Ukraine Breaking News Today Live on 05-03-2025

From Ukrainian drones striking Russian factories to Putin proposing a ceasefire while intensifying attacks — here’s your full summary of the week in Ukraine, as of May 3, 2025.

Since 2014, voices of appeasement have suggested Ukraine give up territory to placate Moscow’s appetite. This is, and must continue to be, a nonstarter for the West.

The Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of Ukraine, the highest law of both countries, unequivocally guarantee their respective full territorial integrity.

Indeed, the Constitution of the United States provides in Article IV, Section 4: “The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion…”

Stefan Korshak, Kyiv Post’s military correspondent, shares his perspective on recent developments in Russia’s war in Ukraine.

This big Ukraine news this week outside Ukraine seems to all have been inside the Beltway.

First, there was this “minerals/rare earth deal” between the US and Ukraine that got signed after several failed attempts.

US efforts to strongarm a ceasefire has run up against a Catch-22 obstacle, apart from Russian intransigence. It is not too late for the US to change course.

Ceasefire negotiations between Ukraine and Russia have reached a critical impasse. Russia continues its offensive operations, while Ukraine persists in its defensive efforts. It resembles the proverbial question of which came first – the chicken or the egg?

For President Donald Trump and his Special Envoy Steve Witkoff, the “possibility to reshape the Russian-US relationship through some very compelling commercial opportunities” will never come to fruition as long as the two sides continue to shoot at one another.

R.E.M. reissues “Radio Free Europe” to honor press freedom and support RFE/RL as it faces US funding cuts and pressure from authoritarian regimes.

The popular alternative rock band R.E.M. is marking World Press Freedom Day and the 75th anniversary of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) with a special reissue of its 1981 debut single, “Radio Free Europe,” RFE/RL reported.

“Radio Free Europe’s journalists have been pissing off dictators for 75 years. You know you’re doing your job when you make the right enemies,” Mike Mills, a founding member of R.E.M. said.

Kyiv Post investigates Ukraine’s new centralized procurement organization, to oversee purchases related to national recovery programs – will it improve on the Ministry of Defense’s failed experiment?

The new centralized procurement body, formed under the State Agency for Restoration and Infrastructure Development (Restoration Agency), will cooperate with the Ministry for Communities, Territories, and Infrastructure Development. Officials have presented it as a decisive anti-corruption measure that will align Ukraine’s procurement practices with the best European standards. But how effective will it be?

What is it? How will it work?

The new organization is expected to handle procurement procedures worth tens of billions of dollars for Ukraine’s post-war reconstruction.

Zelensky said some countries had approached Kyiv, warning they were travelling to Russia and had requested safety. Zelensky said it’s up to the Russians.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky dismissed a three-day truce ordered by Russian leader Vladimir Putin as theatrics but said Kyiv was ready for a full ceasefire.

Russia has so far rejected an unconditional 30-day ceasefire pushed by Kyiv and Washington, which is trying to broker an end to the three-year Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Zelensky says Trump may be shifting his stance on Ukraine after their Vatican meeting, where they discussed stronger US sanctions against Russia.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said US President Donald Trump’s perspective on the war in Ukraine may be shifting following their first face-to-face meeting since a tense exchange at the White House at the end of February.

The two leaders had met at Pope Francis’s funeral at St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican on April 26.

A Russian strike on Velykyi Burluk in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region sparked a massive fire, destroying buildings and injuring two elderly women, officials said.

A large-scale fire spanning approximately 2,000 square meters (21,528 square feet) broke out Saturday, May 3, in the village of Velykyi Burluk, located in the Kupyansk district of Ukraine’s Kharkiv region, following a major Russian strike on the settlement’s central area, local officials said.

The attack completely destroyed a two-story commercial building and caused partial damage to a two-story residential building, several administrative offices, local businesses, and pavilions.

Russia’s “Died for the Truth” exhibition in Belgrade celebrates its journalists who have exposed “Ukraine’s crimes” while ignoring its attitude to the “Fourth Estate.”

Imagine a state that poisons members of the opposition, shuts down independent media, arrests journalists, and tortures them to death – and then organizes an exhibition in the capital of another country to celebrate the “truths” of its propagandists. This is precisely what Russia has done, in the heart of Belgrade – under the auspices of its ambassador, Botsan-Kharchenko – and applauded by representatives of the government of the Republic of Serbia.

The Russian House in Belgrade opened an exhibition, “Died for the Truth,” on April 30. Ostensibly dedicated to those journalists who have exposed the “crimes of the Ukrainian regime since 2014,” this morally reprehensible display was nothing more than propaganda theater of a state that has turned journalism into a weapon and the truth into an enemy.

The judge described the defendant’s decision to fight in Ukraine as “brave but foolhardy” and noted that Ukraine needed the weapons to help defend itself.

A British man who fought in Ukraine and brought back a cache of grenades and ammunition received a suspended sentence on Friday, as reported by Richmondshire Today.

Stewart Wright, 45 from North Yorkshire, England, volunteered to fight in the war in Ukraine and reached the front lines, Teesside Crown Court heard.

Latest from the British Defence Intelligence.

• Russia has likely incurred approximately 950,000 casualties (killed and wounded) since launching the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
• In the first four months of 2025, Russia likely sustained approximately 160,000 casualties. Should these casualty rates persist for the rest of 2025, this would be the costliest year of the war in terms of Russian personnel, continuing the year-on-year trend of casualty increases.
• The average daily Russian casualties during April 2025 was just over 1,200, and totalled 36,000 over the course of the month, according to Ukrainian General Staff reporting. This was a moderate decrease from the daily average of 1,300 in March 2025.
• Whilst the numbers of casualties remain below the very high daily rates of nearly 1,600 in late 2024, when Russia was making territorial gains, it is still towards the high end in the overall context of the conflict. So far in 2025, Russia has not been able to translate continued heavy losses into significant advances in Ukraine.

On May 4, citizens of Romania will attend polling stations to elect a new president.

On May 4, citizens of Romania will attend polling stations to elect a new president. This is a second iteration of the elections as the results of the 2024 presidential campaign were annulled after the unexpected success of Călin Georgescu — a far-right candidate sometimes referred to as “TikTok Messiah.” The nickname is given because of the social media platform that made his success possible and his blend of religious rhetoric, seasoned with anti-EU and Moscow-friendly narratives. Georgescu was banned from running to the office, but he still plays an important role in the campaign. OpenMinds explored Romanian Telegram channels and found that every fourth one serves as a direct conduit for Russian propaganda.‍

The 2024 elections in Romania were cancelled by the Constitutional Court on December 6. One rationale for the cancellation was a declassified intelligence report that suggested a “state actor” was behind Georgescu’s popularity spike, particularly on TikTok. This cancellation, coupled with subsequent legal challenges and investigations into Georgescu’s campaign, ultimately led to him being barred from the 2025 rerun, a decision upheld by the Romanian Constitutional Court at the beginning of March, amidst protests and political instability.‍

Ukrainian actor Maksym Kovtun, known for his work at Dnipro’s Youth Theater, was killed in combat after volunteering to serve. He is remembered as a beloved artist and hero.

Maksym Kovtun, a beloved stage actor with the Dnipro Academic Oblast Youth Theater who volunteered to join the Ukrainian Armed Forces, has been killed in action, the theater announced Friday.

“With heavy hearts, we share the sad news: our talented actor Maksym Kovtun died defending Ukraine,” the theater said in a statement posted to Facebook on Friday, May 2.

Trump has boasted of securing major commercial deals from oil-rich Saudi Arabia, which has also been a key go-between for the US diplomacy on Russia and Ukraine.

The United States on Friday approved a $3.5 billion sale of missiles to Saudi Arabia, ahead of a visit to the kingdom by President Donald Trump.

The State Department said it notified Congress of the deal that will include Saudi Arabia’s purchase of 1,000 medium-range air-to-air missiles.

Explosions were heard in Mykolaiv during a Russian drone raid; no immediate damage reported. Ukraine’s Air Force shot down 64 drones amid nationwide air alerts.

Explosions were reported in the southern Ukrainian city of Mykolaiv early Saturday as Russian forces launched an overnight air raid, local officials said.

Mykolaiv Mayor Oleksandr Senkevych confirmed the blasts in a message on Telegram, warning that “the threat persists.”

Ukrainian drones destroyed Russian assault troops on motorcycles in Kupyansk, as Russia tests new tactics using motorbike columns and ground drones in Donetsk.

Ukrainian drones destroyed nearly a dozen Russian assault troops on motorcycles during an attempted attack in the Kupyansk sector(Kharkiv region), the State Border Guard Service reported.

Accompanying the post on Telegram was a video labeled: “Drones of the ‘Vengeance’ [Pomsta] unit take out the enemy on the move.”

The Ukrainian soldiers joining is seen as “recognition that Ukraine and its heroes stand at the forefront of the fight for freedom and peace in the world.”

Ukrainian soldiers will join British military personnel next week for a historic parade in London marking 80 years since the end of World War II in Europe, the UK government announced on Saturday.

Ukrainian personnel will join around 1,000 members of the Royal Navy, Royal Marines, British Army and Royal Air Force, “symbolizing the global support for their continued fight for freedom against Russia’s unprovoked, illegal invasion,” the UK’s Ministry of Defence said.

Tensions between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan are escalating after a deadly Kashmir attack, threatening global stability, trade, water security, and tech supply chains.

The world is watching two nuclear powers inch closer to conflict – not only with grave concern for human life but also with a keen awareness of the cascading effects this war could unleash across global systems.

In a multipolar world already under strain from climate change, inflation, and war in Ukraine, a conflict between India and Pakistan might be the last domino we can afford to see fall.

Latest from the Institute for the Study of War.

Key Takeaways from the ISW:

• Russian gains along the frontline have slowed over the last four months, but Russia continues to tolerate personnel losses comparable to the casualty rate Russian forces sustained during a period of intensified advances between September and December 2024.
• Russian forces are currently sustaining a higher casualty rate per square kilometer gained than in Fall 2024.
• Russia has thus far sustained these casualties and the current tempo of offensive operations by rapidly deploying low quality troops to frontline units, although the reliance on such troops is also hindering Russia’s ability to conduct complex operations and make rapid advances in Ukraine.
• Russian President Vladimir Putin’s commitment to maintaining the tempo of offensive operations despite diminishing returns underscores Putin’s ongoing efforts to leverage further battlefield gains to generate pressure on Ukraine in ceasefire and peace negotiations or otherwise to force Ukraine’s collapse.
• Western intelligence reportedly suggests that Putin may begin prioritizing short-term goals such as consolidating Russia’s gains in Ukraine and Russia’s immediate economic viability over seizing more territory, but Putin’s demonstrated commitment to maintaining the tempo of Russian offensive operations in Ukraine despite continuing high casualty rates is a counter-indicator to this reported assessment.
• A future slowing of Russian offensive operations and/or transition to defensive operations in all or part of the theater would be indicators that Putin is shifting his short-term goals from seizing more territory to consolidating previously held territory.
• ISW continues to assess that Russian President Vladimir Putin remains committed to his long-term military objectives of seizing all of Ukraine and undermining NATO.
• Statements by US officials suggest that the Trump administration is considering stepping back from intensified mediation efforts to end the war in Ukraine.
• The US Department of State submitted a proposed license for defense exports to Ukraine to the US Congress on April 29.
• Russian forces recently advanced near Toretsk and in western Zaporizhia Oblast.

The standoff between pro-EU and far-right candidates could very well determine the fate of one of the key members of NATO’s eastern flank.

Romania is set to hold its first round of presidential elections again on Sunday, May 4, with a second round to follow on May 18.

Here is why the elections are important for Europe, and who might dictate the role of the country moving forward.

Elon Musk, Trump, and Silicon Valley leaders are reviving a 1930s technocracy vision, pushing for tech-led governance, global annexations, and space colonization.

What do Greenland, Canada, Panama, and Elon “chainsaw” Musk have in common besides President Donald Trump?

All are key elements in a modern version of the 1930s “technocracy” movement, founded by Utopians who believed that governments and economies should be run by scientists and engineers, not politicians or businessmen.

Russian attacks on Ukrainian civilian areas have killed dozens of people in recent weeks despite the United States talking with both sides in a bid to end Moscow’s three-year invasion

Russian drone strikes on Ukraine’s second city of Kharkiv wounded 47 people late Friday, police said, while Russian officials reported a “massive attack” by Ukraine on the Krasnodar region.

“Hostile attacks on Kharkiv resulted in 47 injured civilians,” police in the Kharkiv region wrote on Telegram.