Ukraine’s 425th Separate Assault Regiment Skelia is moving under the operational command of the 1st National Guard Corps Azov, as the Ukrainian military works to consolidate scattered Skelia units under a single command and eventually deploy them on the same section of the front.

The move comes amid scrutiny of Skelia following an investigation into dozens of non-combat deaths among its recruits and ongoing criminal proceedings over alleged abuse. It also forms part of broader reforms being carried out by newly appointed Commander-in-Chief Mykhailo Drapatyi, who made the decision to place Skelia under Azov’s operational command, according to the regiment.

Oleksii Bratushchak, head of communications for the Skelia regiment, announced the change on 13 August on the YouTube channel “Butusov Plus”. He stressed that Skelia is not becoming part of Azov’s organizational structure. The arrangement concerns operational command, meaning Azov will direct the regiment’s combat employment.

Skelia’s scattered units are being brought together

Bratushchak said Skelia is currently carrying out combat orders under Azov Corps command, although not all of its units have yet been transferred.

The regiment’s units have been spread across several areas and operating under different higher commands. The plan is to gradually bring them together so they can operate on the same part of the front.

Part of Skelia will move to the Dobropillia direction, where Azov Corps is deployed. Other elements remain on their current assignments for now, including the Pokrovsk, Kharkiv, and Kostiantynivka directions.

Bratushchak said Skelia’s command has already met with Azov and established cooperation. He described the decision as one made by Drapatyi and said the regiment views it positively.

The move follows personnel changes that began earlier in August. On 7 August, Ukrainska Pravda reported that Skelia had begun transferring soldiers to around 10 other units, citing sources in the regiment and Ukraine’s Defense Forces. 

The regiment confirmed that personnel were being reassigned on orders from higher command, while stressing that its units remained at their positions and continued carrying out combat tasks. The number of troops being transferred was not disclosed.

The move is part of Drapatyi’s ongoing reforms of Ukraine’s armed forces following his appointment as commander-in-chief. In July, the General Staff launched an audit of how personnel are distributed among brigades, regiments, and corps, reflecting Drapatyi’s focus on addressing imbalances in how Ukraine’s forces are manned.

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Skelia remains a separate regiment under Azov’s operational command

The change does not dissolve Skelia or turn it into an Azov unit. The regiment remains a separate military formation, while Azov Corps takes operational control over its forces for combat tasks.

Ukraine has been reorganizing its ground forces around corps-level commands, intended to give commanders greater control over multiple brigades and regiments operating in the same area.

Azov itself is now the core of Ukraine’s 1st National Guard Corps, commanded by Brigadier General Denys Prokopenko, known by his call sign “Redis.” The corps has been operating in the Donetsk region as part of Ukraine’s effort to consolidate forces and command structures on the battlefield.

The backdrop: deaths and abuse allegations inside Skelia

The reorganization comes less than two months after a major investigation into conditions inside Skelia’s training system triggered criminal and institutional investigations.

Babel’s investigation published in June documented 25 non-combat deaths among Skelia recruits between late 2025 and spring 2026, including cases where forensic findings raised questions about reported causes of death. Ukraine’s State Bureau of Investigations opened a criminal case, and Skelia’s commander was suspended pending the investigation.

Skelia confirmed that 25 of the 26 deaths cited in the investigation had occurred but disputed some of the reported circumstances. The regiment has denied that abuse was systemic.

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The investigation has since produced further legal action. Two Skelia servicemen were placed in pretrial detention in July over allegations of illegally detaining and beating fellow soldiers. 

On 11 August, Ukrainian lawmaker Oleksandr Fediyenko said, citing National Police data, that 103 criminal proceedings had been opened in 2026 over non-combat deaths in the regiment, with three people charged and one case sent to court.

The new operational arrangement does not itself indicate a change in the status of those investigations. Skelia’s communications office has said personnel transfers and organizational decisions are matters for higher military command and part of the management of Ukraine’s armed forces during wartime.

Russian security services are increasingly recruiting Ukrainians to carry out sabotage, terrorist attacks, and killings, with police reporting a sharp rise in attacks linked to such recruitment since 2024, according to independent Ukrainian outlet Babel.

Since the start of 2026, Ukraine’s National Police and Security Service have registered 31 terrorist attacks, 80% of which have been solved, while another 14 were prevented during preparation.

Authorities have also registered 11 cases of military personnel being poisoned that are being investigated for links to Russian recruitment.

From simple tasks to terrorism

Andrii Niebytov, deputy head of the National Police and chief of criminal police, said Russian recruitment became systematic in early 2024, Babel reported.

Russian handlers typically approach people through Telegram channels and chats where users seek work, easy money, or drugs. The first assignment may appear harmless: photographing a location, passing information, moving a package, or delivering an item.

The tasks can then escalate into property damage, arson, terrorist attacks, and killings. Police say handlers can gradually involve recruits in more serious crimes before using threats or blackmail to keep them under control.

The increase is reflected in police figures. Russian operatives used Ukrainian recruits to carry out nine terrorist attacks in 2024, according to data cited by Babel. The figure rose to 61 in 2025, including 27 attacks that police stopped during preparation. Authorities solved 52 terrorist cases that year.

Military personnel targeted through poisoning

One increasingly dangerous part of the recruitment campaign involves attempts to target Ukrainian service members.

Police have registered 11 poisoning cases since the beginning of 2026 in which investigators are examining or have established links to Russian recruitment, Babel reported.

In some cases, Russian handlers have used young women to establish contact with soldiers, arrange meetings, or deliver poisoned items.

In late July, police detained a 20-year-old woman in Poltava who is suspected of poisoning two soldiers with drugs allegedly provided to her by mail.

In Rivne, investigators are examining the death of a soldier allegedly poisoned by a minor girl with a drug mixed with alcohol. The Russian handler reportedly installed tracking software on the girl’s phone and remotely monitored her actions.

A toolkit built around vulnerability

Russian operatives use different entry points depending on the target. Some recruits are drawn in by promises of easy money or drugs, while others are manipulated through personal relationships or threatened with supposed criminal prosecution.

One scheme involves fraudulent call centers operating in Russian-occupied Ukrainian territories. Callers impersonate Security Service of Ukraine officials and accuse targets of offenses such as buying Russian-made goods or financing Russia.

Police are investigating 449 fraud cases involving this scheme. But according to Babel, the same tactic is now also being used for recruitment.

After intimidating targets, callers send fake summonses, notices of suspicion, or other documents through messaging apps. They then offer to help the person avoid prosecution in exchange for carrying out criminal assignments.

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Children used as disposable operatives

Russian handlers have also targeted minors, who can be easier to manipulate and may be used as intermediaries or perpetrators.

The National Police said 260 children have independently contacted authorities after being approached by Russian recruiters, according to Babel. Their reports helped prevent terrorist attacks in which minors were allegedly intended to be used as perpetrators.

Police say Russian intelligence services are constantly changing their methods, while the basic pattern remains consistent: identify a vulnerability, offer or impose an initial task, and gradually draw the recruit into more serious criminal activity.

Ukrainian authorities are urging people approached with suspicious offers or assignments to stop contact and report the recruitment attempt immediately.

Finland will provide €28.5 million ($33.2 million) to support new power generation in Ukraine, with Finnish company Wärtsilä selected to supply the equipment, Finland’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on 13 August.

Ukraine’s power system has been repeatedly damaged by Russian attacks, leaving the country facing each winter with reduced generation capacity and a heightened risk of electricity and heating disruptions. Strengthening distributed generation is therefore a key part of keeping essential services running when further strikes hit the energy grid, as they are expected to do ahead of the 2026-27 winter season.

The total value of the power plant technology is €46.5 million, with Ukraine covering the remaining cost. The plants will be manufactured in Vaasa, Finland, with the Ministry saying it will support Finnish jobs and exports while adding generation capacity to Ukraine’s war-damaged energy system.

Power generation for Ukraine’s winter

Ukraine’s state energy company Ukrnafta is purchasing the power plants to strengthen electricity production, with the need particularly acute ahead of another winter under Russian attacks.

“Reliable energy production is vital, particularly in winter months, when Russian strikes on energy infrastructure have made day-to-day life in Ukraine difficult,” Finland’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.

Russia has repeatedly targeted Ukraine’s electricity generation, transmission, gas, and heating infrastructure since the full-scale invasion. The attacks have caused widespread blackouts and damaged or destroyed large parts of Ukraine’s generation capacity.

Previous winters have shown the consequences. Russian strikes have repeatedly caused rolling blackouts, while damage to heating infrastructure has threatened access to heat and water during freezing weather.

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Ukrainian officials have warned that the coming winter could be more difficult than previous ones, as Russia is expected to again target Ukraine’s energy, heating, and water infrastructure. Russia has already intensified attacks on Ukrainian civilians and civilian infrastructure this summer, raising concerns that the campaign against essential services could escalate further during the winter months.

Finnish technology heads to Ukraine

Wärtsilä Finland Oy will manufacture the power plants in Vaasa.

Finnish Foreign Trade and Development Minister Ville Tavio said the project combines support for Ukraine with Finland’s energy-sector expertise.

“Finland has world class energy sector expertise that can benefit Ukraine’s reconstruction efforts,” Tavio said. “I am pleased that Finnish technology and Finnish workers are playing a part in strengthening the security of Ukraine’s energy supply.”

How Finland is financing the project

The €28.5 million Finnish contribution comes through the Finland–Ukraine Investment Facility, which supports public investments in Ukraine using Finnish technology, expertise, and services.

Finland’s funding will cover the interest costs and capital of the investment loan Ukraine will take out for the project. Finnish export credit agency Finnvera is providing a 100% export guarantee for the loan.

The project combines immediate energy support for Ukraine with Finnish financing, technology, and manufacturing capacity.

Ukraine and international partners agreed to work urgently on a mechanism for up to €4 billion ($4.6 billion) in farm loans, Ukrinform reported on 13 August. The plan would use a proposed €220 million ($253 million) EU grant, the Agriculture Ministry said.

Ukraine rebuilt its maritime trade after pushing Russia’s fleet away from its coast. By 2025, its Black Sea route carried about 92% of the country’s grain and oilseed exports. Russia is now striking the Odesa ports sustaining that recovery. The ministry says the attacks have closed three deep-water ports. Ukraine planned to export 64.4 million tons of agricultural products in 2026/27, but now says shipments may reach only 29.6 million tons. The proposed loan mechanism is meant to cover that cash shortfall before next year’s sowing.

EU and Norwegian diplomats joined the meeting with representatives of the World Bank and the UN Food and Agriculture Organization.

The participants agreed to develop the plan through the Ukraine Facility and EU guarantee institutions. They aim to do so in the coming weeks, before fall storage use peaks. The grant has not yet been approved.

Odesa attacks send Kyiv toward Baltic ports

The loan plan comes as Russia’s attacks force Ukraine to seek new export routes.

Russia initially blockaded Ukraine’s ports after launching its full-scale invasion. Ukraine later restored a sea corridor after forcing much of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet away. Moscow then shifted pressure to missiles and drones, hitting Ukrainian ports 90 times in 2025 and intensifying attacks this summer.

A Russian strike killed 10 people aboard the grain-carrying Golden Leo on 19 July. Three days later, no ship passed through the corridor.

Kyiv is now considering the Polish Baltic ports of Gdańsk, Gdynia, Szczecin, and Świnoujście. Yet the ministry estimates that all alternative routes may eventually carry only 2.9 million tons a month. Ukraine’s monthly target was 5.4 million tons.

Farm loans target next year’s sowing

The €220 million would not go directly to growers. It would subsidize interest and partly cover banks’ lending risks, including by expanding Ukraine’s “5-7-9%” affordable-loan program.

The ministry wants the support to generate €4 billion in farm loans at annual rates no higher than 10%. It calculates that every euro of grant money could mobilize more than €18 in lending.

Ukraine has also temporarily adjusted minimum export price coefficients to offset higher logistics costs, meeting participants noted. Without grain sales, farmers struggle to pay wages and land rents or buy fuel and fertilizer. By November, Ukraine's storage shortfall could reach 11 million tons of crops, with more than €10.8 billion ($12.4 billion) tied up in unsold stocks.

Ukraine’s Defense Forces struck a Russian Nebo-U long-range radar in occupied Sevastopol and several other military targets in Russia and occupied Ukrainian territories during a series of overnight attacks on 13 August, the General Staff of Ukraine’s Armed Forces reported.

The strikes are part of Ukraine’s broader “Middle-Strike” campaign, which targets Russian military infrastructure beyond the immediate front line.

Nebo-U radar hit in Sevastopol

The most significant overnight target was a Russian Nebo-U radar station in Sevastopol, occupied Crimea.

The Nebo-U is a Russian long-range, three-coordinate radar operating in the meter wavelength range. It is designed to detect and track airborne targets, including aircraft, cruise missiles, and ballistic missiles.

The General Staff said disabling the radar weakens Russia’s ability to detect and track incoming aircraft, cruise missiles, and ballistic missiles, potentially making it harder for Russian forces to detect future Ukrainian strikes and giving Ukrainian weapons a better chance of reaching their targets.

The Nebo-U is estimated to cost around $100 million, making it a high-value Russian surveillance system.

The radar strike supposedly came during a broader Ukrainian drone attack on Sevastopol that also damaged energy infrastructure, according to Russian occupation authorities. The attack caused a citywide blackout before power was later restored through a temporary setup. Ukrainian drones also reportedly targeted the Balaklava power plant, one of Crimea’s two main power stations.

Earlier strikes hit Crimean military infrastructure

The General Staff also reported strikes on Russian military infrastructure in occupied Crimea on 12 August, including a control tower at the Saky airfield.

Ukrainian forces also struck a communications relay near Chornomorske used to control Russian Geran and Gerbera strike drones, according to the General Staff. It said the strikes weaken Russia’s ability to operate the military airfield and control its attack drones.

Russian logistics and supply sites targeted

Ukrainian forces also struck a Russian drone control center near Myrne in occupied Zaporizhzhia Oblast, a fuel and lubricants depot near Dovzhansk in occupied Luhansk Oblast, and an ammunition depot near Novyi Hai in occupied Zaporizhzhia Oblast.

Another strike hit a Russian logistics and equipment depot near Kalanchak in occupied Kherson Oblast.

The General Staff said these strikes disrupt Russian logistics and reduce the military’s ability to accumulate and use ammunition, equipment, and personnel.

Strike reported inside Russia

Ukraine also reported striking a Russian personnel concentration area near Butyrky in Russia’s Belgorod Oblast.

The General Staff did not provide details on the weapons used, the scale of damage, or possible casualties at the individual sites.

The latest report is part of Ukraine’s continued campaign to strike Russian military infrastructure beyond the battlefield. The “Middle-Strike” concept focuses on targets that support Russia’s ability to conduct and sustain combat operations, including command, logistics, air defense, and other military facilities.

The General Staff said Ukrainian forces continue to carry out strikes against key Russian military targets.

On 13 August, the Ukrainian-Crimean Tatar partisan movement ATESH said its agents had disabled a communications tower near Pylna in northern Kharkiv Oblast. The group said the damage disrupted links between two Russian motor rifle regiments near the border.

Pylna lies on the Russian border and was among the villages seized when Moscow opened the northern Kharkiv front in May 2024. The claimed tower attack is part of a wider Ukrainian resistance effort behind Russian lines. Moscow's forces still depend on infrastructure in occupied territory to communicate, move supplies, and hold the line. Ukraine’s underground fighters exploit that dependence from within, targeting communications, transport, and fuel supplies to create problems for Russian units at the front.

ATESH said the tower carried data between Russian command posts and coordinated units in the area. The movement said its loss disrupted command channels and delayed border-zone mobile groups. It did not say how agents disabled the tower or how long the interruption would last.

The partisans stated that the communications between Russia’s 345th and 380th motor rifle regiments were hit hardest. The regiments operate in neighboring sectors and rely on stable links for joint action and rapid responses, according to the group. ATESH claimed their offensive tempo and ability to support each other had fallen.

Neither the claimed ATESH sabotage nor its reported effects have been independently verified.

ATESH attacks on Russian supply lines

The tower claim follows ATESH’s 10 August account of sabotaging an electric locomotive near Voronezh. The group said it carried military supplies toward the Kupiansk front in Kharkiv Oblast. In June, ATESH also said agents damaged power and rail equipment near Russia’s Novomoskovsk Azot plant, whose output feeds explosives production.

ATESH has also reported intelligence work inside Russian forces. In July, the group said an agent reported a Ukrainian strike on five military fuel trucks in occupied Luhansk. Together, the claims describe a campaign against transport, fuel, and communications behind the front.

Ukrainian resistance works behind the front

The claimed tower operation is one part of the Ukrainian resistance behind Russian lines. Underground networks also gather intelligence and sustain civil defiance. 

A Euromaidan Press investigation documented groups planting explosives, tracking Russian positions, distributing leaflets, and painting Ukrainian symbols despite the threat of imprisonment and torture.

ATESH says its network includes Ukrainians, Crimean Tatars, anti-war Russians, and sources inside Russia’s military and occupation administrations. Its claims are often impossible to verify independently. Taken together, they portray a campaign to make Russia’s rear less secure while other groups preserve Ukrainian identity under occupation.

Russia may expand hybrid attacks against Poland and the Baltic states, including infrastructure sabotage or false-flag attacks, Bloomberg reported on 12 August, citing an unnamed European intelligence official. 

The warnings come amid concern that Moscow wants to intimidate Ukraine’s supporters. The CIA warning follows Russian threats, incursions, alleged sabotage plots, and disinformation against Poland and the Baltic states. Most Western military aid reaches Ukraine through Poland, while the Baltic states rank among Kyiv’s strongest supporters. Sabotage of transport, energy, or communications can slow aid delivery and test NATO while hiding Russia’s role.

Separately, a European government official told Bloomberg that the CIA had warned countries in the region of a possible future Russian attack. The CIA declined to comment.

The same official said Russia might instead be creating the impression of an impending attack to sow fear as part of an information operation. The official saw no signs that Moscow was preparing a conventional attack or invasion.

Moscow tests NATO’s eastern flank

Poland and Lithuania had already raised similar concerns. In July, Poland said it had credible intelligence that Russia was planning new provocations. Lithuania later warned that Moscow might rebuild captured Ukrainian drones for false-flag strikes on critical infrastructure.

In September 2025, between 19 and 23 Russian drones entered Polish airspace, shutting down airports and damaging buildings. Poland closed four airports as NATO aircraft responded.

Meanwhile, five people are on trial in Lithuania over attacks allegedly organized for Russian military intelligence in 2024, Bloomberg reported. Lithuania has reinforced infrastructure sites and deployed troops since June.

These warnings and incidents place the CIA alert within a wider pattern of pressure on NATO’s eastern flank and Ukraine’s supporters. 

How Russia strikes without starting a war

Bloomberg cited several recent unexplained drone incidents in Germany alongside the CIA warning. Citing Die Zeit, Euromaidan Press reported that an explosive-laden drone struck the wing of a parked Ukrainian An-124 at Leipzig-Halle airport and failed to detonate. A US Defense Department official in Europe told CNN that Washington assessed the drone belonged to Russian intelligence. 

Bloomberg also reported that a cargo plane hit an unidentified object and that drones appeared over a military base the following day. It did not connect either incident to Russia.

More broadly, Russian hybrid operations have grown sharply since the full-scale invasion. CSIS found that attacks in Europe tripled from 2023 to 2024, after quadrupling the previous year. Separately, the US Helsinki Commission mapped nearly 150 operations in NATO territory attributed to or suspected of Russia between February 2022 and November 2024.

Retired Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges told Euromaidan Press in February that attacks on ports, railways, and cables can probe routes needed for NATO reinforcements. Their deniability raises the political cost of responding.

By hiding its role, Moscow can disrupt support for Ukraine and test NATO without openly starting a war. 

A 12-year-old with a high fever died without medical care in Russian-occupied Kherson Oblast, Hola Prystan official in exile Svitlana Linnyk told Ukrinform on 13 August 2026.

No medicine or medical worker was available locally, and the child’s mother could not reach an ambulance pickup point, she said.

The child's reported death comes amid a wider humanitarian crisis in Russian-occupied Kherson Oblast. UN and OSCE monitors found drone attacks, mines, and movement restrictions obstructing medical aid and evacuations around Oleshky and Hola Prystan, two occupied communities across the Dnipro from Kherson city. About 6,000 civilians, including 200 children, remained in and around the two communities as of May. Similar medical shortages span occupied Ukraine, while access to free medicines has been tied to having a Russian passport.

The Hola Prystan community where the child died has no operating hospital or rural medical post, Linnyk said. Only two pharmacies remain: one in the city of Hola Prystan and another in the nearby village of Nova Zburivka. Both are selling their remaining supplies.

The nearest hospital is in Skadovsk, an occupied Black Sea port about 60 kilometers by road from Hola Prystan. Nova Zburivka’s ambulance has not operated since 2025. 

Russian occupation authorities have distributed no humanitarian aid for at least eight months to villages surrounding Hola Prystan, or for over a year in the city itself, Linnyk said. 

Linnyk said a Moscow Patriarchate priest occasionally brought supplies but gave them only to Russian passport holders. This reflects a broader pattern of tying basic services in occupied Ukraine to accepting Russian citizenship.

Ukrainian children face a medical system stripped bare 

The medical dangers surrounding the 12-year-old’s death are not confined to Hola Prystan.

In April 2025, Ukraine’s National Resistance Center reported that occupation officials were administering vaccines to children under six in Luhansk Oblast. It described the vaccines as uncertified and of unknown origin.

That November, the Center said a Russian inspection found Crimea’s main children’s hospital lacked breathing bags and cardiac monitors. It said infant mortality on the occupied peninsula had risen 9% over the previous year.

Aid comes with a Russian passport

Hola Prystan is not the only occupied community where access to care has depended on Russian citizenship.

In 2023, Russian-installed officials in occupied Zaporizhzhia Oblast threatened to deny medical care to residents without Russian passports. A 2025 Kremlin policy later tied free medicines for chronic illnesses to Russian citizenship.

Ukraine’s Health Ministry reported in July 2024 that Russian forces had destroyed 214 medical facilities. It said the full toll remained unknown because authorities had limited access to occupied territories. 

Lithuania's government approved an expanded plan on 12 August to fortify its borders with Russia and Belarus against a possible attack, LRT reports. Lithuania, a Baltic state and NATO member, sits wedged between Russia's Kaliningrad exclave and Belarus. The decision opens a new counter-mobility belt reaching inland from the border, a 20-meter strip that widens to 150 meters where the army marks out areas for operations.

The buildout answers a fear that has gripped the Baltics since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022: that a Russia left unchecked in Ukraine could turn on them next. Western intelligence agencies have warned for years that Moscow could eventually threaten NATO itself, and former CIA director David Petraeus has singled out Lithuania as the likeliest first target, pinned between Kaliningrad and Belarus and sitting beside the Suwałki Gap, the thin land corridor that is NATO's only overland route to the Baltic states.

The decision raises the number of engineering parks, storage depots for obstacles like concrete blocks and roadblocks, from 27 to 50, and gives that work until the end of 2028, more than three years past the original April 2025 target. The state rail company LTG Infra is to store the equipment. The changes could cost an extra €50 million ($58 million) from the State Defense Fund between 2026 and 2030.

Of the Baltic states and Poland fortifying their eastern borders, Lithuania is the most at risk yet the least fortified, according to a satellite review by open-source analyst Clément Molin, even as Belarus keeps testing that border with engineered migrant crossings. The plan is Lithuania's share of the Baltic Defense Line, the joint barrier it launched in 2024 with Latvia and Estonia, alongside Poland's parallel East Shield.

The design comes straight from Ukraine. Lithuania began building counter-mobility parks in 2023, drawing on Russia's war against Ukraine, and much of what it is now putting into the ground, the swamps, ditches, and obstacle fields, was tested first on Ukrainian battlefields, where mud, water, and simple barriers have repeatedly stalled armored advances.

The restored swamps should make some ground impassable to heavy military vehicles within a few years, the Defense Ministry says, with that work due by the end of 2030. Plans for defensive ditches and streams in the Marijampolė municipality were dropped, and the ministry found better sites in the Vilkaviškis and Šakiai districts. Deadlines for obstacles on roads and bridge approaches, and for fitting bridges with holders for explosives, were also moved to the end of 2028.

"Military counter-mobility is an important part of Lithuania's defence preparedness," Deputy Defense Minister Tomas Mikelkevičius said. "We seek to make the best possible use of Lithuania's terrain and engineering measures to impede an adversary's movement if necessary and create more favorable conditions for our armed forces to operate."

Lithuania approved its first counter-mobility plan in July 2024. The plan's original 2024 estimate put the full system at around €600 million ($690 million) over the decade.

Russia's pressure on the Baltic borders

The buildout lands amid steady friction along NATO's eastern edge. Latvia has absorbed the bulk of the migrant crossings funneled from Belarus, and this week found its first used smuggling tunnel under the border. Estonia has switched on the first sensors of a planned drone wall along its Russian frontier and is reallocating €500 million ($575 million) toward air defense and long-range strike. Russia, for its part, has shut seven rail crossings with Latvia, Estonia, and Finland without explanation.

The fortification drive is a bet on time. Estonia's military chief has set a two-year clock, warning Russia could be combat-ready again by 2027, and ISW analysts assessed in May that Moscow was manufacturing pretexts for aggression against the Baltics. Poland's parallel East Shield, meanwhile, has gone up far slower than promised, leaving the region's defenses still thin where the threat is judged greatest.

The Coordination Headquarters for the Treatment of Prisoners of War said the remains arrived on 13 August, and that investigators will now work to establish the identities.

Ukraine recovered the 261 bodies as part of repatriation measures carried out with Russia, the Coordination Headquarters reported. Russia claims the dead are Ukrainian servicemen, but law enforcement investigators and forensic experts will conduct the identification before any confirmation.

The return of the dead remains one of the few channels that still functions between Kyiv and Moscow during Russia's war against Ukraine. Each handover lets families of the missing bury their relatives, and it again relied on the International Committee of the Red Cross, which helped coordinate the exchange.

Ukraine's Interior Ministry, the Security Service of Ukraine, the Armed Forces, the Office of the Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights, the State Emergency Service, and the Secretariat of the Commissioner for Missing Persons under Special Circumstances all took part, the Coordination Headquarters said. Units of the Armed Forces transported the remains and passed them to police and to medical examiners under the Health Ministry for identification.

Previous exchanges

The handover is the latest in a long series of transfers Russia has carried out during its war against Ukraine, and in each case it has claimed the dead were Ukrainian servicemen or citizens, an account Ukrainian forensic experts verify independently. The exchanges have followed the Istanbul agreements that Kyiv and Moscow reached on 2 June 2025. Over the course of that June, Russia returned 6,057 bodies, and on 17 July 2025 it handed over another 1,000. Further transfers of 1,000 followed on 19 August, 18 September, 23 October, and 20 November 2025, before Russia returned 1,003 bodies on 19 December. The exchanges continued into 2026 with 1,000 bodies on 26 February and another 1,000 on 9 April, after which the totals fell to 522 on 18 June and 501 on 16 July, ahead of the 261 returned on 13 August.

Taken together, the transfers have returned thousands of the dead since mid 2025, which makes the repatriation of remains one of the most consistent forms of contact that still survives between Kyiv and Moscow.

A man was killed in an explosion in occupied Sevastopol on the morning of 13 August, according to the Russian outlet ASTRA and the local Telegram channel Emergency/Sevastopol.

The man's identity has not been officially confirmed, but Russian and Ukrainian Telegram channels are circulating claims that he is Robert Shahieiev, deputy commander of the 4th separate submarine brigade of Russia's Black Sea Fleet — a former Ukrainian Navy officer who sided with Russia after the occupation of Crimea.

What happened

According to preliminary information from Russian sources, the man was walking down a set of stairs with a friend when the explosion occurred. He died of his injuries at the scene. The device is believed to have been planted in a trash bin next to a bench, per preliminary reports cited by Ukrainska Pravda.

The Russian Telegram channel "Baza" reported that the blast took place in a park behind a residential block on Stoletovsky Avenue and that forensic investigators were working at the scene. The channel said local residents were being urged to stay alert and avoid approaching suspicious objects.

Some witnesses initially believed a drone had struck a nearby building because of how loud the blast was, according to accounts circulating on Telegram.

Unverified claim about a suspect

The pro-Kremlin channel Mash claimed a woman carrying a backpack may have been involved, alleging she stood between two residential buildings — numbers 28 and 30 — and watched the man before the explosion. Ukrainska Pravda noted this claim has not been confirmed.

No source has provided official confirmation of the victim's identity or a motive for the attack.

Poland will decide within days whether to send Ukraine another batch of Patriot interceptor missiles, Deputy Defense Minister Magdalena Sobkowiak-Czarnecka said in a radio interview RMF24. Any transfer, she said, has to be judged first against Poland's own security.

A Russian strike on NATO soil is now moving Warsaw where months of Ukrainian appeals had not. Sobkowiak-Czarnecka said Defense Minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz leans toward sending more interceptors after a Russian missile crashed inside Poland on 30 July, and that he would rather one be shot down over Ukraine than reach Polish soil.

Tusk had signaled at the end of July that Warsaw would soon weigh sending more Patriots. Sobkowiak-Czarnecka's remarks are the first to put a timeline on that decision.

Warsaw had been split for weeks over whether giving up the missiles was the right call. She set that argument aside, saying only that a decision is a matter of the coming days.

A second handover from a thin stock

This would not be the first transfer. In the spring, Poland quietly gave Ukraine five PAC-3 MSE interceptors — the missiles a Patriot battery uses to stop ballistic threats — a move confirmed only in July, when the defense ministry declassified its aid records and Prime Minister Donald Tusk put the number at five.

The disclosure drew sharp criticism at home. Opposition figures noted that the PAC-3 is the only interceptor Poland holds capable of downing Russia's Iskander ballistic missiles — the same class of weapon now crossing into Polish airspace.

Why the interceptors are so scarce

PAC-3 interceptors are among the hardest munitions in NATO to spare. The United States builds them at a rate that does not cover its own needs, and only a handful of alliance members operate them at all.

Ukraine has been pressing for them for months. In early July, after one of the largest air attacks of the war, Kyiv appealed to nearly 40 countries to release Patriot missiles from existing stocks, warning that its air defenses cannot stop Russia's ballistic missiles without them.

Poland holds roughly 200 of the interceptors, by Ukrainian estimates — its own shield against the missiles now reaching its border. Kosiniak-Kamysz's reasoning turns that overlap into the case for giving some away: better the interceptor meets the missile over Ukraine than over Poland.

The transfer would come with Polish-Ukrainian relations at their lowest point in years. In May, Volodymyr Zelenskyy granted a special forces unit the honorary title "Heroes of the UPA" — the wartime insurgent army Poland blames for the Volhynia massacres of the 1940s, which Warsaw recognizes as genocide. Polish President Karol Nawrocki responded in June by stripping Zelenskyy of the Order of the White Eagle, the country's highest honor; three former Ukrainian presidents returned their own in solidarity, and Nawrocki has since tied Ukraine's path into the EU to the unresolved history. Yet the friction runs mostly at the presidential level. The aid decisions sit with the Tusk government, and it has kept the weapons — and now, in all likelihood, the interceptors — moving to Kyiv regardless.

Ukraine struck the Novorossiysk naval base in Russia's Krasnodar Krai overnight on 12 August, and for the first time coordinated more than 15 different strike systems in a single operation, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said. The package combined Palianytsia jet drones, Neptune anti-ship missiles and naval drones, hitting warships, air defenses and oil infrastructure at the Black Sea Fleet's main base.

Novorossiysk is the refuge Russia's fleet fled to after Ukrainian drones and missiles pushed it out of occupied Crimea. Reaching its warships there with a mixed salvo — and getting through air defenses that bystander footage showed firing heavily — is the operational read the strike carries, more than any single ship damaged.

The systems and the targets

Zelenskyy named more than a dozen systems that worked together for the first time, from the Palianytsia and Peklo drones to the long-range Neptune and a set of naval drones. He thanked weapons developers for the added reach, framing the coordination itself as the milestone rather than the results.

The Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) confirmed hits on two Kalibr-carrying frigates, the Admiral Essen and Admiral Makarov, and the patrol ship Vasily Bykov. The same strike hit an S-300 radar, a firing position on one of the port's piers, the Sheskharis oil terminal and three of the harbor's berths — a target list wider than the ships alone.

How many ships

The three Ukrainian accounts agree on the two frigates but not on the full tally. The General Staff counted four warships, adding a Buyan-M missile ship to the SBU's three. Zelenskyy separately cited a large landing ship and a corvette among the vessels hit.

Independent analysts who reviewed satellite imagery told The Maritime Executive the damage did not appear catastrophic, with no ships visibly burning or sinking. Ukraine's General Staff said the assessment is still under way.

The fleet's shrinking refuge

The strike extends a campaign that has driven Russia's fleet eastward without Ukraine fielding a navy of its own. Having lost safe basing in Sevastopol, Russia moved its ships more than 300 kilometers from the front — far from Ukraine, but no longer out of reach.

The operation's footprint reached past the base. Russian authorities in Novorossiysk declared a state of emergency and cut water to the port city, and the strike on the Sheskharis oil terminal hit infrastructure that helps fund the war. Zelenskyy said Ukraine would keep striking such targets, and that Russia alone can end the war it started.

Ukraine holds only about a tenth of the Patriot interceptor missiles it needs from the United States to stop Russia's surging ballistic strikes, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told CNN. Selling Kyiv 5% of the current US stockpile would carry the country through winter, he said, and 10% would let it "destroy all the Russians' ballistic missiles" — but he holds 1%.

The plea puts a number on a shortage that has run through Ukraine's diplomacy all summer and left its cities increasingly exposed. It is the concrete cost of near-empty interceptor stocks: on 5 August, Russia fired 28 ballistic and anti-ship missiles at Kyiv and Ukraine intercepted none of them, killing 17 people, and four days earlier launched 27 ballistic missiles with only one stopped. July was the deadliest month for Ukrainian civilians since April 2022, according to the UN.

The arithmetic of a losing race

"This year we have two and a half times less interceptors than we had in 2025," Zelenskyy said, while "Russia has two times more ballistic missiles per month than they had before."

The interceptor that most reliably stops those missiles, the US-made Patriot's PAC-3, is scarce worldwide: the war between the United States and Iran drained stocks as American and Gulf forces spent dozens against Iranian missiles and drones, and the shortage has fallen hardest on Ukraine.

The bottleneck is structural, not budgetary. Only five or six countries build interceptors capable of stopping ballistic missiles, the US makes around 600 Patriots a year, and orders are placed years in advance — so money alone cannot close the gap before winter, defense expert Marc DeVore told Euromaidan Press in June.

A home-built Patriot, still uncertain

Zelenskyy said doubts remain over whether US President Donald Trump's apparent offer to let Ukraine manufacture its own Patriot interceptors will materialize. At the NATO summit in Ankara, Trump said he would license Ukraine to build the missiles, then days later said he was unsure; the Patriot makers have since sent officials to Kyiv, without result so far. "I hope that I will get it," Zelenskyy said, calling it "one of the biggest [challenges] I had from the very beginning of this war."

He described daily, largely private deal-making to close the gap: "million phone calls ... I try to exchange something to missiles ... I do some things which I can't even share. It doesn't mean that it's outside of the law. But I can't speak about it."

Putin, the Donbas, and the next war

On the stalled peace process, Zelenskyy said Kyiv had put new proposals to the Trump administration and needed "more involvement of the American side," adding that Vladimir Putin "doesn't want to stop this war now and (there's) not enough pressure on him now." He rejected ceding the rest of the Donbas that Putin seeks, arguing security guarantees matter more: "Why he will not come again ... to occupy us?"

He confirmed a recent call with Vice President JD Vance but declined to say whether Vance had asked Ukraine to halt strikes on a Russian Black Sea oil port that were hurting US firms and threatening a spike in global energy prices, as the Financial Times reported. Zelenskyy also endorsed Western assessments that Putin could widen the war toward a smaller NATO state, likely in the Baltics: "He wants quick victory ... occupy or destroy or control."

A large-scale Ukrainian drone attack cut electricity across occupied Sevastopol overnight on 13 August, with power later restored on a temporary scheme after strikes damaged the city's energy infrastructure, the Russian-installed head of the city wrote on his Telegram channel.

The blackout is the latest blow in Ukraine's months-long campaign to isolate occupied Crimea by degrading the fuel, power, and transport networks Russia relies on to hold the peninsula. Sevastopol — the former main base of Russia's Black Sea Fleet — has lost power repeatedly since early June, when Ukraine sharply escalated strikes on Crimean energy sites.

What was hit

Drones headed toward the Balaklava thermal power plant, one of the peninsula's two main power stations, while mobile fire groups worked over Sevastopol, the monitoring channel Crimean Wind reported. Witnesses described an explosion and the loss of electricity across the city.

A fire also broke out at a large water-supply facility near the village of Shturmove, south of Sevastopol, around the time of the strike on Balaklava, the same channel said. The cause has not been established. The site houses the city's No. 3 hydro unit, which supplies Sevastopol's water.

Elsewhere on the peninsula, gunfire was reported near the Tavriiska thermal power plant, and Russian air defense operated near the Gvardiiske airfield.

A grid already rationing power

Russia closed the Crimean Bridge to road traffic during the attack, the crossing's occupation-run information channel reported.

The outage lands on a grid already under strain. Sevastopol last went fully dark on 27 July, and in July the occupation authorities imposed a rolling blackout schedule that left residents with about six hours of electricity a day. Since early June, Ukrainian strikes have repeatedly cut power across Crimea, with some districts dark for a week or more, alongside disruptions to water and mobile coverage.

The isolation campaign

Ukrainian officials have described the strikes as stages of a plan to cut occupied Crimea off from mainland Russia. Beyond power plants, Ukraine has hit the fuel tankers supplying the peninsula, the bridges and rail links feeding it, and Russian vessels — leaving Crimea rationing petrol and, at times, short of food.

Ukraine's military had not publicly claimed the 13 August strike as of publication.

Ukrainian drones struck the Gazprom Neftekhim Salavat oil-refining and petrochemical complex in Russia's Bashkortostan on the morning of 13 August, setting off a fire — the second strike on one of Russia's largest refineries in a month.

The repeat hit lands as Ukraine's deep-strike campaign forces Russian refining to its lowest level since 2002 and pushes fuel shortages back into at least 16 regions, where drivers again face queues and sales limits at filling stations. Striking the same plants faster than Moscow can repair them is the point — each return resets the clock on units that take weeks or months to rebuild.

What happened

Bashkortostan's head, Radiy Khabirov, confirmed that debris from a downed drone fell in Salavat's industrial zone and sparked a blaze, which he called a "terrorist attack." Ukrainian monitoring channels Exilenova+ and Supernova identified the target as the Gazprom Neftekhim Salavat plant, and residents reported a column of black smoke over the site. Ukraine's military had not commented on the strike.

The complex is one of Russia's largest refining and petrochemical sites. It processed about 7.2 million tons of crude in 2024 — roughly 2.7% of Russia's total refining — and turns out gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, ammonia, and more, according to Reuters, citing industry sources.

Ukrainian drones struck the same plant on 14 July, damaging two primary distillation units and halting operations; industry sources told Reuters the repairs could take weeks to months. Open-source data cited by Radio Svoboda places Russia's only heptyl rocket-fuel producer, the Salavat Chemical Plant, inside the same industrial perimeter, though there is no confirmation it was hit.

A campaign that keeps resetting repairs

Since early August, at least four refineries have stopped processing after Ukrainian strikes, including plants in Orenburg, Tyumen, Saratov, and Volgograd oblasts. Across 2026, attacks have interrupted work at no fewer than 26 refineries, seven of them still offline at the end of July, according to S&P Global.

Russian refining has fallen to about 3.6 million barrels a day, the lowest since 2002, per EA Analytics — the trigger for the fuel crisis now resurfacing. Shortages had eased by late July, but by mid-August residents of at least 16 regions were again reporting queues and sales restrictions, with Ai-92 and Ai-95 grades pulled from some Gazprom and Lukoil stations.

Attack on warehouse Wildberries

Drones also struck a Wildberries logistics center under construction in Bashkortostan's Chishminsky district, according to the monitoring channel Astra.

Wildberries is Russia's largest online retailer. The hub—about 187,000 square meters—has been under construction since 2024 on the grounds of the "Center of Agrotechnologies" agropark.

A Russian jet-powered Shahed drone struck the locomotive of a passenger train in Odesa Oblast on the morning of 13 August, killing the driver and his assistant, Ukraine's national rail operator Ukrzaliznytsia reported. The train was carrying 340 passengers on the Odesa–Dnipro route.

Russia has spent 2026 methodically dismantling the network that keeps Ukraine supplied, destroying or damaging more than 200 locomotives in the first half of the year alone, as Euromaidan Press documented. The crew kept the train moving toward a station so passengers could get out; all 340 evacuated without injury, and were driven on to Odesa by bus.

Overnight drone barrage

Ukraine's Air Force shot down 111 of the 133 Shahed drones Russia launched overnight, it said. Part of Izmail lost power after the attack, and a strike set port infrastructure alight in Odesa Oblast.

A drone damaged a civilian vessel at a Mykolaiv Oblast port. In Chernihiv Oblast, Russia hit two raions, damaging homes and knocking out a filling station; a child was treated for shock.

Kherson and Kharkiv

Two men were killed and a three-year-old injured in a strike on Kherson's Korabelnyi district, according to reports. A separate airstrike on the city's central district injured a 63-year-old man, local officials reported.

In Kharkiv Oblast, a Russian strike killed a 36-year-old woman in Tsyrkuny. Three more people were wounded when Russia hit the center of a village elsewhere in the oblast.

Zaporizhzhia and the northeast

Over the previous day, Russia killed one person and injured three in Zaporizhzhia Oblast, striking 52 settlements 962 times with airstrikes, drones, and artillery, regional head Ivan Fedorov said. Seven people were injured across Sumy Oblast, where Russia shelled 19 settlements, the regional administration reported.

By the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine's account, Mykhailo, one of its soldiers, deployed to the forest in October 2024 with the rapid-response border commandant unit Shkval and held off Russian assaults while fortifying the ground under constant drone attack.

Holding a position like that on a static, drone-saturated front takes endurance as much as firepower. A unit has to supply itself, down to digging its own water under fire. The Serebryanskyi forest, on the border of Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts, has been contested since 2022. Euromaidan Press has previously reported on Ukrainian storming operations in the forest and on Azov's account of driving Russian forces from some positions there in 2024.

Mykhailo worked abroad in construction after his studies, then signed a contract with the State Border Guard Service in 2020. He served first at the Nismychi unit, then at Belz, where he worked as a district inspector, before the October 2024 rotation with Shkval put him on the positions for 115 days.

"Logistics were not easy. Drones delivered the food, and we also had to supply the positions with water. So we even dug our own well, to have our own water and to be able to bring in more food," Mykhailo recalled.

He returns repeatedly to the men around him. When his own endurance ran out, he said, it was his brothers-in-arms who kept him in place.

"Your brothers-in-arms motivate you. When I said I couldn't take it anymore, they said: 'Sit tight. Together to the end.' And so we all sat there together to the end," he said.

Mykhailo is motivated by his family, which he considers his greatest incentive to defend Ukraine.

Ukraine reached the port where Russia's Black Sea Fleet took shelter and hit four of its warships. On the night of 12 August 2026, in a joint operation, Ukraine's Defense Forces struck the naval base at Novorossiysk in Russia's Krasnodar Krai, the General Staff reported.

Novorossiysk became Russia's main Black Sea naval base after Ukrainian strikes and sea drones drove the fleet out of occupied Sevastopol in Crimea, so reaching its warships there strikes at the refuge that was supposed to be safe.

The ships that were hit

The four vessels are among the fleet's more capable surface combatants. The two Project 11356 frigates, Admiral Makarov and Admiral Essen, are among the newest and most important surface ships Russia has kept in the Black Sea, both capable of launching Kalibr cruise missiles at Ukraine.

The Buyan-M is another Kalibr shooter. The Project 21631 small missile ship carries the same cruise missiles Russia fires at Ukrainian cities, and the Vasily Bykov is a patrol ship of the class Ukraine has struck before, so the strike damaged both major missile-carrying combatants and a patrol vessel in one night.

The overall damage at the base is still being assessed.

The fleet has no safe harbor left

The strike extends a campaign that has steadily pushed Russia's fleet eastward and out of action. Ukraine drove the Black Sea Fleet from Sevastopol without a navy of its own, using drones and missiles, forcing Russia to pull its ships back to Novorossiysk, farther from Ukraine but not out of reach.

This means that Russia holds no waters it can use and now no harbor where its ships are safe. Ukraine's Defense Forces said they consistently reduce Russia's capacity to continue its armed aggression, and damaging four warships at their fallback base is the naval form of that pressure.

Russia is forcing Ukrainian prisoners into its own army and starving others while "fattening" a few for show, Andrii Pasternak of the SBU's Joint Center for coordinating the search and release of prisoners says. Ukrainian intelligence also has information about Moscow creating battalions from Ukrainian prisoners of war (POWs), UkrInform reports.

As of May 2026, approximately 7,000 Ukrainian service members were held in Russian captivity, while the number of civilian detainees is estimated at between 10,000 and 20,000, according to Vice Speaker of the Ukrainian Parliament Olena Kondratiuk.

Russia is forming units from Ukrainian prisoners

Pasternak described the POW battalions as confirmed and monitored.

"We know about such battalions. Together with our colleagues from foreign intelligence and military intelligence, we track and record this. Such facts exist," he stated.

Forcing prisoners of war to serve in the captor's forces is itself a war crime. The Geneva Conventions prohibit compelling a POW to fight against their own country, and turning captured Ukrainian soldiers into Russian units, if confirmed at scale, would be a grave violation on top of the coercion required to make men fight the country they were defending.

Russia feeds up some prisoners and starves others

The coordinator also pointed to a practice of staging appearances before exchanges. Knowing whom it will hand over, Russia brings those prisoners, including civilians, into "normal form" through a process he called "fattening," drawing on testimony from released Ukrainian defenders and returned civilians.

The starvation behind it is deliberate and selective. Pasternak characterized it as an element of torture: some prisoners are deliberately not fed, while others are fed up so they look more or less normal for the swap. Ukraine's negotiators note at every meeting that the two sides' prisoners differ starkly, he added. The returning Ukrainians are almost all very thin, with only a few in decent condition, while the Russian POWs Ukraine hands back are genuinely well-fed.

Russia has ceased producing its Geran-3 jet-powered attack drone, Ukraine’s Military Intelligence (HUR) told the Ukrainian defense outlet Militarnyi. The agency estimates Russian industry now makes about 3,000 newer Geran-4 and Geran-5 drones per month.

Russia is shifting toward faster jet drones as Ukraine’s low-cost interceptors have become more effective against slower Shaheds. The Geran-4 and Geran-5 leave defenders less time to react, requiring faster interceptors or short-range air defenses. At the reported production rate, these newer Geran models, previously used in limited numbers, could become a regular feature of Russian attacks.

HUR said Russia has established serial assembly of the two newer models at the Alabuga complex in Tatarstan, with other Russian companies supplying components. The agency also said Russia’s Defense Ministry wants to expand Alabuga’s capacity. Construction began in May. Satellite imagery showed large-scale work by early July 2026, although the purpose of the new buildings remains unknown.

From Geran-3 to newer jet drones

Russia first used Geran-3 drones in large numbers during a combined nighttime attack on Ukraine on 30 July 2025. At least eight flew alongside propeller-driven Shaheds and decoys. The model retained the Geran-2 airframe but replaced its piston engine with a Chinese Telefly JT80 turbojet. HUR gave it a speed of 300–370 kilometers per hour and a range of up to 1,000 kilometers.

In May, then-Defense Ministry adviser Serhii “Flash” Beskrestnov said Ukrainian defenses stopped 95% of incoming Shaheds during the most recent documented strike and predicted Moscow would produce more jet-powered Geran variants.

The newer Geran-4 has a more robust airframe than the Geran-3 and is designed for high-speed flight and maneuvers. It can reach 500 kilometers per hour.

The larger Geran-5 carries a roughly 90-kilogram warhead and has a stated range of up to 1,000 kilometers. HUR has said Russia may equip it with R-73 air-to-air missiles, potentially threatening aircraft sent to intercept it.

The Chinese engines that Russia itself can't build

The Geran line combines Iranian designs, Russian assembly, and imported technology. HUR described the Geran-3 as a localized version of Iran’s Shahed-238. It found 45 foreign components inside, including parts from the United States, China, Switzerland, Germany, Britain, and Japan.

Russia depends on China for the turbojet engines in newer Geran models. HUR deputy chief Vadym Skibitskyi told RBC-Ukraine that Russia remains fully dependent on Chinese turbojet engines for the Geran-4 and Geran-5. Each costs about $35,000–$40,000, he said.

A Chinese XK-F358 mesh radio recovered from a Geran-5 also helps Russian drones resist jamming. Its manufacturer remains outside the US, EU, UK, and Ukrainian sanctions, according to a review by Euromaidan Press.

A Ukrainian court sentenced the former chief engineer of Lyman’s locomotive depot to 15 years in prison with property confiscation for helping Russia target the frontline city, Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) said on 11 August. Investigators report he sent a Russian handler the locations of Ukrainian positions intended for guided-bomb and artillery strikes.

Lyman blocks Russia’s northern route toward Sloviansk and Kramatorsk, which are part of Ukraine's fortress belt in the Donbas. As attacks on supply lines intensify, information about Ukrainian positions can help Russia direct bombs and artillery. The case fits a broader pattern of Russian intelligence recruiting people inside Ukraine to locate targets. Russian services have used money and blackmail, including threats against recruits’ families, to secure their cooperation.

According to the SBU, the former engineer traveled around Lyman and its outskirts to record Ukrainian military bases. He marked possible targets on Google Maps, then sent screenshots to a handler in Russia through a messaging app.

The collaborator operated from basement

The agency said an acquaintance whom it described as a “DNR deputy” in occupied Donetsk Oblast connected him with Russian intelligence. The SBU said the man moved into an apartment building’s basement to shelter himself while directing Russian strikes on the community.

SBU officers detained him in Sloviansk in May 2026. The agency said a seized smartphone contained evidence of his reconnaissance and contacts with the Russian side.

The SBU did not identify the man, the court, or any specific strike enabled by his information.

How Russia turns locals into spotters 

The Lyman case involved an acquaintance of the former engineer, but Russian services also use money, blackmail, and online platforms to find recruits. The SBU says minors may initially receive simple assignments, such as taking photographs or painting graffiti, before being directed toward more serious sabotage.

Other recruits have allegedly answered Telegram offers of “easy money.” These include a Zaporizhzhia man later convicted of building bombs and a Dnipro suspect accused of activating more than 1,000 Starlink terminals for Russian forces.

Ukraine has prosecuted similar cases before. In November 2024, a court sentenced another Russian agent to 15 years for guiding missile and drone strikes in Zhytomyr Oblast.

More recent cases remain at the allegation stage. The SBU has accused a Kharkiv Oblast man of installing hidden cameras near military sites and a Poltava student of mapping energy facilities while filming air-defense units.

Russia is turning out its cheap Banderol drone-cruise missile at scale. Russia is capable of producing up to 80 jet-powered weapons a month, Ukraine's Defense Intelligence (HUR) told the defense outlet Militarnyi in response to a query.

The production figure sharpens a threat Ukraine has tracked as the Banderol expands. The missile has a relatively short range of about 500 kilometers, so Russia effectively launches it from Crimea at Odesa. It means Russia can sustain and grow the Banderol strikes on Ukraine's south, a weapon whose ground launcher Ukraine recently found could let Russia fire it without warning and in salvos.

The missile is fast, cheap, and short-range

The Banderol was developed and is made by the Russian company Kronshtadt, reaching a maximum speed of 620 to 650 kilometers per hour and cruising at 520 to 560, with a fragmentation-high-explosive warhead of 114.3 kilograms, of which 49.5 kilograms is explosive.

Its range dictates where it is used. At about 500 kilometers, the Banderol cannot reach far into Ukraine, which is why Russia fires it from occupied Crimea at Odesa, using the peninsula's proximity to strike the southern port city that has borne so much of Russia's missile campaign.

It has launched them at the Kyiv agglomeration to hit Rozetka, Ukraine's largest online retailer.

Banderol's jet propulsion allows speeds that Ukrainian mobile fire teams cannot match with standard ground-based machine guns. Countering the missile requires systems like the Gepard that can track fast-moving targets. 

The production runs on Western parts

The 80-a-month figure comes at a cost in effort and imports. To sustain the stated production rate, Russian enterprises work in three shifts, and to make the missiles, Russia uses Western components.

Ukraine's War & Sanctions portal documented over 20 foreign-made components and approximately 20 microchips of foreign origin from 30 different companies in the missile's construction, with a Chinese Swiwin SW800Pro jet engine, available on AliExpress for approximately $16,000, powering the weapon.

Latvia has discovered its first known border tunnel used to enter the country illegally from Belarus, the country’s State Border Guard said on 11 August. Officers intercepted 15 people who had crossed through the underground passage and returned them to Belarus.

Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland accuse Belarus and Russia of directing migrants toward their borders to retaliate for EU sanctions and strain countries supporting Ukraine. Minsk and Moscow deny orchestrating the crossings. Tunnels found in Lithuania and Latvia show organizers adapting to fortified borders, requiring Baltic governments to deploy more personnel and surveillance technology.

The tunnel was about 10 meters from Latvia's fence

Border guards found the group on 10 August in Skrudaliena parish, in Latvia’s southeastern Augšdaugava municipality, and briefed the public on the discovery the following day. The operation involved the State Police, a Lithuanian border-service dog handler, and a rapid-response unit, the Latvian Border Guard said.

While reconstructing the group’s route, officers found the passage near the Silene border post, about 10 meters from Latvia’s fence. The agency said it had received intelligence that a tunnel might be under construction, but had previously found no sign of a breach there.

Riga answered on 11 August 2026 by launching Operation Vilkatis, or “Werewolf,” scheduled to run through the end of August. The government says the operation will improve intelligence-sharing among border guards, police, the military, and security services. It will also expand aerial surveillance and target networks that transport and shelter migrants after they cross.

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Latvia faced 87% of all crossing attempts along the EU-Belarus border by mid-July 2026

Belarus has weaponized migration since 2021, when EU governments accused Alyaksandr Lukashenka’s regime of bringing people from the Middle East and Africa to the bloc’s frontier in retaliation for sanctions. Belarus denied orchestrating the crisis.

Latvia reported more direct evidence in January 2026. Documents and phones taken from detained migrants linked Belarusian military and border personnel to organized crossings, according to Latvia’s armed forces and Border Guard.

By 13 July, Latvia had recorded 7,791 attempts over 111 consecutive days, 87% of all attempts along the EU-Belarus border by then. Lithuania later found an unfinished tunnel dug from Belarus. Latvia’s tunnel, unlike the unfinished Lithuanian passage, had already been used.

Russian forces have executed at least 345 Ukrainian soldiers who surrendered since the start of the full-scale war, Ukrainian Ombudsperson Dmytro Lubinets said at a press conference at Ukrinform.

The figure is the latest point on a documented and rising curve of a systematic war crime. Ukraine's prosecutors and international monitors have tracked these killings from 268 confirmed by July 2025 to over 330 by March 2026. Financial Times investigation found the executions appear to be systematic military policy directed from Russian command, with intercepted orders to "shoot prisoners on the spot."

The victims had surrendered

Lubinets described people killed after they had given up.

"It means that they laid down their weapons, came out with raised hands, lay on the ground, and showed they were no longer fighting," he said, and Russian soldiers examined them and confirmed they were unarmed.

Then the soldiers killed them.

"We have recorded cases where they fully demand that the clothes be removed. And after that, they force them to lie on the ground the same way, and shoot the Ukrainian soldiers at point-blank range," Lubinets added.

Killing a surrendered soldier is a war crime

Lubinets stressed the legal character of the act. The killing of soldiers who have surrendered is a distinct war crime, he said.

The prohibition is absolute. Under the Geneva Conventions, a soldier who lays down arms and surrenders is protected, and killing a prisoner of war is a grave breach of international law. Common Article 3 of the Third Geneva Convention prohibits "violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds" against those who have laid down their arms, with no battlefield circumstance that permits it, per the ICRC.

The count keeps rising and accountability lags

Ukraine documents each case for eventual prosecution, but most perpetrators are in Russia, beyond reach, and Russian courts and media have glorified the killings rather than punished them.

Ukraine has approved a new domestic interceptor and put it on the shelf for units to buy. Ukraine's Defense Ministry has codified the high-speed TAF Kolibri-i10 interceptor from TAF Industries, the company announced.

The approval adds one more weapon to Ukraine's fast-scaling interceptor arsenal and its state procurement pipeline. Ukraine now fields drone-hunters from dozens of makers to counter Russia's massed drone attacks. Units can order it directly through the state marketplace, the same DOT-Chain and Brave1 Market system that has turned battlefield-proven drones into off-the-shelf purchases.

The interceptor grew out of combat use

The Kolibri-i10 came from an improvised solution that worked. The idea grew from using the FPV drone Kolibri 10 to intercept Russian fixed-wing drones, and combat experience showed the approach was so effective that TAF built a new, specialized interceptor rather than modifying the existing model.

Its job is hunting Russian reconnaissance and strike drones. The Kolibri-i10 is designed to destroy Molniya, Orlan, and Zala drones, preventing attacks on Ukrainian positions and covering operations and rear-area sites.

"Field tests have already confirmed the effectiveness of this interceptor, so we have already begun scaling it," CEO Volodymyr Zinovskyi said.

The specs and the jam-resistance

The interceptor was rebuilt for speed and durability. It has a stronger frame, more powerful motors, faster propellers, and improved aerodynamics, reaching over 200 kilometers per hour, a range of up to 25 kilometers, more than 20 minutes aloft, and an altitude of up to 3,000 meters.

It is built to work under jamming. Manual control gives the operator full command at critical moments; digital day-and-night cameras enable operation in varied conditions. MilELRS firmware ensures stable operation in the presence of active electronic warfare. That jam-resistance is a recurring requirement for Ukrainian interceptors, since signal-dependent ones fail against the electronic warfare saturating the front.

The drone is available to order on Brave1 Market, priced at about $760 with a day camera and $1,550 with a night camera.

Ukraine struck a Russian drone-control relay station and two other military targets in occupied Crimea and the occupied south overnight on 12 August, its General Staff said. Explosions rolled across the peninsula through the night, Sevastopol declared repeated air-raid alerts, and towns across occupied Crimea lost power, according to Ukrainian monitoring channels and Russian occupation authorities. 

Russia launches its attack drones at Ukraine from sites inside Russia and across occupied territory every day, and relay stations let it steer those drones over long distances. Occupied Crimea is the logistical spine of Russia's hold on southern Ukraine, the funnel through which fuel, ammunition, and reinforcements reach the front, and its fixed airfields, power plants, and control stations sit within reach of Ukraine's growing long-range arsenal.

What the General Staff says was hit

Ukraine's Defense Forces struck three targets overnight, the General Staff reported. The first was a ground relay station used to control Geran and Gerbera attack drones near Olenivka in occupied Crimea. The others were a Russian repair unit near Mariupol in Donetsk Oblast and a staging point for an enemy drone unit near Marivka in Luhansk Oblast.

Hitting these sites weakens Russia's ability to command its attack drones, keep its military vehicles running, and sustain its units, the General Staff said. 

Euromaidan Press could not independently verify the strikes and damage.

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Russia flies these drones through a chain of ground repeaters, often mounted on mobile-operator towers or similar tall structures, boost the control signal so operators inside Russia can steer Geran and Gerbera drones over Ukraine from hundreds of kilometers away. Kyiv has dismantled similar relay networks before, including one Russia had built on towers and rooftops in Belarus.

Explosions and blackouts across occupied Crimea

Sevastopol declared three air-raid alerts, and the Russian-installed governor Mikhail Razvozhaev claimed Russian forces downed more than 30 drones, with the heaviest activity over the Balaklava district and no one hurt.

The Ukrainian monitoring channel Krymsky Veter reported explosions in Feodosia and Kerch, and drones close to the Kacha and Belbek airfields. Residents reported air-defense activity near major cities.

The channel said explosions sounded near the Balaklava thermal power plant, a mobile gas-turbine station, and a substation in Sevastopol. Power cut out across parts of occupied Crimea, leaving Sevastopol, Simferopol, and several more cities and districts without electricity.

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Sea drones, jet drones, and Neptune missiles hit one Russian port in a single night

After the attack, Krymsky Veter's monitoring group reported two large fires near Sevastopol, citing satellite data. One sat by a road junction near the village of Pervomaiske under Balaklava, where a bridge crosses the railway. The other burned near one of the local beaches. The group also logged an already-extinguished fire in the Inzhyr tract that had been reported the day before.

The same night, Ukraine also struck Russia's naval base at Novorossiysk, the fleet's main Black Sea base since late 2023.

Part of the campaign to isolate Crimea

The overnight strikes fit Ukraine's months-long effort to cut occupied Crimea off from the forces and supplies that sustain it. Ukrainian drones have severed road and rail links to the peninsula, left it rationing fuel under rolling blackouts, and pushed the campaign onto the sea by hunting the tankers that supply it. 

An American AI computer has turned up inside Russia's newest cruise missile. Ukrainian specialists has found an Nvidia Jetson micro-computer in Russia's new S-71 "Monokhrom" cruise missile, the Defense Ministry's Main Intelligence Directorate (HUR) reports.

S-71M “Monokhrom is the first fully autonomous long-range strike system designed to engage not only stationary but also moving targets. The system is designed to independently decide whether to destroy a target based on threat priorities. A significant problem for such autonomous systems is determining exactly what they are attacking — a military truck or a bus carrying children.

The discovery is the latest evidence that Russia's newest weapons still run on Western technology. Ukraine has already documented hundreds of foreign components in Russian missiles and drones reaching Moscow despite sanctions.

The AI chip is the standout find

The use of the Nvidia Jetson may indicate the application of AI technologies in the missile. This capability would let the weapon process visual or sensor data onboard to identify targets or navigate, functions that depend on exactly the kind of compact AI computing it provides.

The chip sits among many foreign parts. In total, 35 electronic components used by Russia in the missile were identified, making Monokhrom another Russian weapon built substantially from foreign electronics.

The same parts show up across Russia's arsenal

HUR's analysis linked the missile to Russia's wider weapons program. The identified components included parts of a passive radar seeker that Russia has begun installing on Geran-2 drones to detect and strike Ukrainian air-defense systems and radars.

Other finds tied the missile to Russia's newest strike systems. They included a Chinese Honpho TS130C-01 camera from the jet-powered Geran-4 drone and components of the active homing seeker of the Kh-47M2 Kinzhal aeroballistic missile.

The finding sharpens the sanctions case

HUR framed the discovery as an argument for tighter enforcement.

"The discovery of an Nvidia Jetson in a new Russian missile once again demonstrates the need to strengthen sanctions pressure and coordinate the efforts of the civilized world," HUR said.

HUR specialists and Ukrainian research institutions continue to study Russian weapons and trace the origin of their electronic components to strengthen measures to block them.

In an 11 August 2026 address, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy stated Russia is preparing a new mass mobilization drive after its parliamentary elections this fall, citing an assessment by Ukrainian military intelligence.

Moscow plans to mobilize several hundred thousand people by the end of 2026 and roughly the same number by the end of 2027, he said. The mobilization would come on top of continuing contract recruitment. 

Moscow has relied on contract soldiers and foreign troops to avoid the political cost of another compulsory draft. But Russia has struggled to recruit soldiers as quickly as it loses them. A mass call-up could replace losses and maintain offensive operations, although Ukrainian officials say it may initially do little more than offset battlefield losses.

Zelenskyy said internal Russian documents support the intelligence assessment. The documents have not been published. 

According to Zelenskyy, Putin plans to wait until after Russia’s parliamentary elections, then use the result to claim the Russians support continuing the war. He described the vote as an “imitation,” claiming every party allowed to compete opposes peace. Russia’s Supreme Court barred Yabloko, the country’s only officially registered party opposing the war, from contesting the election, Reuters reported.

Russia avoided a second draft since 2022. Now recruitment can't keep up

The Kremlin has largely avoided another compulsory call-up since its September 2022 mobilization triggered mass protests and an exodus of Russians. Instead, Moscow has used financial incentives and recruited prisoners and foreigners to replenish its forces in Ukraine.

In March 2026, then-Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrskyi said Russia aimed to recruit 409,000 troops during 2026 and form at least 11 divisions. Ukrainian intelligence then warned in July that Moscow could mobilize 500,000 people that fall. 

195,000 new contracts signed—but losses keep outpacing recruitment

Russia has struggled to meet those targets while covering battlefield losses. Ukraine said Moscow had failed to replace its losses for five consecutive months by April. By mid-July, Russia had signed 195,000 military contracts against a target of 204,500, while Ukraine’s Foreign Intelligence Service estimated its 2026 personnel losses at 196,700.

In his 11 August 2026 address, Zelenskyy claimed Russia is losing at least 30,000 personnel monthly, 60% of them killed, and that its force in Ukraine is gradually shrinking. The figures could not be independently verified.

Zelenskyy also said Putin expects the recruits and North Korean troops to prolong the war and expand Russian offensive capacity. The president stated that he had ordered Ukraine’s intelligence agencies and special services to make Moscow’s plans harder to carry out, but gave no details.

Ukraine wrecked more Russian vehicles in July than in any month of the war. Ukraine's Defense Forces destroyed and disabled 13,998 units of automotive equipment, the most for the entire war, Ukraine's Defense Ministry reported on 12 August.

The record fits a month of intensifying attrition against Russian logistics and air defense. In July, the Defense Forces continued methodical work to weaken Russia's air-defense capabilities and logistics, and the vehicle figure, the war's highest, reflects a campaign hitting the trucks that move Russian ammunition, fuel, and troops to the front.

The vehicle losses target Russian logistics

The record vehicle toll strikes at how Russia sustains its offensive. Trucks and transport vehicles are the arteries that carry ammunition, fuel, and supplies to Russian forces, and destroying nearly 14,000 in a month, largely with drones, degrades the logistics that keep the assaults moving.

The figure marks a scale of vehicle destruction not seen before. That the highest monthly total of the war came in July matches the wider picture of that month, which was also Russia's deadliest for personnel in 2026, as Ukraine's drones reached deeper and hit more.

Air defense and armor were hit hard too

Ukraine also struck at the systems that protect Russian forces. Ukrainian troops hit 68 units of Russian air defense systems in July, chipping away at the shield that guards Russian positions and rear areas.

Armor losses were also heavy. Ukraine destroyed and disabled 162 tanks, including 28 in a single day on 22 July, along with 204 armored combat vehicles and 2,016 artillery systems.

The count is Ukraine's own

The figures are Ukraine's tally and cannot be independently verified. The Defense Ministry reports Russian losses without detailing Ukraine's own.

Meanwhile, July was Ukraine’s deadliest month for civilians since 2022 due to Russia's ballistic missile attacks and lack of Patriot interceptors from allies.

Human Rights Watch is asking the US Congress to block Türkiye from transferring tens of thousands of decades-old cluster munitions to Ukraine. The State Department had earlier told Congress it is prepared to authorize the deal, which Ukraine wants to strengthen its firepower against the Russian invasion. 

What Türkiye wants to send

Türkiye has requested US permission to retransfer to Ukraine tens of thousands of cluster munition rockets, missiles, and artillery shells held in its stockpiles for decades. The package covers Türkiye's entire inventory of 12 M270 rocket launchers and three types of cluster munitions: 70 M39 ATACMS ballistic missiles, 2,524 M26 rockets, and 47,000 M509A1 203mm artillery shells, according to the State Department transmittal sheets.

The deal is valued at $256 million. Together, the rounds hold more than 10 million explosive bomblets, Human Rights Watch said, produced in part by Türkiye under US licenses first issued in 1987. The US removed the M509A1 shells from service in 1994, when the howitzers that fired them retired, according to HRW.

Cluster munitions scatter small bomblets across a wide area, and some fail to explode on impact, leaving hazards that can maim civilians long after fighting ends.

Ukraine, for its part, gave Washington written assurances not to fire earlier US-supplied cluster rounds in civilian-populated urban areas, and US officials said Kyiv had kept to its use constraints.

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What Washington says

A senior State Department official notified Congress that it is prepared to authorize the transfer, in documents printed in the Congressional Record on 6 August. Türkiye wants to shed older stock and focus its money on modern systems, the official said. Ukraine wants the munitions to bolster its fire support as it resists the invasion, the official added, noting that Ukraine already fields the same or nearly identical rounds. Congress can review the deal and pass a resolution of disapproval to block it.

Human Rights Watch argues the age and unreliability of the weapons make them a foreseeable hazard to civilians. Human Rights Watch deputy Washington director Nicole Widdersheim said the more-than-30-year-old munitions are inaccurate and prone to failure, and that their impact on civilians drove 112 countries to ban the weapon under the Convention on Cluster Munitions.

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The same group has documented Russia's cluster attacks since 2022

Human Rights Watch opposes the weapon for all sides and has tracked Russia's use of it throughout the war. It documented repeated Russian cluster strikes since 2022, called a Russian attack on Lyman a possible war crime, and logged further strikes on civilians in its World Report chapters on Ukraine.

In each case, the group called on Russia to stop firing the weapon. On the Türkiye deal, it is asking Congress for something more concrete — to kill the transfer before the munitions reach Ukraine.