Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky said he had approved a 40-day offensive campaign to “influence” Russia to end the war.
Zelensky said he made the decision after consulting the head of the Ukrainian security service. It is unclear whether this offensive has begun yet.
He also confirmed that Kyiv's forces had attacked two more Russian oil refineries in Ufa, 1,500km from the frontline, and an oil depot in the Krasnodar region, 300km from Ukraine, in the latest blow to the rival's infrastructure.
Meanwhile, France claimed on Thursday that its forces had intercepted a Russian ‘shadow fleet’ oil tanker, just days after the British Royal Marines stormed a ship in the English Channel.
French president Emmanuel Macron said his navy intercepted the tanker as it transited near the coast of Sicily, accusing Russia of using the ship to skirt Western sanctions.
“This new action against the shadow fleet, conducted days after a similar operation by Britain, shows Europeans' determination," he said, adding that the interception took place on Tuesday.
Key Points
- Zelensky says he approved 40-day campaign to 'influence' Russia to end the war
- Ukrainian air defence units repel Russian missile attack on Kyiv
- Drones hit industrial facility in Russia's Tula, governor says
- Secret group chat between Zelensky and European leaders ‘discussed how to deal with Trump’
- Moscow library places 18,000 'Russophobic' books from Ukraine in special archive
- Nato chief says billions in new defence contracts to be announced in message to Putin
Kazakhstan cuts gas production after Ukraine attacks on Russian plant
10:06 , Alex Croft
Kazakhstan has cut gas production at its Karachaganak gas field after Ukraine's drone attack this week on the Orenburg gas processing plant in Russia, energy minister Erlan Akkenzhenov told reporters on Friday.
Kyiv has been scaling up its attacks on Russian energy infrastructure, a move which is inflicting significant damage on its output in some areas.
European Commission extends protection for Ukrainian refugees
09:45 , Alex Croft
The European Commission has on Friday proposed to extend temporary protection for Ukrainians who have sought refuge in the European Union until March 2028.
The move underlines the need for flexibility regarding Ukrainian refugees, as Russia's war in Ukraine drags on in its fifth year.
The proposal would limit access to temporary protection for newly arriving men who are not authorised by Ukrainian authorities to leave Ukraine because of their military obligations.
Putin says Russia is ready for peace talks with Ukraine - ICYMI
09:24 , Alex Croft
Analysis | Putin is asking for peace talks. It’s time to kick him while he’s down
09:02 , Alex Croft
Russia is losing its war against Ukraine. Proof of this has come from Vladimir Putin himself, who has issued a desperate call for a return to peace talks while his oil refineries burn and his bridges to occupied territory are pounded by Kyiv’s missiles.
Russia’s president has been badly rattled; his airports are closed, his military logistics chain has dangerously snapped, and public support is waning for a war he started, and for which Russia’s national media can no longer generate artificial enthusiasm.
His minions have been whining that an agreement they believe was struck with Donald Trump at the Anchorage summit with Putin last year – giving Moscow colonial ownership of 20 per cent of Ukraine – has been abandoned by the US president as he prepares to meet Nato’s secretary general Mark Rutte.
Trump likes to back a winner. So far he has backed Russia, which invaded a democratic European nation at full scale in February 2022.
World affairs editor Sam Kiley writes.
Russia attacks Ukraine with 7 ballistic missiles and 189 drones
08:40 , Alex Croft
Russia has attacked Ukraine with seven ballistic missiles and 189 drones overnight, the Ukrainian Air Force has said.
Three of the missiles and 174 drones were shot down, it added.
The air attack was launched from Russia’s Bryansk and Kursk regions, targeting largely the Kyiv and Poltava regions of Ukraine.
"As of 09:00, air defence had shot down or jammed 177 aerial assets – three Iskander-M ballistic missiles and 174 enemy UAVs, including Shahed, Gerbera and Italmas drones, as well as drones of other types, over the north, south, centre and east of the country,” the Air Force said.
Strikes were recorded by four ballistic missiles and 11 attack drones at 12 locations.
Security risks on Nato's eastern flank may escalate soon, says Poland's Tusk
08:06 , Arpan Rai
The security situation on Nato's eastern flank is unstable and risks could escalate soon, Polish prime minister Donald Tusk said on Thursday after meeting leaders from the region.
“We also share, without exception, the opinion that the situation is very unstable and various types of escalation can be expected in the coming weeks and months," Tusk told a news conference.
Ukraine says it expects to sign over €10bn in deals at Poland forum
08:03 , Arpan Rai
Ukraine expects to sign deals worth more than €10bn (£8.6bn) over the next two days at a reconstruction conference in Poland, its prime minister said yesterday, as the European Union transferred the first tranche of a big loan to Kyiv.
The announcement at the start of the Ukraine Recovery Conference in the Baltic port city of Gdansk struck a positive tone for an event that had looked likely to be overshadowed by a row between Warsaw and Kyiv over the Second World War-era massacres.
Ukrainian prime minister Yulia Svyrydenko said Kyiv expected to sign more than 160 agreements at the conference, taking place after more than four years of war following Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
"The challenges facing our continent are existential... We're forced to innovate to survive, and this has become our superpower," she said.
“So Ukraine empowers European defence. Ukraine empowers energy resilience." She added that on the sidelines of the URC, Ukraine signed a $3.39bn agreement with the World Bank under the First Growth and Jobs Development Policy Operation (DPO).
Zelensky says he approved 40-day campaign to 'influence' Russia to end the war
07:56 , Arpan Rai
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky said on Thursday, after consulting the head of the country's security service on strikes against Russian targets, that he had approved a 40-day campaign to 'influence' Russia to end the war against Kyiv.
“I approved a 40-day operation by the Service to influence the aggressor state in order to press for an end to the war," Zelensky wrote on Telegram.
Ukraine has for months engaged in waves of medium-range and long-range strikes on targets in Russia or Russian-held areas, mainly focused on the oil industry.
EU investigates secret group chat between Zelensky and European leaders that ‘discussed how to deal with Trump’
07:28 , Arpan Rai
The EU Commission is being investigated over a secret group chat involving Ursula von der Leyen, Volodymyr Zelensky and several European leaders that discussed how to deal with Donald Trump, according to reports.
The group is said to have included UK prime minister Sir Keir Starmer, French president Emmanuel Macron, German chancellor Friedrich Merz and Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni.
But the contents of the chat have remained private, after the commission rejected calls from a media company to provide access to the correspondence.
EU watchdog investigates secret group chat with Zelensky and European leaders
Lukashenko says he warned Ukraine not to drag Belarus into war
07:00 , Arpan Rai
Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko said on Thursday he had warned Ukraine, against a background of rising tensions, not to try to drag his country into war.
"I told them bluntly: 'Guys, tell your president: if he thinks he can talk to us like that — and drag us into a war to boot — then he needs to understand that the nature of the war would change instantly,'" Lukashenko said, adding that Belarus had no desire to fight Ukrainians.
"We received a reply: the president and his team understand this. So, let's reach an agreement, guys. We need to reach a substantive agreement."
There was no immediate comment from Kyiv about Lukashenko's remarks.
Nato deputy commander says member states should reaffirm support for Ukraine
06:48 , Arpan Rai
Nato's deputy commander told The Associated Press that he wants a summit in Turkey to spur member countries to spend more on defence, reaffirm support for Ukraine and underline the unity of the alliance.
Air Chief Marshal Sir John Stringer, Nato’s deputy supreme allied commander in Europe, spoke to AP in London less than two weeks before the crucial Ankara summit on 7-8 July tests the cohesion of the 77-year-old alliance.
Summits are “highly political events and they are a demonstration of any organisation’s unity,” said Stringer, a senior British air force officer.
It would be strange if over decades of Nato expanding there weren't moments of turbulence, he said.
“Are we in one of those moments at the moment? Yes, we are,” Stringer said in an interview at a military conference in London.
Ukrainian air defence units repel Russian missile attack on Kyiv
06:06 , Arpan Rai
Ukrainian air defence units repelled a Russian missile attack on Thursday evening on Kyiv, local officials said, noting that debris had landed in at least one district.
No injuries were reported.
A Reuters witness saw at least one Russian missile being downed. Tymur Tkachenko, head of the capital's military administration, wrote on Telegram that air defences had "worked on enemy missiles".
Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko said debris had fallen in an open area in the suburban Darnitskyi district and set fire to a storage area.
President Volodymyr Zelensky last week warned of impending large attacks on Kyiv and other cities.
Zelensky says he approved 40-day campaign to 'influence' Russia to end the war
05:42 , Arpan Rai
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky said on Thursday, after consulting the head of the country's security service on strikes against Russian targets, that he had approved a 40-day campaign to 'influence' Russia to end the war against Kyiv.
“I approved a 40-day operation by the Service to influence the aggressor state in order to press for an end to the war," Zelensky wrote on Telegram.
Ukraine has for months engaged in waves of medium-range and long-range strikes on targets in Russia or Russian-held areas, mainly focused on the oil industry.
Watch: Secret group chat between Zelensky and European leaders ‘discussed how to deal with Trump’
05:38 , Arpan Rai
Moscow library places 18,000 'Russophobic' books from Ukraine in special archive
04:56 , Arpan Rai
A vast state library in Moscow has so far taken 18,000 "Russophobic" books from Russian-controlled areas of Ukraine and placed them in a special repository, its director said.
Vadim Duda, head of the Russian State Library, said the books had been removed from libraries in areas captured by Russia in the eastern Donbas region and other parts of Ukraine, and were being stored for "scholarly and research purposes".
Duda, posting on Telegram, said the books placed in the special archive contained "overtly nationalist and Russophobic ideas that grossly distort our shared history". He said the collection had been started in 2024 on orders from the Russian culture ministry.
"This is not an act of destruction, but an act of preservation... for future researchers and historians, enabling them to study not only the facts but also the ways in which dangerous ideological narratives were created and disseminated," he said.
Ukraine accuses Russia of trying to eradicate its culture and identity in the war that began in the Donbas in 2014 and exploded into Europe's deadliest conflict since the Second World War after Moscow staged a full-scale invasion in February 2022.
Nato chief says billions in new defence contracts to be announced in message to Putin
04:40 , Arpan Rai
Nato allies will announce tens of billions of dollars in defence-related deals at a summit next month in Turkey, and will also underscore their commitment to defence spending goals and reaffirm their support for Ukraine, Nato chief Mark Rutte said on Thursday.
The gathering, he said, would send a strong message to Russian president Vladimir Putin that the 32-member alliance is ready to respond to any "silly move against us."
In comments addressed directly to the Russian leader, Rutte said Putin "is not afraid of commitments, he is afraid of (us) implementing commitments, and that's exactly what we are doing, Vladimir. We will defend ourselves."
Rutte spoke at the Atlantic Council policy institute on the final day of a visit to Washington in advance of the summit in Ankara.
The summit will underscore that after years of underinvestment, allies are on a "trajectory" to reaching a defense spending goal agreed upon last year of 5 per cent of GDP by 2035, said Rutte.
Allies still need to boost defence industrial production on both sides of the Atlantic, overcome "fragmented national defence industries" in Europe, reduce bureaucracy in Washington and boost innovation, he continued.
The prospects for achieving those goals "are plentiful" and tens of billions of dollars in new defence-related contracts will be announced at the summit, Rutte said.
“The result is not only improved security. We are in the early stages of a defense industrial revolution that will help grow our economies" and support hundreds of thousands of jobs, he said.
Drones hit industrial facility in Russia's Tula, governor says
04:31 , Arpan Rai
A drone attack damaged an industrial facility in Novomoskovsk in Russia's region of Tula, regional governor Dmitry Milyayev said this morning on the Telegram messaging app.
He gave no details about the facility in an area home to several large chemical plants, but added that electricity lines were also damaged and a woman suffered injures in the Shchyokino district of the region.
Russia-controlled areas of Ukraine's Kherson left with no power
03:55 , Arpan Rai
Power was fully or partially cut off across the Russian-held part of Ukraine's Kherson region bordering Crimea, the Russian-installed governor Vladimir Saldo said on Telegram early on Friday.
Saldo did not provide details.
In Sevastopol, the biggest city in Crimea which Russia annexed in 2014, power supply was restricted to avoid overloading the strained network, following Ukraine drone attacks which also triggered a fuel crisis.
The number of trains to Crimea, a popular summer destination for Russian tourists, will be gradually reduced, Crimea's Russia-installed governor Sergei Aksyonov said on Thursday.
Earlier, he ordered the suspension of children's summer camps there. Aksyonov also said one person was killed in a drone attack in Crimea near the crossing into the Russian-held part of the Kherson region on Thursday.
Zelenskyy says Russia is shifting air defenses to Moscow and other key sites after drone strikes
03:00 , Rebecca Whittaker
Russia is moving a significant part of its air defenses to protect a handful of prime targets, including Moscow, as Ukraine’s long-range drones continue to hammer sites deep inside the country, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy says.
Ukraine has in recent months stepped up its aerial campaign against Russian military installations and energy facilities. Its success has caused fuel shortages and disrupted army supply lines, stalling Moscow’s invasion of its neighbor after more than four years of fighting and rattling Russian officials.
Read more here:
Zelenskyy says Russia is shifting air defenses to Moscow and other key sites after drone strikes
Watch: Ukraine releases footage claiming to show destruction of key Crimean rail bridge
02:00 , Rebecca Whittaker
Recap: Russia considering legal options in case Britain sells seized oil
01:00 , Rebecca Whittaker
The Kremlin said on Thursday that it would look into its legal options and employ them to the fullest extent if Russian crude oil from a tanker seized by Britain this month is sold.
The Daily Telegraph newspaper said Britain could hold an auction to sell off the 100,000 tons of Russian crude oil on board the Smyrtos, a suspected Russian shadow fleet tanker intercepted by British forces in the Channel on June 14. The proceeds could be used to fund Ukraine, the paper added.
"There are certainly legal options for responding; they will be examined, and the situation will be analysed," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists on a conference call.
EU investigates secret group chat between Zelensky and European leaders that ‘discussed how to deal with Trump’
Friday 26 June 2026 00:00 , Rebecca Whittaker
The EU Commission is being investigated over a secret group chat involving Ursula von der Leyen, Volodymyr Zelensky and several European leaders that discussed how to deal with Donald Trump, according to reports.
The group is said to have included UK prime minister Sir Keir Starmer, French president Emmanuel Macron, German chancellor Friedrich Merz and Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni.
But the contents of the chat have remained private, after the commission rejected calls from a media company to provide access to the correspondence.
Read more here:
EU watchdog investigates secret group chat with Zelensky and European leaders
Watch: Macron says France intercepted a Russian tanker off coast of Sicily
Thursday 25 June 2026 23:00 , James Reynolds
Analysis: Putin is asking for peace talks. It’s time to kick him while he’s down
Thursday 25 June 2026 22:00 , James Reynolds
Putin is rattled and Trump needs a win – this is the chance for Ukraine and her allies to force the collapse of Russia’s army and push back against its land grab, writes world affairs editor Sam Kiley
Why is Putin asking for Ukraine-Russia peace talks now?
Danish police say no proof Copenhagen airport objects last year were drones
Thursday 25 June 2026 21:00 , James Reynolds
Danish police said on Thursday they had no conclusive evidence to prove that flying objects that disrupted Copenhagen airport last year were drones.
Copenhagen Airport suspended flights on September 22 when flying objects thought to have been drones were observed in its airspace, followed by a string of shutdowns in the following days across Denmark, including at the main base of Denmark's air force fighter jets.
The case was seen as being part of a growing pattern of suspected hybrid warfare targeting critical infrastructure across the Nordic and Baltic region, raising alarm among NATO allies.
Watch: Secret group chat between Zelensky and European leaders ‘discussed how to deal with Trump’
Thursday 25 June 2026 20:00 , James Reynolds
