The Latest Breaking News from Crimea

Operation ‘severely damaged’ base of Crimean bridge, opened by Putin in 2018, Kyiv’s SBU security service says

Video footage has captured the moment a bridge linking Russia and Crimea is blown up in a huge explosion carried out by Ukraine’s special forces.

Even though neither leader met in the Istanbul summits, Vladimir Putin and Volodymyr Zelensky have met before

Delegations from Ukraine and Russia met for a second time in Istanbul in a month on June 2, 2025. Missing, again, were the country’s two leaders.

Exiled Soviet-era dissident tells the Guardian that for the US to turn its back on the territory would be ‘shameful’

When it comes to the sincerity, or otherwise, of Vladimir Putin’s apparent willingness to talk peace with Ukraine, the Russian leader has given us plenty of hints. He may insist he wants to see a deal done and an end to the killing. But his insistence that any agreement would…

There is one topic on which Kyiv and Moscow will never agree, and yet, for both sides, this point is of the utmost importance — Crimea. Olha Kuryshko, the Ukrainian president’s permanent representative in Crimea, told Euronews that Russia implemented its 2014 techniques on all occupied territories.

Rustem Umerov, who heads Ukraine's delegation at peace talks with Russia on Friday, is a skilled and pragmatic negotiator, hailed by his colleagues as a worker of diplomatic "wonders".

If the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, meet in Istanbul on May 15, territory – and who controls it – will be high on their agenda.

SPECIAL REPORT: World affairs editor Sam Kiley has been covering Ukraine since the Russian invasion of 2014. Here he looks at the current state of the conflict, the likelihood of a lasting ceasefire and what Russian leader Vladimir Putin is planning next

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