Russian propagandists filmed the target for Ukraine themselves. Operators of Ukraine's 422nd Separate Unmanned Systems Regiment "Luftwaffe", part of the 17th Army Corps, have destroyed a Russian logistics hub that occupation forces had set up inside a former Epicentr hardware store in occupied Melitopol, regiment commander Major Mykola Kolesnyk told Army TV.

Melitopol sits on Russia's land corridor to occupied Crimea. The city was occupied on the second day of Russia's full-scale war in 2022.

Russian occupation forces had moved a large consignment of generators and other equipment into the building for military use. Russian state television broadcast footage of the delivery.

Propaganda footage exposed the shipment

The video gave the regiment its confirmation. Russian channels posted footage showing many generators that had not been there before, Kolesnyk said, that had been brought in deliberately.

"The hub was used, above all, to supply the people fighting directly against us, as their forward positions are not far from there. Calling it a civilian facility would be a considerable stretch, because this really was a hub whose services were used directly by Russian troops," Kolesnyk explained.

Operators tracked the target before striking

The regiment watched the site before hitting it, and no civilian was harmed, according to Kolesnyk. He set the operation against the Russian strike on Kryvyi Rih on 21 August, when two waves of drones, half an hour apart, killed 16 people and injured 130, including 23 children.

The UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine visited the site and a hospital and said the shopping center was operational and full of civilians when it was struck, and that the attack appears to breach international humanitarian law.

Generators feed the drone war

The hub's destruction will narrow Russian capacity to equip shelters, Kolesnyk said. The generators mattered for a more specific reason.

"A generator is what makes it possible to charge batteries for the unmanned component that then flies at us. So it is an absolutely legitimate target, and I am sure we will not stop here," the commander added.

Russia will introduce two editions of a new regional history textbook series in occupied Ukrainian schools on 1 September 2026. The books present the occupied Ukrainian regions as historically Russian, MOST, a Kherson-based outlet, reported on 10 August.

The new textbooks bring Russia's campaign to erase Ukrainian identity into occupied classrooms, where authorities remove Ukrainian from curricula and replace lessons with Russian ideology, military drills, and firing-range visits. Moscow's Russification campaign extends beyond schools to efforts to change the demographics of occupied Ukrainian territory and re-educate forcibly transferred Ukrainian children.

The new textbook series, entitled "History of Our Region: Donbas and Novorossiya," comprises one edition for grade 5 and another for grades 6–7. The course attached to the books will be compulsory throughout Russia's so-called "new regions," according to the Ukrainian human rights center ZMINA.

"Novorossiya" is an imperial term Moscow uses to claim southern and eastern Ukraine. 

Russia's Education Ministry calls the course "objective" and part of a "unified history of Russia," Meduza reports. Minister Sergei Kravtsov claimed it contains "objective information, rather than the lies that appeared in Ukrainian textbooks."

Replacing the curriculum, then the population

The "Novorossiya" textbook forms part of a broader Kremlin campaign to Russify occupied Ukraine's education, culture, and demographics. 

Since occupying Melitopol, Russian authorities have systematically replaced Ukrainian curricula and textbooks. Older Russian textbooks, issued after Moscow's full-scale war, already depicted occupied Melitopol as part of Russia. 

A 2025 Kremlin strategy requires occupied regions to enter Russia's educational, cultural, and information space. The policy also sets a nationwide target for “All-Russian civic identity” to reach at least 95% by 2036.

35,000 Ukrainian children still missing

Meanwhile, experts estimate that about 35,000 Ukrainian children remain missing and are likely held in Russia or Russian-occupied territory. Yale's Humanitarian Research Lab identified at least 210 facilities used to hold children from Ukraine. The lab found that at least 130 facilities subjected Ukrainian children to pro-Russian cultural, patriotic, or military programs. 

One case shows where such indoctrination can lead. Once listed as missing under occupation, Ukrainian boy Oleksandr Mustiatse later appeared online in a Russian uniform bearing the “Z” invasion symbol, Save Ukraine reported.