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Here’s where things stand on Saturday, June 7 2025:
Fighting
- At least six people were killed in Russian missile and drone strikes on the Ukrainian capital Kyiv and across the country on Friday.
- Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said three of the victims were emergency responders who were killed in a missile and drone attack on Kyiv, while a further 80 people nationwide were injured in the attacks.
- Two people were killed in Ukraine’s northern city of Chernihiv, and at least one more person was killed in the northwestern city of Lutsk.
- Ukraine’s air force said Russia had used 407 drones, one of the largest numbers recorded in a single attack, as well as 45 cruise and ballistic missiles in the attack.
- The Ukrainian military said it had launched a preemptive strike overnight on the Engels and Dyagilevo airfields in the Russian regions of Saratov and Ryazan, in addition to striking at least three fuel reservoirs.
- Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said Russia had “responded” to Kyiv’s audacious drone attack that destroyed Russian heavy bombers at airfields in Siberia last weekend by attacking civilians and civilian infrastructure in Ukraine.
- Russia’s Ministry of Defence said its forces had carried out the strikes, which targeted military and military-related targets in response to what it called Ukrainian “terrorist acts” against Russia.
- Western military aviation experts told the Reuters news agency that Russia will take years to replace the nuclear-capable bomber planes that were hit in Ukrainian drone strikes on airfields in Siberia.
- Russia’s National Guard said it killed a man as he tried to prepare a drone attack on a military site in Russia’s Ryazan region, southeast of Moscow.
- Russian air defence units intercepted and destroyed 82 Ukrainian drones over Russian territory, including the Moscow region, Russia’s Defence Ministry said early on Saturday.
- Moscow’s mayor, Sergei Sobyanin, said six drones headed for the capital city had been destroyed or downed.
- In total, Russia’s Defence Ministry said that air defences had downed 174 Ukrainian drones over 13 regions. Three Ukrainian Neptune missiles were also shot down over the Black Sea.
- A locomotive train was derailed in Russia’s Belgorod region after the track was blown up, regional Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said.
Regional security
- German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said some US legislators do not understand the scale of Russia’s military rearmament campaign: “They clearly have no idea what is happening there right now,” he said after a meeting with US President Donald Trump.
- Merz said he had been reassured by President Trump’s “resounding no” to a question on whether the US had plans to withdraw from NATO.
Politics and diplomacy
- The Kremlin reacted angrily to comments by Trump, who likened the war in Ukraine to a bitter dispute between toddlers in a park.
- Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said it was possible Trump believed his own comments, but for Russia, the war on Ukraine was “existential”.
- “For us, it is an existential issue, an issue on our national interest, safety, on our future and the future of our children, of our country,” Peskov told reporters.
- Russia has asked the UN nuclear watchdog to mediate between Moscow and Washington to resolve the question of what to do with US nuclear fuel stored at Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, which is under Russian control.
- Russian nuclear energy chief Alexei Likhachev said that Russia was willing either to use the fuel, supplied by US company Westinghouse, or to remove it entirely and return it to the United States.
Sanctions
- President Trump said that he had not decided whether to deploy sanctions against Russia that are being considered by the US Senate.
Economy
- The Russian central bank has cut its key interest rate by a full percentage point, a surprise move by the bank, which it justified by pointing to declining inflation pressure and a more robust rouble. It was the first easing since September 2022 by the bank, which has faced pressure from business leaders and top government officials to begin cutting rates.
Russian attacks on Ukraine kill six as prisoner swap hangs in balance
At least six people have been killed and more than 20 wounded as Russia launched a barrage of missiles, drones and bombs across Ukraine, officials said, as an agreed exchange of prisoners of war appeared to hang in the balance with contradictory signals from Moscow and Kyiv.
The Ukrainian Air Force said on Saturday that Russia struck with 215 missiles and drones overnight, and Ukrainian air defences shot down and neutralised 87 drones and seven missiles.
At least three people were killed in the northeastern city of Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, Mayor Ihor Terekhov said, describing the assault as “the most powerful” on the city since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Later Saturday, Russia dropped aerial bombs on the city centre, killing at least one person and wounding five more, Kharkiv’s mayor said.
The two attacks injured more than 60 people, including children and a baby, local officials said.
Terekhov said of the early hours initial attack that 48 Iranian-made drones, two missiles and four guided bombs were fired before dawn at the city of 1.4 million people, located just 50km (30 miles) from the Russian border.
Kharkiv resident Alina Belous told The Associated Press news agency that she had tried to extinguish flames with buckets of water to rescue a young girl trapped inside a burning building who had called out for help.
“We were trying to put it out ourselves with our buckets, together with our neighbours. Then the rescuers arrived and started helping us put out the fire, but there was smoke and they worried that we couldn’t stay there. When the ceiling started falling off, they took us out,” she said.
Kharkiv was also hit by a Russian missile strike on Thursday that left 18 people injured, including four children.
Surge in attacks
Elsewhere in the south, Russian shelling hit the city of Kherson, killing a couple and damaging residential buildings, regional Governor Oleksandr Prokudin confirmed. In Dnipro, two women, aged 45 and 88, were injured in separate attacks.
Officials said that at least six people were killed and dozens were wounded on Friday when Russia launched an aerial bombardment across Ukraine. Rescue workers in the city of Lutsk on Saturday recovered another body, raising the toll from Friday’s attacks to seven.
Moscow said Friday’s assault was carried out in response to Ukrainian “terrorist acts” against Russia, saying military sites were targeted.
The surge in Russian attacks follows an unprecedented Ukrainian drone operation last weekend that damaged nuclear-capable military aircraft at Russian airbases deep behind the front lines, including in Siberia. Russian President Vladimir Putin pledged to retaliate for the attack, which Kyiv reportedly planned for 18 months using smuggled drones.
The strike reportedly targeted Russian bombers as they were being prepared for operations against Ukraine.
Ukraine, however, continues to push for a 30-day ceasefire and presented its latest proposal during talks in Istanbul on Monday. But Moscow has rejected calls for an immediate truce, insisting the war is a matter of national survival.
“For us, it is an existential issue,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Friday. “It concerns our national interest, our safety, and the future of our country.”
Putin has demanded Ukraine withdraw from four partially occupied regions, abandon its NATO ambitions and halt all Western military cooperation – terms Kyiv has dismissed as unacceptable. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has instead called for a three-way summit involving himself, Putin and United States President Donald Trump.
Exchange of prisoners
Later on Saturday, Ukraine rejected Russian claims that it delayed a planned exchange of prisoners and the return of soldiers’ remains, saying Moscow’s accusations were false and politically motivated.
Kremlin adviser Vladimir Medinsky had alleged that Kyiv indefinitely postponed the process, despite a prior agreement reached during talks in Istanbul to repatriate 12,000 bodies and conduct further prisoner swaps.
“The statements made today by the Russian side do not correspond to reality or previous agreements,” Ukraine’s Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War said in a Telegram post. It accused Moscow of “foul play” and deliberate “manipulation”.