A firefighter trying to douse flames at a private building in Kharkiv hit by a Russian strike. Photograph: Sergey Kozlov/EPAView image in fullscreenA firefighter trying to douse flames at a private building in Kharkiv hit by a Russian strike. Photograph: Sergey Kozlov/EPA‘Putin only cares about parades’: fury as Russia rains missiles on Ukraine during 24-hour truceDozens killed despite ceasefire announced by Zelenskyy, after Moscow asked for Saturday truce for its annual military parade
Kyiv has criticised Russia for attacking several Ukrainian cities overnight with more than 100 combat drones and three missiles, in spite of a unilateral 24-hour ceasefire called by Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Ukraine’s president had announced the truce after the Kremlin said it wanted a ceasefire on Saturday during its annual military parade in Red Square. He promised to reciprocate if Vladimir Putin broke Ukraine’s ceasefire, which ends at midnight on Wednesday.
Instead of pausing operations, Moscow has intensified them with a series of devastating bombings on busy urban areas. On Tuesday, 28 civilians were killed in bomb and missile strikes in the Donetsk, Poltava and Dnipro regions. Dozens were injured.
View image in fullscreenRescuers at the site of the kindergarten hit by a Russian drone strike in Sumy. Photograph: ReutersThe latest strikes on Kharkiv and Zaporizhzhia showed that Russia rejects peace, Ukraine’s foreign minister Andriy Sybiga said. “This shows fake calls for a ceasefire on May 9th have nothing to do with diplomacy. Putin only cares about military parades, not human lives,” he wrote on social media.
Sybiga added: “Such attitude necessitates strong and increased pressure on the Russian regime, including new rounds of sanctions, isolation, accountability for Russian crimes, and enhanced support for Ukraine in all areas.”
Moscow’s drone and bomb attacks Tuesday were the most deadly in Ukraine for weeks. They come at a time when Russia’s advances on the battlefield have practically stopped, with its armed forces losing more territory in April that they gained, for the first time since 2024.
The Kremlin has taken widespread measures to protect Saturday’s parade – which celebrates the allies’ victory over Nazi Germany in the second world war – after recent long-range Ukrainian drone strikes on a range of targets. For the first time in nearly 20 years the event will take place without a display of tanks and ballistic missiles.
Air defence systems have been transferred to the Russian capital from other areas, and the mobile internet network has been shut down, apparently as a security precaution. It is unclear if Ukraine will seek to disrupt the event, or instead target Russia’s oil infrastructure and military-industrial sites.
View image in fullscreenRescuers working at the site of a Russian strike on a private building in Kharkiv on Wednesday. Photograph: Sergey Kozlov/EPAMoscow’s defence ministry said it downed 53 Ukrainian drones between 21:00 and 07:00 (1800-0400 GMT) – far fewer than in previous days. It did not say whether any of the drones attacked after Kyiv’s unilateral truce was supposed to come into effect at midnight.
Talks on ending Europe’s worst conflict since the second world war have shown little progress. Putin has refused to moderate demands first made during his 2022 full-scale invasion. They include the handover of swathes of Ukrainian territory and the removal of its pro-western government.
