Russia and Ukraine trade drone strikes, disrupting air travel
Photos circulating on social media showed crowds huddling at Russian airports including key international hubs in Moscow and St. Petersburg, as hundreds of flights were delayed or canceled due to Ukrainian drone strikes on Saturday and overnight, according to Russia's Transport Ministry.
The flight disruptions hit Moscow's Sheremetyevo and St. Petersburg's main Pulkovo airports. Other airports in western and central Russia also faced disruptions.
Russian air defenses shot down 120 Ukrainian drones during the nighttime attacks, and 39 more before 2 p.m. Moscow time (11 GMT) on Sunday, Russia's Defense Ministry said. It did not clarify how many had hit targets, or how many had been launched in total.
Early on Sunday, Ukrainian drones injured two civilians in Russia's Belgorod region near the border, its Gov. Vyacheslav Gladkov said Sunday.
The Ukrainian attacks came just days after Russia pummelled Kyiv with waves of drones and missiles overnight into Friday, in what Ukrainian officials called the largest such strike since Moscow's all-out invasion. The seven-hour onslaught killed at least two civilians, wounded dozens more and caused widespread damage, Ukraine said, while Moscow ramped up its push to capture more of its neighbor's land.
In total, Russia launched 550 drones and missiles across Ukraine that night, according to the country's air force. The barrages have coincided with a concerted Russian effort to break through parts of the roughly 1,000-kilometer (620-mile) front line, where Ukrainian troops are under severe pressure.
Large-scale Russian drone strikes on Sunday injured three civilians in Kyiv and at least two in Kharkiv, Ukraine's second-largest city in the northeast, officials said. A large Russian attack involving Shahed drones also targeted port infrastructure in Mykolaiv in central Ukraine, according to local Gov. Vitaliy Kim. He reported warehouses and the port's power grid were damaged but there were no casualties.
Hours later, Russia launched a glide bomb and a drone at the front-line town of Kostyantynivka in eastern Ukraine, killing four civilians and injuring a fifth, the prosecutor's office said. The drone struck a car in which a married couple were travelling, killing the 39-year-old woman and 40-year-old man on the spot, it said.
___
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Hill
4 hours ago
- The Hill
Scott on accusations that Trump is ‘too easy' on Putin: ‘Hogwash'
Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) rejected concerns that President Trump is going 'too easy' on Russian President Vladimir Putin, as the White House works to broker a ceasefire between the Kremlin and Ukraine. In an interview on 'Fox News Sunday,' anchor Shannon Bream asked the senator, who sits on the Foreign Relations Committee, about criticism from a French news outlet over the Pentagon's pause on some deliveries of air defense missiles and munitions to Ukraine. Bream quoted the outlet, which reported, 'The White House not only halted a planned shipment of arms to Kyiv, it deliberately bypassed existing sanctions to offer economic relief to Russia's nuclear giant Rosatom.' Bream added: 'What do you make of this accusation that President Trump has made things too easy on President Putin? Can he, should he, make things tougher?' 'Well, Shannon, the only word I can think of is hogwash,' Scott replied, noting that Trump's predecessors — former Presidents Obama and Biden — took actions that 'set President Trump up in a poor posture.' 'President Trump has done what he has always done, which is to focus on solutions and looking for ways to end the conflict,' Scott continued. 'We just heard him say Putin is killing thousands of people unnecessary.' 'That's why he's been in constant communication, trying to de-escalate the situation. And at the same time, having Secretary Hegseth focus on our responsibility of keeping Americans safe here at home and abroad,' he added. Asked whether this is the best time to be withholding weapons deliveries to Ukraine —noting it appears Putin has taken the pause as an opportunity to scale up attacks on Ukraine — Scott said he has complete confidence in Trump's ability to navigate the situation. 'There's no doubt that President Trump can be trusted on solving some of the major conflicts around the world,' Scott said, pointing to progress in Gaza peace talks and his strikes on Iran. Scott also said he expects weapons shipments to resume following the Pentagon's review. 'I trust President Trump to get the job done. That means that we start here at home. The level of escalation around the world requires Secretary Hegseth to take a look at our weaponry and make sure we're prepared for defense,' he said. 'I believe that after that time has elapsed, that we go back to providing the resources necessary,' Scott added.
Newsweek
5 hours ago
- Newsweek
Vladimir Putin Details How Russia Helped US Achieve Independence
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. Russian President Vladimir Putin revealed that he discussed his country's role in helping America win its independence during a call with President Donald Trump on July 3 in a bid to highlight the history of cooperation between their nations, according to Russian news agency Tass. Newsweek has reached out to the White House outside of normal business hours by email on Sunday evening for comment. Why It Matters Trump and Putin spoke by phone on Thursday, with the conversation lasting around an hour. The two leaders spoke about the ongoing war in Ukraine, which has drawn no closer to any sign of conclusion despite Trump's assurances both during and immediately after last year's presidential election that he would be able to bring the conflict to a swift end. Trump, however, expressed disappointment with the call, saying the conversation did little to convince him that Putin has any desire to stop his offensive on Ukraine. "I'm very disappointed with the conversation I had today with President Putin, because I don't think he's there. I don't think he's there, and I'm very disappointed," Trump told reporters after a rally in Iowa. "I'm just saying, I don't think he's looking to stop, and that's too bad." Russia launched a drone attack on Ukraine within hours of the call, according to Ukrainian officials. Russian President Vladimir Putin during a meeting on development of "new regions," annexed from Ukraine, at the Kremlin, on June 30 in Moscow. Russian President Vladimir Putin during a meeting on development of "new regions," annexed from Ukraine, at the Kremlin, on June 30 in Moscow. Contributor/Getty Images What To Know During the call with Trump, Putin drew several hardline stances, telling Trump that Russia will "achieve its goals" and "not retreat from these goals," according to the Kremlin's readout of the conversation. He also described the conversation as "frank, business-like, and concrete." But on Sunday, he revealed that he also tried to press upon Trump the historical ties between the two countries, going back to the founding of America. "We have always had, for a very long time, very good and special relations with the United States," Putin told Russian television host Pavel Zarubin. "We supported their aspirations for independence from the UK We actually supplied weapons." "We helped them with money," he said. "Afterward, we supported the North during the North-South war. So in this sense we found things that united us." The Kremlin confirmed to Tass that Putin had raised the topic of historic Russian support for U.S. independence and ambitions during the July 3 call, and that he had congratulated Trump on Independence Day. Historian Paul Behringer, in a paper published in 2024, wrote that the Russian Empire and fledgling U.S. enjoyed a "distant friendship," with first interactions and perceptions between the two nations "mostly positive," but with no "particularly deep" affinity for each other. Russia is understood to have maintained a stance of neutrality during the American Revolution, but according to the State Department website, Russia did not recognize the U.S. representative to Russia in 1780 and refused his credentials, doing so again in 1795. Russia first recognized the U.S. in 1803, almost two decades after the U.S. had declared independence from the United Kingdom. In his paper, Behringer wrote that the U.S. went on to "tacitly" support Russia in the Crimean War, wherein the Russian Empire fought an alliance of the Ottoman Empire, Great Britain, France and Sardinia for nearly three years in the 1850s; Russia returned the favor by supporting the Union in the American Civil War. The goodwill at this time eventually led to Russia selling Alaska to the United States. "Soon, however, differences in ideology and interests drove the two countries into a more tense and competitive relationship," the historian added. What Happens Next It remains unclear when the next round of negotiations between Russia and Ukraine or Russia and the U.S. might happen, despite Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov saying on June 20 that Moscow expected to determine the date for a third round of talks with Kyiv within a week.
New York Post
6 hours ago
- New York Post
NATO chief predicts how China could set off World War III: ‘Let's not be naive about this'
World War III will erupt when Chinese President Xi Jinping invades Taiwan and tasks Russian leader and ally Vladimir Putin to attack NATO nations to keep them out of the Pacific, the defense block's top chief warned. NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said it would be 'naive' to believe that Xi's ambition to conquer the autonomous nation of Taiwan would only involve the two countries, predicting that the war would be fought on two fronts. 'There's an increasing realization, and let's not be naive about this: If Xi Jinping would attack Taiwan, he would first make sure that he makes a call to his very junior partner in all of this, Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, residing in Moscow, and telling him, 'Hey, I'm going to do this, and I need you to keep them busy in Europe by attacking NATO territory,'' Rutte told The New York Times. 4 NATO Chief Mark Rutte warned that China could tap Russia to invade further into Europe to distract the West from responding to the looming invasion of Taiwan. RUT / Xi and Putin have touted their close partnership throughout Russia' invasion of Ukraine, with the Chinese president previously stating that their alliance has 'no limits.' Rutte's prediction that Beijing would use Moscow to distract the West echoes reports from the European Union's meeting with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi last week, where the official allegedly claimed Xi cannot afford to see Russia lose the war in Ukraine. The shock revelation reportedly saw Wang drop all pretenses and described Russia's invasion of Ukraine as a blessing that allowed focus to shift away from Beijing's looming invasion of Taiwan, sources familiar with the talks told the South China Morning Post. American and Taiwanese officials predicted that China would mount its assault on Taiwan come 2027, as Beijing seeks to annex the independent country. 4 Chinese President Xi Jinping, left, Russian President Vladimir Putin have touted their partnership in recent years. AP Rutte warned that the world has also seen what a Russo-Pacific alliance can accomplish through the developments of the war in Ukraine, which has already seen more than 12,000 North Korean soldiers deployed to assist Moscow's invasion effort. The conflict has also seen Moscow get its hands on Iranian-made drones, with the EU also accusing Chinese companies of supporting Russia's military complex. 'So here, the Indo-Pacific and your Atlantic are getting more and more interconnected,' Rutte explained as he backed the call for NATO nations to raise their defense spending. 4 China has held multiple drills along Taiwan as it warned that it will annex the country one day. AP 'We know that China has its eye on Taiwan. Given this whole geopolitical setup, there is no way we can defend ourselves if we stick to this old 2 percent,' he added. In order to curb the risk of global war, Rutte said it was imperative that NATO bolster its forces in order to scare Russia from expanding its invasion further into Europe. He also called on western nations to unite and curb China's aggression in the Indo-Pacific, which has seen Beijing perform several, large-scale military drills surrounding Taiwan. 4 Rutte called on NATO nations to bolster their defenses so that Russia would be too scared to invade another European country. AFP via Getty Images Former Russian President and top Putin ally Dmitry Medvedev slammed Rutte's prediction of World War III and mocked the NATO secretary general on X. 'SG Rutte has clearly gorged on too many of the magic mushrooms beloved by the Dutch,' Medvedev wrote. 'He sees collusion between China & Russia over Taiwan, and then a Russian attack on Europe,' he added. 'But he's right about one thing: he should learn Russian. It might come in handy in a Siberian camp.
