Stay on top of Russia-Ukraine war 05-24-2024 developments on the ground with KyivPost fact-based news, exclusive video footage, photos and updated war maps.
A Russian missile strike destroyed a printing plant on Thursday, killing seven workers and burning 50,000 books.
President Volodymyr Zelensky shared a video on his social media showcasing the aftermath of Thursday’s massive Russian missile attack on Kharkiv, which destroyed one of the largest printing houses in Europe, Factor-Druk.
Russia implicitly challenges existing border with Estonia.
NATO “stands in solidarity” with member country Estonia following a border incident with Russia on the Narva River separating the two nations, alliance chief Jens Stoltenberg said Friday.
“NATO stands in solidarity with our ally Estonia against any threat to their sovereignty,” Stoltenberg said on the social media platform X after speaking with Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas.
Meanwhile, state-owned train operator Ukrzaliznytsia reported a flurry of attacks on the Kharkiv region's railway system overnight that damaged tracks, train carriages and buildings.
Ukrainian forces have “stopped” Russia from advancing further into the northeastern Kharkiv region and are now counter-attacking, but Moscow is intensifying its assault on other parts of the front, Ukraine's army said Friday.
Kyiv has been battling a fresh Russian land assault in the Kharkiv region since May 10, when thousands of Moscow's troops stormed the border, making their biggest territorial advances in 18 months.
President Joe Biden will miss Ukraine’s Peace Summit in Switzerland in June, in favor of hosting a fundraiser for his presidential campaign in California.
US President Joe Biden is likely to skip the Ukrainian Peace Summit to be held in Switzerland in June this year, as he is scheduled to be in California at the same time for a presidential campaign fundraiser, Bloomberg reports.
The peace summit is to be held in Switzerland on June 15-16, directly after G7 leaders meet in Italy, some of whom will travel to Switzerland for the summit.
The FT cites a Russian defense insider who, contrary to other sources, states that a significant summer offensive by Moscow would be unsustainable without a new wave of mobilization.
The Financial Times (FT) spoke to Russian sources who told it that a new mobilization wave will be necessary by the end of 2024 if Moscow is to achieve its military aims in Ukraine.
In September 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s decree to conscript 300,000 men for his “special military operation” resulted in considerable domestic unrest, leading tens of thousands of military-age men to flee the country to evade military service.
Franak Viačorka, chief political adviser to Belarusian democratic opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, talks about the struggle against dictatorship and Belarusian solidarity with Ukraine.
As Russian air defenses are being hit by ATACMS missiles Ukraine’s Air Force looks set to add to their woes as it seems to be on track to launch its first F-16 “Viper” combat missions.
The first Ukrainian pilots and ground crew trained on the US F-16 fighter aircraft have recently completed almost a year’s worth of training and will soon be ready to begin combat missions against the Russian Air Force in summer.
The first batch of Ukrainian F-16 pilots have graduated from the 162nd National Guard Air Force Base in Tucson, and will now move on to advanced training in Europe, US National Guard Air Force spokeswoman Erin Hannigan told Politico in comments published on Thursday, May 23.
The day after Russia held tactical nuclear weapons drills, France test-fired an updated version of its air-launched ASMPA-R nuclear-capable missile (without a warhead).
Russian forces began military drills earlier this week in the Southern Military District that simulated the use of tactical nuclear weapons in response to what Moscow characterized as provocative Western threats to consider direct involvement in the war in Ukraine.
Russia’s defense ministry said that the drills are designed to test “the readiness of personnel and equipment of non-strategic nuclear weapons combat units to respond and to unconditionally ensure the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the Russian state.”
The complex issue is on the agenda at this week's meeting of finance ministers of the Group of Seven wealthy democracies.
The West wants to dig into Moscow's pockets to provide aid to Ukraine, but tapping frozen Russian assets is not that simple.
The complex issue is on the agenda at this week's meeting of finance ministers of the Group of Seven wealthy democracies.
Atesh agents infiltrating various units of the Russian Armed Forces also report that Russian troops have begun evacuating some of their personnel from Dzhankoi, Crimea.
The Ukrainian Atesh partisan movement reported via Telegram that Russia has started restoring and likely modernizing airfields farther east in occupied Crimea.
Additionally, Atesh agents, infiltrating various units of the Russian Armed Forces, reported that Russian troops have begun evacuating some of their personnel from the Dzhankoi region – which the Ukrainians struck last month with drones – in north-central Crimea.
The Ministry of Finance boasted record volumes of government bonds purchased, also indicating how it helped mobilize revenues for the state budget.
Total purchase of Ukraine’s domestic government bonds reached hr. one trillion ($25 billion) since the start of Russia’s invasion against Ukraine in February 2022. It allowed Ukraine to mobilize resources domestically to finance more than 200 days of war expenses, according to a press release from Ukraine’s Finance Ministry.
“Investments in government bonds have become the second largest source of financing for the State Budget after international aid,” said Minister of Finance of Ukraine Sergii Marchenko.
The next six months are critical for Ukraine, and all bets are off as to its outcome. Even so, the author writes that the US mainstream press has turned negative about Ukraine’s prospects.
The next six months are critical for Ukraine, and all bets are off as to its outcome. Even so, the US mainstream press has turned negative about Ukraine’s prospects. This is mostly due to what I call “worm-hole reportage” – news reports that are subjective, incomplete, selective, and often influenced by Kremlin narratives.
For example, The New York Times’ headline on May 18 was “Russians Poured Over Ukraine’s Border” into the Kharkiv Region and that this was a “stunning incursion”, boding badly for Kyiv.
The world in focus, as seen by a Canadian leading global affairs analyst, writer and speaker, in his review of international media.
Mikhail Fridman, one of Russia’s richest men, is seeking sanctions-related damages from Luxembourg on assets worth $15.8bn and plans to take the country to court if it cannot agree a payout, said people familiar with the matter. The challenge, filed in February, makes Fridman the first oligarch to demand compensation for sanctions against him over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine after he successfully challenged some of the grounds for the EU restrictions last month. If successful, Fridman would potentially be entitled to a sizeable payout under an obscure 1989 treaty between Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Soviet Union protecting investors’ assets from expropriation and nationalisation, as well as “any other measures having similar effects”. Fridman’s threat is the latest salvo in a legal battle with western authorities over the sanctions against him. The Ukraine-born oligarch, who moved to London a decade ago, initially offered guarded criticism of Vladimir Putin’s invasion before souring on the west and returning to Moscow last October. He is attempting to dismantle the one remaining justification for the EU sanctions against him by selling his stake in Alfa-Bank, Russia’s largest privately held lender - FT
The investigative group Conflict Intelligence Team (CIT) confirmed on May 23 that a Ukrainian missile attack four days earlier on the port of Sevastopol hit a Cyclone missile carrier ship belonging to Russia's Black Sea Fleet. CIT said that, after reviewing photographs of a sunken ship showing a mast sticking out of the water, it concluded that the vessel was the Cyclone missile carrier. The Karakurt-class corvette joined the fleet six months earlier. Russia has not confirmed the loss of the vessel and no information has been made public about possible casualties among the ship's crew. British intelligence said that the Russian ship was "almost certainly" sunk by a Ukrainian strike on Sevastopol in occupied Crimea on May 19. The attack likely involved a combination of drones and ATACMS missiles, British intelligence said. The Cyclone missile carrier was one of four Russian vessels of the Karakurt class. It was armed with Kalibr cruise missiles, which have been used against Ukraine. - RFE/RL
Serhiy Kolyada on the latest failure by Rasshist unlimited cannon fodder to break through Ukraine's defenses.
Four major political players have advocated authorizing Ukraine to hit Russian territory with US-made weapons – to turn fighting “with one hand behind its back” into an ATACMS turkey shoot.
Russian forces are pressing Ukrainian defenses from formations, their supply lines and staging grounds safely positioned just over the border near Kharkiv within Russian territory.
Many of the weapons provided by the United States, most notably those ATACMS filled with cluster munitions, are ideally suited to destroying locations where massed troops and materiel are formed up.
Kyiv has been battling a Russian land assault on its northeastern Kharkiv region since May 10, when thousands of troops stormed the border, making their biggest territorial advances in 18 months.
Russian forces have become "bogged down" trying to capture the northeastern border town of Vovchansk but fighting on the eastern front remains intense, Ukrainian army chief Oleksandr Syrsky said Friday, May 24.
Kyiv has been battling a Russian land assault on its northeastern Kharkiv region since May 10, when thousands of troops stormed the border, making their biggest territorial advances in 18 months.
IS has claimed responsibility on multiple occasions for the March 22 attack which killed over 140 people, but Moscow has repeatedly tried to link Ukraine and the West to the attack.
Russia on Friday, May 24, said for the first time that the Islamic State group coordinated the March concert hall assault in Moscow, the country's deadliest terror attack in two decades.
IS has claimed responsibility on multiple occasions for the March 22 attack which killed over 140 people, but Moscow has repeatedly tried to link Ukraine and the West to the attack.
In yet another case of Moscow accusing the victims of its own crimes, Russia now has the gall to make the absurd claim that Kyiv leaves booby-traps to kill its own children.
The number of credible and substantiated reports of Russian forces leaving booby-trapped landmines, human and animal bodies, household appliances, dwellings and toys, as they withdrew from occupied areas following the February 2022 full-scale invasion are almost too numerous to count. These are considered as war crimes.
Typical accounts were published in April 2022 by the US Lieber Institute and at a meeting of the OSCE, citing documented evidence of the widespread use of victim-activated explosive devices hidden within everyday objects.
A member of the Atesh guerrilla movement destroyed telecommunications equipment near Smolensk which resulted in the shutdown of the Russian air defense system.
An agent of the Atesh partisan movement carried out a sabotage attack against external telecommunications equipment belonging to Russia’s armed forces, near the Russian city of Smolensk, 270 kilometers north of the Ukrainian border.
“An agent of our movement destroyed the external telecommunications cabinet of a communication tower in the village of Stanychky near Smolensk,” the partisans reported on social media.
The TV debate between Attal and Bardella covered a wide range of topics from the economy to trade, agriculture, immigration and the war in Ukraine.
France’s Prime Minister Gabriel Attal and far-right Rassemblement National (RN) lead candidate Jordan Bardella engaged in an unprecedented TV debate on Thursday, hoping to sway voters just days before the European elections.
“You are bound by a moral contract with [Russia],” Attal told his far-right counterpart, raising alarm bells over the RN’s actual patriotism and national integrity.
As the G7 ministers gathered, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree allowing the confiscation of assets inside Russia belonging to US companies or citizens.
US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on Thursday, May 23, urged G7 ministers meeting in Italy to consider "more ambitious options" to use frozen Russian assets to help Ukraine.
The ministers and central bankers from the Group of Seven world powers are meeting in Stresa, on the shores of northern Italy's Lake Maggiore, to prepare for a summit of G7 heads of state next month in Puglia.
Latest from the Institute for the Study of War.
Key Takeaways from the ISW:
Following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the West froze approximately $300 billion in Russian financial assets, primarily from its central bank reserves.
In another round of economic tensions escalation, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree on Thursday, May 23, permitting the confiscation of assets within Russia belonging to the United States, its citizens, and companies.
This move is intended to compensate those affected by Western sanctions against Moscow.
Now serving his fourth term as prime minister, Fico soured ties with Ukraine after he questioned the neighbouring country's sovereignty as it battles Russian forces.
The man charged with shooting and seriously wounding Slovakia's prime minister said he did so to oppose the government's Ukraine policy but regrets his actions, according to a court document obtained by AFP on Thursday.
Slovakia was left reeling last week after the head of government, Robert Fico, was struck by four bullets while greeting supporters in the central town of Handlova.
The new draft law marks the first step for Ukraine to join the EU’s unified roaming network and abolish roaming fees for its citizens abroad, though this is just one of many steps ahead.
Ukraine has adopted a draft law in preparation for joining the EU’s Roam-like-at-Home initiative that was introduced in 2017, though it still requires substantial changes to the country’s existing regulations and approvals from the EU.
“In the second reading, the Parliament adopted draft law No. 10265 on the implementation of European legislation on roaming. Thanks to this decision, Ukraine continues the process of joining the single digital market with EU countries (Roam like at home),” reported the Ministry of Digital Transformation in a press release.
Recently, Atesh partisans have frequently observed Russian military equipment in Crimea, including tampering with tanks stationed at the Yevpatoria railway station.
The Atesh partisan movement reported on Telegram the unloading of a train carrying Russian military equipment at a freight station in Yevpatoria, occupied Crimea, including a platoon of T-72 tanks.
A new T-72 tank ranges from $3-4 million, depending on the configuration, while an older Soviet T-72 can cost as little as half a million dollars.
The proposal comes as EU nations scramble to bolster their defences and re-arm in the wake of Moscow's 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
Poland and Greece on Thursday called for the European Union to create an "air defence shield" to better protect the bloc in the face of Russia's war on Ukraine.
"Europe will be safe as long as the skies over it are safe," Poland's Prime Minister Donald Tusk and Greek counterpart Kyriakos Mitsotakis wrote in a letter to EU chief Ursula Von der Leyen.
Ukraine expecting $4.5B from IMF; China denies supplying weapons to Moscow; US pushes for “ambitious” actions on frozen Russian assets; Kremlin bemoans calls to use Western weapons in Russia.
On Thursday, representatives from Ukraine’s Finance Ministry met with the leadership of the International Monetary Fund’s European Department and the IMF’s mission in Ukraine. The group discussed the country’s compliance with benchmarks that allow for regular distributions of the Extended Fund Facility (EFF) budget of $15.6 billion to Kyiv over four years, part of a broader international IMF allocation of $122 billion in total.
The outcome of the meeting is that Kyiv can expect $4.5 billion this year, pending regular reviews, separated into three tranches.