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Stay on top of Russia-Ukraine war 04-25-2025 developments on the ground with KyivPost fact-based news, exclusive video footage, photos and updated war maps.
The cash will help Naftogaz build up gas supplies for the next two winters, but the volumes of purchased gas depend on the prices, Vice President Matteo Patrone told Kyiv Post.
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is lending Ukraine’s state-owned gas giant Naftogaz €270 million ($307 million) to finance emergency gas purchases for the next two heating seasons.
The amount of gas Naftogaz will purchase with it is unknown for now, EBRD Vice President Matteo Patrone told Kyiv Post.
Ukrainian partisans report drone strikes on Friday against multiple airfields and cities on the occupied peninsula. Also hit the home of a top Chechen official.
The Ukrainian “Atesh” partisan movement reported that on Friday morning a drone struck the home of Murad Saidov, the Deputy Head of the Chechen Republic, in the city of Saky on the occupied Crimean Peninsula.
According to the report the drone struck the building, damaged the house and several nearby vehicles.
Belarus is accused by international experts of political abuses of psychiatry.
UN independent rights experts on Thursday condemned what they said was “coercive psychiatric treatment” inflicted on dozens of critics of the government in Belarus since the presidential elections five years ago.
The former Soviet state was gripped in 2020 by a huge protest movement against President Alexander Lukashenko, which prompted a ruthless crackdown on opponents.
Naftogaz purchased 300 million cubic meters of LNG to prepare for the winter after Russia disrupted half of Ukraine’s domestic gas production.
Ukraine’s state-owned gas giant Naftogaz and Poland’s oil company Orlen signed an agreement to supply 100 million cubic meters (mcm) more of liquefied natural gas (LNG).
This marks the third contract under the companies’ long-term cooperation agreement signed in March, bringing the total contracted volume to 300 million cubic meters, the company’s Thursday, April 24 press release says.
Senior officials don’t rule out a potential Trump-Zelensky meeting this weekend.
WASHINGTON DC – US President Donald Trump said Friday morning that he thinks Ukraine and Russia are “coming along,” reiterating that peace was “pretty close.”
“No deadline... I just want to do it as fast as possible,” Trump told reporters on the South Lawn of the White House as he departed for his first overseas trip to attend Pope Francis’ funeral in Rome.
A Russian media outlet has detailed how a boy scout from a militant family grew up to be an ecologist and eventually a foot soldier for Putin’s army who died in Ukraine.
Michael Gloss, son of CIA Deputy Director of Digital Innovation Juliane Gloss, died aged 21 while fighting for Moscow in Ukraine in April 2024.
Russian investigative outlet iStories, citing Gloss’s acquaintances, has pieced together Gloss’s life and detailed how a boy scout-turned-ecologist joined a hippie community in Europe before becoming a foot soldier in the Russian army who met his end in eastern Ukraine.
US President Donald Trump has expressed his ambitions to control Greenland, insisting Washington needs control of it for security reasons.
Danish intelligence on Friday accused Russia of being behind a disinformation campaign which falsely claimed that a Danish lawmaker was seeking Russian aid to prevent the United States from annexing Greenland.
Klitschko told the BBC that Ukraine might cede land “temporarily” for peace – though he insists Ukrainians will “never accept occupation.”
Kyiv Mayor Vitaliy Klitschko has suggested Ukraine might need to give up some territory to secure a “temporary” peace with Russia.
“One of the scenarios is... to give up territory. It’s not fair. But for the peace, temporary peace, maybe it can be a solution, temporary,” Klitschko said in an interview with the BBC published Friday.
A explosion in a car in Russia’s Bryansk killed Yevgeny Rytikov, chief designer of the Krasukha EW system being used against Ukraine.
In the Russian city of Bryansk, during the night of April 17–18, Yevgeny Rytikov – a leading engineer and head of the design bureau at the Bryansk Electromechanical Plant – was killed when his car exploded. Rytikov was responsible for the development and modernization of electronic warfare (EW) systems for the Russian military, including forces operating on occupied Ukrainian territories.
According to Kyiv Post sources who requested anonymity, the car exploded when Rytikov and a colleague got inside. However, sources within Ukraine’s intelligence community said they “can neither confirm nor deny” the involvement of its special services in Rytikov’s assassination.
Trump’s appeasement emissary back in Moscow.
US envoy Steve Witkoff met Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin on Friday to tout Washington’s plan to settle the Ukraine conflict, a day after Donald Trump issued a direct appeal to the Russian president to halt his offensive.
Trump has been trying to broker a truce between Moscow and Kyiv to end three years of fighting, but has failed to extract any major concessions from the Kremlin despite several rounds of negotiation.
New documents arising from recent negotiations show the gap between the Trump’s team’s demands and what Kyiv’s leadership is willing to consider.
As talks to end Russia’s full-scale war on Ukraine continue behind closed doors, new documents from recent negotiations show the gap between what the US wants – and what Ukraine is willing to consider.
Two rounds of talks – one in Paris on April 17 and another lower-level gathering in London on April 23 brought together officials from the US, Ukraine, and European countries. The proposals exchanged at those meetings illustrate competing visions for how to stop the fighting and what peace might look like.
The US president has doubled down on his stance that Ukraine will not be able to return its occupied peninsula and called for Kyiv to accept the concession.
US President Donald Trump said Crimea “will stay with Russia,” once again reiterating his narrative that Ukraine has lost the peninsula and blaming his predecessor, former President Barack Obama, for Moscow’s annexation.
The statement, made in an interview with TIME magazine published on Friday, is a reiteration of Trump’s similar remark on Wednesday on his Truth Social platform, where he questioned Ukraine’s sovereignty over Crimea and blamed Obama and Ukrainians for not winning it back in 2014 when Russia annexed the peninsula.
US Vice President recently said both Kyiv and Moscow need to make concessions, but the US president said that Moscow’s concession is simply that it stops trying to take parts it doesn’t control.
US President Donald Trump said on Thursday that Moscow’s concession in the US peace deal is simply that it does not keep invading Ukraine and take territories it does not even control.
On Wednesday, Vice President JD Vance said an “explicit proposal” was issued to Kyiv and Moscow without naming the terms, adding that Washington would withdraw from the deal if no progress were made.
The Kremlin’s long-running campaign to blast Ukraine’s population into submission seems to be targeting people more and trying to take advantage of Ukrainian Patriot missile shortages.
Kremlin strike planners set a new wartime bombardment record on Thursday with the launch of 11 ballistic missiles at targets across Ukraine. The previous record, set in early 2024, had been 10.
Russian ballistic missiles fired on Thursday included Russian-made Iskander-M missiles and a North Korean analogue of that missile called a KN-23. Some of them broke through Ukrainian air defenses, Ukrainian military analyst Anatoly Khrapchinsky said in a Thursday evening national television news interview.
Russian authorities reported the third drone attack on the city that hosts its 112th Missile Brigade accused of launching the Palm Sunday missile strike on the city of Sumy.
In the early hours of Friday, April 25, Russian authorities reported a drone attack on the town of Shuya in the Ivanovo region. Shuya is located approximately 950 kilometers (600 miles) from the Ukrainian border and about 300 kilometers (190 miles) northeast of Moscow.
According to the Russian Telegram channel ASTRA, residents heard early morning sirens followed by explosions. Around 3:30 a.m., the local administration confirmed that a UAV attack was “being repelled” over the city. Later, officials reported falling debris and that emergency services were operating at the scene.
Zelensky tells Ben Shapiro that Russia still seeks America’s destruction, defends mobilization, and says Ukraine’s church must be free from Moscow’s “KGB control.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Russia aims to destroy the US and that Ukraine’s struggle against the Kremlin regime is, in its way, beneficial to the American people.
In an interview with Daily Wire founder Ben Shapiro published Thursday, Zelensky recalled the Soviet Union’s Cold War-era policies, which were based on the goal of annihilating the US and NATO countries in a nuclear conflict.
Yaroslav Moskalik, Deputy Chief of the Main Operational Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, is believed to have died in the blast.
A senior Russian military officer was killed by a car explosion Thursday, April 25, in the Moscow region, Russia’s Investigative Committee confirmed.
Authorities named General-lieutenant Yaroslav Moskalik, deputy head of the main operational directorate of the military’s General Staff, as the victim.
Beyond the headlines, the Kyiv Post newsroom has an obligation to report the reality and uncertainty Ukraine faces. Here are a few key messages and reminders.
On Thursday morning, explosions thundered across Kyiv once again as Russia unleashed one of its largest missile-and-drone attacks against the Ukrainian capital.
This, following deadly strikes earlier this month on Kharkiv, Sumy, Odesa, Zaporizhzhia and other cities and towns.
The attack came on the heels of one of Russia’s largest aerial assaults on Ukraine, carried out Thursday April 24, that killed 12 people and injured dozens more.
Russian forces launched a large-scale drone attack on Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk region overnight, killing at least two people and injuring several others, local officials said Wednesday, April 25.
According to Serhii Lysak, head of the Dnipropetrovsk regional military administration, a Shahed drone struck a high-rise residential building in the city of Pavlohrad, sparking multiple fires.
Zelensky will be one of the mourners at Saturday’s funeral for Francis even though the pope never visited Ukraine and critics said he echoed Kremlin talking points by saying the war was “provoked.”
As Catholics around the world mourn Pope Francis, many Ukrainians will remember him bitterly for failing to clearly blame Russia for its invasion and calling for Ukraine to raise the “white flag”.
President Volodymyr Zelensky will be one of the prominent mourners at Saturday’s funeral for Francis even though the pope never visited Ukraine and critics said he echoed Kremlin talking points by saying the war was “provoked” and portraying it as part of a wider global confrontation.
Ukraine’s military intelligence says more people inside Russia are ready to resist the Kremlin and carry out acts of “demilitarization” in retaliation for Moscow’s war crimes.
Ukraine’s Main Intelligence Directorate (HUR) reports the destruction of a Russian Su-30SM fighter jet following what it described as a “successful sabotage operation.”
In a video posted on Telegram, the agency showed the jet burning in the distance, accompanied by the message: “An enemy Su-30SM fighter jet was destroyed in Russia – resistance to putinism is growing.”
The original proposal involved deploying troops to protect key Ukrainian cities, ports, and nuclear power facilities. A reduced presence is now deemed more realistic.
Britain is expected to drop plans to send thousands of ground troops to Ukraine as protection force over fears it could trigger a wider conflict if a hypothetical ceasefire with Russia – which has yet to be reached due to Moscow’s unwillingness – breaks down, The Times reported, citing government sources.
British officials reportedly believe the risks are “too high” and the available forces insufficient for such a mission. The original proposal involved deploying troops to protect key Ukrainian cities, ports, and nuclear power facilities in the event that a peace deal takes hold.
Ukraine’s intelligence directorate said 360,000 items were stolen from occupied Kherson alone – in a bid to erase the country’s national memory.
Since 2014, over five million documents belonging to Ukraine’s National Archival Fund (NAF) have fallen under Russian control following the occupation of parts of Ukraine, including Crimea, Donetsk, Luhansk, and Kherson regions.
According to Ukraine’s military intelligence (HUR) and the State Archival Service, a significant portion of these documents was illegally removed and integrated into Russia’s archival infrastructure.
When the Trump administration offered a plan that basically calls for Ukraine’s total capitulation, Zelensky balked. He knew it was just “cover” to give Putin more breathing room.
The Trump Administration followed through on their threat to “walk away from efforts to broker a Russia-Ukraine peace deal unless there are clear signs of progress.” Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Special Envoy Steve Witkoff took their ball and went home on Wednesday.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and EU High Representative Kaja Kallas each said they would never recognize the Russian-occupied Crimea peninsula as legally Russian, not to mention the other six points contained in Team Trump’s seven-point plan.
Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff is due in Russia on Friday where he is expected to hold another round of ceasefire talks with Putin.
Russia’s foreign minister said Thursday that Moscow was ready to do a deal on its war in Ukraine after Donald Trump urged Vladimir Putin to halt attacks, in a rare rebuke following the deadliest strikes on Kyiv in months.
“We are ready to reach a deal, but there are still some specific points... which need to be fine-tuned, and we are busy with this,” Sergey Lavrov said in an interview with CBS News.
Latest from the Institute for the Study of War.
Key Takeaways from the ISW:
The latest setback for the embattled US Defense Secretary centers on his use of an insecure web connection, as one of his top advisers is sent packing, leaving a leadership void in the Pentagon.
The US Secretary of Defense is once again under fire for his sloppy communications, this time for bypassing the Pentagon’s security protocols by using a personal computer and an unsecured connection for messaging on the encrypted app, Signal.
Pete Hegseth had been called out twice already for the disturbing disregard in the way he handles classified information; first for discussing sensitive war-planning information on a Signal chat that included a journalist, and then for including family members and his lawyer on the same app, unduly exposing similarly sensitive Department of Defense material.
“We’ve shown them the finish line,” Marco Rubio insists, calling Russia’s overnight attacks on Kyiv “horrible” and reminder to “everybody of why their war needs to end”.
The top US diplomat on Thursday condemned Russia’s overnight deadly barrage of missile strikes on Kyiv after talks to reach a peace deal failed.
“It’s horrible,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio told reporters when asked about Russia’s war during an Oval Office meeting between President Donald Trump and Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre, adding that last night’s attacks “should remind everybody of why their war needs to end.”
Secretary of State and special envoy Witkoff vehemently deny that any such talks about Nord Stream pipeline took place, calling Politico a “fifth-rate publication.”
The administration of US President Donald Trump is discussing lifting sanctions on the Russian Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline and other Russian assets in Europe as part of broader talks about ending the war between Russia and Ukraine, Politico news site reported.
According to five White House insiders interviewed by the political magazine, Trump’s special envoy to Russia. Steve Witkoff, is the leading force behind the initiative, and has instructed his team to compile a list of all energy sanctions the United States has imposed on Russia.
“We all agree in NATO that Russia is a long-term threat to NATO territory, to the whole of the Euro-Atlantic territory,” Rutte told reporters, adding that he “doesn’t know” if Putin wants peace.
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte on Thursday ruled out the United States withdrawing from Ukraine-Russia peace discussions, after closed-door meetings with President Donald Trump and his cabinet members at the White House.
Speaking to reporters outside the White House, the NATO chief praised Trump’s leadership in trying to bring Russia’s war in Ukraine to an end, saying that “this could be brought to a positive end.”
