out its ambitious goals for deportations set under Trump, there exists a pervasive fear that ICE will arrest parents around schools. It’s happened a few times, according to the internal emails.

A Jan. 29 message from Jorge Santillan, CPS Student Safety Center coordinator, to several top district officials cited a principal’s report of ICE detaining a person near Eberhart Elementary School in the 14th Ward on the Southwest Side.

The alderman of that ward, Jeylu Gutierrez, saw three ICE trucks in the area detaining that person, Santillan writes in the email.

Gutierrez said in an interview with the Tribune she tries to minimize misinformation of ICE reports in her community that create more chaos and instability for the undocumented community.

“Our constituents are afraid,” she said. “They’re asking neighbors who are citizens or permanent residents to drop off their kids to school.”

Many of the reports are unfounded, the emails show. The day before the alleged arrest in the 14th Ward, the principal of Pulaski International School in Bucktown reported a district bus driver called to say they “would be late (to school) due to ICE detaining the bus,” according to an email from Ben Middleton, a CPS Student Safety Center coordinator to two of the district’s top transportation officials.

Though the driver “alleged ICE had broken windows on her bus while looking for an unspecified student, and she had to return to the depot to get another bus,” the report was later dismissed as untrue, Middleton wrote.

Principals across the city reported possible ICE sightings both at drop-off and dismissal, emails show, but on at least three occasions, the vehicles in question left the premises without incident. In one case, a parent was stopped by ICE on the way to school without being detained.

Still, the effects on students and staff are immeasurable, UCLA’s Gandara said.

Under the first Trump administration, she worked on a study about the effect of the president’s immigration enforcement policy on schools across the country. Researchers used survey data completed by over 3,600 educators, and found that 80% said their students were affected by rumors and concerns. Teachers, Gandara said, overwhelmingly felt powerless.

Those trends popped up in several incidents in CPS schools, gleaned through the emails.

On Jan. 24, the same day as the Hamline Elementary ICE snafu, LaDonna Williams, the principal of Hefferan Elementary School in Garfield Park reached out to the CPS Student Safety Center regarding emails she’d received protesting videos a Heffernan teacher had posted of herself on TikTok.

“You don’t think I already have a plan? And a backup plan?” the teacher said in a video, picked up by the far-right X (formerly Twitter) account Libs Of Chicago. “There’s no way you’re touching one of my students.”

According to the email from a CPS School Safety Center case coordinator, the principal sent the text of the email she received: It describes the videos as “unhinged rants.” Then it provides a warning that “if this dangerous individual is not dealt with appropriately, this will be escalated to (the) appropriate department.”

On Feb. 3, at Hale Elementary on the Southwest Side, a dean notified a CPS School Safety Center case coordinator in an email about a student who brought two Nerf guns “to protect everyone in the school from ICE.” Students were worried because all they’d heard was the word gun, according to the email, and parents were made aware.

On Feb. 26, CPS confirmed to the Tribune that the parent of a student was detained outside of a different elementary school in Gage Park.

ICE later specified it was someone with “criminal convictions for drug trafficking, gang loitering and damage to property who was previously removed from the U.S. to his home country in 2005 and 2013.”

Karina Martinez, communications coordinator for Brighton Park Neighborhood Council, said the school was supportive of the family who was affected by the arrest, but that it affected the entire community. Videos of law enforcement in the area spread through social media channels, she said.

“Many of them are plain clothes, and that makes it a little bit of a tricky situation,” she said.

Martinez emphasized vigilance and encouraged reporting suspicious activities to CPS.

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© 2025 Chicago Tribune.

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Between 200,000 and 250,000 Russian soldiers have died in the war unleashed by Russia against Ukraine and ongoing since February 24, 2022. This is the estimate of British intelligence, which believes that the Russian army has recorded 900,000 casualties, including dead and wounded, in clashes with Ukrainian military personnel. This is the worst death toll for Russia since World War II.

British intelligence therefore points out that Russian President Vladimir Putin and his military leadership prioritize achieving objectives over the lives of their soldiers. It is therefore underlined that “Putin and his military leadership recognize a lower value for the lives of those belonging to Russia’s ethnic minorities and those living in the poorest regions”.

For example, British intelligence notes, “Russians living in urban centers such as Moscow and St. Petersburg have contributed disproportionately less to the conflict than their poorer and ethnic minority compatriots.”

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© 2025 GMC S.A.P.A. di G. P. Marra.

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A bomb disposal expert from the UK has been injured in an explosion in Gaza.

The unnamed 51-year-old was wounded at a UN facility in Deir Al-Balah on Wednesday. Four others were injured and a UN worker was killed in the incident.

The Briton, who was working in Gaza as an explosive ordnance disposal expert for the Mines Advisory Group, was treated locally before being moved to a hospital in Israel.

Darren Cormack, the charity’s CEO, told the BBC that the man was conducting an explosive hazards assessment at a UN Office for Project Services facility when the explosion occurred.

“The UN has confirmed that today’s incident did not occur in the course of normal EOD operations and resulted from ordnance being fired at or dropped on the building in which the team was working,” Cormack said.

“It is shocking that a humanitarian facility should be subject to attacks of this nature and that humanitarian workers are being killed and injured in the line of duty.”

Cormack added: “Attacks against humanitarian premises are a breach of international law.”

Health authorities in Gaza said the explosion was a result of Israeli military activity.

Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Oren Marmorstein posted on X: “The circumstances of the incident are being investigated. We emphasize that the initial examination found no connection to IDF (Israel Defense Forces) activity whatsoever.”

Farhan Haq, deputy spokesman for the UN secretary-general, told the BBC: “We are making it clear that all military operations have to be conducted in a way that ensures that all civilians are respected and protected.”

UNOPS chief Jorge Moreira da Silva said the explosion was “not an accident” and described the situation in Gaza as “unconscionable.”

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© 2025 the Arab News

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Russia and Ukraine exchanged mass drone attacks overnight, even as the two countries declared they’re ready to observe a moratorium on strikes against energy infrastructure sought by U.S. President Donald Trump.

Russia sent 171 explosive-laden Shahed drones toward Ukraine, up from 145 and 137 in the previous two days, the Ukrainian Air Force command reported Thursday.

“Russian strikes on Ukraine do not stop, despite their propaganda claims,” President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a statement on social media platform X. “With each such launch, the Russians expose to the world their true attitude towards peace.”

While air defenses intercepted most of the drones, 10 people were hurt and several buildings were damaged in the central city of Kropyvnytskyi, Ukraine’s State Emergency Service said on Telegram.

Russia downed 132 Ukrainian drones over six regions of the country, the Defense Ministry in Moscow said on Telegram. They included 54 drones that targeted the Saratov region and the Engels military base that the local governor described as the largest attack of the war so far.

The mutual drone assaults continued after the leaders of Ukraine and Russia said they’re willing to abide by a 30-day truce preventing strikes on each other’s power infrastructure. Russian President Vladimir Putin spurned Trump’s bid for a 30-day full ceasefire in his war on Ukraine during a phone call on Tuesday.

Zelenskyy agreed to a mutual halt to strikes on energy assets after a call with Trump the next day, calling it an initial step to ending the war started by Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022. The Ukrainian leader has repeatedly said U.S. involvement is needed to monitor the ceasefire effectively.

The latest attacks occurred just hours after Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff said in an interview with Bloomberg Television that the partial truce on strikes against energy had come into effect, hailing it as a breakthrough that could end Moscow’s global isolation.

Russia targeted Kropyvnytskyi with 21 drones in the largest such attack on the city since the war began, regional Governor Andriy Raikovych said on Telegram. The city’s rail infrastructure was damaged, disrupting train services, Ukrainian Railways said on Telegram.

“That’s what Putin’s ceasefire looks like,” Andriy Yermak, the Ukrainian president’s top aide, said on Telegram.

The Engels military airbase has been a frequent target for Ukraine as it seeks to limit Russia’s ability to use aircraft to carry out attacks. The overnight strike by Ukrainian drones resulted in a fire and triggered explosions of ammunition stored at the site, the Ukrainian General Staff said on X.

The governor of Russia’s Saratov region said that at least two people had been hurt and about 30 buildings damaged during a drone attack. A fire at the airfield triggered evacuation of nearby residents, Roman Busargin said on Telegram.

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© 2025 Bloomberg L.P.

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