The assault began around 2 a.m. on May 11, with Russian forces deploying 108 Shahed-type attack drones and decoy UAVs from multiple directions, Ukraine’s Air Force said.
"Think of the hundreds of thousands of lives that will be saved as this never ending 'bloodbath' hopefully comes to an end... I will continue to work with both sides to make sure that it happens."
U.S. State Department Spokesperson Tammy Bruce called for "concrete proposals from both sides" in order for Washington to "move forward" in peace negotiations.
"If they speak to each other in Russian, he doesn't know what they are saying," one Western official told NBC News. Michael McFaul, former U.S. ambassador to Russia, called Witkoff's approach "a very bad idea."
Tougher sanctions "should be applied to (Russia's) banking and energy sectors, targeting fossil fuels, oil, and the shadow fleet," the leaders of Ukraine, the U.K., France, Germany, and Poland said in a joint statement.
"Russia is ready for negotiations without any preconditions," Putin claimed in an address marking the end of the three-day Victory Day ceasefire. He invited Ukraine to begin talks in Istanbul on May 15.
While serving as a bishop in Peru, Robert Prevost, now Pope Leo XIV, called the full-scale war "a true invasion, imperialist in nature, where Russia seeks to conquer territory for reasons of power."
Speaking to CNN on May 10, Peskov commented on the latest ceasefire proposal from Ukraine and Europe, responding that Russia needs to "think about" it, but is "resistant" to pressure.
Speaking at a press conference in Kyiv on May 10, President Volodymyr Zelensky rebuked the idea of a demilitarized zone in the war and emphasized the importance of first securing a ceasefire.
Illustrative image of a tanker transiting through the Great Belt of Denmark off the coast of Agerso, Denmark, on Thursday, Aug. 15. 2024. (Carsten Snejbjerg/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock has raised concerns about Russia’s so-called "shadow fleet" following recent damage to undersea cables across Europe.
"Almost every month, ships are currently damaging important undersea cables in the Baltic Sea," Baerbock told Germany’s Funke media group on Dec. 28. She described suspicious activities by ship crews, including dropping anchors and dragging them along the seabed for kilometers without explanation.
"Ship crews lower anchors into the water, drag them for kilometers across the seabed for no apparent reason, and then lose them when they pull them up," she said.
Baerbock expressed doubt that the string of incidents over recent months could be coincidental. "This is an urgent wake-up call for all of us. In a digitalized world, undersea cables are the communication arteries that hold our world together," she stressed, urging stronger sanctions against Russia and increased investment in national security.
Earlier this week, Finland reported damage to the Estlink 2 undersea power cable connecting Finland and Estonia. Finnish authorities suspect sabotage and detained the oil tanker Eagle S, flagged under the Cook Islands. The European Union has linked the vessel to Russia’s so-called "shadow fleet."
The shadow fleet refers to a network of ships allegedly used by Russia to bypass sanctions, such as those restricting oil sales. "It is used by Russia to finance its illegal war of aggression in Ukraine," Baerbock explained. As of mid-December, over 50 ships from this fleet have faced EU sanctions.
In a related event last month, two fiber-optic cables were severed in the Baltic Sea. Swedish investigators boarded a Chinese vessel as part of their probe into possible sabotage.
Olena Goncharova is the Head of North America desk at The Kyiv Independent, where she has previously worked as a development manager and Canadian correspondent. She first joined the Kyiv Post, Ukraine's oldest English-language newspaper, as a staff writer in January 2012 and became the newspaper’s Canadian correspondent in June 2018. She is based in Edmonton, Alberta. Olena has a master’s degree in publishing and editing from the Institute of Journalism in Taras Shevchenko National University in Kyiv. Olena was a 2016 Alfred Friendly Press Partners fellow who worked for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette for six months. The program is administered by the University of Missouri School of Journalism in Columbia.
Dmytro Basmat
