Putin’s forces suffering 1,000 daily casualties as Zelensky praises Kursk attack

A Russian attack killed at least five civilians and wounded five others on Saturday in the eastern Ukrainian town of Kostiantynivka, a regional governor said.

Vadym Filashkin, governor of the Donetsk region, said rescuers and police were working at the scene of the attack, which took place early on Saturday.

“I urge you all again: take care of yourselves, evacuate,” Filashkin wrote on the Telegram messaging app, without giving further details about the attack.

Kostiantynivka is located close to the active combat zone in Donetsk, where Russian forces have been inching forward for months.

The Russian advance quickened in recent weeks as Moscow’s troops are mounting relentless attacks in the direction of the strategic logistics hub of Pokrovsk.

Russia and Ukraine are set to exchange 115 prisoners on Saturday following mediation from the United Arab Emirates, an Emirati official has told Reuters

It would be the first such prisoner swap between the countries since the Ukrainian military launched its offensive inside Russia on 6 August.

Ukraine‘s President Volodymyr Zelensky has signed a law banning Moscow-linked religious organisations, the parliament website said on Saturday.

The bill approved by parliament earlier this month created the legal tools for the government to ban activities of a Russia-linked branch of the Orthodox church and paved the way for a historic rupture with an institution that Kyiv has accused of complicity in Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

He also signed a law on Ukraine ratifying the Rome Statute, allowing the country to join the International Criminal Court (ICC).

The law published on the parliament’s website was also a key to Ukraine’s efforts to move closer to the European Union.

The EU’s diplomatic service has called on member states to better adapt a military training mission for Ukraine to Kyiv’s needs but stopped short of recommending the bloc send military instructors to the war-torn country, German weekly Welt am Sonntag reported on Saturday.

The EUMAM mission, launched in November 2022, has trained some 60,000 Ukrainian troops mainly in Poland and Germany and is set to be extended by another two years once the current mandate runs out in mid-November.

“It is imperative to train AFU (Ukraine) soldiers on the same equipment that they will use later in combat,” the report cited a review of the mission by the EU’s diplomatic service as saying, adding that EU defence ministers would discuss the topic next week.

The EU did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the review, which has also been seen by Reuters.

It said that a shortage of Soviet-style equipment was one of the challenges of the current training in the EU.

Kyiv asked the EU in May to conduct some training on Ukrainian soil but member states are divided with sceptics warning that the bloc could be drawn into the war and raising doubts about Kyiv’s ability to protect training sites against Russian attacks given its severe shortage of air defences.

Russia has declared a state of emergency in part of the Voronezh region bordering Ukraine after an overnight drone attack, local governor Alexander Gusev said in his Telegram channel.

According to Gusev, Russian forces intercepted five drones. Falling debris ignited a fire, leading to the detonation of explosive materials.

The incident damaged no civilian buildings, but prompted authorities to impose emergency measures in three settlements in the Ostrogozhsky district and evacuate 200 people, he said.

Defence Secretary John Healey has said “Britain is united for Ukraine” to mark Ukrainian Independence Day.

“On their Independence Day, we salute the fearless resolve of the Ukrainian people. They fight for freedoms that we must never take for granted”, he said in a statement on X.

“Ukraine has no firmer friend than the UK and we will stand with them for as long as it takes. Britain is united for Ukraine.”