Ukraine Warupdated 1h ago3 min read
MapUkraine Sends Drones Toward Russia as Finland Detects Strike on Russian Warship in Gulf of Finland
“Ukraine fired almost 1,200 drones at Russian targets overnight in one of its biggest aerial attacks”
“Finland’s military says it detected ‘a strike’ on a Russian warship in the Gulf of Finland”
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Ukraine fired almost 1,200 drones at Russian targets overnight in one of its largest attacks. Attacks coincided with US-led talks in Abu Dhabi to broaden European security.
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Baltic strike during talks
Finland’s military detected “a strike” on a Russian warship in the Gulf of Finland on Wednesday, while Ukraine sent waves of drones towards Russia’s northwestern Leningrad region as Russian and Ukrainian delegations met in Abu Dhabi for their first United States-brokered talks since February. A Finnish Defence Forces spokesperson told the Reuters news agency in an emailed statement that Finland was not under any immediate military threat, and the spokesperson declined to say where or when the incident happened or how it had been detected. Estonian media said the vessel was a small Russian navy ship that later returned to St Petersburg, and the same day drones caused a fire in the Russian port area of Ust-Luga, injuring three workers, regional Governor Aleksandr Drozdenko said.
Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania told citizens to take shelter as drones strayed into their airspace, and NATO scrambled warplanes in response, while Ukraine’s Security Service said it attacked the Buyan-M-class small missile ship, Naro-Fominsk, as part of a special operation, according to Yle. Ukraine’s General Staff said the strike on Ust-Luga damaged five fuel tanks, and it reported on Telegram that “the tank network suffered the most damage.”
Drone barrage and casualties
Russia’s Defense Ministry said it intercepted and destroyed 1,198 Ukrainian aerial drones over around twenty Russian regions from Thursday to Friday, including the Moscow region, as it reported nine deaths. The Russian Defense Ministry said, “During the past night, air defense systems intercepted and destroyed 1,198 Ukrainian aerial drones,” and it added that the interceptions covered “around twenty Russian regions.” In the Volgograd region, regional governor Andreï Botcharov said four people were killed and two injured in strikes on an industrial area that includes a petroleum refinery and a chemical company.
In Ukraine, Ukrainian authorities reported another night of Russian strikes that killed three people and caused substantial damage in several regions, and the French outlet Franceinfo said two people were killed in Odessa and a 17-year-old boy was killed in Zaporijjia. In Kiev, Ukrainian officials said one person was injured in a strike on a hospital that caused a fire, and in Rivne, a kindergarten was hit and six people were injured, according to local authorities.
European security at stake
U.S.-led talks in Abu Dhabi produced no breakthrough beyond an agreement to swap a large number of prisoners, and the Russian state-run TASS news agency said the exchange should happen in two to three weeks.
PBS reported that U.S. and Russian negotiators raised the stakes in talks to stop the fighting by including for discussion wider European security arrangements that have been in place since the end of the Cold War.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said, “Russia wants to talk about questions of European security architecture. We don't need to talk about that. There is one,” referring to the NATO military alliance.
Kaja Kallas told European leaders in Dublin that Europe must insist on a ceasefire before taking the negotiations further, and she warned, “If we start to talk about what Russia is asking regarding the security architecture, we actually walk into the traps that Russia is setting us.”
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he hoped the resumed discussions would focus on measures of truces and de-escalation, and he said, “We have decided to work on all forms of de-escalation, some forms of a truce.”