"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.
Volodymyr Zelenskiy, Ukraine's president, at a meeting on the Ukraine Compact during the NATO Summit in Washington, DC, US, on Thursday, July 11, 2024. (Chris Kleponis/CNP/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his evening address “that Russia must be held accountable for everything it has done.”
The statement comes after Russia's missile attack on the Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rih on April 4 killed 19 people, including nine children, according to local authorities. Seventy four were reportedly injured.
“Russian ballistics on a street in an ordinary city, into a residential area, and after that strike, an additional strike with drones. And another person died, and more were injured,” Zelensky said.
“We need to put pressure on them there — really put pressure, don't waste time on empty talk — to end this war.”
The U.S. and Ukraine agreed to a full ceasefire on March 11 but Russia rejected it.
Instead, Ukraine, Russia, and the U.S. agreed on March 25 to a partial truce covering energy infrastructure and the Black Sea.
However, the Kremlin has blocked the partial ceasefire as well, saying that the Black Sea truce would take effect only after some sanctions against Russia are lifted. Russia and Ukraine have also accused each other of violating the ban on energy infrastructure strikes.
The U.S., so far, had declined to put pressure on Russia to force Moscow into a ceasefire.
"Horrified that tonight a ballistic missile struck near a playground and restaurant in Kryvyi Rih," U.S. Ambassador Bridget Brink posted on X following a Russian missile attack on Kryvyi Rih on April 4. "This is why the war must end."
Zelensky took issue with Brink's refusal to denounce Russia for the strike, which included an Iskander ballistic missile with cluster munition touching down on a playground in Zelensky's hometown.
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The Kyiv Independent news desk
