Russia launches deadly drone attack on Ukraine after Vladimir Putin vows revenge
Two women and a one-year-old child are among the fatalities after a Russian drone strike in Ukraine at the back of Kyiv’s stunning attack on Vladimir Putin’s air bases.
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Russian drone strikes killed five people and wounded six others in the northern Ukrainian city of Pryluky, a Ukrainian official said.
“Five people have been reported dead, including two women and a one-year-old child, who were found under the rubble,” Vyacheslav Chaus, a Chernigiv administration official, said on Telegram on Thursday, adding six people were wounded and hospitalised.
It comes after Vladimir Putin vowed to take revenge against Ukraine for its devastating attack on Russia’s bombing fleet.
Donald Trump revealed he had a 75-minute phone call with the Russian president that was “good” but would not lead to immediate peace between Moscow and Kyiv.
Mr Trump said the pair spoke about the attack by Ukraine which has been described as Russia’s Pearl Harbour moment.
“President Putin did say, and very strongly, that he will have to respond to the recent attack on the airfields,” Mr Trump said.
“We also discussed Iran, and the fact that time is running out on Iran’s decision pertaining to nuclear weapons, which must be made quickly.”
Mr Trump said both he and Mr Putin agreed Iran should not have nuclear weapons.
“President Putin suggested that he will participate in the discussions with Iran and that he could, perhaps, be helpful in getting this brought to a rapid conclusion,” the US President wrote.
“It is my opinion that Iran has been slow walking their decision on this very important matter, and we will need a definitive answer in a very short period of time.”
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky urged allies not to show “weakness” to Mr Putin following his threat of retaliation.
“If the world reacts weakly to Putin’s threats, he sees that as a willingness to turn a blind eye to his actions,” Mr Zelensky said in an online post.
“When he feels neither strength nor pressure, but weakness, he commits yet more crimes.”
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N KOREA VOWS ‘UNCONDITIONAL SUPPORT’ FOR UKRAINE
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un vowed to “unconditionally support” Russia in its war in Ukraine and said he expected Moscow to emerge victorious, Pyongyang’s state media said on Thursday.
North Korea has become one of Moscow’s main allies during its more than three-year Ukraine offensive, sending thousands of troops and container-loads of weapons to help the Kremlin oust Ukrainian forces from Russia’s Kursk border region.
Meeting top Russian security official Sergei Shoigu on Wednesday, Kim said that Pyongyang would “unconditionally support the stand of Russia and its foreign policies in all the crucial international political issues including the Ukrainian issue”, the Korean Central News Agency reported.
Kim “expressed expectation and conviction that Russia would, as ever, surely win victory in the sacred cause of justice”, KCNA said.
The two sides agreed to “continue to dynamically expand” relations, the state news agency reported.
Russia and North Korea signed a sweeping military deal last year, including a mutual defence clause, during a rare visit by Russian leader Vladimir Putin to the nuclear-armed North.
Shoigu hailed the deal as “fully meeting the interests of both countries” during a visit in March.
PUTIN AND POPE LEO IN FIRST PHONE CALL
Vladimir Putin discussed the war in Ukraine with Pope Leo in a telephone call on Wednesday, with the Kremlin claiming the Russian president wanted peace through diplomacy. Mr Putin however also claimed “the regime in Kyiv is betting on an escalation of the conflict and carrying out of acts of sabotage against civil infrastructure on Russian territory”, it said in a statement.
In the phone call, Mr Putin “reaffirmed his interest in bringing about peace by political and diplomatic means”, the Kremlin said, describing the call as “constructive”.
He did so “underlining that in order to come to a definitive, just and comprehensive settlement to the crisis, it was necessary to eliminate the deep-seated causes”.
The afternoon phone call was the first between the US-born pope and Mr Putin since Leo became head of the world’s Catholics last month.
After taking office, the pontiff offered to mediate between leaders of countries at war – an offer that Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni later said meant hosting Ukraine peace talks at the Vatican.
But Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov cast doubt on the idea, saying “it would be a bit inelegant for Orthodox countries to discuss (the conflict), on Catholic ground”.
On Wednesday, Mr Putin thanked Leo for “his willingness to contribute to a settlement” of the conflict, the Kremlin said.
UKRAINE BLASTS VITAL RUSSIA BRIDGE TO PIECES
Ukraine has carried out a devastating strike on the only bridge connecting Russia and the occupied province of Crimea, severing the vital supply line for President Vladimir Putin’s forces, Ukraine’s security service announced.
Dramatic video shows the piers of the Crimean Bridge, also known as the Kerch Bridge, exploding on Tuesday morning after Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) agents mined it following a months long operation.
Ukrainian special forces used more than a tonne of explosives, which “severely damaged” the underwater pillars supporting the road and rail crossing, the SBU wrote on Telegram alongside the video.
This is the third attack on the Kerch Bridge by Ukrainian forces since the start of the full-scale war in February 2022.
Russian officials did not immediately respond to Ukraine’s claims about the attack, but all traffic on the bridge was suspended on Tuesday morning, the operator for the crossing announced on its official Telegram account.
The reported strike comes just two days after the SBU blindsided Russia with a devastating series of drone strikes on its air bases, reportedly wiping out 34 per cent of the country’s strategic nuclear bombers and causing an estimated $11 billion of damage.
RUSSIA SAYS NO QUICK BREAKTHROUGH IN TALKS
Russia said it was wrong to expect a quick breakthrough in Ukraine talks, a day after Moscow rejected Kyiv’s call for an unconditional ceasefire at negotiations in Istanbul.
The sides agreed on a large-scale swap of captured soldiers and exchanged their road maps to peace, or so-called “memorandums”, at the discussions, which lasted less than two hours.
“The settlement issue is extremely complex and involves a large number of nuances,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Tuesday.
“It would be wrong to expect immediate solutions and breakthroughs,” he added.
Moscow demanded Ukraine pull its troops out of four eastern and southern regions that Moscow claims to have annexed as a precondition to pausing its offensive, according to the document handed to the Ukrainians that was published by Russian state media.
Kyiv had pressed for a full and unconditional ceasefire. Russia instead offered a partial truce of two to three days in some areas of the frontline, its top negotiator said after the talks.
Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andriy Sybiga on Tuesday denounced Russia for presenting “old ultimatums that do not move the situation any closer to true peace” and for having “so far rejected any meaningful formats for a ceasefire”.
Peskov earlier also dismissed the idea of a summit between the presidents of Russia, Ukraine and the United States.
“In the near future, it is unlikely,” Peskov told reporters.
RUSSIA ‘DELIBERATELY’ TARGETING CIVILIANS
Mr Zelensky accused Russia of “deliberately” targeting civilians in a rocket attack on the city of Sumy, some 30km from the Russian border, that killed four people.
Russian troops have accelerated their advance, seeking to establish what Mr Putin called a “buffer zone” inside Ukraine’s northeastern Sumy region.
President Zelensky posted a video from the emergency services showing destroyed cars and the body of one victim lying on the road.
The attack “says everything one needs to know about Russia’s so-called ‘desire’ to end this war”, he added, calling for “decisive actions” from the United States and Europe to push Russia into a ceasefire.
“Every day, Russia gives new reasons for tougher sanctions and stronger support for our defence,” he said.
A seven-year-old girl was among 20 wounded, with doctors “fighting for her life”, Sumy’s Acting Mayor Artem Kobzar said.
Three people were also killed in a rocket attack in the northeastern Kharkiv region.
Moscow’s army said it had captured the village of Andriivka in the Sumy region, located around 5km from the Russian border.
Mr Zelensky said last week that Russia was massing some 50,000 soldiers for an offensive on the region.
DJ AND EROTIC AUTHOR LINKED TO ’RUSSIA’S PEARL HARBOUR’
Russia has launched a massive manhunt for a former DJ and his wife, an erotic novelist, after they were linked to Ukraine’s stunning “Russian Pearl Harbour” attack on its air bases, the New York Post reported.
Ukraine’s surprise attack — dubbed Operation Spider Web — managed to wipe out or damage dozens of the Kremlin’s nuclear bombers and other aircraft after explosives-laden drones were stashed in a slew of trucks that were driven onto the air bases.
Russia is hunting Artem Timofeev, a 37-year-old former Ukrainian DJ who they say owns the truck company.
His 34-year-old wife, Ekaterina “Katya” Timofeeva — who moonlights as an erotic writer — is believed to have aided him, Russian media outlets reported.
“Artem is now wanted in connection with a terrorist attack in Irkutsk region,” Russian online news source Readovka reported.
“Four lorries were registered in his name, and one of them was the source of the drones that launched (in an attack on a Russian air base).”
His wife, who penned a book titled I Became Bad While You Loved Me, hasn’t been online in two weeks and has since scrubbed her usually active social media accounts, according to reports.
Timofeev was apparently last seen at the couple’s apartment in the Russian city of Chelyabinsk roughly a week ago.
The couple reportedly grew up in Ukraine but later moved to Russia, though it wasn’t clear when.
Timofeev is said to have set up his trucking business in December last year.
Prior to relocating, Timofeev reportedly co-owned a clothing brand and was a DJ in Kyiv.
The couple is believed to have fled in the wake of the latest attacks, local media reported.
– with the New York Post and AFP
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