Exclusives
 |
Ukraine's prosecutor general resigns as the watchdogs he was appointed to leash close in. He is the third powerful figure they've brought down. What looks like a government in crisis is a state where impunity at the top is ending. |
Military
Far from any front line: Russia has hit at least five of Ukraine's western border crossings with Moldova and NATO member since late August. During one strike, a drone flew into Moldova toward Romania and NATO jets scrambled.
"Neither pickup nor Bradley can enter": retreating Russians have mined sector where three Ukrainian oblasts meet so heavily that only ground robots can cross. On the junction of the Donetsk, Dnipropetrovsk and Zaporizhzhia oblasts, Russian forces lace their old positions and roads with mines and FPVs.
Ukraine's top commander scrapped more than 30 obsolete General Staff orders, freeing field commanders from paperwork built for different war. Many of the cancelled rules dated to the trench fighting of 2016-2020.
Ukraine reported hitting warships and an oil terminal in a Russian port city whose mayor claimed only falling debris. Orbital heat detection and eyewitness cameras placed more than one blaze across Novorossiysk overnight, in a port that carries a large share of Russia's seaborne export trade.
"In the best blockbusters you wouldn't see this": Ukrainian soldier on fighting off a Russian drone from a moving Humvee. The soldier commands a squad that hauls wrecked armor off the battlefield, and this run cost the crew their own vehicle and a walk out on foot through mined ground.
Intelligence and technology
"We found the key to the Russians": Ex-Defense Minister Fedorov returns from the US, planning Ukraine's largest venture fund for defense tech and war think tank. Fedorov credited contacts built around Palantir with helping raise it. No name, size, or date yet.
Osa air defense missile stocks are running low, but Ukraine has developed the RK-19 as a replacement. Ukraine's Osa launchers stay in the fight with a domestically built RK-19 interceptor as the Soviet 9M33 stock runs down.
Russia's new ballistic missile could reach western Ukraine—and it may be tested there within months. Russia is building more ballistic missiles as well as longer-ranged ones, part of a push to tip Ukraine into a social and economic crisis, Kyiv's military intelligence says.
20% to 70%: Ukraine's National Guard rewired its drone war around cables. Fiber-optic drones trail a cable with no signal to jam—and now account for 70% of the drones the National Guard uses, up from about a fifth.
1,000 Patriot missiles arrive too late for this winter, so Ukraine asked the Ramstein arms coalition to open its warehouses. The swap Kyiv proposed would move rounds out of allied warehouses immediately and hand those governments newer replacements once its own orders come through.
Can Ukraine's newly shown Koral become home-built answer to Patriot? Expert evaluates system displayed at Poland's MSPO expo. The new missile looks a tier below the newest Patriot and has yet to prove it can stop Russian ballistics.
International
Norway sends 69 Russians home without their ship, held for Ukraine. The vessel stays tied up in a Russian settlement on Svalbard while Kyiv's state gas company works to collect a compensation award.
Humanitarian and social impact
Mines and unexploded munitions have harmed 1,688 civilians since Russia's full-scale invasion, Ukraine says. Farmers were the worst-hit occupation, in a country the UN's mine action service calls the most heavily contaminated since the Second World War.
Political and legal developments
Ukraine moves to restore anti-money-laundering safeguard that it quietly weakened, alarming EU and IMF. The IMF said the previous version pulled Ukraine out of global anti-money-laundering standards.
New developments
Romania trailed a Russian agent for seven months—then revealed what he was filming. Romania watched a man filming NATO bases and Ukraine's giant Antonov cargo planes for months.
A drone nearly hit Zelenskyy's plane taking off from Moldova on his way to a king's funeral, Norway's PM says. Zelenskyy arrived in Oslo having spent much of the night on the phone about strikes on his own country.
Read our earlier daily review here.
