"According to the participants of the performances, their goal is to remind the civilized world of the barbaric actions of Moscow, which for many years and decades has systematically violated international law," a source in Ukraine’s military intelligence agency (HUR) told the Kyiv Independent.
"I have great hope that an agreement for a ceasefire in Ukraine will be reached this weekend," German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said on May 9, shortly before traveling to Kyiv alongside the leaders of France, Poland, and the U.K.
U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk will arrive in Kyiv early on May 10.
The United States embassy in Kyiv on May 9 issued a warning that Russia could launch "a potentially significant" attack in the coming days, despite Putin's self-declared Victory Day "truce."
The sanctioned oil tankers have transported over $24 billion in cargo since 2024, according to Downing Street. The U.K. has now sanctioned more shadow fleet vessels than any other country.
Washington and its partners are considering additional sanctions if the parties do not observe a ceasefire, with political and technical negotiations between Europe and the U.S. intensifying since last week, Reuters' source said.
The Kyiv Independent’s contributor Ignatius Ivlev-Yorke spent a day with a mobile team from the State Emergency Service in Nikopol in the south of Ukraine as they responded to relentless drone, artillery, and mortar strikes from Russian forces just across the Dnipro River. Nikopol is located across from the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant in the city of Enerhodar.
Two Russian Su-30s in close formation in the sky over Zhukovsky, Russia on July 25, 2021. (Mihail Siergiejevicz/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)
The German and Swedish air forces scrambled NATO jets on Aug. 3 after two Russian jets were detected heading toward Latvian airspace over the Baltic Sea.
The German Air Force reported that the jets from NATO's Baltic air-policing mission identified two Russian Su-30s.
The Russian pilots "behaved uncooperatively but not aggressively," the German Air Force said.
According to the German news outlet Bild, two German Eurofighters and two Swedish planes intercepted the Russian Su-30s.
The Russian jets were involved in a training exercise, but the flight plan had not been communicated beforehand, a German Air Force spokesperson told Bild.
"The transponders were switched off, and the pilots did not respond to radio requests," according to Bild.
NATO aircraft were scrambled 11 times in mid-June to identify and escort Russian aircraft that had violated rules while flying in international airspace, Lithuania's LRT news agency reported.
Most of the Russian aircraft were reportedly flying with no flight plans and had their onboard transponders turned off.
Andrii Kharuk
