A notice about the airspace closure was published on the U.S. Defense Department's NOTAM (Notice to Airmen) website on May 10, as cited by Ukrainian defense news outlet Militarnyi.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov rejected the idea of a 30-day ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine, claiming in an interview with ABC News on May 10 that it would be "an advantage" for Ukraine.
"Our involvement in the war was justifiable, and this belongs to our sovereign rights," North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un said. "I regard this as part of the sacred mission we must execute for our brothers and comrades-in-arms."
"We have a plan B and a plan C. But our focus is plan A, the essence of which is to get everyone's support" for Ukraine's accession, EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said.
"(T)he presence at the Victory Parade of a country that bombs cities, hospitals, and daycares, and which has caused the deaths and injuries of over a million people over three years, is a shame," Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said.
"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.
A mural depicting a mother who holds a baby remains on a wall of a damaged due to hostilities residential building on December 24, 2022, in Bakhmut, Donetsk Oblast, Ukraine. (Serhii Mykhalchuk/Global Images Ukraine via Getty Images)
Ukraine's birth rate continues its downward trend in 2024, as official data shows one newborn per three deaths in the first six months of the year, the Opendatabot service said on Aug. 5.
Some 87,655 children were born in the first half of 2024, while 250,972 citizens died of various causes during the same period, data shows. The numbers are likely incomplete because of Russia's ongoing occupation of Ukrainian territories.
While the low birth rates and high mortality have been a long-standing issue in Ukraine, the demographic crisis has deepened during the Covid-19 pandemic and Russia's full-scale war.
According to data from the Justice Ministry, the most recorded births were in the city of Kyiv (9,695), Lviv Oblast in the west (7,923), and the heavily populated Dnipropetrovsk Oblast (6,962) in the central-eastern part of the country.
The fewest births were recorded in front-line and border oblasts, like Chernihiv (1,904), Sumy (1,798), Zaporizhzhia (1,576), Donetsk (702), and Kherson (221) oblasts. The latter three are under partial occupation by Russia, meaning not all data is available.
Ukraine did not record official data on birth rates in either completely occupied Crimea or almost completely occupied Luhansk Oblast.
Most deaths between January and June 2024 were recorded in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast (26,374), northeastern Kharkiv Oblast (17,999), and southern Odesa Oblast (16,085). All three regions are heavily populated and host some of Ukraine's largest cities, though they also suffer regular Russian attacks.
The data cited by Opendatabot did not distinguish between different causes of death.
The birth rate in 2024 is 1.4 times smaller than during a six-month period in 2021 when 132,595 births were recorded. The number of deaths in the same time span in 2021 was 349,041, though this figure was recorded during the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic.
In 2019, the number of deaths during half a year was 304,330, while the number of births was 149,549.
Emigration and refugees is another key factor deepening Ukraine's demographic crisis. Over 6 million Ukrainians remain abroad after they fled the country as a result of Russia's full-scale war. Around 700,000 more people are expected to leave Ukraine in 2024-2025.
The country's population went from its peak of over 50 million in the early 1990s to over 37 million by January 2024. According to one of the U.N.'s projections, the population could drop to 15.3 million by 2100.
Martin Fornusek is a news editor at the Kyiv Independent. He has previously worked as a news content editor at the media company Newsmatics and is a contributor to Euromaidan Press. He was also volunteering as an editor and translator at the Czech-language version of Ukraïner. Martin studied at Masaryk University in Brno, Czechia, holding a bachelor's degree in security studies and history and a master's degree in conflict and democracy studies.
The Kyiv Independent news desk
